What about air traffic control over the ocean, off the coast? He knew some of the radar that picked up incoming planes could reach out for sixty miles. There were no checks or tracking of planes over the ocean, except by radio. Planes could fly up and down the coast as long as they didn't punch into U.S. airs.p.a.ce. If they did, they would answer to the Air Defense Command.

Stroh sipped at a cup of hot coffee and nodded. He could call the Air Traffic Control System Command Center and ask if with the new security they were monitoring flights farther off the coast now. He could, but he wasn't going to. He was sure of the sixty mile limit. Mexico, it had to be Mexico. But where in Mexico? He was thinking in circles. He and Murdock had gone over this before. A nap. He needed a nap. A research outfit said that workers who took a half-hour nap during the day awoke refreshed and worked at a much higher efficiency level than those same type workers who plowed straight through the day. Yeah.

His office door opened and Milly pushed inside. She was forty, thirty pounds overweight and didn't care, and had yogurt every day for lunch. She grinned at him.

"Hey, Mr. S. Time for your meeting. The main conference room. Looks like quite a bunch coming in. You want me to run interference for you?"

He groaned, stood, picked up his notes from his talk with Murdock, and angled for the door.

"This time I've got to do my own downfield blocking, but thanks, Milly. Next time for sure I'll get you out in front. If Murdock calls, have him give you a number. I'll need to talk to him as soon as he hits town."

"Yes, Mr. S. I'll do that." She smiled. "You get in there and get this thing straightened out."

"Wish I could, Milly. I do so wish that it was that easy." He walked down the hall and went into the conference room. Ten or twelve men with notebooks and pads of paper sat around the big table. The Director of the Department of Homeland Security rapped his water gla.s.s and the men sat down.

"Gentlemen, thanks for coming. We have facing us what may be the greatest threat to the United States in our history. It's up to us to come up with some answers, and some way to detour, detect, and destroy this nuclear threat that even now may be hidden in the heart of one of our great cities. First I'd like to hear from Don Stroh, who has been shepherding this situation from the start and has the latest information about the possible location, destination, and maybe even the target of this nuclear device. Mr. Stroh."

24.

Ramstein Air Force Base, Germany Gunner's Mate First Cla.s.s Miguel Fernandez sat on his bunk in the transient barracks at the U.S. Air Force base and thought back over his work in Iraq. He shook his head. He didn't even know how many men he had killed. Several. Two, ten, fifteen? He had been on the a.s.sault fire and some of the other firefights. Did it bother him? He rubbed one ear that had been itching lately for no apparent reason.

Yes, the killing now did bother him. Was it enough to make him quit the SEALs? He didn't know. Death had suddenly become a factor. After over six years of close and dirty combat with the SEALs, he was starting to feel the strain. Was it the actual killing or the idea that someone's brother or father or son would not be returning home from his military post that bothered him? He simply didn't know. He could go talk to an air force chaplain. No, he couldn't. They were on a fifteen-minute alert schedule. They would have only that much time to get their gear together and rush to the flight line for a ride to the next military base. He hated this. .h.i.tchhiking. They became just so much cargo for these air transport guys.

So he couldn't risk missing a flight by going to a chaplain. He sure as h.e.l.l wasn't going to let any of the men in the platoon know how he felt-except Murdock. Death had become more important to him since his grandfather died two months ago. The old guy was almost eighty, but spry and witty and still worked part-time in his small restaurant. He had died with his boots on, or more properly his ap.r.o.n, where he stood at the stove in the kitchen grilling a pair of steaks. He had gone in a flash and there was no chance to revive him when the paramedics came. A heart attack-ma.s.sive, unstoppable, and deadly.

His grandfather was his first relative who had died in ten years. He didn't think too much about it at the time. The large, extended Mexican family had the usual ma.s.s, wake, funeral, and burial. It had all seemed routine at the time. This was simply what a family did when a member died.

Now he realized that the loss of the old man had been more than routine for him. His grandfather had taken him on his first fishing trip and to his first baseball game. Had come to watch him play baseball in high school. His own father had been navy and often out on six-month blue-water trips, so he wasn't home that much. When he was there, he was distant, unresponsive. Not your best hands on Dad. The death of Grandfather Hernando had been a severe blow; he just didn't realize it at the time. Now he was paying for it.

d.a.m.n it, he was doing what he had been trained to do. Six long months of training. He was good at this job. It was work that had to be done by someone. They had taken on the country's enemies in dozens of different locales and situations, and had won. He had faced death himself twenty, thirty times in those six years and had survived. Maybe that was what was meant to be? He didn't believe in fate. Man made his own way, and sometimes luck of the draw was a factor, but certainly nothing was preordained. A man lived or died mostly by his own decisions and actions. Sure, a plane might go down and all on board be killed. A chance happening. A man did not have "a time to die." He hated it when people said, "Well, I guess it was Joe's time to go." That was nonsense. No person of even average intelligence could possibly believe that.

So where did that leave him? He didn't know. He'd see how he felt when this mission was over. Maybe it was over. Or maybe they would be chasing that fourth nuke all over the world. He wondered where it was by now. Had the bad guys moved it where they wanted to set it off? That would more than likely be some target city in the United States. He just hoped that it wasn't San Diego.

"On your feet, troops," Senior Chief Neal bellowed. "We have exactly sixteen minutes to get to the flight line. We've got a ticket to fly straight into Washington, D.C., good old Andrews Air Force Base just outside of the District. Move it."

Over the Atlantic Ocean

Along the U.S. Coast

Asrar Fouad grinned as the BAC's radio spoke again.

"Last call, BAF-235. We have no position for you after your takeoff from Halifax on our screens at Boston Oceanatic Control. Do you read me? Do you read me? Please respond."

"Yes. They can't find us," Fouad said. "That's the best news we've had yet. They don't know where the h.e.l.l we are. That's good."

"I can get in huge trouble for doing this," the pilot said. "Turning off the transponder and not answering the AT control. I'll lose my license at the very least. I could land in jail."

"Don't worry about it," Fouad said. "Who is going to report what happened? Not me, not your engineer. You're safe and going to be a rich man. h.e.l.l, you don't even have to go back to Jordan if you don't want to."

The engineer laughed. "Hey, we stay in Mexico City, learn to speak Spanish, and keep the plane to start up our own airfreight business. Or we sell the plane. Must be worth at least two million dinar."

The pilot shook his head. "That would really make us criminals. Jordanian cops would come looking for us."

Later the flight engineer told Fouad they were two hundred miles down the United States coast from Halifax. Boston had been trying to reach them since they cut the switch to the transponder after leaving Halifax. They were a hundred miles off the United States coast.

"So we may officially be dead," Fouad said, smiling broadly. "They had us heading for the Azores, then we vanished. Tough luck, guys, you must be sleeping with the fishes." The Jordanian nationals frowned at his remark.

"Don't worry about it. That's a term from a movie about American mafia criminals. Just keep us heading south and we'll be in good shape. How long until we come to Na.s.sau?"

The flight engineer made some calculations.

"About two and a half hours more," the engineers said.

"Good." Fouad's smile broadened. "Hey, I'm hungry. You guys want another one of those airline dinners?"

They said they did, and Fouad went back to the small galley and heated up meals in the microwave. There were still twenty frozen dinners waiting. It was dark out now. It would stay dark as they came around Florida and headed across the Gulf of Mexico. Fouad's eyes lit up as he realized that the plan was working to perfection. Soon they would be in Mexico City and he would make the final preparations.

Washington, D.C.

Murdock, Ching, and Rafii arrived in Washington's Ronald Reagan National Airport at 0115. Murdock phoned Stroh at his office. A man answered and said Mr. Stroh was in conference.

"Good. Tell him Murdock and team have arrived at National. We'll check into a local motel and wait for his instructions in the morning. I'll call him with our hotel number when we have one."

"I'll tell him that. No, no, wait a minute, the meeting just broke up and Mr. Stroh is coming back in. Hold a moment."

"Murdock?"

"The same. At National, where do you want us?"

"Stay there. I'll send a car for you. We've had a report of a BAC One-Eleven that dropped off radar when it was on a flight plan to return to the Azores. Our team doesn't think it crashed. They could have turned off the transponder, which makes it tougher for the sixty-mile radar to find them. Then they could have turned south. Not that many BAC planes flying in and out of Halifax."

"So, Mexico City?"

"Looks that way. They could be almost there by now. At five hundred miles an hour you eat up the distance. We'll get you into our place, get you new clothes a little less ethnic, and ship you out to Mexico City on a Gulfstream. You'll get into Mexico City fast. Hope you slept on the plane. Yes, we can get you clothes in the middle of the night. This is the Company. Also get you some weapons. The car should be there in about twenty minutes. Meet the driver at the central taxi stand."

"A black Lincoln?"

"The same. Oh, the rest of the platoon left Germany about noon yesterday. Be in here sometime today at Langley."

"Good. See you soon."

An hour later, the three SEALs were checking out their new clothes. They fit. Sport clothes with a change in a modest roll-along suitcase. Each man had a 9mm automatic in his waistband and an Ingram in the suitcase with plenty of filled magazines.

Stroh looked them over.

"Not my idea of the perfect American tourist, but you'll have to do. We've been bombarding Mexico City's airport but can't get much cooperation. They say a BAC One-Eleven has landed without a flight plan, but the crew claimed radio and computer problems on board. They released it and it's somewhere on the big airport, but they had no reason to watch where it parked. Somewhere in the transit or freight sections, they figured."

"I've been at that airport," Murdock said. "There are all sorts of private hangars big enough to hold that plane. We'll have to find it before it takes off again."

Stroh's cell phone rang. He answered it and nodded. "Fifteen minutes. Right. We'll be there."

"A chopper is standing by to get us back to National, where the Gulfstream is waiting. We'll be in Mexico City early this morning. I'm going with you. We have to find that d.a.m.n plane. It must have the fourth nuke on board."

"We'll give it a try," Murdock said.

Thirty minutes later, the SEALs and Stroh boarded the sleek business jet used mostly to fly VIP visitors around. They had used the plane before. They leaned back the first-cla.s.s-type seats and relaxed. They knew they would get little sleep once they hit Mexico City.

The pilot told them his flight plan was to Corpus Christi, Texas, then almost due south to Mexico City. The whole run was about twenty-one hundred miles, and they could do that without stopping for fuel.

"Flight time a little under four hours, depending on the winds up there. We'll be at forty-one to forty-three thousand feet, depending on the wind. It's now three-oh-five A.M. Which puts us in the hot tamale town about seven A.M. Snacks in the galley and lots of pillows and blankets. Check in later."

The speaker snapped off and the sleek jet raced down the runway and took off. Each man had twenty thousand U.S. dollars in a money belt around his waist. They were ready to do business in Mexico, where cohecho, or bribery, was the way business transactions were done. Murdock had three hundred in ten-dollar greenbacks in his pocket.

"Let's get some sleep," he said. He was sure before their work was done in Mexico they would need it.

25.

Mexico City, Mexico

Benito Juarez Airport

Three Mexican CIA agents waited for them at the taxi stand when they walked out of the terminal. Murdock could tell that they were Company men. They didn't wear suits or hats, but each had on a sports coat and a white shirt and tie.

"Mr. Stroh and Murdock?" one of the men asked as they walked up.

"Right, I'm Murdock," he said holding out his hand. The other man shook it.

"I'm Antonio Gutierrez, head of station." He turned to Stroh. "You must be Don Stroh. I've talked with you before but never met you." They shook hands. "There are some messages for you at the emba.s.sy. The second car will take you there. They said you should go there first, and then catch up with us."

"Thanks, Antonio. I'll go see what they want, then come back here to the airport." He waved and walked to the second black Buick at the side of the street and stepped inside.

"What do you know about that BAC One-Eleven that landed here sometime last night or early this morning?" Murdock asked.

"Not much. The Company is not exactly on good terms with the powers that be here, and the airport manager bucked us up to the Mexican City Chief of Police, who said he couldn't help us."

"So, where do we start?"

"We have a contact in one of the air-freight companies," Antonio said. "He's going to meet us as soon as I call him."

"Go," Murdock said.

Antonio took out a cell phone and hit the numbers and chattered in Spanish for a moment. He looked up and waved at a black Buick that pulled up beside them. "That was my contact, Felipe. He said if it's a rogue aircraft, there are more than a dozen old buildings on the north side of the airport where it might be hidden and worked on or just kept out of sight. We'll split up and three of us will work from each end of the old buildings. They were supposed to be torn down, but things move slowly sometimes around here. You and I and one of your men will go one way, my two men and one of yours will be the other team."

They all squeezed into the Buick and drove around the parking lot, through a gate marked, FOR OFFICIAL VEHICLES ONLY, and around a road that hugged the airport's outside fence. Murdock saw the buildings well before they got there. All were old, most unpainted, one had half the roof fallen in. The car stopped at the first one and two of the Mexican CIA men got out. Murdock pointed to Ching, who joined them.

The Buick moved along the access road to the far end of the quarter-mile-long row of old hangars.

"Do these buildings still have electricity?" Murdock asked.

"Some do and some don't. It depends on who the owner knows, and how much he pays to keep the juice on."

They came to the last building, which looked better than the rest. "We might get lucky on our first try," Murdock said. Then he saw a sign with lettering and pictures of three fish.

"This one I know," Antonio said. "A big shipper of fish to outlaying areas in medium-sized transports. We'll go in and look around anyway."

On the south side of the airport, Asrar Fouad stared at his cell phone and swore in three languages. "What's the matter with these people?" he asked the two men who stood near him in a clean, well-lighted hangar that had the large front doors closed. "I asked them for clearance to fly to Monterrey, and they told me I would have to wait for the weather to clear. Weather, where? There's not a cloud in the sky here. Who knows what the weather will be like by the time we fly up there? These people are idiots."

The two Mexican men grinned, understanding little of what he said, which had come out in rapid-fire Arabic. They knew he was angry. So far they had helped him get the plane fueled and even some food restocked in the galley. They had been ready when he landed and routed him to this hangar for transient aircraft. He knew a little Spanish, enough to make them understand what he needed. The strange behavior of the tower made him angry, and he slipped into Arabic out of necessity. He knew no swear words in Spanish.

Now he tried to relax and struggled to find the right word in Spanish. "The weather," he said in Arabic. Then he tried his Spanish. "Boletin meteorological muy malo," he said.

The two men looked up at the ceiling. "Aqui?" one asked.

Fouad shook his head. "En Monterrey." The two Mexicans nodded and looked around. There was nothing else for them to do. Fouad seethed. He was ready. He had phoned Tijuana, and it took him an hour to get through. Mexico must have the worst telephone system in the world. He made arrangements on the other end and then filed his flight plan thirty minutes before he asked for take off. That's when they started talking about the bad weather. Nothing he could say in his limited Spanish helped. He would have to wait. He told them he would be at 42,000 feet, but they weren't swayed.

He was in a hurry but did not feel rushed. With any luck the air traffic people would figure his BAC went down in the Atlantic on the way to the Azores. He wondered if they would put out a search party looking for debris. Probably not. He went to the small door in the huge one and looked out. He didn't expect to see a h.o.a.rd of police cars, wailing sirens, and red lights angling for this hangar to take him into custody. But he checked anyway. He had violated no Mexican laws. Bent a few but hadn't broken any. He knew that the CIA and Interpol had files on him, but first they would have to try to tie him into the cargo he carried, and then get him involved with the BAC. Slim to none, he figured. He had filed his flight plan to end at Monterrey, a big town four hundred miles due north. He groaned. So that was the holdup. Monterrey must be socked in with fog and he wouldn't be able to land there. s.h.i.t! A town he wasn't going to go to was holding up his takeoff. He used his phone again and called the tower to find out about the weather for his flight.