Thinking he was about to be frisked, Phillipo complied without protest. Francesca’s warning came too late. The pistol barrel arced down in a silvery blur and struck the bodyguard above the right ear. The sickening crunch was drowned out by the bodyguard’s cry of pain as he doubled over and crumpled onto the floor.
Francesca jumped up from her seat. “Why did you do that?” she said defiantly. “You have his gun. He couldn’t harm you.”
“Sorry, miss. I’m a firm believer in insurance.” Riordan stepped over the prostrate form in the aisle as if it were a sack of potatoes. “Nothing like a cracked skull to discourage a man from getting into trouble. There’s a first aid kit up there on the wall. Taking care of him should keep you busy ’til it’s time to set down.” He tipped his hand to his cap, strolled back to the cockpit, and shut the door.
Francesca knelt by the stricken bodyguard. She soaked cloth napkins in mineral water and cleaned the wound, then applied pressure until the bleeding was stanched. She daubed an antiseptic on the scalp cut and the bruised skin around it, wrapped ice in another napkin, and pressed it to the side of the man’s head to prevent swelling.
As Francesca sat by his side, she tried to piece the puzzle together. She ruled out a kidnapping for money. The only reason someone would go through this much trouble would be for her process. Whoever was behind this mad scheme wanted more than a scale model and the papers explaining her work. They could have broken into the lab or grabbed her luggage at the airport. But they needed Francesca to interpret her findings. Her process was so arcane, so different, that it didn’t conform to the norms of science, which is why no one had thought of it before.
The whole thing didn’t make sense! Within a day or two she was going to give the process to the countries of the world for nothing. No patents. No copyright. No royalty fees. Absolutely free of charge. Anger smoldered in her breast. These ruthless people were stopping her from improving the lot of millions.
Phillipo groaned. He was coming around. His eyes blinked open and came into focus.
“Are you all right?” she said.
“It hurts like the devil, so I must be alive. Help me sit up, please.”
Francesca put her arm around Phillipo and lifted until he sat with his back against a seat. She unscrewed a bottle of rum from the bar and put it to his lips. He sipped some liquor, managed to keep it down, then took a healthy swallow. He sat there for a moment waiting to see if his guts would come up. When he didn’t vomit, he smiled. “I’ll be fine. Thank you.”
She handed him his glasses. “I’m afraid they were broken when he hit you.”
He tossed them aside. “They are only plain glass. I can see fine without them.” The level eyes that bored into Francesca were not those of a frightened man. He glanced at the closed cockpit door. “How long have I been out?”
“Twenty minutes, maybe.”
“Good, there is still time.”
“Time for what?”
His hand slid down to his ankle and came up filled with a snub-nosed revolver.
“If our friend hadn’t been so anxious to give me a headache, he would have found this,” he said with a grim smile.
This was definitely not the same rumpled man who had seemed more like an absentminded professor than a bodyguard. Francesca’s elation was tempered by reality. “What can you do? They have at least two guns, and we can’t fly the plane.”
“Forgive me, Senhora Cabral. Another failure to be forthright on my part.” Sounding almost guilty, he said, “I forgot to mention that I was in the Brazilian air force before I joined the secret service. Please help me up.”
Francesca was speechless. What other rabbits would this man pull out of his hat? She gave him a hand until he was able to stand on shaky legs. After a minute a new strength and determination seemed to flow through his body. “Stay here until I tell you what to do,” he said with the air of a man used to people obeying his command.
He went forward and opened the door. The pilot glanced over his shoulder and said, “Hey, look who’s back from the land of the living dead. Guess I didn’t hit you hard enough.”
“You don’t get a second chance,” Phillipo said. He jammed the revolver barrel under the Texan’s ear hard enough to hurt. “If I shoot one of you, the other can still fly. Which one will it be?”
“Christ, you said you took his gun!” Carlos said.
“You’ve got a short memory, cavaleiro,” the pilot replied calmly. “You shoot us and who’s going to fly the plane?”
“I will, cavaleiro. Sorry I didn’t bring my pilot’s license with me. You’ll have to take my word for it.”
Riordan turned his head slightly and saw the cold smile wreathing the bodyguard’s face.
“I take back what I said about dealing with a professional,” Riordan said. “What now, partner?”
“Give me the two guns. One at a time.”
The pilot handed over his pistol and the one he had taken from Phillipo. The bodyguard passed the weapons back to Francesca, who had come up behind him.
“Get out of your seat,” he ordered, backing into the cabin. “Slowly.”
Riordan caught the copilot’s eye and levered himself out of his seat. Using his body to shield the gesture, he made a quick palm-down flip with his hand. The copilot nodded almost imperceptibly to show he understood.
The pilot followed Phillipo as if drawn by an imaginary leash, as the bodyguard backed up into the cabin. “I want you to go lie facedown on the divan,” Phillipo said, keeping his gun pointed at Riordan’s chest.
“Hell, I was hoping I could take a nap,” the pilot said. “That’s real kind of you.”
Francesca had backed off the aisle to make room for the two men to pass. Phillipo asked her to get some plastic trash bags from under a front seat. Phillipo intended to use the bags to bind the pilot. With Riordan on ice he would only have to deal with the copilot.
The cabin was about twelve feet long. In the tight space Phillipo had to step aside to let the other man pass. He reminded Riordan not to try anything at close quarters, because it would be impossible to miss. Riordan nodded and stepped toward the rear. They were only a few inches apart when the copilot put the plane over on its left side.
Riordan had expected the move, but he didn’t know when it would come or that it would be so violent. He lost his balance and was thrown onto a seat, his head slamming into the bulkhead. Phillipo was lifted off his feet. He flew across the cabin and landed on top of Riordan.
The pilot disentangled his right hand and blasted his big fist into the bodyguard’s jaw. Phillipo saw galaxies whirling over his head and almost blacked out, but he managed to keep a death grip on the gun. Riordan brought his arm back for another punch. Phillipo blocked it with his elbow.
Both men were street fighters. Phillipo clawed at Riordan’s eyes. The pilot bit Phillipo on the fleshy part of the palm. The bodyguard jammed his knee into Riordan’s groin, and when the pilot opened his mouth, Phillipo snapped his head forward, smashing the cartilage in Riordan’s nose. He might have gained the upper hand, but at that point the copilot made the plane yaw sharply to the right.
The struggling men flew across the aisle into the opposite seat. Now the American was on top. Phillipo tried to club Riordan with the gun’s muzzle, but the pilot grabbed his wrist with two hands and twisted it away and down. Phillipo was strong, but he was no match for the double-teamed assault. The barrel swung closer to his midsection.
The pilot had his hands on the gun and was wrestling it away. Phillipo tried to hold on to the pistol, almost had control of it again, but the grip was slippery from the jets of blood flowing from Riordan’s nose. In a wrenching twist the pilot took control of the gun, got his fingertip onto the trigger, and squeezed. There was a muffled crack! Phillipo’s body jerked and then went limp as the bullet plowed into his chest.
The plane righted itself as the copilot put it back into its normal position. Riordan stood and staggered toward the cockpit. He stopped
and turned, apparently sensing something wasn’t right.
The gun he had left behind was propped up on the bodyguard’s chest. Phillipo was trying to steady it for a shot. Riordan charged like a wounded rhino. The pistol cracked. The first bullet hit the pilot in the shoulder, and he kept coming. Phillipo’s brain died, but his finger twitched twice more. The second shot caught the pilot in the heart and killed him instantly. The third went wild and missed him completely. Even as the pilot crashed to the floor, the pistol had dropped from Phillipo’s hand.
The struggle from one side of the cabin to the other had taken only a few seconds. Francesca had been thrown between the seats and played possum as the bloodied pilot was making his way back to the cockpit. The shots sent her down again.
She cautiously stuck her head into the aisle and saw the pilot’s still body. She crawled over to Phillipo’s side, pried the pistol from his bloody hands, and approached the cockpit door, too enraged to feel fear. Her anger quickly turned to shock.
The copilot was slumped forward, his body held in place by his seatbelt. There was a bullet hole in the partition separating the cockpit from the cabin and through the back of the copilot’s chair. Phillipo’s third shot.
Francesca pulled the copilot upright. His groan told her he was still alive.
“Can you talk?” she said.
Carlos rolled his eyes and whispered a hoarse “Yes.”
“Good. You’ve been shot, but I don’t think it hit any vital organs,” she lied. “I’m going to stop the bleeding.”
She retrieved the first aid kit, thinking that what she really needed was an emergency-room trauma unit. She almost fainted at the sight of the blood flowing from the wound down his back to puddle on the floor. The compress she applied immediately turned scarlet, but it may have helped stanch the loss of blood. It was impossible to tell. The only thing she knew for certain was that the man was going to die.
With fearful apprehension she looked at the glowing instrument panel, numbed by the realization that this dying man was the key to her survival. She had to keep him alive.
Francesca retrieved the bottle of rum and tilted it to the copilot’s lips. The rum dribbled down his chin, and the little amount he swallowed made him cough. He asked for more. The strong liquor brought color to his pale cheeks and the gleam of life back into the glazed eyes.
She put her lips close to his ear. “You must fly,” she said levelly. “It’s our only chance.”
The proximity of a beautiful woman seemed to give him energy. His eyes were glassy but alert. He nodded and reached out with shaking hand to flick on the radio that connected him directly with traffic control in Rio. Francesca eased into the pilot’s seat and slipped on the headset. The voice of the traffic controller came on. Carlos asked for help with his eyes. Francesca began to talk, explaining their predicament to traffic control.
“What do you advise us to do?” she said.
After an agonizing pause the voice said, “Proceed to Caracas immediately.”
“Caracas too far,” Carlos croaked, mustering the strength to talk. “Someplace closer.”
Several more moments dragged by.
The dispatcher’s voice came back. “There’s a small provincial airstrip two hundred miles from your position at San Pedro, outside Caracas. No instrument approach, but the weather is perfect. Can you make it?”
“Yes,” Francesca said.
The copilot fumbled with the keypad of the flight computer. With all the strength at his command he called up the international identifier for San Pedro and entered it in the computer.
Guided by the computer, the plane began to make a turn.
Carlos smiled slightly. “Didn’t I tell you this plane flies by itself, senhora?” His wheezy words had a drowsy quality to them. He was obviously becoming weaker from loss of blood. It was only a matter of time before he passed out.
“I don’t care who flies it,” she said sharply. “Just get us on the ground.”
Carlos nodded and set up the automatic descent profile on the flight computer to take the plane down to two thousand feet. The plane began to descend through the clouds, and before long patches of green were visible. The sight of land reassured and terrified Francesca at the same time. Her terror rose a few degrees when Carlos shuddered as if an electric current had gone through him. He grabbed Francesca’s hand and held it in a death grip.
“Can’t make San Pedro,” he said, his voice a wet rattle.
“You’ve got to,” Francesca said.
“No use.”
“Damn it, Carlos, you and your partner got us into this mess, and you’re going to get us out of it!”
He smiled vacantly. “What are you going to do, senhora, shoot me?”
Her eyes blazed. “You’ll wish I had if you don’t get this thing down.”
He shook his head. “Emergency landing. Our only chance. Find a place.”
The big cockpit window offered a view of the thick-grown rain forest. Francesca had the feeling she was flying over a vast unbroken field of broccoli. She scanned the endless greenery again. It was hopeless. Wait. Sunlight glinted off something shiny.
“What’s that?” she said, pointing.
Carlos disconnected the auto pilot and auto throttles, took the wheel in his hands, and steered toward the reflection, which came from the sun glinting off a giant waterfall. A narrow, meandering river came into view. Alongside the river was an irregularly shaped clearing of yellow and brown vegetation.
Flying almost on automatic himself, Carlos passed the open area and set up a thirty-degree banking turn to the right. He extended the wing flaps and put the plane in a boxlike flight pattern. With a hard right he prepared the plane for its final approach. They were at eighteen hundred feet, descending on a long, shallow glide. Carlos extended the wing flaps to slow them down further.
“Too low!” he growled. The treetops were rushing at them. With superhuman strength born of desperation he reached out and gave the throttles more power. The plane began to rise.
Through blurred vision he scoped the final approach. His heart fell. It was a terrible landing field, small and lumpy, the size of a postage stamp. They were doing a hundred and sixty miles per hour. Too fast.
A soggy gasp escaped from his throat. His head lolled onto his shoulder. Blood gushed from his mouth. The fingers that had clutched the wheel so tightly were curled in a useless death grip. It was a tribute to his skill that in his last moments he had trimmed the plane perfectly. The jet maintained trim, and when it hit the ground, it bounced into the air a few times like a stone skipped across water.
There was an ear-splitting shriek of tortured metal as the bottom of the fuselage made contact with the earth. The friction between the plane and the solid earth slowed it down, but it was still going more than a hundred miles an hour, the fuselage cutting through the ground like the blade of a plow. The wings snapped off, and the fuel tanks exploded, leaving twin black and orange swaths of fire in the plane’s wake for another thousand feet as it hurtled toward a bend in the river.
The plane would have disintegrated if the grass-covered ground had not given way to the soft, marshy mud along the river bank. Stripped of its wings, its blue and white skin splattered with mud, the plane looked like a giant wormlike creature trying to burrow into the mire. The plane skidded over the surface of the muck and finally came to a lurching stop. The impact hurled Francesca forward into the instrument panel, and she blacked out.
Except for the crackle of burning grass, the ripple of river water, and the hiss of steam where the hot metal touched the water, all was silent.
Before long, ghostly shadows emerged from the forest. As quiet as smoke, they moved in closer to the shattered wreckage of the plane.
1
2001
San Diego, California
WEST OF ENCITAS on the Pacific coast, the graceful motor yacht Nepenthe swung at anchor, the grandest craft in a flotilla that seemed to include every sailboat and powerboa
t in San Diego. With her fluid drawn-out lines, the spearlike sprit jutting from the thrusting clipper bow, and her flaring transom, the two-hundred-foot-long Nepenthe looked as if she were made of fine white china floating on a Delft sea. Her paint glistened with a mirror finish, and her brightwork sparkled under the California sun. Flags and pennants snapped and fluttered from stem to stern. Bobbing balloons occasionally broke loose to soar into the cloudless sky.
In the yacht’s spacious British Empire–style salon a string quartet played a Vivaldi piece for the eclectic gathering of black-clad Hollywood types, corpulent politicians, and sleek TV anchors who milled around a thick-legged mahogany table devouring pâté, beluga caviar, and shrimp with the gusto of famine victims.
Outside, crowding the sun-drenched decks, children sat in wheelchairs or leaned on crutches, munching hot dogs and burgers and enjoying the fresh sea air. Hovering over them like a mother hen was a lovely woman in her fifties. Gloria Ekhart’s generous mouth and cornflower-blue eyes were familiar to millions who had seen her movies and watched her popular sitcom on TV. Every fan knew about Ekhart’s daughter Elsie, the pretty, freckle-faced young girl who scooted around the deck in a wheelchair. Ekhart had given up acting at the peak of her career to devote her fortune and time to helping children like her own. The influential and well-heeled guests chugging down Dom Perignon in the salon would be asked later to open their checkbooks for the Ekhart Foundation.
Ekhart had a flair for promotion, which was why she leased the Nepenthe for her party. In 1930, when the vessel slid off the ways at the G. L. Watson boatyard in Glasgow, she was among the most graceful motor yachts ever to sail the seas. The yacht’s first owner, an English earl, lost her in an all-night poker game to a Hollywood mogul with a penchant for cards, marathon parties, and underage starlets. She went through a succession of equally indifferent owners, winding up in a failed attempt as a fishing boat. Smelling of dead fish and bait, the rotting yacht languished in the back corner of a boatyard. She was rescued by a Silicon Valley magnate who tried to recoup the millions he spent restoring the vessel by leasing her out for events such as the Ekhart fund-raiser.