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The hallway went quiet. Silas kept his eyes on me. I kept mine on him. I considered the possibility that I had just committed career suicide.
His eyes narrowed, which again made me think he was smiling. But he waited me out. Probably wondering if I would fill in the silence with a profuse apology. But I was playing his game now. I wasn’t going to back down.
“And yet you’re representing me,” he said.
“Yes.”
“The thought of representing me thrills you, doesn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“If I decided to go to trial, you’d represent me to your fullest, wouldn’t you?”
“Yes.”
“You think you could actually win, don’t —”
“I know I could.”
The sound of Silas chuckling through voice alteration sounded like something from a movie, like a hideous robotic monster, Darth Vader on laughing gas.
“Now we’re getting somewhere, Marcie,” he said.
TWENTY-FOUR
SPECIAL AGENT FRANCIS BLAIR runs his hand over his unshaved face. Looking the part in his puffy red vest, unbuttoned flannel shirt with a black T-shirt underneath, ratty jeans, and work boots.
Inside the van with him is the technical team and the head of this task force, Agent Neary with US Customs, a career government guy, gray-haired and wrinkled, a smoker’s gravelly voice.
“You’re a long way from mobsters and Organized Crime,” he says to Blair by way of apology. “Appreciate your help on this.”
Blair looks at his watch. “So we know nothing about who’s showing up?”
“No idea,” says Neary. “They say you’ll know. And then you’ll ask the question.”
“Any chance I can bum a smoke off ya?” Blair says.
“Exactly. And then he’ll say …”
“Think I can spare one.”
That’s the code. Then the contact will show Blair the crates holding the stolen video-game consoles.
“We won’t have eyes or ears inside, you understand,” says Neary. “Once you get past the gate, you’re flying without a net.”
Blair already knows that, of course; the task force is following ass-covering protocol by making sure they reiterate to their agent that he’s about to go in cold, so if this whole thing goes to shit, they can say they warned him.
He has to go solo because of the security guards, who are corrupt, part of the theft ring. They pat down everyone entering the freight area, ostensibly looking for contraband and weapons, but they’re really searching for wires and hidden body cameras. So the FBI can’t sneak in there and install surveillance. And Blair can’t go in miked up. No wire, no body cam, no badge, no weapon, no backup.
Flying without a net, as Neary said.
“I get it,” says Blair. “If they make me, I’m toast.”
Blair pops out of the van, a block down from the freight company’s main entrance. The whipping winds off nearby Lake Michigan lift Blair’s hair as he approaches the gate and the guard station.
A beefy guard steps out from the booth. Checks Blair’s papers — Blair’s fake name, front company. The guard pats Blair down and runs a wand over him. Satisfied, he hands Blair a hard hat and a lanyard bearing Blair’s fake name.
Blair heads to cargo area C, where he’s supposed to meet his contact, a person with a pack of cigarettes showing, leading to the confirmation code.Any chance I can bum a smoke off ya? Think I can spare one.
