Condor

by M. L. Buchman

  “I do,” he smiled at her and pointed to one of the nearby parking areas where dozens of helicopters rested.

  29

  Holly had never ridden in a helicopter of the 160th SOAR before. The regiment was the elite helicopter team of the entire US military. Five years of an exceptional flying record in the regular forces might garner a pilot an invitation to try out for their two-year advanced training program.

  The Black Hawk that Major Swift led them toward was, oddly, pure black.

  No big white Army star. Even warning signs, usually painted in shocking yellow or red to get attention, were a dark gray. Nothing to catch the light. The 160th’s nickname was the Night Stalkers and they did fly mostly at night. Delivering SEALs and Delta Force teams where no one else could put them.

  In broad daylight, they looked like dark, helicopter-shaped holes in the world.

  Holly placed two fingers between her teeth to let out a shrill whistle.

  When the others looked up from where they were still prowling the wreckage, she waved them toward the waiting bird.

  Because of where they each were, they all arrived at the helo at roughly the same moment.

  Holly was about to reach for the handle of the cargo bay door. She may not have flown with the Night Stalkers but she’d flown plenty with Australia’s 6th Aviation Regiment and knew her way around a Black Hawk.

  Mike flashed her a signal and lagged back.

  Holly slowed to match him.

  Elayne Kasprak arrived at the door first, reached up, and slid it open easily before climbing up onto the cargo deck.

  “What do you need, Mike? Get any fingerprints for me?” The others were making enough noise boarding that the two of them could talk safely.

  “She didn’t touch a single thing. Kept her fists rammed into her pockets like it was midwinter.”

  “Bloody hell!”

  “Until that,” he pointed at the cargo door handle.

  It had been a perfect move. She wanted to kiss him. Or slap a high five. But Elayne might be watching, so she went with her third choice and punched his arm. Hard.

  “Ow! God damn it, Holly. Aren’t you ever happy?” He rubbed his arm as Jeremy and Miranda boarded.

  “Right now,” she grinned at him. “Totally ecstatic.”

  “Got a damn weird way of showing it.”

  “That’s me, mate.”

  Mike shook his head and climbed aboard.

  Major Swift was waiting to close the door.

  Holly whispered as she came even with him. “Major, don’t touch the outside door handle. We need to test it for a matching set of prints to the radio trigger.”

  He raised his eyebrows in question but was otherwise rock steady.

  A lot to like about him. Might have considered having a go at him herself if his eye hadn’t landed on Miranda.

  “And just so we’re clear. One misstep with Miranda and you’ll have me to deal with. Roger that?”

  He saluted sharply. “Yes ma’am.” His tone was dead serious but his eyes were laughing at her.

  “Laugh away, Gull boy. It could be your last travels.”

  “Yes ma’am. I will be careful.” And that sounded serious. But maybe not because of her threat.

  She climbed aboard and ended up next to Mike. She made a point of landing in her web seat with an elbow to his ribs, but she was feeling good so she didn’t drive it home.

  “You’re crazy, you know that, right?”

  “First thing you ever said to me. Doesn’t make it any less true.” Then she leaned forward enough to look at Elayne on his far side. “Isn’t he just so sweet?”

  “I think he’s very cute.”

  Mike grimaced. Cute was the last thing that a guy like Mike wanted to be called.

  Major Swift climbed aboard as well, which she hadn’t expected, and closed the cargo door from the inside. He winked at her, then ended up between Jeremy and Miranda. How had she missed that seat being open?

  In under two minutes the pilots had the engines up to speed and wheels off the ground.

  If only she had some control on where all of this was flying.

  30

  “Congratulations, Mr. Vice President.” Drake rose to his feet and shook Clark Winston’s hand as he entered the White House Situation Room.

  “Thanks, Drake. And please, call me Clark.”

  “Yes sir, Mr. Vice President.”

  Clark smiled. “That means I’m now stuck calling you General Nason.” He took his seat to the right of the President’s chair.

  “No sir. Protocol of respect only goes upstream. You’re the Vice Commander-in-Chief. You can call anyone except President Cole anything you want.”

  “He’s already insisted on Roy,” Clark waved him toward his own right. “Vice Commander-in-Chief. I try not to think about that one.”

  “Still surprising to be in the job?”

  “I was confirmed and sworn in Friday; this is Saturday afternoon. Give me a break.”

  “Nope. It’s the hot seat now.”

  Clark scoffed at him, then turned to Elizabeth waiting quietly across the table. “Hello, General Gray. No chance of getting a ‘Clark’ out of you, is there?”

  “No sir, Mr. Vice President.”

  He groaned dramatically, but appeared to be enjoying himself.

  President Cole arrived in mid-discussion with his Chief of Staff, Nora Farber. She’d been his adjutant when he retired from the Green Berets and followed him straight into the Senate, then the White House. She’d been his right hand for almost two decades. There was a lot of speculation as to whether Cole could even tie a tie without her assistance…at least until someone pissed off Cole enough for the former Green Beret to surface.

  He was already signaling for them all to stay seated even as he kept talking.

  “Right. Get that and ram it down President Montoya’s throat.”

  “Sir?”

  “Do it nicely, but make sure he knows that he has no choice if he wants our continued trade agreement and naval protection.”

  “Yes sir,” and Nora was gone.

  “Anyone else coming?” President Roy Cole dropped into his chair.

  “Not right now,” Drake tapped the isolation switch, blocking even the Marines of the National Security Council who monitored the room to service any requests.

  Roy Cole just raised his eyebrows in question.

  “This is top-secret need-to-know information,” he explained.

  “Does that include his girlfriend?” Cole teased his new Vice President.

  Drake hated politics. And having the VP, who he trusted, screwing the new Director of the CIA, who he wouldn’t trust with a dull pencil, didn’t help matters.

  “While the D/CIA is the original source of this information, I’d like to keep this meeting compartmentalized for the time being.”

  Cole nodded.

  Clark saw that and shrugged uncomfortably—the President had already agreed so there would be no point arguing.

  Welcome to Day One on the job, buddy.

  “D/CIA Clarissa Reese has a Russian source. Somewhere in the next forty-eight hours, the Russians will be transporting a Persona-class recon/surveillance satellite from the Progress factory in southwest Russia to their new cosmodrome in southeast Russia.”

  Drake waited to see their reactions. Two pros. He had their undivided attention, but that was all he could read. Good poker players.

  “The compartmentalized portion of this conversation is that we’ve confirmed this is very likely to be accurate intelligence. General Gray and I would like to investigate possible scenarios to snatch the satellite.”

  “In the next forty-eight hours?” The President didn’t even hesitate, cutting right to the core.

  “All the warning we had, sir. This information is just three hours old.”

  For some reason that surprised Clark and had him checking his watch, then the time zone clocks on the wall.

  No longer the D/CIA, many of his ave
nues of information would be cut off. Ah! Including from his lover, whom he must have seen in the last three hours to be so visibly bothered about not having been informed of this.

  “Why?” The President stayed right on track.

  Elizabeth spoke up and explained about the US’s lack of intelligence regarding Russian satellite surveillance capabilities. Then he offered his own thoughts about not fully understanding the strategic ramifications of those new capabilities.

  “Also set the Russians back on their asses,” the President observed when they were done.

  “Yes sir. They’re on a similar launch cycle to us, one satellite in this category every four to six years.”

  “Won’t that be a little obvious? Just grabbing the damn thing?”

  “Our plan won’t work if they ever find out about it,” Drake was clear on that point.

  “So…” Cole waved a hand to tell him to come to the point.

  Drake took a deep breath and resisted looking to Elizabeth for support. It was her original suggestion, but he didn’t want to put her in the line of fire if this went wrong. He was the one bringing the idea forward rather than burying it.

  “Mr. President, I’d like to bring in that Chase woman and her team. I want them to assist us in staging a crash.”

  “How is crashing a satellite going to get it for you?”

  “No sir. We were thinking of making it appear that the transport plane from Samara to Vostochny crashed. Crashed violently enough that they won’t go looking for the pieces. Or they’ll be fooled if they do.”

  “How in hell are you going to do that?”

  “Not a clue. That’s why we need them.”

  “This is that woman who attacked the White House in a Korean War Air Force jet?”

  “Ha, ha, ha, sir.” Drake still felt a chill when he recalled how close Miranda had come to dying on the National Mall when her plane was sabotaged.

  “Gotta respect a woman with the guts to do that. Any thoughts, Clark?”

  The new VP startled but also didn’t hesitate. “I’ve only dealt with her the one time, sir, during the Casper drone incident. Her work there was beyond exemplary. And her parents have stars on our—on the CIA’s Memorial Wall. They were exceptional agents, Mr. President.”

  Drake hadn’t known that about Miranda. He saw that Lizzy had. Gave him some empathy for Clark; compartmentalized information in a relationship definitely sucked.

  “Ms. Chase’s team is one of the only ones in the NTSB entirely cleared top secret or better,” Clark concluded.

  The President pondered in silence for approximately thirty seconds.

  Long enough for Drake to think back and wonder if that was something Cole always did on hard decisions. The timing when he’d made his own decision to bring this forward did feel familiar.

  Battlefield tactics.

  They’d both been out of the field for twenty years, but battlefield tactics still remained. Take the time to think things through, but not long enough for the enemy to start wondering what was happening.

  “Do it. But only if we won’t get caught with our hand in the cookie jar. I’m not having a war declared over this thing. Clear?”

  “Clear, sir.”

  “Anything else for me, Drake?”

  “You mean other than Afghanistan versus Pakistan, Saudi Arabia versus Iran, and China versus everybody.”

  “What is this? Playoff season? Get out of here. Clark, you stay.”

  Drake held the door for Elizabeth and was just easing it closed when he overheard the President.

  “Clark, what are you going to do about Clarissa? Damned peculiar situation unless you make an honest woman out of her.”

  Drake’s earlier chill became a shiver.

  Make an honest woman out of Clarissa Reese? Was that even possible?

  And that snake could be First Lady someday?

  He liked Clark. But if it ever came down to it, he’d be voting for the other party as many times as he could get away with.

  31

  The incident at Nashville would have been laughable if there hadn’t been so much upset.

  The FedEx agent confronted Miranda as she cleared the edge of the Black Hawk’s slowing rotor blades.

  “I need immediate permission to unload those packages. I need to get them on a new flight. But they say that I can’t unload them without your permission.”

  Before she could tell him that they’d be released when her inspection was complete, an older man with a ridiculous black toupee stormed up.

  “That…that…that plane,” he practically spit in her face. “It’s all their fault. You’re going to—”

  Mike took him by the arm and tried to turn him aside. “Let’s go look at what happened.”

  But the man wasn’t having anything to do with that and spun free to continue spewing out his frustration.

  Jeremy already had his instruments out and was measuring air temperature, humidity, and wind speed.

  Where was Holly or Jon?

  They were back at the helicopter talking to the flight crew.

  The man came so close that he was practically standing on her toes. His cologne had striking power and made her eyes water.

  He was still yelling. So fast and loud. She couldn’t hear the words.

  Too much.

  Just when she thought she’d scream, someone moved past her.

  “Let me help you, sir.” The Antonov engineer took his arm.

  Then she did something too fast to follow.

  The man clutched his chest, gasped desperately, and dropped to his knees.

  A second later, Holly and Jon had arrived to either side of her.

  “I’m so sorry, Miranda.” “Are you okay?” Their words tumbled over each other.

  She took in a breath.

  The air was still too thick with cologne.

  Miranda backed up a step, then another.

  She tried again and felt she could breathe—almost.

  Normal sounds returned. The last descending whine of the Black Hawk’s twin T-700 turboshaft engines. A Boeing jet by the sound of the engines—she glanced over, yes a 737—was taking off along Runway 2C. An Airbus was nearly silent as it landed on Runway 2R at the far side of the airport.

  “I’m okay.” She hoped that her single answer covered both of their questions. I’m so sorry, Miranda, didn’t really count as a question anyway. Yes, one answer was enough. Which was good as she didn’t feel up to making a second one.

  “Have you ever seen anything like it, Miranda?” Jeremy pointed. “I mean I once saw a pickup truck—small one, a Nissan Frontier—brake suddenly. The Corvette that had been right on his tail didn’t react fast enough. As the Nissan nosed down, the rear bumper raised and the Corvette drove right underneath. Ended up going down the road another fifty yards with the pickup perched right on top of the car. But this? It’s amazing.”

  Jon anchored her in place with a hand on her shoulder. As if he was holding her once more down upon the ground, which had become so unstable for a moment.

  Finally able to breathe properly, Miranda looked around.

  Nashville was changing, with a lot of new construction. But the three parallel runways and a fourth crossing one were the same as always. The FedEx facility was a small affair, presently including just four jets. Their main hub at Memphis, just four hundred miles away, typically had over a hundred at a time, all in some state of transition.

  Their jets never remained still for long.

  Except this one.

  Jeremy’s description was apt, except the smaller, lower plane hadn’t rear-ended the bigger one.

  The Boeing 767-300F freighter was sitting across the taxiway for Runway 2 Left.

  Literally sitting.

  A Bombardier Global 7500 had slid under the front of the 767 from the side, striking just behind the forward landing gear. It had lifted the 767’s nose until its tail sat directly on the ground.

  It was a good thing that the Bombardier had
swept wings and rear engines mounted by the tail. It was so far under the bigger jet that the 767’s landing gear would have ripped off straight wings. Leaking fuel and an explosion would have been nearly inevitable.

  “Jeremy. We’ll need the loading charts for the 767 as well as both plane’s recorders. Gather any information that we’ll need to make a calculation of the impact force necessary to place the Bombardier so far under the 767. They’re both modern aircraft, so they probably have QARs as well. Make sure that you gather those too.”

  He hurried off.

  As he’d already measured the environmental conditions, and there was no debris field, she moved forward to inspect the length of the skid marks. Both planes were exhibiting them.

  The Bombardier’s were long and black, indicating hard, late braking. Hard enough that all of the tires should exhibit a flat spot. Gentle braking and hard maneuvering might have avoided the calamity. Though, by the length of the skid marks, perhaps not.

  The far more massive 767’s marks were very short, but they were sideways. No indication that the jet had been in motion when it was struck on the taxiway.

  “I’ll sue you. All of you.” The pilot, still on his knees in pain, had finally recovered enough to start shouting again.

  “Just try,” Elayne’s snarl was nasty. “I am no pansy-assed American dog. I am bull. You don’t stop whining and I kick your goose-ass as all the way to M…” Then she glanced around at everyone else watching and seemed to stumble for a moment. “All the way to Kiev.”

  Miranda appreciated Elayne dealing with him.

  Pansy-assed? That sounded nice and pretty…if a little odd.

  32

  Holly knew Russian fluently. Enough for her to know that, even in English, Elayne Kasprak’s accent was Russian, not Ukrainian.

  Kick your ass all the way to Moscow?

  Not so much an engineer with Antonov, are you, girlfriend?

  Holly upped her bet with herself that if they recovered a fingerprint from the transmitter on the crashed Condor, it would be Elayne Kasprak’s.