Page 134 of One Minute Out

I play it as cool as possible as I respond. “I knew Matt would send a plane for me, and I halfway figured you’d be on it.”

Zack sips his beer. “You know how it is, bro. He calls me into this shit to serve as your voice of reason. And usually you ignore reason, so I have to do the strong-arm thing.” He adds, “Don’t make me do the strong-arm thing.”

Zack is good at what he does, and I’m pretty sure he’s also crazy.

I look around the aircraft a moment to confirm the two of us are, in fact, alone. “How, exactly, are you planning on strong-arming me?”

“Travers and his boys are on the way back to the jet right now. They made a little noise tonight, apparently, so they’ve been recalled.”

“But they aren’t here yet.”

Zack laughs. He loves it when he’s got me where he wants me. “Neither are the pilots, dumbass. You going to fly this yourself all the way back to the States?”

I just look at the cockpit, then look back at him.

He laughs, but I can tell he’s suddenly uneasy. “Hell no. You can’t do that.”

“Then call the pilots. Right now.”

He cocks his head. “You’re hijacking an Agency aircraft?”

“I wouldn’t put it like that. I’m just borrowing it.”

“And you’re planning on flying this jet all the way to the U.S.? By yourself, if I refuse to call the pilots? Seriously? That’s your play?”

“I was hoping to avoid that play. But if you don’t give me another option, then I’ll have to give it a shot. You feeling lucky?”

Zack rolled his eyes. “This isn’t some four-seater twin-prop bush plane. This is an elite corporate jet.”

I look around a little more. “It’s okay. I’ve seen better.”

“You suck as a pilot, dude. You always did.”

“Then let the pros come on board and we’ll jet off into the sunset together safely.”

He drinks down half the beer now, then burps. He’s in his early fifties, but apparently no one told him this. Then he looks back to me. “I’m gonna go ahead and call that bluff, Six. Fly this plane back to America. I’ll take that ride with you.”

Shit.

I can fly a corporate jet this size, but I’ve never done it transcontinentally, and I imagine that’s not something one normally just does on one’s own, with no guidance and little sleep.

But what choice do I have? I start for the jet stairs so that I can go out and close the aft hatch. I don’t even know if the aircraft is fueled, but I’ll figure that out when I get in the cockpit.

But when I step up to the top of the stairs, I see a gun pointed right at me at a range of three feet.

A woman is holding the weapon, a large-framed Sig, and she motions for me to step back into the cabin.

I do so, then sit, and she comes in and turns on all the lights.

Zack says from the back, “The cavalry has arrived. Just as well; I’m guessing you’d have slammed us into a mountain in Iceland.”

I look at Zack, thinking about my plan B. While turned away from the woman at the front bulkhead with the gun on me, I hear her speak.

“It’s you.”

I turn back. Huh? There is nothing more disquieting in my life than to be recognized, and at first this fires my defenses up. But quickly I recognize her, too.

The last time I was on an Agency transport, she was the flight attendant.

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