Alex stood, put the light pen down, and paced back and forth behind his desk. After a few seconds he said, “All right. Is there any point in me calling State and telling them we want this guy back here?” Toni shook her head again.
“If Hughes thinks he is going to be arrested as soon as he steps off a plane, probably not.
State can’t make him come home if he’s got the country’s President in his pocket.” Toni continued.
“Of course, he is the COS for a United States senator. He can likely throw some heavy artillery at us.
Political types will owe him favors.
Maybe he comes back and White steps up to bat for him.” “Maybe,” Alex said.
“But national-class politicos don’t get to the top of the heap without knowing which bugs to step on and which ones to step around. This isn’t a political gaffe, it’s grand theft. Not an ant, but a stink beetle.
Hughes will play hell trying to blame this on the opposition party trying to make him look bad.
I’d bet White will drop Hughes like he’s a lit bomb.” “All of which means what, Commander?” Joanna asked.
“I think it means if we want him, we are going to have to go and get him,” Alex said.
“Hold up a second,” Toni said.
“He doesn’t know we know he’s the thief.
White is due to return to the country next week.
Wouldn’t Hughes just come back with the senator? I mean, maybe not, but he’s got a seat on White’s charter. Why wouldn’t he return? As far as he is concerned, he’s gotten away with it. That would make things a lot easier. We wait until he lands right at Dulles and collect him, no fuss.” Alex looked at her and smiled.
“You’re right. Of course.
He doesn’t know we are looking at him. And now that the theft is a done deal, I would suspect there won’t be any more attacks on the net by his pet thug. No emergency. We can wait a few days. That would keep me from having to explain to the Director why I invaded a third-world country and kidnapped somebody. Brilliant, Toni.” Toni smiled. Any time she could get that kind of response from him, she was happy.
“Of course, it might be a good idea if the CIA gave us a little help keeping an eye on this character, just in case he decides to go elsewhere.” “They’d be happy to,” Toni said.
“They lost people when that spy list hit the web. They want this guy.
I’d guess if we don’t get him pretty soon, he might have a fatal accident.” “That would be bad,” Alex said.
“We need him alive at least until Jay and Joanna have tracked down and defused his little time bombs.” “I know,” she said.
“I mentioned that we want him alive.” Sunday, January 16th, 10 a.m.
Chicago, Illinois Platt had booked a commercial flight from O’Hare to Heathrow, where he’d switch airlines for the hop to North Africa, before transferring to a local crop-duster flight to Oogaboogah.
Starting out on a nice big Mil, then going to a DC-9, and finally a De Havilland prop plane. Since he was flying tourist class all the way, the seats weren’t gonna be that comfortable, but pretty soon he wouldn’t have to be fooling with this crap anymore, and he could fly first class if he felt like it.
The plane didn’t leave until the afternoon, though, and he had more than six hours to kill. He thought about checking into a room and getting a few hours sleep, but he could sleep on planes, if he could get them to give him two or three pillows, and he didn’t want to take any chance he’d miss his flight, so he decided to wait at the airport. He could dick around, pick up copies of this month’s Flex, Muscular Development, and Musclemag, eat a good lunch, all like that. He only had the one carry-on bag, and he could rent a locker for that. What the hell.
Since he was so early, he wasn’t in any hurry to check in.
He got some breakfast, hit the magazine racks, went to the John, then found a place to sit and read near where his gate was.
He spotted the two feds when they came in.
They were looking for somebody, and he didn’t think that much about it, other than the usual wolf-aware-of-the-hunter kind of thing.
But then he saw them see him, saw them recognize him, then pretend it wasn’t him they were interested in.
Oh, shit backslash The two feds walked off, moving quick, ignoring him, but it was too late. He was sure. They had come here looking for him, specifically for him. They were early, checking the place out for spots to set up, and they hadn’t expected him to be here yet.
How had they tracked him? If they came to this international gate, then they must know he was booked on a flight with this carrier. If they knew that, they knew what name he was traveling under, his main passport, and all. And there was only one way they could possibly know that, because he had told only one person.
Hughes. And Hughes had given him up.
Just like Platt had given up Peterson.
Shit. He had underestimated Hughes. He should have been more alert.
The bastard.
He put the magazine down. He had to get the hell out of here. The two feds would be calling for backup, and the airport was going to be a stoppered bottle in a few minutes, if it wasn’t already.
Maybe the feds didn’t know he’d spotted them.
That might buy him a couple of minutes. But he couldn’t chance trying to leave by the front door. There could already be local cops heading that way.
He stood and walked toward the exit that led to the gates.
It was the fastest way out of the building.
There was a keypad lock by the door, but nobody was looking right at him, so he figured he could put his shoulder against the door and pop it, but when he looked, damned if the door didn’t open inward.
Wasn’t gonna shove that one open. Crap!
He looked around. A couple of women were opening up a computer station at one of the nearby gates. He headed that way.
“Ma’am? I’m sorry to bother you, but I just saw somebody go into that door over there.” He pointed.
The airline clerks looked at him. One was tall and bottle blond, the other was short and kind of plump, with red hair probably out of a bottle too.
“Sir?” “That door that says no entrance, right over there?
Well, it was partway open, and some kid, I dunno, about eight or nine? she just went in and closed the door behind her.” “I’ll check it, Marcie,” the redhead said.
“It’s right over here,” Platt said, smiling.
Once she’d punched in the number and opened the door, Platt considered his options. Grab her and haul her ass inside, close the door, clonk her on the head, and haul ass? Or just remember the number, wait until she got done looking for the kid who didn’t exist, then sneak in himself?
If he’d had more time, he’d have gone with the second choice. Less fuss. But even as they stood there, FBI and local cops could be tossing a net over the building. Seconds might count.
He stepped in behind the woman, wrapped his arm around her throat, and squeezed her carotids shut.
She struggled and tried to scream, but that came out like a gargle. Thirty seconds later she was out cold, the blood shut off from her brain. If he held on and squeezed a little tighter, she’d croak, but he wasn’t that desperate yet. It wouldn’t do any good besides; they already knew who he was. No point in adding murder to whatever they had. Once she was out, he tore off her blouse, ripped it into strips, tied her hands and feet, stuffed a piece in her mouth and used her scarf to hold it in place, then picked her up and put her over his shoulder. He went down the ramp, laid her on the floor at the end, around the turn where nobody could see her, then opened the emergency exit and went down the ladder to the concrete. She was coming to as he left She’d be okay.
Noisy as hell out here.
They were unloading a jet two gates over, and Platt hurried in that direction. A guy on one of those motorized conveyer trucks passed him.
Platt waved him down.
“What’s up?” the guy said, yelling because he was wearing headphones.
Platt smiled. Grabbed the guy, then gave him one in the gut and one upside the head, knocking the guy senseless. Platt grabbed his earphones and hopped on the conveyer truck. He put it in gear and took off.