Stephen Cannell - The Plan

"I wouldn't' ve believed it if I wasn't seeing it," Kaz said, looking down at Ryan's left leg as he walked with only a slight limp.

"I'm not gonna be making any sharp cuts over the middle, but I'm not bad if I move straight ahead."

Ryan and Lucinda had packed only carry-on luggage, just one change of clothes and their toilet articles. They'd left the boat at a Mexican marina and paid the dockmaster to watch it for a month.

Kaz had the airline schedules in his hand.

"We take a two o'clock United flight to Atlanta and then connect with the El Al transatlantic direct to Tel Aviv," he said as they moved up to the United Airlines desk, where Ryan paid for all the tickets with cash. The ticket agent found Ryan's name in her computer and automatically credited his mileage account without mentioning it. An hour later, they were boarding the first leg of the flight.

"United Airlines," a man's voice said over the phone. "You guys are screwing me on my MileagePlus. I fly on your airline and you don't give me credit?" the Ghost said. This was the fourth airline he'd called.

"Couldyou give me your name sir and your MileagePlus number? I'll get your account on the screen."

"Ryan Bolt," he said and then gave the number he got from Jerry Upshaw's office. He waited as he heard the computer keys clicking over the phone.

"Well, sir, I have your account here. This is odd. . We just credited your account with forty thousand miles."

"That's impossible." The Ghost grabbed for a pen on the nightstand.

"No, sir. . Four tickets from Phoenix to Atlanta and then continuing on from Atlanta to Tel Aviv on El Al Flight 2356. Is this Mr. Bolt? Where are you calling from?" The man was starting to get suspicious.

"My mistake." The Ghost hung up abruptly.

Then he called El Al Airlines. "You have a flight from Atlanta to Tel Aviv?"

"Yes, sir, Flight 2356, leaving at seven P. M. arriving at eleven A. M." a man informed him.

"Can you get me out of LAX so that I can meet that flight in Israel?"

Computer keys clicked.

"Yes, sir. Flight 3476 leaves LAX at four this afternoon and arrives in Tel Aviv at nine A. M. That would be two hours ahead of the Atlanta flight. Do you want me to book you?"

"Yes, please. The name is Harold Meeks."

The Ghost packed his small suitcase, then called a cab. Before he left, he placed a call to Mickey Alo on the scrambled line.

"I just found out they're going to Israel."

"Really?" The mobster had left the dining room table to take the call. He still had his monogrammed napkin in his hand.

"Why would they be going to Tel Aviv?" the Ghost asked.

"Don't know."

"There are four of them traveling together. Do you have any idea who's with them?"

"Just get it done. I thought you were the best. What's taking so long?"

"Mr. Alo, it's much easier for me to take care of it in Israel. I have contacts over there. People die unexpectedly in that country all the time. Don't worry, it's better this way."

After he hung up, he dialed a man named Akmad Jam Jarrar in Paris. Akmad wasn't in, so he left a message in his hotel voice mail that said, "I need to get the old crew together. Meet me immediately in Tel Aviv, the Hotel American. Same terms as always. The Ghost."

The passenger in seat 25B of El Al flight 3476 went into a convulsion at 7:37 A. M., just as the El Al flight attendants were beginning to set up for breakfast. His name was Leonard Greenberg, he was fifty-six, and he owned a jewelry store in Burbank, California. His legs shot out and kicked the seat in front of him; then he jackknifed forward and hit his head on the back of the tray table. The woman sitting in the seat in front woke up with a start, turned, and glared around the seat at him. What she saw immediately alarmed her. Leonard Greenberg looked at her with half-lit brown eyes and said, "So sorry." Sitting beside him were Leonard's wife, Hanna, and his sixteen-year-old daughter, Sasha. They were all going to Israel for the first time.

"Get the stewardess! Get a doctor!" Hanna Greenberg shouted at her daughter Sasha, who scrambled out of her seat and ran to get the flight attendant.

"His shunt is failing," Hanna said to the startled woman in the seat in front of him. Hanna had seen this happen twice before and she knew the results would be fatal if Leonard didn't get immediate surgery to relieve the pressure on his brain.

A man from a row behind them, across the aisle, came forward and kneeled beside Greenberg. He carried a small, black briefcase.

"I'm a doctor."

"It's his shunt. I've seen these convulsions before. He has to get to a hospital immediately."

"What is a shunt, for God's sake?" the flight attendant said.

"Everybody has cerebral spinal fluid that surrounds the brain," the doctor explained. "Some people don't have the proper drainage and fluid gets trapped in the brain causing what is known as hydrocephalus. To fix this, we install a plastic tube in the lateral ventricle called a shunt. Occasionally the shunt gets clogged, causing extreme pressure on the brain. This man needs immediate surgery!"

"You need to explain this to the pilot. Come with me." She led the doctor up the aisle, past the first-class passengers.

The Ghost woke up as they brushed past on the way out of the cockpit. He caught a glimpse of the strained expression on the flight attendant's face and knew immediately something was wrong. He grabbed the flight attendant's arm and flashed his goofy, harmless salesman's smile.

"We got a problem?"

"Sick passenger. We're probably diverting to London, Heathrow."

"But that's gonna take hours. I gotta be in Tel Aviv. I have important business. . "

"There's a phone aboard. I'm sure you don't want a fellow passenger to die so you can keep a business appointment." She pulled away, picked up the intercom, and announced the change in destination.

The Ghost retrieved the air phone on the wall in the front of the cabin. He used one of his Harry Meeks credit cards and walked back to his seat with the phone.

He dialed the number for the Hotel American in Tel Aviv and asked for Akmad Jarrar's room. In a minute, he heard the Arab's voice.

"Thank God you're there," the Ghost said, without preamble.

"Yes, my friend, I have just arrived. I took the first flight I could get."

"I need help. I'm being diverted to Heathrow because some passenger is sick. . Our CEO is arriving at Ben Gurion Airport at eleven on El Al Flight 2356. He's traveling with three accountants; at least one is a beautiful woman. They should be met but not escorted. We're scenario dependent until I can get there. The C-cube is your hotel." This was a code they had used before. "CEO" would sound like chief executive officer to anybody picking up the open telephone signal, but to the Ghost and his team of assassins, it stood for covert elimination objective, or target. "Accountants" or "CPAs" were collateral personal assistants. In espionage circles, they were generally men or women with briefcases who worked with or for the target. "Met but not escorted" stood for follow but don't apprehend. "Scenario dependent" meant they would be dependent on the chain of events. "C-cube" stood for communications command control center. Akmad said he would handle it, and the Ghost gave him a brief description of Ryan and Lucinda, mentioning. that Ryan would most likely be on crutches and was blond and handsome, the girl dark-haired. The Ghost said he had no descriptions of the other accountants.

"Are they prepared to do business?" Akmad asked.

"Definitely," the Ghost said, indicating that they were dangerous and should be treated as such. As they rang off, the Ghost felt the plane banking to the left for Heathrow. He would probably be in Tel Aviv four hours later than planned. But he was invigorated by the unexpected problem. He loved improvising. He loved the chase. But most of all, he loved the kill.