Flight ik-8

by Jan Burke

  He felt a white-hot anger burn through him, a desire for vengeance unlike any he had ever known before.

  He heard voices in the hall. He hurriedly turned off the lights and moved to the closed door. The so-called guard was chatting with a nurse. “Need some help with that?” he heard the guard say to her. There was the scrape of the guard’s chair as he stood, the sound of his footsteps moving away.

  Lefebvre quietly moved out of the room and out to the patio door. He used it to escape down the stairwell, just as the killer had escaped him the night before. Sickened that he had not caught him then, he made his way to the car.

  He looked back toward the window of Seth’s room, saw it was still darkened, and with a sense of emptiness unlike any he had ever known, he drove away.

  9

  Friday, June 22, 8:45 P.M.

  An Apartment Not Far from the Las Piernas Police Department

  He stared at the pencil lead, placed it on the page, and then lifted it again. How to rate today’s performance?

  At times, he had achieved nothing less than an eight. At others, he barely merited a one. Those hours, for example, when he had lost track of Lefebvre. Terrible, though hardly his fault.

  He decided that he would need to patiently await the final outcome before giving himself a rating. Waiting patiently would add points; jumping to conclusions would lower his score.

  He never doubted the importance and necessity of his work, but that did not mean that he was pleased with every aspect of it or even took joy in it. He was quite critical of himself. Knowing that his special calling would always be a lonely business, he not only had to keep his triumphs to himself, but there was no one with whom he could share his disappointments.

  In truth, the entire Dane episode had been a disappointment. Had his plans succeeded as intended, a great deal of trouble would have been spared. God was indeed in the details — one small element out of place could ruin the most elaborate plans.

  The watch. If the boy had fought instead of hiding on the yacht, he would have been dead long before he heard the watch. If he had not recognized the sound of the watch yesterday afternoon, he would have been allowed to live. And Lefebvre! Such a brilliant career, and it would end in shame. Because of a watch.

  He shook his head and sighed deeply, genuinely sad about Lefebvre.

  To console himself, he carefully turned to the first page of the notebook and began reading.

  As always, it cheered him.

  10

  Friday, June 22, 9:36 P.M.

  Above the San Bernardino Mountains

  Lefebvre flew above the dense fog that blanketed the mountains on that moonless summer night. Solo in the Cessna, with a cloud carpet below, a canopy of starlight above — on another night he would have been calmed by the view, lulled by the droning of the engine. Not tonight.

  Tonight he was distracted from the night sky by memories of Seth, lying cold and still in the hospital bed. He had thought himself accustomed to seeing the dead, until he had seen the body of the young man.

  Not a young man, really. Not yet. Not ever.

  The boy, he amended. The boy who had trusted him.

  Against such thoughts, the drone of the plane’s engine became a drill, burrowing into his mind, looking for secrets. He needed to get away from talk and noise and pursuers.

  The engine coughed and caught, coughed and caught — once, twice, three times. And then, with a horrifying suddenness, the drone was gone.

  Without another cough or sputter or miss, the Cessna’s engine died.

  At first, he was disbelieving. He was an experienced pilot. This couldn’t be happening to him. Not tonight. Not tonight of all nights.

  He feathered the propeller to reduce drag on the plane, tried to restart the engine. Nothing. Tried switching fuel tanks. Nothing.

  What was wrong?

  Had he missed some problem in preflight? Tonight he had found some comfort in the rituals of preflight, rituals he performed religiously. But he could not deny that he had been upset, distracted. He kept seeing the boy, dead — kept wondering if the others had found the body yet and how much lead time he would have before they came looking for him. Wondering if Elena would be safe, would be wise enough to keep her distance from him.

  Even in that anxious state, though, he had made sure he had enough fuel to reach his destination. He had topped off the Cessna’s tanks himself.

  He checked the gauges — he still had plenty of fuel. Then what the hell was wrong?

  He went through the Cessna’s checklist, item by item, fighting the urge to panic. Nothing worked.

  He tried to restart again. No response.

  Nothing made sense! Helplessly, he watched the altimeter fall.

  No, he pleaded. No! Please, God, not now! Not now!

  The plane was losing altitude, dropping into the clouds, the darkness below. He did not need lights to know what lay waiting for him.

  Trees. Tall pines and unforgiving rocky canyons — mountain slopes.

  Don’t come in fast, he told himself. He slowed the plane to a stall. The fog beaded into water on the windows, enveloped him in white silent darkness.

  His mouth went dry. He knew a moment of nearly unbearable loneliness, then calm, as his thoughts returned to Elena and the boy.

  The young man, he amended.

  The left wing went first — wrenched off by a pine tree. Once again — though briefly — Lefebvre’s world filled with noise.

  Two

  Ten Years Later

  1

  Saturday, July 8, 2:15 P.M.

  San Bernardino Mountains

  “It’s in our jurisdiction,” the sheriff’s deputy said as he led the way to the wreckage. “I guess we had to give it to you because the deceased is a Las Piernas police officer.”

  Frank Harriman didn’t respond. Nor did Ben Sheridan. However excited this green kid was to be associated with a crash investigation, they both knew that the San Bernardino Sheriff’s Department homicide detective who had brought them here was more than happy to have this case off his hands. Cliff Garrett was currently waiting in his air-conditioned car at the top of the steep incline they had just hiked down.

  As they made their way in the sticky afternoon heat, the young deputy had taken one horrified look at the prosthesis on the lower half of Ben’s left leg and started up to meet them. He had reached for Ben’s elbow, and Ben had told him in no uncertain terms that if he touched him, he’d find out just how well a one-legged man could do in an ass-kicking contest.

  Frank had thought Ben was a little hard on the kid. Fifteen minutes later, he wished he had volunteered to referee.

  “Jesus, what is that thing?” the deputy had asked, staring at the prosthesis. “It looks like a shock absorber getting it on with the end of a ski or something.”

  “Does it?” Ben asked.

  “Yes, sir, it sure does.”

  Ben turned to Frank and said, “Garrett gave you a radio?”

  Frank nodded.

  “Call him and tell him there was no one here to lead us to the Cessna.”

  “Oh, no!” the kid said. “That’s why I’m here. That’s my job.”

  “Then do it,” Ben snapped.

  The deputy didn’t seemed fazed by this; he shrugged and started down an uneven path. Two seconds later, he turned and said, “You going to be able to—”

  “Don’t ask him that,” Frank warned.

  “I used to go surfing in Las Piernas,” he said as they finally reached the shade.

  When Frank said nothing, he added, “You probably don’t think a guy from the Inland Empire would know much about surfing, but I haven’t lived here all my life.”

  “A rambling man,” Ben muttered.

  “Exactly,” he said. “I’ve lived all over Southern California. Even San Diego.” He turned to Frank and asked, “You’re a homicide detective in Las Piernas?”

  “Yes,” Frank answered, slapping at a mosquito, wondering why the shade wasn’t
offering more relief from the heat.

  “Really? You’re a detective?”

  “Really. You want to call Detective Garrett from your department and verify it?”

  “No, sir, it’s just—” Their guide stopped, taking a moment to look him up and down. “They let you — you know, wear hiking clothes on the job down there?”

  “No.”

  “But you can wear them when you’re not in your own jurisdiction?”

  “No. Are you with the reserves?”

  “Yes, sir, how’d you know?”

  “In Las Piernas, that’s on the test for detectives. Identification of Reserve Officers.”

  Deputy Whatever continued on as he mulled this over, giving them a little peace. A few minutes later, though, he let loose with a loud and pungent fart.

  “For Christ’s sakes!” Ben said angrily.

  “Sorry.” The kid grinned. “No charge for the bug repellent.”

  Eventually, they could hear other voices up ahead.

  “Deputy,” Frank said then, “I just realized that I am without one of the authorization forms I’ll need for this investigation to be taken over by Las Piernas. It’s vital that I have it. We can find the site from here — but would you please return to Detective Garrett and tell him that I need a Universal Transfer of Responsibility Form Eighty-five-dash-seven?”

  “I don’t know if I should—”

  “Maybe I should go,” said Ben. “I don’t know if I’ll be able to make it back here on my bad leg, but—”

  “Don’t even think of it!” The deputy repeated the form number and took off.

  “Universal Transfer of Responsibility Form?” Ben asked as soon as the deputy was out of earshot.

  “I thought the ‘Eighty-five-dash-seven’ was a nice touch, myself. Which one is your bad leg?”

  Ben smiled.

  Frank called Garrett on the radio and warned him that the deputy was on his way. “You’d better take a long time finding that form, Cliff,” he said, “or I may require lots of cooperation from a certain San Bernardino homicide detective. You want to hike down here again to help?”

  Cliff laughed and asked how the mosquitoes were, then agreed to keep the deputy busy.

  They had no trouble finding the others; they followed the sound of their voices until they saw the coroner’s assistant, several sheriff’s deputies, and a tall, dark-haired woman in lightweight coveralls standing in a small clearing. Frank recognized the woman — they had worked together on a previous case. Was that the real reason Carlson had sent him out here?

  “Hello, Mayumi,” he said to her. “How’s life with the NTSB?”

  She turned and smiled. “Frank! Good to see you again.” She quickly sobered and said, “Sorry it has to be under these circumstances.”

  “Thanks, but I never knew him, so—”

  “Of course not,” she said.

  This quick reassurance puzzled him. He glanced at the other men. They seemed a little tense. What was going on?

  “You weren’t in the department in Las Piernas ten years ago, were you?” Mayumi was saying.

  “No, I was still working in Bakersfield then,” he said, and saw the others visibly relax. What the hell was that all about?

  “Where’s the wreckage?” Ben asked.

  “Not far. I’m Mayumi Iwata,” she said, extending a hand. “I’m with the National Transportation Safety Board.”

  “Forgive me for not introducing you, Mayumi,” Frank said. “This is Dr. Ben Sheridan. Ben’s a forensic anthropologist. He’ll be doing the work on recovering and identifying the remains.”

  “Oh, yes, the coroner’s office told us you would be coming here with Frank.” She introduced them to the coroner’s assistant and the others. One of the older deputies, a man named Wilson, looked back in the direction of the road and asked, “Where’s the chatterbox?”

  Frank and Ben exchanged a look.

  “Frank sent him on an important errand,” Ben said.

  Wilson laughed. “You have our undying gratitude.” He gave them the sign-in sheet for the scene, noting the time of their arrival, then reached into a canvas bag and brought out some gloves. “You’ll need these. There’s quite a bit of poison oak down there.”

  “I begin to see why Cliff was so happy to hand this one off,” Frank said with a laugh, but noticed that Wilson suddenly seemed uneasy. Probably one of Cliff’s friends. Frank decided to stick to business. “Who was first on the scene?”

  “I was,” Wilson said. “A couple hikers with a dog wandered through here. We don’t get many through this ravine, because most of the time the little creek that runs through here is dry. I don’t think they would have seen the wreckage if it hadn’t been for the dog.”

  “Did the dog disturb the remains?” Ben asked.

  “No, and the hikers didn’t either. The dog kind of scratched at the door of the plane. Hikers called him back, and I guess they — well, they freaked out when they realized what it was and came running out of here. We almost couldn’t find it again. Hadn’t been for the dog, I don’t know if we would have. We took statements from them and let them go on home — didn’t realize what a mess…” His voice trailed off, and he colored slightly. “Well, let’s take you on over there.”

  Again, Frank felt as if the others were waiting for him to react to something, that there was more going on here than the little Carlson had told him.

  He mentally reviewed the brief, unpleasant phone conversation he’d had with his lieutenant. Carlson had paged him just as he had settled into a deck chair at his cabin, cold beer in hand. Frank had objected to being called on a day off; Carlson told him he didn’t care who was up next on the roster, Frank was only a few minutes away from the scene. Besides, the lieutenant told him, Lefebvre, the presumed victim of the crash, had not only been a Las Piernas homicide detective, he had been involved in one of the old cases he had just assigned to Frank. The Randolph cases.

  “What Randolph cases? I don’t have any Randolph cases.”

  “You do now. Discuss this with no one. You and Sheridan have a very simple task today. Just let me know what you find in a careful search of whatever’s left of that plane.” He had added that Cliff Garrett would be by to drive them to the scene, then hung up.

  Lefebvre’s name had seemed vaguely familiar to Frank. He supposed that someone who had worked with Lefebvre when he was with the department must have mentioned him, but he could not remember who might have done so or what had been said.

  They picked up a couple of duffel bags, including one with supplies for Ben — courtesy of the San Bernardino Coroner’s Office — and began following Wilson.

  “San Bernardino called us right away,” Mayumi said as they walked. “As you know, Frank, if a plane is missing, we start a file at that time.”

  “When you say ‘missing’ — that might not be known immediately, right? The pilots of these small planes don’t always file flight plans, do they?”

  “No. Eventually, though, family members or friends will report that a pilot didn’t return home on time or didn’t reach a planned destination. But you’re right, flight plans aren’t always required, and obviously one wasn’t filed in this case—”

  Obviously? But before Frank could ask about that, Wilson said, “The file you start — is this data about the plane or the pilot?”

  “Both,” Mayumi answered. “The plane’s registration number, manufacturer, model, and age are included, along with information about the pilot’s health, experience, drug or alcohol consumption, and possible state of mind. So are any flight plans, communications with control towers, checks on the weather conditions that day, and other data. When any wreckage is found, the registration number is checked against the list of missing planes — its file can be matched very quickly, especially if the plane is from the local area.”

  “And this one was on your local list,” Ben said.

  “Yes. When we checked this registration number against our records, we found that t
en years ago, this plane went missing — and that it was owned and piloted by Detective Philip Lefebvre. That’s why we called Las Piernas right away.”

  They climbed a small rise overlooking a dry gully. What remained of the Cessna lay below, so covered with leaves, pine needles, earth, and vines, Frank was amazed that the hikers had been able to see what their dog was after. Most of the left wing was broken off; Mayumi told them they had found it about twenty-five yards back. There were little numbered yellow flags on wires scattered in a pattern behind and near the plane; locations where debris had been found or from which measurements had been taken. “Lots of small hardware scattered along here,” Mayumi said. “Mostly from the wings and tail.” He half listened as she spoke. He was looking at the fuselage. He wasn’t thinking about small hardware.

  He had brought a notebook with him, and he took it out now. He began making crude sketches, noting the position of the plane. He could tell that the scene had already been mapped and measured by the sheriff’s department and Mayumi. He didn’t care; he started sketching because the process helped him think.

  He thought about Lefebvre and wondered who he had been and what those last few moments of life had been like for him. Peaceful or terrifying?

  This is an NTSB case, he told himself. If a Las Piernas cop hadn’t been at the controls, his department never would have been called in. Frank might not have been the one to take that call if he hadn’t been up here — or maybe he was sent because he was with Ben. Given the age of the remains, a forensic anthropologist was needed, so Ben might have been called by the San Bernardino coroner anyway.

  Mostly, though, the investigation would be Mayumi’s problem — figuring out what had happened, what had caused this crash. He knew that most of these light plane crashes were caused by inexperience, overconfidence, or other pilot error. What had been Lefebvre’s error?

  The plane had landed on its belly and lay slightly askew. The right wing was buckled back, the right side of the cockpit caved in, the nose buried. The fuselage had taken a beating, but even so, it was relatively intact. Although it was dented and scraped, Frank saw no large tears or holes. There were stains where muddy water had reached the lowest portions of the wreckage.