A dozen more airmen rushed into the scene and surrounded the dead man and Frank’s group. Several airmen clambered up into the plane. Braewyn was helped to her feet by Frank and a couple of airmen. Roland wobbled to his feet looking like a rodeo cowboy whose bronc had hurled him to the arena dirt.
“Nicolai,” Frank said. “Where’s Cezar Nicolai?”
Everyone looked around the room in silence. Those who saw him go up into the B-29 cast their eyes in that direction, but nothing stirred. Frank ran to the tail of the plane and looked up at the rear gunner’s blister. Airmen appeared above the stairway under the plane, guns in hand.
“Get medics in here,” One airman yelled from the bay. “We’ve got two down.”
Moments later, several of the airmen returned to the floor. Their leader crossed to Frank and shrugged.
“Your man’s gone, sir.” he said and looked back at the bomber. “And so are ours. Both of them.”
Chapter 68
The Air Force command issued a base alert for the missing Cezar Nicolai, and the local police were called, but he’d vanished.
Frank gritted his teeth as an airman with bolt cutters removed the snug neck piece from his throat without taking out his voice box. Afterward, Frank and his entourage left the air base in the Crown Vic. As they pulled out of the visitors’ parking area they noticed Cezar’s rental Cadillac still parked on the lot.
“He’s on foot?” Roland asked.
“Not for long,” Frank said. “He’s lost his main protector, but he has others who jump to his beck and call. I’ll bet he’s already plotting his next move.”
“I’ve got every resource out hunting him,” Braewyn said.
“I didn’t come here to tour the McConnell Air Base,” Frank said. “I also didn’t come here to visit Wichita, but they’ve served their purpose. Tomorrow I want to finish what I started. There’s one tiny condition I need you guys to agree to.”
“Here we go,” Roland said.
“No, no, don’t be that way,” Frank said. “It’s only one tiny request.”
“Let’s hear it,” Braewyn said.
“I’m going out of town for the day,” Frank said. “I need to visit a place. Alone. It’s personal.”
“What’s the condition?” Roland asked.
“You guys stay at the motel ‘til I get back,” Frank said, “then we all go home.”
“I smell fish,” Roland said.
“We can’t go?” Braewyn said.
“It’s important I go alone,” Frank said. “End of discussion. Let’s haul ass out of here. I could use a drink.”
* * * * *
Cezar saw the black Hyundai Sonata as it slowed and stopped at the corner of South Rock Road and East 31st Street where he stood behind a thick tree. When the woman driver looked to her left for oncoming traffic, Cezar dashed out and jumped into the passenger seat with his Beretta leveled at her ribs.
“Scream and you die right here,” Cezar said.
“Please. Take the car. You can have it, just let me out.” the woman said.
“Drive.”
“Where?”
“Go left here, and turn left again at the next road.”
“You live down there? It’s a park,” the woman said and turned onto the cross street.
“Go there. And stop shaking.”
“I can’t help it. Is it money you want?”
“What I want is for you to shut up, stop shaking, and drive.”
The woman made a nervous turn toward the park and drove more than two miles into a wooded area that culminated in a dead end.
“Pull over up here on the right. Next to those trees.”
The woman did as she was directed and stopped the car.
“Can I go now?” the woman said, her voice faltering and her hands shaking worse than ever.
“Put the car in park and get out.”
The woman fumbled with the gearshift, then the door handle, and finally got the door open and jumped out, clutching her purse. Cezar climbed out and directed her to the broadleaf trees nearby. He looked around for anyone who might be able to see them. He saw no one.
“I have a husband and two children,” the woman said as she stumbled in her high heels into the shade of the woods with Cezar directly behind her. “One’s very sick. I was going to the drugstore to get him medicine. You can have my money. The druggist knows me and will give me the medicine on credit. He knows we’re good pay. We’ve been customers of his for years and he─”
Cezar had wrapped the muzzle of the Beretta with his jacket and fired a single shot into the back of the chattering woman’s head.
He ambled leisurely back to the car, pleased that the woman at last had stopped her continuous blathering and shaking. He knew his Learjet would be under heavy surveillance, so going back to the Wichita airport would be suicidal. To pick up the trail on Frank he had to find him and follow him to the genuine Omega formula he was certain was nearby. Cezar called one of his acolytes who had flown in with him and told him to ready their forces.
Cezar was certain Frank would go straight to it, now that he would think he was safe from his unrelenting pursuers. He could feel an electric charge sweeping over his scalp and down his neck as he envisioned following his unruly detective right up to the answer to the mystery of the Omega device, and its recipe for world-changing power. Tomorrow he would place his hands on it.
Tomorrow he would be undefeatable.
Chapter 69
The Wichita FBI agents led the caravan of federal and local law enforcement personnel from the air base back to the Prairie Inn. Frank, Braewyn, and Roland went to the motel bar to unwind from their morning ordeal and to plan their next move.
The plan was that Frank would file his statement with the local authorities regarding the killing of Vlad Torok. Then he would go on his lone mission in the morning. When he returned, he would drive the Impala to the rental agency in Wichita, while Braewyn and Roland followed in the Crown Vic and picked him up before all flew out of town. That was the plan until Braewyn came to Frank’s room after leaving the bar.
“They’ve found a woman’s body in the park near the air base,” Braewyn said. “Shot once in the back of the head. She’d been driving a late model, black Hyundai Sonata, according to her family. The car’s missing.”
“Sounds like Nicolai’s handiwork,” Frank said. “God almighty, he kills people like you and I have lunch. It means nothing to him.”
“Tomorrow we’ll follow you to the rental agency over on…,” Braewyn said and tapped some screen links on her smart phone, “Air Cargo Road at the Wichita airport. Looks like it’s on the west side of town.”
“I’ll find it,” Frank said and stared at Braewyn.
“What?”
“The hug at the air base. Is that in the FBI manual?”
“You looked like you could use one,” Braewyn said. “What? Not as cozy as the one Vlad Torok gave you?”
“That bastard’s hug nearly crushed my rib cage.”
“And mine?”
“That one hurt a lot less,” Frank said. “So, do you now believe I’ve told you all I know?”
“Oh, I’m sure, now more than ever, that you’re holding back. I think you believe what you’re concealing is for the good of the country and not its detriment.”
Frank stepped over to the window and panned his eyes across the motel parking lot.
“Did you say a black Hyundai?”
“Yes,” Braewyn said and moved to the window.
“I see one sitting all by itself on the back row,” Frank said. “What do you think the odds are of it being driven by a guest here?”
“Parked in the back row? I’m not sure,” Braewyn said and quick-stepped to the door. “I’ll scramble the guys.”
“No. This is my thing.”
Braewyn stopped.
“If that’s Nicolai down there, he wants just me, and I only want him. You and your crew stay put. I’ll take it from here.”
> “We have a dozen armed men in this building. Why should you march your macho butt out there alone and face him like a Dodge City cowboy?”
“Because cowboys and I know what has to be done,” Frank said and checked his Hi-Power for a full magazine and a round in battery.
“I’m sending the troops,” Braewyn said.
“Not until I’m finished with him,” Frank said, his tone firm.
“Or he’s finished with you.” Braewyn said. “He’s wanted by the FBI. And I’m sending in all I can to take him down.”
“This isn’t about surviving anymore,” Frank said. “It’s about stopping him from getting the Omega formula. The odds are two to one in our favor. I kill him, we win; we kill each other, we win; he kills me, you can have at him.”
Frank brushed past her and strode out of the room.
* * * * *
Frankk skirted the full rows of parked cars in the lot and made his way carefully to a point where he could see the Hyundai from thirty yards away. He squinted in the bright morning sun to make out an occupant behind the harsh reflection of the windshield. A moment later, a short man dressed in a gray business suit got out of the car and went to the trunk and opened it. It was not Cezar Nicolai, but Frank watched him carefully as he pulled out a briefcase from the trunk and hiked over to the motel office.
Frank turned back toward the motel. As he approached the doorway leading to the rooms, Braewyn appeared with several agents behind her.
“I’m supposed to be taking time off for R&R,” Braewyn said.
“Relax. No Nicolai. No shootout,” Frank said as he stepped to within arm’s length of her.
“Buy you a drink, Wyatt?”
* * * * *
Frank stared into his drink and stirred the ice cubes with his finger.
“Going on your solo trip tomorrow?” Braewyn asked.
“Maybe.”
“I thought that was your big plan.”
“Cezar Nicolai is out there watching my every move. He’s watching me right now. I can feel him. He’s going to follow wherever I go, and he’s never going to give up ‘til he gets what he wants.”
“We’ll get him first.”
“Not before he figures out where the Omega formula is,” Frank said. “He’s got the same information I do, and he knows he’s close as long as I’m close.”
“So what are you going to do?”
“I have to lure him away from what he wants. He’ll follow. He has to.”
Frank watched Braewyn looking at herself in the large mirror mounted on the back of the bar.
“Jack Ortiz was right,” Braewyn said. “I need a vacation. I look like twenty miles of bad road.”
“Do it. Take a vacation. Get the hell outa here.”
“I can’t as long as you continue to bait this murdering bastard,” Braewyn said, glaring at Frank. “I’m an FBI agent. I vowed to protect people like you from people like him.”
“Here’s a start─ find out who owns the black Hyundai out there and ask the motel office about the man who just drove it here. Short, homely dude in a gray suit with a briefcase.”
“That car just arrived here? Why didn’t you mention that before?” Braewyn said and jumped off her barstool and rushed to the corridor off the lounge
“It’ll all be over soon,” Frank said.
“Yeah, I know,” Braewyn said and ran down the corridor.
* * * * *
When Braewyn reached the front desk of the motel, the mysterious gray-suited man was gone. The clerk said the man was here to see the Wichita Air Show and wanted to see if there were any vacancies. The clerk told him the inn was fully booked and sent him on his way.
Braewyn charged out into the parking lot and searched for the Sonata.
The gray man and the black Hyundai were gone.
Chapter 70
The early morning air was warm and clear as Frank drove the Impala northwest on Route 90 leading out of Wichita. He passed a weapons testing laboratory on 33rd Street that had formerly been known as the United States Testing Laboratory. It was this facility that was cited in the second film David Hapburg had given him. The lab had worked secretly with William Dugan’s covert team to test the Omega weapon. According to the film, that testing was done at an area approximately five miles away. Its geographic co-ordinates he’d seen on the movie slates had been transferred to the car’s GPS. After all these years, Frank didn’t think he would find the exact spot looking as it was in the 1945 film, but he did have its basic location. He hoped where he was headed didn’t have a Walmart sitting on it.
A brief stop at a convenience store got Frank a cup of coffee and area information from a couple of the locals in the parking lot. He hated having to leave a message at the motel desk that he’d meet Braewyn and Roland for breakfast at 8 AM at the Prairie Inn’s restaurant, but he needed to put distance between him and everyone else involved in this cross-country chase. This was a gig he had orchestrated, and he planned to be its soloist.
Frank turned onto a secondary road he’d been told went out onto the open prairie. The remaining distance to the long-ago test area passed under the powerful Impala’s wheels in minutes, and Frank slowed to carefully pan the uninhabited terrain of the seemingly endless dry grassland. He was so absorbed in looking for an area that resembled the one he’d seen in the Omega films that he didn’t notice the Kansas Highway Patrol cruiser closing fast behind the Impala. The whoop of the cruiser’s siren startled Frank. He slammed on the brakes and gazed into the rear view mirror.
The police car, with its lights flashing, pulled up close behind Frank, and the trooper got out and headed for the driver’s side of the Impala. Frank rolled down the window.
“Driver’s license and registration, please,” the officer said.
Frank noted his name plate which read: T. Hunter.
“This can’t be for speeding,” Frank said and dug for his ID.
“I didn’t stop you for speeding,” the trooper said.
Frank handed the trooper his license and the rental registration papers. The officer looked over Frank’s credentials and stared at Frank through his dark aviator glasses.
“So?” Frank said.
“We got a bulletin about a Florida detective who’s been missing. Looks like I found him.”
“I’m not missing, officer.”
“What are you doing out here?”
“Just on a historical visit. I’m looking for an old weapons testing site. It’s supposed to be out here somewhere. My grandfather worked here during the war.”
“I see,” the trooper said. “You go on with your hunt. I’ll file a report that you’re okay and check on you later to make sure you don’t get lost. This is a pretty lonely stretch of road. Not used much since they put in the interstate. Kinda like a desert out here. Gotta watch out for snakes and… other bad things.”
The trooper returned Frank’s papers.
“I’ll be careful.”
The trooper returned to his cruiser and climbed behind the wheel. The roof lights went out, and a moment later the cruiser pulled out and drove past Frank. A minute later, it disappeared around a distant turn in the road.
Frank called the motel and rang Roland’s room.
“It’s 7 A. M.,” Roland said. “This better be important.”
“Seen Braewyn this morning?”
“I haven’t seen my feet yet.”
“I left you guys a message at the desk. When you see her, take her to breakfast and tell her I’ll join you later.”
“Why can’t you tell her?”
“She’ll ask me a lot of questions I don’t want to answer right now.”
“Where are you?” Roland asked.
“See? Like that one.” Frank said and ended the call.
Frank slowly drove a mile farther down the road and stopped when something caught his attention. Prairie dogs, lots of them. They started popping up from small mounds spread out all over the parched ground and grassy patches a hund
red yards to his left. He checked the GPS. He was within a mere yards of the location on the horror film slates.
He quietly slid out of the car and crept low toward the colony of prairie dogs. He made it unnoticed for about thirty yards and crouched behind a solitary boulder, large enough to conceal him from the road. He moved to the prairie side of the rock, concealing himself from the road, reached under his lightweight windbreaker, and pulled down his Browning 9mm. He rechecked its ammo. He felt his shoulder rig for its two extra mags, then snugged the pistol up into the holster.
Frank stepped around to the roadside face of the rock and leaned against it. He took an old, Prince Albert tobacco tin from his jacket pocket, opened its rounded hinged top, and checked it for a folded piece of yellow paper. He took out the paper, unfolded it, and slowly went over the physics equation he got from Doctor Dekler. He flipped over the paper to see the back side, read more, then refolded it. Satisfied that all was in order, he carefully placed the paper back in the box, recapped it, and tucked the bright red tin into his jacket pocket.
Frank knew Nicolai was there. He could sense his evil presence. The Kansas State trooper didn’t fool him either. No real cop pulls his cruiser butt up against the rear bumper of a pull-over unless he’s trying to box it in. Nicolai’s money could buy phony cops to run surveillance for him and report Frank’s exact location. Nicolai was nearby, no doubt about it. He could feel his eyes. But Frank wanted Nicolai to see him; wanted him to see the tin box with its mysterious folded paper. Frank was certain Nicolai would keep his detective alive as long as he believed it would bring him closer to the Omega formula’s whereabouts. But Frank didn’t come out here to tease Nicolai. He’d come to end their relationship.
Frank turned away from the road and looked over his surroundings for possible cover. There wasn’t much to hide behind on a prairie, and even less that would stop bullets. Parallel to the road, an uncharacteristic ridge rose fifty yards away. It contained several boulders protruding from the dusty soil and offered an elevated position and cover. The glacier that had crept through this land all those millennia ago had planed the terrain flat, except for a few large rocks that stubbornly refused to be milled down, merely accepted a smoothing, and now stood alone like giant egg-pillars in a North American Stonehenge. Frank judged it to be the best location to retreat to, should the lone rock position where he stood prove untenable.
The Omega Formula: Power to Die For (Detective Frank Dugan) Page 31
