Hostile Fire (29 page)

“Then we decide if we want to steal the plane, or radio home and get instructions?” the engineer asked.

“That’s it,” Fouad said. “Then it’s up to you what you do. You’ll each have that fifty thousand dinars I promised.”

“Good. Now let me concentrate on my pre-flight.”

Fouad went to the galley and made coffee. It wasn’t the best, but would have to do. He enjoyed playing around in the little galley. He especially liked the variety of frozen dinners that were available.

On the north side of the airport, Murdock, Antonio, and the other Mexican CIA agent had been through six buildings
so far and found nothing but a few vagrants, a lot of rats and cobwebs, and one small firm still in operation, but no aircraft.

They paused outside the next building. Murdock figured there were at least twenty in the row. He saw two cars parked in front of the one three buildings down the line. They hadn’t been there a half-hour ago. He motioned and the three men ran to the spot and checked. The man-sized door in a large hangar door was unlocked. Murdock motioned for Antonio to jerk the door open and Murdock would go in first with his weapon drawn.

The door jolted outward, and Murdock surged inside. He stopped in a blaze of lights. Directly ahead sat a half-finished sailboat, maybe thirty feet long. He lowered his nine millimeter and waved with the other hand. Two men sat on the partly finished deck working with narrow strips of wood.

Antonio shouted something to the men on the boat, and the three attackers went back outside.

It was forty-five minutes later that the two teams met in the middle and reported no suspects.

“So where the hell is he?” Murdock asked.

“Don’t know. Let me try to see if he’s filed a flight plan. The first time I tried, the man said he wasn’t authorized to give it to me over the phone. We didn’t have time to go up to the tower.” He phoned and talked for two or three minutes, but Murdock figured he was striking out again.

Antonio folded his cell phone and scowled. “The tower master says we’re not authorized to receive that kind of information. If I want to go to the tower and show him my credentials and get them verified, he can tell me.”

“Where else on the airport? Any small air freighters?”

“Several. On the south side. Let’s go down there and work them.”

They drove around the perimeter fence again and into the south part of the airport where there were maybe a dozen hangars with mid-to-large–sized jet transports parked inside and out. In the third building they tried there was no office, just two men wiping up oil spills on the otherwise clean concrete floor. Antonio talked with them.

He became alert at once and signaled to Murdock who went up to him.

“These men say, yes, a plane with DAF on the tail was here. They helped service and refuel it. It took off about fifteen minutes ago. They saw it airborne.”

“Damnit, what rotten fucking luck. Now we go to the tower and you show him your papers and get that flight plan destination.”

A half hour later, Murdock watched Antonio come out of the airport tower manager’s office. Murdock couldn’t read his expression. He slumped down beside Murdock and shook his head.

“Not sure if this is good news or bad. Yes, the BAC One-Eleven took off at 0832. It had a flight plan with Monterrey in north eastern Mexico as its destination. Four hundred miles from here. Only when the air traffic men tracked it on their radar, they found it on a different course. It had gone twenty miles north, and then turned northwest. It continued on that course for forty miles until it flew out of the radar’s range. The air controllers could not raise them by radio.”

“So he filed a false flight plan,” Murdock said. “He was really heading northwest. Not many major airports out that way.”

Antonio took over. “Where is he headed? Leon is up that way about two hundred miles, but has only a small airport. Then there is Durango on that line, which has a good airport, but why would he go there with a nuclear bomb?”

“He wouldn’t. What’s on out in the northwest?”

“Hermosillo, about a thousand miles northwest, but it’s still two hundred miles south of Tucson, Arizona. Why would he stop there?”

“He wouldn’t,” Murdock said. “On northwest is Mexicali and Tijuana, both right on the border with easy crossing into the U.S. One of those must be his destination.”

“Or he really did go down. Weather was bad and he was delayed on his takeoff. Weather was extremely bad with electrical storms, even funnel-shaped clouds near the Leon area. So he could have gone down.”

Murdock stood and paced. Then they went down the steps to the terminal.

“How long would it take him to get to Tijuana or Mexicali?”

“I don’t know the BAC that well, but figure five hundred miles an hour. Three and a half to four hours. Depending on headwinds. The jet stream is moving against him, but he could go above or below it.”

“Okay, alert our people in those two border towns to monitor the landings of any BAC One-Elevens within the next four hours. If they find one, they should use local law and grab it and arrest everyone on the plane, and check to see if there’s a large crate on board that might have lead shielding around it. That’s all we can do right now.”

“If it doesn’t land at one of those two airports?” Antonio asked.

“Then we get on our boots and hire some choppers and run that flight line he took until we find or don’t find a wrecked BAC somewhere beyond Mexico City’s radar reach.”

“We have at least a two hundred mile line to check just for starters from here to Leon,” Antonio said. “We better get started.”

“Why don’t we rent two choppers now and have them ready just in case we need them? Then with any luck we can run that first two hundred mile line before it gets dark.”

While Antonio made some calls to rent the two search choppers, Murdock called the embassy. Don Stroh came on the line.

“What have you found out about the BAC?”

Murdock brought him up to date.

“I want to go with you on the search. I approve. Sounds like the best bet. How long until they should land at the border cities?”

“Almost three hours. Antonio has your people alerted in both towns who are at the airports keeping watch. Where is the rest of my platoon?”

“They hit Andrews about a half hour ago and checked in with me. I put them on a borrowed Gulfstream, and they should be here by one-thirty, or thirteen-thirty, as you guys say.”

“What do we use for quarters down here?”

“No U.S. military facilities. I’m having a man here rent one of the unused hangars in that northern section of the field. Have the choppers flown there, where we can get up and away fast if we need to. There’s a fancy hotel right inside the new terminal there, the Hilton Mexico City Airport Hotel. It’s on the third level and on the plush side. I don’t think they would appreciate our traipsing around in our cammies and toting submachine guns.”

“Right. Can we keep the Gulfstream here in case we need to make a run to Tijuana?”

“That’s the plan. If the big plane did go down along that route, we’ll need all of our troops to dig it out. I’ve had your men fully equipped with their usual armament, including the twenty-millimeter rounds. We can do that with the private charter. Anything else?”

“Yes, have one of the men at the embassy arrange to bring in catered food to that hangar three times a day until we tell him to stop. I hope you brought your standard CIA-issue credit card.”

“I never leave home without it.”

“Good. We three knights of the O table are going to find a snack bar somewhere and fill up on fast food before the action gets going again. I figure another two hours and fifty minutes until we should have some confirmation from both towns.”

“Your platoon guys may not even have time to stretch their legs after they get here, before jumping right back on that Gulfstream.”

“There was bad weather to the north. The BAC was held up for a half hour waiting for it to clear so they could go straight north. They may have run into the back end of it and gone down. That’s my hunch right now. We’ll see how well it plays out.”

“I’m done here. I’ll catch you in the airport in about an hour.”

“See you then.”

Murdock picked up his two men and they headed for the tourist-type food concessions in the huge new terminal. He figured the world’s largest city should have the world’s best eating spots.

North of Mexico City

Fouad settled back into the fourth seat in the cockpit and worked on his steak portabella with mushroom sauce, peas, carrots, mashed potatoes, and an apple crumb desert.

“We’ve got weather ahead,” the pilot said. Fouad adjusted his headset and mike so he could talk with the crew.

“There always is weather,” Fouad said. “Is that good weather or bad?”

“Bad. When we left Mexico City going north, they said the weather had closed in on Monterrey and was building to the west of the city. When we turned northwest, I hoped we could clear it. I can see the storm clouds ahead. They are spiraling up to fifty thousand feet. Lots of electrical activity.
Maybe we should turn around and go back to Benito Juárez Airport.”

“Not a chance. Don’t even think about it. We’re charging straight through. What’s the next big town on this route?”

“León, about a hundred miles ahead. I don’t think we can make it there, and it doesn’t show on my maps as having a runway long enough for us.”

“I show a big airport at Guadalajara,” the flight engineer said. “Only trouble is it’s a hundred and twenty-five miles almost due west of us.”

“Forget it,” Fouad said. “Why can’t we fly through a little bit of lightning and wind?”

“That little bit of lightning could hit us and knock out all of our electrical circuits, putting us down in the jungle,” the pilot said. “That wind could rip off the rudder or a wing.”

“I don’t believe you,” Fouad barked. “I’ve flown in worse weather than this. We’re going through, straight through on our heading for Tijuana.” He pulled the pistol from his belt and moved forward to the pilot’s chair. He pushed the muzzle of the gun against the pilot’s head.

“We’re going through,” he said again. “Either that or I take the controls because you’ll have your brains blasted all over the side of the cockpit.”

Sweat ran down the side of the pilot’s face. He lifted his brows and coughed. “Yeah, okay. We go through. We’re at fifteen thousand now. It looks calmer down here. Our forward speed is cut to a little over four hundred due to the heavy head winds and the turbulence. We’ll try. May Allah be with us.”

“That’s for damn sure,” Fouad said. “I’ve come this far and I’m this close. Nothing is going to stop me. Certainly not a little thing like a windstorm and some lightning.”

The first rain crashed into the windshield of the BAC like hail. The wipers came on but couldn’t keep up. The pilot turned and looked at Fouad.

“This is not good. The rain could turn cold and freeze on the wings. We don’t have automatic de-icers.”

“Shut up and fly,” Fouad said. “Unless you want a nine-millimeter addition to your brains.”

A sudden jolt hit the aircraft and Fouad felt himself lifted
off the floor, and his hands reached for the top of the cockpit.

“Hang on,” the pilot shouted. “An air pocket.”

Fouad was on the ceiling of the cabin for what seemed like twenty minutes. He knew it couldn’t have been more than ten seconds. He dropped suddenly to the floor and his knees buckled as gravity took over again.

“We dropped straight down over two hundred feet,” the flight engineer said. “Hope there are no more of those.” The other two men were belted into their seats. Fouad returned to the fourth seat and buckled himself in.

“Keep flying this bucket of bolts straight on our heading,” he shouted.

A flash of lightning tore through the clouds, turning the near darkness into brilliant light for a brief moment. Then it was gone and the rain and the rumble of thunder pounded through the plane.

“We’re drifting right,” the copilot said into his mike.

“Corrected,” the pilot said.

The thunder came again, and lightning. The plane jolted and this time Fouad scowled.

“We were just hit by lightning,” the engineer said. “Our dampening rods took care of most of it, but we’ve lost part of our controls to the ailerons.”

“Switching to backup controls for the ailerons,” the pilot said.

They flew for two more minutes before another bolt of lightning hit the aircraft. The whole plane began to vibrate and swing slowly from side to side.

“We’ve lost the number-two engine,” the pilot said. “We can fly with one, but it cuts our speed to about three hundred and fifty miles an hour.”

“Where are we?” Fouad asked the flight engineer.

“About fifty miles from León. No airport there.”

“I should send out a mayday and ask for instructions to the closest airport,” the pilot said.

“No,” Fouad shouted. “We dropped off their radar, remember.” He looked at the flight engineer. “You did turn off the transponder, didn’t you?”

“I haven’t had time yet. I was trying to track the storm.”

“Idiot. I should shoot you right here. Pilot, make your
mayday call but don’t identify yourself. Clear?”