Final Approach

by Rachel Brady

  He whispered again. “I won’t hurt you, but be quiet. Understand?”

  I tried to swallow but my mouth was dry. I stared straight ahead and waited.

  He took the flashlight from my hand.

  “Quiet,” he repeated. I nodded, aware I was trembling. A tear fell into the space between my cheek and the steel.

  He removed his weight from my head, but not my body. I turned and recognized the rat features of Craig Clement. He stared at me with unspoken warning. Then, still leaning heavily into me, he reached one-handed for something I couldn’t see. I feared it was a gun.

  Instead he produced some kind of leather wallet and held it in front of my face, pulling it backward slowly until I focused on a headshot of him below the words Federal Bureau of Investigation.

  When he released his weight, it was all I could do to keep from collapsing onto the floor.

  “I checked you out,” he whispered. “You’ve got nothing to do with NASA.”

  “I’ve got nothing to do with any of this—”

  He held a finger up.

  If Clement was a good guy, who was helping Trish?

  He put a hand on each of my shoulders and eased me forward, away from the beam.

  “You’ve got more to do with this than you think,” he whispered.

  He positioned himself behind me and directed me through the training room.

  “I think I know what happened on Lake Erie,” he said.

  Before I could speak, he put a hand over my mouth again and shushed me. He maneuvered me around hardware and lumber until we were at the outermost wall of the training room. I could vaguely make out the contours of an overhead gantry in front of us. A row of harnesses hung from it. Clement parted them like curtains and nodded for me to step into the shadows beyond.

  “Stay here until I come for you. No matter what.”

  “But—”

  “No matter what.”

  When I was hidden, he pointed to the floor, directing me to sit. Then he passed me the flashlight and let the harness hang freely again, closing me in the dark corner. I sat. The cement floor was frigid under my jeans. I listened for more instructions, but none came. All I could see of him were his sneakers, padding away almost silently.

  I pressed the Indiglo button on my watch. One twenty-six. Clement was somewhere in the shadows to my right, presumably back at his listening post by the door. How long had he been here? What was going on in the next room? And what did the FBI know about my family’s boat wreck on Lake Erie? I considered creeping over to beg him for answers. Then light spilled into the training room. Clement had opened the door.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  The door clicked shut behind Clement and sealed the training room in shadows. I expected a commotion on the other side of the door, but heard nothing. What was he doing out there? I couldn’t stand it. Could. Not. Stand it!

  Using my flashlight, I made my way across the room. Dim light filtered through the window in the interior door separating me from the main area of the hangar. I moved toward that window and straightened slowly, trying to glimpse what was happening inside.

  In the packing area, the Otter’s nose pointed to my left toward the landing field out back. The door I’d jumped from earlier was practically right in front of me, a set of portable stairs pressed flush against its frame.

  The U-Haul, backed up to the hangar’s huge open door, held several wooden crates the size of refrigerator boxes inside.

  Everything else was as it had been earlier—jumpsuits on hooks, gear on pegs. I spotted a duffle bag at the foot of the portable stairs and heard the office door swing open on the other side of the plane. I ducked and listened.

  “What are the drop conditions?” It was a woman.

  It sounded like Trish.

  “Southeast wind, twenty knots. Gusts to thirty. Seas four to six feet. Hey, give me a hand with this, man.”

  It was quiet for a moment, then the same voice, a man’s, asked, “Trish, where the hell’s that boyfriend of yours? No, dude…this one, over here.”

  A shot of adrenaline hit me like a punch.

  Jeannie was right—Trish wasn’t working alone. By the sounds of it, she had more help than we’d figured. I remembered our talk and felt like a fool for defending David.

  “Son of a bitch,” someone muttered. “I cut myself.”

  “I’ll get the kit,” Trish said.

  Carefully, I stole another glance. A man in coveralls stood near the U-Haul, inspecting his palm. A thin streak of red coursed over the back of his hand. Trish, in jeans and David’s bomber jacket, walked toward the office, her back to me, and disappeared behind the nose of the plane. The other man in coveralls stood in the back of the truck, trying to maneuver a dolly under one large crate. A third man sat in the cockpit; the pilot’s door wide open at his side. From my vantage point behind him, all I could see were his elbow and shoulder. A clipboard flashed near his arm and disappeared.

  Where was Clement? Who were these people? I moved away from the window.

  “Suck it up, Decker. We don’t have all damn night,” someone said. A moment later, he added, “I mean it, Trish. Where is he?”

  I peeked through the glass again and watched Trish pass a small metal first aid kit to the bleeding man before pulling a phone from her pocket and flipping it open.

  Almost immediately, a series of rings broke the silence in the training room. I pressed a hand over the phone in my pocket and, smothering it, darted away from the door. Then I remembered—my phone was set to vibrate.

  I swept my flashlight beam around the room and froze when it revealed a figure standing near the wall. At first, all I could make out was a man’s form, and the glint of a phone in his hand. But then I snapped the light toward his face. Scud raised an arm to block his eyes.

  I thought I’d be sick.

  “She’s calling you?”

  He reached behind his back with his free hand and produced a pistol. He began walking toward me with the gun in his hand, swinging it casually at his side.

  “I’m here,” he said into the phone. “And heads up, you’ve got company out there. I’m on my way.”

  He snapped the phone closed and shoved it in his pocket, never taking his eyes off me.

  “Recognized your name right off, but wasn’t sure it was you until you mentioned your kid.” He stopped for a moment, studied me. “Shame you’re so pretty. I hate waste.”

  He started toward me again. It seemed the closer he got, the faster he walked, despite his limp.

  “Sorry, sweetheart. She hates when I’m late.” He raised the gun.

  As he closed in, I aimed my light straight at his eyes. He flinched, and I rushed forward and tried a front kick. My foot connected with the underside of his forearm and knocked away the gun. It hit the slab with a smack. Scud entangled the leg I’d used to kick and shoved it upward until I fell backward on the concrete. I broke the fall with my hands, but lost my flashlight. It rolled to the base of the metal wall and barely lit the area around us. When I got my feet under me, I saw Scud retrieve the gun from the floor.

  Two shots rang out from the main part of the hangar.

  I lunged toward Scud before he could take aim and grabbed his hand and wrenched it toward me. I bit the meaty part of his thumb as hard as I could, forcing my teeth into flesh until I tasted the metallic tang of blood. The gun clacked on the concrete beside my knee. I reached for it, but Scud closed a fist over my hair and yanked my head backward so my grasp came up short. I managed to kick the gun and heard it slide toward the Cessna mock-up.

  I twisted under his grip until I was off my knees, then reared up and smashed the top of my head into his chin. His teeth crunched. It felt like a hammer had struck my skull.

  Another round fired on the other side of the door.

  Scud pulled at my jacket and closed me in a headlock from behind. Then, he wrapped a leg around my shin and pushed forward until we both fell to the floor, belly down. The impact forced the
air from my lungs. I tried to twist away, and freed my upper body, but he stopped me with another violent jerk on my hair. Then he grabbed my shoulder with fingers that felt like talons and pushed me onto my back, where he pinned me under his weight again.

  He kneeled over me and pressed both of his hands into my throat. I thrashed and kicked until my eyes and neck throbbed with pressure.

  I dug my nails into his wrists and pried. I couldn’t breathe. If only I could reach the gun. A block of wood. Anything.

  I had an idea, or at least what would have to pass for one.

  Letting go of Scud’s wrists was hard to do. As soon as I released, his clutch tightened and I felt faint.

  I reached for the seat of my jeans and fumbled for the opening to my back pocket. Snaking my fingers into the fold, I dug until I felt the coil I was looking for, then hooked my finger around it and pulled it to my belly. Above me, Scud’s weight shifted as he tried to see what I was doing.

  I had Vince’s broken high E, the thinnest steel string on a guitar, and I counted on it to deliver a sting. I wound it around my fingers in the narrow space between our bodies. Then I raised it to his wrist and slashed upward and sideways with all the strength I had left.

  “Damn it!” He winced enough for me to steal a gulp of air. It was enough.

  I adjusted my grip on the string and tried again. This time I thrust my chest and shoulders upward when I felt resistance on the string.

  He reeled off me, squeezing his wrist. I drove my foot into his bad knee, smashing with all the strength I had. It buckled, and I scrambled, crawling for the gun a yard away.

  I reached for it. Scud gripped my ankle and pulled my leg backward with a determined jerk.

  My chest hit the floor as I closed a hand over the pistol’s long barrel. I pulled it with me as Scud dragged me backward. Something seared into my calf, and I yelled out from the pain. I collapsed on my side, and glanced toward the door. Surely someone had heard. I wondered if that someone would be on my side or Scud’s. He lunged toward me again. I rolled to my back and aimed for his chest.

  When I squeezed the trigger, a muffled ffft sounded. Scud’s shoulder flinched backward and spun him to the floor. He tried to get up. I shot him again.

  He collapsed on the slab, motionless.

  I scooted to the flashlight, picked it up, and swung the beam to Scud’s body. There was a hunting knife on the floor behind him, its awful blade wet with my blood. I turned the beam onto my leg. The denim covering my wound was dark and warm. I held the flashlight beneath my chin and took off my belt. I tied it in a crude knot above the gash and limped toward the door.

  Through its window, I saw the men in coveralls disappear around the nose of the plane and heard the thump of the office door closing. In front of me, the Otter’s fuselage had been fully loaded with the wooden crates from the truck. They were stacked horizontally, nearly to the plane’s ceiling. Only a few square feet of unused space remained in its tail. I decided to find out what Trish was hauling and closed a hand around the doorknob.

  But as I pushed the door open, I spotted Clement on the far side of the plane, near the office. He was facedown in a puddle of blood that had spilled from his chest or abdomen, I couldn’t tell which. I concentrated on his back and noticed a subtle rise and fall.

  I stepped back into the dark training room and pulled my phone from my pocket. It wasn’t until I saw the phone in my hand that I realized I was shaking. I told the 9-1-1 operator to send an ambulance to Gulf Coast Skydiving, and added that the police and FBI should come too. I dropped Clement’s name and said he’d been shot but was still breathing. Then I hung up. I had to see inside the crates before Trish’s people came back.

  When I stepped out into the packing area, it was all I could do not to kneel beside Clement and beg for what he knew about my family. But he’d been shot too close to the office. There was no way to get to him without being seen.

  I winced when I climbed the portable stairs leading to the Otter’s open jumpers’ door, but I got inside quickly. I stayed low and fumbled with a latch on the nearest crate. It popped open.

  Three others remained. Once opened, maybe I’d know what was going on.

  I popped the second latch. Something inside might lead to Casey.

  Maybe even to answers about Annette.

  The office door swung open. I crouched and froze.

  Castors squealed in the packing area, followed by the rhythmic clang of something being wheeled up a loading ramp. I listened while the back door of the U-Haul slid down and was latched into place.

  Heavy footsteps reverberated through the room, growing louder as their owner drew near. I squeezed into a narrow gap between the far wall of the fuselage and the wooden boxes that had been crammed inside.

  “Decker, what’s this?” The speaker seemed suspicious.

  My hand went to my pocket. I wondered if I’d dropped something.

  “Not mine,” Decker answered. “Maybe the Fed’s?”

  Silence followed.

  “Check your shoes.”

  It hit me: they’d found blood. Had I bled a trail through the Otter? I applied pressure to my leg and waited.

  “My bad,” I heard. “It’s me. Must’ve walked through it.” Then, louder, he added, “Trish! Kurt! All yours.”

  The portable stairs scraped something as they were pulled away. I started to panic. What if I couldn’t get off the plane? Failing to include Richard was proving to be a very stupid mistake.

  An engine started, the one to the moving truck, and my breath quickened as its hum faded.

  Then the office door pushed open and smacked shut. A moment later, the plane bobbled as people climbed in through the pilot and co-pilot doors. Trish was talking.

  “He said he was here, and now he won’t answer his phone. You boys get us on our way, then have a look around. If we don’t leave now, we’ll miss the drop.”

  Someone rolled down the jumpers’ door on the side of the plane. I felt hot. Burning spasms shot through my calf.

  A new engine rumbled. It was the tow tractor, here to pull us to the field. The plane lurched forward and we rolled over a bump. I hoped it wasn’t Clement.

  When the Otter’s engines whirred to life, I checked my watch—1:48 a.m. We accelerated, bumping over pits and mounds on our way down the grass runway. The wheels touched off and the nose inclined, and I expected crates to topple over me, but they didn’t. I could look through a window, but not well enough to see below.

  We banked hard to the right, and shortly afterward, we banked right again. Trish was heading west.

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Fifteen minutes later, my main concern was the throbbing, stinging gash in my calf. I needed to stretch and check my leg.

  The cabin was unlighted and loud with the humming of twin engines. Trish and Kurt, whoever he was, might have been talking. I couldn’t have heard a word over the noise. That was partly good because I didn’t think they couldn’t hear me scooting around either.

  The Otter’s cabin was almost twenty feet long with the jumpers’ door located near the back. Trish’s men had stowed their crates in the usable cabin volume between the cockpit area and the door, but several feet of empty space remained in the tail. Trish and her co-pilot could never see me back there, even if there were light, because the wooden boxes took up most of the cabin’s height and width. I’d have to move slowly though, so they’d attribute any resulting trim adjustments to ordinary gusts or turbulence. Thankfully, the Otter was a large enough aircraft that its center of gravity would be unaffected by my maneuvering, as long as I moved smoothly.

  I inched through the gap between the side of the fuselage and a row of crates, and headed toward the tail. When I got to the back of the plane I stayed low and stretched. I rolled up my pant leg and twisted to have a look at the back of my calf, but it was impossible to see in the dark. I ran a finger along the wound and was surprised it was only about an inch long. Its depth worried me more, but I wasn�
��t going to poke around to get an estimate on that. The opening was wet and sticky. At least the bleeding seemed to have slowed. I reapplied the belt and took a moment to think.

  If my abbreviated 9-1-1 call was successful in getting police to the airport, authorities could be there now. They’d discover Clement and Scud, and eventually, I assumed, my car. Tags would be traced to Richard, who could have no idea about any of this.

  The engines were loud enough I could probably make a call from my spot in the tail without being overheard in the cockpit, but I was reluctant to chance it. I sent a text message to Richard instead and briefly summarized my mess, making sure to include the GPS coordinates from my watch.

  Next was 9-1-1, but since texting wouldn’t work there I actually placed the call. I repeated my coordinates several times, only to hear some variant of, “I can’t hear you, ma’am” or “Are you still there?” I couldn’t risk speaking any louder, and eventually gave up. I slipped the phone into my pocket.

  My thoughts returned to what I’d overheard about the drop conditions. Whatever we were hauling wasn’t going to land with the plane. That presented another problem because somebody had to make the drops. Eventually, Kurt would probably venture to the back of the plane and unload whatever cargo was onboard. When he discovered me, he’d probably try to force me out the door with whatever was in the crates.

  I took a deep breath, feeling the total weight of the situation for the first time. My interest in the flight didn’t stop at mysterious cargo or its potential link to missing kids. What drove me onto the plane were questions about Jack and Annette. Clement’s reference to “what really happened on Lake Erie” confirmed it was more than an accident as I’d believed for the last four years.

  Hidden from Trish and Kurt, I scooted into a corner and leaned back to rest while I figured what to do. An object loomed where I’d expected emptiness. I ran a palm over a solid fabric surface and it didn’t take long to identify the straps and ribbing of a parachute system. I felt along the floor for goggles or a helmet, but found only the gritty surface of well worn carpet. The parachute was probably insurance for Kurt. If I were standing in an open aircraft door shoving large amounts of contraband overboard, I’d want a rig too.