John Nance - Headwind

Craig nodded, straining to see her eyes. “I can, and will.”

“We do have fuel limitations,” Alastair interjected from the right seat.

Craig looked forward at the fuel tank gauges and ran a quick mental calculation on the fuel remaining. “About two hours of cruise flight, which means we could hold no more than forty-five minutes if there’s any chance we’ll need to fly somewhere else.”

“Excuse me,” Alastair interjected. “Somewhere else? Where, perchance, did you fancy? Honolulu? Seattle, perhaps?”

“Cut the sarcasm, Alastair,” Craig snapped.

“We don’t know,” Sherry replied, ignoring the sharp exchange. “There probably isn’t anywhere else to go, but… there are people in Washington, D.C., frantically checking right now.”

“Excuse me,” Alastair added, ignoring the captain’s hand raised in a stop gesture. “Everyone does realize, I hope, that if we fly anywhere else, we will be basically stealing this aircraft?”

“I realize that,” Craig replied.

“Captain, we just need to buy some time,” Sherry continued. “For all I know, they may just need time to get American Embassy people to the airport.”

“If we’re only going to Rome,” Craig continued, “I can hold for over an hour, but they’re going to be screaming at me to tell them why.”

“Don’t forget,” Jillian added, “we’ve got one hundred some-odd paying passengers aboard who would like to land somewhere close to Rome sometime today.”

“I know that,” Craig said.

“That raises something else,” Jillian said. “We have the snack service on board for the leg to Paris, and this wasn’t a snack segment. Should we serve them now, if you’re going to hold?”

Craig laughed and shook his head before nodding. “This is bizarre,” he said under his breath.

“At long last, a rational statement!” Alastair snapped, anger barely disguised in his tone.

“Go ahead and do the snack service, Jillian,” Craig told her over his shoulder. “I’ll do a PA in a minute. Tell them about holding. I’ll blame it on traffic. We’ll also need to find out who may have tight connections.”

“Okay.”

“And, Ms. Lincoln… Sherry?”

“Yes?”

“As soon as you or the President or your Secret Service guy know anything that will help me plan what to do, please get up here immediately.”

“Don’t worry. I will.”

“My first officer is being rude, but he’s also quite right: I’ve put both of us in terrible jeopardy with respect to our airline. I think all we can do is delay the landing.”

“I understand, Captain. So does President Harris, who is eternally grateful for what you’ve already done.”

The two women started to leave and Craig Dayton reached out to stop Sherry.

“Wait… look…” He took a deep breath and exchanged glances with Alastair before looking back up at her. “Just tell me what you need, okay? I’ll deal with any job consequences later. As far as Alastair, here, I may have to say I clubbed him and tied him up.”

She smiled thinly. “Looks like he’s bound and gagged to me.”

“You may jolly well have to do just that!” Alastair said without humor. Sherry and Jillian left the cockpit as Alastair’s eyes shifted to the window beside his captain, his face registering surprise. “Craig, you might want to have a look at this,” he said, pointing.

Craig Dayton looked toward the left wing, startled by the presence of two jet fighters with Italian Air Force markings descending from above and ahead of them, a position only the occupants of the cockpit could see.

“Jeez!”

“Toronados,” Alastair said. “Probably scrambled from Naples because we’re supposed to be hijacked.”

Craig was shaking his head. “And if I had some hysterical trigger-happy commando in the cockpit here with a gun to my head, that sight would really calm him down!”

A new voice came over their headsets speaking English, the accent clearly Italian. “EuroAir Forty-Two, please come up frequency one twenty-five point three.”

“Guess who?” Alastair muttered, dialing the frequency into the number two VHF radio.

“I’ll get it,” Craig said, punching the appropriate transmit selector. “This is Forty-Two. Is this the lead Toronado?”

“Affirmative, sir. Do you need assistance?”

“Negative.”

“Are you squawking seventy-five hundred?” the fighter pilot asked, referring to the international hijack code.

“No, but I can’t discuss it. Please back off, and stay out of sight of the cabin.”

“Roger.”

The two fighters rose in their windscreens and disappeared, but there was no doubt in either pilot’s mind that they would be trailing the 737 the rest of the way.

John Harris was sitting in deep thought when Sherry slipped back into the seat beside him. He looked up suddenly as if she had materialized without warning.

“Oh!”

“Are you okay, sir?”

“Yes, of course.”

She relayed the conversation in the cockpit.

“It will be time to phone Washington back in just a few minutes,” Sherry told him.

Harris nodded absently, tapping his finger on the seat’s armrest. “I’ve been thinking, Sherry, of all the good lawyers I know. Those who were in my administration. Those we considered for judgeships at all levels, those I looked at for Justice. And those whom I ran into from time to time in the Oval and elsewhere. The good, the bad, and the unspeakable.”

“Yes, sir.”

“But while you were up there I had to come to a rather frightening conclusion. The only lawyer I’m absolutely sure I can trust to help me with this is the last one I should be hiring.”

“I don’t understand, Mr. President,” she said, surprised by the sudden smile that crossed his face. He looked at her and slapped his hand gently on the armrest, as if bringing a gavel to rest on a decision.

“Sherry? How do I get hold of an information operator Stateside?”

“They used to call them directory assistance operators, sir, but I think they’re extinct now. Ma Bell shot them all. You can only talk with computers. What do you need?”

“The main number of the University of Wyoming in Laramie.”

“And for… who…?”

“Don’t ask, Sherry. Not yet.”

The assistant dean of students of the University of Wyoming pulled the blanket below eye level, verifying her suspicions: It was indeed morning. She pulled the covers down a bit farther, sampling the cold air in the room with her nose and opening one eye far enough to see a clock and other vaguely familiar surroundings before considering where she was – and with whom.

Jay! A warmth spread over her at the thought of him. His arm was characteristically draped over her in sleep, his hand still cupping her breast.

She pulled the covers up and went back to sleep.

There was the smell of bacon in the air when Dr. Linda Collins awoke again around 6:30. Stretching luxuriously, she could hear Jay in the kitchen turning an economy of noise into a gourmet breakfast. The soft sounds of something vaguely Celtic wafted through the bedroom door.

It’s not fair! she thought, chuckling to herself and blowing a tendril of blonde hair from her face as she sat up. He can eat anything and never gain an ounce.

Eggs Benedict, a little Chablis, and a few pieces of crisp bacon on the side was his favorite morning meal, and it rankled her that he was a better cook than she.

There was a faint hint of sweet wood smoke in the air, probably from the fireplace in his small living room. They both loved crackling fires, especially those fueled by the fragrant piñon pine logs they’d brought back from Taos, New Mexico, during the winter.