“Look,” she said. “I’m not sure who I can trust right now.”
“You called me,” he said. “Remember?”
“I guess I did,” she said. “Listen, there’s a water park near Manassas. Can you meet me there?”
“Well,” Bowen said, “I was assigned to a protective detail, but as it happens I just got relieved to deal with a local police matter. I can meet with you tonight, no problem.”
“That’s too far off,” Garcia said, sounding as if she about to loose a flood of Cuban curses. “This is life or death. I wouldn’t bug you if it wasn’t.”
Bowen took a deep breath. “Okay. A water park in Manassas.”
“Eleven o’clock.”
“I’ll be there.” He looked at his watch. “But I’m not wearing a swimming suit.”
“Up to you,” Ronnie said. “But this is a family place. They won’t be too happy with you lounging around in the water without one.”
Chapter 36
Quinn hung his head out the window of Lovita’s borrowed Pontiac, thinking of how many times he’d ridden this road on a motorcycle. Die-hard riders often called other vehicles cages. The little Pontiac was a perfect example of why. Thankfully, the passenger window was completely gone, allowing some escape from the stale odor of fast food trash — and some creature that had crawled up inside the air vents and died.
It was not quite seven in the morning but the sun had already been up for three hours and the Chugach Mountains glowed with the brilliant golden-green of summer. Joggers and bicyclists moved steadily through the crisp Alaska morning down the paved pathway between the Glenn Highway and Joint Base Elmendorf Richardson. There was a time Quinn had thought of becoming the OSI detachment commander here at JBER. His parents pushed for it. Kim certainly wanted it. Heaven knew he owed Mattie a little more of his time. But for some reason, that normal, move-up-the-ranks-and-become-the-boss portion of his career just wasn’t meant to be so the det co thing never materialized. He was an Air Force Academy alumnus, a Fulbright Scholar, and spoke five languages. Out in the world he could have been described as a renaissance man. But he was just rough enough around the edges that he always felt like a bit of a thug compared to the other Air Force officers in garrison. He supposed he just wasn’t cut out for it. Lately, it had been difficult to comprehend what he was cut out for except for slitting the odd throat now and then. It sure wasn’t being a father — no matter what patriotic platitudes he spouted to Lovita about having something to fight for.
His mind had covered a dozen different scenarios for his arrival at the airport by the time they passed the National Guard Armory — known as the “Green Banana” — between Eagle River and Anchorage. He had never been the nervous sort. When he made a decision, he followed through, leaving the outcome to God or fate or whatever great cosmic dice game was in control of his destiny. But that was him. When it came to his daughter, he was capable of worrying a hole in his gut.
Quinn’s greatest worry was that his parents had been followed out of DC and a crowd of IDTF agents or contract killers would swoop down on them as soon as he set foot in the airport. If by some miracle his parents were able to get Mattie to Alaska unimpeded, there was the high likelihood that some other passenger, a TSA officer, or even a US Customs agent might recognize Jericho from having grown up with him. Nearly 300,000 people called Anchorage home, but the small-town feel made it difficult to go to a store or restaurant without running into someone who knew him.
Five months of heavy black beard had made him look like a pirate. He’d trimmed it back to a more city-acceptable length before leaving the hangar that morning. Lovita said it gave him “ambiguous ethnicity.” He wore a ball cap pulled down low and black Wiley X shades that he hoped were all enough to camouflage his identity.
Traffic was heavy with morning commuters along the Glenn, but Lovita took C Street through midtown and hung a right on International Airport Road across from Baily’s Furniture Store. He’d met plenty of pilots who scared him to death when they got behind the wheel of a car, but Lovita, a village child who rarely drove anything larger than a four-wheeler, handled the car as if she’d grown up driving in a city much larger than Anchorage.
His head still out the window, Quinn caught the flowery sweet scents of birch and balsam poplar as they neared the airport. The air was still crisp enough that no one questioned the fact that Quinn was wearing a black motorcycle jacket. A Vanson Enfield, the jacket was heavy leather but old and worn enough to fit like a comfortable baseball glove. It wasn’t armored like his customary Aerostich Transit Leather, but that one had been cut to ribbons back in Japan.
Lovita pulled up next to the curb at the North Terminal and put the car in park. She turned to look at him, smiling softly.
“I think I would make a good government operative,” she said, out of the blue.
Quinn cocked his head to one side, studying her face. The traditional tattoo notwithstanding, she was probably right.
“I think so too,” he said. “Give me a call after this is over. I can introduce you to some people.”
“Be careful, Jericho Quinn,” she said, as if his name was all one word. “I need to keep you as a contact.”
Her voice was even huskier than usual, her eyes red as if she’d stayed awake much of the night. She was an incredibly tough human being, but coming within inches of crashing into a mountainside was enough to work on anyone’s emotions.
She leaned across the seat to give him a hug. The smell of cigarettes and some sort of musky perfume she’d found back at the hangar was a welcome cover for the odor of the Pontiac.
“Thanks for flying Air Lovita,” she said.
“Yeah, well, thanks for saving my life.” Quinn turned to grab his duffel from the backseat. “You flying back tonight?”
She nodded. “Got a Costco run, then fish to cut when I get back,” she said simply. Good-byes over, she waited for him to shut the door, then pulled away without another word.
The North Terminal was the older portion of Ted Stevens Airport. It wasn’t quite as swank as the newer, main terminal across the way, but it did have a huge stuffed polar bear in the waiting area outside security — the part of the airport Quinn most remembered as a child. It was also the terminal for US Customs and international flights arriving and departing Alaska.
The Alaska flight from DC had arrived an hour earlier at the South Terminal, but Quinn was already inside by the time his parents had retrieved their bags and hopped a shuttle to the north side of the airport. Quinn didn’t see any tail, but if there was one, it wouldn’t matter at this point anyway. He’d known Kim wasn’t coming, but his heart sank a little when she didn’t get off the shuttle with everyone else.
Mattie bolted to him as soon as she came through the door. It had been half a year since she’d seen him last, beside her mother’s hospital bed. It was a lot for an adult to handle, let alone a seven-year-old girl.
She buried her face in his chest, squeezing him until her arms shook.
“I missed you too, Sweet Pea,” Quinn said, glancing up at his father. He mouthed the words “How’s Kim?” so Mattie couldn’t hear him.
Pete Quinn took a deep breath, putting a hand on the little girl’s shoulder. “Can you help Grandma with the luggage, sweetheart?” he said. “I need to talk to your dad a minute before y’all go.”
Mattie looked up, arms still locked around her daddy’s neck.
“We’ll just be a minute.” Jericho hugged her one more time before peeling her away.
Mattie nodded and dutifully went to stand with her grandmother, a tall woman with deep brown eyes and silver-gray hair she liked to call “Arctic Blonde.”