“Yeah, no doubt,” replied Mitchell, chuckling to himself.
29
Jen bit her thumbnail and glanced down at her watch for the hundredth time in the past hour. She was growing antsy. She pursed her lips and stood up. It had been nearly four hours since Michaels had departed for the consulate. Ready to explode, she began to pace the room.
“Pretty lady, please sit down,” said Yuri. “They’ll come for us when they are good and ready and not one minute before.”
“I can’t sit anymore,” replied Jen. “All this waiting is driving me out my mind.”
“You learn to get used to it,” said Sam.
“Hurry up and wait was how the army did business most days,” added Cardinal.
Jen kept pacing. “I don’t know how you can all take things so calmly. What I wouldn’t give for an hour at the gym to burn off all this nervous energy.”
“You’re welcome to do some calisthenics in the corner if you think it will help,” said Sam.
“Ha, ha,” replied Jen just as the door opened and Michaels walked in.
Before he could open his mouth, Jen said, “So, Mister Michaels, what’s the word?”
Michaels smiled. “The word is you’re all going home. The State Department has arranged for a military Learjet to pick you up here at the airport and then fly you on to Germany where another plane will be waiting for you.”
“Thank God,” said Jen, visibly relieved that the wait was over.
Sam asked, “When will the plane be arriving?”
Michaels glanced down at his watch. “In less than an hour.”
“That’s fast,” said Cardinal.
“The Learjet was already in Russia moving several government VIPs around,” explained Michaels. “It didn’t take much effort to have it re-tasked.”
Yuri looked over at Michaels. “Any word on a lawyer for poor old Yuri?”
“Mister Uvarov, I’ve been asked by the FSB to offer you a seat on the jet. It would appear that they’d like it if you disappeared for a few weeks.”
“Sounds good to me,” said Yuri smiling. “I think I’ll fly down to Florida for Christmas and visit Disneyland.”
“Disneyworld,” corrected Sam. “Disneyland is in California.”
“I don’t care what it is called as long as I get to see Goofy. He’s my favorite.”
“Somehow I knew you’d say that.”
Jen said, “Sir, what about our passports, wallets and cellphones, do you have them with you? I’d really like to make a call home.”
“Sorry,” replied Michaels. “I was only able to get your wallets and your passports. Don’t be surprised if they are a little bit light. It’s normal for a ‘departure fee’ to be taken from time to time. Unfortunately, the police, for some reason, are reluctant to return your cellphones. Not to worry, you can call home from the plane.”
“What’s another hour?” Sam said to Jen, trying to cheer her up. “You can talk for hours if you want once we’re on the plane.”
“I suppose another hour won’t kill me,” replied Jen.
“Okay then, sit tight,” said Michaels. “I’ll have some food and bottled water brought in right away.”
“Can we leave the building to stretch our legs?” asked Cardinal.
Michaels shook his head. “Sorry, but the FSB asked me to tell you to remain inside the hangar until the plane arrives.”
“A small price to pay,” replied Cardinal cheerfully.
“I’m going to step out for a minute and tell them to hurry up with your food,” said Michaels as he left the room.
Jen walked over beside Sam and Cardinal. “Do you two still not trust him?”
“I don’t know,” answered Sam. “Something doesn’t feel right about this whole thing.”
“I’ll feel better once we’re out of Russian airspace,” added Cardinal.
Ninety minutes later, with Saint Petersburg behind them, everyone but Jen began to relax. The phones on the plane were all down for maintenance. She would have to wait until they landed in Germany to call home. The three-hour flight would carry them across Poland before stopping in Frankfurt, Germany.
“I could get used to flying in one of these,” said Cardinal as he stretched out his long legs.
“Dream on,” said Sam. “Unless you win the lottery or have a few million dollars stashed away that I don’t know anything about, this is as good as it will ever get for you.”
“A man can dream.”
Jen smiled at her friends’ banter, unbuckled her seatbelt, and stood up. She walked to the front of the cabin and saw the plane’s steward, a petite U.S. Air Force Staff Sergeant, sitting down in her foldout chair reading a book.
“Excuse me,” said Jen to the steward, “I was wondering if I could have a drink.”
“Sure, what would you like, ma’am?”
“A Diet Coke would be great if you have it,” replied Jen. She was about to tell the woman — who was about her age — not to call her ma’am, but knew it would be useless. If a person in uniform didn’t know the person they were talking to, they always defaulted to sir or ma’am.
With a smile, the steward opened a tiny fridge and handed Jen a cold can of Diet Coke, and then asked if there was anything else she needed.
Jen shook her head, thanked the staff sergeant and walked back to sit down in her very comfortable leather chair.
In the cockpit, the pilot, a major with dark-brown hair and chestnut-colored eyes turned his head and looked over at his co-pilot, a young captain on his first VIP mission outside of the United States.
“Gary, please take over. I’m going to head back and check on our passengers,” said the pilot.
“Very good, sir, I have the stick,” replied the co-pilot, placing his hands on the plane’s controls.
The pilot unbuckled himself, stood up and reached down behind his seat where his flight bag was stored. He reached inside. His fingers wrapped around the pistol grip of the silenced Sig Sauer 9mm pistol he had smuggled on board. He could feel his heart racing wildly in his chest. His palms became sweaty. He had never done anything like this in his life. Taking a deep breath to calm his nerves, the pilot looked over at the young captain.
“Gary, could you place the plane on autopilot for a moment? There’s something I need you to see,” said the pilot.
“Sure, one second, sir,” replied the young captain as he reached over and placed the plane on autopilot.
Before the co-pilot knew what was going on, the pilot pulled out his concealed pistol and fired a shot at point-blank range into the co-pilot’s head, killing him. Blood splattered all over the plane’s controls. The bullet, specially designed, shattered on impact, lessening the possibility of it traveling through a body and damaging the skin of the plane. A sudden decompression at ten thousand meters would have been catastrophic.
“I’m sorry,” whispered the major. “Where I am about to go, you cannot follow.”
After checking for a pulse, the pilot turned on his heel, grabbed his flight bag, opened the secure door to the cockpit, and tossed his bag at the steward.
With a stunned look on her face, the steward caught the bag out of the air just as the pilot stepped out of the cabin with his pistol aimed straight at the staff sergeant’s heart.
“What the hell?” said Cardinal, seeing the gun in the pilot’s hand.
“Stay where you are or I will kill Staff Sergeant Kim!” warned the pilot, his tone menacing and deadly.
The pilot grabbed Kim by the arm, hauled her out of her seat, and pushed her into the main cabin.
“I told you we couldn’t trust these people,” said Sam.