Read Online 02 Thunder of Heaven: A Joshua Jordan Novel by Tim Lahaye - Free Book Online Page B

would do. He would get a quarter of a million, maybe a third of a million, for them if he was lucky. Usually that was chump change, but now money was tight. He had to be more discrete than usual. His last client, Caesar Demas — the international business celebrity, a friend to the vice president of the United States, and a chum of the secretary general of the U.N. — had not paid him for his last job. At least not the second half of the contracted job. That came as no surprise, of course, because the American job didn’t work out the way that he and Demas had planned.
    But for Atta Zimler, the customer in the bank’s security cubicle who was impersonating a Swedish diamond broker, there was no such thing as failure. It was just a matter of delay. He had every intention of finishing what he’d started the year before in a New York City train station. And when he was through, and he offered Demas what he still hoped to obtain, then he would get his money from Caesar Demas. Or else.
    After he had placed the bag of diamonds in his briefcase, secured the lockbox, and unlocked the frosted-glass cubicle, he strolled back, his Italian-made shoes clicking on the marble floor of the bank lobby.
    Always looking for an opportunity, he spotted some mints on the counter outside the window of a pretty bank teller. He walked over. He put his hand into the dish and pulled out a small candy.
    “I was looking for something sweet,” Zimler said to her with a smile as he lingered at the window.

SIXTEEN
    In the Manhattan office of Jordan Technologies, Joshua and his research and development team had worked around the clock for two days on their design data for the commercial version of the RTS laser antimissile system. They had found nothing to explain the failure of RTS to stop the terrorist missile that downed the illfated 797. His engineers had theories, but no real answers.
    Joshua was in his office with Ted. As Joshua looked out the window to the New York skyline, he thought back to something his weapons physicist, Caroline, had said. So Joshua put the question to Ted. “How soon can we get the data from the black box and the voice recorder?”
    Ted said, “The FAA isn’t the problem. The real issue is getting the okay from Homeland Security to share the data with us. That’ll be a high hurdle.”
    “I don’t understand,” Joshua complained. “We designed the system. We’re part of the team.”
    “Yes and no. Don’t forget that the Feds placed all kinds of restrictions on a pilot’s ability to hit the RTS button — like getting permission from the tower first. It’s all part of their concern about the consequences if a missile is turned around in a highly populated area. The RTS could result in huge casualties on the ground — ”
    “But we explained we were working on refinements to minimize collateral damage. Until then, our current RTS is the best thing going. They can’t blackball us.”
    Ted pulled out his handheld wireless Allfone, clicked on the headline news, and said, “Maybe this will explain.”
    Joshua looked at the screen. His stomach turned.
    The headline read: “Return-to-Sender Failure Cited for Chicago Air Disaster.”
    “You’ll notice,” Ted said, “that the media guys don’t report that terrorist crazies shot a missile at the plane and that’s why it fell from the sky.”
    Ted took his Allfone back and started searching for something else. “Like we’ve said all along,” Ted noted, “the biggest obstacle is always the politics.” He swooped his finger over the screen. After a moment, he said, “Found it. Yeah, I wanted to see what AmeriNews had to say. They’re the only ones giving you a break.”
    Joshua kept his mouth shut. If anyone on his tech team could be trusted to be discrete, it was Ted. Even so, Joshua had never shared with Ted his connection to AmeriNews. Joshua had been intimately involved with this controversial new entrant into the electronic media, the first to finally