“Out there? Starboard engine’s at forty percent and still burning.”
“That’s where we land,” Cantell said. “That strip. We can make that.”
“You’re suddenly the pilot?” McGuiness stole another look at the MaxViz. He glanced over at Cantell.
“We can do this,” Cantell said. “We put it down there. We make the call. Not so different than what we had planned.”
“The checklist,” McGuiness shouted.
The nose of the jet slowly moved away from the lights of Stanley and pointed northwest.
“Thata boy,” said Cantell.
He then flipped the laminated sheets and began reading aloud.
46
The periodic updates from his dispatcher began to weigh on Walt. He put two patrols on the armory. He had his deputies there in vests and with shotguns.
Connected with the MC from the Incident Command Center, using a video uplink, he was apprised of the damage and informed of the overwhelming response from law enforcement-eighteen officers in twelve patrol cars were currently on the scene. Including his own deputies, that put the number at well over twenty. By his estimate, that left four or five officers total in the Hailey area, four his, two already guarding the armory.
It was another screwup of epic proportions by valley police departments.
He had finally identified George Clooney. He’d popped out on a federal sheet of “known associates” of the wheelman, McGuiness. A picture of one Christopher Cantell was in the upper-right-hand corner of the OneDOJ sheet that lay in front of him. It listed arrests, not convictions, and noted that Cantell had a reputation for creating feints for his heists. He was “a master of deception, calm to the point of sociopathic,” and “a person of interest” in four open investigations.
Whatever Cantell’s plan had been for the wine, Walt now believed it too was a feint, a second robbery attempt planned south of the blocked bridge. His patience stretched thin, still reeling from Cantell’s success with the Roach Motel bait-and-switch tactic, Walt took a call from Fiona.
“Not north of the terminal,” she said. “South. Sumner’s jet, a Lear. No one’s seen the kids.”
“Okay.”
But it wasn’t okay, and they both knew it.
“The Lear… Sumner’s Lear? It just took off. That was the plane you saw. Tail number T-A-nine-five-nine.”
“What?” His head spun. “Hillabrand’s at the auction dinner?” he asked.
“What has he got to do with anything?”
“Yes or no?”
“Yes, but-”
“Call him, please. Tell him it’s an emergency, that we need him to find Teddy Sumner in the crowd. Sumner needs to call my office ASAP. Can you do that?”
“Of course.”
“Is Pete there with you?”
“Yes.”
“Put him on please.” Walt waved off Nancy as she entered his office to tell him something. She leaned over and passed him a note. Armory clear. Standing guard.
He acknowledged it with a nod.
A gruff voice answered the phone.
“Pete! Have you got a flight plan for the Lear?”
“I’ll look into it.”
“I think Kevin’s on that plane. If and when that jet lands in another state, he’s looking at a felony. Transportation of a minor. We need to contact the pilot and turn that plane around for everyone’s sake.”
“I understand.”
“Call me.”
“Done deal.”
The phone rang less than five minutes later. It was Teddy Sumner. Fiona was proving herself invaluable.
“What’s this all about, Sheriff?”
Walt could hear the auctioneer prattling in the background.
“Your plane,” he said. “I need you to tell your pilot to turn it around.”
“My pilot’s at the Best Western, running up movies and room service on an expense account, Sheriff. What do you mean, turn it around?”
Walt held the receiver to his ear but said nothing. The bidding price in the background was up to seven thousand dollars.
“Your Lear took off from the Sun Valley Airport less than ten minutes ago. I believe your daughter and a companion are on board.”
“Summer’s due… Oh, shit-”
There was a long pause on the other end. The bidding had reached eight-five.
“I suppose it’s possible William needed a maintenance run,” he continued. “I don’t always hear about those things. Maybe Summer talked him into a joyride.”
“We need to reach the pilot.”
“I can call.”
“Anything you can do to confirm the location of your plane and whether your daughter and a friend are on board would be appreciated.”
“To confirm you’re mistaken?” Sumner sounded dubious.
“Yes.”
“That would be a first. What kind of cop are you?”
“Elected,” Walt answered.
Sumner barked a laugh.
“One other thing, Mr. Sumner. Can you tell me how much a plane like yours costs?”
“The general rule is, if you have to ask, you can’t afford it.”
“Millions.” Walt made it a statement.
“Seventeen-five.”
“Get back to me as soon as you can. And thank you again for your cooperation.”
The bidding stopped at nine thousand five hundred. Going once… going twice…
Walt grabbed his cell phone from its charger on his way out the door.
Seventeen-five.
He stopped in front of Nancy’s desk.
“Call Myra,” he said. “Get the details of how to track Kevin’s cell phone. We’ll need her user name and password.”
Nancy reached for the phone.
Walt moved around to behind her desk. Within a minute, she had accessed the website and had the GPS location for Kevin’s phone, which was north of Ketchum.
Walt checked the map’s time stamp: seven minutes earlier.
“Oh, crap,” he said, his eyes jumping between his watch and the time on the screen.
“Click ‘History,’” he said.
Nancy moved the cursor and clicked. The screen refreshed to Kevin’s location of ten minutes earlier.
“The airport,” Nancy said. “That can’t be right. Hailey Airport to Ketchum in a couple of minutes? I don’t think so. No one can drive that fast.”
“He isn’t driving,” Walt said.
47
As the call went dead, the plane shook, and to the left Kevin heard a series of loud pops followed by silence. The roar now came only from the right.
He checked his bars: zero. He powered down the phone, saving the battery for when they landed.
He looked at the phone cradled in his hand. If they caught him-and they would-they’d confiscate it. The trick was to hide it, come back for it later. He tried slipping it under the pad he was lying on, but it made an obvious bulge. Just outside the sliding partition, he spotted a hand-towel dispenser. With the pilots busy and Summer and her captor facing forward, their backs to him, Kevin reached out of the storage compartment.
His finger deciphered the dispenser’s front panel and he opened it, slipping his phone inside.
The challenge was to think like his uncle. For all he knew, these guys were planning a 9/11-style suicide flight into some skyscraper in Seattle or Salt Lake. Or maybe they were hijacking the Lear to pick up some criminal, like on Prison Break.
He relived all that he’d seen on his brief tour of the jet: a fire extinguisher next to the galley, knives and a corkscrew in the drawer, a flashlight above the toilet, a first-aid kit.
He assumed there would be cleaning supplies, possibly beneath the sink or in one of the larger drawers in the galley.
The wiry guy had taken down Summer with one hand. Kevin wasn’t going to let that happen to him. He’d seen enough movies to know the good guy never got a second chance. He’d get one shot, if he was lucky. He was Bruce Willis in Die Hard, Matt Damon in Bourne, Daniel Craig as 007. He had plenty of reference material to draw upon.