Читать книгу Head Of The Snake - G. Rehder - Страница 6

Chapter 2

The fall season would be short-lived in Anchorage. Winter came in fast and cold and ended the summer warmth with quick temperature transitions. It was a mere thirty degrees as Dave Banner (alias Dan Mercer) ran along the Tony Knowles bike trail that was on the outskirts of the Ted Stevens Airport. His warm breath was turning into small ice droplets on his red beard as he pushed down the path.

His pace was steady as he ran the course. He tried to get on it four days a week. Keeping up his strength and endurance was drilled into him in the Army, and he enjoyed the challenge. His route started on Float Plane Drive, which ran into Lakeshore, then a quick cut through on Helio Place brought him onto the bike trail.

He liked the course because it quickly got him into what he liked to call his natural setting, away from the constant activity of planes, pilots, and mechanics coming and going with aircraft taking off and landing on Lake Hood. Normally, the run would clear his head. He would focus on his pace, his breathing, and the landscape around him, but this morning, it was different.

His thoughts were consumed by his mentor and friend Jason Orr, now known as Alan Ames. The past months had been filled with high intensity and adventure. His life had been turned 360 degrees, but it was a good turn. He was in a good place, with good friends, whom he could count on to have his back, as he had theirs.

Jason had saved his life, and Dan had saved Jason’s; it was a bond that was hard to explain if you had never experienced it yourself. Dan had learned a lot under Jason’s guidance, which, in turn, gave him the confidence he now had. There was much more he hoped to learn, but that he foresaw for another day.

Now he was facing the inevitable. Jason was moving on, and Dan knew he was moving in a direction that would certainly bring him into danger, and with that danger, possibly death. As he ran, he considered all that had happened the past months, but what bothered him the most, he would not be there for him. Who would have Jason’s back?

But again, he knew Jason’s skills. That gave him comfort.

October 3, 1600 hours, it was a balmy forty-eight degrees as Dave Banner was taking advantage of the warm afternoon, checking the fluid levels in my dear friend Bo Cavanaugh’s Cessna Caravan. Bo had insisted on flying me all the way to Port Angeles, Washington, from his base field here in Anchorage. We would depart the next day, early about 0600 hours.

I walked across the deeply cracked asphalt between Bo’s office residence to the hangar, where the Cessna was being maintained. Dave was on a metal five-step ladder. Deep in his preflight inspection, as I walked up on him, he didn’t notice my approach. He was engrossed in the inspection.

“Mr. Mercer,” I called out.

Dave almost fell as he turned toward my voice. “You scared the crap out of me,” he said.

“Sorry, just like I did on the roof in Bermuda.”

“Yeah, I remember.”

There was a moment of silence as we both reflected on that moment when both of our lives had changed dramatically.

“So you all packed?” he asked me.

“Yeah, got it all into two bags. Man, that’s my whole life, in two bags.” I shook my head as I said it.

“Nah,” he said, “all of us. We’re your life too.”

“Yep, you’re right. Damn and wise beyond your years.”

“Thanks to you,” Dave said.

As I looked at him, I saw him as a younger brother.

“So tomorrow’s the day,” he said more than asked.

“Early, Bo and I will be out of here early,” I responded.

“Well, the plane is airworthy. I’ve made sure of that.”

“I have no doubt.”

Then I reached up and gripped his wrist. He stepped down from the ladder. We embraced each other.

“I’m going to miss you, man,” he said.

“Yeah, I know. Me too.”

“Don’t get dead on me. I’m not going to be there to have you’re back.”

“Just knowing you’re here to protect, Bo, Ann, and Friend, that’s having my back.”

Dave released from my hug and turned and walked deeper into the hangar. I watched him as he moved to a workbench. I was proud of this young man. I knew his sister Sarah would be also. I told him that many times.

Bo had assured me that Dave would always have a job with Cavanaugh’s Alaskan Adventures for as long as he wanted. Dave was learning to fly and soon would be able to pilot anyone of Bo’s three planes. Bo’s business had grown, and by next season, with Dave’s help and new pilot’s license, he would be able to have two planes in the air consistently.

In my heart, all was as good as it could be for my friends here in Alaska. Ann and Roger would be married next month. I deeded my property in Levelock over to them as a wedding gift. They intended to rebuild a cabin on the property using the same blueprint as my dad’s. The original cabin had been purposely burned down in an attempt to get to me and to hurt anyone associated with me.

Those attempts didn’t work out the way the perpetrator intended. You could say I won the first couple of battles to my adversaries none, but I knew the war between us would not end until either one or both of us were dead.

Right now, I had the advantage. Joseph Lehan did not know my new identity or where I was and where I would go. And I knew the Sarnev organization inside and out. As their former head of security, I was intimately familiar with their people, their offices around the world, and their mode of operation.

I had all this knowledge, and I planned on using that knowledge to avenge the deaths of my best friend Peter Grayden and the women I had fallen in love with, Sarah Mercer, Dave’s (Dan Mercer’s) sister.

With the help of my friends here in Alaska, we cut off the head of one snake, Andre Sarnev, but the body was designed to grow a new head, and its venom would be more lethal than the first. I still had some snake hunting to do.

Within a month, the highs here would only be in the midthirties. I grew to love Alaska and was reluctant to leave, but my work and goals here were complete. I knew the safety of those I loved was secure.

Now the weather was pushing me. The window for decent flying was growing narrower each day, not to mention my own drive and desire to check in on my old Army buddy, Mike Groves, hoping to make things right.

Mike had suffered on my account. His loyalty to me had put him in a position that lead to two broken hands, a concussion, ongoing surgeries, and rehab. He had kept a file hidden and safe for me, one that held damaging information against the relentless and unscrupulous Joseph Lehan.

His fight to protect the files location ended badly. He was outnumbered, and a former security partner of mine from Sarnev had a general idea of its location on Mike’s property in Questa, New Mexico. He had used that to his advantage.

The betraying partner, Dobbins, was a spy planted by Lehan. He was tasked with keeping an eye on me and my activities. His spying was what lead to my sudden and violent termination from my personal protection job with the now missing Andre Sarnev.

Unfortunately for Dobbins, I dealt with his betrayal on a dark cold street in Dillingham, Alaska, with one round to the forehead.

Now Mike’s health was declining because of his injuries. When I last spoke to him by phone, his voice was slurred and weak. He said he wasn’t drinking but was on some strong pain meds. That worried me. I couldn’t turn my back on my special ops brother. I still believed in “no man left behind.”

He needed my help, and I intended to do all I could for my old friend.

It was 0547 October 4, departure day. Bo Cavanaugh was on the radio, requesting takeoff from the Ted Stevens Airport tower. We were cleared to use the private plane runway on the east side of the airport.

Our first fuel stop would be in Sitka, 591 miles away. The Cessna could cover 790 miles with a full fuel tank, but we planned our 1,665-mile trip with two fuel stops before we made it to Port Angeles.

Bo’s piloting skills were top-notch even though he was in his early seventies. He had been flying for over fifty years, a Vietnam combat vet and copter pilot. He was my deceased Father Jack’s best friend. Bo had become my rock during some dangerous and trying times. I trusted him with my life.

He moved us onto the strip and pulled back the throttle on the 675-horsepower engine. The fourteen-passenger plane rose easily in the cold morning air. He banked us to the right, taking us away from the airport and its flight traffic. When we were out of Anchorage airspace, Bo took us up to about fifteen thousand feet.

We had our headsets on, and I turned and looked at him. His long handlebar mustache was solid gray and covered the whole lower half of his face. His mouth was obscured. I tried to read his thoughts by his eyes since he hadn’t put on his mirrored aviators yet.

I saw a sadness that I had only seen once before when he and I and Ann Hoffman put the ashes of my dad and Ann’s husband, Brian Hoffman, into the clear cold water of the Kvichak River.

I spoke up, “I couldn’t ask for a better friend. Bo, I really appreciate all you have done for me. And what you are doing now, flying me all this way.”

Bo looked my way.

“Son, I need to be thanking you. You in my life gave me purpose again. Adventure, excitement, and you brought Dave up here, a blessing, son, a blessing.”

“I’m going to miss all of you, the whole team, a damn good one too.” I tried not to get emotional, but my voice cracked. It gave me away. Then I added, “I know you’ll look after everyone. If there is any sign of Lehan’s people, you’ll call me right away?”

“Yep, first thing. Now that Ann”—whose new name is Janice Moore—“has Friend”—whose new name is Fred Rogers—“in her life, I can breathe easier for her sake. I know Friend can hold his own. They got a good future together. You know I’ll treat Dave like my son. We got plans, and they’re all good.”

“I know, Bo. If I felt you didn’t have a good handle on things, I wouldn’t be leaving.”

“Dang, son, maybe I should give you somethin’ to worry ’bout.”

I could tell he was grinning because his rising cheeks brought deeper creases around his eyes.

We flew in silence most of this first leg to Sitka. There was fog along most of the coast, so we flew about eighteen thousand feet. The ceiling on the Cessna was twenty thousand feet. Bo was instrument-rated, and his newest plane was equipped with the most modern navigation system available. Bo would need it when we finally had to break through the cover to land in Sitka.

For three minutes, we were flying blind through the dense cover that hung at six thousand feet. Bo had radioed the Rocky Gutierrez Airport tower in Sitka and was informed that the RVR (runway visual range) would be in the proper, operating Minima when he broke below five thousand feet.

After hearing the towers response, he looked at me and said, “We’re all good, son. How come you’re so white?”

“You know I don’t scare easy, but this pea soup is not soup. It’s like cotton candy,” I responded.

“Son, this is exactly why I bought this plane. When we take off from Sitka, I’m going to autopilot and then take a nap. You good with that?”

As I looked his way, we both started laughing.

The Sitka fuel stop went without incident. We got out of the plane and walked around stretching, taking advantage of the break. We had been in the air for three hours and forty minutes, running a little behind schedule because of the fog.

The next leg would be over Queen Charlotte Sound, moving into a warmer airstream with a possible front moving in from the mid Pacific. In my mind, rain was better than fog, and I told that to Bo.

“I’m an Alaskan bush pilot, son. I fly it all. You just sit back and let me get you to Port Hardy and Port Angeles.

“I have no doubts about that, my friend.”

“There was only a slight drizzle coming down on us at Port Hardy again after landing a chance to stretch and get two large cups of bad coffee from the vending machine in the terminal lobby.”

“At least it’s caffeine,” I told Bo as I sipped it.

He took a drink, just like in Nam. “You weren’t fussy, just grateful.”

“Next stop, the William R. Fairchild International Airport, 331 miles away, in one of the most northern locations in the lower forty-eight.”

At Port Angeles, Bo’s friend Eddie Mize, a vet buddy from Nam was going to put us up for the night. He also had a 2014 Toyota Four Runner that he was willing to sell me, cash.

I was looking forward to being on the ground. My body was stiff from sitting so long, and old injuries were telling me they had had enough.