Chris reached the conference room and opened the door to see Alek sitting at the head of the round table. The Rabbi was nowhere in evidence, though he was supposed to be here, too. “Hey, Alek.”
“Curt, thanks for coming in.” Alek half-rose and extended a hand, which Chris shook, though he could barely bring himself to meet Alek’s small, dark eyes, set deep in a long face. His dark hair thinned in front, and a thin scar on his cheek looked like it was from a knife fight, but it was from a car accident at the mall.
“Where’s the Rabbi?”
“He’ll be right back.” Alek sat down. “You know, that’s all you ever ask me. ‘Where’s the Rabbi?’ ‘Where’s the Rabbi?’”
Suddenly the door opened and the Rabbi came in, holding his laptop. “Curt, so good to see you!” he said with a broad grin, showing teeth stained from excessive coffee. His real name was David Levitz, but everyone called him the Rabbi because he was the smartest agent in the Division.
“Hey!” Chris gave the Rabbi a bear hug, almost lifting him off his feet, since the Rabbi was only five-foot-five and maybe 160 pounds. He was fiftysomething with frizzy gray hair, sharp, dark brown eyes behind thick, wire-rimmed bifocals, and his thin lips were bracketed by deep laugh lines, earned over the years.
“Sorry I missed you last night,” the Rabbi said, which was code for Sorry I didn’t rescue you from Alek.
“No worries,” Chris said, which meant, Can we shoot our boss and get away with it?
“Let’s get started, lovebirds.” Alek gestured Chris into the seat opposite the Rabbi, rather than next to him, and it struck Chris that Alek was the Coach Hardwick of ATF. Technically, Aleksandr Ivanov was the Group Supervisor, or GS, of the Violent Crimes Task Force, and the Rabbi was Chris’s contact agent, to whom he reported when he worked undercover.
“Okay, so Alek, why did you call me in?”
“I’m pulling the plug.”
“On my operation?” Chris wasn’t completely surprised. “There’s no reason to do that, Alek. I disagree—”
“I went out there to meet you. Sleepy little town in the middle of nowhere. It’s nothing but a total waste of time, and now that some teacher offed himself last night, there’s a possibility of you being blown.”
“I won’t be, and anyway, I’m not so sure it’s a suicide. The jury’s out for me, and it could be connected to the case.” Chris still couldn’t believe that Abe Yomes was really gone. He had liked Abe, and it had shocked him to the marrow to hear that he was dead, much less by his own hand. It was awful, and it sent up red flags in terms of the operation, which had been dubbed Operation Varsity Letter.
“What facts do you base that on?”
“His personality. It doesn’t make sense that he would commit suicide.”
“You didn’t know him that well. You’ve been there two days.”
“I get the guy. He’s a fun, upbeat guy. Connected to friends and students. They all loved him, they called him Mr. Y.” Chris flashed on the scene at practice this morning. The players had been so distraught when they heard the news. Raz had been dropped off by his mother, after he had obviously been crying. Coach Hardwick had made them practice anyway, but they played horribly and left crestfallen.
“I don’t see the point.”
“That’s because you never heard the justification for the operation. You were in D.C. when I got the authorization—”
“I read the file. I’m completely up-to-date on your reports.”
“It’s not the same thing, and besides, there’s no downside. It costs nothing. My rent is $450, and I buy my own clothes.”
“Don’t forget we had to pay to place you in the school. The superintendent wanted four grand to send the teacher and her old man on a vacation.” Alek rolled his eyes. “Your tax dollars at work.”
“But still, it’s cheaper than a house or a boat, and the upside is great.”
“You know what your problem is, Curt? Your premise is wrong.”
“How? It’s cost–benefit. The typical budgetary analysis—”
“No, your premise is that you’re the one who makes that analysis. But you’re not. I am. I’m shutting you down.”
“You haven’t given it a chance. Let me break it down.” Chris commandeered the Rabbi’s laptop, logged into the network using his password to get beyond the ATF firewall, then found his private files. “Did you see the video? Did you even look at it?”
“I read—”
“It’ll take fifteen seconds. Watch.” Chris hit PLAY, and the video showed a shadowy image of a tall figure forcing open a door in a dark shed, then hurrying toward bags of ammonium nitrate fertilizer. The figure reached for one of the bags, and as he did so, he came closer to the camera. The man’s features were obscured by a ball cap, but it captured the lettering of his blue T-shirt, which read Musketeers Baseball.
“So?” Alek sighed theatrically.
Chris hit STOP. “We know that ammonium nitrate fertilizer is the go-to ingredient for IEDs made by domestic terrorists and that its purchase, transport, and storage is strictly monitored by Homeland Security and it’s restricted to those with a permit, mostly farmers. The only other way to get it is theft.” Chris pointed to the screen. “This video was taken by Herb Vrasaya, one of the farmers in Central Valley, whose farm is located five miles from the high school. Mr. Vrasaya grows corn and he has a permit to buy and store the fertilizer. He installed the camera two weeks ago, because he thought rats were getting into the shed and he wanted to see how.”
“I read that part.”
“Mr. Vrasaya sent the video to our office, like a good citizen. ‘If you see something, say something,’ and he didn’t want his permitting jeopardized. I think this video is evidence of a bomb plot that has a connection to the baseball team at CVHS. The blue Musketeers T-shirt is issued to only the varsity players, the boys I coach. It’s a badge of honor. I’m inflitrating the team to identify this kid and learn why he’s stealing fertilizer. And it would be no problem at all for an underage kid to rent a box truck in Central Valley. All the locals know where to go, to a guy named Zeke. I went there myself to see how hard it would be to rent a truck and what the pitfalls would be. I met the guy. He always has them available, and there’s no paperwork.”