Address of record, next of kin. Two wives and seven kids between them.
Christ .
Davis hunched forward on his chair, elbows on knees and chin cupped in his hands. He stared at the names. The information did nothing to help solve the crash. But it did a lot to complicate things. It always did. Davis had been brought here to find a missing drone, a mangled pile of high-tech hardware. Yet things were never so simple. Larry Green should have known better. He should have known better. An airplane had gone down and two pilots were dead. Nobody knew why. Not their boss, not their fellow pilots, not the mechanics who’d worked on the airplane. Worst of all, not their families.
It was a terrible thing to be in the dark about something like that. Davis had felt it when Diane had been killed. He’d wondered why. Her car had been T-boned by a delivery truck. On first glance, a straightforward tragedy, yet it had been all he could do to stand back and let the state police run their investigation. When he eventually got a look at the final report, Davis had to be restrained from taking the investigating officer’s head off. The delivery truck had recently been in for brake maintenance, but nobody at the scene had bothered to check if the brakes were working. Nobody had checked phone records to see if the driver had been talking on his cell phone or texting at the time of the crash. Loose ends everywhere. The supervisor had tried to convince Davis that it had just been an accident, one driver missing a stop sign. The who and the when and the how were all right there, clear as day. But the why was left unanswered. Davis and Jen had been forced to live with that, and they had. But right now two families in Ukraine were asking that same agonizing question. Why? In a place like this, a dysfunctional corner of North Africa, Davis knew that if he didn’t find the answers, nobody ever would.
And then there was the other part, the thing he’d mentioned tauntingly to Schmitt. Aviation really was a small world. A brotherhood, even. If Davis didn’t get to the bottom of this crash, he would be haunted by questions. Could the same disaster happen to another crew? Possibly someone he knew? Would another pilot lose his or her life to the same faulty part or shoddy procedural screwup?
Not if Jammer Davis could help it.
He would find the CIA’s drone—find it if it still existed. But at the same time, he was going to get to the bottom of this crash.
When he entered the familiar hangar, Khoury took off his sunglasses and paused to let his eyes adjust. The light inside was good, but no match for the brilliant desert sun. The place was cavernous inside, and while an attempt was made to cool—big fans overhead stirring and blowing—the system never quite kept up. Until eight months ago, Khoury had never been in an aircraft hangar in his life. Now he had come to appreciate their utility. It was a Spartan place, naked light and ventilation fixtures mounted openly to the walls and rafters, no effort made toward a tidy appearance. Benches and toolboxes and work stands encircled the perimeter, all of it bathed in the brazen fragrances of machine oil and rubber.
As he walked around the old airplane with the crazy antennae, he encountered Muhammed. The mechanic was tending to something underneath an engine, and when he saw Khoury he clambered to his feet and bowed respectfully. Khoury gave him the wave, but said nothing. The Jordanian recruit was at one end of Khoury’s spectrum, the last man he would ever have to worry about. Raised in a strict madrassa, he was as devout an extremist as Khoury had ever seen. If Muhammed were not here, he would certainly be in Kandahar or Lahore being fitted for explosive underwear.
The hangar’s second working area was well defined, separated by a high partition of plywood and cloth. Inside he found Fadi Jibril. By training, the man was an engineer, years spent in university learning things Khoury could never hope
Christ .
Davis hunched forward on his chair, elbows on knees and chin cupped in his hands. He stared at the names. The information did nothing to help solve the crash. But it did a lot to complicate things. It always did. Davis had been brought here to find a missing drone, a mangled pile of high-tech hardware. Yet things were never so simple. Larry Green should have known better. He should have known better. An airplane had gone down and two pilots were dead. Nobody knew why. Not their boss, not their fellow pilots, not the mechanics who’d worked on the airplane. Worst of all, not their families.
It was a terrible thing to be in the dark about something like that. Davis had felt it when Diane had been killed. He’d wondered why. Her car had been T-boned by a delivery truck. On first glance, a straightforward tragedy, yet it had been all he could do to stand back and let the state police run their investigation. When he eventually got a look at the final report, Davis had to be restrained from taking the investigating officer’s head off. The delivery truck had recently been in for brake maintenance, but nobody at the scene had bothered to check if the brakes were working. Nobody had checked phone records to see if the driver had been talking on his cell phone or texting at the time of the crash. Loose ends everywhere. The supervisor had tried to convince Davis that it had just been an accident, one driver missing a stop sign. The who and the when and the how were all right there, clear as day. But the why was left unanswered. Davis and Jen had been forced to live with that, and they had. But right now two families in Ukraine were asking that same agonizing question. Why? In a place like this, a dysfunctional corner of North Africa, Davis knew that if he didn’t find the answers, nobody ever would.
And then there was the other part, the thing he’d mentioned tauntingly to Schmitt. Aviation really was a small world. A brotherhood, even. If Davis didn’t get to the bottom of this crash, he would be haunted by questions. Could the same disaster happen to another crew? Possibly someone he knew? Would another pilot lose his or her life to the same faulty part or shoddy procedural screwup?
Not if Jammer Davis could help it.
He would find the CIA’s drone—find it if it still existed. But at the same time, he was going to get to the bottom of this crash.
When he entered the familiar hangar, Khoury took off his sunglasses and paused to let his eyes adjust. The light inside was good, but no match for the brilliant desert sun. The place was cavernous inside, and while an attempt was made to cool—big fans overhead stirring and blowing—the system never quite kept up. Until eight months ago, Khoury had never been in an aircraft hangar in his life. Now he had come to appreciate their utility. It was a Spartan place, naked light and ventilation fixtures mounted openly to the walls and rafters, no effort made toward a tidy appearance. Benches and toolboxes and work stands encircled the perimeter, all of it bathed in the brazen fragrances of machine oil and rubber.
As he walked around the old airplane with the crazy antennae, he encountered Muhammed. The mechanic was tending to something underneath an engine, and when he saw Khoury he clambered to his feet and bowed respectfully. Khoury gave him the wave, but said nothing. The Jordanian recruit was at one end of Khoury’s spectrum, the last man he would ever have to worry about. Raised in a strict madrassa, he was as devout an extremist as Khoury had ever seen. If Muhammed were not here, he would certainly be in Kandahar or Lahore being fitted for explosive underwear.
The hangar’s second working area was well defined, separated by a high partition of plywood and cloth. Inside he found Fadi Jibril. By training, the man was an engineer, years spent in university learning things Khoury could never hope
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