Page 99 of Hush

“How did they get on top of us?” Hall wound his way to Mitchell, bracing himself on the bucking deck and grabbing the handholds above him.

“They could have masked their signature in the storm, and they’re not broadcasting an identification beacon.” As Mitchell spoke, four more dots appeared on screen, flanking the Russian spy plane. “Oh, shit!” Mitchell cursed. “Sir, four Sukhoi fighter jets now on station! Distance, half a mile! They’re on an intercept course!”

“Have they painted us with radar?” Hall’s voice dropped, clinically cool. Half a mile from an attack run of Russian planes. The odds were not in their favor.

“They just did.” Mitchell looked up, meeting Hall’s gaze briefly.

Paulson’s voice broke over the intercom again. In the cockpit, he was receiving the same information from his flight crew. “Brace for impact! All crew, brace! Brace!”

Hall threw himself into a jump seat as the bulky, blocky communications and electronic surveillance plane dove, spiraling and banking hard in a wild evasive pattern. Wind shears howled against the airframe, and G-forces pinned the crew into their seats. Mitchell started reciting the Rosary.

This is it,Playa thought.The Russians are going to shoot us down. World War three is about to begin. We’ll be in all the history books… if there are any history books when this war is over.

Heavy rattling, deep and thunderous, boomed on all sides, echoing just beyond the steel hull of their jet. Someone was shooting.

Three NATO fighter jets, two from Sweden and one from the UK, zoomed past their plane, whooshes of light and sound outside their windows. Tracer rounds illuminated the dark sky, and the lightning flashed, just long enough to glimpse their harsh outlines against the storm. The trio of fighter jets roared into the wake of the American plane, barreling forward and firing warning shots over the Russians’ wings.

“Russian flight, Russian flight, you are in violation of NATO airspace.”Playa’s earpiece picked up the heavily accented voice of one of the Swedish pilots. “You are in violation of NATO airspace. Return to Russian airspace immediately, or we will take your actions as provocation and respond accordingly.”

Unfailingly polite, as always.Move, bitch, get out the way,would be how she’d say it. Or,get the fuck out of our face.

They kept diving, but the half barrel rolls stopped, and—finally—the dive tapered off, too. Playa sat back as Captain Paulson leveled their recon plane out, and all around the cabin, shaky sighs mixed with nervous prayers.

Playa kept listening over the comm unit, to the NATO fighters closing in on the Russians. “Russian flight, return to your airspace. This is your last warning.”

“They’re not turning around.”

“Do we have permission to engage?”

“Fucking start a war? Are you bloody serious?”

“They were warned!”

“Fucking Reds. They’re asking for this—”

A new voice broke into the channel. “NATO flight, you do not, repeat, do not have permission to engage. Trail fighters and rebroadcast our demands to the Russians to leave NATO airspace.”

Silence, for a moment, until the lead fighter responded. “Understood, sir.”

Muttering continued on the private channel, though. “There you go. Now the fucking Reds know they can do whatever the bloody fuck they want, and all we’ll do is be cross with them.”

“Cut the chatter!”

Playa listened until Captain Paulson flew out of range. The NATO fighters were circling and shadowing the Russian jets. Ten minutes later, Captain Paulson reported that the Russians had retreated back to their airspace, and they were on approach for landing back in the UK.

She tuned into UK frequencies, listening as they came in closer.

When the breaking news skewered the airwaves, she wished she was back in the air over Estonia.

Chapter 27

“Mr. President, we have a situation.”

President McDonough glared at his National Security Advisor, Bill Simon. A migraine had latched itself to the base of his skull the day of the DC Sniper shooting, and it was only getting worse each day.

“What is it now?”

“The Russians have launched military maneuvers around St. Petersburg, on the border of Estonia, and over the Gulf of Finland. They breached NATO airspace over Estonia and fired a microwave burst at an American surveillance plane. It hit them like an EMP and fried their equipment.”