Death Takes a Gander (16 page)

At the plane, she pushed Coot through the checklist and breathed an audible sigh of relief when the plane lifted off. Scanning the ground as the plane circled around, a sudden movement caught her eye. Radigan stared up from the deck of the clubhouse, his hand shielding his eyes from the sun.

Angela leaned back her head.

Then the plane dipped.

Angela jerked upright. She blinked and tried orienting herself. She must have dozed off. In her dream it had been dark, and she was at the edge of a lake. In the light, she was in the cockpit next to Coot.

The plane swerved the other direction, setting off alarm bells in Angela’s head. Lark sat paralyzed on the back seat.

“Keep it steady, Coot!” Angela said, wondering how long she’d been asleep.

Silence.

“Coot?” She felt a stab of fear, then a shot of adrenaline hit her veins.

Coot slumped in the seat, and his eyes fell to half-mast. He began to convulse.

“What’s wrong with him?” Lark asked, her voice at the edge of hysteria.

“I don’t know. Maybe he’s having a seizure.” Angela shook his shoulder. “Coot!”

No answer.

The plane dipped again, and Lark shrieked. Angela shook him harder, and his head lolled to the left.

“Coot, can you hear me?” Angela leaned closer to him and sniffed. No alcohol, at least not that she could smell. Grabbing his cup, she took a drop on her tongue. It tasted like dark French roast.

“Maybe he’s having a stroke. What are we going to do?” Lark’s voice sounded high-pitched and frantic.

“We’re not going to panic.” Angela handed his cup back to Lark. “Take this.”

Lark reached forward, and the plane started down.

The woman froze, and Angela stuffed the cup back into a holder and grabbed the yoke on the passenger’s side. “What the hell do I do?”

She tried pulling back on the yoke, like she’d seen people do in the movies.

The plane climbed. Then its engine speed dropped, and it started to slip sideways.

“We’re going to crash,” Lark said, panic edging her voice.

“No, we’re not!” yelled Angela. “Get a grip, Lark. I could use your help.”

Turning the yoke left leveled the plane, then the engine sputtered.

“Quit climbing. You’re going to stall the plane!” The hysteria in Lark’s voice snapped Angela to reason. She pushed forward on the yoke, and the nose of the plane dropped. The engine revved. Then the nose of the aircraft cracked the horizon, and the plane started down.

“Back, back,” yelled Lark.

Angela pulled back, and the nose crept up.

Aha!

“Forward down, back up,” she said, proud of herself for figuring it out. “Somewhere in there we’re level. Otherwise it sort of steers like a car.” She pulled the yoke right, and the plane swerved right. Left, and it swerved left.

Angela glanced over her shoulder. Lark looked sick. “Can you call for help?”

“Let’s hope so.” Angela reached for the radio and fiddled with the knobs until she heard voices. Pressing the transmit button, she hollered, “Mayday, Mayday!” into the mike.

A deep, male voice boomed back. “What’s your situation?”

“Our pilot’s passed out. Requesting assistance,” Angela said, lapsing into law enforcement lingo.

After a beat, the man’s voice came back. “Are you a non-pilot?”

“That’s affirmative.”

“Do you have control of the plane?”

“Not really.” Though, for the moment, they seemed to be okay.

“What’s your location?”

Angela looked out the window. “Just east of Barr Lake.”

At her movement, the plane veered.

Lark shrieked into the earphones.

Angela leveled the aircraft.

“What’s going on up there? Is everyone alright?”

“We’re fine. Fine,” Angela said, soothing herself and Lark as much as possible. “We just need help. Now!”

“Okay. Stay calm. We’re going to try and get you down. First, what type of plane are you in?”

“A small one.”
Very small
. The front seat barely had room for Coot and herself. “A Cessna.”

“Single engine,” he said.

“I think I’ve got her on radar,” a voice in the background said.

“Are you flying on autopilot?”

“No.” Angela described how she was controlling the plane.

“Do you see the pilot’s clipboard?”

“Yes.” She tried to curb her excitement. It was her first right answer. She stretched sideways, but as short as she was, she couldn’t reach without letting go of the yoke. “Can you reach it, Lark?”

Lark eased herself forward and reached over the seat.

“We’ve got it,” Angela said.

“Good. Now find the airplane’s checklist for descent and landing.”

Angela watched Lark flip through the pages.

“It’s a Cessna 180,” she said.

“Great. Now I need you to look at your airspeed.”

“Where?” Angela stared at the dials and knobs. None of them made sense to her.

“There’s an airspeed indicator on the dash. It should have a green arc near the bottom.” He waited a moment, then asked, “See it?”

“No.” There were too many gauges. Shifting her gaze back and forth from the dials to the horizon, she found one that seemed to read knots. “Wait, I think this is it. I don’t see the green arc, but it reads eighty-five knots.”

“Good! Now just keep the needle between eighty and one hundred.” The man paused. “Do you see the throttle? It should be a black knob.”

“Is that the one on the dash that Coot used to add power?”

“Is Coot the pilot?”

“Was the pilot,” she corrected. She wondered if the man on the radio knew him. If so, he didn’t react.

“That’s the knob. Find it, but don’t do anything with it yet,” said the man. “If you push it in, you add power. If you pull it out, you reduce power.”

“Got it.”

“Good. Let’s practice.”

Angela’s chest tightened.
Practice?

“Right now?”

“It’s important you get a feel for the plane.”

“I feel her just fine.”

The man laughed, and Angela forced herself to relax, shaking out her shoulders like a boxer before a big fight.

“Seriously, try pulling up the nose of the plane.”

“We did that before, and the engine sputtered.”

“That’s because you need to increase the power to the engine. After that, you’re going to do the reverse and descend.”

Angela felt paralyzed. “I can’t.”

“You can,” he countered. “Listen to me, you can fly this plane. Do everything small. No quick movements. No large bursts of power.” He paused. “Ready?”

Angela drew a deep breath. “I’m ready,” she said, afraid he might quit on her if she told him no.

She pulled on the yoke, and the nose of the plane lifted, just like before. Only this time, when the airspeed dropped below eighty, she reached forward and pushed on the throttle.

“She’s climbing,” said the voice in the background.

Power surged through the aircraft. Excitement tingled along her spine.
I am doing it! I am really in control of the plane
.

“Now level her off, and let’s try a descent.”

“Ten-four.”

When Angela started down, Coot moved in the seat beside her. Falling forward, he slumped across the yoke. The plane pitched down and to the left, throwing Angela forward.

Time slowed to a crawl.

Coot twitched.

Lark screamed, drew a breath, then screamed again.

Fear constricted Angela’s throat. She opened her mouth to speak, but words didn’t come. Blood pounded in her ears. The wind whistled. The earth rose in the window as the plane hurtled toward the ground.

Angela pressed herself back
in the seat and tried yanking back on the yoke. Coot’s weight countered her efforts.

“What’s going on?” the voice on the radio demanded.

“They’re dropping altitude!” the person watching them on the radar said.

“Talk to me. Are you okay?” her instructor demanded.

“Lark, pull him off the yoke,” Angela shouted. “Get him into the backseat.”

From the corner of her eye, Angela could see Lark grabbing fistfuls of Coot’s shirt. The woman straddled the seat and was leveraging her weight, trying to pull him back. “He’s too heavy.”

“Why is he out of his seatbelt?” the man asked.

“Who knows?” they responded in unison.

Who cares?
At this point, Angela just wanted him clear of the yoke. Her arms ached, and she was losing control of the plane.

Was there anywhere she could try and set down?

Beneath her, Barr Lake sparkled in the winter sun like a small puddle of blue on a white patchwork quilt. To the west lay Commerce City, an industrial wasteland of belching smokestacks, speeding cars, and scrawled graffiti. To the south was Denver International airport, where there were too many bigger planes to contend with.

Her best bet lay to the east. There, the ground stretched flat toward Kansas. Acre after acre of agricultural fields, broken by an occasional tree or farmhouse and dissected into squares by miles of one-lane country roads. If worst came to worst, maybe she could set the plane down on one of them. Or in one of the cornfields.

Static hissed across the radio.

Angela heard Ian’s voice in her head.
First things first
.

She focused on the problem. To land, she needed the ability to level the plane. Wrapping her arms around the yoke, she heaved back. The plane kept dropping.

“Do something!” Lark screeched.

“I’m trying.”

Their airspeed was climbing. Reaching forward, Angela eased off on the throttle. The nose lifted slightly, but they continued to fall, plus now they were slipping sideways.

“Try scooting his seat back,” she told Lark. It seemed like their only hope.

“I can’t reach the bar.”

“Okay, then I’m going to let go of the yoke.”

“No!”

“It’s the only way. Ready?”

Lark nodded.

Angela let go and bent down. The plane veered sharply to the right, then to the left. Her hand hit the bar under the seat and she pulled up, shoving her shoulder hard against the seat cushion.

Nothing.

She tried again, and the seat slid back. Coot lolled to the left.

Sitting upright, Angela reclaimed the yoke. She straightened them on the horizon, then pulled back. The plane started to climb. The engine coughed, and she throttled up.

“We did it!” Lark cheered.

“We’re back in control,” Angela said, checking her airspeed indicator.

There was a burst of applause on the radio.

“Good job,” the man said. “Now I need you to find the altimeter.”

That was it? No champagne?

She glanced out the window, and realized how close they were to the ground.

“It measures in feet.”

“Is it a round gauge?” she asked.

“That’s it.”

“It reads 5900. Wait! 5920.”

“You’re still climbing. That’s good. Take it up to about 6200, then bring down the nose and level off. Try to keep the altimeter set there.”

The reality of how close they had come to crashing into the ground hit home. If Denver was a mile high, they’d come within several hundred feet of the ground. “Thanks.”

“Don’t thank me yet.”

Why? Didn’t he think he could talk them down?

Panic bubbled up inside of her.

Maybe he was superstitious.
Oh my god, did I jinx us by saying thanks before we landed the plane?

Suddenly it seemed important to know his name. “I’m Angela,” she said. “Angela Dimato. What’s your name?”

“Leo. Leo Kaminsky, Denver International Airport Air Traffic Control.”

“Okay, Leo.” She leveled the plane off at six thousand two hundred feet. “What do we do now?”

“How many of you are up there?”

“Two, plus the pilot,” Angela said, giving him everyone’s name.

Another voice broke in, this one a woman’s. “Denver International, this is Carrie McCullough, a flight instructor out of Fort Morgan. I have a visual on the Cessna. Want me to lead her in?”

A flurry of conversation followed the offer, then Leo spoke. “Angela, do you see an airplane off your left wing?”

“A small, white one?” She had spotted it while they were talking. A dark-haired woman wearing a baseball cap hunkered behind the controls.

“That’s correct. She’s going to escort you in. I want you to shadow her movements. I’ll be giving you the power, flaps, and pitch settings for an approach on runway seventeen.”

“What about jets?” Lark asked, reigniting Angela’s fear about landing at DIA.

“We’ve got them circling way above you. You don’t need to worry.”

That’s easy for you to say
.

While the white plane maneuvered in front of her, Angela focused on the directions Leo gave her for setting flaps and cutting power.

“Do you see the runway?” he asked.

She nodded, realized he couldn’t see her, and said, “Yes.”

“There’s one more thing to remember.”

What now?

“In a Cessna, you have to manually coordinate between the yoke and the pedals.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Once you’re on the ground, the yoke won’t work. You’ll have to steer the plane by working the rudder, using the pedals on the floor. It may feel backwards.”

“Anything else?” she asked.

“That’s it. Good luck. You can make your approach now.”

This time she nosed the plane toward the ground on purpose. Smooth and pale, the runway stretched toward the horizon in front of them, shimmering like a gray satin ribbon on a white package. To the west, the white cloth tepees of the terminal poked toward the sky.

The asphalt rose to greet them, and so did Angela’s fear. Her fingers tightened on the yoke. She pulled up and veered away. “I can’t do this.”

“Yes, you can,” insisted Lark, sounding more desperate than convinced.

“No, I can’t.”

“Stay calm,” Leo ordered.

Angela gulped in air, forcing her hands to relax. “Calm.”
Yeah, right
. “I’m working on calm.”

“You need to climb in altitude, Angela, and swing around for another try,” Carrie said. “How’s your fuel holding up?”

The gauge read low. “If I don’t land soon, we’ll go down under natural power.”

Lark gave a little yip and pressed herself back in her seat.

“I’m moving above and behind,” Carrie stated.

The white plane veered out of sight, and Angela’s heart stopped, gripped by a momentary panic. Even with Lark clinging tight to the backseat, she felt alone and vulnerable. Her heart hammered in her chest. Her breath came in short bursts.

“You still with me?” Carrie asked, breaking the spell.

“Unfortunately.”

“I’ll walk you through it. You’re doing fine.”

They circled around until the runway came back into view.

“Now, set your flaps like Leo told you. Bring your nose down, then cut your power. Just pitch level.”

“And pray,” Lark whispered.

The ground came up fast, and the plane hit the tarmac with a force that jarred Coot awake. He grabbed for the yoke, but Lark pinned back his arms. Angela held tight.

The plane lifted and bounced. Her teeth slammed together. Pain shot through her tongue.

We are going to die
.

“Pull the throttle all the way back, Angela,” Carrie yelled. “And pull the red knob to kill the engine.”

The plane bounced a second time, and Angela cut the power. Careening toward the edge of the runway, she depressed the right pedal. The plane straightened out, then veered in the opposite direction. She depressed the opposite pedal, over-correcting, and the plane ran off the left side of the runway into a shallow ditch.

We’re going to flip
.

The plane dove forward, and Angela slammed her head against the yoke. Then the plane tore free of the grass and coasted to a stop on the taxiway.

The silence frightened her. Turning off the engine, Angela flung open the door. Spitting out a mouthful of blood, she gingerly checked her teeth. Her head throbbed, but she seemed to be in once piece.

“Are you okay, Lark?”

Lark cupped her hands around her mouth and huffed a few breaths before throwing her arms around Angela. “You did it.”

“We did it,” Angela said, hugging her back.

Sirens blared, accompanying the cheers on the radio.

“Thank you, Leo, Carrie… everyone,” Angela said, staring at the white plane swooping past the runway.

“Our pleasure,” responded Leo. “Welcome to Denver International Airport”

Despite the fact they were okay, rescue personnel insisted on transporting Lark and Angela to the hospital. Except for a few minor lacerations, bumps, and bruises, both had emerged unscathed. The Denver County sheriff and investigators from the Federal Aviation Administration had asked a few questions, then they were allowed to go.

“How’s Coot?” Angela asked, pausing in the doorway on her way out.

“He’ll live,” the sheriff answered.

“What’s wrong with him?”

The FAA investigator looked up. “We’re working on that.”

Angela bristled. Was he trying to stonewall her? “I’m a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Special Agent—”

“And a witness in this investigation,” the FAA man said. “Close the door behind you.”

Annoyed by his dismissive tone and the sheriff’s smirk, Angela exited into the hallway. There was no point in arguing. But, borrowing a phrase from her Italian grandmother, there was more than one way to peel a grape.

A scan of the emergency room whiteboard showed Coot in cubicle seven. She flashed her credentials at the guard posted in front of the curtain. He allowed her to pass.

The lights were dimmed, throwing the tiny cubicle into twilight. The counter next to the sink was littered with cotton balls and blood-soaked gauze. Coot sprawled on the narrow gurney, a stream of wires connecting him to a bank of monitors on the back wall. Asleep on his back, his feet dangled over the end of the bed, and his short hospital gown crept toward indecent.

Angela averted her eyes and looked for his chart. It was where it belonged, tucked safely at the foot of the bed. She made a quick perusal of the chicken scratch on the chart.

His vitals looked good.

She flipped a page and found what she was looking for. A small notation in the doctor’s handwriting read, “Patient is suffering from toxic poisoning.”

“May I help you?”

The voice startled Angela, and she bobbled the chart. “Yes. No. I… ”

The male nurse snatched the medical chart out of her hands. “What are you doing in here?”

“Special Agent Dimato,” Angela said, introducing herself. “The guard let me in.”

“No one but a nurse or the doctor is allowed to handle his chart.”

“Fair enough. Would you mind reading it then, and telling me how he’s doing?”

“It’s hard to say. It sounds like he’s lucky to be alive,” the nurse said, jotting a note in the chart. Angela figured he was writing her up.

“I was one of the people in the plane with him.”

“Yeah? Then you’re lucky too.”

Being friendly wasn’t working. Maybe it was time to try the official tack. “When will I be able to question him?”

The nurse slapped shut the chart and jabbed it in the direction of the makeshift interrogation room. “Lady, from where I stand, those two dudes are ahead of you in line.”

Angela glanced over her shoulder. The sheriff and FAA investigator were standing in the hall. Angela ducked behind the curtain too late. The FAA investigator had spotted her.

He charged across the linoleum and crowded into the cubicle. “What the hell—?”

“I’m leaving,” she said.

“Damn straight you are. You’re lucky I don’t put you behind bars.” The FAA man turned to the guard at the door. “Take a good look at this one. She doesn’t get in. If she shows her face again, arrest her.”

Kramner was even less kind. Dorothy had picked up Angela and Lark at the hospital and dropped Angela back at her pickup. She had called her mother from her cell phone, left a message saying she was alright just in case Verbiscar aired a story about the plane crash, then went straight from there to the duty station.

“I’m pulling you out of the field,” Kramner said. “I want you in here come Monday morning, where I can keep an eye on you.”

She watched him pace, the fluorescent lights sparkling off the bald spot on the back of his head, creating the illusion of a disco ball on parade. His thick, black glasses perched on his nose above nostrils flared with anger.

“What were you thinking?” he asked, stopping in front of her.

The lyrics from another country western song popped into her head, and she banished them to the recesses of her mind. “I was doing my job, sir.” A spark of fear filtered into her consciousness. “You aren’t serious about the desk job.”

“Dead serious.”

“You can’t pull me off this case.” She had worked too hard. She had too much invested to see it handed off to someone else.

“I can, Dimato. I did. I suggest you take the rest of the week off, recover from your ordeal, then report in here on Monday morning.”

“I don’t want a day off.” She wasn’t giving up without a fight. “You gave me permission to investigate.”

Kramner resumed pacing. “I never authorized a charter flight. And I certainly never authorized a crash.”

“I figured it was better to try and land the plane, sir.” She swallowed. “I heard Coot was poisoned.”

Kramner swiped a hand through his hair. “The FAA faxed me a preliminary report. It seems your pilot ate something that didn’t agree with him.”

“Not by any chance goose paté?”

“No. Try a goose-meat sandwich.”

Angela perked up. She was being facetious, but Kramner meant what he said.

“It seems your pilot helped himself to a snack while he waited for the coffee water to heat up.”