Читать книгу Top Hook - Gordon Kent, Gordon Kent - Страница 8

The Cessna 180 held steady at 5600 feet. At the controls, Rose Siciliano flew with the unconscious ease of a seasoned pilot—helicopters, now heading for astronaut training. Next to her, her husband glanced over the gauges and listened briefly to the Quonset tower. That was mostly the way it went—she flew and he kibitzed and ran the radio. Now, he put his hand on her knee, and her hand came down to cover his, and she flashed him a grin.

“It’s been a great couple of years,” he said.

She nodded, looked aside. Below, the Rhode Island coast was spread out for them on a sparkling day, Quonset Naval Air Station in her near foreground as they came around for their approach. They had been here two years and now they were leaving—both lieutenant-commanders, both at the Naval War College, both taking a quiet tour after some very hairy sea duty. And in two weeks it would be over.

“Gonna miss it,” he said.

“You bet.” Her normally husky voice was even a shade raspier. She had had their second child here. They had been happy. “Like real people,” she growled. Like civilians, she meant. Now, it was off to the CIA’s “Ranch” for him, astronaut training for her. Great moves for both of them, exactly what they wanted, but—She squeezed his hand. “We’ll look back on it,” she said.

“Hey!” He squeezed her leg, laughed. “Come on! Life is good. What can go wrong? We’re us.”

She grinned again, then leaned way over to kiss his cheek.

But what could go wrong? He was LCDR Alan Craik, off to the Ranch, the CIA’s arduous school for spies; she was LCDR Rose Siciliano, off to conquer the stars. What could possibly go wrong?

He got on the radio, and she banked the plane and descended, and then both of them were absorbed into the routine of headings and altitudes, and they went down and down and around and she brought it in on the center line of the runway, the wheels touching with a bump and squeal, and the ground raced along under her, and she was happy.

Rose learned how fast things could go wrong when they got home. He was already indoors; she had put the car away and gathered up their stuff, and she was standing in the front door of their rented house, looking down the long central corridor at his study. He stood there, back to her, telephone at his ear. She knew that stiff posture and long neck and what they meant: rage.

Mikey, their seven-year-old, knew it, too. And he knew the Navy. “His detailer,” he said, with the wisdom of a child who had grown up in the Navy. The baby-sitter, also a Navy child, nodded.

Rose started down the hall. Calls to your detailer were life-changing: your detailer helped plan your career, generated your orders.

Alan hadn’t said a word yet. She had almost reached him when she heard him say, “Understood,” and he slowly hung up and then gathered the cordless phone and its cradle in one hand and threw it across the study.

It smashed against the far wall; Rose flinched as bits of plastic flew.

“Those bastards!” he shouted. His face was contorted with anger. “Those bastards have changed my orders!”

Going to the Ranch had been a big deal. Their pal Harry O’Neill had urged it. It was a logical step for a hotshot whose squadron days were over, he said—move into the covert world and go where the action was.

“Why?” she said.

“How the fuck do I know why? They won’t tell me why!”

“But—honey—”

He came down a little, his anger never hot for long. “They’re sending me to some rinky-dink experimental project. Month at sea, then—the detailer doesn’t know.”

“Tell them you won’t accept the orders!”

He blew an angry sigh through puffed mouth. “The detailer doesn’t advise it.” He bent to pick up the telephone and tried to fit two broken pieces of plastic together. “Not going to the Ranch, Rose—It’s as if they don’t trust me all of a sudden.” He stood there, holding the pieces as if they were emblems of his helplessness. “All of a sudden, I’m a pariah.” He looked up at her in anguish. “Why?”

Tar sticks.

“Oh, shit.” He sat on the stair. “I’ve got to be in Trieste, Italy, in four days. I’m going to miss my own fucking graduation from the War College!”