Jordan’s words came back to her: “Whoever these people are, they’ll find a way to divert, contain, distract, or otherwise neutralize whomever Jake sends. We do not know who is trustworthy.”
The DC-10 was on the taxiway moving northbound, with less than a quarter mile separating them from the South Satellite terminal.
Kat leaned over Holt’s right shoulder. “Captain, please listen to me. I believe my people and I are being set up. I saw the police cars at the north gate. This diversion has to mean the people we don’t want to meet are waiting at the south.”
He turned. “No problem. We’ll just taxi to the north gate and ignore them.”
“No!” Kat said. “That… that could put everyone aboard in jeopardy. No. Stop just ahead here, then go toward the south gate.”
“What are you planning?” he asked.
“We’re… going out your right rear door on the escape slide.”
The captain thought for a minute and nodded. “Okay. I’ll stop where that maneuver can’t be seen from the terminal, then have Judy pull the pins after you’re off. We’ll just let the slide blow off, but I’m going to need your corroboration within a week, because my company’s going to want to fire me for throwing a slide out.”
“I will. I promise.”
“What do we tell them at the gate?” Holt asked.
“That you have no idea what they’re talking about. You saw nothing. Buy me some time. One of those groups will not be legitimate FBI agents. If you say you’re going to check their names with FBI headquarters and they leave, you’ll know.”
“You got it. Go. Call me on the interphone before you open the door.”
Kat patted his shoulder and thanked him as she turned and left the cockpit. She tried not to look panicked as she collected the others. Steve grabbed her suitcase from the overhead compartment without being asked and hurried after her toward the back of the DC-10.
The aircraft was moving too slowly, and the ground controller had noticed. “Seven-thirty-two, Seattle Ground. You have a problem, Sir?”
“Negative, Ground. Just a passenger out of his seat too soon. We need to hold here until we coax him back in.”
Kat had briefed Judy on the way to the rear of the aircraft as they tried to avoid the startled looks of the other passengers. Judy pulled a curtain separating the last row from the entryway and placed her hand on the door lever as Kat phoned the cockpit.
“Captain? We’re ready,” Kat reported.
“Okay,” Holt told her on the interphone. “We’re depressurized and stopped. Do it. Be careful going down that slide, and Godspeed.”
Kat breathed a thank-you as she hung up, and Judy opened the door, letting the large emergency escape slide fall from its housing and start inflating.
“Stand by!” Judy said. “When I give the word, jump and sit, and run when you hit the bottom.”
“Jump, then sit?” Dallas asked. “Are you sure that’s the right sequence?”
Judy nodded. “We do it all the time.”
Dallas looked genuinely startled. “Passengers leave like this all the time?”
Judy smiled and shook her head. “Only in training. Now GO!”
Steve went first, followed by Graham and Dan, who was helped to the edge and guided by Judy. Robert followed, but Dallas stood to one side of the open door virtually immobile, her eyes following the others.
“DAMN, that’s a long way down!” Dallas said.
“We don’t have time to debate it, Dallas,” Kat told her.
“Honey, you guys go on, and I’ll just hide in the rest room till spring.”
“No.”
“I don’t want to go down that slide, Kat! Gravity and I don’t get along.”
“It’s simple,” Judy offered.
“Then you go in my place. A little dark makeup, you could pass for me. I could stay here and serve the drinks and pamper the pilots.”
“DALLAS!” Kat snapped, taking her by the shoulders. “NOW!” She half kicked Dallas out the door, listening to a war whoop as Dallas’s rear landed on the slide about a quarter of the way down. She slid off the bottom to the waiting arms of Steve and Robert as Kat turned to Judy. “He said to release it after we’re gone.”
“I will. Go. The bags come next. Good luck.”
Kat’s trip down the slide was fast. She stumbled at the bottom and righted herself, then turned around in time to see Steve’s backpack, Robert’s computer case, and her roll-on bag coming down behind her, followed by the large emergency slide fluttering away as Judy jettisoned it, waved, and closed the door.
“Okay, Kemosabe,” Dallas yelled in Kat’s ear, trying to be heard over the noise and jet blast of the engines as she brushed herself off. “What do we do now?”
Kat had seen the makeshift private aircraft facility at the south end of the field before. They had bailed out next to it, unobserved in the darkness.
“This way!” she said, running toward the trailer that doubled as an office, past two Learjets, a Cessna Citation, a King Air, and a Gulfstream, all of them parked on the small corporate ramp bordering the large Alaska Airlines maintenance complex.
With Robert running in step beside her, she glanced back, satisfied that all of them were keeping up. She slowed her own pace to keep everyone close.
“Hurry! Come on!”
Kat slowed to a walk as she climbed the steps to avoid bursting through the door of the office, where two men were working on a computer behind the counter.
Both of them jumped from their chairs. “Hi! We… didn’t miss an arrival out there, did we?” one of them asked.
Kat smiled and shook her head. “No, we’re from the Gulfstream. You fellows have a way to get us to the terminal?”
“Sure,” the older man said. “Right out back. Come on.”
Robert was giving her a quizzical look as they all followed the man through the doors to a van with the facility’s name printed in bold letters on its side.
“What are you doing, Kat?” he half whispered. “I thought we were trying to avoid the terminal.” She put a finger to her lips and motioned him inside the van, bringing up the rear and closing the door.
The driver dropped them off inside the airport’s parking structure adjacent to the terminal, and Kat handed him a twenty-dollar bill as they got out.
“Hey, not necessary!” he told her.
She leaned over and lowered her voice. “No, but it’s both a thank-you and silence money. You didn’t see us, and neither did your coworker.”
He smiled and put the van in gear. “You got it, Ma’am, and Jerry’s going off duty as soon as I get back.”
With Steve and Dallas bringing up the rear, Kat quickly guided the little group to the northern-most parking elevator. They rode it down to the first floor, and she briefed them urgently before the door slid open.
“Okay. Walk to the right, all the way to the end of that driveway where it rejoins the main drive. Wait there and be ready to jump in when I get there.”
“What are you doing? Renting a car?” Robert asked.
“Sort of,” she said, smiling. “We broke up a ring of car thieves doing exactly what I’m about to do. So don’t ask, and don’t hesitate when I reach you.”
Kat found the appropriate part of the rental car return drive, positioning herself well away from where the other rental car company employees were standing. There would only be minutes left before the men waiting for them at the South Satellite realized they’d been outfoxed. With Jake’s team converging as well, they had one chance to escape before even the airport exits might be closed.
A subcompact car entered the car-return area, and she let it pass, along with a midsize car behind it. A minivan turned in with a couple and three kids, and Kat stepped forward, checking a clipboard she’d taken from an unattended counter.