The Last Hostage (12 page)

A cold apprehension gripped her. Dealing with unbalanced humans was one thing. Bargaining with rabid political zealots was entirely another. She mumbled a small prayer that it wasn't the latter.

Kat looked quickly at the faces around her. Frank Bothell was calm and collected. Bill Lipsky, the tall, tanned young police sergeant, had a wide-eyed expression of serious alarm; but several other police officers in the room were obviously pumped.

And they're all looking at you, girl! she thought.

Kat turned toward Bill Lipsky, the police sergeant. "Okay," she said with as much authority as she could muster, "someone please try to get me a briefing on the amount of fuel aboard that aircraft and its range. I need aviation maps and a list of airports they can use in the surrounding multistate area. And, if you can manage it, get me an aircraft flight manual for that precise model."

"You got it," Lipsky said.

"Frank, could you push them to get me a radio hookup to the aircraft as soon as possible? We need to know what we're dealing with."

She started to turn toward the phone, then looked back at him. "And as soon as you know where you're going to park them on the airport, let me know."

"Why, Kat?" Frank asked with one eyebrow raised.

She looked him squarely in the eye and smiled. "Because I can't build the trust of a hijacker by hiding in a windowless office. I'll need to be out there at some point where the man can see me."

"You're assuming the S.O.B. is male."

She chuckled. "Most S.O.B.'s are."

Frank rolled his eyes. "You worry me, Bronsky."

Aboard AirBridge Flight 90. 11:45 A.M.

Annette had made her way back to the interphone panel as soon as the 737 righted itself, and Ken had answered rapidly.

"You've got to understand, Annette. I've got to do what he tells me as safely as I can. Go sit down now and pray." "Is he listening, Ken?"

"Yes."

"Okay. Mister hijacker, will you please tell us what you want?"

"ANNETTE! Jeez, what are you trying to do? Thank God he found that amusing."

The cockpit interphone clicked off for a second, then back on.

"Annette, look. Go back and sit down and keep an eye on Bostich."

Annette took a deep breath and pressed the interphone button harder.

"What about Bostich, Ken?"

"Say again?"

"You said to watch Mr. Bostich. I'm asking you why. What does he have to do with anything? Is this something personal?"

There was a lengthy pause. "Hold... hold on." His voice diminished as he talked to one side of the interphone handset, apparently to the hijacker.

"Can I tell her? I mean, what the hell's the point of keeping my crew in the dark?"

More silence, then Ken's voice on the line.

"All he'll let me tell you is this. This whole thing is about Rudy Bostich. Bostich isn't the noble individual he appears to be. That's not my deal, that's his."

"I... I don't understand, Ken. If it's about Bostich, why is he hijacking all of us?"

"Enough, Annette! I've got a guy with a gun and a bomb up here, and we're not going to antagonize him, okay? Enough. Go sit down."

"Ken,"

"Now, Annette. NOW?

"Okay. Okay, I will."

She replaced the handset and moved into the front of the first class cabin in total confusion as the P.A. clicked on.

"Ah, folks, all flight attendants are to be seated immediately in the nearest seat. I'm ordered to tell you that, crew. Do it now!"

A large, masculine hand reached out from nowhere and gently guided Annette into one of the plush first class aisle seats. She let herself settle back and closed her eyes for a second before looking over at her rescuer, who was trying to help her with her seatbelt.

"Thank you, Mr. Bostich," she managed.

He smiled thinly. "Don't mention it. The hijacker is probably watching through the peephole."

She drew a long, uneven breath.

"Anything I can do for you, Annette? By the way, I wish you'd call me Rudy."

Annette turned and looked him in the eye, her resolve hovering on a knife edge of momentary indecision. She was supposed to "watch" Bostich. Did that include talking to him? Why shouldn't she warn a future U.S. Attorney General that he was the apparent target of a hijacker?

Prosecutors always had criminals in their past crying foul play.

Maybe he would know what this was really all about.

After all, it isn't Rudy Bostich who's hijacking this aircraft, is it?

"Mr. Bostich... Rudy... I'm not sure how to say this, but the hijacker is saying this whole thing is about yo,u."

"What?"

"That's all I know."

Rudy Bostich swallowed hard and looked at the cockpit door, then shook his head.

"That makes no sense. I have no idea what he means."

Annette's eyes remained fixed on the back of the cockpit door as she sighed and nodded her head. "In any event, we've got to get word to the FBI and my company."

Rudy Bostich looked puzzled. "How?"

She fished his tiny cellular phone from the pocket of her flight apron and slipped it in his hand, feeling, more than seeing, the confused look on his face.

"I... thought you said..."

Annette nodded again. "I did. And I think he probably does have a cellular signal detector up there. But I'm guessing he wouldn't blow us up over the first unauthorized use."

Rudy Bostich looked at the phone in his hand as if he'd been handed a live grenade. "Don't you think the FBI already knows, with the unplanned flight to Salt Lake, that there's a hijacker up here?" "I'm sure they do know," Annette said. "But they need to know exactly what's happening up here, and I need some information from them." "What do you mean?" he asked.

She explained her worries over the young pilot from seat 18D.

"I saw him go forward to the cockpit back there in Durango," Bos-rich said. "I think I heard him go down the stairs, too, but I'm not certain."

"If he didn't leave the airplane, Rudy, then he's the hijacker."

Rudy Bostich was shaking his head. "No. No, I got a good look at him. He's very young, probably late twenties, and I know I've never seen him before. I can't imagine why he'd have a problem with me.

It's got to be someone else."

"You have other enemies?"

He snorted and laughed, then raised his hand in apology. "I'm sorry. That sounded derisive. It's just that my job is putting people on trial and helping to ruin their lives for what we believe they've done.

There are probably a hundred or so hardened felons out there who would consider it an honor to kill me slowly."

"Does the name Ken Wolfe ring a bell, Rudy?" Annette had to know if Rudy and Ken had a history.

He shook his head at first. "Ken Wolfe? No, I can't say it does. Who is he?"

"Ah, he's our captain, and I just.., wondered if you might know him. That's all."

Rudy Bostich shook his head in the negative. "Not that I can recall.

Where's he from?"

"Colorado, I think."

"Name's not familiar, Annette."

She pointed to the cell phone in his hand, as much to change the subject as to make contact. "Could you give it a try, Rudy?"

He looked at the phone again, as if surprised it was still in his hand.

"Yeah, ah, how do I get in touch with the FBI, though?"

She looked over at him, surprised at the question. This was a federal prosecutor.

"You dial nine-one-one, I suppose, and ask to be transferred."

He swallowed and nodded slowly, his eyes still on the tiny cellular phone. "Okay. Okay, I'll give it a try."

Annette shifted forward on the seat.

"Where're you going?" he asked.

"To check on the people."

"But Annette, he said--"

She cut him off. "Rudy, this is still my cabin, and I'm still responsible for all of you. It's a balance of risks, okay?"

"But what if he detects the phone and comes charging out of the cockpit?"

"You hear the cockpit door open, hide the phone. There's no way to know where a signal came from."

Rudy Bostich nodded and slowly opened the phone's keypad as Annette moved into the aisle, trying to suppress a sudden flash of disappointment at his timidity.

FBI "Command Post," Salt Lake City International Airport. 11:50 A.M.

"Agent Bronsky. If youll pick up the phone and punch line 'twenty-five, Approach Control says they'll have the aircraft patched in momentarily."

Kat flashed a thumbs up to the airport police officer and turned to a technician who had been working to specially equip one of the desk telephones.

"Ready?"

He nodded, pulling off a headset. "We're wired. I'll be running a tape as well as piping the line back to Washington as you requested."

She sat down and adjusted herself in the chair, taking time to breathe deeply before lifting the receiver and punching the appropriate button.

"Agent Bronsky here."

"This is Salt Lake Approach. Stand by. We're going to patch you through."

"Approach, who's doing the talking aboard that aircraft?"

"Far as we know, one of the pilots. We gave him a heading direct Provo a few minutes ago and the response was completely professional.

I'm sure we're talking to a pilot. In fact, we're ready for you to give him a call."

Kat adjusted the handset against her ear. "AirBridge Ninety, how do you read me?"

There was silence on the line for a few seconds, then the sound of a transmitter being keyed.

"This is AirBridge Ninety. Who's calling?" The voice was deep and steady.

"Is this the captain?"

Another pause.

"Who's calling? Who are you?"

"This is Kat Bronsky. I'm an FBI agent, and I'm talking to you through Salt Lake City Approach Control's radios. I'm at Salt Lake International. Now, can I please ask to whom I'm speaking?"

"This is the captain of Flight Ninety. You understand our situation?''

"Not well enough, sir. I take it you have an uninvited guest in the cockpit with you who's on channel?"

"That's correct. We've been squawking seventy-five hundred, and he's fully aware of what that means."

"And this is Captain Wolfe?"

Several seconds ticked by as Kat waited for the calculated effect of letting both hijacker and captain know that the FBI had already done their homework on the crew.

"Yes. Ken Wolfe."

"And, Captain Wolfe, does the person in the cockpit with you want to tell me his name?"

"Hold on." Twenty seconds went by before the transmitter was keyed on again. "He says no, he doesn't want to give his name."

"Okay, Captain. We can work with that. Will he talk to me directly?''

Another pause, equally as long.

"He says no. I'm supposed to relay."

"Understood. Well, the first thing I need in order to help is to have some clear idea of precisely what he wants. We understood your earlier relayed transmission regarding the various officials he might want to talk to, and we're working on that, but I need to know precisely what else he wants so that we can try to meet those requests."

There was no response for more than thirty seconds.

"I asked him. He says to tell you he wants love and charity and peace in our time, Agent Bronsky. He wants... murderers executed for their crimes, pedophiles permanently locked away where they can't hurt little girls and boys, lying prosecutors exposed for what they are, and-- what was the last one?"

The transmitter keyed off, then on again. "Oh yeah. He wants stupid, criminal-loving judges thrown off the bench. All of his demands, he's telling me, are achievable, and I tell you, the safety of every person on this airplane depends on his instructions being followed to the letter. I--what?"

Kat could hear some mumbling in the background while the captain held down the transmit button.

Good thinking, captain! she mused. Now maybe I can hear what the hijacker's saying, too.

The voice was too far in the background to understand, but it was there.

"Okay, Agent Brasky, was it?"

"No. Bronsky."

"Right. Bronsky. He says to tell you he has nothing left to lose, and you can consider him completely desperate. He's armed, and he's got us wired to blow up if he lets go of an electronic trigger he's holding.

There are explosives in the forward baggage bin. He says to tell you that he'll issue more instructions one by one, and if any one of them is not agreed to immediately, we're.., we're dead."

Kat nodded. Standard ploy. Hijacker loads on the initial threats of violence to establish his dominance over the situation.

"Okay, Captain. You can tell him, if he's not listening to my voice, that we will follow each and every instruction to the best of our abilities, and we'll keep you informed on exactly what we're doing. We do not want him to be surprised or concerned. Our policy is to give a hijacker what he wants as long as he shows his good faith by progressive release of the passengers and crew, and as long as no one is harmed. Tell him that whatever he wants, what we want is a quick and safe ending to this with no one, including him, getting hurt. Do you think he understands that?"