24 Hours

Will increased speed. He had thought he might take off from the taxiway, but he saw now that was impossible. A giant C-130 Hercules transport sat astride the taxiway ahead of him like an alien spacecraft, its four props slowly turning. He would have to taxi beneath the wing of the Hercules and turn onto the next taxiway, which intersected the main runway at 90 degrees.

“Baron Whiskey-Juliet,” said the tower, “you are endangering the lives of military aircrew and ground personnel. Cut your engines immediately.”

Cheryl braced in her seat as they rolled toward the Hercules. The sight of the huge spinning props was sobering, but Will held his collision course.

“You’re going to hit it!” she shouted. “Stop!”

He swerved left, buzzed under the left wingtip of the C-130, then slowed for the turn that would carry him onto the next taxiway.

“Tower, this is Delta-Seven-One,” said the radio. “Who is that crazy son of a bitch?”

That had to be the C-130 pilot. Will was halfway through his turn when another C-130 dropped out of the sky to his right and touched down on the general aviation runway.

“You’re going to kill us!” Cheryl shouted.

Will completed his turn, centered the Baron on the taxiway, then stood on his brakes and ran both engines up to full power. His oil pressure looked good, and under the circumstances, that was all he cared about.

Eight hundred feet ahead of him, the F-18s took off without pause, flashing left to right across his line of sight. They looked like sculpted birds of prey as they screamed into the sky. He had always thought it a sad irony that the most beautiful machines ever built by man were built to kill. But that rule held true in nature as well, so perhaps the “irony” was merely sentiment getting in the way of reality.

“You can’t fly through that!” Cheryl yelled above the engines.

He was going to have to time his takeoff so that the Baron would pass between two of the departing Hornets, but he felt confident he could do it. This was the last takeoff he would ever be allowed to make from this airport, probably from any airport. It might as well be his best.

“Is this even a runway?”

“It is for us.”

“Baron Whiskey-Juliet!” barked the radio. “You are not, repeat not, cleared for takeoff.”

Will took his feet off the brakes, and the Baron rolled forward with nauseating slowness compared to the jets. As they approached the intersection with the main runway, an F-18 hurtled toward the same point with a roar like a perpetual explosion. Cheryl screamed and covered her eyes, but Will knew the Hornet would be airborne before they reached the runway. He gave the twin Continentals everything he could.

Seconds before they reached the intersection, the F- 18 blasted into the blue. Cheryl was still screaming, but Will let himself ride the rush of adrenaline flushing through his system. All the fatigue of the past twenty-four hours had disappeared. After hours of impotence, he was finally doing something.

“November Whiskey-Juliet! Cut your engines! You are not cleared for takeoff!”

They crossed the intersection at eighty-five knots.

“November Whiskey-Juliet-Goddamn!”

The Baron rocketed into the air. In seconds it was only a thin cross-section against the sky.

Will was banking north at a thousand feet when he sighted the helicopter. It was a mile behind him, but it was moving to cut the angle off his turn. He increased speed and kept climbing, his eye on a bank of cumulus clouds to the northwest.

He had turned down his radio to dampen the sound of the tower, but as they plowed toward the clouds, he detected a new voice competing with that of the furious controller.

“Baron Two-Whiskey-Juliet, this is the helicopter on your starboard side. I am FBI Special Agent John Sims. Be advised that you have committed multiple felonies. Return to the airport immediately. Please acknowledge.”

“Can he catch us?” Cheryl asked.

“Not a chance. We can do two hundred twenty knots, and we’ve got clouds ahead. He’s history.”

“Baron Whiskey-Juliet,” crackled the radio. “I know you can hear me. I’m patching my Special Agent-in-Charge through on this channel. Stand by.”

Will kept climbing toward the cloud bank, pushing the twin engines as hard as they would go. “Can you see the chopper?”

“Getting smaller by the second,” Cheryl reported.

“Dr. Jennings,” crackled the radio. “This is Frank Zwick. You’re putting the lives of your wife and daughter at risk by cutting us out. You’re going to need backup. Without it, your family will end up dead.”

Will keyed his mike. “That’s a risk I’m prepared to take.”

“At least tell us where you’re headed.”

“The best thing you can do right now is get some agents into Brookhaven, Mississippi. Put some more in McComb. I’ll call you back.”

Will switched off the comm radio, then the transponder, which would normally broadcast his altitude and position to air-traffic controllers.

“You’ve got a bigger problem than that helicopter,” Cheryl said.

“What?”