Dana Stabenow - Prepared For Rage

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Following A Deeper Sleep, her most successful Kate Shugak novel to date, the Edgar Award winner and New York Times bestselling thriller writer Dana Stabenow delivers a nail-biting, all-too-real novel of international suspense.
A terrorist with a most personal grudge, an FBI analyst challenged to be three steps ahead of the intelligence, a Coast Guard captain assigned to keep watch on that very American of symbols from the water, an astronaut who takes her job very seriously-the paths of all of these characters converge on one clear morning in Florida. NASA is preparing to launch the space shuttle, this time with a high-paying visitor on board as a guest, and the FBI and the Coast Guard are doing everything they can to help the launch go off without a hitch. But one Pakistani man with a bottomless personal grudge and the commitment of many zealous men behind him is determined to strike back at the most visible target he can find.
Once again Dana Stabenow, who researched this gripping scenario by spending weeks living on board a Coast Guard cutter as it conducted its mission in the Caribbean, delivers an action-driven thriller with an ingenious, frightening, straight-from-the-headlines plot, certain to be her next bestseller.

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When they were done they would know two things they hadn't known before.

One, that no one was safe from him and his forces. No one was beyond his reach.

And two, that henceforward Isa and Abdullah were names of respect, of awe and admiration, names to be taken seriously by every Western nation in the world.

NO ONE ON THE HANGAR DECK WAS AWARE ANYTHING UNTOWARD WAS happening elsewhere on the cutter because no one on the hangar deck could hear anything over the multiple boom boxes playing everything from Dave Matthews to the White Stripes. The 76mm was forward, that was where the attention of the terrorists would be concentrated. The hangar deck and his people were aft. For the moment, Cal wanted it kept that way. He didn't think his crew would panic but he didn't want to test the thesis, either.

He and Noyes walked to the helo at a casual pace, Cal unable to refrain from taking a look over the port side at the shuttle gleaming white and brave under the lights.

Noyes opened the door of the helo and slid inside. "Shit," he said a few minutes later. "The radios are dead. They've already been here. Somebody had some good intel, Captain."

"Yes, they did," Cal said. He scanned the crowd, a few of whom were giving them curious looks.

He looked at his watch.

"There can't be that many of them, Captain," Noyes said urgently. "We can rush them."

"They've got hostages," Cal said, "the Munros, BMC, the XO on the bridge. The watch standers in Main Control and CIC. They've killed Myers and I think everyone on the boat crew and they're not out of ammunition."

"They'd rush the bridge."

"I know they would. I don't want them to."

"How about rushing the 76mm?"

"They've got people on the doors leading to the gun deck."

"But we can't let them take out the shuttle."

"Did they just take out communications, or can you still get this bird in the air?" Cal scanned the crowd and didn't see the other aviator. "And can you do it alone?"

Noyes flicked a few switches. His frown cleared. "I think she'll fly, sir." He looked at Cal. "But sir, there isn't enough time to fly to shore and get help. The shuttle launches any second now."

"I know."

Noyes looked confused at first, and then he understood. His face changed in the reflected glow of the lights on land. "Oh. Shit. You want me to be a hero."

"If I knew how to fly it, I'd fly it," Cal said.

Noyes, amazingly, grinned. "Can you shoot the M-240?"

"Will it do enough damage to get the job done?"

"You said you think they're not going to start shooting until after the shuttle launches. Do you know what spiking a gun means?"

"Yes," Cal said, and realized what Noyes meant. "Yes!" There was another way, a better way, and maybe no one else would die.

They conferred hurriedly and came up with a plan.

"There's only-"

"What?"

"They could shoot us down."

"I haven't seen anything bigger than a.22 pistol. They're traveling light. If you can stay out of range until the last minute, and if you're willing to take the risk-"

"Let's do it," Noyes said.

Cal looked at the crowd, and then at his watch. Six minutes. "We have to clear the hangar deck. Oh, Jesus. And we have to get rid of them."

"Them" was the CNN crew, now snaking its way through the crowd on a dead reckoning for the helo. "Start the engine, that'll get all the bright ones moving," Cal said, and slammed the door shut. He grabbed the first crewman he saw, which turned out to be FS2 Mellot. "FS2."

Startled, she said, "Captain?"

He looked past her. "SKC? YNC? Come here a minute." He led the food service officer and the two chiefs away from the helo, along the way collecting MK3 Ochiai and DC2 Milton, all reliably levelheaded crew members. "We need to launch the helo. Never mind why, it's an emergency, just help me clear the hangar deck. And folks? We have armed hostiles on board. Let's not attract any attention. As quietly as possible, please, get everyone down on the fantail. Now!"

ON BOARD SHUTTLE ENDEAVOUR

"T minus thirty-one seconds. Go for auto-sequence start."

Her mouth was dry and her heart was racing. Cal, Mom, Dad, she thought, watch me fly.

ON BOARD USCG CUTTER MUNRO

The rotors were beginning to turn and the noise of the engines increased. The hangar deck was deserted. Cal 's picked band of crew members had shoved, muscled, and strong-armed everyone down onto the fantail or into the hangar, the CNN crew protesting all the way.

He fought with an intransigent buckle on one of the tiedowns and swore out loud. The buckle came free and he threw the tiedown over the side to follow the first three. The last thing they needed was some piece of debris getting caught up in the rotors' backwash and he didn't have time to run anything back to the hangar.

Onshore, clouds of steam were beginning to boil up from beneath the shuttle's tail. Kenai, he thought, it'll be all right, I promise, go, go, go!

Camera lights went off like popcorn all along the main deck. He risked a look around the corner of the hangar. Was that a dark figure he saw slipping from shadow to shadow? They couldn't all hit the Darwin sorter, worse luck.

He duckwalked beneath the rotors and climbed in the back of the helo. Noyes was taking off as Cal 's foot left the deck.

Munro fell away beneath him.

ON BOARD SHUTTLE ENDEAVOUR

"T minus ten seconds. Go for main engine start."

"Five… four… three… two… one…"

The hold-down bolts blew and they were hit with seven million pounds of thrust from two solid rocket boosters and three main engines.

The noise was deafening, the vibration threatened to shake her hair loose from her head, and the G-force flattened her against her chair like a steamroller.

Her teeth were rattling so loudly in her head that she almost couldn't understand Rick when he said, "What the hell was that?"

ON BOARD USCG CUTTER MUNRO

The boom of the 76mm firing was loud even over the noise of the engine. Cal yelled something, he didn't know what, and looked over his shoulder to see the shuttle was off its pad, rising slowly into the air, straining bravely for the stars. He knew a wave of relief so strong it was dizzying.

"Get ready!" Noyes yelled, and the sound of his voice steadied Cal. The aviator had already unlimbered and loaded the M-240. Its barrel pointed out of the left side of the helo and Cal 's hands were tight on the grip. Noyes maneuvered the aircraft until it faced Munro port side to port side.

Cal 's finger tightened on the trigger and the M-240 chattered, spraying the hatchway leading to the gun deck where he was certain one of the terrorists was on guard. It's where he'd have stationed a man if he'd been running this op, it was a chokepoint in case anyone decided to rush the 76mm. He couldn't get a direct shot but with all the metal the ricochet was bound to hit something. He prayed it wouldn't be a member of the crew.

"All right!" he yelled, and Noyes crabwalked the helo in closer, so close it seemed to Cal as if the rotors were going to slice into the bridge. "Jesus, Noyes, be careful!" he yelled. He wondered for a wild moment if Noyes could even hear him over the engines. They hadn't had time to don helmets. He crouched next to the M-240 in the door of the helo.

There was a muzzle flash from the bridge, and the helo jolted hard.

"Fuck that," Noyes roared, "jump, goddammit, jump!"

Cal jumped, pushing against the doorframe of the helo with his feet, launching himself in a shallow dive for the gun deck. Behind him he heard the helo roar off, and more gunfire, and more impacts.

It was the longest two seconds of his life.

He hit hard, just forward of the gun deck port hatch. He actually remembered to tuck and roll, and by a miracle came up on his feet.

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