She felt her cheeks flush with anger. “You what?” It was a stupid thing to say; the reason she’d become infuriated was that she’d heard him properly, after all, but it was practically one of those reflexive responses that came out the way your leg jumps when the doctor taps your knee with a hammer. He ignored the steam and let her cool off, like a picture she’d seen of Hawaiian lava running into the ocean. Behind him, Ahn-Kha bore the pulls and pinches of the kids with a toothless smile and a wince.
“Simmer down. I trust Sime. He’s always been straight with me, brutally so, sometimes. He said he’d keep it from his team, for now. He’s worked with Postle and Alexander before, but this is his first trip with Stamp.”
“Who is she, anyway?”
“Some friend of the president’s. She’s a money person. A financial backer. Sime said this conference was really supposed to be a sightseeing jaunt, at least for the Southern Command delegation.”
Touring. Well, nice work if you can get it. “Did he seem concerned?”
“He said he’d be surprised if the Kurians didn’t manage to sneak a spy or two in. He’s not that concerned, for two reasons. One is that there’s a lot of security, and the location of the conference isn’t even going to be announced until thirty-six hours before it is supposed to start, and second, he’s there to make sure the UFR and Southern Command commit to zilch.”
“I thought it was supposed to be, you know, unification for victory grand strategy session or something.”
“That’s the impression the invitation gives,” Valentine said.
“I wonder why so many freeholds bother going at all,” she said. She took out the Canadian currency. “A trip like this can’t be easy, or cheap.”
“I’m wondering that myself. Appearances, I suppose. Solidarity, maybe. Can’t be that fun of a long trip—nobody’s getting there by luxury liner,” Valentine said. “Sime said something about votes on strategy, and different freeholds agreeing to pressure the Kurians in certain areas. I know Southern Command’s gone into a defensive crouch ever since the victories in Texas. My guess is that Sime is going because he’s well known outside Arkansas and Texas, and when he says Southern Command won’t do any joint operations for the foreseeable future, they’ll believe him.”
Not for the first time, Duvalier wondered why Lambert had insisted that she make this trip. Ahn-Kha she understood—Valentine without his faithful shaggy friend was a bit of a sourpuss. He was like a big, savage dog who loved you and you alone; you slept better at night knowing he was ready to rip out a few throats in your defense. But what did she bring to the table, other than a joint history? She liked to complain to him on an op; it was nice to have a real set of ears listening and talking back rather than having imaginary conversations with yourself that made you wonder if you were cracking up far from help and safety.
Valentine was always harping about her needing a rest. Maybe he knew this was going to be a big political circle jerk and just saw it as a way to get her out of the bluegrass and the mosquitoes for a nice break with clean bedding. If so, she should just roll with it. Life was handing her a tiny taste of what those Old Worlders enjoyed without much appreciation.
Well, she might as well relax and have a good time, at least until they reached the still-secret destination in the Baltic. Cocktails and hot towels all around, steward.
“So, what are we supposed to do?” she asked.
Valentine shrugged, but his eyes remained distant and thoughtful. “We don’t have to follow Sime’s orders; we’re representing Kentucky. I’d still like to find that infiltrator. We can’t count on whoever it is to just be there to take notes. I imagine there are a lot of people there the Kurians would like to see captured or eliminated.”
“Maybe we should double-check the garbage trucks,” she said. She’d seen those dreadful Grog-grown Reapers that had attacked Fort Seng one wild night. What if the Kurians somehow introduced a hundred of them to the conference?
“We should keep that in mind,” Valentine said. “I’m sure they wouldn’t mind the whole conference being wiped out. I don’t know that anyone could do anything about a ballistic missile, but I hope they’ve planned for anything and everything. I’ve had some experience with cold-wat
er amphibian Grogs. They could come up out of the Baltic about anywhere.”
“They’ll be sorry to lose Ahn-Kha here,” she said. “He seems like a hit as a tourist attraction.”
“I don’t think there are any Grogs in Eastern Canada. There are some out west, I believe. That lost tribe of Golden Ones,” Valentine said.
“Well, they must not get around much.”
“I’ll go rescue him,” Valentine said.
They returned to the airport to find that one of the engines on the plane was being worked on. It would mean an extra three or four hours on the ground, the pilot predicted.
Sime didn’t want them wandering the airport, so he confined them to either the hangar or the hotel they’d already checked out of.
“Not going back there,” Valentine said. “They’ll charge us for breathing the lobby air.”
The soldiers, showing the renowned politeness of the region, were willing to hand over the little hangar office and withdraw to attend to some minor maintenance duties for the hangar’s portable work lighting. The office had a little radio tuned to cheerful music coming in across Lake Ontario from the Ordnance. There were but two chairs; neither could be called comfortable, but the space heater made up for the lack of seating with its cozy glow. She and Val and Pistols made themselves as comfortable as possible. The Canadians had a big aluminum thermos of something, but none of them felt like pressing the hospitality that much.
Sime paced the hangar with Alexander, and Stamp went off to the washroom to do her laundry in a sink. Ahn-Kha, who was always interested in something new, made himself useful around the engine as it was being worked on by Montee and the Canadian Provincial Defense air mechanic.
Valentine lost himself in a book for a few minutes, then announced that he’d have to sit too much in the plane. He left to go join Ahn-Kha at the engine, leaving her alone with the bodyguard.
Postle considered not-in-air time as off-duty time, and drank. He wasn’t a heavy drinker as most people would call it, more of a steady one, consuming two beers an hour over a span of increasingly frequent bathroom breaks. He seemed the type to relax into a nap before becoming loudly drunk.
The drinking also released a certain amount of libido, she discovered. As they passed each other just outside the office, she leaving for and he returning from the toilet facility, he interposed an arm, blocking her way.