Warshot (The Hunter Killer Series Book 6) Don Keith (red seas under red skies TXT) 📖

pain meds as quickly as he could tolerate, his wounds still left him sore and with a nagging ache in his left side where the Chinese bullets had done their damage.

The doctors at Changi General Hospital had been decidedly unhappy when Ward informed them that he would be checking out, with or without their approval. They had ultimately relented when Li Min Zhou, the Chinese spy lady, showed up with a world-renowned thoracic surgeon from Taipei University Hospital. The doctor carefully examined Ward and reviewed the diagnostic and treatment records, then his most recent CT images, before he pronounced him fit to travel, but only under medical supervision. Supervision by the doctor and his “assistant,” Li Min Zhou.

The SEAL team leader certainly had no objections. And that was how he ended up on the Gulfstream, bound for Taiwan.

Though he assured everyone that he was able, Ward still could not walk without some pain, so they wheeled him out of his room to a waiting ambulance. It was a mercifully short ride from the hospital right up to the Gulfstream’s ramp at the airport’s JetQuay VIP terminal. By the time Ward was comfortably tucked in, the plane had begun its takeoff roll and he was starting to doze. It was the way of life for members of the Navy Sea, Air and Land Teams. Grab sleep whenever available. No telling when it might not be.

Once they reached their cruising altitude, Li Min Zhou unbuckled her seat belt, rose from her seat, and walked back to where Jim Ward lay, eyes closed and snoring quietly. Along the way, she secured two glasses of champagne from a small refrigerator and carried one in each hand. As she settled into the seat next to him, she gave him a gentle nudge. He instantly came fully awake, another valuable trait for one in his line of work.

Li smiled as she offered one of the glasses to Ward.

“Didn’t realize I was booked into first class,” he said as he pushed the button to raise the bed, almost to eye level with her.

She turned up the brightness on the smile. “Doctor’s orders. You are allowed one glass, as long as it is properly chilled and at least a Dom Perignon 2002. Anything less might be too hard on your delicate system.”

Ward assumed this lovely but mysterious woman was not serious, that she was only pulling his leg, but he was willing to take what she offered. He accepted the glass and took a sip.

“Delicious, but after my time in the Navy and associating with the characters I do, I’m not sure my palate could tell the difference between a 2002 Dom and a five-dollar Total Wine special.”

“Barbarian,” she said, but with a chuckle. “I should have expected as much. Your friend TJ Dillon is no better. At least you are giving it a try. He prefers Budweiser. Absolutely disgusting.”

She leaned back in the overstuffed chair opposite his bed, carefully crossing her legs. He tried not to let her see that he was studying her. But as with most beautiful women, she was more than aware of how men saw her. And of the advantage that often gave her.

She took another small sip of the wine before placing the flute on the little fold-out tray. Again, the shifting of gears was obvious.

“Well, Mister Steely-eyed Trained Killer, I think it is time we talked a little. We did not spring you from that hospital room just to listen to you snore. As you might expect, not everything is as it seems in our most complicated world. That is especially true here in Asia. There are many players, and it is a very convoluted game in which we find ourselves. Some of the players you can easily see and can also quickly figure out what they are attempting to achieve. Others, not so much.”

She picked up the flute and took another sip. She thought for a moment, as if deciding how to explain some dense math problem to him. Jim Ward was more than intrigued by this woman, by her beauty but also by her demeanor, her obvious smarts. But there was something else there he could not quite figure out. He hoped that he would have the opportunity to learn just what that might be.

Finally, she set the glass back down, looked hard at him, and went on.

“As you know, fighting has broken out between our Taiwanese Armed Forces and the People’s Liberation Army Navy over the Dongsha Islands. It would appear that the Chinese were trying to stage some kind of nuisance raid that spooled out of control when one of our destroyers detected submarines and went out to investigate. There is nothing of any interest to anyone on that bit of coral and no reason for China to risk international scorn and retaliation over it. Of course, they have staged similar confrontations on the Indian border and, as you know only too well, on the Vietnamese border. As we always fear, such pushing and shoving can easily escalate into a serious knife fight, one in which people get hurt. This time, it happened. It cost PLAN a submarine or two and many men their lives. And another dozen of my countrymen died on the destroyer. Even one of your submarines was caught in the middle and suffered damage but, thankfully, no casualties. Now this event threatens even greater ramifications. There is a very real possibility that the current fighting could easily escalate and engulf the whole area in the major war over Taiwan that the world has dreaded for so long.”

Ward nodded. He had studied naval engineering at the Naval Academy but had opted in for courses in Chinese history and politics. It had been obvious to him even then that China might possibly play a role in his military career someday. He had also read all of the intel reports that his father had sent him while he was flat on his back in the hospital.