North was staring at her in silence, his jaw muscles working furiously.
“Bronsky, you go to hell. I’m not about to be badgered into this fantasy of yours.”
She nodded and looked down again.
“Okay, Bill. Then let’s get some more of it on the table. Was she dead when you drove her to Connecticut?”
He snorted and shook his head, but she could see the resolve draining away slowly.
“You’re aching to tell me she was, but you never checked. You assumed.”
“Why are you torturing that father over there?” North asked.
“Oh, I’m not! You’ve done that yourself.” Kat turned around to Ken, trying to judge how much strength he had left. He took a deep breath and nodded for her to continue.
She looked back at North. “Bill, when Melinda died, she was several hundred yards from where you left her. Do you know why?”
He stared at her blankly.
“Because, Bill, she crawled there. You see, you buried that little girl alive.”
Kat let the horror of her words sink in, watching the cloud move across North’s face before continuing.
“She was unconscious from a minor drug overdose Lumin had given her, Bill, but she was very much alive when you put her in the ground.”
North gasped, and a ripple of emotions crossed his face as he struggled to keep his mouth shut even as his eyes glazed.
Kat nodded and continued, mindful of the low gasp from Ken’s direction.
“Sometime later, after you were long gone, Melinda Wolfe woke up two feet underground with dirt in her face and mouth. She clawed and dug, gasping for breath, until she found the surface. Fortunately you hadn’t packed it too tightly. She was alive, Bill. You buried that little girl alive, and she crawled out on her own and got several hundred yards away before she died from loss of blood, exposure, and the results of her abuse.”
Bill North’s eyes were enormous, his mouth opening and closing once silently, his eyes darting toward Ken, then back, before he spoke in a low, halting voice.
“I’m devastated … to hear what that poor little girl went through. But you’re wrong. I … I had nothing to do with it.”
She nodded. “Your denial is pathetic, Bill. The truth is written all over your face, and we have the evidence.”
He remained motionless.
Kat dropped her gaze to North’s right hand. She reached out and took the hand, pulling it to her, spreading the fingers apart and tracing the line of his little finger as he watched her in growing alarm.
“Did you break this finger as a kid, Bill?”
He hesitated, then nodded, thoroughly off balance. “Yeah. As a teenager. It didn’t set correctly.”
“It left you with a very distinctive shape around the knuckle that’s easily identifiable. I saw it the first time in Salt Lake. You remember us on the satellite phone discussing the photo you loaded on Bostich’s computer? Well, Bill, you want to know how I know all these things? You want to know how I can convince a jury beyond a reasonable doubt? Because I enlarged that photo to look at the hand reflected in the window. There was something distinctive about that hand, and I finally realized what it was. The little finger had a unique shape to the knuckle. I’d seen that hand a few hours before in person, because it’s your hand, Bill.”
The single explosion of a .44 caliber bullet just to her left was deafening, and Kat dove instinctively to the right as she looked back around to see smoke curling from the barrel.
She jerked her head back toward North, amazed to find him unscathed, a huge bullet hole in the sidewall of the cabin several inches above where his head had been.
She whirled on Ken, her eyes huge. “NO! Ken, this isn’t the way! It’s far too easy for him.”
Ken Wolfe was breathing hard as he resettled his feet and brought the loaded and cocked .44 to a dead aim on Bill North’s forehead.
“Step back, Kat,” he commanded in a dangerously quiet voice.
“Ken—”
“STEP BACK!” he snapped at her, his gaze remaining on North, who was cringing to his left in the chair.
Kat drew a ragged breath as she tried to assess the options, her desire to get North’s confession now secondary to keeping North alive, the image of her purse at the back end of the cabin looming in her mind.
Kat moved quickly back to the swivel chair near the rear of the cabin and sat down, her right hand feeling around on the floor for her purse, her eyes riveted on Ken, who was paying no attention to what she was doing.
Her hand closed around the purse and she drew it to the side of the chair, working the zipper at the top, her fingers slipping inside to the welcome feel of the cold metal of her gun.
“Stand up, North!” Ken was commanding.
“Why?”
“STAND UP, YOU FUCKING MURDERER!” he screamed. “This nightmare just gets worse and worse. Now I find a corporate suit let Melinda die, and on top of that, buried my little girl alive! You could have saved her, you shit!”
“Look, Wolfe, I …”
Ken raised the gun to his eye level, then slowly dropped his aim to North’s crotch.
“If you tell me the truth right now, I’ll let you live to stand trial. Otherwise, I’m going to start blowing off body parts one by one until I hear the truth.”
“Look, goddammit,” North began.
Another thunderous explosion ripped through the cabin as North yelped and looked down in horror, confused to find everything between his legs seemingly intact.
“I’m a perfect shot, North. That was your last warning. The next one will be a ballistic castration. You killed my daughter! Admit it!”
North’s hands were out in a stop gesture, his eyes frantic. “Look, Ken, please, you’ve got to believe me! I didn’t kill her. I didn’t hurt her.”
“You’re lying!”
“NO!”
“You raped her and murdered her!”
“NO, NO, NO! I DID NOT! Godammit, listen to me! I had no idea she was alive!”
For a second, Ken stood in stunned silence, the confession in North’s words finally registering.
“Oh, GOD!” Ken’s agonized voice cut through the cabin, his face contorting in pain, his eyes closing tightly in agony.
Instantly Bill North seized the opportunity, diving to the carpet, his hand reaching out to the side of an end table at the forward end of the cabin as Kat pulled her .40 mm semi-automatic clear of her purse and leveled the barrel at Ken’s head.
“KEN! DROP IT! RIGHT NOW! DO NOT SHOOT AT HIM AGAIN!”
Ken opened his eyes, his gun still aimed at where North had been. He glanced at Kat, then down at North, who appeared to be writhing on the floor.
“I haven’t shot the bastard yet, Kat.”
“And you’re not going to! Drop that gun. NOW!”
Ken took a deep breath and shook his head no. “For hours now, I’ve been trying to tell you my life is already over, Kat. I really don’t care if you shoot me or not. Just make sure this murderer is put away if I fail to kill him.”
“You’re not going to commit murder, Ken!”
“I’ve already committed a capital crime.”
“Then don’t make it worse. DROP THE GUN!”
“No, goddammit!”
Ken pointed the barrel at North on the floor. “Get up, you fucking murderer! I’m gonna blow your balls off first.”
“KEN!” Kat bellowed. “It won’t work! I’ll have to shoot you if you show any sign of pulling that trigger!”
“I don’t care, Kat,” he said softly.
“But Melinda would care, Ken! Melinda would want you alive to see this through. You know I’m right! I know how daughters feel about a loving father, Ken. Melinda would never want you to use that gun. She’d want that bastard rotting in jail for the rest of his life, stripped of all his privileges. Killing him is too easy!”
Ken was hesitating. She could see him blink, obviously confused, as he let the aim of his gun sag. Slowly, a
gonizingly, the barrel dropped toward the carpet as he turned toward Kat with resignation on his face, his attention too diverted to see the simultaneous whirl of movement near the end of the coffee table.
The blur of motion instantly caught Kat’s attention as she realized what was happening. Time dilated, the scene before her shifting into slow motion. Ken let the .44 slide from his fingers as Bill North rose like an angry cobra from behind the table, a deadly sneer on his face, his eyes aflame—and his hand clutching the stock of a silver .45 automatic snatched from a hidden compartment on the side of the end table.
“BILL!” she yelped in surprise.
She could see North’s eyes on Ken’s head, the aim of the .45 rising as North propelled himself up, his finger on the trigger of the cocked weapon.
Instinctively, Kat swung the aim of her gun to the right, from Ken Wolfe to Bill North, her mind rebelling at the thought of pulling the trigger.
“BILL! STOP!”
North was ignoring her. He raised the barrel of his .45 inexorably toward Ken, who had finally detected the movement to his left and was starting to look around, an expression of surprise on his face as he saw the Gulfstream’s owner rising from the carpet with lethal intent.
Ken’s eyes flickered to the dropped .44, then back to North, whose finger began to squeeze the trigger.
“BILL! NO!”
The .40 mm’s gunsight was resting now on the side of North’s head.
“FREEZE, BILL, OR I’LL SHOOT!”
But it was obvious North had a singular mission and the rearward motion of the .45’s trigger left no doubt. She had no time to decide. It would be instinct alone.
The explosion rocked the interior of the Gulfstream as the slug from North’s gun ripped through Ken Wolfe’s right chest.
And milliseconds later, Kat’s bullet exploded into flight, the projectile blowing through Bill North’s head.
North’s body crumpled as Ken Wolfe staggered toward the opposite wall, his eyes huge, a growing patch of crimson on his white shirt above the right breast pocket.
He looked down at North’s body, then back at Kat, trying to smile, sliding down the wall to a sitting position as she and the two pilots rushed to his side.
EPILOGUE
FBI Headquarters, Washington, D.C. Two months later
The Director of the FBI stood up and walked to the window shaking his head, his words clearly audible to Kat Bronsky as she waited in the plush chair on the other side of his desk.
“Agent Bronsky, I’ve got some real problems here. On one hand I’ve got rules and regulations this agency has to adhere to, and on the other hand, I have you.”
He turned at last and looked at her with a neutral expression.
“Problem one is, you ignored orders, sidestepped procedures, and managed to get yourself captured in the process, as you used what some around here are calling cowboyish maneuvers to deal with this hijacking.”
He moved back to the large chair behind his desk. “And, of course, let us not forget the small matter of shooting to death a personal friend of the President of the United States aboard his own jet.”
“Sir—”
He raised a hand for silence.
“Problem two is, I also have to acknowledge that an FBI agent saved a plane full of passengers and cracked a major murder investigation in a matter of hours through intuition, intellect, training, and brilliant detective work under fire. In fact, like it, hate it, or however I feel about it, the image of the modern FBI agent you’ve presented to the public has done this agency a world of good—even if it is rankling some of your fellow agents.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“Don’t get cocky. That’s reluctant praise.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Okay. I’ve also got to add that the President instructed me personally and very privately to tell you he’s damn grateful for your unmasking of Bill North. He hadn’t a clue that North was involved in worldwide sleaze. By the way, do you know we now have conclusive evidence linking North personally to the production of snuff films in Mexico?”
“Good Lord, no.”
The Director nodded. “Enough to indict, if he’d lived. So that was a well-aimed bullet, Kat, and I’m well aware it was fully justified, as the formal review concluded. The President also wanted me to thank you most profusely for exposing Bostich and saving his Administration a major scandal. By the way, you said you had the latest on him?”
She nodded and thumbed through a note pad. “Bostich was removed as U.S. Attorney the same afternoon, as you know. Technically he resigned, but he had no choice. The Connecticut Bar suspended his law license for lying to the judge. And the Connecticut judge reinstated the warrant against Bradley Lumin, which, it turns out, was needed to get enough evidence to convict Lumin of kidnapping Melinda Wolfe.”
“So that indictment is secure?”
She nodded and smiled. “Lumin has been indicted for the federal crimes of kidnapping, rape, attempted murder, and conspiracy to commit murder, and charged in Connecticut with aggravated first degree murder for his complicity in the death of Melinda Wolfe. In addition, the publicity has caused more young female victims of Lumin’s cinematic work to come forward, and more charges are pending. He’ll never walk the streets again.”
“Good!”
“Bostich came out okay on one point, by the way. The grand jury no-billed him on possession of child pornography. Seems he just likes lewd pictures of big girls.”
The Director sat down and motioned toward the notebook in Kat’s lap.
“About the pilot, Kat. I know he was released from the hospital last week into custody, but what’s his legal situation?”
Kat nodded. “It’s the damnedest situation I’ve ever seen. You knew the U.S. Attorney decided not to charge Wolfe with air piracy?”
He nodded. “Yes, but I haven’t heard why.”
“He had no choice,” Kat replied. “Incredibly, the airline refused to acknowledge that Wolfe didn’t have permission to fly the airplane all over Utah, Colorado, Telluride, and Arizona!”
“You’re kidding!”
“Nope. Legally, you can’t hijack an aircraft you have full authority to fly. I’m told their corporate lawyers made the decision based on which type of negligence they’d rather admit to. With the public outpouring of sympathy for Wolfe, they apparently didn’t want to be responsible for putting one of their captains in a death penalty prosecution.”
The FBI Director was shaking his head in wonder. “I heard that none of the passengers would press for prosecution.”
“Not one. It’s amazing. Some of those same people who are probably going to sue the hell out of AirBridge for mental anguish and reckless endangerment wrote passionate letters for leniency. But with Wolfe determined to plead guilty to any charges, it really came down to the decision of the U.S. Attorney in Denver.”
“And the bottom line there?”
“This morning Wolfe pled guilty to assault and weapons charges worth up to twenty years, and sentencing is next week. Of course, he’s already received the ultimate punishment for a pilot. He’ll never fly again. The FAA jerked his license immediately, and there’s no chance he’ll ever get it back.”
“Quite a tragedy, Kat.” He looked up and slapped the file folder bearing her name. “Okay. Now, what do we do about you?”
“Director, I—”
Once again he held up his hand to silence her. “Kat, some of the good old boys around here are pretty steamed at you, but mostly for stealing the spotlight.” He smiled and pointed to the folder. “In fact, your superiors here solemnly recommended that you be fired for insubordination, or at least suspended, demoted, and retrained.”
She nodded glumly. “I expected that.”
“But the President won’t stand for it, and frankly, neither will I.”
“So …”
“So, while I need a blood oath from you that you’ll at least try to abide by the rules in the future, I also need mor
e people around here like you who refuse to limit their thinking in a crisis, and who can make good decisions under fire.”
Federal District Court, Denver, Colorado. One week later.
“Mr. Wolfe, would you rise, please?”
The voice of the occupant of the ornate bench rumbled through the packed courtroom, and Ken Wolfe suppressed a shudder as he moved the chair back several inches and got to his feet.
The judge adjusted his reading glasses and peered over the top of a paper in his hand. “Mr. Wolfe, you have entered a plea of guilty to the charges in the indictment, and you waived a reading of that indictment. Is this correct?”
“Yes, your honor.” Ken felt his stomach fluttering, which was a surprise. He had been numb for weeks. There had been no reason to fear the sentencing. He would spend the rest of his life in prison, whether one run by the federal government, or the one in his own mind. What difference could it make?
Yet, he felt his middle contorting with apprehension.
“Very well. Mr. Wolfe, this court has the responsibility to impose appropriate penalties for violations of our laws. You have readily admitted to the charges filed by the United States Attorney, and these are serious crimes, but I am also fully aware of the details through the exhaustive, and I might add, very compassionate presentencing report presented to this court by the government. I am also fully aware that you have lost your profession as a pilot, and that loss is, of necessity, permanent.”
The judge paused and looked Ken Wolfe in the eye.
“So, Mr. Wolfe, this court finds that you should be confined to a psychiatric facility for six months of treatment, and pending a favorable report from that therapy, I am imposing a sentence of ten years … which I will probate.”
The judge removed his glasses and sighed. “Captain, your conduct cannot be condoned, but I’m convinced that you are of no further risk to this society, and you have already lost far more than this court could ever take from you. Provided you live up to the letter of the restrictions I will place on you, you may remain free of incarceration.”
The Last Hostage Page 40