Red Heat (30 page)

She leveled him a gaze. “I doubt he’d agree to betray his country.”

“It’s not like they deserve his loyalty. They’ve pretty much thrown him to the wolves.”

It was true. But Julie knew how honorable Nikolai was.

“You don’t know until you ask him,” Clint persisted.

“I suppose.”

“The thing is . . .”

She’d known there would be a catch. “Yes?”

“We’d need something from you in return.”

She set her jaw. “Me?”

“It would only be fair. For bringing Romanov over for you.”

Yeah, like
she
would be the one benefiting most from any of that. And gee, one guess what they’d want from her in exchange. “You’re kidding, right?” she ground out. “You must think I’m a complete idiot.”

“No,” he said. “I think you’re a woman in love.”

“Same thing,” she muttered and dropped back onto her chair. “But you can forget it. I have every intention of fulfilling my mission.”

“The plans on that storage card are critical to our nation’s defense,” Clint said earnestly. “Believe me, CIA isn’t going to keep them secret from the navy.”

“I realize that,” she conceded.

“So what difference does it make who actually brings it in? I’ll make sure you get credit for finding and retrieving it, and Nikolai for his cooperation.”

Her brain couldn’t help but fantasize. She had to admit the offer was tempting. Very tempting.

Well. Except for one thing.

“The whole question is moot,” she said, tamping down the hurt that swirled inside her at the bitter reality. “Nikolai isn’t interested in a long-term relationship. No way will he want to move to the States. Not for me, anyway.”

Clint shot her a look of incredulity. “What universe are you living in?”

“The real one,” she said, a pang of regret cramping her insides. “Spies working for opposing sides only live happily ever after in the movies.”

Just ask her father.

Or Nikolai’s mother.

Clint’s brows flicked up at Julie. “Anyone ever mention to you that the Cold War is over?”

“Yeah, as a matter of fact,” Julie murmured, a chill tinkling down her spine like out-of-tune piano keys. “Nikolai said exactly the same thing the first day we met.” The day he’d gotten orders from the FSB to seduce her into giving up her mission.

Was Clint doing the same thing, just using different bait? Oh, wait. The same bait, just in a different way.

Wow. Did these men think
all
women were so damn gullible, or just her?

Hell. The Cold War might be over, but sexpionage was alive and well. And it always seemed to be women who paid the price.

Just then
Kvartirmyeister
Kresney ducked through the watertight door and reported to the captain, then frowned when he received his instructions. Apparently he still wasn’t convinced of Clint’s innocence.

Misha gave Clint a curt signal to get moving. Clint tossed her a wry smile and said over his shoulder as he followed the quartermaster out of the central post, “There, you see? Great minds think alike.”

Yeah, if you were a Neanderthal.

“Sorry, Walker. No deal,” she called after him. “So go do something useful with yourself and kill that goddamn UUV.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Clint’s voice floated back after he’d disappeared from view.

Nikolai suppressed his irritation as he walked over to Julie. “What was that all about?” he asked. She and Walker had been having an intense conversation in hushed tones and he wanted to know the subject.

“Nothing.”

“Really.” He didn’t even try to hide the sarcasm.

Her lips thinned in a nose sigh. “Fine. He offered to have the navy invite you to move to the United States if I gave him the SD card in exchange. I told him you wouldn’t be interested.”

Nikolai was momentarily stiff with shock. Yes, about her denial, but mostly about Walker’s offer in the first place.
The U.S. Navy would bring him to America?
“What makes you think I wouldn’t be interested?” he asked, recovering.

She glanced up at him in patent disbelief. “Are you saying you would?”

He was still too taken aback to know how he would feel about that, other than his initial knee-jerk inner dialogue—
No way in hell
—followed swiftly by
Jesus, I wouldn’t have to give her up.

Aloud he said, “What I would have liked is to answer for myself.”

Her cheeks flushed lightly. “Sorry. I just assumed—”

He needed to change the subject before he said something stupid. Something like, “Yes! Yes! Yes!”

“You seem to be confiding in Walker a lot.” He did his best not to sound petulant. Not sure he succeeded.

Her tongue peeked out and swiped over her lower lip. “Nikolai,” she began, but thankfully she was interrupted when Walker appeared back at the door.

“Skipper,” Walker called from the door, “it occurred to me that you might try to scrape that sucker off our butt by going too deep for it. The max depth on most UUVs of this type is either two or three hundred meters, or somewhere in between. You could try diving below two hundred and see if it can follow.”

Now there was an interesting idea. Nikolai considered. And now that he thought about it, the Chinese had only launched their UUV after
Ostrov
had come up from the deep submersion drill. Afterthought . . . or necessity?

“What’s the max depth of your UUVs?” he asked Walker.

Walker grinned. “Four hundred meters.” With that, he disappeared again.

Nikolai strode over to Danya Petrov, raising the circuit headphones to his ears. “Get me
Praporshchik
Selnikov.”

“
Da, Kapitan
.”

When Yasha came on the line, Nikolai asked, “How are the leaks holding up?”

“Well, we haven’t drowned yet,” his chief engineer responded. “But we’re getting mighty low on chewing gum and duct tape.”

Nikolai smiled despite himself. “Let me know when you run out. Meanwhile, can we push her down to three hundred meters?”

Yasha started to cough loudly. “You got a death wish, boy?”

Nikolai told him what Walker had suggested.

“Shit, we barely made it down to
two
hundred before the welds started splitting,” Yasha reminded him gruffly. “Three hundred will pop the rivets for sure.”

“Hell, let’s give it a shot,
Praporshchik
. We can come right up again if things get hairy.”

“That’s pretty much a guarantee,” Yasha grumbled.

“Do your best, Yasha.” Nikolai tore off the headphones. “Nav! Find me a blasted canyon!”

Twenty minutes later, they were hovering just under the lip of the Aleutian Trench at two hundred thirty-five meters, hiding from the 093’s aggressive sonar in a narrow natural depression between three boxy seamounts.

They hadn’t lost the UUV at two hundred meters as they’d hoped. They could still hear it swimming around, pinging away at the seabed playing hunt and peck. It was, however, only making quick forays below that depth, so Nikolai figured they were very close to its limit.

“Two-four-zero meters,” Borovsky announced from the fathometer.

Nikolai planned to go as deep as he dared and hunker down for the time it would take for Walker to launch one of his UUVs and rid them for good of the persistent pest.

So far,
Ostrov
’s integrity had held up fairly well. Just two new leaks, both quickly sealed. Only the old weld break above the battery compartment was giving Yasha trouble, springing open anew no matter what kind of repairs and mechanical wizardry the chief engineer threw at it.

“It’s like someone used fucking toothpaste to weld it,” Yasha complained bitterly. “The whole fucking space is awash in sea spray. The men are working in fucking foul weather gear.”

“Just make sure the batteries are protected,” Nikolai said unnecessarily. “Can your men hold out for another hour or so?”

“We’ll give it our best,
Kapitan
.”

He figured that was about how long it would be before Walker could make good on his plan.

Assuming he intended to do so. Nikolai was still not one hundred percent convinced of Walker’s intentions. With his idea he’d effectively driven
Ostrov
back into the deep, where at any second the ill-maintained sub could conceivably fall apart and implode. But Nikolai had to trust him, because, as Julie pointed out, Walker would also suffer any bad consequences. The American didn’t seem ready to die just yet.

“Two-five-zero meters,” Borovsky announced, sweating nervously forty-five minutes later.

Julie joined Nikolai at the repeater and looked on breathlessly as Walker finally launched the UUV. The entire central post watch stood behind them, glued to the sight of the tiny blip as it shot away from
Ostrov
’s torpedo tube.

“Here goes nothing,” she murmured.

The moment the tubes were flooded, their hiding place had been exposed, of course. But Nikolai and the nav had already mapped out their escape route, through a feature-filled side canyon at two hundred sixty meters that cut back toward Attu Island.

He waited impatiently until the UUV was well away, then called to the OOD, “Get us out of here, Mr. Zubkin.”

He took the sub into a slow downward dive, heading for the canyon. Holding his breath as they went.

Moments later Danya called out, “Sir! We have a contact. Not the 093. A different signature. Something above the surface.” Nikolai spun his attention to the radioman, who listened intently for a moment on the headphones. “Sonar says it’s a Chinese Y-8MPA aircraft. Flying a loose pattern over the area. Range closing fast.”

Чертов ад.

“This is crazy,” he muttered. “Now they’re throwing
aircraft
at us?”

Julie’s worried gaze shot to his. “Is that bad?”

It could be. Very bad. “Usually there’s only one reason aircraft get involved in enemy sub hunts: to drop nasty things in the water. Things like sonobuoys, explosive locators, or depth charges.”

“Depth charges?”
Her eyes rounded.

He rubbed a hand over his mouth. “It’s undoubtedly just another tease. We have to believe this is still a peaceful encounter,” he reassured her. Though he was beginning to wonder. “But they’re playing real dirty.”

That was when all hell broke loose below.

“Kapitan!”
Danya shouted. “Mr. Walker reports flooding in the torpedo room! And
Praporshchik
Selnikov is yelling they can’t control the leaking over the battery compartment. It’s getting worse. He politely suggests we get ourselves up to a less precarious depth.”

Nikolai slammed on his earphones. “Torpedo room, conn. Walker, will the flooding effect the UUV sortie?”

“No, we’re good, Skipper,” came the reply over the sound of shouting and spraying water. “The crew is getting it under control.”

“How long before the enemy UUV is neutralized?”

There was static and more shouts and cursing in the background. “The fucker’s hightailing it,” Walker said over the noise. “It could be a while if I have to chase him down.”

Nikolai swore under his breath. “The boat’s starting to fall apart, Walker. I’ll need to bring her depth up. Fast. What’s your operating range?”

“Do what you have to do. I’ll manage somehow.”

“Keep me informed.” He switched circuits. “Engineering, conn. Yasha, what’s going on down there?”

“We’re wading in half a meter of water,
Kapitan
. I’m afraid the—” Suddenly alarms started to wail both in the central post and over the circuit. The overhead lights and the control monitors all went out, leaving them in darkness for a few seconds before the red battle lanterns flickered on. Yasha let loose a string of obscenities. “We have a battery short, sir! I have to—”

“Go.”

Nikolai made the emergency announcement over the 1MC and glanced over at Julie. When things erupted, she’d backed away from the main console, returning to her seat. She stood gripping the back of it, looking pale even in the red glow. He fought the instinct to go to her and fold her in his arms. “Don’t worry,” he called to her. “Just a glitch with the batteries.”

He didn’t think she believed him, but she nodded and stayed put.

Yasha’s harried voice came over the sound-powered phones. “Sir, we managed to stop the sparking before it caught fire.”

Thank God
. “Damage report?”

“We’re still assessing, but we’ve lost the forward batteries until we can isolate the affected circuits and get the short repaired.”

Losing the batteries was bad, but a fire would have been far worse. Fire on a submarine was one of the worst disasters imaginable. There was nowhere for the heat, smoke, and toxic gases to go other than straight into everyone’s lungs.

“How long?” Nikolai asked, his gaze running over the darkened monitors.

“A couple of hours at least.”

So much for playing games with the 093.

With only the after battery array intact, all nonessential equipment would have to be shut off. They still had power, but it wasn’t enough to drive the ship through the water. Not at any speed.

And if the rest of the batteries failed . . .

Nyet
. Best not even go there.

Luckily, they didn’t need full power to reach the surface. Once there, they’d have the diesels to run on. He turned to Borovsky. “Dive, take us up to periscope depth. Slow and steady. Bearing zero-six-five.”

“Attu Island,
Kapitan
?”

“As fun as this party’s been, it’s time to bail.” He had a feeling they’d be late picking up the scientists.

Assuming they made it back in one piece.

Julie was still watching him anxiously. As he strode over to her, the regular lights came back on. Yasha was a miracle worker.

“Are we in trouble yet?” Julie asked, fear sanding her voice as she looked around at the men’s faces.

“We’ve lost some of the battery power,” Nikolai told her. “Yasha is fixing them now. We’re heading for the surface so we can use the diesel engines. We’ll be fine.”

“What about the aircraft?”

“Still out there.” He gripped her shoulders and urged her down into the seat. “Liesha, my men are all busy. Can you do something for me?”

“Of course.”

“I need you to sit here and watch the UUVs on the repeater. Let me know the instant one of them disappears. Preferably theirs, if you can arrange it.”

“Okay, but—”

“We’re heading back to Attu now,
milaya moya
, but I won’t lie, it could be a bumpy ride.”

She swallowed heavily, her pretty face drawn with worry. “Isn’t there anything else I can do to help?”

He smiled dryly before slipping on his headset again. “You might practice saying ‘We surrender’ in Mandarin.”

He was kidding.

Julie knew Nikolai was making a joke, trying to lighten things up so she wouldn’t worry. But she understood misdirection when she heard it. The entire crew had gone all grim and deadly serious. The tension in the central post was so thick you’d need a buzz saw to cut it.

She’d picked up enough Russian words over the past few days to be able to recognize a few, especially the submarine lingo, since it was often similar to the English words. So she knew the hull was leaking like a sieve and there was something bad happening with the batteries. Nikolai had ordered
Starpom
Varnas to the lower deck to help
Praporshchik
Selnikov, and the rest of the crew was rushing back and forth between compartments dealing with a bevy of emergencies.

It was worse than a nightmare. On the outside Julie was determinedly putting on a brave face, but inside she was barely holding herself together. She couldn’t get Josh’s vivid image of rivets popping all over the sub out of her mind. Lord, she couldn’t believe the crew could function so well under such insane pressure. When the lights had gone out earlier, she’d nearly fainted, but they’d barely paused in their work.

She was a complete wreck. Which was probably why Nikolai had assigned her the obviously unnecessary duty of UUV lookout.

Nevertheless, she was grateful. The task gave her something to focus on besides her own growing terror.

Anxiously, she watched the two gnatlike blips chase and circle each other around the monitor, suddenly terribly unsure of whether killing the Chinese UUV was such a great idea. It was no doubt a very expensive piece of equipment. It might make the 093 angry. Angry enough for reprisals? In its present state, she didn’t know if
Ostrov
could take much more punishment.

She also wondered if any of the disasters on board were the work of the enemy agent.

Honestly? She didn’t think so. The leaks were happening because of long-term neglect on the part of the Russian navy, and the electrical shorts had been caused by the leaks. Still. Something just didn’t feel right about all this happening at once.

On the monitor, suddenly one of the blips winked off. It didn’t come back on.

She blinked, then jumped up excitedly. “Nikolai, he got it! Walker zapped the UUV! It’s gone!”

A few seconds later, Walker’s triumphant voice came over the 1MC and announced, “
Ostrov
scores one, Shang class zero. Sortie complete.”

After a moment’s delay for translation, a cheer went up all along the boat.

Nikolai came over and gave her a quick hug, kissing the top of her head. “Okay. So I may not like the guy, but I’m getting more convinced he’s on our side.”