In the photographs it looked as though it might be possible to climb horizontally along the face of the cliff below ground level, then come up over the patio near the end of the swimming pool. It wouldn't be an easy climb. The face of the cliff appeared soft, ready to crumble. A fall meant death on the rocks below.
"The idea is pretty good except for one thing," Ronnie said.
Nick had known Ronnie a long time. The two of them were still alive because they trusted each other.
"What's bothering you?"
"The look of that cliff. It's more dirt than rock. I don't think it's going to hold us. There's too much moisture. Look at the photo. You can see the erosion and lots of plants growing on it."
They all looked at the photograph.
"I lived on the coast most of my life," Selena said. "Ronnie's right. People are always getting hurt or killed when they get too close to the edge of one of these. The ground just crumbles away under their feet."
"Okay," Nick said. "What's Plan B?"
"Maybe we've been thinking about this all wrong," Ronnie said. "Like you said, it's a long way to the house through the grounds. We're worried about alarms giving away the game. Ground sensors, lasers, stuff like that, right?"
"Right."
"So why not just drop in on him?"
"An air drop?"
"We could land on that patio. It's plenty big enough. We make a night drop from a few thousand feet and glide right in. Everything they have assumes someone comes through the grounds. They won't expect trouble from above."
"I like it," Lamont said. "No razor wire."
CHAPTER 47
They flew to Sacramento on the Gulfstream. Their weapons and gear were stashed in two large aluminum cases. Nick rented a GMC Suburban at the airport. They headed north on Interstate 5 and turned west on Highway 20. They stopped for something to eat at a small town by a lake. The last part of the trip took them along a scenic, winding road that twisted its way through a forest of cedars and redwoods before ending at the coast in Fort Bragg.
They rented rooms in a motel overlooking the ocean. Aside from a view of the Pacific, it didn't offer much more than a bed, a bathroom, satellite TV, and continental breakfast in the morning.
They didn't need more. They weren't there to look at the whales.
Nick spread out blueprints of Haltman's house on the bed. Lamont looked at the plan.
"Lot of rooms."
"Standard procedure," Nick said. "We clear a room, we leave it behind, we assume it doesn't stay clear after that."
"At least they're big rooms," Ronnie said. "Gives us more space to move around."
"If anyone is awake and paying attention, they'll see us as soon as we land on the patio," Lamont said.
"We'll hit them at three in the morning," Nick said. "Haltman will probably be asleep in this room here."
He tapped the plan where it was marked as the master bedroom.
"He's got cancer," Selena said. "You can't count on him being asleep."
"Freddie said he'd be waiting for us." Ronnie rubbed his nose. "You think he's that smart? That he knows we'll be coming for him?"
"Yeah, I think he's that smart," Nick said. "Besides that, he's got nothing left to lose. Makes him dangerous."
Lamont began whistling Bobby McGee.
"Lamont…"
"Sorry, Nick." He grinned.
"Let's assume he's waiting," Nick said. "It doesn't matter. We have an advantage because he doesn't know that we think he's ready for us. He'll have told his security to be on the lookout. It's reasonable to assume they'll expect us to come through the grounds."
"That doesn't mean he won't have somebody watching the back," Ronnie said.
Nick nodded. "If there is, we should be able to spot him as we come in. No one's going to hear us coming. We can take him from above before he sounds an alarm."
"Those big glass doors on the patio have to be alarmed," Lamont said. "As soon as we open them, all hell is likely to break loose."
"There's no help for that. We shoot anybody that shows up."
"What about domestic help?" Selena asked. "There could be someone there. A cook or a nurse, someone who isn't a combatant."
"Then we identify and move on," Nick said. "It shouldn't be a problem."
For the next two hours they studied the plans and went over problems that might arise, working through every scenario they could think of. They'd all been there too many times to assume everything would go smoothly. It was best to plan for Murphy's Law: if something could go wrong, it would. All the planning and visualizing had to be done, but in the end anything could happen once the shooting started.
They spent the rest of the afternoon cleaning weapons and rechecking gear. Lamont, Ronnie and Nick spent extra time with the military skydiving chutes they'd use to glide in on the target. Hood had provided a plane and CIA pilot for them. It was waiting at the local airport.
Nobody felt hungry. The rooms had a snack rack with crackers, bottles of water and candy. It was all they needed.
At 0100 they left the motel. The air was wet with mist rolling in from the ocean.
"This turns into fog, it could be a problem," Ronnie said.
"Visibility's still okay," Nick said.
"Yeah, but for how long?"
"Fog could work to our advantage."
"Not if we can't see the house when we jump."
"The GPS will handle that."
The private airport was about two miles from town. Arrangements had been made with the owner for the flight. About a dozen small planes were parked on an apron near a single, green-roofed hangar. A windsock flapped erratically from a tall pole. There was no tower.
Light spilled out onto the apron from the open hangar door. Their plane was inside, a Cessna 208 Caravan. Nick drove the Suburban into the hangar and shut it down The pilot was walking around the plane, making a last-minute check. He eyed the lethal gear and chutes they were carrying
"You must be Carter," he said. "I'm Eddie."
He didn't say his last name. He held out his hand and Nick shook it.
A large rollup door on the side of the plane's fuselage was open. They stowed their gear inside. Nick handed the keys of the suburban to Selena.
"Drive to Haltman's and go past it, then kill your lights. Come back and park near the drive leading in from the highway. Once we're done, we'll exfil along the drive and through the gates. Wait for us."
"What if there's trouble?"
"Then I'll let you know. Don't get yourself killed playing Wonder Woman, all right? We can handle whatever they've got."
Eddie the pilot was looking impatient.
"You'd better get going," Nick said. He kissed her. "I'll see you in a couple of hours."
"You'd better," Selena said.
She put the Suburban in gear and drove off into the night.
CHAPTER 48
Gregory Haltman leaned back in his chair and studied a row of a dozen monitors showing different views of his estate. The monitors were there for his own personal satisfaction. Security was the job of the men he hired to protect him. In the building next to the garage, a complete monitoring station was manned twenty-four hours a day. But Haltman liked to keep his finger on things.
He wouldn't be doing that for much longer. The latest laboratory report from the hospital lay crumpled in a wastebasket near his chair. The numbers were all going in the wrong direction. With luck, he might have another four or five months. Maybe six.
It was ironic. He was one of the richest men in America, yet all his billions could not buy him more time. All they could buy was an array of drugs which gave him pain relief and provided an illusion of energy. Not long before, he'd taken two of the designer pills that boosted his alertness and woke up his body. Combined with the narcotics that kept the pain bearable, they produced a crackling high.