CHAPTER 1
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The immigration officer stared at his computer screen. “Asif Ali,” he said in his heavy accent. ”Nandini Ali.” Then he spat something in the local language.
“Punjabi, please,” said Nandini sweetly. “My husband is Pakistani.”
The immigration officer reacted as if she’d said I had a contagious disease. He held out his hand for my passport. “Business or pleasure?”
“Business,” I said proudly. “We work together.”
He looked suspiciously at my dark blue Pakistan passport and then Nandini’s much more elaborate, Indian one. He stared at her picture for a long time, and I knew why. Passport photos are always unflattering, so it takes a very beautiful woman to have a knockout photo. Nandini was just such a woman. Her Northern Indian heritage had given her high cheekbones and full, sensual lips. Her lustrous, honey-blonde hair hung long and straight down her back and her blue eyes shone with enthusiasm and just a hint of wicked promise.
It was that promise—that hint of sex—that had made our business such a big hit. We’d filmed over a hundred short documentaries together, with her as presenter and narrator and me as cameraman and editor. With a good camera rig and a laptop to edit on, we were a two-man production house: filming, editing and uploading, then making money from ads as people watched. I was well aware that it was the glimpse of Nandini in the video’s thumbnail that got so many people clicking on them. She always wore something appropriate for the location, be it overalls or a blouse and skirt. But she always seemed to find a way to tweak it to be just a little sexy—a button unfastened here, a zip lowered there. With her full breasts and tight, toned ass, the camera loved her—it was actually hard, sometimes, even as her husband, to resist tilting the camera down to look down her top, or to focus for too long on her ass as I trailed behind her.
Did it bother me that our business swung on Nandini’s sex appeal? Not at all. In fact, the idea that somewhere out there, tens of thousands of guys were fantasizing about my wife kind of turned me on. It wasn’t as if she ever actually showed anything…and besides, they were only watching. Let them look. It was me she got to go home with. For all her sexiness, my wife was actually sort of shy, when it came to meeting other men face-to-face. Sometimes, I actually wished she’d be a little more flirtatious.
Nandini nervously pushed her hair back behind her ear and gave the guard a worried but beautiful smile, showing perfect white teeth. “Okay?” she asked, eager to be off. She’d kept her Indian accent, even after four years in the Pakistan. It actually seemed to add to her appeal amongst our audience. Maybe if our documentaries had appealed to housewives, they would have preferred an all-Pakistani girl. But we specialized in Indian army stuff—behind the scenes with the army’s new helicopter, that sort of thing. So the viewers were almost all men, and they found her Northern Indian accent bewitching. It didn’t hurt, either, that we’d found a niche in which all the other presenters were aging men or over-enthusiastic teenagers with no social skills. A helicopter firing missiles? That’s cool. But a helicopter firing missiles while a beautiful blonde with a sexy accent explains the new targeting system? That’ll get you a million views.
“How long you stay in Vishakapatnam?” the guard wanted to know. I wasn’t sure if he was being annoyingly thorough because I was Pakistani, or because he wanted to keep talking to my wife. Looking around at the rest of the arrivals, I could see why he wanted to make the most of her. There were some depressed-looking business people in suits and that was about it. Our flight had been mostly empty. Nobody flew into Vishakapatnam. They all got out as soon as they could afford it, just as Nandini had.
“Just today,” Nandini told him with another huge smile. “We’re sailing out tonight.”
The guard nodded sullenly, glaring at me. “Is not good time to be here, as Pakistani,” he said.
I shrugged. Sure, there had been some saber-rattling going on between the Pakistan and India. But it was all just politics and talk. Still, old habits died hard, out here. It wasn’t so long ago that the whole area had been allied against the Pakistan, back before capitalism won out. They still thought like Hindu fundamentalists, over here, and I was still the enemy. I did my best to smile at the guard, in an we’re all friends, hands across the water kind of a way. He glowered at me and finally waved us through.
I slipped my arm around Nandini’s waist as we moved on through the terminal. She slowed to a stop, turned to face me and, suddenly, we were kissing.
I’m not the biggest guy, but Nandini’s still shorter than me unless she’s got her very highest heels on—the ones she wears for the shoots. She just felt right in my arms, her soft breasts pressing up against me, her long legs skimming my jeans, nylon stockings whispering. She was in a sensible, mid-length skirt for traveling—like the heels, she kept her more daring stuff for the actual filming. My tongue teased her lips apart and it turned into a deep kiss, tipping her backward slightly on my arm. She sighed softly into my mouth and I felt her smile under my kiss.
Nandini is…sensual. I don’t mean that in any kind of slutty way. We’ve been married for three years and we probably have less sex than most couples, because we both work so hard. What I mean is…she reacts a lot to touch. You know those women who need hours of foreplay to get them going? That’s not her. I only need to stroke her breasts, or her thighs, and she really responds—almost helplessly. It’s one of the many things I love about her.
When I broke the kiss, I could see a couple of local men sneering at us. I knew exactly what they were thinking, because I’d seen plenty of it when I first came to Vishakapatnam, four years before. They were thinking I was some rich Pakistani, and I was being conned by a gorgeous local girl, and that she’d let me spirit her off to America and fuck me in return for a green card, then dump me.
They didn’t know a damn thing. I mean, sure, those women existed. When I’d come out here, four years ago, working for a TV production company, I’d had plenty of them come onto me. Nandini was different. She had a degree in engineering—another reason she was such a good presenter in our documentaries—and when I met her, she was swiftly working her way up the ladder in the corporate video company she worked for. We’d met by chance at one of those “East meets West” media conventions, and within one evening we went from conference room to hotel bar to elevator to Nandini naked on my hotel bed, heels kicking in the air, as we fucked like I’d never fucked before. Six months, and I had her back in the Pakistan. Seven, and I’d quit my day job to shoot our videos full time.
I was the luckiest guy in the world. I had a gorgeous, sexy Northern Indian wife who was completely faithful to me, and a job I loved. After marriage I already thought of her as Pakistani. She had very little contact with her homeland—in fact, I was always surprised that she never seemed to want to email her old friends, or invite them to stay. She’d become the model Pakistani wife—even her accent had faded considerably. But right now, her heritage was a bonus. It was how we’d got this opportunity—a job that was going to make us a small fortune.
Nandini grabbed her suitcase—a small mountain of clothes, make-up and, of course, lots of pairs of heels to give her that delectable ass wiggle in front of the camera. I grabbed my flight case, checking that all the locks were still sealed. My camera rig is my baby. Ultra-portable but capable of shooting in Super-HD with high-quality sound, it’s what sets us apart from the amateurs. In contrast to Nandini , I had a couple of changes of clothes and that was it. She’s the one who needs to look good; I was in my usual hooded top and jeans.
Outside, a fancy black SUV with Indian army plates was waiting for us. It stuck out, next to all the aging Mercedes spitting smoke and the even older locally-made cars. The whole of Vishakapatnam was still crawling out of the Nehru Socialist era, its economy in tatters. Back in the old days, its position close to the South East Asia had meant that it had been an important Indian army port, and that’s where most of the money and jobs had come from. Now that we were all friends, the country had found itself with a massive Indian army fleet to maintain and no money coming in. Bad luck for them. Good luck for us—it was what had led to our trip.
As soon as he saw us, an eager young Indian army driver jumped out of the SUV and opened the rear door. Just as we approached, a man stepped out.
And my wife and I both stumbled to a stop.
He was big. He must have been six-three, and he was wide as well as tall, the sort of guy who you keep thinking is going to bump his shoulders on doorframes. There didn’t seem to be an ounce of fat on him—he was all solid, hard muscle. And as my eyes tracked up to his face, I saw that he was good looking, too. Nandini had once said that Indian men fell into two categories—dumpy and surly looking, or chiseled and really good looking. I hated to admit it, but I suddenly saw what she meant. The immigration guard had been the first kind—the guy had basically had no neck—but this guy was most definitely the second. He had sculpted cheekbones, a strong jaw and a dusting of dark stubble around his jaw. His eyes were as coldly blue as Nandini’s are calmingly green, and his dark brows and lashes gave him a look that women would call brooding.
He was in full captain’s dress uniform—and Vishakapatnam really goes to town when it comes to their Indian army. His uniform was all rich, dark blue fabric and perfectly-polished brass buttons, and there were a good few medals across his chest. He took off his hat when he saw Nandini and held it neatly under one arm.
“Miss Mathur,” he said formally in heavily-accented Punjabi. “I am Captain Akshay Singh.” And he reached for her hand.
I blinked, because he’d said Miss and used her maiden name. Nandini had said something, when she’d organized the trip about using her maiden name to reinforce the fact she was Hindi, but I hadn’t realized she’d neglected to tell the Indian army she was married.
When I turned to look at her, she looked…hypnotized. She was much smaller than the captain, so she had to crane up to look into his eyes. She didn’t resist as he gently took her hand, lifted it up to his mouth…and kissed it. And then he looked up from her hand, straight into her eyes, as he held it there for a second.
Nandini didn’t speak. She took a breath and then another and I heard a little shudder in her breathing, as if she’d just stepped off the treadmill at the gym.
There was something about him that’s difficult for me to explain. He was…foreign, but I don’t mean anything to do with his looks or his voice. He just felt very unfamiliar. The best way I can describe it is: we’d travelled around both America and Western Europe a lot, during our years filming. All over Germany and France and Italy, I couldn’t read the road signs, but I could at least recognize the letters. But when we came far enough east, to places like Vishakapatnam, the entire alphabet was different. You couldn’t even take a stab at pronouncing the words, because it was just totally alien and strange. That’s how meeting Captain Singh felt. Like I’d just come up against something I’d never experienced before.
The captain smiled and finally dropped Nandini’s hand and the spell that had been holding both of us was broken. I stepped forward and offered my hand. “Asif Ali,” I said firmly.
The captain turned to me and smiled politely but a little disinterestedly. “Miss Mathur’s cameraman?” he asked.
“And also her husband,” I told him. I’d been planning it in my head, and in my head it sounded confident and grand—putting him in his place a little. But when it came out of my mouth, it didn’t sound confident or grand at all. It sounded nervous and petulant, like a child demanding the grown-ups acknowledge that he really is a pirate.
It made him take notice of me, though. Just not in the way I’d been hoping.
“Her husband?” said the captain. He turned to Nandini . “But you are unmarried.”
My wife did something I’d never seen her do before: she dropped her eyes to the ground, just for an instant, as if shamed. She’s never done that with me. She’s a very proud woman, always holding her ground in an argument. Then she looked back up into those cold blue eyes. “There must have been a mistake,” she said quietly.
The captain pulled a piece of neatly-folded paper from his pocket and made a big show of unfolding it and reading it. “Miss Nandini Mathur,” he read in his deep, accented voice, “requests to accompany the Sindhughosh on its final voyage, together with her cameraman.”
There was absolute silence for a second. I should have been leaping to my wife’s rescue, but I felt almost ill. It was like being a couple of high school kids, caught by the principal.
“I made a mistake,” said Nandini in a voice that was almost a whisper. “Galti ho gayi.” Sorry.
I blinked. I’d barely heard her speak Indian in years. And she was gazing up into his eyes in a way I’d never seen before. On camera, she could be flirty and vivacious, but when she met men in person she was shy and almost awkward—people often couldn’t believe it was the same woman from the videos. But she didn’t look shy or awkward now. She looked more…dumbstruck. Awed, almost.
Suddenly, the captain smiled. “Well,” he said, slipping the paper back into his pocket. “I’m sure we can make it work.” And he waved at the Indian army driver to get Nandini’s case. The man reacted as if he’d been whipped, darting to the kerbside and grabbing the case, then carrying it as if it was a Faberge egg. Clearly, the captain was a man you didn’t upset.
I noticed that no one moved to help me with my much heavier flight case. Well, fine. Vishakapatnam was Vishakapatnam, and it’s always been a pretty old-fashioned, macho place. So I heaved my own case up into the trunk and went to climb into the rear seat with Nandini .
Only to find that the captain had already climbed in beside her. He indicated that I should ride shotgun up front. He didn’t bother to actually speak to me or even look at me, just pointed.
I slumped into the passenger seat, sulking a little. As we pulled away, he started to chat away to my wife, asking her about what the video would be like, how she got started in the business and a thousand other things…all questions that we should have been answering together, as a team. But he was treating us as if she was the boss and I was just her hired lackey. After a while, they switched to Hindi, speaking in rapid fire phrases that I couldn’t catch. I’d tried a few times to learn to speak Hindi, but it was a tough language for an outsider to pick up, full of rolling “Rs” and harsh “Ks” and “Qs.” I knew a few words, but that was about it.
The Indian army driver kept his eyes on the road, as silent and serious as a statue. So eventually, I glanced back at Nandini and the captain.
His hand was on her knee.
That’s the very first thing I noticed, before I saw how he leaned in to her when he spoke, or how his eyes were locked on hers. His hand was on her knee. I was so shocked I didn’t even get angry at first. It was just so completely inappropriate, so far outside acceptable behavior in America, that it refused to compute.
And it wasn’t as if it was just an accidental touch, or a good-humored slap on the thigh. No, he had his palm—and it was a big palm, much bigger than mine—flat on her stockinged thigh, between her knee and the hem of her skirt. His fingers were wrapping around the curve of her leg. Nandini has beautiful, shapely legs—it’s why our viewers enjoy it so much when she wears skirts—and I could imagine how smooth and warm it must feel. My wife. My wife! The anger boiled up inside me.
I didn’t know what to do. Say something? Yell? The Vishakapatnamn Navy had granted our request, but the captain still had the right to refuse us access. We’d fly home thousands of dollars out of pocket, not to mention the weeks we’d spent planning and prepping.
I tried to catch Nandini’s eye, to indicate that she should stop him. But she didn’t seem to even be aware I was there. She was gazing into the captain’s eyes with an expression on her face I’d never seen before—something between shock and awe.
As I watched, he gave my wife’s thigh a tiny squeeze. Barely enough to be noticeable, if I hadn’t been staring so intently. But I saw my wife react. Her lips widened a little, her breathing sped up. So she was aware he was doing it—she hadn’t just not noticed. Why didn’t she tell him to move it?
And then suddenly, the captain glanced at me. He didn’t move his head, just looked at me from under those heavy brows for an instant, without a trace of shame, and—
I flushed. I actually felt my cheeks go red, and that’s not something I could ever remember doing. It felt as if I’d been caught doing something wrong, as if I was the guilty one. I turned back in my seat to face the windshield and a tiny part of me actually wanted to say sorry. What the hell?!
“We’re here,” said the driver.
And we got our first look at the Sindhughosh. The Sindhughosh submarines, designated 877EKM, were designed as part of Project 877, and built under a contract between Rosvooruzhenie and the Ministry of Defence (India).
Sindhughosh has a displacement of 3,000 tonnes, a maximum diving depth of 300 meters, with a top speed of 18 knots, and can operate solo for 45 days with a crew of 53. The unit was equipped with the 3M-54 Klub (SS-N-27) antiship cruise missiles with a range of 220 km.
It was a monster.
***
The immigration officer stared at his computer screen. “Asif Ali,” he said in his heavy accent. ”Nandini Ali.” Then he spat something in the local language.
“Punjabi, please,” said Nandini sweetly. “My husband is Pakistani.”
The immigration officer reacted as if she’d said I had a contagious disease. He held out his hand for my passport. “Business or pleasure?”
“Business,” I said proudly. “We work together.”
He looked suspiciously at my dark blue Pakistan passport and then Nandini’s much more elaborate, Indian one. He stared at her picture for a long time, and I knew why. Passport photos are always unflattering, so it takes a very beautiful woman to have a knockout photo. Nandini was just such a woman. Her Northern Indian heritage had given her high cheekbones and full, sensual lips. Her lustrous, honey-blonde hair hung long and straight down her back and her blue eyes shone with enthusiasm and just a hint of wicked promise.
It was that promise—that hint of sex—that had made our business such a big hit. We’d filmed over a hundred short documentaries together, with her as presenter and narrator and me as cameraman and editor. With a good camera rig and a laptop to edit on, we were a two-man production house: filming, editing and uploading, then making money from ads as people watched. I was well aware that it was the glimpse of Nandini in the video’s thumbnail that got so many people clicking on them. She always wore something appropriate for the location, be it overalls or a blouse and skirt. But she always seemed to find a way to tweak it to be just a little sexy—a button unfastened here, a zip lowered there. With her full breasts and tight, toned ass, the camera loved her—it was actually hard, sometimes, even as her husband, to resist tilting the camera down to look down her top, or to focus for too long on her ass as I trailed behind her.
Did it bother me that our business swung on Nandini’s sex appeal? Not at all. In fact, the idea that somewhere out there, tens of thousands of guys were fantasizing about my wife kind of turned me on. It wasn’t as if she ever actually showed anything…and besides, they were only watching. Let them look. It was me she got to go home with. For all her sexiness, my wife was actually sort of shy, when it came to meeting other men face-to-face. Sometimes, I actually wished she’d be a little more flirtatious.
Nandini nervously pushed her hair back behind her ear and gave the guard a worried but beautiful smile, showing perfect white teeth. “Okay?” she asked, eager to be off. She’d kept her Indian accent, even after four years in the Pakistan. It actually seemed to add to her appeal amongst our audience. Maybe if our documentaries had appealed to housewives, they would have preferred an all-Pakistani girl. But we specialized in Indian army stuff—behind the scenes with the army’s new helicopter, that sort of thing. So the viewers were almost all men, and they found her Northern Indian accent bewitching. It didn’t hurt, either, that we’d found a niche in which all the other presenters were aging men or over-enthusiastic teenagers with no social skills. A helicopter firing missiles? That’s cool. But a helicopter firing missiles while a beautiful blonde with a sexy accent explains the new targeting system? That’ll get you a million views.
“How long you stay in Vishakapatnam?” the guard wanted to know. I wasn’t sure if he was being annoyingly thorough because I was Pakistani, or because he wanted to keep talking to my wife. Looking around at the rest of the arrivals, I could see why he wanted to make the most of her. There were some depressed-looking business people in suits and that was about it. Our flight had been mostly empty. Nobody flew into Vishakapatnam. They all got out as soon as they could afford it, just as Nandini had.
“Just today,” Nandini told him with another huge smile. “We’re sailing out tonight.”
The guard nodded sullenly, glaring at me. “Is not good time to be here, as Pakistani,” he said.
I shrugged. Sure, there had been some saber-rattling going on between the Pakistan and India. But it was all just politics and talk. Still, old habits died hard, out here. It wasn’t so long ago that the whole area had been allied against the Pakistan, back before capitalism won out. They still thought like Hindu fundamentalists, over here, and I was still the enemy. I did my best to smile at the guard, in an we’re all friends, hands across the water kind of a way. He glowered at me and finally waved us through.
I slipped my arm around Nandini’s waist as we moved on through the terminal. She slowed to a stop, turned to face me and, suddenly, we were kissing.
I’m not the biggest guy, but Nandini’s still shorter than me unless she’s got her very highest heels on—the ones she wears for the shoots. She just felt right in my arms, her soft breasts pressing up against me, her long legs skimming my jeans, nylon stockings whispering. She was in a sensible, mid-length skirt for traveling—like the heels, she kept her more daring stuff for the actual filming. My tongue teased her lips apart and it turned into a deep kiss, tipping her backward slightly on my arm. She sighed softly into my mouth and I felt her smile under my kiss.
Nandini is…sensual. I don’t mean that in any kind of slutty way. We’ve been married for three years and we probably have less sex than most couples, because we both work so hard. What I mean is…she reacts a lot to touch. You know those women who need hours of foreplay to get them going? That’s not her. I only need to stroke her breasts, or her thighs, and she really responds—almost helplessly. It’s one of the many things I love about her.
When I broke the kiss, I could see a couple of local men sneering at us. I knew exactly what they were thinking, because I’d seen plenty of it when I first came to Vishakapatnam, four years before. They were thinking I was some rich Pakistani, and I was being conned by a gorgeous local girl, and that she’d let me spirit her off to America and fuck me in return for a green card, then dump me.
They didn’t know a damn thing. I mean, sure, those women existed. When I’d come out here, four years ago, working for a TV production company, I’d had plenty of them come onto me. Nandini was different. She had a degree in engineering—another reason she was such a good presenter in our documentaries—and when I met her, she was swiftly working her way up the ladder in the corporate video company she worked for. We’d met by chance at one of those “East meets West” media conventions, and within one evening we went from conference room to hotel bar to elevator to Nandini naked on my hotel bed, heels kicking in the air, as we fucked like I’d never fucked before. Six months, and I had her back in the Pakistan. Seven, and I’d quit my day job to shoot our videos full time.
I was the luckiest guy in the world. I had a gorgeous, sexy Northern Indian wife who was completely faithful to me, and a job I loved. After marriage I already thought of her as Pakistani. She had very little contact with her homeland—in fact, I was always surprised that she never seemed to want to email her old friends, or invite them to stay. She’d become the model Pakistani wife—even her accent had faded considerably. But right now, her heritage was a bonus. It was how we’d got this opportunity—a job that was going to make us a small fortune.
Nandini grabbed her suitcase—a small mountain of clothes, make-up and, of course, lots of pairs of heels to give her that delectable ass wiggle in front of the camera. I grabbed my flight case, checking that all the locks were still sealed. My camera rig is my baby. Ultra-portable but capable of shooting in Super-HD with high-quality sound, it’s what sets us apart from the amateurs. In contrast to Nandini , I had a couple of changes of clothes and that was it. She’s the one who needs to look good; I was in my usual hooded top and jeans.
Outside, a fancy black SUV with Indian army plates was waiting for us. It stuck out, next to all the aging Mercedes spitting smoke and the even older locally-made cars. The whole of Vishakapatnam was still crawling out of the Nehru Socialist era, its economy in tatters. Back in the old days, its position close to the South East Asia had meant that it had been an important Indian army port, and that’s where most of the money and jobs had come from. Now that we were all friends, the country had found itself with a massive Indian army fleet to maintain and no money coming in. Bad luck for them. Good luck for us—it was what had led to our trip.
As soon as he saw us, an eager young Indian army driver jumped out of the SUV and opened the rear door. Just as we approached, a man stepped out.
And my wife and I both stumbled to a stop.
He was big. He must have been six-three, and he was wide as well as tall, the sort of guy who you keep thinking is going to bump his shoulders on doorframes. There didn’t seem to be an ounce of fat on him—he was all solid, hard muscle. And as my eyes tracked up to his face, I saw that he was good looking, too. Nandini had once said that Indian men fell into two categories—dumpy and surly looking, or chiseled and really good looking. I hated to admit it, but I suddenly saw what she meant. The immigration guard had been the first kind—the guy had basically had no neck—but this guy was most definitely the second. He had sculpted cheekbones, a strong jaw and a dusting of dark stubble around his jaw. His eyes were as coldly blue as Nandini’s are calmingly green, and his dark brows and lashes gave him a look that women would call brooding.
He was in full captain’s dress uniform—and Vishakapatnam really goes to town when it comes to their Indian army. His uniform was all rich, dark blue fabric and perfectly-polished brass buttons, and there were a good few medals across his chest. He took off his hat when he saw Nandini and held it neatly under one arm.
“Miss Mathur,” he said formally in heavily-accented Punjabi. “I am Captain Akshay Singh.” And he reached for her hand.
I blinked, because he’d said Miss and used her maiden name. Nandini had said something, when she’d organized the trip about using her maiden name to reinforce the fact she was Hindi, but I hadn’t realized she’d neglected to tell the Indian army she was married.
When I turned to look at her, she looked…hypnotized. She was much smaller than the captain, so she had to crane up to look into his eyes. She didn’t resist as he gently took her hand, lifted it up to his mouth…and kissed it. And then he looked up from her hand, straight into her eyes, as he held it there for a second.
Nandini didn’t speak. She took a breath and then another and I heard a little shudder in her breathing, as if she’d just stepped off the treadmill at the gym.
There was something about him that’s difficult for me to explain. He was…foreign, but I don’t mean anything to do with his looks or his voice. He just felt very unfamiliar. The best way I can describe it is: we’d travelled around both America and Western Europe a lot, during our years filming. All over Germany and France and Italy, I couldn’t read the road signs, but I could at least recognize the letters. But when we came far enough east, to places like Vishakapatnam, the entire alphabet was different. You couldn’t even take a stab at pronouncing the words, because it was just totally alien and strange. That’s how meeting Captain Singh felt. Like I’d just come up against something I’d never experienced before.
The captain smiled and finally dropped Nandini’s hand and the spell that had been holding both of us was broken. I stepped forward and offered my hand. “Asif Ali,” I said firmly.
The captain turned to me and smiled politely but a little disinterestedly. “Miss Mathur’s cameraman?” he asked.
“And also her husband,” I told him. I’d been planning it in my head, and in my head it sounded confident and grand—putting him in his place a little. But when it came out of my mouth, it didn’t sound confident or grand at all. It sounded nervous and petulant, like a child demanding the grown-ups acknowledge that he really is a pirate.
It made him take notice of me, though. Just not in the way I’d been hoping.
“Her husband?” said the captain. He turned to Nandini . “But you are unmarried.”
My wife did something I’d never seen her do before: she dropped her eyes to the ground, just for an instant, as if shamed. She’s never done that with me. She’s a very proud woman, always holding her ground in an argument. Then she looked back up into those cold blue eyes. “There must have been a mistake,” she said quietly.
The captain pulled a piece of neatly-folded paper from his pocket and made a big show of unfolding it and reading it. “Miss Nandini Mathur,” he read in his deep, accented voice, “requests to accompany the Sindhughosh on its final voyage, together with her cameraman.”
There was absolute silence for a second. I should have been leaping to my wife’s rescue, but I felt almost ill. It was like being a couple of high school kids, caught by the principal.
“I made a mistake,” said Nandini in a voice that was almost a whisper. “Galti ho gayi.” Sorry.
I blinked. I’d barely heard her speak Indian in years. And she was gazing up into his eyes in a way I’d never seen before. On camera, she could be flirty and vivacious, but when she met men in person she was shy and almost awkward—people often couldn’t believe it was the same woman from the videos. But she didn’t look shy or awkward now. She looked more…dumbstruck. Awed, almost.
Suddenly, the captain smiled. “Well,” he said, slipping the paper back into his pocket. “I’m sure we can make it work.” And he waved at the Indian army driver to get Nandini’s case. The man reacted as if he’d been whipped, darting to the kerbside and grabbing the case, then carrying it as if it was a Faberge egg. Clearly, the captain was a man you didn’t upset.
I noticed that no one moved to help me with my much heavier flight case. Well, fine. Vishakapatnam was Vishakapatnam, and it’s always been a pretty old-fashioned, macho place. So I heaved my own case up into the trunk and went to climb into the rear seat with Nandini .
Only to find that the captain had already climbed in beside her. He indicated that I should ride shotgun up front. He didn’t bother to actually speak to me or even look at me, just pointed.
I slumped into the passenger seat, sulking a little. As we pulled away, he started to chat away to my wife, asking her about what the video would be like, how she got started in the business and a thousand other things…all questions that we should have been answering together, as a team. But he was treating us as if she was the boss and I was just her hired lackey. After a while, they switched to Hindi, speaking in rapid fire phrases that I couldn’t catch. I’d tried a few times to learn to speak Hindi, but it was a tough language for an outsider to pick up, full of rolling “Rs” and harsh “Ks” and “Qs.” I knew a few words, but that was about it.
The Indian army driver kept his eyes on the road, as silent and serious as a statue. So eventually, I glanced back at Nandini and the captain.
His hand was on her knee.
That’s the very first thing I noticed, before I saw how he leaned in to her when he spoke, or how his eyes were locked on hers. His hand was on her knee. I was so shocked I didn’t even get angry at first. It was just so completely inappropriate, so far outside acceptable behavior in America, that it refused to compute.
And it wasn’t as if it was just an accidental touch, or a good-humored slap on the thigh. No, he had his palm—and it was a big palm, much bigger than mine—flat on her stockinged thigh, between her knee and the hem of her skirt. His fingers were wrapping around the curve of her leg. Nandini has beautiful, shapely legs—it’s why our viewers enjoy it so much when she wears skirts—and I could imagine how smooth and warm it must feel. My wife. My wife! The anger boiled up inside me.
I didn’t know what to do. Say something? Yell? The Vishakapatnamn Navy had granted our request, but the captain still had the right to refuse us access. We’d fly home thousands of dollars out of pocket, not to mention the weeks we’d spent planning and prepping.
I tried to catch Nandini’s eye, to indicate that she should stop him. But she didn’t seem to even be aware I was there. She was gazing into the captain’s eyes with an expression on her face I’d never seen before—something between shock and awe.
As I watched, he gave my wife’s thigh a tiny squeeze. Barely enough to be noticeable, if I hadn’t been staring so intently. But I saw my wife react. Her lips widened a little, her breathing sped up. So she was aware he was doing it—she hadn’t just not noticed. Why didn’t she tell him to move it?
And then suddenly, the captain glanced at me. He didn’t move his head, just looked at me from under those heavy brows for an instant, without a trace of shame, and—
I flushed. I actually felt my cheeks go red, and that’s not something I could ever remember doing. It felt as if I’d been caught doing something wrong, as if I was the guilty one. I turned back in my seat to face the windshield and a tiny part of me actually wanted to say sorry. What the hell?!
“We’re here,” said the driver.
And we got our first look at the Sindhughosh. The Sindhughosh submarines, designated 877EKM, were designed as part of Project 877, and built under a contract between Rosvooruzhenie and the Ministry of Defence (India).
Sindhughosh has a displacement of 3,000 tonnes, a maximum diving depth of 300 meters, with a top speed of 18 knots, and can operate solo for 45 days with a crew of 53. The unit was equipped with the 3M-54 Klub (SS-N-27) antiship cruise missiles with a range of 220 km.
It was a monster.
***