Not on His Watch

by Cassie Miles

  “Do what he says,” her father ordered. “Natalie, I forbid you to take this risk.”

  Somewhere on this aircraft, Quint was doing his best to rescue them. She had to help him. “Henry, I’m going. I’ll be okay.”

  “Excuse me,” Jerome repeated a little more loudly.

  “What?” Natalie yelled.

  “The numbers,” Jerome said. “I recognized some of these sequences. The initial routing of the money transfer is through Zahir.”

  “That bastard,” her father snarled. “I’m calling the Feds.”

  “Don’t,” she said. “Please don’t. They’ll blast us out of the sky before they allow a hijacked plane to fly into Washington airspace. Don’t do anything until I talk to you again.”

  “Natalie,” he snapped.

  “What is it, Henry?”

  “I love you, honey. Be careful.”

  “I love you, Dad.” She didn’t intend to die. Not for a very long time.

  Chapter Twelve

  A warning light flashed on the avionics panel in the cargo hold. Quint didn’t know what he’d done wrong, didn’t know how to fix the error. He’d followed Andy Dexter’s instructions precisely. He’d adjusted switches and copied a series of numbers into a keypad. The autopilot should’ve been manually reset to change the course of their flight.

  Something had changed, all right. The whine from the turbojets ratcheted louder and louder. They were losing altitude. The aircraft bucked. They continued to bank steeply left.

  “Andy,” he said into the cell phone. “This isn’t right. Feels like we’re in a downward spiral.”

  “The manual override was correct,” Andy said. “I’m sure it was.”

  Quint might have felt a little more confident if Andy had been a certified pilot instead of a computer jockey. “This isn’t a simulator. We got a real aircraft here and it’s—”

  “Human error,” Andy said. “Your pilot hasn’t turned off the other autodrive instructions. Give him a minute to figure it out.”

  The floor beneath Quint’s feet dropped as the aircraft took another swoop. It felt as if they were standing on one wing. He’d never heard of a jet this size attempting a rollover and didn’t want to be the first to try. “I can’t wait. What can I do?”

  “Get to the flight deck,” Andy said. “Hit the autopilot switch.”

  Easier said than done. The whole point of this diversion was to draw the pilot away from the controls so Quint could get past the security door into the cockpit. There was no guarantee the pilot would come down here to check on the manual avionics, even though the warning lights on the flight deck instrument panel had to be flashing like Las Vegas on a Saturday night.

  Given his druthers, Quint would have preferred to regain control of the aircraft in a more subtle fashion, luring each of the hijackers separately into the cargo hold. But he had to play the hand he’d been dealt—to handle an aviation emergency and to eliminate the hijackers at the same time.

  Fighting the force of gravity that propelled him to the left, he went to the forward hatch and pulled down the hinged metal stairs. At the top of the steep stairs was a door with a circular handle. If twisted clockwise, a push would open it.

  With pistol in hand, Quint prepared to open that door and emerge into the passenger cabin. He had to move fast. His training in close combat taught him that his best chance was to charge head-on, giving himself an instant of surprise before his enemies reacted. But when he got to the passenger cabin, he’d be outnumbered. And the hijackers were armed. Quint reckoned his chance of survival was worse than Custer at Little Big Horn.

  A mental picture of Natalie flashed across his brain. Clear as crystal, he saw her smart-alecky smile and the ever-present challenge in her green eyes. She was an incredible woman. Losing her would be his greatest regret. Silently, he wished her goodbye—

  “Quint, where are you?”

  Either he was hearing things or that was her voice. “Natalie?”

  Through the semidarkness of the cargo hold, he saw her. A combination of dread and sweet relief flooded through his veins as she rushed toward him. Sure-footed and strong, the list of the plane didn’t slow her approach. She crashed into his arms, and he held her tightly, buried his face in her fragrant chestnut hair.

  She shouldn’t be with him. The risk was too great. “How’d you get here?”

  “Squeezed through the plumbing under the private cabin.” She beamed up at him. Her face was smudged, but her expression was alert. “What do we do next?”

  “I’m running up those stairs. By myself. When I get up there, I’m going to take out a couple of hijackers and somehow get onto the flight deck.”

  “Bad idea,” she said. “Charging up at them puts you at a disadvantage. Wait until they come down here to fix the autopilot, then we can pick them off.”

  “I can’t wait.” If he didn’t get to the controls and stabilize the aircraft, they’d crash.

  As he spoke, the handle on the hatch turned. They were coming.

  Against his better judgment, he placed the Taser in her hand and positioned her to the side of the stairs. “Zap the first person who comes through the hatch. The Taser range is only fifteen feet.”

  “Got it,” she said. “What will you do?”

  He took the safety off the handgun. “I’ll be ready for the second guy.”

  There was no more time for planning.

  With a crash, the first hijacker charged down the metal stairs. It was the weightlifter. He got off a couple of shots before Natalie zapped him. As he was falling, Quint climbed over his body to confront the second man—Smilin’ Jack, the co-pilot.

  With a grin as tight as a corpse in rigor, Jack stared, recognized his adversary. He’d hesitated too long. Quint aimed and fired his handgun twice. Two hits. One in the arm. One in the leg.

  Smilin’ Jack went down.

  Brutally, Quint shoved Jack out of the way, grabbed Natalie by the hand and pulled her up through the hatch. They raced into the bright lights of the cabin. To their right was the lounge where the passengers were screaming and tumbling in chaos.

  To the left was the flight deck. The security door was wide open! Finally, he’d caught a break. He rushed inside, dragging Natalie with him.

  Handing her the gun, he said, “Shoot anybody that walks through that door.”

  The pilot, unconscious, was safety belted into the jump seat at the rear. No one was at the controls. The aircraft continued its crazy rolling tilt.

  Quint leaped into the pilot’s seat. He stared through the windshield at a sheer black night, which made it impossible to visually navigate. Though he’d flown small planes and knew the basics of rudder and yoke, this was a full-size jet with a whole lot of flashing lights and dials and gears. He pulled back on the yoke to regain altitude. Nothing happened. He tried to counter the spiraling left descent. None of the instruments responded.

  He punched speed dial on the cell phone. “Andy, I’m on the flight deck. We’re losing altitude. The horizontal direction indicator is going crazy. Still banking hard left.”

  “Turn off the autopilot.”

  “Where is it?”

  “Look for a switch on the upper right of the overhead panel.”

  When Quint hit the switch, the massive turbojets seemed to sigh with relief. He grasped the yoke and felt the jet respond. Using skills he thought he’d forgotten, Quint managed to level the plane’s descent and control the tilt. Reading the altimeter, he could tell they were lower than the standard cruising speed but not dangerously near the earth. They were still above the cloud cover.

  He glanced over at Natalie in the co-pilot’s seat. Her hair was mussed. Her cheeks flushed. Bracing the barrel of the automatic pistol on the back of the chair, she concentrated on the door to the cockpit with savage intensity. Nobody in their right mind would mess with this woman.

  He grinned. “That’s my gal.”

  “What comes next, cowboy?”

  “Hell, I don’t kn
ow. I didn’t think we’d get this far.” Picking up the cell phone, he said, “Are you tracking us, Andy?”

  “You’re on radar,” said an unfamiliar voice. “This is Colonel Robbie Roberts, U.S. Air Force, retired. Currently with Chicago Confidential.”

  The sweet sound of practical experience! Colonel Roberts sounded better than Garth Brooks and Pavarotti combined. “Glad you’re with me, Colonel. No offense, Andy.”

  “None taken.” He snorted a laugh. “Over and out.”

  Colonel Roberts said, “Daniel Austin tells me that you used to be a damn good pilot. Right?”

  “Roger,” Quint said. “But flying my little Cessna was like riding a tricycle. This jet is a Harley-Davidson hog.”

  “The principles are the same,” the colonel said. He proceeded to give Quint the fast course on the layout of the instrument panel. “When your altitude is twelve hundred meters, I’ve got the new numbers you need to feed into the autopilot computer.”

  Mindful that he still had two hijackers on the loose, Quint adjusted the tillers and increased vertical thrust. “Where’s the autopilot going to take us?”

  “You’re coming back to Chicago, man.”

  “Good.” To Quint, Chicago sounded like home, sweet home.

  WHEN THE AIRCRAFT STABILIZED, Nicco left a man in charge of the passengers in the lounge and returned to the private cabin, where the idiot accountant still cowered behind the desk with Scout at his feet.

  Natalie was nowhere in sight, but Nicco couldn’t worry about her now. His carefully laid plan was falling to pieces.

  “The transaction,” Nicco demanded. “Is it complete?”

  “I’ve done everything you told me.”

  “Out of my way.” He pushed the little man aside.

  With a fearful yelp, Jerome Harris scurried into the lavatory and closed the door.

  Nicco plugged one last set of numbers into the computer and stepped back. The seconds passed like hours. He bent down and stroked Scout’s black-and-white fur. His plan would change, but success was still within his grasp. The next moments would require every bit of his ingenuity.

  On the computer screen, a message flashed: Received.

  Ten million dollars. Received. In a secret account beyond any regulating agency. By the time they caught up to him, he’d have the money in cash or gold bullion.

  His challenge now was to get off this damn aircraft.

  He signaled Scout to follow as he went toward the door. As an afterthought, he fired a spray of bullets into the closed lavatory door. Jerome Harris was one witness he could do without.

  Leaving the private cabin, Nicco shouted instructions in French to his man in the lounge. Then he hurried toward the rear of the plane. He passed the seating area and went through the galley with Scout right behind him.

  In the belly of the plane, he would make his final move.

  WHILE QUINT HANDLED maneuvers with the aircraft, Natalie kept her focus on the door leading into the cockpit. Her assignment was to shoot without hesitation. The automatic handgun felt impossibly heavy in her hand.

  Could she shoot another human being in cold blood? When she’d zapped the hijacker with the Taser and he fell, there hadn’t been time to think. And she knew the man would recover from the stun gun assault. If she fired lead bullets, she would commit murder.

  Though she could aim for the arms or legs, her marksmanship wasn’t that good. In every self-defense training session she’d ever taken, the instructor encouraged them to aim at the largest target. The torso.

  From inside the cabin, she heard gunfire and screaming. Her heart jumped. Those were her people inside the plane. They were her responsibility. All her life, she’d groomed herself for leadership. If she had to commit murder to defend them, Natalie would.

  Stealing a glance at Quint, she admired his unflappable calm. “Do you ever get afraid when you do this Confidential stuff?”

  “Oh, yeah.” He stretched his arm to reach across the center panel and touch her shoulder. “There was only one time in my life when I could face danger without fear. After my wife died, I didn’t feel like I had anything to live for.”

  “Were you suicidal?”

  “Never,” he said. “But if I’d happened upon death, it wouldn’t have mattered. I guess I’m lucky the grim reaper didn’t stop by.”

  “Why?”

  “I never would’ve met you. Being with you makes all the pain worthwhile. You give me a reason for living.”

  A warmth surged through her. “Even now?”

  “Especially now,” Quint said. “We’re going to get through this, Natalie—”

  From out of nowhere, the hijacker lunged through the doorway. His gun blazed. Bullets ricocheted through the flight deck.

  Natalie fired back. She should have gone for his torso, but her aim centered on his arms and legs.

  He dropped the gun. He stumbled. With disbelieving eyes, he stared directly at her. Then, he toppled backward to the floor.

  “Get his gun,” Quint ordered. “And the Taser.”

  She leaped into action. With all her strength, she rolled the man to his back. He was the smallest of the hijackers, and she thought she’d heard him speaking French. Blood seeped from his wounds, spreading dark stains at his shoulder and thigh. His eyes winced tightly shut but he was still breathing. She hadn’t killed him.

  With his weapons in hand, she said, “He’s not dead. We’ve got to start first aid.”

  Through the door of the flight deck, she saw Maria Luisa. Her left arm was bandaged. In her right hand, she held a golf club, ready to attack.

  “It’s okay,” Natalie called to her. “Come here. Quickly. I need help.”

  When Maria Luisa stepped into the flight deck, her dark eyes widened in her ashen face. She gasped.

  Natalie turned and looked over her shoulder. She saw, for the first time, the damage wrought by the hijacker’s bullets. Sparks danced across the instrument panel like Saint Elmo’s fire. Some of the dials had been shattered. The center panel between the seats appeared to have sustained most of the damage. Though Natalie smelled smoke, there was no discernible fire.

  Quint’s hands were busy, flipping switches, adjusting the dials.

  Natalie shuddered. This was all her fault. If she’d fired more quickly, they wouldn’t be in this danger. “Quint, what can I do to help?”

  “Give me room,” he said. “I think we’re okay. Looks like the transponder is out.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “We’ve got no way to communicate with the airport control towers.” His hands gripped the yoke as he peered through the windshield into the darkness of night. “Should be okay as long as I can keep Colonel Roberts on the line.”

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

  “For what?” He shot a swift glance over his shoulder. “You’re the best damn backup I’ve ever had.”

  “Really? The best?”

  “Number one,” he said. “You’re always number one with me.”

  She intended to occupy that position permanently. Turning back toward Maria Luisa, Natalie asked, “What’s the situation in the cabin? There was one more terrorist in the cabin.”

  “The guy with the dog,” she said. “He went to the rear of the plane, and I haven’t seen him since.”

  Natalie counted up the threats. There was the huge guy she zapped with the Taser and Smilin’ Jack—both of whom were in the front cargo hold. Now it sounded like Nick Beaumont had gone into the rear hold with his dog. “Okay, Quint. What do we do next?”

  He asked, “Is there anybody back there who’s got experience flying a plane?”

  “Maybe one of the flight attendants,” Natalie said.

  Quint thought for a moment. Smilin’ Jack had turned out to be working with the hijackers. There might still be a ringer among the flight crew. “What about one of the regular Quantum employees?”

  “Gregory from Marketing,” Maria Luisa said. “I know he does skydiving on weekends.”r />
  “Get him up here. Pronto.”

  After one last consultation with Colonel Roberts on the cell phone, Quint was fairly sure that the modified Boeing 737 was running all right. Miraculously, despite the hijacker shooting up the flight deck, their only real loss was the transponder.

  According to tracking, the autopilot was keeping them on their new course toward Chicago. Right now, the danger from crashing due to mechanical difficulties was not imminent. It was more important to find and subdue the hijackers, especially Nick Beaumont.

  When Gregory from Marketing came into the cabin, Quint got him seated in the pilot’s seat. Maria Luisa would be beside him as co-pilot. Unless something happened, their job was to sit still. They needed to keep a watchful eye on the altitude, thrust and stabilization.

  Gregory cleared his throat. “I’ve been taking flying lessons, but I’m not a certified pilot.”

  “It’s okay,” Quint said as he handed over the cell phone. “We’re on autopilot. You shouldn’t have to touch anything.”

  “And if I do?”

  Quint patted him on the shoulder. “It’ll be your first solo.”

  Gregory swallowed hard and gave him a thumbs-up. “You’re coming back. Right?”

  “Soon as I can,” Quint assured him. “Don’t worry, man. If you run into a problem, just do what Colonel Roberts tells you.”

  When Quint and Natalie left the flight deck, he closed the security door behind him. The flight deck was secure.

  Gun in hand, Quint searched the crew lounge at the front of the plane. Assured that the area was safe, he closed the hatch leading to the cargo hold. He recruited another Quantum employee and armed him. Quint’s instructions were simple. “If anybody pokes their head up from the cargo hold, shoot. Understand?”

  Nervously, the guy nodded. His eyes flickered.

  “Say it.” Quint moved directly into his line of vision. “What are you going to do if somebody tries to come into the cabin?”

  “I’ll shoot.”

  “That’s good,” Quint said. “Again?”

  “I’ll shoot.”