For a minute, it didn’t register. Then he felt his stomach drop several stories. “What do you mean, they turned off?”
“It looks like they turned south.”
“South?”
“You can see for yourself.”
“South? Why would they go south?”
“GPS doesn’t lie, sir.”
“You must be mistaken.”
“Take a look, sir.”
Squinting, one-eyed, he looked at the computer. “This thing is hard to see. Where’s a map?”
Benteen reached across the bench seat and grabbed a map, already unfolded and awkward to wield. It took him a few moments to find the place. “It’s 95. They’re going south on 95. Toward Cal-Nev-Ari.”
Where had he heard that name before?
Jon Service had mentioned it. Some outpost on State Route 95.
He had to think fast—there was no room for error.
“Are there any side roads that can take us down to 95?”
“It doesn’t look like it.”
Shit.
He wasn’t worried about catching them. That would not be a problem. But coming at them from only one angle—from behind—might encourage them to run with a truckload of nuclear waste.
That would be dangerous as hell.
He lowered his head, so that Jordy could look him in the eye, and enunciated clearly. “I don’t care what you do, how you do it, but we’ve got to get our people out in front of them.
“You’d better goddamn find a road.”
*
Glenn Traywick taxied his Cessna toward the FBO ramp, his mind already ticking away, how he would do this. It would be cheaper to get self-serve—and normally he would do just that. He hated to spend more than he had to. He was in a hurry today, though, so he would ask the lineman to bring the fuel truck. While the plane was being fueled, he could go in and get Michelle, and they’d be on their way.
He hoped she wasn’t fudging on the weight issue. That was all he needed. That woman had more designer knockoffs than a Liz Claiborne outlet.
Glenn slowed down, expecting the golf cart to come out any minute. He needed the guy to come out and park him. He’d debated calling ahead and requesting a spot at the jetline, which was right in front of the door, but decided against it. So he had to walk a little farther—he wouldn’t be signaling the fact that he was flying in. Better to just get in, get out, fly right under the radar. But where was the lineman?
Then he saw the guy come out of the FBO building, get into the golf cart, and tootle his way.
He stopped the plane on the tarmac, the engine still running, waiting. His mind already spinning ahead to Loon Lake. To the lodge he had bought with a down payment that came from his Uncle Jack. That was the great thing about Jack; he took care of his obligations.
Once they got out of the US, it would be fine. He had his new name, his new passport, his new lease on life. If his girlfriend didn’t bring all her clothes and sink them right here.
He noticed the guy in the golf cart looked ill at ease driving. The guy didn’t look like any meet-and-greeter or lineman he had ever seen. He looked like a cop.
Suddenly, he had a bad feeling. He knew from experience that he needed to trust his bad feelings. The guy might or might not be a cop dressed as a lineman, but he wasn’t taking any chances. Michelle would be disappointed, but she could meet up with him later. He started to turn the plane around, just as he saw something dark in the corner of his eye.
A cop car coming through the gate onto the tarmac.
He sat there in his plane, where he had always felt invincible before. Still in command. He looked at the vintage dash, the flight instruments, the shiny finish of the wing outside his window, the sun and the blue sky shining on his lap. His little kingdom. The only place he truly felt free. And now the cops were here and he’d never fly this plane—or any other—again.
He looked for a way out. He still had time to move forward, turn the plane around. He could drive around, but there were more police cars. It would be like taxiing his way around an amusement park. He could cover some ground, but in the end, the gates were closed and he wasn’t going anywhere.
He shut the engine down just as the cop car came up and blocked his path. Two sheriff’s deputies opening the doors, guns trained on him. He glanced at the guy in the golf cart who was just now getting out, holding up his badge, accidentally knocking the length of red carpet the people at Wiseman Aviation always rolled out for their customers, knocking it onto the tarmac, where it rolled out like in a parody of welcome.
Chapter Forty-One
Richie waited for the Bomb Squad to go through the house. When they gave him the okay, he headed for Bobby Burdette’s basement.
Josh got a ride with the Bomb Squad—they would take him back to the Williams PD. To tell the truth, Richie was relieved he was gone. He had the place to himself now, and in a way, he enjoyed that.
The head of the Bomb Squad, Bill Slade, had already told him what was down here. A washer/dryer combination, a water heater, a work bench that had not been used for a long time, and a gun cabinet.
Richie looked at the guns: a Ruger Mini-14 with a folding stock, a Remington 870 shotgun—also with folding stock—an old .30 caliber M-1 carbine, a Winchester model 70 .270 rifle, a Smith & Wesson M&P Compact .40, and a Raven Arms MP-25.
He checked the shotgun to see if it was unloaded. It was. He sniffed the chamber. It smelled of lubricating oil. All of Bobby’s guns were well-cared for. A Hoppe’s cleaning kit on the bench. He found ammo, too. Bagged and labeled the gun and the ammo as evidence.
Then he called Laura. When he heard her voice, he said, “I’ve got a 12-gauge shotgun here. A Remington 870.”
“Oh,” she said, “that’s great.” The way she said it warmed him, an undercurrent of excitement in her voice, almost gleeful. They’d had their differences, but this was something they both wanted.
“Hope we can nail him,” he said.
“Me, too.”
Feeling expansive, he added, “That was good work, finding that cartridge.”
She laughed. “It was luck more than anything.”
“Yeah, well.”
When they disconnected, he had a big smile on his face—a good day’s work.
*
Hard to see in the dust and wind, which had cast a bluish pall over the landscape, but Mark Sproule thought he saw lights ahead. “Is that a cop car?”
Dell looked up from the motorcycle magazine he was reading. “Looks like it.”
Yes, definitely a cop car. Headlights blinking back and forth, blue and red lights on the roof.
Mark’s foot hovered over the brake. He shifted down.
“What are you doing?” Dell demanded.
“We have to stop.”
“Why don’t you just run it?”
Mark looked at Dell. Twenty-eight years old and he thought he ran the world. Well, he wasn’t going to get Mark killed over this.
“It’s probably nothing anyway,” Dell said. “He probably stopped some speeder.”
But Mark knew. And a few moments later, when he saw the lights in his side mirror, he was sure.
*
They had the truck, they had the drivers. The drivers were currently sitting inside the Las Vegas Metro car that had come up from Laughlin.
Special Agent in Charge Damien Peltier leaned in to the Suburban to grab a bottle of water. The dryness getting to him. Jordy sat inside, still on his computer.
Great, how it had worked out. Even if they had to pursue, even though they couldn’t find a road down to cut them off. The Las Vegas Metro unit had come in handy after all.
Making the streets safe for tourists in Laughlin.
“Mission accomplished,” Peltier said between drinks.
“That’s what Bush thought.”
Peltier looked at Jordy. Always suspected he was a liberal. “What do you mean by that?”
Jordy nodded toward the truck, sitting on the
desert verge, taillights blinking. “That look like an NTS truck to you?”
Chapter Forty-Two
“Everybody wants a deal,” Laura said to Jon, after a fruitless half hour of trying to finesse Glenn into talking. She had co-opted the tiny conference room off the hallway at Wiseman Aviation, rather than taking Traywick back to DPS. The room was mostly taken up with a table and chairs, but it was self-contained and private. Laura added, “His lawyer’s on the way. How are you doing with Michelle?”
“Nada. We don’t have anything to hold her on, so she left.”
Laura wondered where she had gone, what her life would be like now. “They’ve got the truck at least,” she said.
“A truck.”
“A truck?”
“It sure as hell isn’t the truck—they were driving a regular semi. It’s completely empty—Jordy told me just a minute ago.”
Laura suddenly remembered the half-thought she had before everything hit the fan: the forty-minute time lapse and Jack Taylor’s rental of a semi truck. “A decoy,” she said.
“That’s what it looks like.”
“Then where’s the real truck?”
*
The real truck, Fleet Trucking no. 57, had finally cleared the wreck outside Baker, California, and was on its way to Interstate 15 going east.
As Bobby Burdette drove into the outskirts of town, he saw a yellow Dodge Challenger up on blocks in somebody’s yard and felt a twinge of remorse.
Maybe he should have found a place to store The Mean Green, so he could retrieve it if he ever got back here.
But he wasn’t coming back. He had himself a white Toyota Camry—there were about a million of those on the road—waiting in the parking lot of the Mirage Hotel and Casino. The Camry would take him straight down to Mexicali, and once he was over the line, he’d be home free with a million dollars in the bank and the cash he’d liquidated from his accounts. Not a huge amount of money, but he’d be able to live comfortably. Find himself a nice place down near Cabo, live the simple life. Margaritas on the beach, maybe get him a little sailboat.
If Cabo was too obvious, there were plenty of little fishing villages down the coast where you could disappear, as long as you could support yourself. Nobody was going to be checking passports in places like that.
Still, he’d miss The Mean Green.
He remembered one of his girlfriends had a poster in her apartment that said: “If you love something, let it go. If it comes back it’s yours; if it doesn’t, it never was.” Or something to that effect. Every agency in three states would be looking for The Mean Green. If he was lucky, some poor sap had already taken the car and was driving it God knew where.
He was fine with that. He had a new life and he couldn’t afford to be sentimental. He loved The Mean Green, but if it was meant to come back to him, then it would. Otherwise, he hoped whoever took it enjoyed it while he could.
An outside observer, privy to Bobby Burdette’s thoughts, might be surprised that Shana Yates, the woman he had slept with and lied to, did not enter into his mind at all.
*
“Sir?”
Damien Peltier wanted to bite Jordan Benteen’s head off. “What is it?”
Staring at the semi truck that wasn’t the truck he was looking for. Tasting grit in his teeth. Gearing himself up to interrogate Mark Sproule and Dell Anders, thinking about the best way to go about it, but having a hard time thinking because of this goddamn wind.
“Call for you.”
“Who’s it from?”
“CHP officer. I think you should listen to what he has to say.”
“Oh, you do?”
“He says it’s important. In light of what’s been happening.”
Peltier grabbed the phone. “Who is this?”
The man identified himself as CHPs officer Jess Harding. “You’re looking for a truck with those nuclear canisters on a flatbed?” he asked.
Peltier grunted assent.
“There was a wreck just north of Baker on 127. Took a long time to clear it—”
“You need to get to the point.”
“There was a trucker there, got caught on the wrong side of the wreck. Something not right about him. Talked a lot of bullshit. It was like he looked right through me.”
Despite himself, Peltier felt a surge of excitement. “Yes, go on. What kind of truck is it?”
Harding described it. A tall load on a flatbed, most of it covered with a large tarp, like the kind the Army used. “But I could see the tanks—three of them, the tarp didn’t cover them. At the time, I didn’t think much about it, but I’ve seen tanks like that before. The ones that come down here on the way to Carlsbad.”
Peltier might or might have not thanked him before tossing the phone back to Jordan Benteen.
This was his chance to shine. He knew how to lead, he knew how to cut through the bullshit, and he knew how to make spontaneous decisions. He thought about what Harding had said about the man. The way he described him. This did not sound like the eco-pussies he’d been dealing with. This guy sounded like he had left the reservation.
“We need two things,” he said to Jordy. “We need a helicopter with a spotter. We need to cover I-15 and every other road out of Baker.” He paused, remembering Jon Service’s suggestion earlier today. He had made one decision then, but now things had changed. “Talk to the people with Las Vegas Metro. We’re going to need a hostage negotiator.”
*
Glenn Traywick’s lawyer arrived and met with his client while Laura and Jon Service cooled their heels outside at a picnic table under the pines. They had been waiting almost two hours at this point.
“Where’s Sharp?” Laura asked, staring out at a plane taking off.
“He’s got a meeting, but he should be here soon.”
“What do you think Traywick meant by that? Saying he had something we really needed to know?”
Jon shrugged. “Could be anything.”
“But the way he said it.” She folded her arms. “Like it would solve everything. Like he was going to give us something that we’d be very grateful for.”
“He could just be bullshitting. At this point, we’ve got it all figured out—with him or without him.”
But Laura wasn’t so sure that was true.
Just then a man in a suit holding a briefcase came out the double doors and motioned them inside. Jeremy Sharp, the US attorney.
“That’s our cue,” Jon said, holding the door for her as she walked back inside.
*
The first time he saw the helicopter cruising over the freeway, Bobby thought it was police monitoring the traffic. The second time it came over, he started to have a bad feeling.
He noticed, too, that the traffic on the freeway was light. No, he realized, not light—nonexistent. At least on the lanes coming from Las Vegas.
A momentary panic, as he realized that there were no cars coming his way.
He glanced from one side mirror to the other, saw the cop cars and dark Suburbans coming up fast, headlights winking back and forth, lights on—completely silent.
Ahead were orange cones, marching off down an exit.
Something blinking dark and light up ahead in the whirling dust, a mirage.
The cars behind him, swift and silent.
The helicopter flying overhead again, looking like a giant navy-blue dragonfly. Another helicopter, clearly marked—this one from a TV news affiliate.
A clear path ahead, the road all to himself, leading to a dead end of more Suburbans and black and whites.
He thought about Mexico.
He thought about the money.
He thought about The Mean Green.
Run it, a voice inside his head urged.
He knew he wouldn’t be able to thread through the vehicles ahead of him. He knew he wouldn’t be able to get past SWAT, who stood like black stick figures behind car doors, aiming high-powered weapons at him.
He could run it and fail. But if he st
opped, maybe he could play one more hand.
He still had the explosives, strapped around the first tank.
He still had the plutonium.
And Las Vegas was only thirty miles away.
He shifted down, the engine dropping into a low-pitched whine. Shifted down and down and down.
Ready to deal.
Chapter Forty-Three
Bobby’s thinking: better make sure they call the right phone. Otherwise—
Boom.
Glad he bought two different kinds of cell phones, two different colors. On the back of a page from the manifest papers with a ballpoint pen, he writes his cell phone number as big as he can, going over it several times to make the letters dark and thick.
He holds it up to the window, waggles it.
“Sir, throw the keys out of the truck.”
Coming out of a bullhorn, just like in the movies. For answer, he waggles the paper some more.
Silence.
The wind worrying at the windows, chortling at him. Dust shuttling across the now-deserted patch of asphalt of I-15 north. The lights winking one hundred yards ahead. Black-garbed SWAT team members. The FBI Surburbans, just like in the movies.
He wonders where the snipers are. He knows he’s in the crosshairs right now. The only thing stopping them is the fact that he is sitting on a shitload of transuranic waste, the biggest fucking hostage in the world.
“Throw your keys out now!”
Or what? You’ll take away my phone privileges?
He walks the sheet of paper along the top of the dash, one corner up, one corner down, up and down.
He hears Back in Black—the phone. The right phone. If it wasn’t, he wouldn’t still be here to answer it.
He picks up.
“We want—”
“I don’t care what you want,” he says, keeping his voice whisper-quiet, barely audible. Whoever is on the other end—and he’s pretty sure it’s the head honcho—will have to listen hard to hear him. All his concentration will be on trying to understand what he’s saying, rather than jumping ahead in his mind, finding a way to outsmart him.
“Listen to me. I’ll only say this once. I have a load of transuranic waste right behind this cab. I have explosives strapped around it. If you come near me, I’ll blow myself and this rig sky high. Don’t think I won’t do it—I’ve got nothing to lose. If I go, I’ll go fast. The rest of you—it’s gonna take awhile. You’ll probably end up in a hospital bed with a tube up your nose and a bedpan under your ass. I’ll let you think about that, and you can call me back.”
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