Chinook

by M. L. Buchman

  It was. “That doesn’t mean men like Li and Zhang don’t need to be taken out.”

  Nobody argued the point, but neither did they offer any other ideas.

  “This isn’t what we do,” Miranda spoke softly.

  “What?”

  “We investigate crashes. We do not cause them. We do not attack, invade, or harm others. We now have six hours and seven minutes left of this flight to learn what we can from this aircraft. Jeremy, have you copied the contents of the QAR?” And just that simply the conversation was apparently over.

  “I have.”

  “See if you can find a black box flight recorder. If the Chinese systems are like ours, it will carry less detailed flight data than the QAR but it might contain more. After that, check the systems’ layouts. Holly, I want you to switch focus to an analysis of the aircraft structure. It appears to have some dynamic flexibility that I expect enhance maneuvering at velocities over Mach 2. It would be nice to understand those. Especially look for their quality of manufacturing as I’ve never cataloged a Chinese jet before. Mike, assist Holly. Taz, you may assist me in analyzing stealth modifications of surfaces and configuration.”

  Then Miranda eased out from supporting Andi as Mike slipped a folded blanket under her cheek. Andi showed no sign of noticing, though her rate of breathing said she wasn’t asleep either.

  Taz waited until everyone except Jeremy was off the headset system.

  He too seemed to have something to say.

  She spoke first, “We’re not done with this. Though I guess it will have to wait until we’re back on the ground.”

  Jeremy nodded but didn’t speak. He definitely wore an emoji sad face.

  “I’m sorry about your hand.”

  He nodded again. And again didn’t speak. Sadder face.

  It was—

  Oh shit!

  “No, Jeremy. Tell me you’re not going there.” Why did men always get so weird around women who’d been violated?

  He nodded a third time.

  “Say something already.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “For what? You haven’t done anything to me.”

  “For what those men did to you. For what they made you have to do.” Then he brushed his fingers so lightly on her cheek that she barely felt it.

  A moment later, Taz was the only one still in the seats other than Andi.

  Kindness. Of all things, she’d never expected him to respond with kindness. Even an entire summer with the hotshots hadn’t prepared her for Jeremy.

  67

  The flight from JBLM to Tacoma Narrows Airport in Miranda’s Citation jet took less than three minutes in the air.

  Only when everyone else was off the plane and she was airborne again and headed for her island did Miranda feel she could breathe.

  For fifteen glorious minutes, she raced north in silence. She stayed down at five thousand feet so that she didn’t have to talk to anyone, not even air traffic control.

  It was just her and the few other fliers enjoying the beauty of being aloft during a summer sunset. She considered extending the flight, perhaps circling up over the Olympics to watch the sun slide into the ocean. That such a flight would also pass over where the first Chinook had been felled by a wildfire was a good reason not to go there.

  Besides, it had been so long since she’d slept that she probably shouldn’t be flying in the first place. They’d left JBLM to fly to Taiwan over thirty hours ago—but staying in Gig Harbor tonight with the others hadn’t been an option.

  Over the island, she dialed the frequency of her runway lights, then clicked the mic transmit button three times. The relay flipped closed and turned on the lights. They were on a ten-minute timer.

  Her wheels kissed the grass of the Spieden Island runway just as the sun kissed the distant ocean. The long summer evening of the San Juan Islands was still rich with reds and golds by the time she’d shut down and hangered her jet.

  The first thing she did was turn off her phone. If there was a crash, they’d have to launch some other team. She’d only done that once before in her seventeen years with the NTSB, but this time it was necessary.

  The walk back to the house was a luxury as well.

  But it wasn’t the cloister it usually had been.

  She could feel Holly and Andi at the table. Miranda straightened all the chairs and put away all except one of the placemats.

  Mike and Taz, getting to know each other as they cooked together in the kitchen. Only when she had reordered the spices properly and emptied the dishwasher so that every pot, plate, and mug was in its designated place could she relax.

  Even after putting fresh sheets on the bed, she could still feel Jon’s presence. As if, even now, he had some question for her about why she behaved the way she did. Even when he didn’t give voice to them, she could hear the thousand tiny corrections just the same. She tried to conform, but it was hard. He made it impossible to come to rest beside him. Miranda enjoyed his company and liked the sex. She liked that they were both crash investigators.

  She showered and lay down, but it didn’t last. She could still feel Jon.

  Finally, she went to the big couch in the library at the end of the second floor. Taking Tante Daniels’ quilt, Storm at Sea, she sat where she had spoken to Jeremy and looked out the big window at the silhouetted islands and the dark water.

  The last of the evening’s deep blue gave way to the black of night. The deer and sheep would have settled by now, tired by the disturbance of her landing and a busy day of foraging.

  As Miranda watched the darkness, she could feel the three crashes.

  The fiery death of the first Chinook and the sabotage of the second.

  Perhaps she understood some of Taz’s anger at…everything.

  The sabotage of the Chinook was unforgivable. And the crashing of the J-20 jet by General Zhang Ru, just throwing away an amazing machine and its pilot. Having only studied the plans for America’s two fifth-generation fighters, it was incredible to inspect one of the only other ones in the world so closely.

  But the waste.

  Unlike Taz, Miranda had never been attacked personally; most men went out of their way to avoid her. But she could feel some of Taz’s hurt when she thought of those needlessly destroyed aircraft. It was a violation of all that was right.

  Miranda sat up and clutched the quilt tightly as she stared out into the night.

  The second Chinook and the J-20.

  Both “felt” the same, not that she’d trust her own feelings…but they did. What if they were somehow linked?

  Zhang Ru had ordered the crash of the Chengdu J-20 Mighty Dragon. He’d also been present at the crash of the Boeing MH-47G Chinook. Had he been responsible for that as well? Taz made it sound as if the man had no morals at all and was capable of anything.

  She should tell somebody. Holly? Drake?

  But she couldn’t face anyone right now.

  Couldn’t face turning on her phone.

  And there had been a fourth crash. One that she could presently empathize with—Andi.

  Miranda slowly sat back against the couch.

  When the world became too much, Andi had collapsed. Miranda had heard Mike’s judgment that she’d driven herself there to help them understand the crash. Yes, it was a great gift, given at such a painful cost.

  She’d still been pale and shaky when they had roused her for the landing at JBLM.

  Andi didn’t have the luxury that Miranda did. Her PTSD attacked her from the inside, from which there was no escape. Miranda’s own problem was with the external world, and escaping to her island had always been a solace.

  Would tomorrow be easier?

  Yes. She’d had no sleep for the two nights in a row with the house full of guests. And then another sleepless night and day spent in the long flight to and from Taiwan.

  Sleep was the answer. Then maybe in the morning she would call someone.

  Or the next day.

  68<
br />
  Taz stood in the living room of the team’s Gig Harbor house. The waterfront lights were just enough to outline a body of water, but the darkness was too complete to see more.

  The décor was IKEA, unadorned IKEA. It looked as if the team wasn’t here for much other than sleeping. The open-plan kitchen was the only real exception, it was well-equipped and laid out. She opened a random cupboard and discovered a wide variety of canned tomato products, but no jarred sauce. Another cupboard revealed the spice rack of someone who cooked from scratch. Mike.

  “That’s my room,” Holly pointed. “Andi takes the spare bed, except the rare nights Miranda joins our merry band, then she gets the couch. I’ll be in with Mike tonight, so you’re welcome to my lay-down. That room is Jeremy’s.”

  “And you’ll decide about killing me in the morning,” Taz kept her tone dry.

  “Too right,” Holly offered with her normal cheerfulness, then unsuccessfully tried to stifle a big yawn. Her grin was a little sheepish. “Besides, it’s bad form to off someone when they haven’t had enough sack time.” With that, she and Mike were gone into one of the bedrooms.

  Andi had already gone to bed.

  Now it was just her and Jeremy in the IKEA model living room.

  He was again doing one of his not-speaking things. That had definitely been a major change since the first time she’d met him six months ago. Getting Jeremy to shut up had been the real challenge then.

  “What are you thinking, Jeremy?” Taz was thinking that there was no way she’d be sleeping in Holly’s bed, so it was the couch for her.

  Jeremy looked at her for a moment, asking, then blushed brightly and looked away.

  “No way. Sorry, I don’t mean that as in no, I’m just surprised. Are you deranged enough to think that we can just pick up where we left off six months ago?”

  Jeremy shook his head.

  Out of other options, Taz decided to try waiting him out.

  “I…” he swallowed hard, then looked directly at her and spoke in a rush. “I’m not…deranged enough to think that we are who we were back then, when we were who we were before who we are now. I’m not stupid. I mean, I get that all that’s changed and that twenty-eight hours shouldn’t mean so much but—”

  “And nineteen minutes,” she couldn’t resist adding in.

  “—and nineteen minutes,” he smiled for half a moment. “But I’ve never met anyone like you. I’m not talking about when we made love down in Baja, though that was incredibly, uh, incredible. I mean your understanding of Miranda, the amount you care about Mei-Li, that trick you pulled on the Taiwanese Army major to get Miranda to safety and salvage the jet. She even said you had great insights about the stealth configuration.”

  “I was General Martinez’s liaison with the defense contractors for eighteen of my nineteen years in the Air Force. He was deeply involved in the aircraft design branch of the service. When learning is part of my survival, I do it very well.”

  “Is that all you ever get? Survival?”

  Taz didn’t even know how to respond to that. Until this last summer, that was all there had ever been. Before she could think of what to say, Jeremy continued.

  “I guess I was kind of like that, but in a different way. You know, before I met you. I was always focused on the next cool thing to the exclusion of all else. You made me see that there can be so much more. Then I thought I lost all that when you died in the crash. Uh, I’m really glad you didn’t, by the way. I just think I should say that because, you know…”

  “You know they could arrest me tomorrow and throw away the key?”

  Jeremy shrugged uncomfortably, then tried to shake it off like a wet dog, which made her laugh.

  “And you have the greatest laugh I’ve ever heard,” his voice was barely a whisper as he took her hand and rubbed a thumb over her knuckles.

  No one, absolutely no one had ever seen her the way Jeremy did.

  Out of all other ideas, Taz used their connection to lead Jeremy toward his bedroom. She closed the door behind them and led him toward the bathroom.

  “One thing is certain though, I definitely need a shower first.”

  Jeremy stumbled to a halt at the threshold, almost pulling her over backward because of his tight hold on her hand.

  His eyes looked a little wild.

  “Haven’t you ever showered with a woman, Jeremy?”

  He only shook his head.

  “Well, you start by getting naked.”

  His eyes widened even further, then he gave her the biggest smile since her return.

  “I think he likes that idea.”

  “He does.” Jeremy reached out and began tugging her t-shirt out of her pants.

  “You’re supposed to be kissing me while you do that.”

  His response was equally enthusiastic.

  69

  Taz’s hair still lay damp across his chest. He made a mental note to purchase a hair dryer to keep in his bathroom.

  In the shower, Taz had smoothed over all his nervous apprehensions.

  “How do I know if I’m doing it right?”

  “I’ll tell you if you’re doing it wrong,” had been her simple answer.

  “But that’s only if I’m doing it wrong. How do I know if I could be doing it right? You know. Better?”

  She’d laughed merrily. “Gods you’re so sweet. I’ll give you pointers.”

  And she had. Sometimes they were as simply nonverbal as shifting against him or riding her hand on the back of his. Others it was a quick gasp begging him to do that more.

  For him? Well, he’d always thought he had a fairly vivid imagination about sex, perhaps in compensation for having had so little of it. Taz quickly proved him wrong. Both in the shower and again in bed.

  Just as she had in Baja, she’d knelt over him, but it couldn’t have been more different.

  Rather than sweating in the heat of the desert sun during a stolen moment, they’d generated enough heat to peel back the blankets and welcome the cool air of the room on their skin. Instead of seeing her body in the stark daylight, in his shadowed bedroom their lovemaking had become entirely about touch. He’d never been so aware of every single shape that passed beneath his fingers as he did tracing the outlines of Taz’s body. She was glorious to hold.

  He’d managed to scoot the covers back over them as she now lay half tucked at his side and half sprawled across him.

  But even wrung out as he was, he couldn’t stop touching her. Tracing the lines of her cheek and jaw. Studying the shape of her ear. Was this what lovers did? He hoped so, because he never wanted to stop.

  “Jeremy?”

  “Uh-huh,” he let his fingers sweep over her shoulder and ribs to brush against the side of her breast where it was squeezed sideways by being pressed against his ribs.

  “What are we going to do about Zhang Ru?”

  He could just reach her hip and brush along where her thigh lay over his waist.

  “Jeremy?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “As much as I hate to stop you doing that, because yes, it feels just as good for me as it probably does for you, can you kick that brain of yours back into gear?”

  “Does it mean I have to stop thinking about how incredible you are?”

  Taz’s sigh sounded like a contented one. “No. I like that you think that. That’s new for me too.”

  “Okay.” He tucked his hand over her knee and leaned his cheek on her damp hair. “Okay. Zhang Ru.”

  “Yes. He deserves to die. To be put down like a rabid dog.”

  “But if we do, it destabilizes the CMC. It will give the president an excuse to exercise his powers as one of the chairmen, appoint a replacement to his liking, then force the Taiwan issue. The fact that Ru was promoted to the CMC by the CMC means that he probably isn’t the president’s yes-man.”

  “All I can see is that Ru has to go down.”

  “I’m not all that great at people, this is more Mike’s thing.”


  “Are you suggesting I should be in bed talking to Mike?”

  Jeremy had to laugh, “I don’t think Holly would be very amused by that.”

  “At least then she’d have a real excuse for killing me.” He’d never get tired of Taz’s laugh, even when it was gentle and wry like this one. Taz could express a thousand emotions with that laugh.

  “Why do you only think with anger?”

  “What are you talking about?” Taz pushed up enough to look at him in the dark.

  He took advantage of her position change to slide his hand back up to cradle her breast.

  “Jeremy!”

  “You said I could think about both you and Ru.”

  She thumped her forehead against his shoulder, “I did. Fine. Cradle my breast like you’ve never felt one before.”

  “Well there was only the one other, and yours are much nicer.”

  “Thanks. Now, Ru?”

  “No, we were talking about anger. You’re letting your anger at Ru block you from seeing what else is possible.”

  “It has to do with his raping—”

  “No!” Jeremy let go of Taz’s breast because it was really hard to think of anything else when he was holding it. He pushed up until they were both sitting cross-legged, facing each other in the dark. “You’re…Ah! You’re thinking like a playing card.”

  “I’m what?”

  “You’re being an F-35 fighter jet, just like Mike said. Your first thought is always to attack. What if you were…an E-3 Sentry AWACS?”

  “Then…” her silhouette tipped its head in the dark as she puzzled at that.

  “Remember what an AWACS does. It has that big radar dome on top to make early observations of distant events.”

  “…I’d be thinking about the big picture and how to turn it into a win for everyone?”

  Jeremy loved the sharp agility of Taz’s mind. That was at least as exciting as her body. It made him want to push her down atop the covers and start all over again.