Nicco squinted. “Nope… but if I go in here and scroll down… here. And hello, baby, there’s the bus timetable for Binghamton. Two bus services travel to Binghamton — Greyhound and Short Line. But which one? Eeny meeny miny moe…”
“Hurry up and find out.” Lopez was impatient.
Nicco pondered the situation. “You have the banking details, right? So how much did the tickets cost?”
Lopez looked at the statements. “Fifty-seven dollars.”
“Bingo!” A split screen displayed on the monitor in front of Nicco. “Two different bus companies, two different prices and fifty-seven dollars belongs to… Greyhound buses.”
Matt Lilburn entered the operations room. None of the intensity had gone — if anything, it had increased. Out of the corner of his eye he caught sight of Evangeline’s shapely silhouette, bent over talking intently to a group at the other side of the room. But before he could make his way over, his name rang out.
“Matt, over here.” Director Hall had spotted him.
“Sir, Ma’am.”
“Stay here.” Hall turned his attention to Lopez. “What was the time the tickets were bought?”
“The first ticket was bought at ten fifty-three.”
“Nicco, when is that bus scheduled to leave the terminal?”
“Eleven-thirty, sir, and the next one at one-twenty.”
“How long is the trip?”
“That would be… Three hours and twenty-five minutes with zero stops.”
Hall did some quick mental calculations. “Arrives fourteen fifty-five at Binghampton. Time now thirteen-ten, half-hour chopper flight from here. We could have a team at Binghampton about an hour before the bus arrives.”
Suzanna interrupted. “Or we intercept the bus.”
“Even better… so that’s the way we’ll play it. Matt, here’s what I want you to do.”
Chapter Thirteen
Lilburn briefed the three other armed agents as the helicopter lifted off from Homeland Security. It had been estimated the target bus was approximately three-quarters into the trip to Binghamton; the four-man interception team was to touch down on the bus route south and follow the road north until the bus was sighted. At a suitable point the bus was to be stopped and the suspects taken into custody. Lilburn handed copies of the suspects’ passport photos to the team and updated them on their current appearance.
“Just going over the state line into Pennsylvania now, sir, ETA to highway about five minutes.”
Lilburn nodded thanks to the pilot. The three agents in the back seats prepared themselves for the takedown.
A few minutes later the pilot spotted the road and corrected the helicopter to fly above it at an altitude where it was possible to identify the bus among the vehicles below. Numerous cars and trucks plied the four-lane highway, two lanes of one-way traffic running parallel to the other opposing lanes bisected by a central grass strip.
The pilot gained a visual. “A bus down there, I’ll take it down for a closer look.” The helicopter dipped forward then slowed as it came alongside and above the traveling bus.
“Wrong bus,” Lilburn exclaimed. The pilot continued on. Two more buses were discounted due to being the wrong bus company before their luck changed. A blue, grey and white bus with its distinctive greyhound logo was spotted.
“Thar she blows.” The pilot kept pace with the vehicle below. “If we try to stop her here we could end up in all sorts of shit with the traffic following behind.”
Lilburn had to agree. Stopping a large bus in the middle of a highway posed some problems. “What do you suggest?”
“Every now and again there’s room for a vehicle to pull off to the side of the road. Once I see one ahead, I’ll try to time it right so the bus has room to pull in. Let’s hope the driver can read my mind. If there isn’t a safe place for me to stay on the ground, as soon as you boys jump out, I’ll get airborne.”
“Sounds good to me. You guys all ready back there?” The three nodded.
It wasn’t long before the pilot spotted what he was looking for. “One pull-off spot coming up… we have a bit of distance between the bus and the nearest cars behind. Now’s as good as ever… I have to time this right… Hang on, here we go.”
The helicopter swooped in low over the bus, the pilot wanting to gain the driver’s attention. Then pushing the helicopter out to what the pilot thought was a respectful distance, he carried out a tight one-eighty-degree turn and faced the oncoming bus, hovering inches above ground level, rotors close to the second oncoming lane.
“Go-go-go!” The pilot wasn’t waiting for Lilburn to give the command.
The last thing the Greyhound bus driver expected was the sudden noise and appearance of something big and loud buzzing just over the top of his bus. Instinctively he ducked and gave an expletive as adrenalin surged through him. As the flying object pulled away ahead he recognized the outline of a helicopter. “What the fuck…” His foot came off the accelerator ready to apply the brakes, which he did as soon as he saw the chopper turn to face him, hovering in his lane, and four men with guns leapt out. The bus slowed and was preparing to stop when the driver was signaled by one of them to pull over off the highway. What the hell? What is this… a bus-jacking? The driver pulled off the road and stopped his vehicle.
Four men ran towards him as the helicopter lifted upwards and away from the road. The driver looked in his side mirror; he was safely off the road but that was now the least of his worries. There was a loud slap on his front window, a hand was holding up what looked like a wallet hard against the glass. Focusing on the wallet he saw a distinctive emblem and the words Homeland Security. There was a banging on entry door to the side. “Open the door, open the door.”
Lilburn was the first in the door of the bus. “Police, everyone stay calm and remain seated.”
The bus driver sat motionless and stunned, as did the passengers, who showed every intention of following orders. The passengers remained silent in their seats, a baby began crying, its mother instantly tried to hush the child, holding it tighter in her arms. Lilburn glanced over the passengers the length of the bus, there were no sudden movements, heads remained still, all eyes were fixated on him and his weapon. A teenage boy, earphones in his ears near the front of the bus, sheepishly blinked then reeled back in his seat as he awoke to a man in the aisle prodding him with a gun. The other three agents entered the bus behind Lilburn. Lilburn slowly proceeded down the aisle only taking quick looks at those in the seats near him while paying most attention to what was ahead, like a lead scout on military patrol, ready to immediately react to a threat. Two officers behind him paid more attention to the individual faces; they dismissed the obvious, blacks, whites, very young and very old. Anyone of interest had their faces compared with photos of the suspects. No one matched. Nearing the rear of the bus, Lilburn was becoming concerned; there were precious few passengers left. Then there was none.
“Double check.” Lilburn squeezed around the two officers following and hurried back to the bus driver. The third agent had remained at his station by the door.
“Did any passengers get off the bus?” Lilburn asked the driver.
“No, sir, none.”
“You sure? Think carefully.”
“I’m sure, I’m sure, none got off. We haven’t stopped since leaving New York.”
“This is the bus to Binghamton, right?”
“Yes, sir.”
“What time did you leave?”
“Eleven-thirty from Port Authority.”
“How many passengers on your list?”
“Seventeen… there were meant to be nineteen but two didn’t show.”
“Did you see those two at all?”
“No, sir.”