The Last Hostage (9 page)

The secretary to the vice president of news programming left her desk and opened the door to her boss's office.

"Julie?

I apologize for breaking in, but could I talk to you for just a second?

It's urgent."

Julie McNair nodded and excused herself from an immaculately groomed young man sitting in front of her desk, then followed her secretary to the outer office, pulling the door closed behind her. "This better be good."

"It is,"

the secretary began, "and I hate to interrupt a job interview, but you remember the applicant from Phoenix two days ago?"

Julie thought for a second. "Chris someone, right?"

"Chris Billings.

He's on line three insisting that I get you on the phone instantly because-"

"That won't make him any points."

The secretary raised her hand. "Wait. He says he's in the middle of a major breaking story. He's on an airplane."

Julie pointed to the phone. "I'll take it."

The secretary punched up the line and handed it over her desk. "Okay, Mr. Billings, what's up?" "I'm hijacked."

"Say again?"

"I'm in a commercial aircraft, and we've been hijacked. The flight is AirBridge Ninety." He filled her in on the basics and Julie McNair's eyes widened as she leaned over the desk, grabbed a pen, and scribbled a note on the back of an envelope: Get the control booth-tell them stand by to go live this line.

The secretary read the note and nodded as she dashed from the office.

"Okay, Chris. You say you're calling on a seat phone?"

"Yeah, and it'll cost a fortune, but-"

"Don't worry, we'll pay the bill. I'm going to put you on live." Billing's voice interrupted her.

"Forgive me, Ms. McNair, but we have to reach an agreement on something first."

His words stopped her for a second as she wondered why a job applicant who wanted to be a CNN correspondent would demand money up front for a story. He should know they didn't pay money for stories.

Besides, this was a perfect opportunity for a live audition. "Ah, what agreement would that be, Chris?"

"Have you hired anyone yet for that news position?"

"No."

"Good.

I want that job. I'm good, I'm the best applicant you have, I'm sick of Phoenix and local news, and, well, I want the job. Hire me right here, right now on the terms we discussed for the money you advertised, and the story is yours."

"That's a form of blackmail, Mr. Billings. I don't appreciate--" "Please, Ms. McNair! It's not blackmail, it's called bargaining power.

I didn't have it the other day. I do now. I could call the other nets and make the same offer, but I dearly want to work for CNN." "The other nets would tell you to go to hell."

"I don't think you really believe that, and neither do I. I'm not selling a story, I'm selling me. Look, I'm a damn good reporter, but I haven't had the chance to prove it at network level. Have you looked at my tapes?"

She sighed. "No, frankly, I've been too busy with interviews." "Okay.

Hire me right now for a six-month trial. Your word will be good enough. If you really like what I do for you on this story, waive the trial period and bring me on in full. But please give me a shot." "Or you walk with this story, right?"

"Ms. McNair, you're a professional broadcast journalist, too. What would you do?"

Julie McNair ran it over in her mind. She'd always loved making decisions under pressure. Network broadcasting was a highwire act without a net, so what the hell. Even if she screwed up she could bury him for six months and hire someone else. "Okay, Mr. Billings, you got a deal." "Chris."

"Chris. You're hired, Chris. Now can we get this story on the air before it gets stale?"

"I'm your man, Ms. McNair. I'm standing by."

AirBridge Airlines Dispatch Center, Colorado Springs International Airport. 11:30

Within twenty minutes, the senior executives of AirBridge Airlines had come together to form a crisis management team, taken over a glassed-in conference room adjacent to the dispatch center, and summoned the chief pilot and his boss, the vice president of operations. With several of the executives milling around in animated conversations on desk phones, two others using cellular phones, and the company president huddled with the corporation's general counsel in the far corner, only the chief pilot was looking up when the director of flight control entered the room wearing an ashen expression.

Judy Smith caught the eye of the tall, distinguished-looking senior pilot and moved quickly to his side.

"Steve? Got a moment?"

The captain looked haunted. He had been chief pilot during a hellish year of constant financial pressure and management demands to keep the airline running with a minimum number of pilots. Even if his pilots worked for free, they'd be costing too much money in the eyes of the company, or so he'd complained at every opportunity. The job was wearing him down, and cumulative fatigue was underscored by the dark bags under his eyes.

"Something new, Judy?" he asked.

She inclined her head toward the hallway. "Could we... talk out there?"

Captain Steve Coberg satisfied himself that the others in the room were all occupied before following Judy into the hallway and around the corner out of view.

"What's up?" he asked.

She looked him squarely in the eye and said nothing for a few seconds.

"Steve, how well do you know Ken Wolfe?"

Coberg cocked his head suspiciously.

"Well, he's one of my pilots, of course. What are you getting at?"

"I think you already know, Steve. I think we both know there are some real concerns here. I know Ken fairly well in an over-the-counter way. I respect him, but there's no avoiding the reality that Ken Wolfe is a very stressed man, and I do not understand why."

He spread both his hands in the air in a constrained gesture. "Judy, Wolfe went through hell before he hired on here. Let's just leave it at that, okay?

There are things that aren't really material to this discussion that make him the way he is."

"What things, Steve?"

He rolled his eyes toward the ceiling and snorted as he raised his hands in a gesture of frustration, then looked back at her. "Things the man asked me not to go blabbing around this airline. Things that caused him great pain. Things that are none of your damn business in dispatch, okay?"

Judy studied her shoes for a second in thought. She snapped her eyes back to Coberg's suddenly. "I wonder if these things he doesn't want us to know about might explain his strange behavior around here."

Goberg sighed and gestured again.

"Look, I know he's a moody bastard, but what can that possibly have to do with a... a hijacking?"

"Ken's had a lot of complaints from fellow pilots, hasn't he?" There was another long hesitation as he studied her eyes. "You know I can't discuss that sort of information."

Coberg watched her eyebrows flare slightly as she moved imperceptibly closer.

"Steve, I've talked to a bunch of the copilots who've been flying with Ken this year. They all say he's a good stick-and-rudder guy in the cockpit, a by-the-book captain, but he's driving them crazy out there. Are you going to tell me you haven't noticed?"

"We get crybaby copilots whining about captains all the time, Judy. You probably don't understand that."

"You ever hear of People's Express, Steve?"

He snorted again. "People's Distress, we used to call them. Of course."

"Well, I was a Boeing 727 captain for what you call People's Distress before we collapsed in the eighties. I do understand, thank you very much."

"Sorry, Judy. I didn't know. I was with Eastern. We didn't like you folks very much."

"I understand that. I also understand that there's been a steady stream of worried copilots coming upstairs to tell you the same things they tell me." She began counting off points on her fingers. "They describe Ken as distant, distracted, distraught, and inconsistent, they say he misses radio calls, that he's moody, which you already pointed out, and I know for a fact that in crew scheduling's point of view, he's undependable because of all his sudden sick calls. That's hardly a normal profile. If I'm hearing these things, Steve, you're hearing them."

Coberg sighed and looked pained. "God sake's, Judy, of course the man's moody." Coberg turned and shoved his hands deep in his pockets as his eyes studied the far end of the hallway. He looked at the floor then, then back up at Judy, speaking at low volume. "Judy, four years ago, he lost his wife to a car crash. Two years ago, his only child, his little eleven-year-old daughter, was kidnapped, raped, tortured, and murdered back in Connecticut. He's in agony every day about that.

The man's lost everyone close to him in this world. He has a right to be moody."

Judy knew her mouth was hanging open, her eyes huge, but she couldn't help it.

"My God, Steve?

"See, that's the type of reaction I think he wanted to avoid around here. That's why he asked me not to tell anyone."

"Did you know about this when you hired him?"

Coberg hesitated, then nodded. "Most of it, yes. He'd been flying for a regional airline back east. Part of the Davidson empire of small airlines. I assume you know about Tom Davidson?"

Judy nodded. Davidson was a familiar name in the Wild West post- deregulation airline world. He was also one of AirBridge's biggest stockholders.

"Well, Mr. Davidson called me personally and told me the story.

He explained that the murderer had gone free on a technicality and said he was worried about Wolfe living there in Connecticut." He stopped for a moment and then continued. "Mr. Davidson asked me to make a place for Ken Wolfe at AirBridge and sent me his file. I couldn't see any reason to refuse."

Judy studied the chief pilot for several seconds before replying.

"Has Ken Wolfe been in counseling, Steve? Did Davidson tell you whether he had?"

Once again, Coberg sighed heavily and glanced around in frustration before locking his eyes on hers again. "Judy, the man's an excellent pilot, and we're desperate for excellent pilots. The suits in this airline are on me every time we cancel a flight because I can't get enough pilots hired who'll stay here for the peanuts we pay. I can't be concerned whether a good pilot's seeing a shrink or not, as long as he does his job. That's a personal question."

"Counseling? Whether an upset captain needs counseling is a personal question?"

"Yes, dammit!"

"But Steve, if you haven't noticed, he's flying our airplanes. He's flying our passengers. Should he be? Regardless of what Mr. Davidson wanted, did anyone check to make sure Wolfe was getting psychological help?"

Coberg snorted. "Is this going somewhere?"

"Yes."

"Well, where, then? Tell me!"

"How'd the hijacker get on board, Steve?"

Coberg stared at her in silence for a few moments before shrugging his shoulders. "What?" "Exactly what I asked. How did the hijacker get aboard that aircraft?"

"Hell, Judy, why ask me? You told us what happened."

She shook her head. "No, I briefed you only on what I had so far, that the aircraft landed unexpectedly in Durango and apparently was commandeered by someone while the copilot was off running a very strange errand, and a passenger who happens to be the only other pilot on board was also sent off the airplane."

"And?"

"And the captain just happens to be our ranking problem child."

Goberg was breathing hard. He paused to wet his lips, his voice coming low and urgently to her ears.

"Judy, look. He was all right to fly, okay? I had no reason to ground Wolfe. We did everything right with him, but you're gonna screw around and second guess me and get me in real trouble here. Don't forget, Tom Davidson personally asked me to hire Wolfe."

"And that means what?"

"Well," Coberg gestured wildly to the ceiling, "if AirBridge is made to look stupid for hiring Wolfe, it reflects on Mr. Davidson."

"Can you prove Davidson made that call to you?"

Coberg looked shocked. "Well, no..."

"Steve, men like Tom Davidson are too smart and powerful to leave themselves open for blame. If the decision to hire Wolfe blows up in our faces, you can bet Davidson will have no memory of that call."

Coberg began to protest, but Judy raised her hand to silence him.

"Look, I'm not trying to get you in trouble, Steve, but either I'm going to tell them about Ken, you're going to tell them, or we'll do it together. Forget Davidson. This one's at your doorstep."

Again he regarded her over an endless bridge of awkward silence.

"You're serious, aren't you?" he said at last.

"Dead serious. We're going to do it right now."

Steve Coberg swallowed loudly and took a deep breath as he rubbed his chin and glanced in the direction of the conference room.