Daniel's Christmas Page 13

  The crew chiefs, Tim and John, settled in the forward crew cabin right behind the entry door as if seeking privacy from the rear cabin, but actually guarding against any curiosity by the flight crew.

  As Daniel followed the group last up the fold-down steps, a gust of freezing rain found its way down his neck.

  Beale hit the door-close switch and Daniel walked through the short crew cabin and entered the main area. There were two groups of four arm chairs set in facing pairs on either side of a central aisle. Half had their backs to him, half facing him. At the far end a couch ran alongside one wall of the cabin facing across the plane to a fair-sized television. The entire cabin was dressed with white leather chairs and wall coverings. The trim and carpeting were charcoal gray.

  Daniel scanned the cabin quickly. Per instructions, there was no sign of Christmas. In 2011, North Korea had threatened to shell a hundred-foot tall steel Christmas tree that shown over the border from South Korea. The President and Daniel had both recalled the escalating tension and decided to avoid it as much as possible. The aircraft carrier, involved in night operations, had no visible Christmas lights anyway.

  Henderson was directing the Supreme Leader and his guard to take seats facing forward for the take-off. Right. Catapult-assisted takeoff. Sit on the couch and you’d end up spilled off the end and into the rear galley and probably right on into the small lavatory.

  Beale and Henderson sat down in a forward pair of facing seats, leaving Daniel the last forward-facing armchair for the takeoff. He dropped into it with deep appreciation, closing his eyes in relief as he settled into the soft leather. He’d been traveling for almost twenty hours so far, and there was eight more to go to get back to Canada.

  And the adrenal crash from hovering for nine long minutes in the midst of anti-aircraft radar systems had taken what little reserves he’d had.

  Had he really served a purpose? He’d have to assume that the Supreme Leader of North Korea would not be seated right behind him at the moment if he hadn’t gone. So, it had been a good decision, even if he was too tired to appreciate it.

  The twin jets of the Gulfstream wound to life with a pleasantly muffled, high whine of a well-insulated passenger jet, rather than the mind-numbing roar of most military aircraft.

  The engine’s whine built and the pilot warned them to buckle up. Daniel groped around, clipped himself in and sank further into the seat. Exhaustion rolled over him like a wave.

  He had done well. He’d survived a flight with Emily Beale, perhaps too busy worrying to actually be concerned with whatever near death experiences she’d been handing out in flight. Against all odds, they’d pulled off an impossible assignment, or at least the first half. Alice’s guiding hand of knowledge and risk assessment had been flawless from the moment she’d walked into Daniel’s office just three weeks before.

  Three weeks. How did a world get so turned over in three weeks?

  His world had become divided: before and after Advent calendar. Before and after meeting Alice. He’d thought the big change was his journey to Washington D.C. three years ago. Starting as champion of the Slow Food movement and the farming community of Tennessee. Becoming assistant to the First Lady and ultimately the White House Chief of Staff. How could any change in his life have surpassed that crazy set of circumstances? He’d thought that anything past serving President Matthews was bound to be a letdown.

  The engine’s roar increased until finally it was a palpable pressure in the cabin.

  He’d been wrong though, the before and after moment that mattered was December first and a tiny door bearing the golden number “1” in finest filigree. That and a russet-haired beauty who’d turned his life upside down.

  Someone patted him on the knee and he heard a soft, “Good job!” over the peaking roar of the engines.

  The pilot warned over the intercom, “Launch in three.”

  Not takeoff. Launch.

  He opened his eyes and there, like a miracle, sat Alice.

  He opened his mouth to exclaim his shock just as the catapult fired ramming him hard back into the seat and driving out what little air had survived in his lungs.

  Chapter 34

  “I thought I might be useful.” Alice had pulled off the conveniently padded strap that had slipped down over her forehead to anchor her in place during the catapult takeoff. As her seat faced backwards, there would have been no support for her head during the immense acceleration.

  Daniel wondered just how much had been done to this particular aircraft to make it aircraft-carrier capable. Trap hook, head straps, structural reinforcements. All he knew was it was the only small business jet that could get them across the northern Pacific Ocean in a single pass without landing for refueling, and that could travel at nearly the speed of sound while doing it.

  “Useful,” Daniel managed. He’d learned a dozen words in Korean, which thankfully he hadn’t needed. He’d actually been banking on his French or German being sufficient as Kim Jong-un had been educated in Switzerland. Alice had picked up the language for the fun of it, one of the reasons for her transfer to the North Korean desk at the CIA. She did know more about the Supreme Leader than most Americans, maybe more than most people on the planet.

  “Do you know anything about basketball?”

  Daniel just shook his head. He knew there was a team based in D.C., but that was about all he really knew. He hadn’t attended but one or two games in college.

  “Major Henderson,” Alice leaned across the aisle toward him.

  Daniel became dreamily mesmerized by her long, elegant neck and thinking of the way she moaned quietly when he kissed her there. He slid his feet forward and they hugged ankle to ankle.

  “Are you a basketball fan?”

  “Sure. Don’t have much time to catch games, but I follow it.”

  She aimed one of those radiant Alice smiles at the Major.

  Daniel felt drifty as he considered the possible uselessness of being jealous of a happily married man who could probably beat the crap out of him using only one pinky. Daniel tried to imagine their battle, himself in heavy armor with an array of lethal weaponry and Major Mark Henderson, the most decorated pilot in SOAR with his pinky. Daniel made a couple bets with himself on how many seconds it might or might not last. Under ten seconds before Daniel was down and done? Fifty-fifty. Under twenty seconds? No contest at all. He’d be a little smear on this amazingly comfortable seat that was rapidly sucking the willpower out of his bones.

  “Did you know,” Alice continued in her sweetest voice to Mark, “that Kim Jong-un became a crazy basketball fan while going to school in Switzerland? And that channel 56 is running the UCLA versus USC game right now?”

  Long before any seatbelt sign turned off, Mark had the two guests on the rear sofa and they were all noisily involved in the game on the large-screen TV.

  Emily leaned into the aisle toward Alice and whispered, not that the other guys would have heard anything, “That was very well done.”

  Daniel’s sleepy brain wondered if his virility was in question because he didn’t troop back to watch the game as well.

  Probably.

  Chapter 35

  Daniel slammed awake and wondered if he really had fought Major Henderson, or even more dangerous, his wife.

  Other sensations started penetrating his consciousness.

  The engines began winding down.

  They weren’t moving except for a rock and sway as if a giant rubber band had just grabbed their tail.

  There was a strap across his forehead.

  The carrier.

  He was still in the forward facing seat, which means he’d had to be braced against the sudden deceleration of landing on an aircraft carrier. Someone had strapped his forehead so that the sudden vicious grab of a wire trap wouldn’t injure his neck.

  He’d slept all of the way across the
Pacific, his first decent sleep in several days. Now they were on the U.S.S. John C. Stennis which had just finished unloading most of its jets to the Whidbey Naval Air Station in Washington state’s Puget Sound. This was a common practice when coming into port; done in order to avoid flight deck operations inside civilian air space. Of course, their carrier would now sit for a little more than a day with nothing on its deck but a passenger jet. It would cause no interference with flight operations because all of the other planes would be gone.

  This had been his idea, based on something Beale had said. One thing he’d contributed to the strategy rather just being baggage.

  Alice no longer sat across from him.

  He struggled out of the seat belt to see her chatting with one of the most feared leaders on the planet as if they were old friends. A moment longer, his brain now fully awake, he realized they spoke in English.

  Kim Jong-un’s voice came out heavy, deeper than when he’d spoken in his native tongue. He made awkward but clear use of a distinctly British accent. And they were chatting about the best restaurants in Grenoble.

  If there was any way Daniel could be more gone on this woman, he didn’t know what it might be. Alice had not only just charmed the leader of North Korea to relax enough to reveal that he spoke English. She had also just paved the way to make President Matthews have a much more productive meeting.

  They filed off the jet into the late evening light, once again wrapped in coats with hoods up. Their entire end of the flight deck was vacant of service personnel. They crossed to the helicopter tied down along the side of the deck. It was the Majors’ other Black Hawk.

  Normally they flew them in tandem. For this mission, they’d each left behind their copilots and two of their crew chiefs. This was the “A” team, the very best that SOAR had.

  They had separated the helicopters by five thousand miles. One helicopter was still parked on the U.S.S. Harry S. Truman in the Sea of Japan. The other now sat on the U.S.S. John C. Stennis a few dozen miles off Cape Hatteras, the northwestern most point of the continental U.S. Also conveniently close to the Canadian islands.

  After staggering about for a minute on a deck far more wind-torn than the Truman’s deck, Daniel climbed aboard an indistinguishably lethal copy of the helicopter he’d ridden into the heart of North Korea. Accommodations were a little more crowded with Alice aboard, but they were far from the half-dozen troops plus field gear that could squeeze into even a heavily weaponized Black Hawk like the Direct Action Penetrator.

  An odd silence settled over them as the helicopter performed the mirror of the movement it had made in North Korea, plunging them down to skim the wave tops before roaring landward. Daniel glanced out the window and what little he could see revealed storm-torn waves.

  This time he felt both more and less panic; less for himself, more for any potential danger to Alice. A glance revealed that Alice was enjoying the ride immensely and he did his level best to switch off his over-protective instincts.

  Kim Jong-un and his interpreter appeared completely relaxed and at ease with helicopter flight. Any novelty they found aboard a U.S. military helicopter clearly sated in the first flight, they now settled into patient waiting. Daniel had observed that more and more in non-Western countries. Most other world citizens consistently exhibited a patient self-reliance that Americans somehow lacked.

  These reflections carried him through the first half of the thirty-minute flight up the storm-torn Strait of San Juan de Fuca and around the southern tip of Vancouver Island. The second half was spent white-knuckling as the helicopter dodged between the ten thousand rocks that were the southern end of the Canadian Gulf Islands. The only radar that was going to spot them would be would be some psychotic fisherman out fishing at night among craggy rocks during a nasty northerly storm.

  And he’d also be the only person who would find them if the Majors screwed up. If they slammed into a cliff face even a psychotic fisherman would be of little use.

  With an abrupt jolt the helicopter slammed him down into his seat. He clenched his hand over Alice’s and held on tight as they climbed into the night. With a sharp tilt toward the stern, he lost all sense of motion.

  They hovered.

  Outside the window he could see that the lights were on up at the big stone house. Warm, inviting, stable lights that didn’t bob or weave in the dark of the night.

  Chapter 36

  “Dinner’s in an hour.” Emily Beale announced as they managed to close the heavy weathered-pine front door against the roaring night.

  “I’ll help.” Alice felt disoriented as she looked about the house and needed something familiar to anchor her in place.

  “Make that forty-five,” Beale called out then dropped her voice. “Let’s go see what we can rustle up.”

  Daniel, back on his feet after sleeping like a baby throughout the flight, was making sure that their guests were guided toward their rooms. She left him to it.

  The fact that he had never doubted her strategic assessment still floored her. That she’d actually been right, shocked her. That he’d slept with his ankles wrapped around hers for the whole flight on the Gulfstream jet had touched her heart and she’d rather not think about that.

  Alice moved to follow Emily to the kitchen. She’d toured the house during their initial daytime survey with Captain Smith, but it looked far different at night. During the day, the light and the outdoor world had dominated. A grand vista of the islands and the waves far below. Wide windows invited those inside to notice the surrounding conifers and lawn.

  Now, under the warm glow of tastefully recessed lighting, dark tile and lush wood floors invited her to linger in the nearly opulent warmth. The heavy furniture proffered a welcome, an invitation to settle in with a good book and never move again. The walls between the windows wrapped cozily about the room. They were covered with a mix of Native American art with its shocking red and black and white contrasts, and tall bookcases almost spilling over with a wide variety of novels and histories revealing the owners’ eclectic tastes.

  The kitchen continued the theme. The cookbooks on a nicely recessed shelf covered a half dozen cuisines. Yet the size and efficient layout of the kitchen revealed that the family cooked here, rather than some servants.

  Emily had already pulled out a big tray of steaks.

  “You had this place stocked.” Alice couldn’t believe she hadn’t thought of it.

  Emily nodded, “I was the First Lady’s chef for three weeks after all.”

  Alice slapped her forehead eliciting Emily’s rare laugh, then reached for an apron. Beale’s flying had made national news and her cooking shone front and center in the country’s gossip pages. It had all been while the Major performed some secret security assignment that Alice had never uncovered. Alice typically felt disjointed around women like Emily Beale. Alice knew how to handle men. Well, men other than Daniel. But women often eluded her.

  Emily Beale felt like the sister she’d never had.

  “So what am I making?”

  “Steaks for entrée. Can you tackle a garlic pasta for a side? I premade cookie dough, so we can hack some off and make a batch of chocolate chip while everything else cooks.”

  Alice dug out a large pot and set water to heat on the stove. She scrounged around and came up with garlic, sun-dried tomatoes, a small bundle of basil, and some broccoli. They worked together in companionable silence for a while. Emily rubbed a pepper and sage combination into the meat. Alice floreted the broccoli and started to sliver the basil.

  “He’s quite in love with you.”

  Alice would have cut off her finger if she’d been using anything more dangerous than a garlic press at the moment. Instead, it merely slipped from her nerveless fingers to clatter down on the counter spreading tiny splatters of garlic across the broad granite surface.

  Gripping the counter edge she managed to tur
n herself enough to face Beale. Emily was leaning comfortably back against the opposite counter and holding out a large glass of red wine. Alice rarely drank. She grabbed the glass and knocked half of it back, leaving her hard pressed to catch her breath.

  “What,” she tried to ignore the amount of effort entailed to speak the word. “Whatever gave you that idea?”

  Emily smiled. That slow, calm, self-assured smile of a woman who has faced down, well, the President and her husband among others.

  “It isn’t an idea. It’s a fact. I’d have to be blind to not see it. Why don’t you?”

  Alice took another deep swallow of the wine that did nothing to slake a throat long gone dry.

  The door to Alice’s right opened, but she couldn’t turn away from Emily Beale’s brilliant blue gaze.

  “Go away,” Beale said without looking around.

  “Uh…” Alice heard Daniel and did her best not to cringe.

  “Come, my friend.” Major Henderson cut him off with a fake Texas accent thick enough to deep-fry in hot oil. “We’all better be walkin’ in places safe for mere men to tread. Which does not include our continued existence if we should remain in this here kitchen.”

  The door swung closed and silence once again reigned in the kitchen other than the soft sizzle of steaks on iron and the bubbling of the pasta water nearing a boil.

  “Just asking.” Emily turned back to preparing a bowl of salad with wild greens, hazelnuts, and dried cranberries.

  Even as she struggled against the idea of love in her life, Alice’s analyst mode kicked in.

  Emily Beale, she knew, ranked as an exceptionally acute observer, just one of many areas in which her file stated she ranked far above the norm. She had known Daniel when they were both working for the First Lady. Beale had a frame of reference that spanned the year following as well.