One Rough Man - Brad Taylor [103]
“I know a way.”
I looked at her face and saw she was serious. “What do you mean?”
“There’s a pilots’ lounge down below Concourse A. Get down there, and we can get on the Delta employee bus. It takes us right out of the airport grounds.”
“How do you know that? Are you sure?”
“My dad was a pilot for Delta. He was also a deadbeat sack-of-shit that I haven’t seen since I was seven. After my parents divorced, his idea of quality time was dragging me through here while he worked. I’ve spent plenty of time in that lounge.”
She had just earned her weight for the entire trip. “Can you find it? How do we get in? What’s the procedure?”
“I can find it, but that was way, way before 9/11. I have no idea about the procedure now.”
“You said A Concourse? That’s the next one up. Let’s go.”
We saw that the escalator was now free of police, and hurried to get to the tunnel below before they returned. The escalator was a long one, about sixty feet down to the ground. Halfway down, a cop sauntered over and positioned himself at the bottom, his back to us. He acted a little bored until he turned around and glanced up. Then he looked like he was going to shit his pants. Damn. Pictures are out.
62
The cop pulled his weapon and aimed it up at us while we glided relentlessly toward him. Jennifer was in front of me, preventing any action. He was an older guy, about sixty, and I saw the pistol barrel shake with his adrenaline. He’s liable to shoot out of reflex.
“Jennifer, raise your hands.”
We both did, and continued our glide, with him shouting all sorts of commands at us and into a radio. Every time he moved his other hand to key the mike on his shoulder, the gun hand would quake violently. Right handed. He backed up as we reached the end of the escalator, both hands back on his weapon, screaming at us to keep our hands in the air. I slipped in front of Jennifer at the end, attempting to calm him.
“We’re done. We’re done. Please don’t shoot.”
Once we were on the ground with him, and seeing our acquiescence, he seemed to grow more confident, saying, “Up against the wall. Now.”
He barked out orders like an overweight Dirty Harry. I turned to face the wall, making sure that Jennifer was to my left, away from the barrel I was about to move. I waited on him to key his mike, leaving one hand on his weapon. I heard him start talking. Please be strong enough to take this.
I rotated to my left, pushing his gun hand away from me while grabbing on to the wrist. I drove a light, stunning palm strike into his nose with my right hand, then closed it over my left, controlling the pistol. I rotated the wrist, locking up the joints in his arm like a twisted rubber band. I didn’t move fast enough to destroy his arm but did move with enough speed to force his body to react, literally doing a flip to prevent his arm from being damaged. He hit the ground hard, the wind knocked out of him. I felt like shit.
“Sorry about that.”
I picked up his weapon, ripped his radio from his belt, and took off in the direction of Concourse A, leaving him gasping for air on the ground. Jennifer stumbled after me.
“Holy fuck. We are definitely going to jail now.”
“Yeah, probably so, because if we face another police officer, I’m not doing that again. We give up.”
I shoved the weapon into the first trash can I could find but kept the radio. I saw Concourse A ahead, and the cops moving around it. Need another way up.
Luckily, the lack of trains had caused everyone to use the walkway, so the tunnel was starting to swell with people still attempting to go about their daily lives. We intermingled with a group headed toward the concourse, listening to them talk about terrorists on the loose. I saw a handicapped elevator ahead, without any police presence. When we came abreast of it, I stopped and pressed the button, the door opening while the group still flowed around us. As we rode up, the cop’s radio crackled with the news that we were at Concourse B. Perfect. Within seconds we were standing outside of Gate A19, no police in sight, looking at the entrance