“Where does it end?”
“
Logan hesitated, then said, “Can you keep looking?”
“You are definitely getting me fired.”
“That is definitely not my intention. I promise.” He paused. “What about the flight plan?”
“The one on file has them going to Tokyo.”
Logan was afraid of that. Not Tokyo specifically, but just somewhere out of the country. There was a very real possibility that Tokyo was not even their destination, and had just been used to explain their initial flight path.
“I really need to know where the plane ends up. If it
“Logan, please.”
“Ruth, can you?”
She hesitated. “I don’t know, maybe.”
“That’s all I can ask,” he said.
“Good night, Logan. Don’t wake me up again.”
She clicked off.
It had been a long day, packed with a hell of lot more than Logan had bargained for. But as much as he would have loved to just lie down and fall asleep as he walked back into his room, he couldn’t. Time was the enemy. With each passing second, Elyse was moving further and further away.
He found a phone book in the nightstand drawer. Midwin-Robb Express was listed under Airplanes, Charter. He called the number and, as he’d hoped, a live voice at an answering service picked up. A charter jet company in Los Angeles, where entertainment industry bigshots kept ever-changing schedules, had to be available 24/7 if they wanted to stay in business.
“I need a plane,” he said. “I have a client who needs to leave for New York first thing in the morning.”
“May I have your name, please?”
“Sure. James Cole.”
“All right, Mr. Cole. I’ll have someone call you back at this number in just a few moments.”
True to her word, his phone rang three minutes later.
“Is this Mr. Cole?” the woman on the other end asked.
“Yes, it is.”
“Hi, my name’s Debbie Midwin. From Midwin-Robb Express? You called about a charter?”
Logan was impressed. She sounded like it was the middle of the day, not midnight.
“Yes, I did. I’m hoping you can help me out of a bind. My client has an event he needs to attend in New York tomorrow afternoon, but he’s here in L.A. right now. How soon do you think you could get him there?”
“We have a plane at the Van Nuys Airport that can take off at six a.m., and get him there a little before two p.m. Eastern Time.”
“He was hoping he could fly out of Santa Monica.”
“Well, we do have a plane there that’s also available tomorrow. But the airport’s closed until seven a.m.”
“So, three p.m. in New York, then?”
“Yes, sir. Around that.”
“That would work.”
“That’s great. Would you like to book it?”
He paused for effect. “Well, here’s the problem. My client is…
“Of course,” she said, without missing a beat. She’d obviously heard this tune before. “When would you like to look at it?”
“Can we do it in, say, fifty minutes?”
“One a.m.?”
“Yeah.”
“No problem,” she said. She gave him the address. “Can I ask who your client is?”
“I’m sorry, but I can’t tell you that right now. If everything’s cool, and we book the charter, of course, you’ll know then.” He paused, then, in a faux whisper, added, “But I can say he probably won’t be bringing along the Oscar he just won.”
He thought he heard a smile in her voice as she said good-bye and hung up.
Logan took a cool shower in hopes it would revitalize him. It wasn’t the perfect solution, but it helped.
He had just pulled on his pants and was grabbing a clean shirt out of his bag when someone knocked on his
