by Diane Capri
“We don’t know much yet.” Gaspar paused a moment. “Looks like a cargo plane crashed into the side of the federal prison building. Only the pilot on board.”
“So they are defending in place,” she acknowledged the only reasonable alternative at the moment.
“They might be forced to evacuate. Too early to say,” Gaspar replied. “Details are coming in piecemeal. You know how these things go. So far, reports we’re getting say no damage to the state penitentiary or the county lockup, which are on the same site. And most of the federal facility is intact.”
Burke glanced her way and gave her a solid nod to acknowledge she’d been right before he cleared his throat. “The plane exploded on impact or shortly after?”
Even before nine-eleven, Kim had hated to fly. Planes were reliable and crashes were rare. But mechanical things and human error being what they were, the chance that someone would screw up something was always a risk she preferred not to take.
Events like this crash cemented her opinion. People laughed at her, but she was right. Flying was dangerous. Every time.
She popped another antacid in her mouth, but her stomach felt like a creature clawing its way out.
Gaspar said, “An A320, based on what we can see from the satellites. Took out one side of the biggest prison building and destroyed one of the exercise yards. Locals are scrambling to get a handle on it and help is on the way.”
“How many dead?” Kim asked.
“Don’t know for sure. All we can say right now is that the damage appears to be contained to the north side of the building,” Gaspar replied.
“How many prisoners escaped?” Kim asked, looking toward the sky. Helicopters would be swarming like mosquitos at a campfire, even if she couldn’t see them from this distance.
“Don’t know that, either. Maybe forty, give or take.”
“What do you know?” Burke demanded sharply, like the superior officer he’d once been barking orders to the young seaman Gaspar never was.
A long pause hummed along the empty air.
Gaspar owed Burke nothing. In a bar, after a few drinks, late at night, maybe this was the point where the big dogs stopped sniffing each other and settled things with their fists.
Kim waited out the silence for several seconds before she turned off the speaker and raised the phone to her ear again. “Thanks, Chico. Any chance you’ve got video or still shots or anything at all to help us out here?”
A few more seconds of silence followed. It wasn’t like Gaspar to pout. So he must have been seriously annoyed.
“We’ll talk about Burke later. There’re a lot of things about the guy that you don’t know, and I don’t like,” Gaspar finally said, not in the least amused. “Meanwhile, keep your puppy on his leash.”
“More like a Rottweiler. When we’ve got more time, maybe you can tell me exactly how I’m supposed to do that.” Kim kneaded the headache that was just beginning between her eyebrows.
Gaspar’s reservations about Burke raised her internal threat level meter into the red zone and held it there, needle pressing hard against the extreme position.
She took another breath and tried again. “So, FAA?”
Gaspar relented. For now. “Classified. Not for sharing.”
“Okay,” she said.
Although he knew she would tell Burke the facts. No way around it at this point.
Gaspar meant she wasn’t to mention where he’d obtained the intel. Not to Burke or anyone else.
Gaspar’s new job at Scarlett Investigations gave him access to all sorts of data the Boss and the law wouldn’t allow her to reach. But that didn’t mean Gaspar was authorized to access it or to share what he found.
“FAA says the plane was most likely an A320 cargo hauler out of Rapid City headed for Minneapolis. Fully loaded. They’d lost contact with the pilot,” Gaspar said, wearily, as if the news was too exhausting to repeat. His tone became more somber. “So far, it looks like he flew straight into the building.”
“Intentionally?” Kim widened her eyes and felt her heart thumping in her ears. Terrorists didn’t usually hijack planes solo. The intel made very little sense. “Like a kamikaze or something?”
Burke flashed an angry stare her way. He didn’t like being out of the loop, even temporarily.
Kim turned her gaze skyward. The intense flame and black smoke seemed to be growing as they came closer to the town.
Gaspar said, “Sounds crazy, I agree. I haven’t seen the video. Just got a report, so far. Based on eyes and ears on the ground out there. I’m working on acquiring the rest. I’ll send it to you as soon as I have it.”
“Copy that,” she said, mimicking his style of old. He chuckled before he hung up, and she was glad his good humor had partially returned. At least where she was concerned. Burke might be another matter entirely.
Man, she missed working closely with Gaspar.
“One more thing,” he said before he hung up. “Smithers is on his way. He was in the area, and when the locals requested FBI assistance, he volunteered. He’ll probably arrive before you do. I told him you were en route. He’s expecting you.”
She slipped the phone into her pocket. The news settled Kim’s nerves a bit. Smithers was a solid agent. She’d worked with him in extremely tense situations twice before. Unlike Burke, she had no reservations about Smithers.
Peering into the distance, she saw a helicopter heading west, flying above the road. It was moving away from the fire, not toward it.
She lowered the window. The scent of burning in the distance filled her with dread.
The helo was still too far away to see clearly through the smoky haze.
“Burke,” she said pointing skyward. “Eleven o’clock. Headed this way.”
Burke glanced up to look. “What the hell?”
He reduced the pressure of his foot on the accelerator.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Friday, May 13
Near Bolton, South Dakota
8:05 p.m.
Moments later, Kim could make out a car headed westward coming out of the smoke at a high rate of speed. The helo might have been chasing the car. Or might have been observing it. Either way, the pilot would be calling for officers on the ground to assist.
Burke said, “This would be a good time to have a radio car connected to local law enforcement. Without it, we have no idea what’s going on.”
She pointed the vehicle out to Burke. “There. Do you see it? A red car. Maybe a mile away?”
Burke leaned toward the windshield, peering ahead. “The helo is what? Chasing him?”
“Looks like it to me, but I’m really reading tea leaves here. Could be a guy involved in whatever’s going on at the prison.”
“Yeah. Or he could be rushing his wife to the hospital or something. Regardless, he’s in one helluva hurry,” Burke said.
“If he’s running from the helo, they’ll be calling ahead for backup. Let’s get behind him and follow along until we get more intel.”
Burke slowed the SUV, waiting for the red sedan to speed past. When it did, Kim saw a white male wearing an orange jumpsuit at the wheel.
She snapped a quick photo as he sped past. The photo was mostly useless, but maybe it would be better than nothing.
Burke turned the Navigator and followed the speeding sedan.
Kim snapped a photo of the car’s license plate. The rental SUV had a dash cam in it, and Gaspar had eyes on her from the sky. She hoped they’d get solid intel pieced together shortly.
“Call 9-1-1. Get the word out to highway patrol,” Burke said, speeding up to close the gap between the SUV and the red sedan.
Kim found her phone and redialed Gaspar. He picked up immediately.
“I’m on it, Sunshine. The car’s stolen. Probably from the prison parking lot, although I can’t confirm that yet,” Gaspar said. “From what I can see, the prisoners that were in the exercise yard when the jetliner hit have been running like cockroaches.”
“Can you get an ID on the driver?” Kim asked.
“The helo is keeping an eye on him, but you’re closer,” Gaspar replied. “I uploaded the best photo I could get off your dash cam. It’s running through facial recognition now.”
“How about the car?”
“The vehicle is a BMW 6 series sedan with a South Dakota plate. Registered owner is Fern Olson. Licensed to practice law in South Dakota. Lives in Bolton,” Gaspar recited from data coming up on one of his screens.
“Anybody headed toward him to intercept?” Kim blinked when she heard the owner’s name. Fern Olson was the woman they were on the way to interview in Bolton.
“Doesn’t look like it. The helo can’t actually stop the guy, and all available units have been mobilized to deal with the prison disaster. If you don’t intercept him, he’ll probably get away,” Gaspar said.
“How’d you do in PIT training?” Kim looked at Burke. She was asking about the precision immobilization techniques. PIT techniques were intermediate force options that could slow a speeding vehicle.
If he executed them well, using the right equipment, and if they had solid backup.
Problem was, they didn’t have the right equipment.
They didn’t have a second vehicle for backup, either.
Which meant skills would matter.
“PIT? Not so great,” Burke replied. “Crashed a couple of training vehicles, but I got the job done.”
“Had any field experience since then?”
“Some.” Burke shrugged, keeping his attention on the driving. “I’m a SEAL, not a traffic cop.”
Kim nodded. There was no time to stop and switch drivers. They’d lose the guy for sure if they slowed down at all.
“We could nudge him. But at these speeds, we might knock him off the road.”
Burke said, “He’s got nowhere to go, with those deep ditches on both sides of the road. He’d probably try to stay on the pavement rather than go off down the embankment. He might be good enough to do that.”
Kim said, “But we’d slow him down, at least.”
“As fast as that guy’s running, he might spin and slam right into you,” Gaspar interjected.
“We’ll need another vehicle ourselves if this thing goes south,” Burke said, eyes still on the road and the racing BMW, hovering no more than two car lengths behind.
Kim said nothing, watching the red car. She lowered the window. If there were sirens headed this way, she couldn’t hear them. She raised the window again.
“If we’re gonna do this, we’ve got to be quick about it,” Burke said, speeding up to close the gap again. “He’s got a better engine than we do. We’re at ninety-two miles an hour now. He’s going to leave us in the dust pretty quick. It’s your call, boss.”
Kim ran through her options.
There were only two real choices, and one was to let the guy go for now. Authorities would find him eventually.
She had no idea why he’d been incarcerated in a federal maximum-security prison.
He could be a serial killer or just a scam artist. Impossible to know.
Should she let him get away?
If she let him go, could she be sure he wouldn’t commit depraved crimes against innocent victims while he was free?
“Gaspar, notify the helo to pick him up once we get him stopped.” She disconnected the call, took a breath, yanked the alligator clamp from her seatbelt retractor, and cinched her harness tighter. “Do it. And try not to kill us in the process.”
“Copy that,” Burke said as he pushed the accelerator to the floor, eating the pavement to close the gap.
The driver of the BMW hadn’t noticed the SUV coming up fast on his tail all of a sudden. If he had noticed, he’d have shot straight ahead to avoid what came next.
Burke moved out into the passing lane and advanced until the SUV’s front wheels were aligned behind the BMW’s back wheels.
The red car still had time to speed away.
He didn’t.
Burke made contact with the BMW’s left rear quarter panel and then accelerated as he steered the Navigator abruptly into the car.
The BMW’s tires lost traction and started to skid across the passing lane.
Burke kept moving to the right to get out of the way, letting the BMW spin out.
The red car didn’t stop.
It didn’t straighten out, either.
The BMW kept moving in the direction Burke had shoved it.
Across the pavement behind the SUV.
Fast and out of control.
When the tires ran off the pavement and hit the grass, the BMW rolled over down the embankment.
Kim counted four complete flips, terminating with the car on its roof in the rushing water.
Burke stopped the SUV and pulled off the road.
Kim jumped out and hurried down the hill toward the red car, struggling to keep upright on the uneven terrain.
Burke parked and followed behind her.
By the time Kim reached the bottom of the embankment, the red car was mostly submerged in the rushing water. The driver had struggled to open the door and pushed his way out of the car.
The orange jumpsuit was wet and plastered to his body. His head was bleeding. His face was covered with grime that looked like black soot.
Burke had slowed his descent about halfway down the hill.
Kim heard the helo approaching, looking for a place to land. She hoped medical personnel were on board.
She reached the edge of the ditch and stepped into the icy water, moving toward the driver. “Hey! Are you okay?”
His mouth split into a wide grin that crinkled his eyes and lit up his whole face. He cackled as he fist-pumped the air with both arms and yelled, “Woo-hoo! What a ride!”
Then he turned, and quicker than a jackrabbit, he jumped up the other side of the ditch and ran.
“Oh, crap,” Kim said, as she headed through the cold water and around the submerged BMW and up the other side after him.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Friday, May 13
North of Bolton, South Dakota
9:30 p.m.
Keegan glanced at the clock on the dashboard again. The sun had set and he appreciated the darkness. They had left the kid’s Explorer hidden in the woods at the second drop-off point and transferred to a stolen black Land Rover with South Dakota license plates.
The switch severed the last tenuous connection to the hacker. Forensic sciences being what they were, sooner or later the feds might discover Keegan’s activities. But that wouldn’t happen for a few days, at least. He and Walsh would have escaped to Canada by then.
Walsh was driving along the county road into the mostly vacant, wooded area north of Bolton. Keegan hadn’t seen a house or a car for the last thirty miles.
Peering through the windshield, Keegan saw a road sign for the first town north of the prison. Newton Hills. Two miles ahead. Population three hundred and two.
“How are you feeling?” he asked Walsh again, for the tenth time, at least.
“I’m fine,” Walsh replied, same as before. Maybe he was.
“Small town up ahead. We’ll find a doctor.”
“What we need is a gas station and a hamburger. It’s been a long time since we ate that crappy mystery meat lunch at Bolton.”
“Burgers it is,” Keegan said, looking out the side window. “Man, it’s dark out here. I don’t think it’s ever this dark in Boston, is it?”
“We picked this road because almost nobody lives out here, and it doesn’t get much traffic,” Walsh replied as he steered around a pothole. “I’ve got the high beams on. That’s the best I can do.” Walsh’s words sounded slurred, like he’d been drinking. Even though he hadn’t.
“How far are we from the meeting point?” Keegan asked.
The Land Rover’s GPS didn’t work reliably in no man’s land. Keegan had a paper map in the glove compartment, but he didn’t want to fish it out and try to read it by the dashboard li
ghts.
“We’re still traveling north, the first leg of a wide arc taking us away from and around Bolton. We’ll need to turn west and then south to get where we’re going,” Walsh replied with a glance at the clock. “Maybe another three to four hours’ drive time, depending on the roads.”
“How’s your arm?” Keegan asked.
Walsh shrugged. “It stopped oozing blood a while ago.”
Keegan worried Walsh was sluggish, tired. But they’d had an exhausting day. “Can you wiggle your fingers? Make a fist?”
Walsh demonstrated both moves in the glow of the dashboard lights. He pretended not to notice the pain, but Keegan saw the involuntary wince.
“How about your leg?”
“Still there,” Walsh replied, wheezing a little bit and definitely slurring his words this time.
Keegan lowered the window and inhaled the fresh night air. It was cool and getting colder. The forecast for tonight was a low of thirty-eight degrees.
He listened to the air whishing across his ears. For the past fifty miles, since they’d jumped into the Suburban with the kid back at the exercise yard, he’d heard nothing but nature.
No helicopters, no sirens, no people.
He pushed the button to raise the window and swiveled his head. Eyes forward.
What was that?
He blinked.
Looked again.
The big creature was still there. Walking on all fours. He turned his head to stare.
Eyes glowed in the headlight beams, five feet above the pavement.
The grizzly bear stopped in his tracks, right in the middle of the two-lane county road.
“Walsh! Look out!” Keegan shouted.
Walsh’s chin had dropped to his chest.
When Keegan yelled, Walsh jerked his head up and widened his eyes.
“What the hell is that?” Walsh jerked the wheel to the left to avoid hitting the big creature. Which would have caused serious damage to the Land Rover, at the very least.
But Walsh had oversteered.
The heavy SUV went off the road on the left, bounced hard onto the shoulder, and kept going.