Shadow Flight (1990) (15 page)

Steve turned to the hotel driver. "Hang on, we'll be just a couple of seconds."

"Take your time, Mister Wickham," the easygoing Australian said, leaning against the front fender.

Steve and Becky trotted down to the waiting catamaran, apolo-_ gized to the skipper and their fellow passengers, retrieved the rented diving gear, then hurried back to the Sheraton's passenger shuttle.

"Honey, I have to go back," Steve said, lowering his voice when the driver opened his door to get in. "Some kind of crisis at the agency."

"You've got to be kidding," Becky responded as the shuttle van accelerated toward the hotel.

"Becky, I know this isn't fair to you, but something very important--really big--has happened. I honestly don't know the particulars, but it's a category one panic."

"Steve, can't they assign someone else? You're on vacation--a well-deserved vacation I might add--and we've only been here three days."

Steve placed his hand on Becky's thigh and patted her in an affectionate manner. "Hey, kiddo, I know you're upset, but it isn't as simple as it sounds."

Becky raised Steve's hand and held it between hers. "I'm not upset with you, Steve. It just seems that every time we arrange anything together . . ."

"I know," Steve responded, "and I can only apologize."

Becky turned slightly to look directly into Steve's sparkling green eyes. "What could be so important that you have to cancel your vacation and race back to Langley?"

Steve remained quiet a moment, selecting his words carefully. "Stephen," Becky said, tilting her head slightly, "you're holding something back, aren't you?"

"Could we give this a rest," Steve said in a hushed whisper, "until we get to our room?"

Becky paused, giving her fiance a stern but understanding look. "Yes, Clark Kent. Just one thing."

"I know," Steve replied, trying to suppress a grin.

"Well, why not?" Becky asked in a pleasant manner. "After risking your life in the Marine Corps and damn near getting killed last year in Russia . . . Steve, taking an administrative positio
n i
sn't the end of the world. You're an excellent manager and leader."

Becky stopped, knowing that this was not the time to discuss her ongoing concern about Steve's profession. "I love you," she said, still clutching his hand, "and I want to spend a long, happy life with you."

Steve Wickham grinned again, revealing his even, white teeth. "Sitting together in our rocking chairs, staring out across the lake?"

"That's right," Becky chuckled, nudging her husband-to-be with her shoulder.

The van stopped at the entrance to the hotel. Steve tipped the driver and followed Becky to their room. Closing the coral pink door of their suite, Steve turned to his fiance. "Honey, do you want to stay over for a couple of days?"

Becky looked at Steve with a quizzical expression. "No. I want to be with you. We'll go back together and I can spend some time in Washington."

Steve put up his hand, indicating that he needed to explain the situation. "Becky, it isn't quite that easy. I won't be going back on the airline, and . . . I won't be going to Langley."

Becky sat down on the floral print couch and crossed her slender legs. "Okay, Steve, out with it."

Steve walked to the small refrigerator and grabbed a can of Foster's lager. "Care for anything?"

"Yes," Becky replied, pulling a pillow toward her. "An explanation."

Steve popped the top and sat down in a chair across from Becky. "Honey, you don't hold a clearance, but I'm going to tell you as much as I can." Becky nodded, curling her shapely legs under her thin cover-up.

Steve swallowed a quick mouthful of the cold brew. "The Navy is sending a fighter--an F-14 Tomcat--to pick me up and boom me to Key West, Florida.* That's all I know right now, honestly."

"Steve," Becky hesitated, "fighter planes don't have the ability to fly nonstop from Australia to Florida."

"Honey," Steve responded, sipping his Foster's, "the Navy is going to aerial refuel the Tomcat all the way across."

"I don't like this, Steve," Becky said, a frown on her attractive face. "The agency doesn't fly CIA agents halfway around the world in a fighter plane if it isn't some kind of crisis."

The former marine corps infantry captain placed his aluminum can on the end table, hesitated a brief second, then leaned forward. "Becky, I haven't explained to you what I'm doing at the present time . . . in the agency."

Becky stood, walked to the refrigerator, and took out a bottle of chilled champagne. "I was saving this for tonight, but I believe now would be an appropriate time to open it. Please go on."

Steve cleared his throat quietly. "I was reassigned to Clandestine Ops after I came back from recuperative leave."

"Clandestine Ops," Becky repeated, popping the cork out of the cold bottle. "That sounds like a nice, safe, long-term career position."

Steve could see the concern on Becky's face. Of all the women he had known in his life, Rebecca Marchand was the first who had made him have second thoughts about marriage and his CIA career. He put his arms around his future wife, then placed her head on his shoulder. "Honey, I promise we'll talk about alternatives when I get home, okay?"

"I'll bet you tell that to all the girls," Becky replied, smiling slightly. "How long until they pick you up?"

Steve looked at his watch. "About two hours. A Tomcat is en route from Cubi Point--it was already airborne when I got the message."

"Well," Becky said as she untied her cover-up and let it drop to the floor, "let's enjoy the time we have."

Chapter
Nine

LANGLEY, VIRGINIA

Norman Lasharr dropped his linen napkin on his dinner tray, pushed aside the plate holding the remains of his swordfish steak, then ran a rough hand over his white crew cut. "It would damn sure figure," Lasharr said to Hampton B. Milligan, director of CIA Clandestine Operations.

"Yes, sir," Milligan responded, avoiding the gaze of David Ridgefield. "At least we found him."

Ridgefield placed his tray aside and wiped his mouth. "Hamp, in the future--especially where Mister Wickham is concerned--have your people leave an address and phone number where they can be reached in an emergency."

"I've taken care of it, sir," the West Point graduate replied, chagrined. The bags under Milligan's eyes made him look older than his forty-seven years.

Lasharr swallowed the last of his tea. "When will they have Wickham in Key West?"

Milligan, a former Green Beret, looked the CIA director straight in the eyes. "They should be airborne fairly soon, generalCINCPAC estimates the aircraft will arrive at Key West between seven and eight tomorrow morning."

"Good," Lasharr replied as he extracted a sheaf of papers from his battered leather briefcase. "Hamp, I want you on the way to Key West as soon as we conclude this brief."

"Yes, sir," Milligan answered tersely. "I've got a C-20 waiting at Andrews."

Lasharr did not acknowledge.

"The vice president," Lasharr said, leafing through his papers, "and Secretary Kerchner are in battery. They made one thing very clear this afternoon. Results--now, whatever we have to do to accomplish the objective."

"Any clues, general?" Ridgefield asked.

Lasharr, unusually exasperated, studied his neatly printed remarks. "We have too many troops stirring this gumbo, but here's the current status."

The director put on his glasses and repositioned himself in his high-backed chair. "Satellite and reconnaissance photos were negative. The TR-1 made three passes, including a fairly low pass. The recon driver did a great job and the sky was crystal clear, but there wasn't anything that appeared unusual."

Ridgefield wrote himself a reminder, then looked up at his boss. "General, how do you plan to employ Wickham?"

"That depends," Lasharr replied, underlining one of his remarks, "on whether we receive any information from RAINDANCE before we introduce Wickham to Cuba."

"Excuse me, general," Ridgefield said with a surprised look, "but I thought we were going with the reconnoiter operation as expeditiously as possible."

Lasharr rolled his eyes to look at his deputy. "That's correct, Dave, but the vice president has really focused on the western end of the island."

"Any particular reason," Ridgefield asked, "or just intuition?"

Lasharr removed his military-style glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose gently. "Seems as if a Customs aircraft--one of our antidrug airborne early warning planes--witnessed something very unusual last night off the northwestern coast of Cuba."

Milligan's curiosity was aroused. "Oh?"

"They relayed the incident," Lasharr continued, placing his glasses back on, "through the FAA, and the White House had the story shortly thereafter."

"What did the Customs people see?" Ridgefield asked, intrigued by the possibility that the Stealth had been involved.

Lasharr looked at Milligan, then back to Ridgefield. "They witnessed four MiGs chase a low, slow-flying aircraft out to sea, where a melee occurred. One MiG apparently went into the drink, along with the small aircraft. The Customs crew watched a helicopter hover over the general area where the slow airplane went down, then return to shore."

"That's rather strange," Milligan responded. "Where did the chopper land?"

"Don't know," Lasharr answered. "The Customs folks lost it in ground clutter. However, they stated that it didn't appear to be returning to the base where the flight originated."

Ridgefield stood and walked to the lighted wall map displaying the locations of CIA station chiefs. "Does the vice president think the incident is related to the B-2 disappearance?"

"Yes," Lasharr answered, looking at the island of Cuba on the map. "So does Secretary Kerchner."

"What do you think, general?" Ridgefield asked as he walked back to his chair.

"It does seem mighty unusual," Lasharr answered, then thought a moment. "The Cubans wouldn't send four MiGs after a drug smuggler. Only two reasonable answers come to mind. Either an important person was trying to get away, or our B-2 pilots were attempting to escape-if we follow the theory that the bomber is in Cuba."

Ridgefield sat down. "Well, we're going to have to depend on Wickham to supply the answer."

"General," Milligan said, "back to RAINDANCE, if you don't mind, sir."

"Sure, Hamp," Lasharr responded pleasantly.

Milligan shifted slightly. "Dave gave me a composite brief on RAINDANCE when I accepted this assignment, but frankly, sir, I'm not clear about the operation. We actually have a source in the Soviet bureaucracy?"

"Two sources," Lasharr answered, nodding slightly to Ridgefield. "Dave, fill Hamp in on RAINDANCE."

"Yes, sir," Ridgefield replied, then faced the surprised Clandestine Operations director. "Hamp, there are a few things that have been buried very deep in the past couple of years. Only a few people in the White House, along with General Lasharr and myself, know about them."

"But," Milligan paused, "I'm the director of Clandestine Operations."

"You've been in this game long enough," Lasharr interjected, "to know some things aren't brought to the surface unless it's absolutely necessary."

Milligan remained silent, agreeing with a nod of his head. He knew the director's penchant for security.

"As the general said," Ridgefield continued, "we have two intelligence sources within the Kremlin military and civilian bureaucracies. One is a rather low-echelon member of the administrative staff to the first deputy chairman of the Council of Ministers."

The deputy director waited a moment, allowing Milligan time to absorb the information. "The other source is a lieutenant general, code name RAINDANCE, on the staff of Troops of Air Defense. He's a recent graduate of the Voroshilov General Staff Academy."

Lasharr rose from his chair, stacked his papers neatly, then turned to his deputy and the director of Clandestine Operations. "Let's take a real detailed look at the Cuba enlargement, then see if we can answer some what-ifs."

CAIRNS, QUEENSLAND

Steve Wickham, feeling uncomfortable in the tight-fitting torso harness, looked out of the right side of the F-14D's rear canopy. He could see Becky standing in the shade next to the Qantas jumbo jet. She was shielding her eyes with one hand and waving with the other.

"Ready back there?" asked Lt. Comdr. Reed Sandoline, swinging the big Grumman Tomcat around to line up with the runway.

"Yeah," Wickham responded absently as he waved back to the beautiful young woman dressed in baggy tropical tans. "I'm ready."

Sandoline held the brakes and advanced the power tc 60 percent. He ran through one final check, confident that the Fox 14 was ready to fly.

"Navy Leadfoot One Zero Seven, Cairns tower, cleared for takeoff. After lift-off, cleared on course, unrestricted climb."

"Roger," the experienced fighter pilot radioed, "we'll do all that."

Wickham was still craning his neck for a last glimpse of Becky when Sandoline shoved the twin throttles all the way forward. "Navy Leadfoot rolling."