Mission: Christmas. Lindsay McKenna

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СКАЧАТЬ so we can’t see them all that well.”

      Tipping the wing slightly to the right, Dallas caught sight of the plane. “Good spotting,” she exclaimed. Hearing the sudden excitement in Murdoch’s voice, she grinned. “What’s your next move when you spot a possible drug plane?”

      “I’m calling the Mexican air channel people right now. If this guy has a flight plan, he’s not a smuggler. The druggies never file flight plans.” Mike jabbed a finger toward the fleeing plane. “He has no numbers on the sides of his fuselage, a dead giveaway that he’s a smuggler. Still, we always check.”

      Pleased, Dallas dropped the plane down to one thousand feet. They were on the six, or rear, of the C-206, which was flying at about five hundred feet. Even if he was swiveling his head around, looking for them, the pilot would never see them at this angle. She gave a wolfish grin.

      In no time, Murdoch had gone through the required steps. He sent Dallas a triumphant smile. “We got ourselves a druggie on the run.”

      “And Santa Ana is probably where he originated from, based on his flight trajectory.”

      “Yeah, you’re right.” Mike’s assessment of her tactical abilities rose accordingly.

      “What next? Do we force him down?” she demanded.

      Surprised, Murdoch looked over at her. He saw her set profile. Right now, she was like a hawk intent on a victim. Gone was the soft, luscious mouth and the curvy, feminine woman. No, he was seeing an air combat warrior. “We have choices here, Major. We can call ahead and ask someone to force them down. Or we can do it. We can just follow the pilot until he lands at his intended airstrip, where he’ll meet men planning to drive the bales across the U.S. border. What’s your pleasure?”

      “Let’s force him down.”

      He liked the edgy excitement in her husky voice. She had both hands on the yoke and was within five hundred feet of the unsuspecting smuggler.

      “You can fly up alongside him and gesture for him to land,” Mike said, “or pull up to the pilot’s side, and I’ll poke the barrel of my M16 out the window here. I’ll put a couple of shots right in front of his cockpit window. That is guaranteed to get his attention.”

      “What are the chances of them returning fire?” Dallas missed not having the missiles and rockets that were part of the Apache’s vaunted arsenal. The Cessna was a civilian plane and had no armor, no weaponry.

      “Depends,” he said, twisting around and reaching for his rifle. With quick, knowing movements, he prepared to fire. “You never know.”

      “Good thing we have our vests on,” she said, slanting a glance in his direction. She saw Murdoch smile sourly as he quickly and expertly readied the weapon. “Okay, I’m going to drop like a rock to his altitude and try to surprise him,” Dallas warned. “You poke that rifle out the window, but don’t fire. Just gesture for him to land.”

      “Are you always this nice, Major?”

      Laughing, Dallas felt the adrenaline pump through her bloodstream. “I’m not known as nice to the druggies in Peru, Murdoch. They don’t like to see me coming. Ready?”

      “Yeah, let’s go for it.” Murdoch’s brain was clearing, especially when he opened the window and fresh air started whistling through the cockpit. He stuck the barrel out the window. “Now,” he told her gruffly, positioning himself.

      Murdoch wasn’t prepared for the swift, calculated movements she made with the plane. To say she was an adept pilot didn’t quite cover it. She dropped the Cessna with a professionalism and swiftness that made him gasp. In seconds, Murdoch was staring at the surprised face of the Mexican pilot.

      Dallas brought their aircraft within six feet of the smuggler’s wing. The pilot’s eyes went wide with shock and then panic. After gesturing for him to land, Murdoch put his hand on the trigger of the M16. The Mexican had a copilot, a younger man who reached back behind the seat. A revolver appeared in his hand.

      “Dammit!” Murdoch snapped off several shots with his M16. The bullets ripped throughout the cockpit of the smuggler’s plane, and suddenly, it swerved to the right and banked sharply.

      Dallas followed in pursuit, the gravity tugging at her harness.

      Smoke leaped up and out from beneath the fuselage cover. One of his bullets had struck the engine. “They’re gonna try to make a run for it,” Mike warned her. “Stay on them!”

      “Like fleas on a dog,” Dallas assured him grimly.

      Murdoch was more than pleased with her flight capabilities. The druggies began to jink back and forth, so they couldn’t get near enough to fire again. Both planes had descended to fifty feet above the desert floor. The air was rougher near the ground, for the risen sun was warming the soil and generating small updrafts. The smoke grew black and thick as it purled from the Cessna’s engine.

      “He’s gonna have to land that sucker anywhere he can,” Mike warned. “Back off a little. We’ll let him put down and then follow him in. If he crashes, we don’t want to be caught in the explosion or debris.”

      “Roger,” Dallas said, lips thinned. Sure enough, she spotted a flat, gravelly spot just ahead among the lumpy hills. There was plenty of cactus and brush growing there, but Dallas knew a plane like this could land if it didn’t run into anything with its tricycle gear.

      “Back off more,” Murdoch warned her. “The area they’re heading for has a rough, dicey surface. We’ve seen planes flip over when a wheel catches a big piece of brush, and you don’t want to be right behind them.”

      “Roger,” she repeated.

      The drug plane landed badly, then hopped back up into the air, plumes of dust flying around it. Then it hit the ground again. This time, the nose wheel plowed into a thicket of brush and collapsed. Dallas watched the craft skid, the propeller snapping off in pieces and disintegrating upon impact. The plane became enveloped in a huge, rolling cloud of dust as she landed their own Cessna, about four hundred feet away. The sand-gravel surface was solid in the stretch she’d chosen, thank goodness. Landing with a solid thump, she brought their plane to a quick stop by standing on the rudders, which acted like brakes for the aircraft. Before it stopped rolling, Murdoch bailed out the door, M16 in hand, and ran hell-bent-for-leather toward the crashed C-206 dead ahead of them. Smoke was pouring out of the smashed engine, and flames licked up here and there.

      Why hadn’t Murdoch waited? Dallas quickly stopped the plane, killed the engine and whipped off her harness. Before diving out the door, she grabbed her own M16, locking and loading it on the run as she sprinted toward the smugglers.

      Dallas saw Murdoch a hundred feet ahead, circling toward the pilot’s door. The Mexican kept hitting the jammed door with his boot until it finally yawned open, and he leaped out. Dressed in a pink shirt and jeans, he appeared to be no more than twenty years old. The kid from the copilot’s seat quickly followed. He had a shaved head and also wore a white T-shirt and jeans. The two ran in different directions.

      Murdoch fired several rounds into the air and yelled at them to stop. Both skidded to a halt, turned around with their arms high in the air.

      By the time Dallas got to them, Murdoch had both men lying flat on their bellies, their arms stretched above their heads. He was looking pleased.

      She СКАЧАТЬ