Page 74 of Shared By the Pilots

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Adam

I was skeptical of this entire thing from the start. Not that I didn’t trust Veronica’s judgment; she was an extremely intelligent woman whose opinions were usually level-headed and well thought-out. But when she spoke about Excelsior Air, and specifically this Alan Broussard guy who flew frequently, she sounded like a conspiracy theorist.

I didn’t like that side of her. It worried me to see her becoming so obsessed. And despite my—and Dexter’s—gentle comments, she wasn’t going to stop believing that something illegal was going on. That was why I agreed to help Luke, a man who was essentially my rival. That, and the fact that it would give me a chance to make some extra cash working an Excelsior flight or two. Veronica had spent so much time gushing about how cushy the job was that I was all too happy to see for myself.

And to the surprise of nobody, Broussard’s actions all had reasonable explanations. He was buying lots of expensive tequila and shipping it back to the United States. Maybe that was illegal, and maybe he was avoiding paying customs taxes or something. But it wasn’t the same kind of illegal as drugs, or human trafficking.

But then I saw the four suitcases that they left on the pickup truck.Why didn’t they take them inside?Maybe they had brought too many, and didn’t have enough bottles of tequila to take home. That seemed unlikely, though.

Especially when I saw them loading the bags of tequila onto the truck, and rearranging the suitcases so that the four empty ones remained on top.

The taxi driver complained about it, but he followed the truck some more. Our suspicions were immediately confirmed when the truck drove west into another part of Cabo, instead of north back to the airport. Eventually, they arrived at a residential area with large houses. One of the rich parts of the city. Our taxi driver parked in an alley as Broussard’s truck drove through the gates of a large house. It was more like a compound, with brick walls around the perimeter topped with barbed wire.

“Something is going on,” Luke said. “Good catch.”

“Thanks.”

Whatever they did inside took half an hour. Then the truck was driving out the gate and back toward the airport. We followed them the whole way, and my eyes were glued to the four bags on the top of the pile.

“They’re cold,” Luke suddenly said while we were stopped at a light. “See the condensation on the outside of the red bag?”

“Ohh,” I said. “Nowthat’ssuspicious.”

“Why would it be cold?” the driver asked. “Transporting fish?”

Luke handed him some more cash. “Stop asking questions.”

The truck returned to the airport. We had the taxi driver drop us off at the regular entrance, and then we walked through employee security by scanning our badges. The truck was on the side of the terminal building, just out of sight of the tarmac where the aircraft were all parked. But we could see it from the side entrance window.

“Here’s the plan,” Luke said, peering out the window. “We play it cool. Let them load the plane. And then when that’s done, and they leave, I’ll open the cargo hatch and pop one of those suitcases open.”

“What makes you think they’ll leave?”

“They usually get lunch after loading the plane,” he explained.

“Usually? What if they don’t do that today, and hang out around the plane?”

“I…” Luke searched for an answer. “I don’t know. Maybe when we land in Houston we’ll have a chance to…”

“No,” I insisted. “I have an idea. Be ready to check the bags.”

Luke’s eyes widened. “What are you going to do…”

Before he could argue, I opened the door and strode out into the warm Cabo sunlight. Broussard and his associate were unloading suitcases from the truck and placing them onto two baggage carts.

“Oh, hey there!” I said with a friendly wave. “You all have a lot of bags. Here, let me help with that.”

“We don’t need any help,” Broussard said bluntly.

“I don’t mind! And I want to make sure you get the full Excelsior experience. I’m new to the airline, but I’m a hard worker.”

The two men were in the middle of carrying a suitcase between them. “Don’t touch that!” Broussard said as I reached for the next suitcase on the truck. “I saiddon’t…”

Before I could even touch the bag, Broussard’s grip slipped on the one he was carrying. The suitcase fell to the ground, landing on one of the corners with the unmistakable sound of glass shattering.

That was lucky, I thought.Now I don’t have to accidentally drop one of the other bags.

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