“Woman, you are wasting my time.”
“I think that the real issue is you’re afraid to have a female in the cockpit, even if she is the superior flyer!”
Yuri’s nostrils flared. He turned to an underling. “Vladimir, you may entertain Captain Moriarty in our absence,” he said. “Perhaps you can teach her some manners on how a real woman should behave.”
“Spoken like a true fool,” she spat.
Gage groaned out loud. She didn’t realize the personality type she was dealing with. If Frankie thought to keep him safe and stranded on the ground, she was going about it the wrong way.
All wrong!
Where the hell was that taser? He’d use it on her himself.
Frankie roared on, “I’ve been dealing with this all of my life. Stupid men are always afraid of women. Why don’t you guys just buck up and deal with it?”
“A truly smart woman would know when to keep silent,” Yuri answered in a lethal tone.
“A truly smart man would leave Adams here and let me fly my helicopter!”
Yuri held up his hand for silence.
“Spineless moron,” she grumbled.
Yuri’s face turned to stone. His jaw clenched. “Are you calling me a coward?”
“If the yellow streak fits —”
Frankie never got the chance to finish the sentence. The rope Yuri held flew up to encircle her neck. Frankie’s eyes bulged in surprise. He began to twist.
Baghdad leaped up at Gage as if out of a dream.
He reacted more than acted. A sharp rip rent the air as he slammed a fist into the nearest nose, spun and fractured a trachea with his elbow.
A blur of arms and legs fell in beside him. Quinton joined the fray, blow for blow, matched in speed and intensity. In the space of a breath, the burly guards were sprawled on the ground. There was a brief break in the fight while more hijackers ran to reinforce their downed comrades.
Yuri took a step away, dragging Frankie with him. She struggled, kicked and stomped, her hands searching for a thumb or finger to isolate that would break his hold on the rope.
Gage pulled a gun from the limp hand of an unconscious guard and turned his attention on the bastard choking Frankie. He cocked the trigger.
Fear danced across Yuri’s face.
“Put down the weapon, Adams, or I’ll snap her neck.”
Quinton hissed to Gage, “Be quick about it mate. I’ll hold the others off.”
Blocking out every other stimulus, Gage took precise aim and pulled the trigger. The force of near point-blank impact propelled Yuri ten feet backwards.
Frankie swayed. Gage rushed to her side and caught her up. “Are you alright?”
She nodded.
“Stay down,” he brushed his lips across her forehead. “I’ll be right back.”
She nodded again. Gage spun, eager to join Quinton.
* * * *
It took a few moments for Frankie’s head to clear. She stood and staggered backwards to the helo as chaos rolled towards her. The fighting had erupted again with incredible violence. Arhepov was trying to escape in one of the vans, his spindly legs pumping with the effort of running.
Her ears were ringing. She thought she heard Gage yelling at her. An order? His voice reached her through the thunder of meaningless noise. Clutching her neck, she felt her way to the helicopter cockpit. She ran her hand blindly over the controls and punched in the transponder code that indicated a kidnapping in progress.
7-5-0-0
The grunting sounds of fighting diminished. Frankie turned to see Gage’s boot colliding with Arhepov’s jawbone. Twisted bodies were scattered across the trampled grass. Gage looked over at her. She gave him a weak hand signal that help was on its way and sank slowly to the ground.
Chapter 22
SORTING THINGS OUT
Quinton, Gage and Frankie sat on the running board of Stella’s rear compartment and watched the procession of government agents lead Dimitri Arhepov and his assistant away in handcuffs. The smell of the clove cigarette Gage had bummed from one of the agents wafted past Frankie’s wrinkled nose. At the last moment Arhepov turned and made eye contact with Gage, his hand flew up in mock salute. Gage answered with his raised middle finger.
It was past midnight. The perimeter lights set up for the investigation cast enough luminescence to give the impression of midday. A group of the FBI’s finest searched the edges of the clearing for any shred of evidence. Quinton rubbed his aching shoulder and scowled at the paramedic trying to take his blood pressure.
The three of them had been privately questioned, separated from one another, their stories compared for consistency. That two flight jockeys, one of whom was injured, could have overcome six armed mercenaries, was met with a good deal of skepticism. It was not until a female agent named Corley produced old service records on Gage and Quinton that any suspicion of collaboration disappeared. From the abrupt change in Corley’s demeanor, the woman had been impressed.
Frankie heaved a deep sigh.
Agent Corley had informed them that Damon was unharmed and in the process of being escorted to the air station clad only in his thermal underwear and a wide grin.
“It figures he would try to screw his way out of a jam,” Gage complained.
Quinton rumbled a laugh.
“Do you think it worked?”
“Probably.”
Frankie paused, a mug of hot coffee half way to her lips. She turned to study Gage’s stoic profile. In another hour or so, that dim shadow he sported above his eye would blossom into an impressive shiner. He had fought like a maniac to save her. She caught Quinton eyeing the black eye too.
“I told you to duck, mate,” Quinton teased.
“You told me to duck after his fist collided with my face. I’m good but I’m not that good.”
“Excuses, excuses. I held up my end of the fight,” Quinton replied.
“Your end?” Gage responded.
“Abso-bloody-lutely, my end. I did my fair share of ass-kicking after taking two in the chest.”
“Two in the chest?” Gage repeated incredulously. “You took two hits in the collarbone and only one of those barbs made it through your flight suit to barely pierce the skin.”
“One was plenty enough, mate.”
“Plenty enough to make you scream like a girl.”
Frankie’s voice was scratchy. “Would you two wankers knock it off?”
“Not until you apologize for calling me a sorry-assed pilot,” Gage responded.
“I didn’t call you that,” Frankie smiled.
“She’s right, mate. She called you a worthless hazard.”
It hurt her throat to laugh but Frankie didn’t care. A little pain was small price to pay for being alive. Gage rolled his eyes and took a long draw on his cigarette.
“Where did you learn to speak Russian?” she asked Gage.
“From Greg.”
“Your friend from childhood?”
He nodded.
“Greg is short for Gregori. Gregori Buletov. His parents immigrated to the United States when he was five. They moved in next door to us.” Gage held out his coffee mug for a refill. The agent assigned to look after them quickly obliged. “The Buletovs were honest, hardworking people,” he continued. “At first they were overwhelmed by all the excess in this country. The wasteful, materialistic ways of our culture, Greg’s dad was fond of saying. They never got used to it and never took anything for granted. The whole family was into recycling before it was fashionable.”
Quinton started to speak then changed his mind.
“My mom taught them English,” Gage continued.
“And you learned Russian from them,” Frankie deduced.
“Exactly.”
Her hands knotted into fists. “How did you know about the computer guy?” She wrapped her chilled fingers tighter around the cup.
“Greg’s parents were computer software experts,” Gage answered. “Geeks and philosophers were the
crowd they socialized with in Russia. I remembered a picture and their stories about a former friend of theirs, some genius gone rogue. Times were really tough back then. Everyone was starving or close to it but good old Arhepov never missed his yearly shopping spree in Paris. He was living the high life at his comrades’ expense. A real lie-cheat-steal kind of guy. He made a killing from selling his hacking services to the highest bidder.
“Who do you think hired him for this job?” Frankie asked quietly.
“That’s what these fine folks are here to find out.” Gage toasted the FBI with his coffee mug and then bummed another clove cigarette from the agent standing a few feet away.
Quinton edged away from him. “Mate, keep lighting those up and you’ll need a lung transplant. They can’t possibly be good for you.”
“Beats the alternative.”
Frankie tapped Gage’s leg. “Do you know what Arhepov was paid to hack?” she asked.
Gage shook his head. “Beaumont Hydroelectric is almost entirely computerized. My guess is someone paid him to take down the power grid.”
Frankie made a growling noise. “That dam supplies electricity for half the west coast. The resulting blackout would cripple us for days and that would just be the beginning.”
“Can you spell chaos?” Quinton spoke in seriousness. “Those blokes could’ve done some serious damage.”
Frankie blinked twice while she digested the ramifications of such a deed. “What about the ringleader of the hijackers?”
“Yuri?”
She nodded. “Where was he from? Could you tell anything from his accent?”
“Middle-Eastern, I think. With a touch of Cambridge University.”
Quinton clapped his hands twice. “That’s a pretty good guess for a worthless, low life fly-jockey.”
Gage smiled.
Frankie’s head had cleared and she was full of questions. “Who do you think hired Yuri?”
“Somebody who doesn’t like the U.S.”
Quinton let out a rude snort. “That leaves the playing field wide open. Could you narrow it down some?”
“Do you think the FBI will ever tell us?”
Gage turned to her and winked. “We could ask them real nice,” he smiled.
Frankie turned to Quinton. “Isabelle has connections. Can you find out for us?”
“I have a better idea,” Quinton answered and pointed to Agent Corley. “Let’s get Damon to do it.”
They considered in a moment of silence and then Gage started chuckling; softly at first, then growing louder. Quinton and Frankie joined him. Agent Corley paused in her duties and turned to look.
Chapter 23
COMING CLEAN
Frankie awoke to the sound of Stewie hacking up a hairball in the middle of her bed.
“Oh my God!”
She flew out of the blanket like a launched rocket and was retching in the toilet before her feet ever touched the floor. A meteor storm of lights wheeled through her pounding head. She reached out for something, anything, to steady herself and ended up in a blizzard of toilet paper.
Hell went on forever.
Each time she thought it was safe to wash her face and step out of the bathroom, her stomach decided it wasn’t finished and propelled her back to the bowl.
Pale and shaky, she steadied enough to clean up the mess then crumpled into a swivel chair in front of the fax machine. With trembling hands she checked the weather forecast.
“Clear and sunny for the next thirty-six hours.”
She fumbled with the computer and found the incident report begun the night before. She looked it over once and frowned. The report read like the ramblings of some hysterical female, not a decorated officer of the Coast Guard. She hit the delete key and prepared to start over when a knock sounded on her door.
Trouble, disheveled and humble, walked into her room. Frankie took one look at Gage and immediately forgot what she’d intended to do next.
“Good morning,” she greeted weakly.
He sat on the edge of the bed, unconsciously rubbing his neck and stared blankly at the wall. A dark shadow of beard stubble set off vivid purple bruising around his injured eye. He cleared his throat and began to speak.
“It was ninety one. A four-man team of para rescue men, were sent to extract a downed F-15 pilot hiding in a village just south of Baghdad. The pilot had called mayday and ejected. He’d been down less than an hour. His injuries were unknown, assumed grave, and there was pressure from all sides to hurry up.” He stopped for a breath. “Risk, rescue and glory. That’s what the political gods wanted from us. Rescue the pilot, save the day and make the navy look good, all in one heroic swoop that they could brag about for years. The mission was hashed out quickly. Nobody seemed to think the situation odd at the time. PJ’s are trained for exactly that type of quick action. I was trained for it.”
The room seemed to swirl around Frankie.
“I was a kid,” Gage continued, “younger than Damon, and they put me in command.”
A jagged fingernail bit into the palm of her hand. Frankie forced herself to sit still. She wanted to reach out, give him comfort. Hold him tightly. Kiss the pain from his face. Yet she knew if she did, the riddle she’d been waiting four years to solve would remain unsolved.
The enigma needed to talk.
She needed to sit silent and listen to him.
“We parachuted in at night using the coordinates that we assumed were coming from the pilot.” Gage paused a moment. “The whole thing was a trap. The pilot was dead. They used his gear and radio to lure us in. My team was taken prisoner in a show of force we weren’t expecting.” He cleared his throat again. “Iraqis were coming out of nowhere. They completely overwhelmed us.”
He squeezed his eyes tightly shut as if trying to block the images.
“At the time, Hussein was offering rewards up to fifty grand for each downed Coalition pilot. I don’t know what my going rate was,” he muttered. “When the Iraqis realized we didn’t have any information they could use, they began to kill us off, one by one. Murdered one at a time, one a day, in front of me. Since I was the team leader, they saved me for last. On the fourth day it was my turn. I was ready to die. I deserved it. Every time I thought about my team, my friends,” he shook his head. “I was eager to join them. When night fell, the guards came to get me. I was awaiting my fate when a man in black quietly stepped out of the shadows and disposed of the rear guard. One quick snap and the body slid to the floor.”
Frankie’s watery eyes grew huge. The raw grief in his voice shook her.
“A SEAL team had arrived to rescue us.” He motioned absently to the scar on his neck. “When the shit hit the fan, the other Iraqi guards decided that killing me was more important than running for their lives. They tried to cut my head off with an old piece of razor wire. I was too weak to fight. I woke up a day later in the infirmary on a navy ship, back from the dead and not ready to join the living. I was numb. I couldn’t talk for days. The navy docs were worried that I’d had some vocal cord damage. It took days of x-rays and exams before a shrink finally figured it out. He saved me from myself but I could never be a PJ again. I’d lost my edge.”
Frankie blinked back tears and swallowed past a lump in her throat the size of a doorstop. “Was Greg one of your team?”
Gage flinched.
“No, a separate incident that happened a few months later. Greg wasn’t a PJ. He was a stable part of my other life, the part where people don’t die by torture and you get to sleep in your own bed at night.”
Frankie rediscovered her legs and eased over to sit down on the bed next to him. She reached out to hold his hand, splayed his fingers between her own. She ran her hands over his blanched knuckles.
A veil of anguish passed across his face. Gage broke contact, jumped to his feet, remained standing as he stared out the window. He couldn’t reach out and make direct eye contact. Frankie knew he blamed himself. She waited, silent, for him to continue.
/> The moment was interrupted by a loud commotion in the other room.
Damon slammed the telephone into the cradle and shouted, “The FBI wants to talk to me again! How many different ways can I say the same thing?” The strain in his voice carried throughout the house.
“Deep breath, mate,” Quinton reassured. “There are worse ways to spend the morning than talking to some pretty government agent.”
“Yeah? Name one. That woman creeps me out.” Damon made a shivering noise.
Frankie glanced over to watch a myriad of looks cross Gage’s dark face while the noise of Damon’s ranting filtered in from the other room.
Damon mimicked the haughty soprano of Agent Corley, “Seaman McGoldrick, could you explain how we came to find you clad only in your underwear when we boarded the Zaitsev?” Pausing before he answered his own question, “Because they stole my mustang suit, lady,” he grumbled.
“She’s a stickler for detail, that one is,” Quinton responded. Frankie didn’t need to see the Aussie smirk to know that he did.
“Seamon McGoldrick,” Damon’s voice became shrill and snotty again. “Could you tell us at what point you realized the intent of the hijackers was to bypass the safeguards of the Beaumont Hydroelectric Plant and take down the power grid covering the western seaboard?”
“After YOU told me about it, lady. I was busy freezing my ass off in the cargo hold.”
Quinton’s response was ripe with humor. “The girl has to get her facts straight. No use blaming her for doing her job.”
Damon sneered. “How about the unflattering way she enunciates seaman when addressing me? She’s deliberately insulting me. I don’t get it. What did I do to piss her off?”
“Don’t be so quick to take offense,” Quinton answered. “Some women come off as prickly when they’re personally interested. Especially the tough ones. She probably wants more detail on where your nickname came from.”
Damon made a rude, grunting noise.
“Then why doesn’t she ask and I’ll show her.” He fell quiet, digested the information a moment longer before asking, “Do you really think she’s interested in me?”
Guarding the Coast Page 24
