Silver Stars (Front Lines #2)(28)

The sub is a Royal Navy T-class, a sullen-looking beast with a strange bulge at the front where external torpedo tubes look like the nostrils of a dragon’s flared head. She’s 275 feet, about four railroad cars long, or just shy of a football field, but just a tenth as wide in the beam. There’s a superstructure divided in two bits, the higher rear portion festooned with antennae and what can only be the retracted tops of two periscopes. The lower, forward part of the superstructure is taken up by a four-inch gun that seems oversized for its environment.

Fishing boats are heading out from the shelter of the pier, chugging slowly, one after another into choppy seas gray in the faint light of dawn. The night has been shortened by their eastward progress.

“There’s your ride,” the lieutenant says. The sergeant shows his face to a bored Portuguese sailor on sentry duty, and they drive out onto the mole, coming to a stop beside the sub.

“Hey,” Cisco says. “That’s not ours, is it?”

“His Majesty’s boat, Topaz,” the lieutenant says. “They’re your ride.”

“The hell they are,” Cisco says. “There is no goddamn way I am going down underwater. No way in hell.”

“You’ll have to,” Rainy says.

“No. No.” Cisco shakes his head violently. He looks like a man ready to crawl out of his skin. Fearless through the battering airborne thunderstorm, he is transformed now. “No way. No way, no how. The hell with this! Uh-uh, no way.”

But in the end there is a way, involving quite a bit of Azorean vinho de cheiro, a red wine that smells of strawberries. And just two hours behind schedule an exceedingly drunk and raving mobster is manhandled down the hatch and lashed into a canvas hammock by wonderfully amused British submariners.





9

RIO RICHLIN—CAMP ZIGZAG, TUNISIA, NORTH AFRICA

“Richlin! Someone here to see you.” Sergeant Cole holds the tent flap back, and a tall young man bows his head to enter.

“Everyone decent?” Strand Braxton asks, grinning. He’s in an Air Corps uniform: khaki slacks and a sheep’s-wool-trimmed leather jacket that looks very dashing and is completely wrong for the heat.

Rio at that moment is carefully cleaning and oiling her M1. The pieces are laid out on her cot atop a spread-out towel. She has removed the strap. She has pulled the trigger guard forward and pulled the trigger assembly all the way out. She has separated the stock and has even disassembled the gas cylinder, laying the parts out in a neat, familiar pattern.

With clean rags, brushes, and solvent she has cleaned each and every part. She is now busy using a second clean rag to cover all moving parts with a thin coat of oil.

Her hands are greasy, and she smells of sewing machine oil and kerosene. She is dressed in dungaree trousers and a sweat-stained T-shirt. The army has spent approximately zero time considering the fact that army bras—a device with as many straps and as little sex appeal as a parachute—is only indifferently covered by the T-shirt.

The fact that she is in a shocking state of undress flashes through Rio’s mind, but that does not stop her from yelling, “Strand!”

She sets the traveler (a small, curiously shaped metal piece) down, glances furtively around to see if Jack is there. Then she runs to Strand, throwing her arms around him.

They kiss, but discreetly, a kiss that is more passionate than brother-sister, but more self-conscious than would be the case if Geer, Stick, and Cat were not watching with undisguised interest.

“Huh,” Geer says. “So Richlin is still a girl. I’ll be damned.”

“Strand, this is Stick, the one with the clean new corporal’s stripes, that’s Preeling there, and the * is Geer.”

The word * is out of Rio’s mouth before she can think it through. She sees Strand wince, then cover it up. Geer doesn’t even pretend to be offended.

“Sorry,” Rio says, genuinely embarrassed. “My language has gone to . . . I mean, well, you know . . .”

“It’s good to meet you all,” Strand says. Then he looks more closely at Rio. “Is that a bruise?”

“What, this?” Rio waves it off. “Just, um . . . I accidentally ran into a pole last week.” She avoids eye contact with her squad members, all of whom maintain what might be called a patently false silence, including Cat, who ostentatiously makes a turning key motion over her mouth.

Just then Jenou enters, spots Strand, and gives him a peck on the cheek. “Well, if it isn’t Mr. Tall, Dark, and Handsome. What are you doing, Lieutenant Braxton, slumming with lowly enlisted types? Did you remember to salute him, Rio?”

“She gave me a different kind of salute, and I liked it a whole lot better,” Strand says.

“What are you doing here?” Rio asks. She’s holding him by the biceps, keeping him close, enjoying the feel of him. He’s a solid reminder of a different life, and a different Rio. And she quite likes the feel of his lean muscles.

“I volunteered to fly a bird colonel over here. He and his staff were in some big hurry, and we’re stood down for a couple days. So I gassed up my plane, grabbed my copilot and flight engineer, and here I am, at least until tomorrow morning. I don’t suppose you can wrangle a twenty-four-hour pass?”

Jenou laughs, and Rio shoots her a warning look, but of course Jenou ignores that and says, “Well, we had some passes last week, and you see the results.” She aims an accusing finger at Rio’s bruise. Mock-serious she says, “I’m afraid Rio can’t handle her drink.”