Over the Edge

by Suzanne Brockmann

  “Yeah, you noticed the lack of furniture, huh?” he was saying. “I’m waiting to win the lottery so I can fill it with Stickley pieces.” At her blank look, he explained. “Oak furniture—antiques from the Arts and Crafts period. Same era as the bungalow—early 1900s. Currently it’s out of my price range and it just seems, I don’t know, wrong to fill a place I’ve worked so hard to restore with stuff from IKEA.”

  Stan Wolchonok’s hobby was restoring old houses and collecting antiques. Teri couldn’t keep from smiling, and he was comfortable enough with himself to laugh, too.

  “Yeah, don’t spread it around, all right?” he continued. “All I need is for my men to find out I’m into antiques. I’ll never hear the end of it—forget about the fact that Stickley used nice, clean, simple, masculine lines. It’s really gorgeous stuff and . . . I’m just digging myself in deeper here, aren’t I?”

  She found herself leaning toward him. “How could they not know? Don’t they wonder why you don’t have furniture in your house?”

  “Yeah, well . . .” He rubbed his face, cleared his throat. “They don’t come over,” he admitted. “My house is off-limits to U.S. Navy personnel, no exception. I decided early on in my career that I didn’t want to live in a halfway house for wayward SEALs. See, some of the other chiefs always find themselves followed home by whichever of their enlisted men has the problem of the week, and . . .” He shook his head. “The few hours that I’m off the base and home are my hours—and it’s usually only about six a day, sometimes fewer, so it’s not like I’m being overly selfish here. And they can reach me by phone, twenty-four/seven, I’ve made that clear. I’ll come rescue ’em if they need rescuing, but they can’t sleep on my couch. They can’t even come inside.”

  “You don’t have a couch,” she pointed out. He’d let her into his house. What did that mean?

  He gave her another of those amazing smiles. “Yeah, maybe that’s another reason why I’m not in such a hurry to get one. There’s never any temptation to let anyone come over and sleep on it.”

  Why did you let me come inside? The question was burning the inside of her mouth, the inside of her very stomach.

  He looked at his watch, and she knew it was just a matter of seconds, maybe less, before he stood up. Then this conversation would be over.

  “Stan.” Oh, God. She’d done it. She’d actually used his name.

  He didn’t seem aware of the momentousness of the occasion, though he stopped looking at his watch and waited for her to continue.

  “I owe you an apology,” she said in a rush. “I didn’t know I was breaking the rules by coming over to your house.”

  He was already shaking his head. “Please, don’t worry about it. You’re an exception—”

  “You said no exceptions.”

  “Yeah, well, I guess that makes me a liar. It’s really no big deal.”

  But it was a big deal. He might’ve been unable to shut the door in her face because he was attracted to her. Or he might’ve let her in out of pity. Teri wanted to know which it had been.

  “I’m glad I was home.” Stan stood up. “Come on. Tomorrow’ll be here far too soon. I’ll walk you to your room.”

  Stan, why did you let me come inside?

  She could do it. All she had to do to start the question was to say his name again. How hard could that be? She took a deep breath.

  “Hey,” he said, turning back to look at her as she followed him up the stairs. “I meant to ask—what’d you think of Mike Muldoon? Good guy, huh?”

  Pity. It had no doubt been nothing more than pity.

  Teri forced a smile. “Yeah,” she said. “He’s a really good guy.”

  “Hello?” Gina said again into the microphone, aware that Handsome Bob and Snarly Al were watching her closely. Bob and Al, Backstreet Bob had said they were called, after Al had backhanded her hard enough to split her lip. They were clearly Americanizations of more complicated Kazbekistani names. “Are you still there? Daddy?”

  Please, Daddy, don’t say something stupid and give her away. Please, Max of the relaxed, matter-of-fact, soothingly rich baritone voice, understand all that she had told him. Karen Crawford wasn’t on this plane. But God help Gina if Bob and Al found that out.

  Would they shoot her or club her to death?

  Please, someone answer or she was going to puke.

  “Hey, Karen, this is Max again.” The voice came over the speaker, the answer to her prayers. “We can’t talk while you’ve got the thumb key pressed on the microphone. It would be a big help if you would say ‘over’ or ‘go ahead’ so we know when you’re finished speaking, and then lift your thumb, okay? And we’ll do the same. Here’s Senator Crawford again. Over.”

  Senator Crawford, he’d said. Not your father. He knew. Now she nearly threw up from relief.

  “Uh, Karen? I’m . . . I’m here, honey. Over.” Thank God, Crawford was playing along, too.

  “They’ve told me they’ve already given you their list of demands,” she said. There was silence until she added, “Over.”

  And then there was more silence. Too much silence.

  Handsome Bob shifted in the pilot’s seat. Just the slightest show of impatience. Gina forced herself not to look at him.

  She pressed the button on the side of the microphone. “Daddy?” she said, trying not to sound as desperate as she felt. “Please go ahead.”

  “We’re . . . we’re working on that,” Crawford finally said. “On their demands. I’m going to Washington, uh, Karen, to, uh, speak to the president and, uh . . .”

  God, this guy was a royal loser. To think she’d voted for him. But okay, to give him credit, he probably wasn’t thinking very clearly. He’d just found out that his daughter wasn’t being held at gunpoint by terrorists.

  Lucky bastard. Much luckier than Gina’s father.

  Well, if the senator didn’t have anything important to say, she sure as hell did.

  Gina hit the button on her mike and the radio squealed. There was silence then. At least she’d managed to shut him up.

  “Go ahead, Karen,” the other voice, Max’s voice—dear, wonderful Max’s voice—cut in.

  “I love you, Daddy,” she said, knowing that somewhere over in the airport terminal building recorders were running, taping every word she uttered. Someday, her real father would hear this. She hoped.

  Her throat ached from trying not to cry. “I’m so sorry—I know you didn’t want me to take this trip,” she continued. “You tried to talk me out of it, but there really was nothing you could have said. I wanted to go. And you can’t live your life expecting to be hijacked. I still believe that. Whatever happens here, it’s not my fault, okay? But it’s also not your fault.”

  Silence. Crap, she forgot to say over. But it was just as well, she wasn’t done.

  “Tell Mommy I love her, too,” Gina said. “Tell her I’m thinking about her. Tell her she was . . . God, she was right about Trent Engelman. Tell her I should have listened to her more. That she was probably right about a lot of things. Over.”

  “Hey, Karen, it’s Max.” Just from his voice, she could picture him, sitting with his feet up on a table in front of him, lazing back in a chair propped back on two legs. He probably wore his shirtsleeves rolled up and his hair long and pulled back in a ponytail and was twenty pounds overweight. Mr. Don’t-Sweat-the-Small-Stuff. “Don’t give your farewell speech just yet, okay? We’ve got a lot to talk about—me and the men who have control of the plane. Are they in there with you right now? Over.”

  “Yes. Over.”

  “Do they speak English or should I use a translator—I have someone on my staff who speaks the language and is standing next to me right now. Although, look, your father wants to say something really quick, and then he’s heading back to DC. Hang on.”

  There was about five seconds of silence, and then Senator Crawford’s voice came back on. “Karen, honey, I love you.” He sounded as if he were reading lines from a bad script. “Tel
l the men who have control of the plane that I’ll be speaking directly with the president, but that these things take time. We’ll need a few days at least to—”

  A female voice cut in. “I’m sorry, Senator, you really must leave now if you intend to make that flight.”

  “Karen, do whatever they say,” Crawford said. “Be safe. And remember that . . . that your father loves you.”

  That one almost made her tears escape.

  “Hey, Karen. It’s me again.” Max was back. “I’d really like a chance to speak directly with the men who are holding the guns. Can I do that now? Go ahead.”

  Bob was shaking his head. No.

  “Bob doesn’t want to talk to you. Over.”

  “Bob? Over.”

  “That’s what he says his name is. And his English is probably better than mine. Over.” Terrorist Bob had told her he’d learned his nearly perfect English from watching television and reading American books.

  “Bob,” Max said. “This would be a whole lot easier, sir, if you and I could talk directly. Over.”

  But Bob was still shaking his head. He took a piece of paper from his jacket pocket and unfolded it.

  Handing it to Gina, he said, “Read.” He gestured to the microphone. “Aloud.”

  “He wants me to read something. Over,” Gina said into the microphone. The light in the cockpit wasn’t the greatest. She angled the loose-leaf paper, trying to see it in the dimness. It was covered with small, slanty handwriting—front and back. Dear God, this was going to take a while.

  “I’m here and I’m listening,” Max said. “Take as long as you need. Go ahead.”

  Take as long as you need. These things take time. Maybe Max and the senator had been trying to tell her something, too.

  She held the microphone’s talk button down with her thumb. “We are the People’s Party of Kazbekistan,” she read aloud, as slowly as she possibly could. “Our requests are but two. . . .”

  Stan came face-to-face with Lt. Tom Paoletti in the stairwell, heading up to the hotel roof where a helo was standing by to take them back to the Kazabek airport.

  The phone call from XO Jazz Jacquette had come just as he was sliding into bed.

  Just as he was about to close his eyes and slip into blessed unconsciousness.

  But then the phone rang. And Stan had his clothes back on inside of fifteen seconds.

  Because the terrorists on flight 232 had broken their radio silence. They were talking with FBI negotiator Max Bhagat. And Tom and his top officers—Jazz and Starrett—and his senior chief—Stan—were needed over there, pronto.

  Bhagat’s FBI team would be making an evaluation of the tangos’state of mind. Were they pushed close to the edge and ready to snap? Ready to start discharging their weapons and killing their innocent hostages?

  If so, the SEALs had to gear up and take down the plane, immediately. Ready or not, here they very well might come.

  Truth was, it could’ve been worse. The call might’ve come in before he’d had a chance to eat that dinner Teri Howe had gone to such lengths to provide.

  He laughed softly, still amazed that she’d gone to that trouble for him.

  “Share it, Senior,” Tom Paoletti ordered. “I could use a good joke right about now.”

  “I had a nice dinner tonight, sir,” Stan told his CO. “I was just thinking how glad I was that I’m not hungry. That because of it, I could easily go for another twenty-four hours without sleep. That’s all.”

  Tom shot him a look as they climbed the endless flights of stairs. “Isn’t it a little early in the op to be punchy, Senior Chief?”

  “Definitely, sir.”

  “Does this have something to do with Teri Howe?” Tom asked.

  Um . . . “Only very remotely.”

  “How remotely?”

  Stan looked at Tom. “Very. Sir.”

  He was well aware that Tom spoke fluent senior chief, and therefore he knew Stan’s real message was a polite variation of “Stay out of my goddamn business. Sir.”

  But Tom chose to play the friend card. “Stan,” he said, laying it out on the table, face up. “I’ve seen you around this girl.”

  “You’ve seen what, sir?” Stan tried to bring it back to CO and senior chief.

  “Jazz told me that you sat with her on the plane.”

  “Next time, sir, I’ll be sure to stand all the way to Kazbekistan.”

  Tom laughed. “Lighten up. It’s just . . . You must be aware of potential problems. Fraternizing issues, for one.”

  Teri was an officer, Stan was enlisted. “The rules are archaic,” he told Tom.

  “I’m the first to agree with that,” Tom said. “But—”

  “And they also don’t apply,” Stan said. “She’s Reserve. There’s no issue.”

  “Ah,” Tom said. “So you’ve, uh, already checked into this?”

  Meaning Stan had anticipated all the potential problems that came with a romantic relationship with Teri Howe.

  God damn, he was tired. Otherwise he would’ve seen that coming a mile away.

  “I meant there’s no issue with my friendship with her,” he told Tom.

  “Does she know it’s just a friendship?”

  “Yes, sir.” Despite the odd mix of signals he’d picked up from Teri tonight, despite the fact that he’d come into his room to find her sleeping on his bed, he’d seen her holding Mike Muldoon’s hand, smiling into the ensign’s eyes. “She had dinner with Muldoon last night. They hit it off.”

  Tom looked at him. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”

  “Don’t be sorry. I set them up. What’s the word from Jazz?” Stan deliberately changed the subject.

  Jazz’s three-man team had run into some problems in their attempt to wire the hijacked plane with microphones and minicams. Hours earlier, Big Mac, Scooter, and Steve had approached from the aircraft’s rear under cover of darkness, with the intention of penetrating the luggage compartment. But everything had to be done silently, and they’d run into an obstacle or two that was really slowing them down.

  Once the sun came up, the SEALs would be stuck there, under the plane, in the blazing heat.

  “He’s going to keep ’em out there for as long as it takes,” Tom told him.

  “Good,” Stan said. MacInnough would glower for a full month if he were—in his estimation—pulled off an assignment too soon. Stan knew that the brawny redheaded ensign would spend two weeks underneath that plane with only MREs to eat and no sanitary facilities before he would willingly quit.

  The plane would get wired. Big Mac would see to it. It was just a matter of when.

  They went up another flight of stairs before Tom broke the silence again.

  “You know, I had to leave San Diego without saying good-bye to Kelly,” he said. “She must’ve been making rounds at the hospital, so I had to do the voice mail thing. The real bitch of it is that I left before I had the chance to ask her if you were right—if she really wants me to resign my commission.”

  Stan’s feet kept moving, but his brain was standing stone still. “Tom. You can’t seriously be thinking—”

  “You’d be surprised what I’m capable of thinking when it comes to Kelly,” his CO said grimly.

  And then they were on the roof, running for the helo.

  Shit. Stan knew that sooner or later Tom would leave Team Sixteen. He’d either be promoted up, or he’d reach the point where he didn’t want to play anymore. Being a SEAL, after all, was a young man’s game.

  Stan had always figured that when that time came, years from now, he’d go, too. Up or out. With Tom Paoletti.

  But he wasn’t ready for that yet. Not even close.

  The helo was in the air before his butt was in the seat, and he checked, out of habit, to see if the pilot was Teri.

  It wasn’t.

  Of course it wasn’t. He’d walked her to her door and beat a rapid retreat back down the stairs to his own room. She was in bed right now, her body warm and soft with s
leep and . . .

  Christ. He shouldn’t be thinking about her like that.

  But it was a much more pleasant thought than that of Tom Paoletti leaving the team. So Stan closed his eyes and let himself drift back into Teri’s room, Teri’s bed, Teri’s arms.

  Ten

  Lt. Roger Starrett was good.

  Alyssa Locke sat in the shade of a tent that had been provided for the K-stani officials and other observers, and watched him run his team of SEALs through their drill, entering the mock-up of the hijacked plane again and again.

  Negotiator Max Bhagat had been on the radio all night, talking to the terrorists through a young American passenger who was pretending to be Senator Crawford’s daughter Karen. The real Karen Crawford had been picked up and whisked away to safety in Athens late last night.

  Despite the fact that there was still no direct audio and video from the plane, a team of FBI psychologists had come to the conclusion that the situation on board flight 232 was stable. Still, the SEALs were drilling as if they could be called in to take down the plane at any moment.

  As she watched, the SEALs burst inside of the wooden plane using grenades that delivered both a loud noise and a blinding flash of light.

  Their timing was even better this go around.

  Yes, Starrett was good. Of course, the entire team he was leading was first-rate. They worked as a unit, practically thinking and breathing as one. But to give Roger Starrett credit, he was a good leader. Direct and self-assured. And capable of letting each of his teammates do what they did best without his interference.

  Yeah, Roger was excellent.

  It helped if Alyssa thought of him as Roger, rather than by his nickname, Sam. Sam Starrett was the impossibly sexy man with the wide smile, brilliant blue eyes, and lean body who showed up in her dreams and had steamy, pulse-pounding sex with her atop her kitchen table.

  As she watched him now, his long, tanned legs were covered by BDUs—Battle Dress Uniform pants—in the traditional olive drab favored by the Army. It was hot out, and he’d taken off his shirt, and his tan-colored T-shirt was stained with sweat, hugging his well-built chest and shoulders. He looked unbearably good.