Crashers (39 page)

What could—

The gigantic wheels of the Vermeer touched the pavement almost exactly parallel to Dennis's Outback, belching black smoke and leaving melted-rubber patches as it shrieked past him in the same direction, roaring south in the northbound lanes, the wing span so great that the starboard wing stretched across the median and hung over two of the southbound lanes.

Dennis screamed. The Outback swerved as if under its own power, shifted two lanes and back again, but not before it clipped the left-front quarter panel of a Civic, sending it into a spin. Dennis's heart slammed in his chest. “
Fuuuuuuuuuck!
” he keened.

The Vermeer shot ahead of him, engine reversers howling like werewolves, its wake vortex made visible by a solid tube of swirling rainwater, twin, horizontal tornadoes stretching out behind it.

The plane disappeared into the thick rain ahead. Dennis regained control of his car, tears running down his face, and plunged after it, slamming his fist into the ceiling of the car, over his head, again and again.
“Fucking . . . I killed you! Fuckers! Fuck! I . . . FUCK!”

 

The reversers screamed at Isaiah, straining to slough off the magnificent momentum that let a bucket of metal 230 feet long and 63 feet high defy gravity. At that speed, Isaiah's vision was limited to ten seconds ahead of the nose cone. If another overpass was waiting for them, or if any of the drivers failed to get their cars off the road, he wouldn't have time to swerve. But then, he didn't have any space to swerve anyway.

How far to the next overpass? He'd driven the route out of Salem twice so far, but he couldn't remember where the overpasses were.

He gauged the speed of the highway stripes. The reversers in the two functioning engines were doing their job. The Vermeer began to slow down.

 

Not only had every car abandoned the northbound lanes to avoid the Leviathan bearing down on them, but most of the cars in the southbound lane had either pulled off to the side, or had been hit by one of the flying Lexus sedans. The highway behind the Vermeer remained empty of all traffic.

.   .   .

As cars pulled off the road ahead of him, Dennis shot into the fast lane and stood on his accelerator. The Outback fishtailed, the tires caught, and he raced ahead.

It took him two minutes to catch up to the Vermeer and zoom past it, crossing under the starboard wing. By now, the jetliner was crawling toward a complete stop.

He had thrown the greatest technological monkey wrench in history at the airliner. His Gamelan had fucked over one engine for sure and was prepared to fuck over the others, as need be.

There was no possible way to bring that jet down for a safe landing. It had been doomed.

Dennis continued to cry.
“Dammit! Goddammit!”
He pounded the steering wheel with his fist, tears streaming down his face.

The doomed craft was on the ground, not so doomed after all. And the fucking Go-Team had survived.

 

Tommy Tomzak forced himself to look out the window. The rain-slick highway wasn't moving. He turned to Kiki. She was staring at him.

 

Ray Calabrese said, “Where the hell did you learn to fly like that?”

Isaiah pried his fists off the yoke. “I learned how to do that about thirty seconds ago.”

“Fucking Jedi.” Ray clapped him on the shoulder.

Ray stood up, his legs almost buckling under him. Burke sat, bent forward, lips moving in silent prayer.

“I thought that guy Kim was going to make the projector flicker? What the hell went wrong?”

“That wasn't Peter's doing. There's no way.” Isaiah unbuckled his harness, pointed to the Gamelan monitor, now dead. “See this? This light blinked as we flew over Peter and Walter's car. Less than half a second later, it blinked again. I didn't think much about it at the time. On the second flyby, I was watching. It blinked twice again.”

“One blink, as it received Peter Kim's signal,” Ray cut in. “One from someone else?”

Isaiah nodded. “What I'm thinking.”

“Okay. Then who?”

Isaiah shrugged.

“How well do you guys know that Silverman guy?”

“Dennis Silverman?” Isaiah shrugged. “We don't. He's our liaison with Gamelan. But, really? The nerdy guy? You like him for your mastermind?”

Ray thought about it for a minute. “Nah. Not really. But he is the expert with the Gamelan. He was at the airfield when someone called the Red Fist's phone in Atlanta. . . .”

The thought of the out-of-shape geek with the bad glasses and goofy grin as the villain behind this plot seemed pretty unlikely. But Ray had to admit, there was a case to be made.

REACHING MCNARY FIELD, IN Salem, Dennis Silverman scrambled from the Outback, carrying his overnight bag and his laptop with infrared transceiver. He scampered across the tarmac to the big, corporate Gulfstream III, running beneath its thirty-five-foot-long wing. The ladder/door was out, and a man in a captain's peaked hat and a slicker was waiting for him.

“You just about didn't make it,” the captain said. “Word is, they're shutting down this airspace in twenty minutes.”

Dennis stood at the top of the stairs and peered owlishly through his rain-soaked glasses. “Can you get me to Southern California ahead of this storm?”

The pilot winked. “We got a couple of Rolls-Royce turbofans out there that can hit five hundred eighty miles an hour without breaking a sweat. We can get you there all right. Go get yourself buckled in, sir, and we'll see what this bird can do.”

Ray moved back into first class to tell Tommy Tomzak about the new theory: that Dennis Silverman of Gamelan Industries was behind their near crash.

He found Kiki Duvall sitting on the arm of a seat, hands on her knees, watching as Tommy knelt, pushed John Roby's head into a more dignified position, and closed John's eyes. Kiki looked like she was close to passing out.

“Doc,” Ray started, then looked over Tommy's shoulder. “Ah, man. I'm sorry.”

“Cervical,” Tommy said, not turning around. “Clean break. Immediate cessation of the central nervous system. He didn't suffer.”

“Jesus.” Ray scanned his brain for something to say, came up with nothing new. “I'm sorry.”

Nobody spoke for a while.

 

On the flight deck, the copilot wordlessly unbuckled himself and shoved his way out. A second later, Tommy, Kiki, and Ray stepped in.

“Everyone okay?” Isaiah asked.

Tommy held a handkerchief to his bleeding forehead. “John died. We have abrasions, contusions, nothing serious. We—”

Isaiah almost fell back into his chair. “John? Ah . . . Jesus. John?”

“Yeah. I know.” Tommy wiped tears from his cheeks. Then he suddenly threw a bear hug around Isaiah. He pulled back, kissed the pilot on the forehead. “Seriously, that was one kick-ass piece of flying. We owe you our lives, man.”

“Yes.” Kiki kissed Isaiah on the cheek. “Thank you.”

He and Kiki left Ray and Tommy, who sank into the copilot's chair. Ray leaned back, his head against the wall, eyes closed.

“The Englishman. You two were friends?”

Tommy nodded, wiped his cheeks again. “Worked together three times. He's brilliant. Very funny.”

They waited, quietly. Tommy dabbed the still-bleeding wound on his forehead. He nodded at the avionics. “That was spooky.”

“No shit.” Ray opened his eyes blearily. Only then did he realize that Tommy was bleeding. Ray reached into his jacket pocket and produced a travel pack of Kleenex. He tossed it to Tommy.

“Thanks.”

Ray activated his cell phone. His hands were still shaking. Ray called Henry Deits in Los Angeles.

“Calabrese? I'm glad you called. What's going on there?”

“Oh, not much,” Ray said, his voice almost cracking. “How about on your end?”

The assistant director told him about the Irish delegation en route to LAX. “They'll be there in under four hours,” he said.

“I still like them as the target.”

Deits said, “I have my doubts. I don't like coincidences any more than you do. But still. There are Sinn Fein members on board, true, but also Ulster Unionists. They're not likely to sacrifice the same number of their friends, are they?”

“I don't know,” Ray said honestly. “Everything we've seen points to them bringing down that Vermeer. Daria says they're moving into position for another play. Look, there's something else. Guy named Dennis Silverman.”

Ray walked Deits through it, including the emergency landing on the highway.

“Holy crap! You're okay?”

“Yeah, but we heard Silverman was leaving town for a conference. If I'm remembering correctly, it's in California. Have someone from the Portland field office check with Gamelan. Find out where he is. Also, look into this guy's background. He sure doesn't come across as a terrorist, but you never know.”

“Okay, we're on it. Ray? Wow, I hope to hell you're wrong.”

Ray nodded. “I know why. If I'm right, this schlub can drop airplanes out of the sky. At will.”

 

Across the cockpit, Tommy called Susan Tanaka at the Woodburn tower and told her about John Roby.

Susan allowed herself five seconds to mourn John, then filed it away for later. There would be plenty of tears. Now wasn't the time.

“It was Dennis Silverman,” Susan said, even before Tommy broached the subject.

“Whoa!” Tommy reached out and backhanded Ray's shoulder to get his attention. “Susan. She says it's Dennis Silverman.”

Ray said, “Call you back?” and folded away his phone.

“Suze?”

“Walter heard a car near where they were parked. As it pulled away, he got a good look at the driver. Peter surmises that he sent a message to your Gamelan, screwing up your flight.”

“We figured the same thing,” he assured her. “Call the cops and—”

“We did. I, ah, may have used Agent Calabrese's name a bit liberally to
get the police to report back to me. They called about thirty seconds ago. There's no sign of him at his office or his home. And a receptionist says he was scheduled to fly to California today.”

“He's in California,” Tommy repeated, watched Ray nod his understanding.

“Stick close to the swap-out,” Susan told him. “From all reports, you guys have clogged traffic in both directions. Walter is calling in the flatbeds that hauled Flight Eight One Eight here. We'll get an ambulance for John. They'll be there in about two hours to tow you guys off the highway.”

“Okay,” he said.

“Tommy? I am so sorry about John.”

“I know. Me, too.” He rang off, glanced at Ray. “California?”

The three Irishmen and Daria sat in the stifling motel room, watching TV. The men had found the ESPN Soccer Channel and a football match. Manchester United versus Arsenal. None of them cheered or groaned, they all just watched stoically, waiting for something.

Everyone twitched when a knock sounded at the door. Donal O'Meara slipped his hand around his Colt Python and moved to the side of the door. “What is it?” he shouted without opening it.

“Are you Jack?”

“Yeah.”

“Got a phone call for you in the office.”

O'Meara slipped the gun's safety back on, then tucked it into his belt, throwing on a work shirt to cover it. He unlocked the door and stepped out.

Contact. In the time Daria had been with the Irishmen, this was the first time O'Meara had received a direct, real-time contact with anyone. Always before, he'd left messages on answering machines. But a true, living human and a live telephone conversation meant that this was their final destination after all. Whatever was going to happen, this motel would be the staging point.

Which meant it was time to call in the marines.

A plan came to her fairly quickly. “Hope he remembers to get towels,” she said, eyes on the telecast.

Keith O'Shea said, “What?”

“Towels. We don't have enough for everyone to shower, and I'm afraid in this heat, we'll all want one.”

The men exchanged looks. “I'm sweating like old nitro,” Feargal Kelly said to his partner. “And you smell like shite.”

O'Shea waved the back of his first two fingers at the smaller man.

Daria shrugged. “Just hope he remembers.”

The door opened again. Both men rested their hands on guns, but it was O'Meara.

“Good news?” O'Shea asked. O'Meara shrugged. “Well, did you think to grab some extra towels at least?”

“Towels?”

Sighing, Daria dragged herself to her feet. “I'll go get them. Right back.”

“Oh. Ta, then,” O'Meara said, and stepped aside so she could pass.

As she did, he swung his right fist from his hip, catching Daria in the jaw. Lights burned bright in her eyes. She hadn't seen the blow coming, hadn't rolled with it in the slightest. She spun, her head cracking against the wall.

Her vision was useless, her balance worse. She slid to the floor, nauseated with pain, barely aware of O'Meara's boot. He kicked her in the side, not with his toe but with the bottom of his heel. A rib cracked, the sound reverberating through her body.

Consciousness slipped away.

AN OFF-DUTY MARION COUNTY sheriff's deputy in a four-wheel Land Rover cut across a blue fescue field, bounced over the median, and screeched to a stop next to the emergency gangplank of the Vermeer, which Isaiah had deployed from the midsection hatch. Isaiah and Susan stood under the port wing, shielded from the rain. The deputy gawked.

“What the ever-loving hell . . . ?” He produced his badge.

“Long story,” Kiki said. “We're NTSB. We're investigating Monday's crash.”

“By reenacting it?”