Running the Maze s-5

by Jack Coughlin

  “Then he is a stupid fellow. Why do you need me?”

  Sybelle was smiling. “I wanted to touch base on whether to bring in the FBI or the locals.”

  The general grabbed his grandson with one big arm and held him motionless. “What does Kyle want to do?”

  “He wants to keep it within Trident. Let him handle it.”

  “Well, I trust the skill sets of Swanson and Ledford more than those of the Feebs. Notify the White House chief of staff that we’re going after the bastard, and give Kyle permission to light him up.”

  “Yes, sir. Have a good time.”

  “I’m going to drive over to the Cape tomorrow morning for the launch. Leave the rest of them here with the rat. It’s my vacation, too, and I’m a general.”

  “Now, now, sir. Think of the children.”

  SAN DIEGO

  Bill Curtis wrapped a colorful Mexican serape over the shoulders of Margaret Ledford, adjusted the front, and took her by the arm. “Scream or try to escape and I will shoot you dead where you stand,” he warned. “Now let’s go see Beth.”

  The small woman and the tall man pulling a little suitcase left the parking garage aboard an elevator that took them up to the top level of the Hacienda Hotel. The hallway was empty except for a service cart at the far end, where two Mexican room attendants were finishing up a room. It was two o’clock in the afternoon, and most of the new guests would start checking in about four. By then, the huge hotel would sparkle.

  Curtis stopped at a door, knocked, and called out, “Beth! It’s us, dear. Open up.”

  The white door opened quickly, and he shoved Margaret inside, into the arms of her daughter, and shut the door as they stumbled back. A pistol was now in his free hand. “Hello, Beth,” he said. “I’ve been waiting a long time to meet you. You have caused me a great deal of trouble. Before you try to do anything, look beneath the serape your mother is wearing. You will find a vest filled with dynamite, and I have the trigger.”

  Beth gave Curtis a measured stare: tall, strong, with desperate eyes. Play along, Kyle had said, and find out what he really wants. “I understand, and I’m not going to cause any trouble that might get my mom hurt. Just tell me what you want me to do.”

  Keeping the pistol pointed at her, Curtis said, “First, go over to the window and close all the blinds and curtains so your sniper buddies cannot take an easy shot.”

  “There’s no one out there.” She twisted the plastic knobs and the blinds closed, and then she pulled the heavy dark drapes together. The room went almost dark.

  “Lock the door and push the straight-back chair from the desk under the knob.” Curtis turned on the bathroom light, as she did as she was told. He sat in an easy chair in the corner. “Now, open the suitcase. There’s another vest in there, just like the one your mom is wearing. Put it on. Once we get you all strapped up, I will cut the flex-ties on your mother’s wrists. The rules are simple: One of you will remain in my sight at all times, so you can even use the bathroom in private. Any attempt to escape or call for help, or any hand-to-hand combat shit, and I will be forced to do something very unpleasant, and a lot of innocent people in this fine hotel will get hurt. Understand?”

  Both of the women nodded. “Then make yourselves comfortable, ladies. I will order up an early dinner from room service, and after that, I suggest you try to get some rest. I want to watch the TV special tonight about the Mars launch tomorrow. Now, Beth, I assume you have been in touch with Kyle Swanson, correct?”

  “Yes,” she answered.

  “We will call him at midnight and give him his instructions. I want him to be part of this package, too.”

  “Gunny Swanson will eat you alive,” she said in an almost threatening tone and wrapped an arm around her mother’s waist. “You don’t know him.”

  Curtis stuffed the pistol into his belt. “I know that some very important people want him dead. I know that I hold all the aces in this game. He will come to me, and he will die. All of you will.”

  ORLANDO, FLORIDA

  LINDA LOOKED SEXY AND exquisite in a lightweight white dress, the lobster at Primo’s was sublime, and astronaut Buck Gardener was a happy man. “I’m going to miss you,” he said, raising a glass of white wine. “Wish we could spend the night together.”

  “It won’t be for long,” she responded with a smile. “I’ll join you in Italy in ten days.”

  “You and me, rockin’ along the Italian Riviera, with money to burn.” He patted his chest pocket, which contained an envelope she had delivered containing nine thousand dollars. Ten thousand in cash leaving the country would raise eyebrows at customs. Nine did not. Millions of dollars were waiting on the other side of the pond, to be released to his numbered account when the rocket blew.

  She crossed her arms, and her dark eyes sparkled. “You look good in civilian clothes. Nice new suit, comfortable shoes, expensive tie. No longer like an astronaut at all.”

  “Thanks. I feel really different, like reborn. This has been a rush, Linda.” A mild look of concern crossed his face. “Be glad when it’s all done, though.”

  Linda reached across the table, put her hand on his, and gave it a squeeze. “I know. Just think of the future, Buck. All that money stored in Switzerland, and a lifetime to spend it any way you want. That’s a dream come true, isn’t it? Now, let’s get out of here, grab one more drink in a nice place, then get you on that last plane to Nassau, sweetheart.”

  “Yeah,” he said. The good spirits came surging back, and he looked at his watch, a sleek JeanRichard model with a black face and slim leather band that had replaced his enormous fighter-pilot watch. Seven o’clock. Fifteen hours before liftoff.

  KANDAHAR ARMY AIR FIELD, AFGHANISTAN

  STEVE LONGSTREET OF THE CIA was sweating in the tight room that was eight feet long by eight feet wide and eight feet high, but Chief Engineer Mohammad al-Attas was wide-eyed in exhaustion and stank of fear. The CIA interrogator had pushed the young engineer hard for hours, waiting out the pauses when the Djinn personality arose, and fighting to keep al-Attas going in the right direction. The lights were bright, and the air-conditioning was off, so the two of them sat stinking in the box.

  The news that Curtis had gone on the run, was wanted for murder, and would not be speaking in behalf of al-Attas had shocked the engineer, who picked at his fingernails as his face twisted in confusion.

  “Give me something, Mohammad,” Longstreet nudged, keeping a command edge on his voice. “Think hard about all of the traffic you saw exchanged between Bill Curtis and Commander Kahn. Try to visualize it. Think of where you were when you read it; pretend that you’re there right now, reading those messages you were never supposed to see.”

  “I have given you everything I know, sir. Everything. I need rest and sleep, and medication. Let me have a pill to sleep, and maybe I can remember something tomorrow.”

  Longstreet slapped his palm on the tabletop, and al-Attas jumped. “There may be no tomorrow for you, Mohammad. There is only now! Tell me about this attack!”

  “I will then die as a martyr?” The proud Djinn voice. Crazy eyes. He jerked at the restraints but could not move.

  “You will not die at all, boy. You will live a long life in our version of a dungeon. Twenty-three hours a day in a room smaller than this, no computers or books to distract your mind, blistering heat or freezing cold, and surrounded by the worst criminals in America. You are not strong enough for that, and you will go mad within a month. Talk to me.”

  Al-Attas squinted his eyes hard, picturing the scrolling screens of communications that he had intercepted and read. “New Muslim Order. Commander Kahn. Undersecretary Curtis. The bridge,” he murmured. “Something about Columbus and America.”

  “Whoa.” Longstreet stopped the thought. “Columbus and America? That’s good, Mohammad. You’re doing good. That is new. Think hard now. Keep going.” Christopher Columbus discovering America? That made no sense.

  “No. No.” The engineer was trying t
o find a single piece of information that was itching in his brain. “Not Columbus. Columbia?” A smile creased the sweaty face. “Yes. Something about Columbia and America.”

  Longstreet got up and leaned over the table on stiff arms, but trying to look peaceful and put al-Attas at ease. “And Challenger. Did they mention the word ‘Challenger’?”

  A long moment passed before al-Attas nodded and spoke almost obediently, as if wanting to please his teacher. “Yes. I think so. Challenger, Columbia, America.”

  Both Challenger and Columbia were space shuttles that blew up, one on takeoff, the other on landing. It wasn’t America that was to be attacked, it was THE America, the Mars mission. “Oh, my God,” Longstreet shouted as he bolted from the room, doing the time adjustment in his head: It was about three o’clock in the morning on the East Coast of the United States, T minus four.

  ORLANDO, FLORIDA

  The Parramore section of Orlando was a distressed area that was as far as the imagination could reach from the magic of the frolicking Disney characters and the glitter of Universal Studios. Police patrol units cruising the alleys and checking the dark corners were constantly alert, particularly in the wee hours when the night creatures were out and fights, dope, and whores were a normal morning menu.

  “Over there,” said Officer Brandi Sharpe, and her partner, Jake Young, yanked the patrol car to the curb where a disheveled man was waving at them at the mouth of an alley on Church Street. Young flicked on the blinking lights, painting the area with flashes of blue and white. Sharpe got out first, followed by Young. “What’s the problem, dude?”

  “I found a dead man!” The wrinkled old wino pointed at a Dumpster. “He’s in there.”

  As Young pulled his pistol to cover her, Sharpe slid her hands into rubber gloves. She hated Dumpster diving, but if the victim was truly dead, she could leave that for the crime scene techs. Please be dead. She raised up on her toes, hands on the edge of the Dumpster, and gave a low whistle. “Hey, Jake, come take a look.”

  The victim was a white man in a dark suit, with two gunshots in his forehead. “I don’t think he’s from around here,” he said, as Brandi called in the apparent homicide. Jake Young told the wino to sit down and stay put.

  Technicians hauled the body onto the cracked concrete of the alley, took some pictures, and looked for ID but found no wallet, although an expensive watch was still strapped to the left wrist. Deep in the right front pants pocket, a tech discovered an unusual small gold pin, a star above three columns rising inside a circle, with a name etched on the reverse.

  A detective at the scene was connected by phone to the security office at the Kennedy Space Center over at the Cape. “I think we’ve found one of your people over here, dead in a Dumpster,” the detective said, looking at his notebook. “Gunshots to the head. No positive identification yet, but there’s a name on an astronaut lapel pin we found on him. Guy named Buck Gardener. Ring a bell?”

  The duty officer in the security office sat up straighter. The alert status was already at the top of the scale because of the threat picked up in Pakistan, and now an astronaut on the closeout crew had left the base the evening before launch and had been murdered? Not just anyone, but Gardener, whose wife was to fly on America within a few hours. Without wasting further time, he set up a conference call with his boss and the America flight director. In five minutes, a hold was put on the launch while officials at the Cape, and in Washington and Houston, were rousted from bed to emergency meetings to decide: Go or no go?

  33

  29 PALMS, CALIFORNIA

  KYLE SWANSON HAD NOT heard from Beth Ledford for twelve hours, which indicated that she had also been taken by Curtis and wasn’t allowed to communicate. That had not particularly bothered him, for it had been anticipated in some form, ever since her mother was captured. Curtis used Margaret as bait to get Beth, and intended to use both of them to get to him. Beth’s job was to stay cool, stay focused, and keep Curtis from doing something in panic.

  The silence had allowed Swanson some unexpected time in which to prepare for the unknown, and with the assistance of the Lizard and Sybelle from Washington, the giant Marine base at 29 Palms geared up to offer Gunny Swanson whatever and whoever was needed to take down this new terrorist. A major from the base commandant’s staff, a light colonel from the Marine Special Operations Command, and a master gunnery sergeant had been on deck with him since late afternoon, prepared to expedite matters. Sybelle and the Lizard were ready to work in Washington. All they needed was a time and a place.

  “You still awake back there?” he asked the Lizard via the live video hookup, as he took a seat before the laptop computer.

  “Yes, of course I am. The signal from Petty Officer Ledford’s sat phone has not moved. It is still in room 310 in the Hacienda Hotel. The tracer button on her belt shows that she is still there, too. This fellow is taking his time.”

  “He is waiting on something specific. We’ll know soon.”

  * * *

  KYLE’S SAT PHONE FINALLY buzzed, shortly after two o’clock in the morning, startling everyone. They looked at it as if it were a live thing, and Kyle picked it up. “Swanson.”

  “Take down these coordinates,” came the harsh order from a male voice; Curtis.

  “Go,” Swanson said, flicking his eyes to meet the others. Bill Curtis read off a string of numbers, then Swanson read them back. “What now?”

  “You get in a Humvee and drive down from 29 Palms and arrive at that position at exactly 5:42 A.M. The approach is a narrow road in an ocean of sand, and I will have a perch with a clear view for miles around. Come alone, and stop when I call and tell you to. Then get out of the car, take off your shirt, and walk up the path that you will find marked by flags directly in front of you. It will take you east, up the ridge where the women will be strapped together, wearing dynamite vests, with my finger on the detonator. One suspicious move by you and I press the button. Clear?”

  “Clear.” There was no use asking the condition of the two captives; either they were alive or they were not.

  “Give me a cell phone number to call,” Curtis said, and Swanson did so. “You have about three and a half hours to drive there from where you are in 29 Palms, so I suggest that you get on the road. That time is absolute, drop-dead certain. Don’t be late.”

  “OK. I’m on the way,” Kyle said, keeping his voice level. He had every intention of being on time.

  They closed the connection.

  * * *

  THERE WAS NO FLURRY of action, or jumping for guns or cars, or a yelling of orders. In this moment of stress, the professionals took time to exchange glances, and all around the table the faces looked like a bunch of hungry wolves that had just found a rabbit. Bill Curtis had made his first mistake, allowing his adversary too much time to plan a response.

  Swanson spoke to the Lizard in Washington. “Can you bring up a map of those coordinates, please, Liz?”

  Almost instantly, a detailed map of Southern California came on the big screen against a wall, and Commander Freedman zoomed in on the specific numbers Curtis had given; a desolate desert position near the Arizona line, just north of the U.S. border with Mexico. “Imperial Sand Dunes Rec Area. Dune buggy heaven,” observed the master gunny.

  “How about matching that with the three-and-a-half-hour drive he mentioned from the Stumps.”

  The map expanded in size, and a straight blue line bloomed from 29 Palms to the desert location south of the Gordon Wells exit on Interstate 8. “Almost perfect, based on driving sixty miles per hour,” the Lizard said.

  “And the time, precisely at five forty-two?”

  “Dawn.”

  “Ah.”

  “Gunny?” the Lizard called out. “The tracking signal on Petty Officer Ledford’s sat phone is still stationary in the hotel room, but the one on her belt shows movement. I hacked into the hotel’s security cameras and have a visual on all three of them leaving. The women seem to be OK.”

 
“Roger that, Liz. Keep us in the loop. How far does he have to travel?”

  There was a clicking of a computer keyboard before Freedman answered. “About one hundred and twenty-five miles to El Centro, then add another half hour to that exit. Say two and one-half hours, plus or minus. Which would put them on the spot about an hour before you, if you drove from 29 Palms.”

  “Thanks.”

  Now the men at the table changed from watching the screen to facing each other and writing on the legal pads. The MARSOC lieutenant colonel said, “The first thing is pretty obvious, Kyle. This guy doesn’t want to go face-to-face with you. He would be a fool to let you within fifty feet.”

  “So the instruction to take off the shirt and walk up the path is bullshit?”

  “Probably just a distraction, to keep you thinking that you can go up and rescue the hostages.”

  “And the daybreak time? What’s that about?”

  “He wants you coming from the west, looking into the rising morning sun.”

  The master gunnery sergeant wrote the capital letters IED on his pad. “I agree. It will be an ambush of some sort. From the file, this Curtis dude was a construction roughneck back in the day, and in Washington, he booby-trapped his home and killed those FBI types. My guess is he will make up for his lack of military skill with weapons by staying with what he knows: dynamite. He most likely will sprinkle an improvised explosive device or two along the road, and certainly mine up any marked path.”

  “Ouch.” Kyle agreed with the possibility and turned to the staff officer. “We need a hero, sir. A volunteer who is an IED expert, someone with experience, and about my size. If he wears a full body armor suit, and can use an MRAP, he could soak up the explosion and walk away. Take some balls, but it can be done.”

  “I’ll shop it out with the engineers,” the major said. “They actually enjoy this sort of thing. Driving a blast-resistant V-bottom truck that weighs fourteen tons through a mine field helps measure the size of their dicks at beer call. We can lift one of them straight down to the El Centro Naval Air Station by helicopter, along with the driver.”