Outlaw

Punky had experienced her share of homecomings when her dad returned from deployments, but this one was unlike most. There wasn’t a sea of people with mothers and fathers, husbands and wives, or children of all ages waiting patiently for their sailors to step ashore. There weren’t women in beautiful dresses that conveyed either a sense of patriotic pride or a strong sexual desire. This one was a private affair for two people who had been through more than most.

Punky saw her reach down and rub her growing belly. “You look beautiful,” she said.

Jenn glanced at her again and smiled. She wore a bright yellow form-fitting dress that ended just below her knees. Her red patent leather high heels were hidden from the California sun but matched her lipstick perfectly. Punky doubted they were the best shoes for a pregnant woman, but who was she to question what a woman waiting for her sailor chose to wear.

“Thank you,” she said.

Punky grinned and nodded. “Andy’s a lucky man.”

In more ways than one, she thought.

If not for the intelligence Jenn had kept safe on her computer, the slow-burning virus that had spread across the USS Ronald Reagan might have succeeded in sidelining it during a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. If not for Andy getting sick early on, the carrier CO might not have ordered a quarantine that alerted Punky to the attack. There were so many what-ifs that kept her from simply enjoying the fact that the good guys had won — that freedom had again triumphed.

Punky glanced at her watch and mentally calculated how much longer they needed to wait. Andy’s plane had touched down ten minutes earlier, and she suspected the C-2 pilot was just as eager to see his girlfriend as she was to see him. She glanced in the mirror and grinned when she saw Jenn nervously biting her lip.

“He’ll be here soon,” she said.

Jenn let out a little gasp, then the door flew open, and she jumped out in a hurricane of yellow. Punky craned her neck and watched the flight attendant weaving through a throng of deplaning passengers, homing in on her boyfriend like a heat-seeking missile. She saw Andy drop his olive drab seabag and lift his girlfriend into the air, kissing her and spinning her around with a look full of love in his eyes.

Her phone rang, and Punky answered it while watching Andy kneel to place his mouth on Jenn’s growing belly. “Special Agent King,” she said.

Jenn brought a hand to her mouth as if to stifle a cry that had been bottled inside, and Punky almost ignored the voice on the other end as she remembered what it had felt like to be reunited with a loved one. “Punky, it’s Camron.”

“What’s going on, Camron?”

“There’s something you should know.”

The overwhelming sense of happiness that had consumed her suddenly vanished. “What?”

“A woman has come forward claiming to be Shen Li’s grandmother.”

“Her what?”

She felt her heart sink as she thought of the frightened little girl who had buried her head in her chest as a guard dog snarled and tore into her mother. She couldn’t imagine what Shen Li was feeling without either of her parents — one who had died to prevent an attack engineered by the other.

“Her grandmother,” Camron repeated.

“That’s bullshit, Camron.”

“I know it is,” he said. “But the State Department received a formal request from the People’s Republic of China to assist in reuniting the orphaned girl with family.”

“Camron…”

“Which is why I’m calling you,” he said. “If there is anybody who can sniff out the truth, it’s you. If Tan Lily really is a Ministry of State Security operative, then there’s a good chance the woman claiming to be Shen Li’s grandmother is somehow connected to their network here.”

“Where does she live?” Punky asked, feeling the familiar stir of excitement of a new investigation.

“In the Bay Area. The Willow Glen neighborhood of San Jose.”

Punky turned and looked through the window to see Andy leading Jenn to the car. If she drove them to Jenn’s place in Escondido and continued north, she could be in San Jose before dark. “I’ll look into it,” she said. “Send me an address.”

Camron ended the call, and Punky turned as Andy opened the rear door.

“Welcome home, sailor.”

60

San Jose, California

Punky sat behind the wheel of the borrowed Ford Fusion, lamenting the loss of not one but two marvels of automobile craftsmanship. First, her father’s vintage Corvette Stingray had been destroyed in a crash while fleeing armed gunmen taking orders from China’s Ministry of State Security. Then, her replacement — a brand-new Dodge Challenger Hellcat Redeye — had been destroyed when a Ministry assassin stole it after shooting her at point-blank range.

I need to find a new job.