by Tom Cain
He needed to get inside. But before he could even think about breaching the doors, he had to penetrate the perimeter fence. The service road curved around toward the hidden air base, but access was only possible through a guarded checkpoint, manned by two sentries. The fence even ran across the taxiway, with a wheeled section that could roll back whenever a plane was cleared for landing or takeoff. Signs at regular intervals indicated that the perimeter was patrolled by dogs.
The only way in was through the main gate. Carver was steeling himself to make a frontal attack, knowing that he would have to kill the sentries, when he saw headlights, away in the distance, coming in his direction. He dashed back to his truck and watched as three vehicles went by: two open trucks, with men sitting in the cargo areas at the back, and one Land Cruiser. He let them get a ways down the road, then swung his truck in behind them, the lights still off.
As the first of the trucks pulled up by the checkpoint, Carver turned on his lights and pulled up at the end of the line. One of the sentries walked up to the driver’s door of the first truck. Carver took out his gun, screwed the silencer onto the barrel, and put it within easy reach on the seat to his right. Then he put on the CD player headphones, gritted his teeth, and pressed play again.
Rap had turned Carver into an old man. To him the music sounded like a tuneless, incoherent cacophony and the only words he could understand were the obscenities. He’d spent too long on parade grounds and assault courses, being shouted at by rabid sergeant-majors whose capacity for verbal abuse and physical violence would put any street braggart to shame, to be impressed. But duty called.
Finally the sentry came up to his window. Keeping his face in the shadow inside the cabin, Carver stuck his hand out of the window and handed over Krasnic’s I.D.
The sentry asked him something. Carver did not reply.
The sentry tried again. Carver leaned toward him, pointing at his ears and jerking his head in time to the beat. He grinned like an idiot and shouted, “Straight Outta Compton, yeah!!” in what he hoped was a vaguely Serbian accent.
The sentry looked at him blankly for a second, and then he saved his own life. He grinned and started jerking his head, too, in time to the sibilant beats hissing from Carver’s earphones. Then he handed back the I.D. card and waved him in.
The other vehicles were already halfway across the tarmac apron, and the blast doors were rolling apart to greet them. Carver hit the gas and took his place in the line, turning off the music with a sigh of relief and a loosening of shoulders that, he suddenly realized, were hunched up with tension. Something about the blaring in his ears, the sensation of inescapable noise, had really disturbed him. His teeth were grinding, his body sweating, and he felt weirdly disturbed, as though that noise had triggered a reaction to some dark, shapeless memory lurking below the surface of his mind.
And then he drove into the hangar, and all thoughts of his own issues were forgotten as he looked around in wonder.
A vast space had been hollowed out from the living rock of the mountain. In the foreground, McCabe’s jet was parked by the newly arrived helicopter: two splendid machines, worth millions and capable of extraordinary feats, yet in these surroundings they looked no bigger or more significant than toys. The hangar stretched back as far as Carver could see. In the distance, more jets were lined up in neat rows, at least two squadrons’ worth of Yugoslav Air Force fighters: old-fashioned MiG-21s, their nose cones poking out of stubby, stocky bodies, and much newer MiG-29s—sleek, hungry twin-tailed raptors.
A man in ground-crew overalls directed Carver to park his truck in an area to the left of the entrance, next to the other three newly arrived vehicles. As Carver drove up, he saw men springing down from the backs of the trucks, dressed in a motley assortment of combat fatigues, denim, leather jackets, and even sportswear, but all carrying weapons. Most of the men stayed by the trucks, leaning against them and lighting up cigarettes in blithe disregard for the vast amounts of aviation fuel that must be stored nearby. But one of them, responding to an order shouted from the Land Cruiser, walked across, his gun slung around his shoulders, opened one of the rear doors, and dragged out a bedraggled, blond-headed figure by his cuffed hands. It was Vermulen. So McCabe really had double-crossed him. Carver didn’t feel much sympathy. A man as astute and experienced as Vermulen should have seen it coming. But he was alone, so at least he’d been smart enough to leave Alix somewhere safe. That was something.
A second man emerged from the other rear door of the Land Cruiser. He had swept-back black hair and the sort of Italianate looks whose impeccable grooming suggests that the owner will never see a face he loves as much as his own. The man wore his smugness like expensive aftershave as he walked around to the back of the vehicle, a shockproof aluminum case in his hand, and watched while a battered brown leather suitcase was removed with extreme caution by two more armed men. They placed it on a long-handled, two-wheeled cart and pushed it away, still supervised by the Latin loverboy, toward a line of offices ranged against the far wall of the hangar, at least fifty yards away.
The Land Cruiser produced one last passenger, with a phone clamped to his ear. He concluded his conversation and strode briskly toward the man pushing the trolley, giving instructions as he went. This, thought Carver, must be Darko. He was certainly the man in charge. Vermulen, meanwhile, brought up the rear, doing his best to maintain an upright, dignified posture as he walked with his captor’s gun pressed into the small of his back.
Carver watched as two shaven-headed men emerged from one of the offices to meet the little procession. They were wearing shades, with ear-pieces in their ears, the unmistakable look of private security goons who want to pretend they’re U.S. Secret Service. Their jackets bulged with the clear presence of weapons. The goons watched as the line of men, plus the cart, made their way in. Then they closed the door and stood outside it, arms folded like nightclub bouncers, doing their best to look menacing.
Wankers, thought Carver to himself. But the men had given him an idea. From the moment that Jaworski told him to stay out of this “domestic matter,” he had assumed that the Americans were planning some kind of stunt to recover the bomb and take out McCabe, Vermulen, and anyone else who got in the way. But he wasn’t going to sit around with his thumb up his arse, waiting for the Seventh Cavalry to ride to the rescue. He’d let McCabe get away from him once, and it wouldn’t happen again. That much he’d decided back at the roadblock. He’d also known, in principle, what he wanted to do.
Now he’d worked out precisely how he was going to do it.
94
The three Black Hawk helicopters flew due south from Tuzla, the pilots pushing their performance to the limit, covering seventy-five miles in a little over twenty minutes, before they turned southeast toward the border. They crossed from Bosnia into Montenegro just south of Foča and followed the Tara River southeast toward the airport at Slatina. The helicopters hugged the valley floors, skimming the treetops, hurdling power lines, and skirting the edge of the hills and mountains of that craggy terrain, avoiding towns and villages like night creatures shying from human contact. Kady Jones was in the third aircraft, with the explosive-ordnance-disposal team. She’d been talking to the team leader, agreeing on the protocols under which they would examine and, if necessary, deal with any bomb they found, when their pilot cut in.
“Okay, folks—we’re into hostile territory. This is where it gets interesting.”
In the White House Situation Room, Ted Jaworski let out a cry of triumph: “Gotcha, you bastard!”
Within the past quarter-hour, an MQ-1 Predator drone from the Tuzla Air Base had arrived over Slatina and begun broadcasting real-time infrared imagery, via the ground-control station at Tuzla, back to the United States. It had spotted the helicopter’s arrival, and then the vivid flare of light as the hangar blast doors opened to admit it. Now that they knew where McCabe was hidden, the mission had become a lot simpler. Within minutes, an army general was in contact with
Dave Gretsch, in the lead Black Hawk, updating his orders. Meanwhile, U.S. Air Force officers were readying fighter squadrons across the Balkan theater of operations and the Middle East to intercept and destroy McCabe’s plane, in the event that it took off before the Black Hawks reached Pristina, no matter where in the region it was heading.
When the general had finished with Gretsch, Jaworski got on the line.
“Major, this is Ted Jaworski, from the Agency. Just wanted to inform you that the Brits may have a man inside the airport facility where you will be deploying. He was tasked to get inside, but we don’t know if he made it. The man’s name is Carver. He’s kind of unofficial, not on any list. So don’t hurt him if you can manage it. But it’s no big deal if you do. Take it from me—he won’t be missed.”
95
Carver walked across the underground hangar thinking, At last, I’m doing my job. After all that had happened, he was back to what he understood: drifting imperceptibly into the lives of very bad people, removing them from the planet, then slipping away again.
The different groups of people scattered about the hangar played right into his hands. Darko’s militiamen mingled with Yugoslav Air Force personnel, while McCabe’s bodyguards looked on, and mechanics and air crew went about their business. No one noticed, still less cared about, Carver.
He’d ripped the two CD player earphones apart and stuck one of them in his ear, letting the wire run down inside his shirt. He was back in his civilian clothes, shades on his face, his gun stuck in the waistband of his trousers, the fisherman’s bag slung over a shoulder. He could be anyone.
His luck just kept getting better. There was a mechanic standing on a ladder at the rear of McCabe’s plane, with his head and shoulders inside the rear equipment bay, pouring hydraulic fluid from a plastic jerry can. Carver stood at the bottom of the ladder and called up, “Hey you!”
The mechanic turned and looked down at him with a puzzled frown.
Carver held up a hand.
“Hold on there,” he said, making the other man wait while he held a finger up to his earpiece, as if trying to hear over the noise in the hangar, then spoke into the wristband of his shirt. “Uh-huh, yeah, I’m on it. . . . I’m there right now. . . . Yeah, I’ll do that. Out.”
He looked back up the ladder.
“Okay now—you speak English?”
The man shook his head.
“Right, well, see if you understand this. . . . You”—He pointed at the mechanic—“off the plane.” He jerked his finger down toward the hangar floor, then repeated the motion, clearly indicating the man should get off the ladder.
The mechanic stayed where he was, uncertain how to respond.
Carver gave a theatrical sigh of irritation.
“All right, then. . . . Plane . . .” Now he gestured at the aircraft. “American. Me”—he tapped his own chest—“American.”
Could a Serb who couldn’t speak English tell the difference between a real American accent and a bad English fake? Carver would have to hope not.
He repeated his little mantra: “Plane American, me American,” then added, “Me go into plane. You . . . off the plane.”
The mechanic looked at him, puffed his cheeks, exhaled heavily, then shrugged. He didn’t need to say a word to convey his message: He thought Carver was a jerk, but he couldn’t be bothered even to attempt to argue with him. He climbed down off the ladder.
“Here, I’ll take that,” said Carver, taking the jerry can from the man’s hand.
He went up the ladder into the bay. Laying his bag on the fuselage floor, he finished topping off the hydraulic accumulator. Then he got out his tools: a wrench to loosen the connections of the hot-air pipes, and a wire cutter to strip as much plastic insulation as possible off the wiring bundles in the same. He wasn’t going to hand McCabe another lifeline. This plane was going down hard. And just to underline the point, he left the jerry can, still half filled with inflammable fluid, its top unscrewed, in the equipment bay when he closed up and left.
He made his way back to the truck, sorely tempted just to put that Serb uniform back on and drive out the way he had come, get out before anyone even knew he’d been there. The urge to stay, though, was stronger. He wanted to see McCabe get on the plane, watch it as it roared down the runway, follow its path into the sky. This time he had absolute confidence in the work he’d done. The aircraft was a death trap. The moment the pilot switched on the jets, its fate was assured. He just needed to know that his prey was aboard.
A movement caught his attention. The over-handsome, Italianate man Carver thought of as Loverboy was emerging from the office at the side of the hangar. Behind him came one of Darko’s men, pushing the cart on which the brown suitcase was resting. They walked over to the aircraft, and as they did so, the door in the underside of the fuselage opened to meet them, swinging down until it hung vertically from the aircraft. A metal frame, like a cradle, was lowered though the doorway, coming to a halt about four feet above the ground. There was already a military-green bundle filling the top half of the cradle, which looked to Carver like a parachute in its sack. It took two men to lift the case from the cart and put it into the cradle, while Loverboy supervised the operation. He checked that the case was secure and had been strapped onto the parachute, then signaled to someone inside the plane, and the cradle disappeared back up into the fuselage again, followed by the closing door.
The bomb was loaded.
96
Francesco Riva returned to the office where Waylon McCabe was waiting. On his way, he passed the Serbian, Darko, who was leaving with a contented smile on his face, like a hyena who has fed well. Riva opened the office door and went in, followed by the two armed guards who’d been standing outside.
“You done?” rasped McCabe.
It was apparent to Riva that this was a very sick man, one close to death. His face, always lean, now seemed little more than a skull, barely covered by skin stretched so tightly over the bone that it seemed it might split open at any moment. From time to time an involuntary grimace would cross his face as another spasm of pain shot through him. His shoulders were hunched, his fists clenched. Yet his eyes burned with wild conviction and the men under his command, any one of whom could have killed him with a single blow, were still held completely in his sway.
“Yes,” said Riva. “The weapon is securely loaded in the bomb bay at the rear of the aircraft. It is not yet armed, but the radio control has been set with the correct code sequence. Once the plane has taken off, simply press the control switch and it will arm the bomb. When you reach your target, open the door and release the weapon. It will fall to a height of five thousand feet, at which point the parachute will deploy. As you saw, I fitted an air-pressure sensor to the device earlier, before it was loaded. At three thousand feet, this will send an electrical charge that will begin the detonation process. Your target, you said, was just below twenty-five hundred feet. It will, I assure you, be devastated by the air burst from this weapon.
“Now, if you will excuse me, I will depart. You have been very generous, Mr. McCabe. I would like to start enjoying my money.”
McCabe nodded at one of his guards, who stepped across the door, blocking Riva’s way.
“I can’t allow that,” said McCabe. “My conscience would not permit me to deny you the chance of salvation and everlasting life, in the company of Christ and all His angels. You know where we’re headed today? To heaven itself.”
McCabe’s guards murmured, “Amen,” as Riva looked on, too shocked to respond. The next thing he knew, one of the guards was twisting his right arm behind his back with one hand, and pointing a gun at him with the other.
“But you let Darko go!” Riva protested, his voice rising almost to a squeal as his arm was gripped even more fiercely.
“I sure did,” replied McCabe. “The man is facin’ damnation in the fires of hell for his sins of violence, theft, and fornication committed here on earth. His only hope of redemption is to s
tay here and fight the forces of the Antichrist in the battle that is to come.”
“You’re mad!” Riva cried, twisting his head this way and that in search of anything or anyone that could save him.
Lieutenant General Vermulen had been dumped in one corner of the room. He seemed defeated and demoralized. His wife was sitting right next to him, her body almost touching his, and yet she was a world apart, looking away, her eyes anguished and unfocused, lost in her private thoughts.
“Let’s go, folks,” said McCabe. “Dr. Riva, I want you to know that I’ll be prayin’ for your soul, despite your grievous lack of faith. And, General, I want you to think real hard, in case you got any plans to try to fight. I know you’re a brave man. I guess you ain’t scared of takin’ a bullet. But take a good look at your pretty little wife. ’Cause if you try anything, my boys are under orders to shoot her first, off the aircraft or on it. And believe me, these boys don’t miss.”
Twelve miles out from Slatina, the Black Hawks were preparing for their final approach into Pristina airport. The fighting troops were getting ready to lock and load. The bomb-disposal experts were checking their gear one last time. Kady Jones’s stomach had been doing backflips since they crossed the border from Bosnia. Now she concentrated on steadying her breathing and relaxing her muscles, just as she had done that afternoon on Gull Lake. She had gone head-to-head with a nuclear bomb. After that, she could surely cope with anything.
97
Carver watched Dusan Darko stride toward his men with a look that suggested he’d just made a very sweet deal. Darko shouted a few words at the men hanging around the parked trucks and the Land Cruiser and they started gathering their gear and loading up their vehicles with a barrage of whoops, cheers, shouts, and backslaps that suggested the bars and brothels of Pristina were in for a busy, but profitable night.
