“I don’t wear glasses,” Greene said hotly. Then he remembered exactly who was in the front seat. Retired or not, you had to be polite to an admiral.
“That, my friend, was the esteemed Pamela Drake. And when we get on board, you’ll say nothing to her. Not a word. Zip. Nada.” The plane captain who had followed Tombstone up the boarding ladder double-checked Tombstone’s straps then pulled the safeties that kept the ejection seat from firing on the ground and held them up for Tombstone’s inspection. Tombstone counted them out loud, as was his habit, and then nodded.
“I’m not a RIO, I’m a pilot,” Greene grumbled. “And speaking of being a pilot—”
“You’re not current, are you?” Tombstone said calmly. “If you had been in shape to fly, you could have gotten your quals out of the way yesterday. I told you I’d make sure you’d get more stick time.”
“A touch of the flu,” Greene muttered. Not exactly true, since the alcohol he’d consumed the night before had killed off any germs.
“Right. Pre-start checklist,” Tombstone said, and opened his flight manual to begin to run through it. “Ready?”
With a sigh, Greene opened his own manual. He knew Tombstone did not believe him, and he couldn’t blame him. Yes, he should have gotten his quals taken care of yesterday, but what the heck? After all, there would be time on the boat, wouldn’t there?
But it’s your own fault. You missed the chance to fly out there, one small part of his mind insisted. Tombstone is never out of qual, is he? He makes time.
Responding automatically to Tombstone’s questions as he completed the backseat pre-flight actions, Jeremy mulled that thought over for a moment.
Technically, Jeremy Greene was not on active duty. When he agreed to become part of the small, highly specialized special operations group that Tombstone and his uncle headed up, he had been discharged from the Navy and offered a civilian contract with the company. True, should he leave Advanced Analysis, as their Beltway front was known, he would immediately be recalled to active duty. But technically, at least, he was a civilian right now, wasn’t he?
Technically.
So how did Tombstone figure he was entitled to tell Jeremy who he could and couldn’t talk to? Pamela Drake — of course, he knew who she was. And he knew her history with Tombstone as well. It wasn’t like he had a romantic interest in her, was it? Hell no. But that chick he’d seen with Drake in the terminal, now that was a different matter. Maybe her secretary or something. He’d find out once they got on the boat. There were no secrets there.
“Pre-fight complete,” Tombstone announced.
“Complete,” Jeremy agreed.
Tombstone started the Tomcat’s engines, increasing power as they rumbled to life. Inside the cockpit, Jeremy felt the familiar vibrations of a Tomcat on the ground radiate through the fuselage, up the frame of his seat, and resonate in his bones. It was a warm, welcoming sound, as though the aircraft had missed them and was eager to be airborne.
“Tower, 101, ready to roll,” Greene announced, taking over the communications. The tower granted them clearance ahead of the COD and they rolled out smoothly past her, paused for a moment at the beginning of the runway for final checks, and then began their final roll out. Tombstone applied power smoothly, quickly taking her up to speed, then rotated at slightly over the minimum distance. He put the Tomcat into a steep climb, carefully following the tower’s vectors to clear the area. The area around San Diego was busy, and he was careful to stay out of commercial air control areas.
“Better than the COD,” Greene said. “Although I’m not sure why we needed a full weapon loadout.”
“Always take weapons if they’re offered,” Tombstone said. “Besides, you never know when you’ll need them.”
“Are we? Likely to need them right away, I mean.”
Tombstone didn’t answer.
So this is just a routine mission to ferry a new aircraft out to the squadron, is it? Bullshit. There’s more to this whole incident than meets the eye. Tombstone’s acting like we’re flying into a hostile area. He’s bound to know more about this than he’s telling me. They always do.
It was a source of continuing frustration to Jeremy that Tombstone and his uncle played their cards close to their respective chests.
“Okay, just so I know to stay awake,” Jeremy said. Not like he could sleep in the back of a Tomcat, anyway. Not after what happened last time he’d dozed off. He slept through an engagement, and it had taken Tombstone shouting at him to wake him up.
“There’s no specific threat to know about, Jeremy,” Tombstone said, evidently reading his backseater’s mind. “But it just makes sense to be heads up. You can’t believe everything you read in the newspapers or hear on the air. Particularly not,” he continued, animosity in his voice, “when Pamela Drake is involved. Just keep that in mind.”
“I will. But once we get closer to the carrier—”
“Some fighters from Jefferson will meet us,” Tombstone said. “And tanker support. I’m not anticipating any problems, but you never know.”
“You never know,” Jeremy echoed. He glanced down at his radarscope. “Looks like they’re airborne. Where do you want to stay?”
“High and forwards,” Tombstone said promptly, evidently having already considered the issue. “We’ll be in the data link, but I want my own radar taking a look ahead as well. Just in case.”
Jeremy sighed. “I have a feeling I’m going to get real tired of hearing that phrase.”
Pamela had sneaked a seat next to one of the four windows, and the light streaming in through the scratched and scarred plastic provided enough illumination for her to read her book as they flew. Winston had not been quite as quick to grab a seat, nor had the cameraman bothered to save one for her as he had for Pamela, and she was relegated to the back part of the plane, with the tail ramp in full view. The rear, Pamela had discovered early on, was also the most turbulent part of the COD, although none of it could be called particularly smooth. And other than in the few seats near the windows, there was not enough light to read. Not that Winston had brought a book anyway.
Beside her, the cameraman was asleep. He was an old hand at this and, although she had never told him so, Pamela’s favorite to work with. Jeff possessed an unusually placid, level-headed manner, and even her worst temper tantrums seemed to pass right over him. Additionally, although she’d never told him this either, he was by far in her mind the most bloodthirsty of the cameramen. Given a chance between reaching out to try to save Drake from falling off a cliff and getting a good shot of the look of terror on her face, she suspected he would instinctively choose the latter. Maybe his even temper wasn’t so much a good disposition as a lack of connection on some basic level with other people.
But she’d take good work over friendliness any day, and that was why he was here.
Finally, she fell asleep as well, and the hours passed quickly.
NINE
The admiral’s conference room was packed with his staff and representatives from the ship’s company. Despite the early morning hour, no one looked tired or sleepy, though more than one face showed purple bruises under the eyes. No one had slept much, Coyote included.
“Listen up, people. It’s going to get worse before it gets better. We’ve got a COD inbound as well as message traffic five feet deep. For the time being, I want us all focused on self-protection and preventing another tragedy. I want a full CAP complement up, twenty-four seven. No chances — not until we figure out what’s going on here. That clear?” Coyote scanned the faces of the staff seated around the table.