Part 35 (1/2)

”Then stop this!”

Without answering me, Semyaza turned northward. ”Ah! Right on time,” he said.

I followed his gaze. In the distant sky I saw a speck that at first glance appeared to be a blackbird. But it wasn't a bird. Its flight was mechanically straight. And it was coming directly toward us.

Jana turned toward the front of the bus just as the driver glanced up into the oversized mirror. Her eyes locked on Jana.

Busted! Jana thought.

But the driver resumed driving and said nothing.

Before Jana had time to breathe a sigh of relief, one of the teachers sitting in the front seat checked the mirror for herself. The way she popped out of her seat, you would have thought it was spring-loaded. She charged down the aisle. ”What are you doing on this bus?” she shouted.

On both sides of the aisle the kids watched with wide-eyed fear, the expression they get whenever someone is in trouble and they're glad it isn't them.

Reaching the back row, the teacher s.n.a.t.c.hed up the skinny boy, Jana's coconspirator, as though Jana was a child molester. The woman's cheap salt-and-pepper wig was knocked askew by the effort. ”Who are you?” she screamed.

The second teacher, shorter and with Chihuahua-like protruding eyes, leaned at a crazy angle from behind to punctuate the question with an angry glare.

Jana smiled her smile, even though she knew it didn't have the same effect on women as it had on men. She decided now would be a good time to play the celebrity newscaster card.

”Maybe you don't recognize me,” she said. ”My name is Jana Torres, a reporter with the-”

Something out the window caught the second teacher's attention. She used it to distract the kids from the backseat stowaway. ”Hey, kids! Look! On this side. Up in the sky. A fighter jet!”

Children poured across the aisle like water slos.h.i.+ng in a tube, plastering their faces against the windows.

”It looks mean,” one girl said.

The teacher chuckled at the girl's innocence. ”I suppose it does,” she said. ”But that's only to frighten away our enemies. He's friendly to us.”

”Cool! He's coming right at us!” a boy shouted.

”He's probably doing a flyover,” the teacher explained. ”You know, like they do at parades and football games.”

”Why?”

”It's the military's way of saluting the president.”

Jana lifted herself up onto the seat and looked out the window. She agreed with the little girl. The fighter looked mean.

”He's the lead pilot enforcing the no-fly zone,” Semyaza said, introducing the approaching aircraft. ”Thirty seconds ago he broke from his designated flight path. His name is Danny Noonan.”

”Noonan . . .”

”I thought you'd recognize the name. After your little jaunt to Montana, you can probably piece together his motive.”

The jet was targeting the bridge. I'd found the threat, but there was no alarm for me to sound. It seemed every time I turned around lately I felt helpless. It was getting tiresome.

”He knows, doesn't he?” I said, swallowing hard. ”He knows Lloyd Douglas killed his . . .”

I had to do a little generational math. Noonan's son would be too old to be a fighter pilot. That meant that Douglas had killed the pilot's . . .

”. . . grandfather,” I said.

”Very good, Grant. In case you haven't noticed this about us already, you'll soon learn that angels love irony. When Danny was a little boy, Lloyd Douglas was his hero. Douglas used to parade the boy and his father around the country to political rallies and fund-raisers. It was a great spectacle, the survivors of the Vietnam hero Douglas tried so valiantly to save.”

”You told Danny the truth.”

”Imagine his disappointment. A patriotic young man, the product of a proud military family . . . imagine how he felt when he learned it was all a lie, that the man he wors.h.i.+pped was in reality his grandfather's killer. For a warrior like Danny, there is only one way to right such a grievous wrong. Blood vengeance.”

The blackbird-sized speck in the sky had transformed into an FA-18 Hornet, bristling with armament. Its nose dipped, taking on an attack posture.

Semyaza rubbed his hands together. ”This is going to be good!” he said.

Two additional FA-18s appeared from nowhere on an intercept course.

”Don't get your hopes up,” Semyaza said. ”They won't catch him. Danny has superior skills. Besides, he has an edge. He's their trainer. He knows the tactics. He knows their weaknesses as pilots. He'll exploit them.”

Noonan's jet streaked in front of us with such ferocity it looked and sounded like it was ripping open the sky. A rocket flared beneath one wing, then the other. Twin smoke trails looking like white serpents struck the bridge.

I held my breath, unable to comprehend what was happening.

When he is suspended between earth and heaven . . .

Two explosions less than a second apart created a single ball of smoke and fire. The one-two punch took out the section of bridge immediately in front of the motorcade.

Noonan pulled up. An instant later the pursuit FA-18s screamed past us.

On the bridge, the line of vehicles bowed forward with simultaneous clouds of white smoke rising from the tires. Some fishtailed. Others rear-ended the vehicle in front of them. The bus swung sideways, the front slamming against the bridge railing and for a second it appeared as though it might go over. But it didn't. It came to a stop.

None of the vehicles plunged over the bridge's severed end. From what I could see, some limos were crumpled, but nothing serious. There was no serious damage.

”Ha! He missed!” I shouted.

Jana, along with everything and everyone inside the bus, was thrown forward when the driver hit the brakes, hitting her head on the seat in front of her. Already a knot was forming.

It took a moment for her eyes to focus on the aftermath. Children lay scattered everywhere and in every conceivable position, in the aisle, on the seats, under the seats. It looked like a doll factory had exploded.

The teachers had been thrown backward on top of children. Now they were groggily trying to disentangle themselves, sorting out whose limbs were whose.

When the brakes locked, the driver had lost control of the bus. She'd swerved right in an attempt to miss the back of the SUV in front of them. She clipped the SUV and slammed into the side railing. For one nerve-rattling instant it appeared the bus would climb the railing and go over the side. But then it slumped back and came to a halt.

”Is anyone hurt?” Jana shouted.

Without exception every child was crying, making it impossible to tell who was hurt and who was just scared. Starting with her row, Jana began checking when a pounding on the back window startled her.

She turned to see the black suit and dark gla.s.ses of a Secret Service agent. His hand moved in a circular motion, as though he was winding yarn.

”Back it up! Back it up!” he shouted. ”We'll retreat the same way we came in.”