Primary Target (1999) (10 page)

"I never take it on vacation," Scott said, then quietly waited while Jackie picked up the receiver. When she was sure she would not be overheard by passersby, she called and left their number.

Less than two minutes later Jackie flinched when the phone rang. "It's for you," she said without rancor.

Scott reached for the phone and surveyed everyone around him as he quietly spoke to Prost. The conversation was short and tense. When he hung up the receiver, Scott stared at the phone for a moment, then closed his eyes. Farkas is just the opening act.

"Bad news?" Jackie asked, knowing the answer.

"Well ..." He hesitated and shook his head. "Are you familiar with a terrorist named Khaliq Farkas?"

For a split second she froze as the line of her mouth became grimly straight. "I sure am," she said in disgust. "I'd like to get my hands on that--"

Scott's eyes grew large.

"SOB." She softened. "What's he done now?"

"Nothing yet." Scott's nerves were suddenly on edge. "He was spotted in Wyoming this morning, but that isn't the bad news," Dalton said as his gaze wandered around the immediate area.

"I'm waiting."

"He was seen flying an A-4 Skyhawk complete with missile racks."

Jackie drew back. "Missile racks?" she asked, trying to make sense of the fragments of information. "Wyoming?" "That's right," he quietly said. "Hartwell said the attorney general just briefed the president and he wanted as to be on guard."

"Wait a second," Jackie queried with a suspicious look. "I think I missed something. Maybe you better start from the beginning."

With the hair standing up on the back of his neck, Scott glanced around the area. "Some local pilots at the Casper airport took pictures--Prost said videotape--of the plane and pilot when he stopped for fuel early this morning. The peopl
e
at the airport became suspicious of Farkas and contacted their local FBI office. The agents viewed the tape, and after picking themselves up from the floor, they called Washington." "Are they positive it was Farkas?"

"No question about it. He's clean shaven now, but Hartwell said that they don't have any doubt. And, surprise surprise, the Skyhawk didn't have any registration numbers on it. That's probably what made the people at the airport suspicious."

"No markings of any kind?"

"Not a thing, except for a blue-and-gray camouflage paint scheme."

"Fearless Farkas has surfaced again," Jackie said with cold frustration, then glanced around the concourse. "This is absolutely crazy. There's a multimillion-dollar bounty on him, and he's blissfully flying around our skies in a military jet. Go figure."

"Yeah," Scott said as he studied the other travelers, "he's definitely a gutsy little bastard, but he won't be able to elude us forever."

A brilliant flash of lightning caught her eye. "Do they have any idea where he's headed?"

"All the witnesses at Casper agreed that he initially headed southeast, then turned due east about three miles from the airport."

The sound of rolling thunder suddenly drifted through the terminal.

Stiff and tense, Jackie stared at Scott. "He'll do anything, and I mean anything, to complete his mission--whatever it is."

"Or to escape being captured," Scott said, pointing to a small reddish scar on his neck under his right ear. "A little souvenir from a recent encounter with Farkas."

Her eyes opened wide in disbelief. "You're kidding," Jackie said as she examined the scar.

"No."

"I didn't see anything in your records."

"That's because I didn't say anything about the wound." "What happened?"

Scott allowed a lazy smile to touch the corners of his mouth. "I was in Tel Aviv on a tip that Farkas had bee
n
spotted in the area. I was checking security systems when we literally bumped into each other at the entrance to a hotel. He fired three or four shots at me, one of which grazed my neck."

"Were you armed?"

"Yes, but I couldn't return fire. There were too many people in the way. He grabbed a pedestrian and used her as a shield until his driver pulled up beside them. Farkas shoved her away, then jumped in the car and disappeared in the traffic."

"I'm amazed that no one recognized him?"

"He was masquerading as an Israeli general."

"That's what I mean," Jackie declared with a shake of her head. "He isn't afraid of anything, and he gets away with murder--literally."

"His day is coming," Scott said mechanically. "He knows I've been dogging him ever since our unexpected meeting." "Well, he's here now," Jackie said, restless with energy. "You may get a chance for a second meeting."

"I would like nothing better."

She picked up the solemnity in his expression. "Let's change our reservations," she said on a high note. "Then how about a drink?"

"You've got a deal." A thunderbolt of lightning prompted Scott to study the dark clouds. "I hope this weather clears before we take off."

"That makes two of us."

Chapter
10

American Flight 1684
.

Relaxing in the first-class section, Ed Hockaday flinched
when a loud clap of thunder boomed across the airport.

A nervous flier in the best of conditions, he glanced at the dark storm clouds, then tilted his glass to finish the last of his double martini. He loosened his seat belt and relaxed slightly as the effects of the alcohol took hold.

By the time the terrorist conference was over, Hockaday and the other experts had made one point abundantly clear to their audience; in the past, when terrorists wanted to attack U
. S
. forces or American citizens, they did it overseas. Now, with the growing animosity between the West and the Iranian leadership, the rules had changed. More and more attacks would likely be taking place on American soil.

Citing the Defense Department study Terror 2000: The Future Face of Terrorism, a specialist in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Low Intensity Conflict predicted that Iran's network of state-sponsored terrorism would rapidly progress to larger-scale operations in the United States.

The experts also believed that incidents that caused few fatalities would no longer have the shock value the terrorists desired. They would concentrate their efforts on inflicting mass casualties, the kind likely to capture U
. S
. media coyerage for extended periods of time. Expressing their mounting fears, Ed Hockaday and most of the conferees agreed that open warfare would have to be waged against terrorists and their supporters.

Across the aisle from Hockaday, Senator Travis Morgan signed an autograph for an exuberant flight attendant assigned to the coach section. After the vivacious young woman thanked Morgan and returned to her duties, the chairman of the vice-president's task force on terrorism took a sip of his bourbon and resumed his conversation with his wife. The smiling couple held hands as they quietly discussed their new grandson.

Morgan had delivered the keynote address in Dallas, noting the serious problems stemming from the spread of terrorism. When he called for open discussions, a lively exchange erupted between law enforcement officials and antiterrorist experts.

When Senator Morgan felt the jet being pushed back from the gate, he asked for another bourbon on the rocks, then opened his Wall Street Journal to skim the political news and the op-eds.

A spattering of warm rain was pelting the terminal building at DFW when Captain Chuck Harrison taxied the twin-engine jetliner away from the passenger boarding bridge. Harrison was in command of Flight 1684, a McDonnell Douglas MD-80-series aircraft. Scheduled to depart Dallas--Fort Worth at 4:50 P
. M
., the nonstop flight was running a few minutes late as a result of weather-related traffic slowdowns.

The former B-52 aircraft commander and his copilot, First Officer Pamela Gibbs, surveyed the ominous rotor clouds as a massive storm began to engulf the northern perimeter of the sprawling airport. Placing her personal handheld GPS in the side pocket of her flight bag, Gibbs watched the advancing greenish-black squall line, then glanced at Harrison. "I'm just waiting for a funnel cloud to drop out of this mess." "I wouldn't be surprised," he said with a concerned look at the swirling rotor clouds. "Definitely not an ideal day for aviating."

"Ditto," she said with a hint of reservation in her voice. "This looks like a good day to go Amtrak."

Even though this time of year was considered to be the height of thunderstorm season in northern Texas, both pilots were surprised to see such a powerful weather system develop so quickly. Brilliant, searing flashes of cloud-to-cloud lightning flickered back and forth as the towering storm blocked the light of the sun and turned day into night. The air was thick and heavy with moisture, promising to spawn even more savage storms before the evening was over. Carefully merging the heavily loaded plane with a half-dozen other jetliners, Harrison felt the gnawing pressure to get airborne as soon as possible. If they could get off the ground before the intense storm rolled over them, Harrison felt confident he could give his passengers a comfortable ride to their cruising altitude.

In an attempt to suppress her concern about the mounting intensity of the storm, Pam Gibbs turned to Harrison and smiled. "Did you have a chance to meet the senator?"

"Yeah," he answered as he released the brakes and moved forward in concert with the other pilots. "We chatted for a minute. He seems like a pretty decent guy ... for a career politician."

Pam chuckled to herself and looked at Harrison. "What," she said with mock surprise, "no tirade today?"

"I had to stop watching C-SPAN." Harrison smiled as he gently applied the brakes. "It was causing a blood pressure problem."

Reading a report from the House Task Force on Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare, FBI terrorist expert Marsha Phillips glanced at two other special agents seated in the back of the coach section. Chatting quietly with the director of the Department of State's Antiterrorism Training Program, the agents appeared to be totally at ease.

Marsha was anything but at ease. She'd spent countless hours mentally preparing herself for the flight back to Washington. A recent experience had reinforced her gripping fear of flying, and had cost her more than a few sleepless nights. The turbulent flight had left her physically ill and terrified of being confined in a fragile metal tube blasting through the sky at over 500 miles an hour.

Marsha looked up from her report long enough to see the threatening clouds and lightning outside her window, the
n
she folded the papers and closed her eyes. She couldn't wait to get home, curl up on her couch, and watch the adventure movies she had taped before leaving for Dallas. Approaching the southern end of Runway 35 Left, the pilots completed the remaining items on their takeoff checklist before Pam switched the radio from ground control to the control tower frequency for the parallel runways on the east side of the airport.

The ex-Navy P-3C Orion pilot again observed the black clouds and the flickering veins of lightning. She noticed that her hands were cold and damp. Pam wondered how much of her anxiety stemmed from her concern about the weather--and how much stemmed from being in the cockpit with Chuck. He was an easygoing, okay guy who happened to be divorced and available, and she was attracted to him. She glanced at Harrison. What the hell--I might as well be straightforward and take the initiative. With a certain amount of trepidation, Pam steeled herself and turned to Harrison.

"Chuck"--she tried to sound nonchalant--"I was wondering if you might be interested in coming over for dinner tomorrow evening? I have a great recipe for lobster with coral sauce ... if you haven't made other plans."

He gave her a slow, quizzical look. "No, I don't have anything planned. Dinner sounds great," he said, letting _his special smile show through his surprise.

"Good."

"Want me to bring the wine?"

"Sounds good." She smiled in return. Yes!

"Regional Tower," Gibbs radioed as she mentally planned the evening with Harrison. "American 1684 is ready to go." "Ah, roger American 1684," came the crisp reply from the female controller. "Delta 728, fly heading three-five-zero, cleared for takeoff."

"Three-fifty on the heading, cleared to go, Delta 728." Two superheated streams of powerful jet exhaust belched dense black smoke from the huge engines as Harrison and Gibbs watched the heavily laden jet begin to accelerate down the long stretch of semiwet runway.

"If the weather keeps building at this rate, we could be in for some real excitement," Pam said dryly.

"Yeah, it's gonna be a challenge."

"All aircraft be advised," the tower operator said as a bright bolt of lightning flashed overhead. "We have, ah, low-level wind shear alerts from all quadrants. Repeat--we have--we're recording low-level wind shear from all quadrants."

The tower personnel, concerned about the intensity of the approaching storm, closely monitored the terminal Doppler weather radar. The short-range, high-frequency C-band radar is specially designed to detect dangerous microbursts that cause strong downdrafts capable of forcing airliners to the ground.