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Xi Jian looked to his left toward the bow of the ship and the lights twinkling on the coast. “How deep?”

The chief mate shrugged. “Ninety feet or so. We’re in one of the deeper anchorages about five miles south of the port.”

Xi Jian looked up and down the vacant deck of the ship, then flung the Toughbook computer over the side and watched it tumble through the air before crashing into the water with a quiet splash. He watched it disappear, then turned right and started walking aft to the rope ladder and his parole.

Wu Tian followed on his heels, keeping a watchful eye on him until he could verify he was off the ship and they had removed all evidence of contraband. Xi Jian heard his heavy footfalls behind him but was too busy thinking about a hot shower and soft pillow-top bed to pay him any mind. But when he heard the radio squawking at the man’s waist, he stopped dead in his tracks.

Did he say Coast Guard?

Wu Tian’s wide-eyed expression amplified his command. “Go!”

Xi Jian looked into the darkness beyond the railing for the approaching dinghy. He had hoped that reactivating their transponder after the Navy ship turned away would eliminate them from suspicion. But the radio call from the bridge dashed that hope to pieces.

“Go,” he said again.

“The container…”

Wu Tian waved away the comment. “I’ll take care of it.” Then, bringing the radio to his mouth, he said, “I’m on my way. Respond that we are ready to receive them.”

Xi Jian hesitated.

“Go!”

He watched the chief mate turn for the bridge, then sprinted aft for the boarding ladder. He needed to be off the boat before Coast Guard Cutter Forrest Rednour pulled alongside to board them.

Or before Wu Tian sanitized the container.

* * *

A few minutes later, he descended from the rope ladder’s bottom rung onto the bobbing bow of the Rigid-Hull Inflatable Boat. He had barely steadied himself when the driver put the transmission in reverse and lurched away from the merchant vessel, bringing him to his knees.

“Sit down!” the voice hissed.

He scrambled off the front step plate and scurried around the center console to the aft seat, collapsing against the backrest as the one-hundred-horsepower Honda outboard propelled the small boat forward.

They were running without navigation lights, and the driver steered them clear of the dim halo of illumination surrounding the merchant vessel. If they could remain invisible from the Coast Guard, they might make it to shore none the worse for wear. But if somebody spotted them without their navigation lights…

“Was it a success?” she asked, craning her neck to look over her shoulder at him.

The faint red glow from the instrument cluster lit up half her face, and Xi Jian could tell she was beautiful. The Ministry had increased its use of women in the field over the half century following Katrina Leung’s infiltration of the American Federal Bureau of Investigation. But at least he didn’t have to spread his legs to complete his tasks.

His eyes wandered from her face, down to the body she had tried hiding underneath a wool peacoat. But even its bulk wasn’t enough to disguise her shapely figure, and his eyes traced further down to her ass. His face cracked into a smile.

She stood the throttle up, and the motor behind him fell silent. “I asked you a question!”

He shot his eyes back to her face, saw it contorted with anger, and shook away his thoughts. “N-n-no,” he stammered.

“No?”

“The hack failed,” he said.

“Was it the drones?”

He glared at her through the darkness. “The drones did exactly what we wanted them to do. They lured the target aircraft into range.”

“So, what happened?”

He shook his head. “I don’t know. The hack… it just stopped.”

If he had expected some sort of absolution for his failure, she didn’t give it to him. “Do you have it?”

“What?”

“The mission data!”

He nodded his head.

“Give it to me.”

He shoved his hand into his front pocket and pulled out the memory card. He felt its miniature form between his thumb and forefinger and held it out across the fiberglass hull, still unnerved by the dichotomy of the woman’s appearance and her demeanor. He had never been spoken to with such disdain, let alone by a woman.

Like a viper, she snatched it from his grasp and slipped it into her pocket. Then, without another word, she turned back and advanced the throttles to bring the twenty-foot craft up on plane to escape the approaching cutter. Xi Jian huddled behind the woman, who stood tall at the console, peering into the darkness beyond the bow. He tucked himself close, her slender body blocking most of the wind while jostling against the eddies that swirled on either side of them.

“Where are we going?” he shouted over the din of the wind and water and four-stroke motor.

“Escaping before your blunder costs us,” she shouted.

He felt his temper flare. “My blunder?”