Empire Rising (41 page)

A minute later, the SEAL returned, offering a thumbs-up. He grabbed one of the duffel bags, rejoined the other three SEALs, and all four surged toward the surface. A moment later, Harrison gripped Christine's arm firmly and propelled them both upward with a powerful kick.

They slowed as they approached the surface, angling toward the rusted metal ladder. Christine grabbed on to the ladder while Harrison removed his fins, motioning for her to follow him up. After climbing a few of the rusted metal rungs, Christine's head emerged from the dark water. She pushed her facemask onto her forehead, taking a deep breath of the cool night air.

Harrison reached the top of the ladder and disappeared. Christine continued climbing, and after a few more rungs, reached the top of a wharf, framing what looked like an abandoned quay. The first four SEALs were arranged in a semicircular perimeter about twenty feet in diameter, each man on one knee wielding a Heckler & Koch MP7 submachine gun—a compact assault rifle barely more than a foot long with an extendable stock, an optical sight, and a suppressor screwed onto the barrel.

The wharf extended for several hundred yards in each direction, and a few hundred feet to the left was an abandoned two-story building. A sign above the dark entrance, inscribed in English, identified the building as the Xingang Port Passenger Terminal, which had been abandoned after the new terminal had been built a few miles away. They were in Tianjin, Beijing's neighboring port city.

Christine pulled herself onto the wharf, moving awkwardly toward Harrison; her muscles were stiff from the cold underwater journey. Harrison opened his duffel bag and retrieved a flashlight that he pointed inland, energizing it briefly three times. As Christine stopped next to Harrison, a pair of headlights appeared in the distance, and a white van soon approached the deserted wharf, stopping next to the five SEALs and Christine. A side door slid open, revealing one of the men from the CIA safe house.

Harrison picked up the duffel bag and guided Christine into the van, and they were joined by the four other SEALs as they collapsed their perimeter. The van sped away and Christine and the five SEALs settled into seats lining both sides of the van, while the Chinese man remained standing, gripping handholds suspended from the top of the van. He eyed Christine and the five men briefly before speaking.

“I am Tian Aiguo. Welcome to China.”

*   *   *

In the back of the van, the SEALs shed their scuba gear, stripping the wet suits from their bodies, and put on the trousers and shirts that Tian pulled from a sack at his feet. Harrison helped Christine remove her gear and glanced at her wet suit.

“Tian has clothes for you, if you don't mind stripping down in the van. We won't look.”

The underwater journey had sucked the heat from Christine's body, and the prospect of warm, dry clothing instead of a cold, damp wet suit outweighed her modesty. “I'll change.”

Tian handed her a white towel, along with a loose-fitting white shirt and baggy khaki pants with a drawstring at the waist. Christine pulled her arms from her wet suit, wrapping the towel around her chest as she pulled the rest of the suit away from her body, steadying herself with a grip on Harrison's shoulder as the van jostled along the highway. True to Harrison's word, the six men averted their eyes as she changed into dry clothing.

“All clear,” she announced, then tossed the towel back to Tian as he turned toward her.

Christine returned to her seat next to Harrison. Even though she'd changed into dry clothing, she was trembling from the cold. She could sense Harrison wanted to wrap his arm around her and pull her close, warming her with the heat of his body. But instead, he sat stiffly as the van bounced along. Minutes turned into hours as the van traveled through the night, and Christine found herself drifting into sleep occasionally, awaking each time to find herself leaning against Harrison's shoulder. He gave no indication that he noticed, and neither he nor the other four SEALs appeared tired. They sat staring ahead, occasionally murmuring something to each other in the darkness that she couldn't quite make out over the rumble of the van.

The outskirts of a large city became visible as dawn crept across the countryside, tall skyscrapers rising in the distance. They were traveling along a six-lane highway, three lanes in each direction, heading north into Beijing. The immense steel and glass oval structure of the Beijing South Railway Station appeared in the distance, and it seemed like it was a lifetime ago that she had boarded the white bullet train out of the city with Peng.

The van exited the highway onto Kai Yang Lu Street, and four kilometers later, the vehicle stopped in front of the same CIA safe house she'd left two weeks ago. Tian opened the side door from inside the van and stepped onto the sidewalk, then after a quick glance in each direction, waved them out. Chief O'Hara led the way, followed by the other three enlisted SEALs, then Christine and Harrison.

Fatigue set in as she stepped into the safe house. The underwater transit, followed by the uncomfortable journey in the back of the van had taken its toll, and her body was in desperate need of sleep. The plan, according to Harrison, was to sleep most of the day, then after a final mission review, head out after dark. From that point on, there would be no opportunity for sleep until the mission objective had been accomplished and the team had returned to
Michigan
, lurking just off the coast.
If
everything went according to plan.

 

61

BEIJING

Huan Zhixin strode briskly through the corridors of the Great Hall of the People, making the transit from his office on the perimeter of the South Wing to its center, where President Xiang and the other Politburo members had their offices. The floor transitioned from terrazzo to marble, and he passed between fluted columns on each side of the hallway, marking the beginning of the Politburo's official spaces.

Huan's plan to gain membership to the elite ruling Politburo was proceeding flawlessly. The American Pacific Fleet had been destroyed and although Admiral Tsou was the plan's mastermind, Huan, as head of the People's Liberation Army, would receive much credit. When it came time to fill Bai Tao's vacant seat, no other candidate could defeat him. However, the United States was up to something. It was important Xiang be briefed, so if things did not turn out well, Huan could somehow twist the situation around and make Xiang responsible.

Huan reached the president's office, ignoring the two Cadre Department bodyguards stationed outside as he knocked. He heard Xiang's voice through the door and entered, settling into a chair across from the president's desk.

Xiang ignored Huan's presence, continuing to review a document in a folder on his desk. Xiang's failure to acknowledge him was deliberate, he thought, treating him like a second-class Party member. Huan began to fume at the blatant disrespect. As he waited, he savored his pending election to the Politburo. Then, with his uncle Shen's support, it would be only a matter of time before he obtained the necessary votes to supplant Xiang as China's supreme leader. Xiang would pay for his insolence.

Finally, Xiang signed the document and looked up. “You have news?”

Huan got straight to the issue. “The American SEAL Team has reached Beijing.”

“Where are they now?” Xiang asked.

“They're at the CIA safe house.”

“Why are they here?”

“We don't know yet. However, our informant has been directed to determine the objective of their mission. Then we will send in our special forces and eliminate them.”

“I thought you didn't know the location of the safe house.”

“We do now,” Huan answered, then explained. “We thought O'Connor's escape from the Great Hall was inconsequential, and not worthy of compromising our penetration of the CIA here in Beijing. We were not aware until later that a secure flash drive was missing, and that she might have it. The SEAL Team, however, poses a clear threat, and we have obtained the location of the safe house by paying our informant a very large sum.”

Huan waited for additional questions, and Xiang asked the most important one. “When will the SEAL Team be eliminated?”

“Today,” Huan answered, “after we determine the objective of their mission. Or nightfall, whichever comes first.”

 

62

BEIJING

A light rain was falling from dark overcast skies, pattering softly against a grimy, four-pane window in a small second-story bedroom, furnished with a twin bed next to a rickety wooden end table. Christine's eyes fluttered open in the semidarkness as she stretched under the soft brown blanket. It was either dusk or dawn, based on the gray light filtering through the window. She poked her left hand out from beneath the covers, and brought her watch close to her face. After scrutinizing her watch in the dim light for a moment, she concluded it was 7
P.M.

She had slept most of the day. After arriving at the safe house, Tian had cooked breakfast for Christine and the SEALs, peppering them with questions about their mission. The SEALs were tight-lipped—they hadn't even told Tian their names—and Harrison had cut her off with a sharp, disapproving glance when she had begun to answer one of Tian's questions. Christine caught the hint—as did Tian, who apologized for prying. After cleaning up after breakfast, Tian took Christine and the SEALs' measurements for clothing that would allow them to travel from Guang Chang Boulevard to the Great Hall of the People without attracting attention.

Christine pushed the blanket aside, swinging her feet onto the cold wooden floor as she sat up on the side of the bed. Glancing at the end table, she eyed a travel kit Tian had dropped off. She grabbed it as she stood, then headed down the hall to the bathroom. After freshening up and returning the travel kit to her nightstand, she descended the stairs to the main floor.

Harrison and the other four SEALs were already downstairs. The Lieutenant and Chief O'Hara were standing in the living room while the other three SEALs—Garretson, Martin, and Andrews—huddled around a laptop computer on the small dining room table, the dark brown curtains by the dining room window drawn closed. The scarred wooden table their laptop rested upon was illuminated by a yellow, incandescent lamp hanging from the ceiling.

All five SEALs were dressed in civilian clothes—black trousers with the legs covering the top of their combat boots, each man wearing a different dark-colored polo shirt. Harrison and O'Hara were trying on black, loose-fitting windbreakers. Both SEALs had their MP7s attached to slings draped around their necks and under one shoulder. After zipping up their jackets, each man turned to examine the other.

“They'll do,” O'Hara said as he unzipped and shrugged his jacket off, tossing it onto three other jackets lying across the back of the couch. Leaning next to the couch were three black backpacks Tian had also apparently procured, lying next to the SEAL duffel bags—now empty. Harrison left his jacket on and she could see a slight bulge in his right pocket, most likely the sealed pouch containing the flash drive loaded with the virus.

Lieutenant Harrison looked up as Christine reached the bottom of the stairs. “Good evening, Miss O'Connor. It's about time you woke up. I was about to knock on your door.”

O'Hara turned toward her as did the other three SEALs, who looked up from the computer, and Christine suddenly realized she was wearing a thin white T-shirt with no bra. It was chilly in the room and the men noticed her body's reaction, their eyes moving from her face to her breasts, the outline of her nipples clearly visible through her T-shirt.

Christine crossed her arms across her chest as the front door opened. Tian appeared in the doorway, carrying a shopping bag in each hand. He kicked the door closed with his left heel as he entered the foyer and moved into the dining room, depositing the bags onto the table as Garretson closed the laptop lid.

Tian pulled the contents from the first bag, stacking them neatly on the table. “I've purchased suitable clothes for you, Miss O'Connor, along with an assortment of makeup products. I wasn't sure if you wanted any and I didn't want to wake you, so I took the liberty of picking up a few things.”

Christine joined Tian at the table, noting a black pair of slacks, long-sleeve dark blue satin shirt, and a short black coat. Tian upended the second bag, dumping a shoe box and an assortment of makeup products onto the table. Christine opened the box and examined a pair of flat-soled shoes with a critical eye before deciding they'd be suitable for running if the situation demanded it. She slipped one on, verifying it fit.

Christine returned the shoe to its box, and after reviewing the products on the table, decided she'd skip the makeup.

“Thanks, Tian.” Christine placed the clothes and makeup back into their bags and Tian disappeared into the kitchen, returning a moment later with a platter bearing a bottle of baijiu—a clear liquor sometimes referred to as Chinese vodka—and seven shot glasses, which he placed on the dining room table.

The three SEALs at the table perked up, and one of the
girls
,
Tracey Martin, broke into a wide grin. “Now we're talking.”

Harrison checked his watch. “We'll be leaving soon. No drinks.”

“Oh, come on, Lieutenant,” Martin pleaded. “One drink won't hurt anything. We've got a few hours to work it off.”

Chief O'Hara interjected. “Shut your trap, Martin. You know better. No drinks.”

The smile disappeared from Martin's face as the other
girl
, Petty Officer Kelly Andrews, smacked Martin across the back of the head. “What answer did you expect?”

Martin rubbed his head. “It can't hurt to ask.” His eyes shifted from Andrews to the bottle of baijiu, then back to the computer. “Let's get back to business, then.” He looked up at Lieutenant Harrison. “We're ready to run through it one more time, sir.” He glanced at Tian, still standing next to the table.