“For me to know. Come on.” As Goliad stood up, he looked down with loathing at the man beside him, whom he would gladly throttle here and now. The boss had told him to bring someone with him, someone disposable, to be the fall guy if something should go wrong. Timmy had been suggested.

Bad idea. Timmy had screwed up, and, for him, there would be hell to pay. But not until the time was right. Presently, Goliad was letting him live because he might yet prove to be useful.

Goliad had been born in the Texas town of the same name. It was the name on his baptismal certificate. The name stuck, but the baptism didn’t take. His sainted mother had died clutching her rosary and sobbing over the path he’d chosen for his life. It wasn’t the straight-and-narrow one she’d fervently and futilely prayed for.

Timmy had been inducted into his first gang at the ripe age of eleven after he’d slit the throat of his abusive father and took to the rough streets of Philadelphia, where he was absorbed into the thriving criminal element. Now in his early twenties, he maintained a feral, street-gang mentality.

They made an odd pair. Goliad carried a handgun but was rarely called upon to use it. His height and breadth of chest made him so physically imposing that few men would think of challenging him.

The top of Timmy’s head didn’t even reach Goliad’s shoulder. He was small, wiry, and mean. He liked to provoke and was easily provoked. He preferred blades to bullets and never carried fewer than three knives, well concealed.

As they headed back to where they’d left their car, Timmy asked, “Are you going to tell the boss about the laser?”

“Haven’t decided yet,” Goliad replied, intentionally leaving Timmy to worry. But he didn’t want to get a knife in the back, so he motioned for Timmy to take the lead.

“I can’t find my way back to the car in this shit.”

“Then I guess you’ll stay lost out here in the woods and may never be found.”

Timmy must’ve sensed the underlying threat. Mumbling about how much he hated nature and missed city life, he plowed ahead, but it was Goliad who set the pace, keeping close behind Timmy, giving him a prod whenever he tripped over something unseen or slowed down to avoid collision with a sapling or boulder that took shape out of the fog, often only inches in front of them.

“I just want to know one thing,” Goliad said. “What the hell were you thinking?”

“I’ve got a curious mind,” Timmy said in a whine. “I saw it on TV. A story telling how dangerous lasers were to pilots. Lots of them are getting zapped.”

“So you thought you’d try it out on this pilot, see if it worked to make him crash.”

“I just meant to mess with him some.”

Goliad shook his head over the stupidity. “Where’d you get the damn thing?”

“Saw UPS delivering a package to a house. Stole it off the front porch soon as the truck drove off. Didn’t even know what was in the carton until I opened it. Bonanza!”

“When was this?”

“Coupla weeks ago.”

“You know, they catch thieves like that on home security cameras.”

Timmy guffawed. “I know how to dodge those.”

“You had better hope. Have you shown it off to anybody?”

“No. Never turned it on before tonight.”

“You couldn’t have picked a worse time to experiment.”

“I wanted to see if it would work in the fog. Jesus, what’s the big deal?”

“The big deal is that the people who hired you are waiting for what was in that airplane.”

“I didn’t know it would crash,” he muttered.

“Well, it did. Just be glad that box wasn’t destroyed.”

“See? No problem. It’ll look like this sorry pilot screwed up, missed the runway in the fog.”

Goliad feared that it wouldn’t be dismissed as lightly as that. He feared a ripple effect that could result in serious consequences for the people he was paid to protect.

After having to backtrack only once, they relocated the car. Goliad was the designated driver. Timmy got in the shotgun seat.

As Goliad reached for his phone, he made a split-second decision to be as short on details as possible. Once he and Timmy returned to Atlanta with that black box, any mishaps they had encountered during the undertaking would be irrelevant.

He turned on the speaker so Timmy could listen in and placed the call. After only half a ring, it was answered, not by the boss, but by his missus, who was much more excitable.

In a voice hard enough to chisel granite, she asked, “Do you have it?”

“Not yet, ma’am.”

“The plane’s not there yet?”

“Showed up about half an hour ago.”

“Then what’s the problem?”

“It crashed.”

She gasped.

Goliad said, “The pilot was about to land, overshot the runway, crashed in the woods.”

He gave Timmy a look that said he could thank him later for saving his ass. Timmy gave him a thumbs-up.

“The plane burned, it was destroyed, what?” she asked. “What?”

“No, it wasn’t destroyed. The box made it okay.”

There was a pause, an exhale, a huskily spoken, “Thank heaven.”

“But the doctor beat us to the crash site.” He described the scene that he and Timmy had crept up on. “She and the pilot were talking.”

“He survived?”

“Uninjured, best we could tell.”

“What was she doing at the crash site? She was supposed to meet the plane at the airfield.”

“I don’t understand that, either,” he admitted. “All I know is, she was there. The pilot gave her the box. It’s as described. About the size of a loaf of bread. Padlocked. They struck off together on foot. They were headed to her car. She was giving him a lift to the airfield office.”

“So why didn’t you go after them? Richard will demand to know. How will I explain this to him?”

“They had no idea we were there, ma’am. Tracking them on foot, we could’ve given ourselves away. It wouldn’t have been a smart move.”

Knowing how thin she was on patience, he used as few words as possible to adequately describe how bad conditions were. “You think it’s bad in Atlanta, it’s worse up here. If we came up on them accidentally in this fog and there was an…encounter…this could get botched real easy.”

“It could’ve got messy,” Timmy said, speaking for the first time. “Because he was packing.”

“What’s he talking about, Goliad?”

“The pilot was armed. You, we, nobody took him into account. He wasn’t even supposed to be in the picture.”

“Why would we have taken him into account? We didn’t know he would crash!”

“True. There was no predicting that.” Goliad shot an angry glance toward Timmy, who squirmed in his seat.

“You say he was armed?” she asked.

“Pocket pistol. Nine-millimeter. He’s not a regular pilot. Looked worse for wear, and not because of the crash.”

She didn’t say anything for a while, thinking it over, Goliad guessed.

He said, “The plane going down was a setback, but the box survived it, and the doctor has it. Only a little time has been lost. We’ll catch up with her at the airport.”

Timmy opened his mouth, but Goliad gave a forbidding shake of his head, silencing him before he spoke.

She was saying, “Need I remind you that every minute counts?”

“We know, ma’am.”

“The next time you call, I want to hear that you have the doctor in tow, with the box, and that you’re on your way back to Atlanta. Is that understood?”

“Loud and clear.”

“Good. I’m hanging up now. I suggest that you start immediately making up for lost time. I must go explain to my husband that you’ve been delayed. He won’t be happy. I’m certainly not. I advise you both not to fail us.” With that, she ended the call.

Timmy whistled. “She burns hot, don’t she? Bet she fucks like—”

Goliad’s arm sliced across the console of the car and clotheslined Timmy’s neck. “Remember who you’re talking about.” He pressed his arm against Timmy’s windpipe hard enough to make him wheeze. “Playing with your new laser,” he sneered. “This isn’t a game, you idiot.”

Slowly he released the pressure on Timmy’s throat and resettled himself behind the steering wheel. Out of the corner of his eye, he stayed aware of where Timmy put his hands. His right was rubbing his throat. Goliad half expected him to produce one of his blades with his left.

But he was gulping air and swallowing noisily. When he had his wind back, he croaked, “I was only joking.”

“Wasn’t funny. You work for them. Show respect for both, or this is your last detail.”

“Okay, okay,” Timmy mumbled. “So what now?”

Goliad started the car. “We go to the airstrip, be waiting for them when they get there.”

“That’s plan B?”

“That’s plan B.”

“You think the lady doctor will go along with us shouldering in on her?”

“She will once we tell her that we’ve been dispatched by Mrs. Hunt, personally. We’ll tell her that Mrs. Hunt was concerned for her, driving up here alone in the fog. Mrs. Hunt sent us to make sure she has a safe trip back.”

“She’ll buy that?”

“She’ll probably call and confirm.”

“What if she still doesn’t like it?”

“Let’s wait and see what happens.”

“What about the pilot?”

“Wait and see.” He looked over at the younger man. “We’re up shit creek. What are you grinning for?”

Timmy giggled. “‘Wait and see’ means I might get to kill somebody after all.”

Chapter 4

2:32 a.m.