pushed into the back of the black van by two more attackers. The catering and lavatory services vehicles were next to it, and several armed men had fanned out away from them.
Almost instantly more gunfire slammed into the Gulfstream near Court. He emptied the SIG at the distant threats but knew he was making more noise than hits because he was firing at a difficult angle back around the doorway of the moving aircraft.
When the pistol locked open, he rushed back to the cockpit.
The Gulfstream rolled on towards the taxiway and the darkness at twenty knots, a slow escape from the danger. Court knew there was nothing more he could do for the Americans back on the tarmac, nor for the MI6 officers.
He grabbed the medical bag off a small shelf just next to the cockpit doors and raced back to the injured woman. She was sitting up now, trying to reach into the closet.
Court knelt above her and began looking over her bloody wounds. “Both pilots are dead.”
She looked out the door, and then back at him with confusion. “Then who the hell is taxiing the plane?”
“That would be me, I guess.” He finished his examination of her injuries. “I know this hurts like hell, but all your fingers are still here and they’re moving. Your wrist is broken, but you weren’t hit through the nerves or the vein. You’ll be fine.”
She gazed down at the wounds with a detached expression on her face now, as if this were all happening to someone else.
Court pulled dressings from a sterile pouch in the medical kit and began wrapping the woman’s wrist tightly. While doing this he said, “I need a sat phone and another weapon.”
Her gaze rose from her shattered hands to the man kneeling over her.
“Why?”
“I’m going after the prisoner.”
“But . . . you’re alone.”
“That’s kind of my thing, ma’am.” Court tied off the bandages. “Weapons?”
“I’ve got more mags for the SIG in the go-bag in the closet.”
“Anything else?”
She winced now, as if the pain was just beginning to reveal itself. “There’s . . . there’s an M320 in the go-bag with a bandolier full of high-explosive and tear gas rounds.”
Court looked up to the closet. “A grenade launcher. Well, that’s handy.” He began bandaging her other hand.
Looking out the passenger door, he saw they were nearing the main buildings of the airfield. The G-IV rolled by a row of tied-down light aircraft, all bearing the markings of the Air Training Corps, a youth military group run by the Ministry of Defense to teach flying to the next generation of RAF pilots. This must have been some sort of flight training center for them, and immediately it gave Court an idea.
The woman said, “The go-bag has everything an officer needs. Surveillance gear, commo gear . . . Shit, my wrist hurts. Uh, medical equipment, surgical supplies.”
Court again headed back to the cockpit to bring the wounded Gulfstream to a stop while the last few rounds of gunfire trailed off behind him.
CHAPTER 3
The black van raced up the A41, heading northwest away from Ternhill airport. In the front passenger seat, a thirty-year-old man named Anthony Kent wiped sweat from his face while he conferred on the radio with his surviving teammates. The lav truck and the catering truck had been left on airport grounds, and the other men had climbed into a nondescript gray four-door. Kent had taken the opportunity to leave the van to check on those still alive, and now they’d resumed their escape out of the area.
Behind Kent in the back of the van, a black man with an unattended shoulder wound reached out with his good arm and ripped the hood off the prisoner.
With a British accent he said, “Name?”
The man seemed to be in a mild state of shock. He did not answer, only stared blindly for a moment.
“What’s your bloody name, mate?”
The prisoner coughed. “Visser. Dirk Visser.”
The wounded gunman pulled a sheet of paper from his pocket, pain evident on his face. On it was a color copy of a passport. He turned and shouted towards the front of the van. “It’s him. He’s not hurt.”
From the front passenger seat Kent said, “Understood.”
The man with the bloody hole in his shoulder put the hood back over the banker’s head.
The other gunman in the back pulled off his ski mask to reveal a bushy red beard and a sweat-covered face. “Fuckin’ hell! How many did we lose?”
Kent said, “Four men wounded, including Davy here. Six