Collateral Damage by Austin Camacho

Author:Austin Camacho
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Intrigue Publishing LLC
Published: 2002-08-23T04:00:00+00:00

-18-

FRIDAY

A voice filtered through Hannibal’s sleep-fogged brain telling him to bring his seat to the upright position and fasten his seat belt. His watch told him it was five minutes after five in the morning. A flight attendant announced that the local time was eleven-oh-five. Cindy’s head lifted from his shoulders.

“Why don’t you reset your watch, Cin? I’ll stay on Eastern time.”

Cindy smiled into his face as their Boeing 737’s tires skidded, then rolled onto the runway. “I liked the way yesterday started a lot better.”

Hannibal agreed, although after their leisurely lovemaking it had turned out to be a busy day. They had gone together to explain their plan to Bea. She was surprisingly agreeable to any straw clutching Hannibal might have in mind as long as she knew Dean would be hospitalized. Cindy had gone alone to explain the situation to Dan Balor, senior partner in her law firm. He had agreed to let her arrange for tickets and hotel accommodations through the firm. Hannibal had visited Mrs. Peters again to get her home address and phone number. She thought he might convince her husband to attend his son’s funeral. He made no effort to persuade her either way. And at seven p.m. their plane lifted off from Dulles Airport and they settled down for the first airline dinner of the trip.

Hannibal tucked into his seat and went to sleep almost immediately after the meal. They were diving into the early morning sun over London before he learned that Cindy had sat awake almost two hours longer then he did. Seven in the morning was two o’clock to their bodies. Cindy had no interest in breakfast so they spent the hour and a half in Heathrow Airport watching other planes come in. Cindy dozed a bit while Hannibal drank British coffee, which is a transitional step between American blends and the stronger European grinds and a good explanation of why British citizens still drink a lot more tea then coffee.

The hop to Germany was barely as long as the London layover, but they passed into another time zone to further confuse their systems. Hannibal’s first stop was a vending machine that turned his American cash into German Marks. Then they stopped at one of the numerous stands in the Frankfurt Main for breakfast. It was close to noon, so breakfast consisted of a fat sausage Hannibal recommended. They ate on their way to the Avis booth to pick up their car, each carrying an overnight bag. Cindy babbled, something Hannibal only knew her to do when she was over tired.

“What a rude people,” she said under her breath. “They stare at you, or ignore you, and they don’t know how to smile, do they?”

“Really?” Hannibal said through his bratwurst. “I don’t find them rude at all. Maybe they’re staring because they don’t see too many Latin beauties like you come through here.”

In fact, Hannibal found Frankfurt Main very much like New York’s Kennedy Airport. The decor, the hustling crowds, even the general layout of the sprawling terminal seemed very American to him.

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