Sagli hated talking about the plan to Deonovich as the large man had a hard time grasping the intricacies of the plan. He could tolerate his small peccadilloes such as his penchant for inflicting pain upon others, but when he tried to question their new partner, it made them both look foolish. After all, the intelligence information this man had delivered to them over the last five years had all been dead-on accurate. The man had proven his reliability and his plan was almost foolproof.
“Look, old friend, when he came to us, I myself was suspicious, but since I have come to know him, I find that his penchant for planning and his eye for detail far exceed the people who trained us in the old days. He is a cold warrior, and we are committed to his plan.” He eyed Deonovich closely. “Now, no more drinking.”
Lynn Simpson looked up from her seat, handcuffs on her ankles and wrists. The duct tape was itching beyond all belief as she looked up and into the dark eyes of Sagli. She never even flinched when he raised the silenced pistol and pointed it at her right eye. Lynn had figured a long time ago she had been living on borrowed time, so she had mentally prepared herself. She closed her eyes and then said a silent good-bye to her mother and then to Jack.
“I just want to ask you a question,” Sagli said as he reached out and gently pulled the duct tape from her mouth. Then, placing the silenced weapon on the seat beside Lynn, he undid her handcuffs.
Lynn opened her eyes at the question and the relief she felt when the cuffs were removed. She glanced at the silenced handgun beside her on the seat, and then she looked from it to Sagli, who was actually smiling, daring her to take it. Instead of taking up the challenge, Lynn rubbed her wrists, taking care not to strike her injured hand.
“The Canadian agent, this Alexander fellow—in your opinion, what are his capabilities?” Sagli asked, finally picking up the handgun and removing temptation from her thoughts.
“Go to hell,” Lynn said with a hint of her own smile touching her lips. “You mean what were his capabilities.”
“No, I mean, what are his capabilities. It seems our Canadian spy survived the assault. Now what can you tell me?”
Lynn remained silent as the thought of Punchy Alexander flashed through her mind. She could hardly believe he lived after her witnessing him getting executed by Sagli.
“I suggest you look down at your hands, Miss Simpson, count your fingers and then in five minutes I will ask you to do it again. I guarantee you will not come up with the same number as before. The only reason you are alive is for the fact that this Alexander just may get lucky and get a track on us,” Sagli bluffed as he just wanted more information on Alexander. “I am skeptical at best, but if he does I believe you may still be a handsome bargaining chip.”
Lynn was down to seven fingers and two thumbs. Her older brother would have said she was still way ahead in the game, but she wasn’t her brother and she wasn’t as brave as Jack.
“If Punchy Alexander is after you, I hope you’re going to a very deep hole in the earth and pull the dirt in after you, because he can be relentless—the second most relentless man I have ever known.”
Sagli smiled broadly. “As a matter of fact, we are going someplace much better, Miss Simpson, a place where the most recent maps were made over a quarter of a century ago; a forgotten place right in your own backyard.” He gave a slight nod of his head. “And yes, we will pull the dirt in after us, and also over you.”
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA
The twin-engine Grumman Goose was flying as low as Alice felt comfortable with in the growing darkness. She manipulated the throttles that she could barely reach on the upper console, firewalling the engines to raise the agile seaplane over hills, and then cutting power to slide the aircraft nimbly into a valley. Jack really didn’t know how she could see anything.
“Colonel, it’s time you went into the cabin with the others. When you get back there, ask Lieutenant Ryan to come up here, please.”
Jack was hesitant about unsnapping his seatbelt, but finally managed enough courage when Alice brought the seaplane into level flight.
Nervous eyes watched Jack as he stumbled his way from the cockpit and into the passenger area. Everett was sitting next to Sarah, and Ryan was sitting across from them. Mendenhall was nowhere to be seen.
“Where’s Will?” Collins asked as he slammed into the seat in front of Ryan.
Jason Ryan pointed to the back of the plane with an outstretched thumb, then he grabbed for the life vest he had found under his seat when Alice sent the Grumman down into a shallow dive.
“He’s . . . he’s in that little closet back there. I think it’s the head, but I think it’s too small to have a toilet,” Ryan finally said. “He doesn’t feel too good.”
“Can’t say as I blame him,” Jack said as he snapped his seatbelt. “Ryan, report to Alice up front.”
The small naval officer looked taken back for the briefest moment.
“Go on, Lieutenant, she’s waiting.”
“Yes, sir,” Jason said as he nervously popped his own belt loose. At that moment the door to the restroom opened just as Alice pulled up to avoid a small hill just outside of Riverside, California. Before anyone could see Mendenhall clearly, he ducked back inside and slammed the door.
Ryan made his way up front and pulled the curtain aside and stepped into the small cockpit. He hurriedly slammed down into the copilot’s seat and fumbled with the seatbelt until he finally managed to get it locked.
“Not like flying F-14 Tomcats is it, Mr. Ryan?” Alice asked with a smirk, managing a quick glance over to her right.
“No, ma’am, not at all.”
“Listen, I need you to watch what I’m doing, because you’re going to have to take the controls in a minute. I suspect we may have to do some evading.”
“Take the controls?” he said as he pulled the belt tighter. “But this thing has propellers, and frankly, ma’am, I don’t see any controls, just a steering wheel—I think.”
“Yes, it does have propellers, young man. It’s called real flying. Now, take the wheel, don’t worry, she’s real responsive. Use your rudder and stabilizers for up and down, and don’t worry about the wing flaps, got it?”
“Why not worry about the wing flaps?” he asked as he took the half-moon wheel in front of him.
“Because we won’t use them in flight—stabilizers, tail and engine acceleration and deceleration, that’s all. Now, I need to find us a good place to land this thing where we won’t bring every policeman in two counties down on us.” She let go of the wheel and pulled a map from an oversize front pocket of her coveralls.
“Ma’am, don’t take this the wrong way, but you’re one crazy . . .”—he stopped and looked quickly at her smiling face—“lady.”
“Good choice of words, Mr. Ryan,” she said as she unfolded the map, while the former fighter jock tried desperately to see out of the half-oval windows to his front.
“I think here would be the best place.” Alice held the map out so Ryan could take a glance, but he was so intent on keeping the plane in the air, that he only looked for a split second and then turned back.
Ryan was getting a quick feel for the ancient Grumman and his vision was picking up far more than he should have been able to, thanks to the advanced windscreen installed in the plane that picked up ambient light and made seeing easier in the darkness. As he turned slightly to avoid a string of power lines on the far side of Upland, he knew he liked flying the old seaplane.
Alice reached out and turned a knob on the aluminum control panel. As Ryan watched a small green illuminated grid appeared on the windscreen, the copilot’s side of the window showed the foothills to the right, and on the left side in front of Alice, the Chino Valley spread out as far as the glass allowed. Ryan was shocked at the modern hologram being projected onto the windscreens.
“A little gift from Pete Golding,” she said when she saw the amazed look on Ryan’s face. “He flew with me and the senator once, and decided we needed some upgradin
g—poor man almost had a nervous breakdown.”
“I can’t imagine why,” Ryan said with a sheepish grin.
As Ryan flew toward Los Angeles, popping up over Kellogg Hill and then down over West Covina, he knew to hug the hills to his right side. Alice stretched her arms out and then flexed her fingers before she slowly placed the flying gloves onto her small hands once more. Then she reached beneath her seat and pulled out a small cylindrical object that resembled the casing for a small kitchen clock. She ran a cord to the console and then plugged the device into a small socket. When its face lit up, she slid it into an open space in the console.
“There,” she said smiling, “now we have radar.”
Ryan looked from the hologram in front of him to the avoidance radar on the console.
“If you don’t mind my asking, why weren’t you using that all along?” Ryan asked incredulously.
“Because, young man, I like to fly once in a while. Now we’re heading into a place where buildings can pop up out of nowhere.” She looked over at him after adjusting the radar sweep speed. “Pete was really the nervous type; he insisted we have a radar. He’s a real wimp.”
Ryan was amazed. Alice was either the bravest woman he’d ever met, or she had gone over the edge and into the bleakness of senility.
“Okay, Mr. Ryan, I’ll take it from here. If you don’t remember how scared you were during night landings on a carrier, you’re about to be reminded.”
As Ryan let go of the wheel, his eyes widened when Alice Hamilton pulled back on the throttles and allowed the seaplane to dip far too low to the ground.
“Uh, ma’am, there’s nothing down here but houses.”
Alice leaned back in her seat and then turned her head and shouted through the curtain.
“Everyone, hold on to your behinds, this is going to be pretty dicey,” she called as a moment later the sound of the bathroom door being slammed sounded through the cabin.
Inside the passenger area, Sarah touched Carl on the arm and, unfastening her seatbelt, she hopped quickly across the small gap between the eight seats and then threw herself onto Jack’s lap. She kissed him quickly and then rolled over to the seat beside him.
“I expect you to save me if we crash, you got that?” she said seriously.
“I was just thinking the same thing about you.”
Up front, Ryan watched as Alice turned the wheel sharply to the left, at the same time slamming her small foot into the left rudder pedal as hard as she could.
“Pete could have suggested power steering for this thing!” she said, taking a quick look over at Ryan and winking.
The Grumman pitched over onto her left side and the large plane took a nosedive for the ground. Ryan wanted to close his eyes, but he watched the hologram on the windscreen instead. It went from showing greater Los Angeles to the front right, to nothing but houses, bridges, and streets. Then he saw a straight blank area.
“Uh, ma’am, can I ask what it is you’re doing?” Ryan said as he reached out and steadied his slide from the seat.
“The report said this Chavez creep lived in Elysian Park, right?”
“I have no idea!” Jason said as the plane drew closer to the ground, the right wing tip almost touching some of the larger houses beneath them.
“Well, I was informed he ran his illegal operations out of there. Now, we can’t very well land at LAX or Burbank now, can we? The police are looking for you and your little merry band if I heard right, so that leaves us one place where we can land that won’t put us thirty miles from Elysian Park.”
“Where is that?”
“Right here—the Los Angeles River.”
Ryan wanted to scream that Los Angeles didn’t have a river in the remotest and loosest sense of the word. He knew the river to be a concrete canal that ran through L.A. like a winding snake, and at most this time of year it had about an inch of water running right down its center. He also knew there to be bridges every six hundred feet.
“Oh, shit,” he said as Alice leveled the seaplane and then in a blur of motion, pulled down the landing-gear lever on her left. She fought with the old-fashioned wheel and then started furiously pumping the wing flaps down as the Grumman’s engine screamed power as she hopped over three houses and then over a small bridge. She cut power to the engines and the eerie silence belied the sheer terror of everyone on the plane.
Finally, the large wheels that had popped free of the boatlike body of the plane struck concrete. She bounced once, twice, finally hitting a foot-deep rivulet of water in the center of the river. Alice pumped up the wing flaps to their stops and the plane slowed after rising again into the air. Finally, she bounced down and then the next bridge in line rose up before them only a hundred feet away. Alice calmly started to apply the brakes, squealing and grinding as the seaplane slowed. Now realizing they wouldn’t slow in time, Alice Hamilton turned the wheel as sharply as she could to the left while at the same time slamming down on the left rudder pedal once more, turning the Grumman’s rear wheel. The large plane skid and then finally turned to the left, finally fishtailing to a stop.
Silence gripped the interior of the plane as Alice quickly looked around after shutting down the hologram. Ryan, for his part, only stared straight ahead. Alice quickly fired up both engines and then taxied back the way they had come until they settled underneath one of L.A.’s old bridges, where she feathered both engines. She took a deep breath and then looked at the white-faced Ryan.
“Well, we’re here. Up the road about two miles is Elysian Park. You see Dodger Stadium up there? Well, the park is right below it.”
Ryan was still staring straight ahead, not moving.
“I hope you watched what I did, Mr. Ryan, because you’re flying my baby out of here since I have to get home.”
“Wh . . . what?” he finally asked, still not looking at Alice.
“I said, you’re flying my plane out of here. I have to get to LAX and catch a flight home. I left a casserole in the oven and I can’t trust Garrison to follow instructions until he sees flames.”
“But . . . but . . .”
Alice slapped him on the leg. “Oh, for an old carrier pilot like you, it should be fun.” She smiled wide and unsnapped her seatbelt.
From the back there were audible signs of relief as the others started to realize they hadn’t crashed. Then the sound of the small bathroom door was heard opening.
“Hey,” Mendenhall said with a shaky voice, “that restroom is officially off limits.”
Alice looked back at Ryan as they came through the curtain and a questioning look crossed her face as she removed her headset.
“We don’t have a bathroom on this plane.”
A moment later, Alice stood under the large wing and the left wing float of the plane after checking the undercarriage of the Grumman. She pronounced everything fit as she looked at Jack.
“Colonel, you know I wouldn’t abandon you like this if I hadn’t the need to keep an eye on that old man. If I could—”
Collins just reached out and pulled Alice to him, and hugged her, cutting off her words.
“Thank you,” he whispered in her ear.
Alice hugged him back and then pulled away, locking her eyes with his. “Find your baby sister, Jack, and bring her home,” she said, patting him on the chest just over his heart.
Collins nodded and then turned away toward the tall sloping sides of the concrete Los Angeles River.
Alice Hamilton looked over the old seaplane one last time, patting it lovingly on the wing float.
“Take care of her, Lieutenant.”
Ryan smiled and gave Alice a salute as he turned and left, following Jack, Carl, and Mendenhall up the slick sides of the river.
Sarah hugged Alice good-bye. “You sure you can get out of here alright?” she asked.
“Honey, if I can climb K-2, I can get my old ass out of here.”
“You climbed—”
“You go help Jack, he needs you. And listen to
me, I think this is far more than just finding his sister; this may be the reason Jack has been so distant and secretive. Now go, I’ll be fine.”
Sarah half smiled and then turned and ran after the others. Alice looked over her old airplane one last time.
“You take good care of them,” she said and then walked away toward the steep sloping side of the river.
The low rider, a 1961 Chevy Impala, pulled slowly up to the curb and let out a loud whine as the front air shocks and hydraulics were relieved of their pressure, then the rear suspension raised to level out the car as it settled next to the curb in Elysian Park.
Jack climbed from the passenger seat, followed by Sarah. The others piled from the backseat, with Will Mendenhall lagging while he admired the old-fashioned Tuck N’ Roll upholstery. Will knew he was home again.
Collins walked up to the driver’s side of the car and handed the driver a hundred-dollar bill. The Mexican American driver took it and then looked the colonel over closely. The red bandana covering his short hair was pulled down almost to his eyes.
“You know, jefe, you guys stand out like white corn in an alfalfa field.”
“I suspect we do,” Jack said as Sarah stepped up beside him.
The driver eyed the small woman for a very noticeable minute. Then he looked at Jack and then to the hundred-dollar bill. “Keep it, my man, buy the lady something nice,” he said as he raced his engine and then peeled away from the curb, the music loud enough to feel it through the soles of their feet.
Jack looked around and then down at Sarah. He smiled and then started walking to catch up with Everett who was confirming the street address.
“I think it may be the one covered in police tape, Captain,” Mendenhall said as he pointed to the large house on the corner.
“Smart-ass,” Carl said as he spied the house ahead. Then Mendenhall caught sight of Everett reaching into his shirt, obviously clicking the safety off of his hidden nine-millimeter.
At ten at night, most families were still out and about. Lights were on and televisions could be seen flickering through shaded windows. Looking down into Elysian Park, Collins could see kids still hanging out in large numbers, and far up in Chavez Ravine, a Dodger game was just starting. As he took in the Chavez house, yellow police tape was pulled from column to column on the wraparound porch and was crisscrossed at the front door. He looked around to see if anyone was watching. When he saw only an old battered Ford pickup across the street from the house, he walked up the small slope of grass and bounded up the six wide front steps.
Primeval: An Event Group Thriller Page 17
