The Lazarus Moment (33 page)

“Very
well. As soon as you left that morning, your wife packed a bag and left with
your daughter for Kiev. She left you a note explaining all this, but it was
lost in the explosion that flattened your apartment. According to Ukrainian
authorities, she betrayed you because she didn’t believe in the war. It had
turned you into a monster that she didn’t recognize or love anymore. So she
decided to leave you and wait out the war in safety. She never knew you thought
they were dead, and she has no clue that you are here now, about to die.”

Khomenko’s
heart was slamming in his chest, his eyes wide, his mouth agape, as he
processed the words. It couldn’t be, it couldn’t be true. There was no way his
wife, his soulmate, could betray him like this, could take his daughter and
deliver her into the hands of the enemy who would oppress them.

“I don’t
believe you.”

The man
tapped at his phone then the unmistakable sound of his wife’s voice could be
heard along with a man’s voice. She was being interviewed, her answers
confirming the horrid truth just revealed him.

He
slumped against the bathroom stall, his eyes closing as he listened to each
word, every syllable another dagger to his heart as he realized the woman he
thought had loved him, hadn’t for some time, the woman he had shared everything
with, had fought so hard for, thought of him as a horrible monster that might come
home one day and take out his frustrations on her or their daughter.

A woman
who was pregnant with a second child, the discovery of that pregnancy spurring
her into action.

The
recording ended and the man slipped the phone back in his pocket. “Everything
you did, everything you did that you said was for them, was for nothing. All
the innocent people you killed was to avenge a woman who hated you, who feared
you, who had fallen out of love with you long ago.”

Tears
poured down Khomenko’s cheeks as he realized everything he had done had no
meaning. The humiliation of failing in his mission to kill the President was
nothing compared to the collapse of his entire world. Every memory of his wife
was now suspect, her smiles, her kisses, her tender caresses, were all tainted.

Was
it
all
just an act? Could there have been
something still there?

He
looked up at the man. “Get it over with.”

The man
nodded and aimed the gun at his head, then quickly drew it away. “Oh, I almost
forgot. I have a message for you from the President.”

Khomenko’s
eyes narrowed slightly. “What?”

“Burn in
hell.”

Kane squeezed the trigger twice, a double-tap to the head, then
followed it up by emptying the magazine into the chest, a message being sent to
anyone who would dare mess with the First Family. The request had come through
Dawson a short while ago, it unofficial, though something he had been more than
happy to deliver on.

The
First Lady was dead.

A
husband was grieving.

A
husband with people like Kane at his disposal.

So a
message had been delivered, there no doubt in Khomenko’s final thoughts who was
killing him. Not Kane, but the President himself, Kane merely an instrument to
exact revenge.

Kane
stepped out of the stall and grabbed the carry-on, dragging it inside. He
locked the door from the inside then slipped under and out. He stuffed the gun
in the garbage bin embedded in the wall then strode out and past the janitor,
mopping the floor in front of the bathroom. He pulled out his cellphone as he
headed for the airport exit, dialing a number from memory, it immediately
answered.

“Hey BD,
it’s me. Tell him his message was delivered.”

Maggie Harris Residence

Lake in the Pines Apartments, Fayetteville, North Carolina

Burt “Big Dog” Dawson, a Command Sergeant Major in America’s most
elite fighting unit, was scared. Terrified. He actually was trembling as he
extended a hand to knock on the door. Spotting his ailment, he jerked his hand
back and sucked in a deep, slow breath through his nose, holding it then
exhaling though his mouth, using some of his battlefield training for something
other than combat.

He had
arrived last night but hadn’t told Maggie, there too many things to take care
of after his debriefing. But the plan had been put in motion, meetings and
phone calls with the Colonel and Maggie’s doctors just the start.

It had
been the call to Maggie’s father that had been the most terrifying thing, more
so than anything he had faced in Mozambique.

Until
now.

He held
out his hand.

Okay,
we’re good.

He
knocked gently on the door, it opened almost immediately, Red’s wife Shirley grinning
at him, tears in her eyes. “I guess you got medical clearance?”

He
nodded. “Uh huh.”

“You
look terrified.”

Is it
that obvious?
“I’d rather face ISIS singlehandedly.
At least I know what they’re going to say.”

Shirley reached
out and took his hand in hers, it trembling again. “You’ll do fine.” She
stepped inside the apartment and grabbed her purse off the kitchen counter.
“I’ll leave you two alone. She’s taking a nap in the bedroom.”

Dawson
nodded and stepped aside as Shirley stepped out. She reached up and pulled his
head down, giving him a peck on the cheek, then hurried toward the elevator.

Dawson
entered the apartment and closed the door, suddenly painfully aware his hands
were empty.

I
should have got her flowers.

He
shrugged.

Nothing
you can do about that now.

He
patted his pocket then headed for the bedroom. The nightstand light was on low,
Maggie lying on her side, her back to the door, her breathing gentle and
steady, her scar visible, the hair still not yet hiding it. The scarf she wore
to hide it from herself lay nearby, it either having come off on its own, or
Maggie having removed it to be more comfortable.

He
stepped inside and gently sat on the edge of the bed, leaning over and kissing
her cheek. She moaned, inhaling suddenly as she rolled toward him. Her eyes
fluttered open and she smiled.

“BD!”

She
reached up and grabbed him, wrapping her arms around him as he did the same.
“Hey, babe, howya doing?”

She
squeezed him tight then kissed him, a kiss that fired him up every time. She
broke it, instead staring into his eyes. “So much better now that you’re here.”
She straightened, pushing herself into an upright position, resting against the
headboard. “I thought you were dead,” she said, her voice cracking. “When I saw
the news reports they showed the file footage and saw you guys in the
background so I knew you were with him.” Her eyes flooded with tears, one
spilling out and down her cheek. “I thought I’d never see you again,” she
whispered.

He
smiled at her gently, reaching out and wiping the tear away with his thumb.
“I’m alive, and so is the rest of the team. You know I’m never going to let
anything happen to me now that I’ve got you in my life.”

She
smiled, reaching for a Kleenex then dabbing at the corners of her eyes. “Look
at me, I’m such a woman.”

His
smile spread. “Yes you are. An incredible woman.” He tried to remember the
words he had memorized, but he suddenly found himself blanking. He stared at
her, the overwhelming feeling of being a raw recruit under fire for the first
time, disturbing.

“What is
it, sweetheart?” She took his hand in hers, lifting it to her lips and placing
a gentle kiss before clasping it to her chest.

He inhaled
deeply then decided to wing it. “We’ve been together a long time.”

“Some
might not call it that,” she replied with a wry grin. “But I would agree.”

“And
I’ve been doing a lot of thinking, you know, after what happened in Paris and the
other day, and it made me realize some things.”

“What,
darling?”

“Well,
it made me realize I love you.”

“And I
love you.”

“And
that when I’m not with you, I think about you all the time. Trapped on that
airplane, as we faced what I thought was certain death, I found myself worried
not about dying, but about leaving you alone. And when I survived, I realized
that the biggest reason I was relieved was that I’d get to see you again.” She
squeezed his hand, he returning it. “When I thought I had lost you in Paris I
decided I didn’t want to go on living. I just wanted to take out as many of
them as I could and die right then and there so I could be with you again, then
when you survived, I wondered if we should remain together because I was a
danger to you.”

She
gasped, her eyes opening wide as she gripped his hand tighter. “You never told
me that before!”

He
nodded. “I know. But I realized that I didn’t want to be without you, that I
needed you in my life.” He paused, staring into her eyes. “I love you more than
I have ever loved any woman in my life. More than I thought I
could
love
any woman in my life. It wasn’t until I met you that I understood why guys like
Red were always so happy, even when they were in the mix. They knew what they
were fighting for, and they knew what they had to go home to.” He wiped away
another of her tears. “The other day, when I realized we were going to survive,
I realized I wanted that feeling too, I wanted to know I had a family to come
home to when it was all over.”

He rose,
pulling a small box out of his pocket, then dropped to a knee, opening the most
expensive thing he had ever purchased besides a car. Maggie gasped, her hand
darting to her chest as her cheeks flushed.

“Oh my
God!” she cried as she realized what was about to happen.

Dawson stared
up at her, finally remembering something he had rehearsed.

“Maggie Alyssa
Harris, will you marry me?”

THE END

The idea for this book came from news reports about hackers being
able to access flight computers. Having worked in the computer business for
over twenty years before becoming a fulltime writer, I was pretty confident
that John Q. Public sitting in their seat couldn’t crash the plane using the
onboard Wi-Fi, though the research would have me avoiding older planes for a
while, the designers not as paranoid when this tech first arrived. Now with
modern methods, everything would be isolated—or it should be!

What
spurred this story on were the reports of the Airbus A400M crash in Spain,
where they discovered that the software for the engines hadn’t been installed
properly, the result of which was the engines going into idle and the plane
crashing, killing four.

So it
was
possible to crash a plane through computer error.

Which
meant hackers could do the same thing.

If they
had access.

Air
Force One is probably the most famous plane in the world, its passenger
certainly fairly well known, so if you’re going to crash an airplane, you crash
this one. The only problem with the scenario was that Air Force One is old.
Very old. It’s due for replacement, the first plane to be in service by 2023.

So how
to get around this little problem of there not being the modern computers that
could be hacked?

Easy.

An
upgrade!

Artistic
license is of course taken, though I think a little less so than that fantastic
Harrison Ford movie. Contrary to what was shown there, there is no emergency
escape pod and there are no parachutes.

Which
was good, as it would have made this story not nearly as eventful.

Whether
or not hacking a plane with someone on the inside, and subsequently crashing
it, is even possible, is up for debate. Note that in this book the idea wasn’t
to crash the plane by overriding the flight controls, it was simply to shut
everything down. Contrary to what our Looney Tunes tell us, planes that run out
of fuel or have their engines cut don’t come to an immediate halt and drop from
the sky, they glide. A skillful pilot can glide a massive 747, exactly as was
done in this book, and has been done far too often through history.

It works
great, as long as you have a place to land.

Crashing
over a jungle sort of solved that plot point.

The
incredible skill shown by Captain Chesley B. “Sully” Sullenberger when he
landed an Airbus A320 on the Hudson River in New York City after his engines
shut down proves that landing safely on a body of water is possible, and the
plane will float.

I hope
you enjoyed this torn from the headlines story, and yes, it was just pure
coincidence that the real President travelled to Kenya just this week, the
destination of the fictional Air Force One before it crashed.

One note
about the dedication. In this book, we saw the misguided actions of parents who
had either lost a child or were trying to secure a better future for their
children. While they truly loved their children, obviously their actions
couldn’t be condoned. True love for your child was graphically illustrated on
July 27, 2015. Before googling Xiang Liujua, be forewarned that the videos
online are graphic and not for the faint of heart. For those who don’t want to
see the moment a person dies a horrible, terrifying death, do
not
view
the videos. For those who do view it, you will see a selfless, almost
instinctual act of a mother who thinks not of herself, but her child. This
brave young mother was killed in an escalator accident recently, and in her
last desperate act, she saved her two-year-old son by pushing him to safety as
she was drawn into the machine.

It is a
sobering reminder of just how precious life is, and how quickly one life can be
saved while another is snuffed out, doing something mundane like shopping at
the mall.