Aaron usually hung in the background whenever Shoshana was around, deferring to her, and it was the first time I’d seen him forcefully tell her no. I thought she would explode, like she usually did with me, but she simply nodded. He was clearly in charge of their team.
She looked at me and said, “Show me what to do.”
I thought,What? How come he didn’t get yelled at? Where did that put me in the pecking order?Instead, I threw her a bone, saying, “Hey, you’ll also be our only conduit to the shit show we just left behind.”
It had taken thirty minutes to convince the battalion of trigger-happy army guys and police that we weren’t the hostage takers, first by communicating with them from the cockpit, then by opening the door and letting a bunch of armed police come storming in, with all of us sitting in the seats with our hands in the air.
They’d stomped around a little bit, acting like they were seeing if we’d crammed the hostages in the toilet or suit jacket closet, but mostly trying to figure out how they were going to explain the embarrassment of what had just happened. It turned out that they had shut down the airport, and the A4 escort had landed, saying that the next plane in—which was a private charter not unlike the Rock Star Bird—would be the hostages.
Easy mistake, if you forget that we had a different callsign and were a completely different type of aircraft. Even so, I’d told them I had no idea what the hell they were talking about, that I was Grolier Recovery Services, and we’d never seen such shoddy treatment. About that time they’d gotten word about the second hijacking of the day, with the theft of a helicopter just across the channel.
They’d left the aircraft and I’d demanded to be allowed to take off andfly back to Buenos Aires. They were more than happy to let us go, figuring we’d be in front of television cameras immediately if we stayed in Ushuaia. Of course, I had no intention of returning to Buenos Aires.
As soon as we were airborne, I’d had Aaron and Shoshana start looking at a digital map for suitable spots to land that little helicopter while Jennifer and Veep started prepping the jump gear. All we knew was that they’d taken off and flown east, towards the Tierra del Fuego national forest, and from a quick look at the map, I figured they were headed to Chile, as that would be a clean break from everything going on in Argentina, both because it was an extremely rugged, depopulated area and because it was a national border.
We were already in Chilean airspace—that’s how close the border was—and we’d flown over two potential areas, but the FLIR had shown no activity. The camera wasn’t nearly as good as something you’d get from a Reaper or Gray Eagle drone, but it wasn’t something to sneeze at either. It was capable of finding heat sources and providing images good enough for mensurating the terrain, which was all we needed.
Shoshana pointed at another spot, deeper into Chile, and I relayed it to the pilot. We were over the top of it in seconds, but it was also empty. I was growing frustrated, because the border with Chile was a giant mountain range with very limited places to set the helo down successfully—especially at night—and we were running up on the range of its capabilities. It wasn’t like it was an MH-60 Pave Hawk with drop tanks.
Shoshana said, “Do you have the cell phone collection on?”
“No. No reason. There’s no cell service out here.”
“All the more reason. If the Ghost still has his cell phone, maybe he’s just left it on in his pocket. It’ll be looking for a tower, and we’re the only game in town.”
I jumped up, saying, “Good point.” I went to the pilots and had them initiate, then separated another tablet from a holster in the cockpit. I called Veep over, telling him what we were doing. He started working the tablet, then said, “It’s completely blank. There’s not a cell phone anywhere around here.”
Shit.I said, “Keep working it. I’ll help out Jennifer.”
I went to her, seeing her checking out the Javelin parachutes we had, making sure the Cyprus AODs were functioning, and the containers were serviceable.
She looked up and I could see a little anxiety slip out. She really hated jumping, especially at night.
She said, “No luck yet?”
Aaron called out, “Alpha four dry hole. Moving to Alpha five, but we’re almost at the nautical limit of the helicopter.”
I smiled at her, because her expression was saying,Glad to hear that.I said, “Don’t worry, I don’t think this fishing expedition is going to work out.”
Chapter 79
Omar put his pistol in the pocket of his parka and put his hands out to the fire, saying, “Why are you so adamant about this final strike? Let’s just kill these people and escape.”
“Why are you so adamant about not telling me? It makes me believe you’re hiding something.”
Omar said nothing. The Ghost said, “Look, what difference does it make now? Even if I’m captured out here and tortured to talk, it’ll be too late, won’t it?”
Omar said, “We should make sure our escape is ready.” He went to a footlocker and pulled out an Iridium satellite cell phone, turning it on. The Ghost knew he was simply stalling, but didn’t press the issue.
He said, “You’re going to call them now?”
“No,” Omar said, “just making sure the number is loaded. They won’t be available until tomorrow. We were supposed to drive to them, but now it looks like we’ll be walking.”
“Where is the pickup?”
“At the end of Highway 3, after it turns into a hiking trail. Follow it to the water and a boat will pick us up at a Catholic shrine right on the shore. That’s the meeting location.”
The Ghost could tell that Omar’s mind was somewhere else by the way he was talking, and he thought he knew why.
