Dragon Head

by James Houston Turner

  Walking back to his van, Zak saw Emily hug Ginie. By now, Jingfei and Kai were gone, to the IHOP, no doubt, and when he approached the van, Emily and Ginie stepped away from one another and wiped their eyes.

  “Everything okay?” asked Zak.

  Ginie nodded and said she was going inside to use the bathroom.

  Zak watched Ginie disappear inside the minimart, and with a troubled frown, lifted the nozzle and began filling the tank. “What’s going on?” he asked, looking over at Emily.

  “She’s taking things pretty hard,” Emily replied. “Looking into the eyes of that crazy woman. Seeing her shoot those people. Seeing Su Yin get kidnapped. Getting smashed in the face. I think she feels responsible. She and Jingfei were talking and hugging.”

  “Did you hear what they said?”

  Emily shook her head. “They went off by themselves.”

  “Is there anything I can do?”

  “You’re her rock, Zak, her father figure, the man who can weather any storm. Keep being that man.”

  “And you? How are you doing?”

  Emily chuckled. “I am such a mess. Getting offended all the time. Making demands that are totally unreasonable.”

  “Don’t be so hard on yourself. We’ve all been through a lot.”

  “Yeah, well, Jingfei and Ginie let me know in no uncertain terms what a bitch I’ve been. And they were right. I got so caught up in . . . myself.”

  Zak opened his arm and Emily slid into his embrace.

  “Jingfei puzzles me, though,” said Emily, stepping away when the nozzle clicked off. “Do you think she’s been acting weird?”

  “Weird, how?” asked Zak, topping off the tank.

  “Weird in that she was hugging me and saying how much she loved me, then telling me to remember that, no matter what.”

  “She said the same thing to me.”

  “Jingfei has never expressed feelings to me that way. What do you think’s going on?”

  “I think she’s realizing how quickly life can change. What happened to Su Yin hit all of us pretty hard. I know those kids have had it tough, traveling cross-country like they did, and Jingfei has always been the one in control. The mama bear of the three. But this has rendered her powerless and ignited emotions she didn’t know she had.”

  “No wonder she pestered Alex so much to go with him. She wanted to be doing something. And if I’m being honest, I actually think she would have been an asset for what Alex is trying to do.”

  “To tell you the truth, so do I,” agreed Zak. “But I know where Alex is coming from. He’d worry about their safety, and that worry would split his focus.”

  Zak replaced the nozzle just as Ginie returned to the van. “Are you okay?” he asked.

  Ginie nodded and climbed into the van.

  “Make sure she’s all right while I grab my change,” said Zak.

  Emily nodded and climbed into the van while Zak headed toward the minimart. On his way across the pavement, he looked again at the pizza delivery kid. He wondered if the kid ever ate vegetables. He thought briefly about the hearty stews he’d eaten most of his life. Lots of meat. Lots of gravy. Lots of vegetables. The Soviet military may not have been the most affectionate place on earth, but they sure knew how to cook.

  Pulling open the glass door, Zak went inside, and after receiving his change, came back out.

  Back at the van, Zak retrieved a long-handled squeegee out of a bucket of water and washed the windshield. He then wiped off the streaks using some paper towels, and after repeating the process for all of the windows, replaced the squeegee in the bucket.

  When finished, Zak looked toward the blue sedan. The occupants were still inside. With a wrinkle of concern, Zak pulled open his car door and slid behind the wheel.

  “How long does it take to get burgers?” he asked.

  “You gave them a hundred dollars,” said Emily. “They’re going to buy everything they see.”

  “I told them to bring me some change.”

  “Good luck with that.”

  Firing up the engine, Zak shifted into gear and accelerated away from the pump. Two minutes later, he was pulling into a parking space in front of the IHOP restaurant. The large windows facing them showed the restaurant to be full of families, couples, groups, and singles, in booths and at tables, eating, drinking, talking, and working their phones.

  “Want me to go in and check?” asked Emily.

  “Let’s all go in,” said Zak. “Hit the bathrooms and get some coffee.”

  The decor inside the restaurant was friendly and bright and rich with the smells of fast food and coffee. Waitresses hurried about, some with plates stacked up their arms.

  “I don’t see them,” Emily said.

  “Check the women’s bathroom while I check the men’s. Ginie, check the floor. See if they’ve found a table.”

  Thirty seconds later, Zak emerged from the men’s bathroom to see Emily and Ginie waiting for him. Neither woman needed to speak for Zak to know what was wrong. He could see it in their eyes.

  Jingfei and Kai were gone.

  CHAPTER 39

  Wilcox slowed his sedan for the turn into an unmarked gate at the southernmost corner of the airfield. News had already reached him about the murder of a guard at the Oakland airport and how a Gulfstream owned by a Hong Kong corporation had taken off.

  Dragon Head, Wilcox thought.

  After rolling down his window, Wilcox showed the armed guard his CIA identification. After inspecting the badge with his flashlight, the guard turned his halogen beam on Talanov, who was seated beside Wilcox, then Straw Sandal, who was in the backseat with her hands duct-taped behind her.

  “Who are those two?” asked the guard.

  “That’s classified,” replied Wilcox, taking back his ID.

  The guard glared at Wilcox, then ambled back to his hut and raised the barrier.

  Wilcox accelerated across a row of retracted steel spikes and along a painted lane toward the Jonsair hangar, which was a large flat shed with huge sliding doors. An oval neon sign was mounted beside the office door. The perimeter of the sign was white and the lettering inside it was blue.

  Sitting in the darkness in front of the hangar, with its stairs folded open, was a modified Gulfstream G650ER. It had a flight range of nearly 14,000 kilometers, or roughly 8650 miles, with a cruising altitude of up to 51,000 feet. Manufactured by General Dynamics, the Gulfstream was a sleek twin-engine jet aircraft that was just under one hundred feet long. The aircraft’s wingspan was two inches shy of its length, with turned-up wingtips and eight small oval windows along each side of the fuselage.

  “You leave your Gulfstream unguarded?” asked Talanov.

  “It’s a sterile area,” answered Wilcox.

  Wilcox parked near the front door of the office, and when he did, the door swung open and three people emerged. The first was an armed guard. He was a big guy in a uniform with a nine-millimeter pistol strapped to his waist. The second was pilot Mark Nutt, who was a seasoned veteran of more than twenty years. Mark was dressed in a short-sleeved white shirt. The third was Stephanie, who was dressed in another of her stylish navy-blue slack suits.

  After greeting everyone, Wilcox tossed his car keys to the guard and led the way up the stairs into the aircraft. Talanov and Straw Sandal followed, with Stephanie and Mark bringing up the rear. Once inside, Stephanie activated a switch that folded up the stairs and closed the door.

  Talanov led Straw Sandal to a seat, where he cut the tape off her wrists, then used a plastic zip-tie to secure one of her ankles to a security ring anchored to the floor. “Can’t have you getting lost,” he said, taking a seat across the aisle.

  Mark was accelerating the Gulfstream away from the hangar when Wilcox stepped into the cockpit. In the distance, a big Boeing was thundering its way up into the sky.

  “Strap in up here, if you want,” Mark said, gesturing Wilcox to the copilot’s seat. “We’ve got a beautiful flight ahead. Clear sky all the way to
DC.”

  “Are we carrying a full load of fuel?” asked Wilcox over the hushed whine of the Gulfstream’s two Rolls-Royce jet engines.

  “Per your orders,” Mark replied.

  “Good. We’ll be needing it.”

  “Why, are we taking the scenic route?” asked Mark while checking his gauges. He flipped several switches while the radio crackled with call signs and flight numbers.

  “You might say that. I’m rerouting our flight to Hong Kong.”

  Marked laughed. “You crack me up.” When Wilcox did not reply, Mark looked over his shoulder to see Wilcox staring back at him. “You’re not joking,” he said.

  “And I need you to not file an amended flight plan,” added Wilcox, “at least not right away. Delay it as long as you can.”

  “Bill, I . . . there’s no way.”

  “You have to. I’ll take the heat.”

  “So you’re saying there will be heat?”

  “Mark, I need you to do this.”

  “Bill, I can’t. We’ll both end up in prison. We’re stealing the company jet!”

  “You’ll be fine. I promise.”

  “With respect, I need more than a promise. I need to know the nature of this trip and who authorized it.”

  “That’s classified.”

  “And that’s bullshit, and you know it. Look, you and I have known each other a long time, and I have never known you to do something this crazy. Tell me what’s going on. You’re asking me to disobey a direct order by the DNI to bring you back to DC.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Can’t or won’t?” asked Mark.

  “Plausible deniability, old friend. The less you know, the better. You can say that I gave you no choice, that I ordered you to comply under the guise of national security. At the end of the day, I’ll be the one they string up.”

  “And I’ll be the one who didn’t call this in or try and stop you.”

  “If there were any other way, I’d jump on it in a heartbeat. But there isn’t. We have to do this.”

  “If we do, you’re finished, you know that, don’t you?”

  “I know,” said Wilcox. “But this isn’t about me or what it will cost me if we do. It’s what it will cost others if I don’t.”

  With a melancholy smile, Wilcox clasped Mark on the shoulder and went back to his seat.

  “You okay?” asked Talanov when Wilcox sat across from him in one of the plush leather seats.

  “Oddly, yes,” answered Wilcox. “So before I come to my senses and realize what we’re doing, I’m going to catch a few winks.”

  Nestling back and closing his eyes, Wilcox fell asleep quickly while the Gulfstream climbed to a cruising altitude of fifty thousand feet. Once they had leveled off over the Pacific, Stephanie appeared with a silver tray. On it were two glasses of wine and a paper cup of water. Wilcox opened his eyes just as Stephanie handed Straw Sandal the paper cup of water. She then offered Talanov and Wilcox the wine.

  “Compliments of Congresswoman Gustaves,” explained Stephanie to Wilcox’s wary scowl. “Some La Tâche for La Tâche, is what she said I should to tell you.”

  Wilcox handed one of the glasses to Talanov. “Enjoy the moment,” he remarked, extending his glass toward Talanov in a toast. “Gustaves will not be in such a generous mood once she finds out what we’ve done. Shaw, either, who will want my head on Stephanie’s silver tray once he—”

  Wilcox was interrupted by the vibrating of his phone on the console beside his seat. After checking the Caller ID, Wilcox set his wineglass on the console and put a finger to his lips. A signal for Talanov to remain quiet.

  After swiping the answer button, Wilcox put the phone on speaker. “Director Shaw,” he said. “What a pleasant—”

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” yelled Shaw, who was pacing back and forth in front of his desk. Behind the desk was a wall of bookshelves. On another wall were dozens of photos of Shaw with famous people. “Did you think I wouldn’t find out?”

  “I had to. Talanov escaped.”

  “He did what?”

  “Got away. He jumped on a commercial flight with Dragon Head’s daughter, Straw Sandal, and is headed to Hong Kong because Dragon Head kidnapped a little girl and ordered Talanov to return his daughter to him or the little girl dies.”

  “I don’t care about some random kid! I want Talanov in custody!”

  “Sir, the only way I can do that is to go after him. To get there first and be waiting when he lands.”

  “How you could let this happen?”

  “He’s Talanov, what can I say? I’ll call you when I know more.”

  Wilcox hurriedly clicked off and slumped back in his seat. Dots of perspiration had already formed on his forehead.

  When Shaw heard the dial tone, he threw his phone against the wall. And with a loud curse, he grabbed another cell phone out of a desk drawer and dialed Adam Schiller. When Schiller answered, he said, “I need you to find out if Talanov’s on a flight to Hong Kong.”

  “Of course, sir,” Schiller replied.

  “What’s the status on Saya Lee?” asked Shaw.

  “She’s being released on a technicality.”

  “Good. You know what to do.”

  On board the Gulfstream, Talanov looked at Wilcox with amused disbelief. “He’s Talanov, what can I say?”

  Loosening his tie, Wilcox finished his wine, motioned for a refill, then nodded for Talanov to join him at the rear of the plane. Talanov knew what that meant. Wilcox wanted to talk without Straw Sandal overhearing them. Once they were seated at the rear of the plane, Wilcox waited until Stephanie had served his second glass of wine before asking Talanov whether or not he thought they could pull this off. Before Talanov could answer, Wilcox said, “Personally, I don’t like the odds. We have the element of surprise – for now – but that won’t last for long.”

  “What about your friend with the CIB?”

  “Alice will get us into the country through the diplomatic gate, but we are holding a Chinese citizen hostage, and not even Alice can overlook that. We’ll need to cut Straw Sandal loose before we enter the airport, which means we lose our leverage.”

  “Maybe not,” said Talanov.

  “What other leverage do we have?”

  “The fact that Dragon Head kidnapped Su Yin.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Why go to all of that trouble?”

  “I still don’t understand.”

  “This was all about finding me,” explained Talanov. “Not about killing me, but finding me. In other words, he wants something. What he wants, we don’t yet know, but it leads me to think we still have leverage, because for whatever reason, Dragon Head needs me in Hong Kong. That means we’ll still have bargaining power, with or without Straw Sandal.”

  “Maybe,” said Wilcox, “but we’ll still be on our own, and we don’t speak the language, and we are dinosaurs when it comes to technology. Alice will give us some help, but she is still in the CIB, and I can’t expect her to violate the law for an unsanctioned operation like this. What we’re attempting is a long shot at best.”

  “When a long shot is your only shot, you take it.”

  “And that is one of the corniest lines I’ve ever heard.”

  “What other choice do we have?”

  Wilcox thought for a moment, then chuckled and raised his glass. “Then here’s to long shots,” he said, “and a prayer that we’re not the ones in the crosshairs.”

  CHAPTER 40

  After dinner, the cabin lights were dimmed and Wilcox reclined his seat and went to sleep. Talanov, however, was unable to sleep. His mind was focused on Su Yin and how she reminded him of his first love . . . a girl whose name he never knew. The occasion occurred when he was a boy of twelve, when he had been sent to the ancient martial arts monastery of Lóngshù, in the mountains of northern China. His instructors, the dăoshī, had chosen the girl for a carefully calculated act of betrayal designed to harden youn
g Alex into the warrior he was chosen to become.

  The dăoshī accomplished this by assigning the girl to be his sparring partner. However, the use of names was forbidden at Lóngshù – even speaking to one another was forbidden – which was why Alex never knew her name, nor did she know his.

  The attraction between them happened slowly. Disarmingly modest and shy, the girl was much more accomplished in martial arts than Alex. Time and again he would attack, and time and again she would effortlessly flip or punch him to the mat. So he would try harder, and fall harder, again and again. Ultimately, the girl became the reason he never resented being defeated by a woman, and she was likewise the reason he never gratuitously handed victory to a woman. If a woman wanted it, she had to earn it. No double standard. No going easy.

  During their sparring matches, the girl came to admire his unconquerable spirit. He remembered seeing it in her eyes. Remembered feeling it in the punches she would pull. Punches that would still knock him to the mat but without the force she could have used. He recalled seeing her watch him practice katas among the peach trees, in the soft green grass, with cool mountain breezes rustling the leaves. He recalled the morning he found a peach hidden in the cleft of the tree where he practiced.

  A gift from the girl whose name he never knew.

  He could still taste the sweetness of that piece of fruit, and for years afterward, would lie awake at night thinking of her and how the dăoshī had forcibly sent her away. Her cries for help when she was being taken still haunted him, and he wondered now, at forty-seven thousand feet, if the agony of that loss was fueling his resolve to rescue Su Yin.

  Then there was Noya, the teenage girl whose family had been executed years ago in Spain by his KGB partner, Sofia, who then turned her hatred on him, and would have killed him had he not killed her first. Noya had been deliberately infected by Sofia with an engineered strain of anthrax, and later died, or so he thought until months later when the Americans got word to him that she had survived.