Thorn watched the entirety of the video three times, taking a sum total of about five minutes. Each time he felt the animosity within him grow a little stronger, his ire aimed at the single figure in the fedora.
While the two men that preceded him onscreen both appeared proficient, the way they had frozen under Thorn’s attack proved they were nothing more than hired hands. Everything about the man behind them, from the way he carried himself to the way he dressed, even the fact that he was the one wielding a gun, proved that he was the one in charge.
It also proved that he was the man to both kill Cyrus and dump the container of refugees into the ocean.
More than once in his prior life Thorn had dealt with people such as he, those that had a wanton disregard for life. Singularly focused on some distant goal, they used it to justify any and all actions, no matter how heinous, regardless how extensive the collateral damage.
On the final viewing, Thorn took a still image shot of the man, saving it to his desktop. After doing so, he brought his video conferencing software to life, calling on Ingram.
It rang only twice before Ingram’s face appeared before him.
“Morning, Thorn.”
“Morning, Coach,” Thorn replied, cutting straight to his main objective for the call. “Everything set for tonight?”
Ingram shuffled through a few papers atop his desk and said, “It is. There’s a container loaded and en route to Boston as we speak.”
“Enough to draw interest?”
“A Viper, a Testarosa, two Corvettes, and an old school Gran Torino with enough under the hood to blow the clothes off a woman ten yards away,” Ingram said, rattling the information off before looking up from the printout in his hand. “That do it?”
Growing up in a navy town with a naval officer for a father, automobiles received a minimal amount of interest from Thorn at best. Before taking on the Explorer, the last ride he had was a twelve-wheel transport designed for carrying soldiers through coastal towns.
Still, even to his untrained ear, the list seemed sufficient.
“That should do it,” Thorn agreed.
“Any idea how you intend to draw them in?”
“Already have,” Thorn said, leaning forward and running a hand along the back of his neck, his short hair feeling like bristles against his palm. “Wrote out a phony purchase order and sent a copy to the dock manager before I went on last night. Told him I found it out on patrol and thought it looked important.
“After that, I asked my new partner and the guys we relieved if they heard about the big shipment of cars coming in tonight, made a few anonymous online posts. If the merchandise is actually what these guys are interested in, we’ll know it by this time tomorrow.”
“And if it isn’t?”
“Then we’ll know that, too,” Thorn said.
A moment passed as Ingram considered the argument. “I like it. What else you got?”
In response Thorn looked away, twisting his head at the neck, watching Abby as she turned in a small circle before settling herself down into a tight ball on the couch.
He wasn’t sure how to best approach what he’d been given by the Garcia’s, even less certain how well it would be received.
“I was able to get a copy of the security video from night before last,” he began, opting for a very narrow version of the truth for the time being. “Whoever it was shot out the camera before anything important was recorded, but there was a few seconds of footage at the beginning.”
The information seemed to gain Ingram’s attention, his eyebrow tracking upward in anticipation. “Anything we can use?”
“Just one image,” Thorn said, minimizing the window and bringing up his email. “I’m sending it over to you now. Most of the face is blocked by a hat and shadows, but you may be able to pull something from it. I’m assuming we’ve got some pretty high-end facial recognition software lying around somewhere.”
“Ha!” Ingram coughed out, his voice becoming a bit detached as he went to look in on the file. “You assume correctly.”
Waiting, Thorn pulled the video feed back up in silence, watching as his counterpart looked at the image.
“Could be anybody,” Ingram muttered.
Thorn offered a grim nod in agreement, having had the same thought just minutes before. The picture told him more about the kind of man he was up against than who he actually was.
In the end, he had a feeling that information would prove far more valuable.
“I’ll make it first priority,” Ingram said, his voice returning to the conversation, rising in volume. “Anything else?”
“Were you able to track down any of the fiber optics I asked for?” Thorn asked.
A Cheshire smile spread across Ingram’s face as he stared back into the camera, rotating to face forward. “Check your back porch. I have a feeling you might have gotten a little visit from Santa Clause this morning.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Liberation Day - A Thorn Byrd Novel Page 26