Xavier was frozen in his seat, hands digging into the dashboard, trying to catch his breath.
I sat there feeling numb until the thickening smoke became blinding and the heat stirred me to action. I holstered the gun and snapped a hand to my face, checking for injuries before moving down to my chest. I shifted my arms to make sure they weren’t broken.
I heard a hissing sound from the engine and saw flames beneath the rising smoke, licking the front of the vehicle.
I tried moving my legs and couldn’t.
I had to get out.
Needed to get Xavier to safety.
Coughing to clear my lungs, I reached for Xavier. My hand fell onto an empty seat. His door was open.
Xavier was gone.
James
I shoved my shoulder against the driver’s side door, but it wouldn’t budge.
Petrol burned my eyes and the bitter taste of fumes coated the back of my throat.
The door suddenly opened with violent force. Xavier reached in and grabbed my shoulders.
Instinctively, I wrapped my fingers around his bicep and coughed to clear my lungs.
“Legs.”
“I’ve got you.” He reached down and grabbed my calf. “Twist your foot.”
I shook my head. “Stand clear, the car’s going to—”
“I’m not leaving you!”
“Consider it an order.”
“We both know I’m crap at those.”
Pain resonated in my ankle as he twisted it free, and I was able to extricate my other leg. Xavier dragged me out of the Jeep and backward along the asphalt until we were in the clear.
A blinding flash of light lit up the night as our vehicle burst into flames. An intense wave of heat hit us and we turned away, hurrying to reach a safer distance up the road. We leaped over a barrier and jumped down to a cement walkway, sprinting shoulder to shoulder along the edge to escape the mayhem.
Relief flooded me when I saw the speedboat tethered to the dock. “Get in.”
We clambered aboard.
“Get down,” I ordered.
While Xavier lay on the floor of the boat, I got reacquainted with the controls, navigating us out of the river and into the South China Sea.
Brushing my hand through my hair, I felt glass splinters scrape my palm. I leaned over and shook them out. The humidity was suffocating. I peeled off my jacket and threw it down, then glanced over to make sure Xavier was okay.
“Are you hurt?” I called to him.
He waved that off.
Using the map on my wristwatch, I checked our coordinates. Our estimated arrival at the checkpoint was thirty minutes away. I pushed the boat hard and the engine roared against the strain. My shirt stuck to my back from the wet heat, the stickiness nearly unbearable. I felt a dull ache in my bones, aftereffects of the crash, but there was no time to deal with it.
Keeping my eyes open for the Coast Guard, I gunned it through the open water. If we were stopped it would be a catastrophe. They’d arrest us, then keep us locked up long enough for MSS to arrive—Chinese operatives who’d make us disappear.
Checking the fuel gauge, I realized we didn’t have enough petrol to get us back to land if that sub didn’t show.
I looked over at Xavier. He had rolled himself up into a ball.
“How are you doing?” I asked.
“I’m going to throw up.”
“Hang in there.”
“This is why I didn’t join the Navy,” he called up. “That, and you’re all a bunch of assholes.”
“Not appreciating the onboard entertainment?” I flashed a smile.
Using Morse code to signal to the Renowned, I sent a message via my wristwatch to let them know we’d arrived at the pre-arranged location.
Xavier leaned over the edge of the speedboat—to vomit, I assumed—and his eyes widened at the sight of surging water nearby. The long vessel rose out of the water nose first and then crashed onto the surface. I navigated our boat on half throttle towards the sub.
“Leave nothing behind,” I told him, grabbing my jacket.
Minutes later, we’d abandoned the speedboat and were descending the steps into the submarine. I made sure Xavier went first.
We both looked like shit in our scorched, stained clothes—and we reeked of acrid smoke.
The master-at-arms, along with the two military policemen, greeted us.
“Have Doc check him over,” I ordered.
“Yes, sir,” replied a midshipman.
“Where’s the Commander?” I asked.
“He’s in the comms room, sir.”
Xavier was escorted to his cabin. I imagined that was where he’d spend the duration of his time until we arrived in Britain.
I needed to clean up and change before debriefing a man like Oliver Hague. The few crew members who’d noticed our disheveled appearance knew what they were seeing was above their paygrade. They diverted their eyes out of respect.
With my hand on my chest, I tried to make it appear that taking deep breaths wasn’t an issue. Or the neck strain I was feeling didn’t hurt like hell. Or that my ankle didn’t burn with pain as I walked on it.
I went off to wash the rest of the glass splinters out of my hair. This shower would equal thirty seconds to warm the water, thirty seconds to soap up, and less than a minute to wash off the grime. Not the half hour shower I coveted. I’d grown soft since leaving this life.
After wiping fog from the bathroom mirror, I studied the bruises covering my face. There was a small cut on my chin, but it didn’t need suturing.
I stole a few minutes to apply ice to my ankle and rehydrate.
It was a hard fact that Xavier had had a chance to bolt at the crash site. Instead, he’d saved my life. Something wasn’t adding up. Either he’d changed his mind or that crash had given him cold feet. Or maybe, and it felt like a stretch, but there might just be some truth in what he was saying. I needed more time with him to dig deeper.
Back in my cabin, I found a bottle of Advil and swallowed four tablets, washing them down with a glass of recycled water. After getting dressed in black-ops combat gear, I headed out to visit Xavier. The young officer guarding his door was reluctant to let me in. Apparently, there was a no visit order.
I pulled rank.
Even if I was retired, my Commander status still meant something.
Xavier was lying on his bunk. Warily, he watched me enter.
I approached him, feeling an unfamiliar emotion at seeing this man trapped in here. He could have escaped to freedom, and yet he’d done the honorable thing.
Xavier had showered, too, and unlike me he’d gotten off light on the bruises. There was a cut on his right eyebrow covered in a steristrip from where the doctor had given him the onceover.
His blue eyes looked no less trusting and he welcomed me with a dazzling smile, which had a curious effect on my senses. This compelling need I felt to reach out and draw him to me made my brain freeze.
It’s because we’ve shared a common threat, nothing more.
I forced a smile. “How are you feeling?”
“Better than you, apparently.”
I reached for the glass of water on the side table. “Here.”
He took it. “That was a bit of a rush. Bet you liked it.”
“That’ll teach you to accept a ride with a senior officer.”
He drank the glass dry. “I’m not allowed out of here?”
“I’ll talk to the Commander.”
“Your bestie, Oliver Hague.”
I smiled ruefully. “I’m fairly sure I’m on his shit list.”
Xavier stretched out his legs “I really need to jog around.” He peered up at me. “How the hell could you stand this confinement for all those years?”
“I kept busy.” I gestured towards him. “The doctor gave you the all clear?”
“Yeah. Bruised ribs, that’s about it. How about you?”
I placed my hand on my contused chest. “I’m invincible.�
�
“Still, they might want to get their prized commander checked out.”
“You’re the man of the hour.”
“Looks like they had a contingency plan.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Those were our men who attacked us on the road.”
I’d not seen who was inside the lorry that had crashed into us, but that made no damn sense.
Instead I said, “Maybe I can help with your case when we get back to England?”
“I’ve tasted your brand of help. Don’t care for it.”
“Start talking, Xavier.”
“Why are you suddenly interested?”
“The mood takes me…now talk.”
He pushed himself up. “My mission was to wipe out any software evidence of what the British government was up to on foreign soil.”
“It couldn’t be done remotely?”
He shrugged. “Their firewalls prevented anyone from the outside accessing it.”
“You believe you’re at risk from the intel you gathered?”
He shook his head. “You were told to assassinate me if I refused to comply. Aren’t you curious why?”
“I will neither admit nor deny—”
“You think I went rogue?” He gave me a sad smile.
I sat on the edge of his bunk. “Tell me everything.”
Xavier shifted back against the wall. “That’ll put you in more danger.”
I grinned, letting him know I never shied away from adventure.
“You think you’re doing me a favor by bringing me home,” he said.
“I’ll tell your barrister you came willingly.”
“Right.”
“That you saved my life,” I added. “You could have just saved yourself, Xavier.”
He could have left me to die.
Xavier swallowed hard. “How can I get you to believe me?”
“Tell me the name of the man in MI6 who you believe is a national risk.”
At that moment I saw the real man behind the quirky demeanor. Gone was his arrogance—though a near-death experience tended to tame the ego.
I rested a palm on his shoulder. “I’ll make sure your transport to the U.K. goes smoothly.”
He shrugged off my hand. “You’re never going to see me again.”
“Are you going to refuse to see me?”
“Of course not.”
“Then what’s the issue?”
“They’ll come for me.”
“Who?”
“Can you get me off this sub?”
“When we reach England, yes.”
“It’ll be too late by then.”
“I suggest you take up meditation, Xavier. This confined space—”
“I want to trust you.”
“You can.”
He threw me a paranoid look. “I’m guessing we’re thirty minutes from Hong Kong?” He squeezed his eyes shut. “If you can get me to Lan Kwai Fong, I’ll tell you everything.”
He was asking me to take him to an expatriate haunt famed for its bars. “What’s there other than the party scene?”
“From there I can find my own way home, Commander.”
He was delusional.
“Lieutenant, we’re going back to the U.K. in this vessel.”
Xavier closed his eyes in resignation.
I pushed off the bed and stood. “I’ll find you something to read.”
He looked more lost than I’d ever seen anyone, perhaps only now realizing the consequences of his actions—a prison cell reserved just for him.
With this miserable fact burning a hole in my chest, I gave a heavy sigh and headed for the door. There came a sense of loss at leaving him.
His words back in Macau lingered in my mind. “James, I have the skill to find the man who made you a widower.”
If I stayed, there could be answers that would unravel a past I hadn’t been able to let go of. Or just more games played by a treacherous agent trying to manipulate a broken man. I was a senior operative who usually hid his pain well beneath his contentious demeanor.
Damn him for seeing through me. Damn him, too, for being so likeable.
Outside the cabin, I gave a courteous smile to his guard, trying to ignore the fact that I was feeling protective toward this young man. I had to fight the urge to turn around and walk back in…
I bit down on my cut lip to refocus.
Half an hour later, after grabbing a hot meal of processed lasagna in the officer’s mess, I gathered a couple of books from the communal shelf. Alex Cross by James Patterson and 12 Rules for Life by Jordan B. Peterson, which I thought would be of interest to Xavier. With these in hand I made my way back to his cabin.
The Master-of Arms who’d been guarding his cabin was gone.
The door was open.
My gut wrenched in alarm when I saw Xavier wasn’t inside. He wasn’t in the head, either. I flung the books onto the bed for when he returned. I wondered where they’d taken him. To have that walk, maybe? He’d desperately wanted to stretch his legs.
The submarine tilted and I braced myself.
We were banking—that familiar sensation similar to a car cresting a hill. The sub had broken through the surface of the water.
With my throat tight with dread, I leaned sideways to avoid the overhead with my right shoulder forward as I made my way through the passageways. I eased through the open hatches, throwing courteous nods to the crew as they passed.
“Where are we?” I called to one of them.
“Just off Hong Kong’s harbor, sir,” replied the young midshipman.
What the hell are we doing here?
A rush of heat and heavy air hit me when I reached the exit to the surface, peering up the ladder through the outside port at the night sky, glittering with stars. I heard the distinctive chop of blades slicing through the air. With two hands on the ladder, I rushed up the rungs toward the outer hatch.
Oliver Hague was standing on the bridge and beside him were two military policemen. I looked up at the Royal Air Force helicopter hovering above.
Xavier was being winched off the sub by rope.
The fierce wind from the chopper blades created a surge; a light spray covered us.
“What’s a SAR-H doing out here?” I yelled to Oliver over the noise.
The RAF left in the late nineties when Hong Kong returned to Chinese rule. There were no military bases here now. Not for the British, anyway.
Xavier was pulled through the chopper’s door.
Oliver studied my bruised face with disapproval. “Want to tell me what happened in Macau?”
“Not particularly.” I gave a nod at the helicopter. “Where are they taking him?”
“Looks like it’s your turn to be out of the loop, James,” he shouted.
James
On the way back home, I had a long time on the HMS Renowned to replay the catastrophe of Macau. The way they’d extracted Xavier from the vessel without consulting me filled me with a quiet rage. This was way off protocol.
London was as gloomy as when I’d left it for the trip down to Portsmouth, where the journey of a thousand cuts had begun aboard that nuclear sub.
Standing before my boss’ desk back in Vauxhall, I tried to gauge his mood. Terrance Farmer, otherwise known as ‘C’ for Chief—though I substituted another “c” word on days like this—was a man I’d once respected. At the moment he seemed distracted and uncomfortable in my presence, like I was taking up too much of his time. All five fucking minutes of it.
Farmer, with his long face and cold eyes, could be a grumpy bastard at times but today he was even more wound up. He looked older than his years. Serving in Berlin before the wall had come down had obviously taken a toll on his body and soul. Despite his frosty demeanor, I had always tried to see beyond his sternness to his more amenable side. Two years ago, he had offered me a civilian position with MI6 and it had altered the trajectory of my life. I’d retired from the Navy and had finally put to good
use the linguistic skills I’d refined at Eton.
After losing Victoria, I’d found being on a submarine for long periods of time suffocating. Something had changed and I’d been unable to define what it was exactly, so I’d looked for an out. It had been Farmer who’d given me an exit plan.
Inside this secret agency, I’d discreetly dug around in my wife’s old files. She had served here after leaving Cambridge, right up until her death. My work, and looking for anything that would lead me to understand what had happened to her, had kept me busy. Not having personal relationships was a side effect of my efforts to understand why my life had gone downhill so fast.
Right now, Terrance and I were at an impasse.
He leaned back in his office chair. “You left quite the mess, James.”
My still being alive didn’t factor in, apparently. Though this was standard for my profession so no surprise there.
“Can we talk about the lieutenant?” I moved over to the chair in front of his desk.
He gestured to stop me from sitting. “I’m expecting a call from the Prime Minister. Let’s meet at the club later.”
“Don’t you want to be debriefed?”
“Not necessary.”
“I have questions of my own.”
“I’m sure you do. Let’s not get into them now.”
“The vehicle that crashed into my Jeep—it was being driven by one of our operatives?”
“Who told you that?”
I stood my ground. “My report—”
“Unnecessary. We’ve cleaned up the damage.” He sat forward. “Take time off.”
“Xavier hinted there could be something nefarious—”
“Xavier?”
“That’s his real name, right? The lieutenant involved?”
He pushed to his feet. “Forget this one, James.”
His way of ordering me out.
I gave a nod. “Give my love to Chelsea.”
“Of course.”
I felt his stare on me until I was out the door.
The old-boys club had closed ranks and I hated the way they’d disregarded a man’s career in the process. A man’s life, even. Xavier deserved better.
I bloody well deserved better.
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