Chapter 11 #2
Gary and Calum started off by showing her pictures of the first-class passengers. They wanted to know what she remembered about them during the first part of the flight. Did they ask for a lot of drinks? Did they get up to use the restroom?
Gillian tried to tell the investigators that she hadn’t paid any attention to anyone beyond her row, but they kept pressing. They wanted to know about the flight attendants; did any of them look suspicious, had she noticed anything odd with them, were they extra friendly with any of the passengers?
The questions went on and on, and for the most part, Gillian’s answers were “I don’t know” or “not that I noticed.”
Then the interview got harder.
They showed her picture after picture of her fellow coach passengers, and wanted to know her thoughts on each person. They wanted her to talk about their personalities, how they dealt with captivity, and anything she could remember them saying. In detail.
“How about Janet Cagle?” Gary asked, showing Gillian a picture of the young mother.
“She was scared out of her mind,” Gillian told them. “The hijackers kept threatening her and her daughter, Renee. Most of the time they sat on the floor between the seats and tried to be invisible.”
“Which one of the hijackers used the girl as a shield when they were trying to escape to the Beechcraft?” Calum asked.
“I’m not sure…Isaac? Carlos? In the chaos, I wasn’t paying attention. They were forcing pairs of men and women out onto the slide and until Alberto grabbed me, I didn’t realize what they were doing.”
“What were they doing?” Gary asked.
Gillian sighed. She had a feeling he knew the answer to his own question, but wanted to hear what she was going to say.
“They were trying to create uncertainty for our rescuers. With one woman and one man paired up, and everyone running toward the smaller plane, it would be hard at first glance to know who was a hijacker and who was a hostage.”
Both men nodded. “What about Maria Gomez?” Gary put another picture in front of her.
And so it went. The pictures kept coming, one after another.
Camile Millan, Rebecca Crawford, Reed Stonegate, Charles Wayman.
Their faces swam as Gillian did her best to recall every little detail about each person.
It was hard because most of the men she’d just seen at a distance and hadn’t had any real contact with.
But of course, Gary and Calum weren’t satisfied with that. They pressed for more.
“Leyton Morales,” Gary said, putting another picture in front of her.
Taking a sip of water, Gillian stalled a bit. She didn’t want to say anything bad about anyone. Didn’t want to finger anyone as the hijacker if they weren’t. She’d feel terrible if they were unfairly accused. “He…um…I thought he was a bit weird,” she said at last.
“Weird how?” Calum asked.
“Just…weird. He stared at the women intently. He also paid a lot of attention to the hijackers. Maybe he was in shock though. I know I was having a hard time processing everything that was happening. He didn’t seem to be quite as scared as the rest of us.
I mean, I don’t know him at all, so maybe he had a horrible life and being held at gunpoint and threatened wasn’t a big deal for him, and that’s why he wasn’t as scared.
” Gillian knew she was talking really fast and making excuses for Leyton, but she couldn’t help it.
“Give us an example,” Gary ordered.
Sighing, Gillian nodded. “When the hijackers inflated the slide and started pushing people out, he kinda just stood there watching. When Alberto grabbed me, Leyton told him that he’d go out the slide with me.
But, to be fair, Wade also volunteered to go with me.
I think they were both trying to get me away from Alberto, which was really brave of them.
Alberto refused, and then Leyton actually reached out and grabbed my free arm.
He and Alberto kinda had a tug-of-war with me for a second.
Eventually, Alberto shoved him away from me with a hand to his chest, but Leyton didn’t back off very far.
He just kept staring at us. Then I noticed, when I was struggling and trying not to be pushed inside the smaller plane, that Leyton was once again standing nearby, just watching.
Or maybe he was staring off into space.”
“Did you see Wade?” Gary asked.
“No.”
“Hmmm,” Gary said.
He didn’t say anything more than that. Just Hmmm. It was maddening.
“How about Andrea Vilmer? We understand she had a hard time of it on the plane.”
That was the understatement of the century. Gillian nodded.
“What can you tell us about that?”
“What do you want to know?”
“Everything you can remember,” Gary said without any emotion.
Her frustration piqued again. “You want to know about her expression of revulsion when Luis licked her neck obscenely? How scared she was when he decided to assault her? How she whimpered in fright when he dragged her down the aisle of the plane? Maybe you want to know how long it took for him to get off as he forced her to suck his dick right there in the exit row? What exactly do you want to know?”
She was breathing fast when she was done, but she took a deep breath and continued in a more even tone.
“I don’t know why Luis decided to single her out.
Probably just because she’s pretty. I’m ashamed to admit that at the time, I was just relieved it wasn’t me…
but that didn’t mean I wasn’t horrified on her behalf.
There was nothing anyone could do, and we knew it.
If we tried to interfere, he would’ve killed us without blinking.
He was that coldhearted. I think Luis was the first one to say he was taking her with him, and that’s probably why Alberto tried to drag me onto that plane too. ”
“You’ve been in touch with Andrea,” Gary said. It wasn’t a question.
“Yeah. Texts. She’s not dealing very well with what happened. She’s been in therapy but I’m not sure it’s helping yet.”
“You’ve talked to others too, right?” Calum asked.
Gillian nodded again. “Yes, a bunch of us exchange texts and emails regularly. We feel as if we’ve bonded. We’ve been through hell and somehow survived.”
“How often do you talk to them?”
Gillian shrugged. “I don’t know. I talk with some more than others. I text Andrea pretty regularly. And Janet sends me texts and pictures of Renee. We’ve talked about how best to deal with the angry feelings that we all still seem to have. About how unfair it was that it happened to us.”
“What about Alice Hicks and her husband Wade?” Calum asked. “You were seated next to them before the plane was taken over. Right?”
“Yes.”
“Do you talk to them?”
“I’ve gotten an email or two. The situation was really hard on Alice.
She and Wade are newlyweds. They were asleep when it all started and they were separated.
Alice seems to be the kind of woman who doesn’t do well at all in stressful situations.
She cried a lot, and I saw Wade doing his best to make eye contact with her throughout the entire ordeal. ”
“What about Muhammad Nassar? He’s Muslim. Did you see him have any one-on-one contact with the hijackers?”
“No,” Gillian told them. “As I’ve said over and over, I didn’t have much contact with the men at all. I didn’t even see most of them. I couldn’t tell you what Muhammad did, although I don’t think it’s fair to think he might be the seventh hijacker simply because of his religious beliefs.”
“We weren’t accusing him of anything,” Calum said smoothly. “We’re just trying to find out as much information about everyone as possible.”
And so the questioning continued. Alejandro Chavez, Mateo Herrera …they went through every single person, including the passengers from Canada, Japan, Colombia, Panama, India, Nicaragua…
By the time they were done, Gillian could hardly function.
She felt as if she’d taken the world’s hardest test…
and failed. She didn’t think she’d given them anything useful.
If she had any suspicions about who the wolf in sheep’s clothing might be, she would’ve told someone before now.
The entire interview just seemed so pointless.
Did they really care who had stomach problems because of lack of food and water, and who didn’t?
“If you think of anything else you didn’t tell us today, please contact us as soon as possible,” Gary told her. “Anything, no matter how small, could be the difference in taking one more terrorist off the street or letting them continue to ruin lives in the future.”
Well, gee, no pressure, Gillian thought. She nodded.
“And you need to be extremely cautious,” Calum added. “You were handpicked by Luis to be their voice for some reason. It could be the seventh hijacker was really the one calling the shots, and he chose you. Until this person is behind bars, your life could be in danger.”
Gillian shivered. Wasn’t that a fun thought? “Do you really think whoever it is will come after me?”
“That’s the thing, we just don’t know,” Gary told her. “But killing you could be a way to get back at the fact that six of his friends didn’t survive their mission.”
“They had to know there was a pretty big chance they weren’t going to live,” Gillian insisted.
Both investigators shrugged.
Great. Just great. “Can I go?” she asked, hating how weak her voice sounded.
Gary and Calum stood, their chairs making obnoxious and ear-splitting screeches as they moved back.
Moving stiffly, Gillian nodded at them, not bothering to shake their hands, and made her way to the door. She knew the men were just doing their jobs, but she needed out of that room.
The second she opened the door, Walker was there. He stood in front of her saying something, but she didn’t hear it. She walked to him, then leaned her head against his chest. His arms went around her and held her close.