“I’m looking for Shelley Adams,” I said, glancing around an otherwise empty room. The woman Shelley was nowhere in sight. Neither was her luggage.
“Ms. Adams came through here a few minutes ago,” the clerk informed me. “She borrowed one of our luggage carts. She’s probably on the taxiway by now.”
“I need to catch her,” I said. I started for the exit that led out to the landing strips. I hit the door full force, but it refused open, and I bounced off it like a Ping-Pong ball.
“Sir,” the clerk said, sounding alarmed. “Please step away from the door. You’re not allowed out there without showing government-issued ID.”
The fact that a cold-blooded killer was about to fly off into the wild blue yonder was of no concern to her. The clerk’s job was to enforce the FAA’s rules, and she was going to do so no matter what.
Shaking with frustration, I dug my wallet out of my pocket and extracted my driver’s license. I stood there shifting impatiently from foot to foot while the clerk took her sweet time examining my license. Then she pulled out a form. “And what is the purpose of your visit?” she asked.
“I already told you,” I barked “I need to speak to Shelley Adams!”
“Good luck with that.” Her reply was accompanied by a syrupy smile as she handed back the license. “I think you’ve already missed her, but when you’re ready to leave, you’ll need to check in with me again.”
“Right,” I muttered.
As I stuffed the license back into my wallet, I couldn’t help thinking about the car-rental agent in that old Steve Martin movie Planes, Trains and Automobiles. I could cheerfully have pulled a Twink and decked the woman on the spot. Instead I made for the door. Once again I had to wait for her to take her sweet time in pressing the button.
When the door opened, I dashed out into the night. The part of the airport where I was standing was reasonably well lit and mostly silent. But then, standing at attention and listening with all my might, I heard the distinct put-put of the engine on a light aircraft of some kind. Seconds later a set of landing lights appeared, as the plane in question rounded a hangar and taxied forward—toward me yes, but also toward the open runway.
I knew it had to be Shelley’s Piper. Who else would be out here flying on a cold winter’s night? I needed to stop her. I had to stop her, but how? And then, as if taking a page out of an action movie featuring some aging superhero, I set off at a dead run.
The Piper was moving straight ahead while I was approaching it at an angle. Weirdly enough, as I raced along, I remembered the sole remaining takeaway from my high-school geometry class: The hypotenuse is the longest side of a triangle, and that's what I was on—the hypotenuse. I was on foot and limping along to the best of my limited ability on that while Shelley was taxiing along on the straightaway. There was no chance on God’s green earth I was going to catch her.
And that’s when a pair of full-beam headlights lit up the tarmac in front of me. Off to the side, I heard the sound of a revving automobile engine, but I didn’t dare look in that direction. Grateful for the additional illumination, I kept on running, but only for a step or two before a resounding crash split the night. At that point I had no choice but to stop and look.
I turned to my right just in time to see the Travelall come barreling through the locked security gate, with the snowplow throwing broken pieces of metal into the air as if they were nothing sturdier than a handful of Tinker Toys. I had no doubt that the ground around the ruined gate was now littered with the crumpled remains of signs bearing the messages exit only and do not enter. None of those had fazed Twinkle Winkleman. They hadn’t even slowed her down.
Too stunned to move, I was still standing there thunderstruck when the speeding Travelall squealed to a stop beside me. Twink gestured wildly in my direction, and I got the message. Wrenching open the passenger door, I scrambled up and into the vehicle. I was barely inside when Twink jammed the gas pedal to the floor, pinning me against the seat back and slamming the still-open car door shut beside me. By the time I took another breath, we were hurtling toward the moving Piper.
Gasping for air, I panted, “What are you going to do?”
“Hide and watch,” she told me, “but hang on to this.”
With only one hand guiding the speeding Travelall, she dragged the 357 Magnum out from under her seat and handed it over. “You do know how to use one of these, don't you?” she asked.
“Yes, but—” I began.