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THE SIZE AND SMELL of her attacker filled up the lavatory. Laynie said nothing because her assailant’s fists looked as though they could snap her neck in two as easily as snapping dried pasta. And there wasn’t much she could do in these close confines to defend herself.
Except for the nail file.
She let her hand float toward it.
“Don’t do it, missy. Don’t even think about it.”
Laynie’s hand fell to her side. “Who are you? What do you want?”
“Those are both good questions, particularly since you didn’t scream for help. I mean, what woman doesn’t scream her fool head off when shoved into a bathroom against her will? Unless. Unless she’s the kinda woman who can take care of herself, who can teach a man to keep his hands to hisself, if need be—which is what I figgered you for.”
His accent was down-South good-old-boy country. Laynie cranked her neck up and back to examine his extremely close-up features.
“I asked the first question. Who are you?”
He grimaced. “Not ’zactly supposed to do that, a’ course—but the exigencies of the immediate situation demand adaptability.”
The glut of polysyllabic terminology piled on top of the country schtick confused Laynie. Then he started to lift his hand—that slab of brick attached to the end of his arm—and she tensed.
“Calm down, lady. Just goin’ for my badge.”
Badge? Marstead agents did not have badges.
He extricated it from his jacket pocket and held it near the tip of her nose—so close that Laynie went cross-eyed trying to read it.
He read it for her. “Quincy Tobin, Deputy US Marshal, Sky Marshal on this flight. My friends call me Quince.”
Laynie swatted the badge away and played her indignant card. “Then I’ll call you Marshal Tobin. Why did you barge in on me, Marshal? What do you want?”
“Like I said, we need to talk. My gut tells me that we-all got us a problem on this flight.”
Laynie wrinkled her nose. “Your gut? What, got you a bad tummy? Need some Pepto-Bismol, do you?”
“Don’t get mouthy, missy. If my gut is right, I’ma need some help.”
She feigned surprise. “Help? From me?”
From li’l ol’ me?
He grinned, displaying an impressive set of pearly white teeth—and a dimple in his chin. “Let’s play nice, shall we? I introduced myself. Want to reciprocate?”
Crossing her arms and moving her right hand to the head of the nail file, Laynie said, “Marta Forestier.”
He nodded. “Noticed you back at Heathrow before you got on this plane, how you stayed tucked away in the back of that coffee shop, watching the gate, checking out every person who came and went, then boarding at the last minute. I boarded just before you did and saw how you scoped out our cabin when you entered—you did walk right by me, you know. I figure you to have some training, possibly undercover experience?”
He shifted from perfect diction back to his hokey po’ boy accent. “So, jest off the cuff, I’ma guessin’ Marta Forestier ain’t your real name—how’m I doin?”
Laynie glared at him. “I have no idea what you’re babbling about. I’m a French citizen, a tourist to the US.”
“And I’m a ballerina. Just you wait till you get a gander at me in my tutu.”
The image was so blatantly ridiculous that Laynie sniggered.
He grinned again. “The Bolshoi wanted me bad, let me tell ya, but I chose the Marshals Service ’stead.”
“I’ll bet the Bolshoi’s still crying its heart out.”
Laynie was, in that moment, not as worried about this guy as she initially had been. She pulled herself together—but he kept pushing.
“So, care t’ tell me who you really are, Marta? Cop? Fed? Crossing guard? You got a badge? I showed you mine. C’mon. Lemme see yours.”
“Sorry. Don’t have one.”
“That so.”
“Yes. That’s so.”
“Hmm. I pegged you for an American at first, but your accent—it jest ain’t right, y’know? Has that tetch o’ European, cain’t quite put my finger on. So, now I’ma have ta think ‘spook.’ Which is it—CIA? NSA? DIA? MIA?”
MIA? Oh, if you only knew.
“No, no, and no.”
He got in her face. “Jest tell me one thing, missy. You one of the good guys, or you one of the bad guys?”
“Good is a relative term, Marshal. And on another point? Stop calling me ‘missy’ like I was in high school. Judging from those crinkles around your eyes and the heaping helping of salt in your formerly pepper hair? You and I are probably close to the same age—so quit with the ‘missy’ business.”
He stared at her, close-up, eye to eye, until she thought his eyeballs might pop out on springs and blind her.
Laynie put a palm on his chest and tried to push him back a few inches. She may as well have been trying to move Plymouth Rock.
She huffed her frustration. “Marshal Tobin, what is it you want from me?”
“Deputy Marshal Tobin. Well, fact is, Marta, we got us a hijacking in the works, and I find myself sadly shorthanded and outgunned.”
Suddenly her earlier disquiet made sense. “Wait. You mean . . . the Middle-Eastern men. They acted like they weren’t together, but . . .”
“Figgered you fancied ’em when I caught your little do-si-do with the leader, minute ago.”
“He’s their leader? Yeah. Something’s off about him. Cocky. Reckless or arrogant? But I didn’t put him and the others together. Didn’t think hijackers.”
I should have.
“No worries. It’s my job to spot ’em.”
“And you’re certain?”
“If I were t’ bet cash money that they weren’t terrorists, I’d lose that bet, sure as the sun comes up in the morning—which it won’t for any of us on this plane if we don’t act to stop them.”
Laynie frowned. “How many, total? Two here in business class—meaning the others are in economy class, somewhere behind us?”
“Yep—three in econo class—two in the rows behind us, the third on the other side. And I ’spect that, soon, at a predetermined time or signal, them good ol’ boys up front with us will charge the cockpit, while the three behind us move to take control of the crew. They’ll take hostages from the passengers to manipulate the crew.”
“What’s the plan?”
“Cain’t say ’less I know you’ll play along, cuz I’ma thinking ain’t neither of us makin’ it to New York if we don’t work together. So. Marta. I have another question. You carryin’?”
The question caught her off balance. She didn’t let it show.
She also didn’t answer.
“C’mon, Marta. Yay or nay. Ain’t got all day.”
“I’ll show you mine, Marshal—if you keep yours holstered.”
“Fair ’nuff.”
“I’m pulling my piece now,” Laynie murmured. She reached inside her blouse and drew the HK P7K3.
“Well, ain’t that sweet—an itty bitty popgun,” Tobin drawled. “An’ I’m partial t’ blue, too. How many rounds?”
“Eight plus a second mag. I hope that doesn’t mean you intend to reenact the O.K. Corral while we’re flying at thirty-thousand feet in a fragile, pressurized metal tube?”
“Naw, but word t’ the wise?” He dropped the phony accent. “If circumstances dictate that you engage our friends with your popgun, don’t shoot out the windows, okay?”
“Got it. What are you carrying?”
“Glock .40 cal in m’ shoulder holster, compact Beretta 9mm backup on m’ ankle.”
“And I got me a mean nail file tucked into m’ blouse.”
He snickered. “Good to know.”
Then he went formal. “Marta Forestier, I hereby deputize you to assist me, a Deputy Marshal of the US Marshals Service, to prevent the hijacking of this plane. You are authorized to use whatever force deemed necessary, including deadly force, to prevent such an attack. Do you accept this responsibility?”
Laynie blew out a long breath. “All right. I accept.”
“Good. And now that we’ve exchanged confidences and all? I’ma thinking we’d better get out of this phone booth before someone suspects us of doin’ the mile-high cha-cha.”
“You still haven’t told me your plan.”
His expression drew down into serious lines. “Right. Here it is. Above all else, above every other concern including personal or passenger safety? Those hijackers do not gain entry to the cockpit. You got that? No matter how many deaths or hostages taken, we—you and I—must prevent those men from reaching the cockpit and taking control of this plane.”
Laynie watched the creases around his eyes deepen.
“Therefore, Marta, I need to know that you are mentally prepared to do whatever it takes to keep them from seizing this plane. I’m taking a risk with you, believing from what I’ve observed that you are both trained and experienced. Am I right in my assessment? And will you do your part, or am I making a huge, potentially lethal mistake by placing trust in you?”
Laynie’s lips twitched. Why, you turn that country schtick on and off like tap water, don’t you?
She met his solemn, inquiring gaze. “No, you’re not making a mistake, Marshal. Yes, I’m trained. And, yes, you can count on me to do my part.”
“Good to know. Well, then, Marta, that is the plan.”
“You plan doesn’t have much detail to it.”
“No, but your seat assignment puts you in a primo location.”
Laynie nodded. “You handle Abdul and his buddy when they charge the cockpit. I’ll pick off the others as they poke their heads through the curtain.”
Tobin’s eyes narrowed. “Abdul? Thought you didn’t know these guys.”
Laynie adopted his drawl. “Ah don’ know ’em, Marshal Tobin, sir. Honest ah don’! Jest slapped that-there ‘Abdul’ label on him, on accounta he irked me reeeel bad.”
Tobin wasn’t convinced.
Laynie sighed and tried again. “Seriously, Marshal. I’d never seen these guys before they boarded this plane. Scout’s honor. I’ll even pinky swear, okay?”
Shooting the stink eye her way, Tobin acquiesced. “Okay, I’ll take you at your word—but only because you threw in a pinky swear.”
He got back to business. “We have as good a plan as we can conjure, given the time we have. You put that popgun back where the sun don’ shine and leave first. I’ma follow you in a minute.”
Getting the door open was, again, problematic. She was amused when Tobin’s massive hands spanned her waist and lifted her like a feather. He pulled her tight to his chest, swiveled, sat on the toilet, and plopped her down in front of the door.
Then he really threw her for a loop.
“God go with you, Marta.”
She met his gaze. He meant it.
“Thank you . . . Quince. Same to you.”
“He’s always with me,” Tobin answered, tapping his chest with a finger the size of a ball-peen hammer. “Right here.”
Laynie jerked her chin once, acknowledging him, pulled the door toward her, and slid out.
No one was waiting in line for the lavatories, and not much had changed in the cabin. Passengers still slept or conversed with their seatmates. Bryan and Todd to the left of her seat tapped on their laptops. The honeymooners snuggled, giggled, and made goo-goo eyes at each other.
Beyond the honeymooners, the dark-haired man pivoted in his seat—as though he’d been waiting for Laynie to exit the restroom. He nodded and smirked, his eyes filled with salacious intent.
Laynie’s lips curved up, and she made a little pistol with her hand and aimed it at him. Smiled larger and kept smiling. It’s a joke, Abdul, her expression told him. A joke, get it? Just a silly, bold-eyed, not even remotely demure, uppity American woman joke.
Until it isn’t.
He laughed and “shot” her back.
Cold and cruel. He was no novice, either. He was calculating and dangerous. Marshal Tobin would have his hands full.
I can’t think about Tobin’s problems. We won’t succeed in stopping them if I worry about him instead of taking care of my own business.
Laynie sank into her seat, considering the three men she was tasked to subdue. Would they be as experienced as she believed Abdul was? How would they be armed? Guns were difficult to get aboard a plane, but not impossible.
I know that for a fact.
Her first action was to bend over like she was tying a shoe, remove the HK from her bra, and tuck it between her right hip and the seat cushion where it would be at the ready. She collected her gun’s second magazine from her purse and slipped it into her left pocket. She left the nail file in her blouse where she could easily get to it.
Then she began her mental preparations, putting herself in the hijackers’ minds, running various scenarios they might use, determining where she should position herself to ambush the three in economy class when they charged forward—planning her offensive the way Marstead had taught her years ago.
The greatest unknown was the timing. She couldn’t move into position before Abdul and his companion commenced their assault. She had to watch them and time her play to beat theirs by seconds.
A couple of minutes passed. Tobin left the restroom and sauntered up the left aisle toward his seat. Laynie peeked right to see if Abdul had noticed Tobin coming out of the lavatory she’d just exited.
He hadn’t. As far as Laynie could tell, he and his companion had their heads together, whispering.
It was going to be dicey, no matter how it played out. Two against five. Defense rather than offense.
Still, Laynie was filled with an odd sense of relief . . . of purpose and “rightness”—something she had lost along the way. She wasn’t afraid. She had a job to do, a real job, one that would save lives, not betray confidences. She could die doing this one thing and be grateful that Fate had placed her here, at this unique moment, for this very reason.
Fate? Or God?
All of God’s promises are true, Laynie . . . One way or another, he will work those promises into reality. He is God, and he will have his way.
Laynie put her head down and whispered into her hands. “Oh, Kari! You have such faith in your God, but the way it looks now? I probably won’t ever make it to your little homestead out on the prairie—and your God won’t have his way. Not with me, anyway.”
She clamped her teeth together and forced herself to put those thoughts aside. She needed to focus on the skirmish ahead, but as she tried to gather her thoughts, Abdul’s cold, cruel expression intervened. She clenched her jaw so hard that it hurt.
Think you’ve got this hijacking sewn up, don’t you, Laynie told the dark-haired man silently. Think again. No. No, I won’t let you do this. We will stop you—whatever it takes.
Laynie checked her watch. She had set it ahead to EDT, and it read 9:05 a.m. They were scheduled to land at Kennedy in less than an hour. The pilots would begin their descent soon.
Across from her, Bryan told his associate, “I’d better check in with Grace—just in case the meeting’s been moved up or the venue changed.”
Bryan drew a pen and a pad of paper from his briefcase and lifted the Airfone from its receptacle in the seatback in front of him. He slid a credit card through the reader and punched in the number.
“Hey, Grace? Hi, Bryan here. Just checking in and—”
“Bryan! Oh, my God! Bry—”
Even from across the aisle, Laynie heard what was coming from the phone.
Screams. Shouts.
Fear.
“Grace? What the *blank* is happening? What? I can’t hear you!”
Bryan had raised his voice, gaining the attention of everyone in the cabin. Then he pulled the phone away from his ear and looked at it.
Todd asked, “What’s up?”
“Dunno. The call cut out. *Bleeping* things aren’t all that reliable.”
“Better call her back.”
Laynie half-listened while Bryan went through the tedious process of running his credit card through the reader and dialing. She was experiencing a revelation of sorts.
What, precisely, had Petroff told her?
I have been summoned to a special assembly of the Security Council. Some emergency of state over rumors of an impending attack on high-value targets of unknown number, the information coming to us via a source I have little confidence in.
She reached her hand across the aisle and touched Bryan’s arm.
“Excuse me. I couldn’t help but overhear your conversation. Where do you work?”
Bryan frowned. “I’m a little busy here, Marta.”
Laynie’s fingers dug into his flesh. “I asked you a question. Where do you work?”
Bryan flushed. “We’re full partners at Braun and Pfizer. Our offices are at the World Trade Center, North Tower. Now, Miss Nosy, if you don’t mind, *blank* off.”
Laynie let go. She had questioned Petroff, couching her inquisitiveness in concern, hoping to gain additional information. An attack? Will you be safe, my love?
Da, without a doubt. I surmised from the call that it was not a threat against the Motherland, and I am not certain how much credence I give the intelligence—coming via Afghanistan.
It had bothered her then, for multiple reasons. What imminent attack on a nation other than Russia would spin up the Russian Federation’s Security Council, forcing them into full session as it had? And why had the intelligence, coming through Afghanistan, made Petroff less than confident of the report? What did it all mean?
Laynie’s instincts raced ahead, her analysis moving faster than her thoughts, colliding with conclusions—horrifying conclusions that set her heart pumping so hard, she struggled to catch her breath.
She stuttered and murmured to herself, “Imminent attacks on-on-on more than one high-value target . . . intelligence from Afghanistan. Afghanistan . . . a predominantly Muslim nation, governed by arcane and often savage tribal leaders who provide refuge to-to-to radical Islamic factions.”
She asked herself, And which nation on earth do Islamic fundamentalists despise above all others?
“America,” Laynie breathed. “America, the Great Satan.”
Her conclusion was a kick in the gut. The hijackers are going to weaponize this plane.
She reached across the aisle and grabbed Bryan’s pen and a pad of paper. “You’ll get this back.”
“Hey! You have some nerve,” Todd fumed.
She ignored both him and Bryan, who was having no luck reaching anyone in their New York offices.
She scribbled a note as rapidly as possible.
Overheard on Airfone
Prob. attack on W Trad Centr
surmise hjackers plan same/similar
WILL WEAPONIZE THIS PLANE
It was enough. Tobin would “figger” it out. She tore off the sheet and folded the note twice, drew her HK from the side of the seat, chambered a round, and patted the spare magazine in her left pocket to assure herself it was there.
Then she stood in the aisle beside Bryan and stretched her back and shoulders, her careless gaze roaming over the two dark-haired men to assure herself that they were seated.
She transferred the HK to her left hand, and Bryan glimpsed the tip of its blue barrel against her thigh. He stopped what he was doing. His mouth hung ajar. Laynie stretched casually in his direction, speaking low and clear to both men.
“Yes, I have a gun. Hijackers are aboard this plane—don’t look around, you idiot! I’m working with the US Marshal on this flight. Keep your heads down. And do not—I repeat—do not leave your seats. Keep the aisle clear.”
Not waiting for their reaction, Laynie palmed the little gun in her left hand and sauntered forward. She tipped her neck side to side as though working out a kink and moved toward the front of the cabin. As she passed the second row, she lightly tapped the gun against her thigh. Tobin’s head moved incrementally. He did not react further than that.
She reached the front of the cabin, turned, started back to her seat. As she passed Tobin, she dropped the note in his lap. She reached the eighth row and sat down.
Bryan and his companion, terrified expressions on their faces, leaned her way to mouth something to her. Laynie shook her head and put her finger to her lips.
The events of the next moment set the hijacking in motion.
