by Roger Hayden
Angela studied her back for a moment then spoke. “Ma’am, if you don’t mind me asking, how do you know Captain Martinez? He mentioned a friend in the FBI before. Are you that friend?”
Thaxton smiled and backed away as the other agents turned around to look at her. From his desk, even Drake couldn’t hide his interest. Thaxton ran both hands through her hair with a sigh. “I met Captain Martinez years ago at the academy. We were both recruits.”
Drake seemed the most surprised. His eyes widened as he stood up from his chair. “Recruit? You mean to tell me that Martinez was FBI?” He looked around, astonished. “That’s not on his record.”
“He didn’t complete it,” Thaxton said with a kindly tone.
Drake looked beside himself. “When?” he asked, very curious now.
Thaxton glanced toward the ceiling, thinking to herself. “I was eighteen when I joined the academy. I believe he was too.” She paused and noticed everyone staring. “I’m not going to tell you my age now, if that’s what you’re thinking. Perhaps you’re thinking I’m someone too young to be an assistant director. And you’d probably be right.”
“What’d he do, drop out?” Hopper asked with little tact.
“Something like that,” Thaxton answered.
“And you’ve kept in contact with him this entire time?” Drake asked, still seemingly stunned by the revelation.
“From time to time. We were friends. Hadn’t heard from him in years when I got a call from him the other week.” She paused and looked at Angela. “He had a lot to say, and though it had been years, I noticed a change in his voice. He was tense. Paranoid even.”
Angela nodded, wondering how much more she didn’t know about Captain Martinez, her partner for the last year.
“So, Agent Gannon. Does that answer your question?” Thaxton asked.
“Yes,” Angela said. “Thank you.” She had plenty of more questions but held back. She wanted to know the connection between Martinez’s suspicions of government officials and his relationship with Thaxton. And if Martinez was in fact old friends with her, why did he balk at the idea of the FBI assisting him? There seemed to be much more to this bizarre scenario, but she knew one thing: she didn’t want to let these FBI agents out of her sight.
“I want in on the El Paso mission,” she announced boldly.
Drake turned to her, surprised. “I’m sorry?”
“If we’re going to El Paso, I want to be there,” she said clearly.
The agents deferred to Thaxton, turning their heads toward her as she studied Angela with an admiring look. The chief, however, didn’t seem too enthusiastic about the idea.
“I’d prefer not including Agent Gannon. We already have one of ours off the grid. Best not to risk another.”
“But, sir,” Angela began.
Drake shook his head, cutting her off, and spoke forcibly. “This is not something I want you involved in any longer.”
Thaxton pushed through the other agents, standing directly in front of his desk. “I’m afraid we need her, Chief Drake.”
The chief balked and pulled at the dark blue tie of his green uniform. “With all due respect, ma’am. I’m in charge of this station, and I answer to the Department of Homeland Security, not the FBI.”
“I understand that, and your station has been more than cooperative to this point. However, like it or not, Agent Gannon is an integral part of this investigation.”
Drake dismissed her with a wave of his hand. “She has your cell number, I’m sure. My answer still stands at no.”
Thaxton placed both hands on the front of his desk and leaned toward him, inches from his face. His eyes blinked rapidly, revealing a brief nervousness.
“Your department will do whatever it takes to find these terror cells. Anything less is unacceptable. Now you can hear it from me or from the FBI or the Homeland director. Hell, we might even get the president on the line. What do you say?”
Drake looked around and saw only the blank faces of the other agents watching him, daring him to argue back.
“I don’t want her placed at risk of any harm,” he said, trying to gain back his authority and tamp down the anger rising in his chest.
“Of course,” Thaxton said, nodding.
“And she can accompany you no longer than twenty-four hours.”
Angela sat by as they negotiated her involvement as though she weren’t in the room.
“Forty-eight hours,” Thaxton added.
“That’s simply too long. We have a border to guard here not in El Paso,” Drake said.
Thaxton backed away from the desk and rubbed her forehead, sighing. The other agents stepped aside as she walked past them, going toward the window. “Time is critical, Chief Drake. We could be dealing with something larger than we can imagine.” She stopped and turned back to him. “The only question is, can we stop it in time?”
“I’m not trying to impede that,” he answered, as the lines in his face deepened into a concerned frown. “I just think that rather than whisking one of my Border Patrol agents going to El Paso on some wild goose chase, you search for the perpetrators who were behind the improvised truck bomb.”
In the silence that followed, Drake knew from their expressions that they were not fully following him. “Not the dead ones, of course. You know, the ones who got away.” He looked directly at Angela for confirmation. “The station wagon.”
Angela had to admit, she preferred a closer search of the immediate area for the station wagon. She found it unfathomable that a car like that still remained unfound. However, she felt, for whatever reason, more on the side of the FBI. Perhaps the assistant director was being genuine in her requests. Stopping the terror cell and finding Martinez seemed to her the best bet for doing that. At the very least, it was something.
She didn’t realize Drake was waiting for a response from her, and then suddenly she spoke up. “Yes. The blue station wagon.”
Hopper laughed. “Hell. They’re probably halfway across the country by now.”
Thaxton walked away from the desk and toward the door, stopping once again to turn to Drake as she reached for the handle. “We’re leaving for El Paso in an hour. I expect to have Agent Gannon on board.” She opened the door and signaled to her team.
Not expecting to leave so abruptly, Sutherland and Hopper walked out. Lynch grabbed his laptop and followed. Thaxton waited as the others had left to deliver the final word. “I appreciate your support, Chief Drake. It means a lot to the Bureau.”
Feeling left out of whatever the hell was going on, Angela stood up. “Ma’am. It’s getting late and I have a family.”
Thaxton’s glacial eyes shifted over to her, unblinking. “The decision is all yours, Agent Gannon. The helicopter will be here soon. We leave in an hour.”
Angela nodded.
“Is that a yes?” Thaxton added.
Duty called, and she had to listen to her gut. “Yes, ma’am. I’ll be ready.” She paused, thinking she could hear the chief’s otherwise thinly veiled sigh.
“Excellent,” Thaxton said. “Don’t go too far.” She then left the room and closed the door without asking if the chief wanted it open.
After having agreed to the mission, Angela dreaded having to look him in the eyes, but she did anyway, as he leaned back in his chair. She glanced at the television, seeing a weather report in process, the first time she had seen them stray from the truck explosion coverage.
“I hope you don’t mind, Chief,” she said, facing him.
Quiet at first, Drake adjusted the collar of his dark-green uniform, affixed with two silver stars. “If it will help get Martinez back, then I’m for it.” He took his glasses off and set them on the desk then squeezed the bridge of his nose as though he had a sinus headache. “I’d have another agent accompany you, but we need all our resources here at home.”
Angela thought to herself for a moment and then said, “What about Captain Reynolds?”
She didn’t know why her na
me came to mind. Reynolds had understandably been a wreck after Dawson’s death. Perhaps helping to find and stop a terror cell would bring closure—for both her and Reynolds. Maybe that was it.
Drake shook his head. “No. You keep your head down out there, and do your best. I’m not so sure about that assistant director. She’s young and cocky. That might work in some areas, but out here we have to look out for each other. Understand?”
“Yes, Chief,” Angela said.
Drake grabbed some files on his desk and began straightening them up. “Dismissed,” he said, keeping his eyes down.
Angela thanked him and got up, relieved to be on her way out. She asked him if he wanted the door open.
“What does it matter?” he said, eyes still cast down.
“Chief?” she said, not understanding his answer.
He looked up, seemingly distracted. “Oh. You can leave it open.”
Angela walked out to find border agents everywhere, walking to and from cubicles and offices on both sides of the hall. She zipped past, hoping to find some quiet. The breakroom was ideal, but she knew of a place even better than that. She passed the restrooms, eyes forward and away from the curious glances of Border Patrol agents, and then turned down a darkened, narrow hall with two doors at the end across from each other. She opened the door on her left and turned on the light, revealing the janitor’s closet.
She stepped inside and closed the door to a crack, basking in the relative quiet. She could feel the warm glow of her cell phone in her pocket and was eager to make a call. She pulled the phone out and dialed Doug. A glance at the screen told her it was close to four. By committing her services, in whatever capacity, to the FBI, she knew that she was in it for the long haul. Maybe several days.
“Hey, what’s up?” Doug asked on the second ring. He sounded like he was driving and had her on the speakerphone.
“Nothing much. Just getting into the thick of it at work,” she answered, leaning against a concrete wall next to a large sink and hanging mop—anything for a little privacy.
“Haven’t watched the news since this morning, but I heard them talking about it on the radio,” he said, sounding more serious than he had with his boisterous greeting.
“Yeah…” she said with a sigh. “It’s a madhouse here.”
“When you coming home?” He paused, then spoke before she could answer. “I still don’t think it’s a good idea that you went in today. Dawson’s death and all. You need time to decompress.”
Angela didn’t want to admit that Dawson hadn’t been much on her mind since morning. She pondered how much to reveal to him about her day. He wouldn’t have approved of her going to the abandoned outpost, and he most certainly wouldn’t approve of her flying to El Paso. But she had to tell him something.
“When’s the memorial service, anyway?” he asked.
Angela peeked out the door crack and was relieved to see no one coming. She also wasn’t sure what question of Doug’s to answer first.
“Soon,” she answered.
“Soon you’re coming home, or soon on Dawson’s memorial?”
“That’s what you get for asking me too many questions,” she said playfully.
“Har, har. When you coming home?”
“Are you driving?” she asked, evading the question.
“Yeah, I got off work a little early. Was going to pick up some pizza for the girls.”
Chassity and Lisa were in the sixth and seventh grades, and they normally got home around three. They were good kids, overall as rambunctious as any eleven- and twelve-year-old.
“Sounds good,” Angela said. She knew she was stalling, and she could sense that Doug knew it as well. It was fairly obvious.
“And when can we expect you home, my dear?”
“Doug…” she began. “Martinez went missing today.”
A pause on the other end indicated that she had his complete attention.
“We think he might be in some serious trouble,” she continued. “The FBI is now involved in the search, and… I have to help them, Doug. I have to.”
“Missing?” Doug asked. “Missing how?”
“He went off on his own, trying to figure this whole thing out. He doesn’t trust anyone, it seems. Anyone but me.”
Doug spoke sternly, as though he couldn’t have disapproved more. “I want you home, Angela. The kids want you home. Whatever he got himself into, I’m sure your partner can handle it himself.”
“I’ll only be a few hours,” she replied. “I have to do this, and I refuse to wait for another memorial service to do something.”
There was little fight left in Doug. He knew when she was serious, and her utter conviction was evident to him.
“If you have to do this, promise me that you won’t put yourself in any danger.”
“I promise,” she said, feeling a surge of tears coming, though she held them back.
A long, defeated sigh came over the phone. “I really wish…”
“What?” Angela asked after his pause.
“Nothing. I love you.”
“Love you too,” she said. “Tell the girls I’ll be home soon.”
“Sure thing.”
She ended the call before the chance of Doug talking her out of it could come about. She tilted her head back against the cold, concrete wall and stood alone in the janitor’s closet with her thoughts. Something didn’t seem right with the mission, but she couldn’t put her finger on it. All she knew was that she had to go along with it. Martinez was counting on her, even if he didn’t realize it.
Closing In
Angela was patient despite her imminent departure for a mission she knew little about.
“So help me God, if we find Captain Martinez, I’ll hang up my badge and become a housewife, I don’t care,” she said to herself. She was due to meet the FBI outside near the landing pad in ten minutes, with tactical gear, a helmet, and her pistol.
Fewer Border Patrol agents were gathered outside the holding area as she passed, but she didn’t linger. She went straight for the locker room to grab her gear and take one last look in the mirror before facing unknown and threatening circumstances.
She arrived at the empty helicopter pad behind the Border Patrol building to find the assistant director waiting with her team, backpacks over their shoulders. The sun was setting in a tangerine glow. Daytime was quickly fading, and she worried that hadn’t even left yet, but perhaps that was exactly what the FBI had in mind.
“Just in time,” Sutherland said as Angela approached them, carrying a helmet and a backpack over her shoulder.
“Welcome,” Thaxton said. “Did you bring a vest?”
Angela stopped and set her bag on the ground. “A vest, ma’am?”
“A bulletproof vest,” Thaxton repeated slowly. On closer inspection, Angela could see that Lynch, Sutherland, Hopper, and the assistant director each wore vests under their dark-blue windbreakers.
Angela looked around as a few loose strands of her brown hair fluttered in the wind. “No, I didn’t bring one.”
Hopper, wearing a pair of aviator sunglasses, tapped his vest with a smile. “Well, you’re probably gonna need one.”
Angela stared at him blankly and then zeroed in on the assistant director. “What exactly are we going to be doing out there, ma’am?”
“These are just precautionary measures,” Thaxton replied, touching her vest.
“Think of it as a sort of reconnaissance mission,” Sutherland added while putting on a black helmet with a headset microphone built into it.
Angela didn’t understand the FBI’s own reluctance toward backup. They had even fewer agents than they had for their earlier raid, which had been less risky.
“Shouldn’t there be more of us?” she asked. “A SWAT team? I mean, these are terrorists, right?”
“Relax,” Hopper said. “We may not even have to get out of the helicopter.”
Not convinced, she asked the group how they planned to find Martine
z and bring him back, especially considering that he didn’t seem to want to be found.
“This is how it’s going to go,” Sutherland said, stepping forward. A slight rumbling came from the sky. Angela looked up and saw a helicopter in the distant purple sky flying toward them, with its main and tail rotors beating through the air.
“As we fly over the coordinates, we’ll examine the scene using an onboard thermal video camera,” Sutherland continued. “We should be able to pick up whoever is in or around this location easy. From there, we make our decision.”
Thaxton zipped up her jacket and then looked up at Angela. “We want you to try to get in contact with Martinez again once we get close.”
Their assumptions about Martinez stunned Angela. “Ma’am, can I ask you a question?” she asked, moving closer to the assistant director. “Why hasn’t he contacted you yet? You are friends, right?”
Thaxton smiled, but her wide eyes showed irritation at the question. “As you know, he’s grown quite paranoid. Perhaps you’re the only one he trusts.”
Not wanting to push the issue, Angela let it go as their helicopter got closer and closer. The agents began backing up, clearing the way, as Hopper spoke into his headset mike, directing the pilot. The more Angela thought about it, the more she could see why there were so few of them. There was only so much space in the helicopter.
As she walked back to the cement partition, she pulled out her cell phone to try Martinez again. If anything, she hoped to give him a heads-up.
But there was no answer. Once again, an automated message told her that the recipient’s mailbox was full. The helicopter closed in and hovered over the platform at about five hundred feet.
Massive gusts of wind swirled as Angela put on her helmet to keep her hair from flying in her face. She was glad they had moved away. The helicopter dipped lower and then gently landed in the center of the large slab of concrete, directly over a painted circle.
Sutherland shouted over the engine for the team to move, but Angela wasn’t ready. She hadn’t grabbed a vest yet, but there was little time to react. The FBI team, led by Sutherland, had already begun to file toward the helicopter with their helmets on and backpacks in place. She slung her backpack over her shoulder and ran after them across the pavement. The wind grew even stronger as she approached the side where Sutherland had opened a door.