Final Winter

Now he was talking to a bright Customs officer named Tanya Mead, who seemed almost relieved as she gave him her read on what had happened earlier in the week with Zhukov and Imad. Janwick kept his eye on her as she talked, gauging her response, seeing what kind of words she chose and how she said them. Janwick had a pretty good built-in bullshit detector — you had to, when you worked with guys who sometimes packed each other’s parachutes — and he liked what he saw. He sure as hell hated the fucking message he was receiving, but he liked her.

With the two of them in this small meeting room were members of his staff, some of whom joined in with the questioning. When they were done, he stepped in.

‘These two — they had valid travel documents and identification. Correct?’

‘Yes, sir, that’s correct,’ Tanya said.

‘Accents?’

‘Yes — both very slight. Hard to pin down.’

Janwick said, ‘You’ve given us some good information. What else can you tell us?’

‘Sir?’

Janwick tried to be patient. ‘Something that we’ve not asked you. Something that stuck in your mind. Anything else you can come up with.’

Tanya said, ‘Well…’

‘Go on.’

‘I think they hated each other.’

‘What?’

The young woman looked around the room for a moment and said, ‘You see a lot of truckers crossing where I work. Part of the job. Most times it’s single truckers… it’s expensive for trucking companies to send out a two-man crew. And when you see a two-man crew, sometimes it’s a man-and-woman crew. A married couple. And when you do get a two-man crew…they, well, they get along. They have to. Otherwise they’d end up killing each other or abandoning their partner at a rest stop somewhere. But not these two. It’s like…it’s like the older guy couldn’t believe he got paired with that younger guy, and the younger guy, it was like it was all he could do to keep himself from cutting the older guy’s throat. I think they really hated each other.’

Janwick saw his team taking notes. They were a good bunch. He said, ‘You’ve done well, Officer Mead. If you like, we can get you back home tonight. Or you can spend the night here. We’ll put you up in a nice place. Oh. And one more question.’

‘Sure.’

He said, ‘I know this is forward and all that, but would you like a new job?’

‘Sir?’

Janwick liked the expression on the young woman’s face. He also liked to surprise people. He said, ‘Would you like something different? We could get you out of Customs, get you here in my group. Working for me. Hours would be longer, pay probably wouldn’t be much better, but I can guarantee you it’d be a hell of a lot more interesting.’

That made Tanya Mead smile. He liked her smile. He liked intelligent young women — please, no sex involved, he was happily married and though he had a wandering eye he never once thought of cheating — and this one looked like a keeper.

She said, ‘I think that’d be fine, sir. But my supervisor might have other ideas.’

Janwick looked at a notepad in front of him. ‘Right. The gentleman who flew in with you. The one who wouldn’t let you search the truck. Known as “Captain Commerce”, right?’

Tanya tried to hide a smile and failed. ‘That’s right.’

‘Don’t worry about it. He’s no longer working in the Customs Department.’

‘Sir?’

‘Gone. Out. If he’s lucky, he’ll be a night-shift stockboy at WalMart in a year or two. Officer Mead, thank you for your service.’

Tanya took the hint and left the conference room. Janwick’s staff, a good mix of young men and women, looked at him expectantly. He took a deep breath, tried to ignore the tightness in his chest. He said, ‘I need to make some phone calls. When I come back, I want a plan in place to get the photos of these two characters and a description of their truck out to every law-enforcement agency within… Paula, how long have they been in-country?’

‘Forty-three hours.’

‘Right. Forty-three hours. Work out how far they could get in that truck within forty-three hours. Postulate no overnight stops. Just occasional fuel stops. Write up a “be on the lookout for” alert. Work a geographical arc, showing the territory they might have covered. Want to know what possible targets might be in that arc. Nuclear power plants, dams, shopping malls, airports, weapons facilities — everything. And we want that BOLO in the hands of every cop, customs, sheriff, game officer inside that arc. Got it?’

No replies. Just nods. Janwick stood up.

‘Good.’ He left the room, thinking that his crew might not be as tough or as smart as his Air Force buds but they were good enough for what had to be done.

~ * ~

Adrianna Scott stood in Terminal B at the Memphis International Airport, tapping her left foot, knowing that it was a nervous gesture, knowing it was something that she couldn’t control. Their flight was leaving in under a half-hour, and Victor Palmer stood with her at the gate, sweating some in the cool air.

‘He’s late,’ Victor said.

‘I know.’

‘And he hasn’t answered his cellphone, or his pager. What’s going on?’

‘I don’t know, Victor, I just don’t know.’