“We’ll be out of the country by tomorrow night… two nights, tops. While Henri is counting the cash, we’ll be on the Challenger to Belo Horizonte.”
“Great, great,” Fell said. That was a relief — the farther he was away from that dark-haired bitch, the better. “I’ve been checking on the plane and the crew every day for a week, making sure they’re ready to blast off. Flight plans are no problem if you’re leaving the country. One stop in Belize for gas and maybe a few senoritas, and we’re out of here with twenty million dollars in cash at our disposal, all nice and safe in numbered bank accounts. We’ll live like kings in that little town, what’s its name, Abaete or something…?” Lake wasn’t sharing in the image one bit — in fact, he looked as if he were turning to stone, or wax. “What the hell’s the problem, Harold? Cazaux will never find the cash we’ve been siphoning off from the Asian contracts. Did he accuse you of something? What—”
“There’s going to be one more operation,” Lake said. “One more big strike…”
“As long as we’re out of it, I don’t really care,” Fell said. “We close up shop and we’re done… right?”
Lake said nothing else during the rest of the ride to the garage, where their limo was waiting-for them. The image of them relaxing on the red-tiled veranda of their two-thousand-acre ranch in central Brazil was gone… replaced by the woman’s struggled plea to stop Cazaux. Obviously he was planning something so deadly, so monstrous, so devastating, that not even Lake could talk about it.
It didn’t matter, Fell decided. In two days they were going to be out of the country. Twenty million dollars and a Gulfstream bizjet bought a lot of comfort, especially in Brazil — it bought a lot of forgetfulness, too. He was going to have to forget the woman’s piercing eyes, her plea that reached down to the core of his soul…
… and remember, if he could ever forget, what happened to experienced mercenary soldier^ who crossed Henri Cazaux. Remember that bloody bag, the black mass dangling from an artery, remember Ysidro’s sick grin. What chance did an attorney from Springfield, Massachusetts, have? Silence and a life of luxury in equatorial Brazil, or go to the authorities and face Henri Cazaux, Tomas Ysidro, Gregory Townsend, and almost certain death.
Ted Fell didn’t need to be a Harvard Law School grad to figure that one out.
Mojave, California
Two Days Later
“They’re coming in here faster than we can handle them,” the man said. “I’ll be of any help I can. You have your pick of the litter, I can assure you.”
Harold Lake did not say anything — he was too surprised to speak. He was looking not at a puppy kennel or thoroughbred racehorse stable, but at two mile-and-a-half-long lines of airliners — all shapes and sizes, in various states of repair but all generally in very good condition. It seemed every airline in the world had an airplane here, and the paint jobs looked brand new. Even Ted Fell, Lake’s assistant, who hated airplanes and anything having to do with flying, was suitably impressed. “My God, I never dreamed anything like this existed,” he said, gaping at what he saw.
“I imagine most folks don’t,” the facility manager responded, smiling at Lake’s amazed expression as they drove down a taxiway in a thankfully well-air-conditioned Range-Rover. “Mojave Commercial Air Services used to be a boneyard for airliners — much like Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson stores and parts-out old military aircraft. We’ve cut up and recycled over ten thousand aircraft since we opened back after World War Two.
“But airliners last longer and are much more expensive, so when times get tough and nobody’s flying, companies send their planes out here for storage — low humidity, not much rain, pretty good conditions for outdoor storage. Some companies buy them and immediately fly them directly out here for storage. When they signed the contract to buy them three years ago, the industry wasn’t in quite bad shape. Now they own it, and it’s a big investment, but it wouldn’t pay to fly it half-filled with passengers, so they bring it out here for storage. The industry will bounce back, and when it does these babies will be put on the line.” He motioned to one airplane, obviously the size of a DC-10 of L-1011, completely cocooned in shiny aluminized plastic. “We used to just fly them in, weatherize them, and let ’em sit, but more companies want a bit more protection from blowing sand and moisture, so we shrink-wrap some planes.”
“That’s shrink-wrapped?” Fell asked. “You’re kidding!”
“Nope. Shrink-wrapped just like a copy of Playboy on the magazine racks,” the manager said. “Actually, it’s much better than that. It takes only a couple hours to apply it, and it protects the planes against most every hazard. It’s completely sealed — all the air is pumped out, so it’s impervious to the elements. A plane in shrink-wrap like that will be as good as new ten years from now — we guarantee it, in fact. No mildew, no critters, no corrosion.”
“Incredible,” Lake exclaimed. The array of planes out here was amazing — he saw quite a few MD-11 and Boeing 757 and 767 airliners, the cream of the airline crop, sitting here idle. “There has to be four or five billion dollars’ worth of machines sitting out here.”
“Pretty good guess, Mr. Lake,” the manager said. “The actual figure is three-point-seven-two-billion dollars — we keep a weekly tally.” He pulled up to a plane and put the Range-Rover in park. “Here’s 331. We started the prepurchase inspection as soon as your people showed up. Isn’t she a sweetheart?”
Lake distrusted and usually discounted anyone who talked about inanimate objects in human terms, and he was proved correct on this one. They were looking at an Aeri- talia G222 twin turboprop heavy transport plane, and it was a short, squat-looking airplane with a tall tail and high- mounted wings — not exactly a “sweetheart” unless you were into ugly-looking planes. This one was painted up with high-visibility white-and-orange stripes, with the words SISTEMA AERONAUTICO ANTI–INCENDIO painted on both sides. Lake opened a thick information folder on the plane: “This is a 1988-model water-bomber? It looks in great condition.”
“The G222 is the finest pure water-bombing aircraft on the market today,” the facility manager said. “These actually have the newer uprated Rolls-Royce Tyne turboprops, so they each put out closer to four thousand shaft horsepower instead of the normal three thousand four hundred. She’s also been strengthened to pull over four Gs instead of the normal two-point-eight — pretty important when your clients are diving into the bottom of a deep canyon chasing that last stubborn torcher. I’ve got to hand it to you water- bomber guys — you got balls the size of coconuts. Which group did you say you were representing?”
“I’m acting as the finance manager for a broker representing Walter Willis and Company,” Lake said. “The G222 and any other aircraft I can find within the next thirty days will be going to his ranch in Colorado for modification and training — and possibly go operational if this summer stays hot and dry like this.” It was all a lie, of course, but he had laid enough groundwork over the past few days, with this deal and with a half-dozen others, to make the fiction work unless a real in-depth investigation was begun. Years ago, Lake, working with the skinflint president of Universal Express, Brennan McSorley himself, had helped finance the lease of several aerial firefighting aircraft to Walter Willis, the biggest private aerial firefighting company in the world. Lake had been involved in several other financing deals since, so he had the credentials to visit this place in Mojave and talk turkey.