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Back Point of Contact Save as PDF
Chapters (83)
  1. Cover
  2. ALSO BY TOM CLANCY
  3. PRINCIPAL CHARACTERS
  4. 1
  5. 2
  6. 3
  7. 4
  8. 5
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  10. 7
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  83. What’s next onyour reading list?

Was the satellite service down because of the storm? No. Sat phones were designed for things like storms. If Wolz and his team weren’t answering, it meant something was wrong.

And that something was Ryan. He was still alive. Had to be.

Did Ryan know about the seven a.m. launch?

No. How could he?

But what if he did?

Ryan would call for help. But he hadn’t called the U.S. embassy or the CIA station in Singapore up until now; otherwise, they would be involved.

Perhaps Ryan couldn’t make the call. And if he couldn’t, what would he do?

What would I do?

I’d drive to somewhere where I could get help.

Zvezdev opened up his laptop and pulled up the storm tracker and latest weather report, then opened a second window and pulled up Google Maps.

Zvezdev swore bitterly.

He hadn’t told Ri about the presence of Jack Ryan, Jr. The less Ri knew about the affair, the better. But now he had to know. It would be an awkward exchange. But necessary.

He picked up his phone and called Ri, worried that the American was about to cross into Malaysia and fuck them both hard.

Ri had to stop Jack Ryan.

Now.

67

SINGAPORE

Lian explained that the shortest route from Dalfan headquarters to Kuala Lumpur was also the northernmost, and most likely to keep them out of trouble. They needed to take the Seletar Expressway (SLE) to the Bukit Timah Expressway (BKE) and cross the Johor causeway into Malaysia. Without GPS, Jack had no idea where to go and Lian’s knowledge of the roadway system was probably better anyway, so she drove. She told Paul she wouldn’t let him come if he didn’t agree to lie down in the back of the van and keep his feet elevated. He complied without protest.

It took them more than two hours to traverse the distance. They kept to the SLE as far as they could, dodging dead vehicles, downed trees, power lines, and finally a sinkhole, where they had to abandon the expressway for narrow side streets. On one occasion Jack had to get out of the van to move an air-conditioning unit that had toppled into the road, and on another he and Lian both needed to get out and push a stalled vehicle out of the way.

They got back on the SLE and finally arrived at the BKE junction, where a battery-powered road sign flashed that the Johor causeway was shut down.

“Now what?” Jack asked. “Swim?”

“In this weather? No. There’s another crossing point west of here.”

“How far?”

“At this rate, forty minutes.”

—

An hour and forty-three minutes later they arrived at the Tuas Checkpoint, the gateway to the only other crossing point over the Johor River from Singapore to Malaysia. The Second Link causeway was almost a mile and a half long.