Contents ( 55)
- In Memoriam
- Epigraph
- Cast of Characters
- Americans
- Russians
- Canadian
- Prologue
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-One
- Twenty-Two
- Twenty-Three
- Twenty-Four
- Twenty-Five
- Twenty-Six
- Twenty-Seven
- Twenty-Eight
- Twenty-Nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-One
- Thirty-Two
- Thirty-Three
- Thirty-Four
- Thirty-Five
- Thirty-Six
- Thirty-Seven
- Thirty-Eight
- Thirty-Nine
- Epilogue
- Acknowledgments
- Weapons and Acronyms
- Weapons
- Acronyms
- About the Author
- Also by Dale Brown
- Copyright
- About the Publisher
“You’re kidding me,” she said in disbelief.
He shook his head with a grin. “Nope. I swear it’s the God’s honest truth. And I kind of wish I hadn’t looked at what M-Squared showed me. Some things should stay private.”
“Definitely!”
For another long moment, they looked at each other in silence. Then Flynn cleared his throat awkwardly. “So, I’ve been meaning to ask—”
“Is this where you make your move, Nick?” she interrupted with a lazy smile.
“Huh? Er, no, that is . . . uh, well, if I did, would you slap me down?”
Her eyes crinkled with amusement. “Maybe. Maybe not. How lucky do you feel right now, Captain Flynn?”
He glanced at his watch and sighed. “Not lucky at all, it turns out. Because I’m due on duty at our outpost line in about twenty minutes.”
“Too bad.”
Mentally, Flynn cursed the series of four-hours-on, four-hours-off patrol shifts he’d decreed in response to the Pentagon’s order to go to DEFCON Three. He never could have imagined he’d end up screwing up a date with a beautiful woman.
“But if we’re still stuck here tomorrow, I just might be able to clear my calendar enough to have dinner with you again. Or maybe lunch, depending on when you’re free,” Van Horn said consolingly. “No promises, mind you.”
“Noted,” Flynn assured her. “But I do have one more quick question.”
She raised an eyebrow. “Shoot.”
“Why is your call sign ‘Skater’?” he asked curiously.
Van Horn sighed. “Because pilots think they’re really clever. My last name is Dutch, see . . . and speed skating is a big deal in the Netherlands, so—”
“You got tagged with ‘Skater.’ Well, I guess it could have been worse.”
“Oh, back in the first weeks of flight school, it was worse,” she told him with a twisted grin.
“Worse, how?”
“My last name is Van Horn,” she pointed out. “Think about it.”
Flynn winced. “Ouch.” He looked at her. “So what happened?”
“A certain fellow pilot ‘tripped’ in the ladies’ room and managed to bust her lip and get a black eye,” Laura Van Horn said with a certain, deep-seated satisfaction.
“On a wet floor?”
If anything, her smile grew bigger. “Nope. That floor was bone-dry.”
Twenty-Six
Zvyozdny Military Airfield, Wrangel Island, off Russia’s Arctic Coast
The Next Morning
One after another, two twin-tailed Su-35S fighters belonging to Russia’s Twenty-Third Aviation Regiment sped down a snow-covered runway and lifted off into the hazy morning sky. Each aircraft was configured for long-range flight, equipped only with two external fuel tanks, a single pair of K-74M short-range heat-seeking missiles, and two KAB-500L laser-guided bombs. Streaking low over a stark white coastal plain, they flew northeast past a white radar dome sited on the lower slopes of Gora Sovetskaya, Wrangel Island’s tallest mountain. The sleek jet fighters were camouflaged in jagged bands of white, light gray, and dark gray that blended with the bleak, ice-covered ocean ahead.
Aboard the lead Su-35S, Major Vadim Kuryokhin keyed his mike. “Moscow Operations Control, this is Polet Telokhranitelya, Bodyguard Flight. We’re airborne and proceeding immediately to Rendezvous Point Alpha.”