Three Minutes to Doomsday

by Joe Navarro

  I just look at Moody. I know she’s right, but I’m too tired and my shoulder is too sore, and unless I’m wrong, the wheels are starting to come off more things than my car.

  “You can make changes, Joe. Rod can adjust his schedule. And you don’t have to go see him every damn day. What was that trip about yesterday—another night of hand-holding?”

  “I told you. I can’t say. I promised Rod.”

  “You promised Rod? What is this? Honor among thieves? I’m your partner.”

  “It’s something he’s too embarrassed for you to find out.”

  “Oh, for crissake,” Moody all but shouts out.

  “All right, he’s got VD, but you didn’t hear it from me.”

  “It figures: boys and their aching penises. But we don’t have to do the interviews in the evening every time. You can be home with Luciana—”

  “No,” I say. “I thought you understood this. There is less resistance from a suspect at the end of the day because of low blood sugar. Besides, daytime is his best shot for fares at the airport.”

  “Okay, but all the planning, Joe. What topics to bring up. Where we sit. What we wear. The order of the questions. The ‘meaningful’ pauses and props. Can’t we just let it fly sometimes? We put in whole days doing this kind of stuff.”

  “Not whole days,” I say.

  “You’re right—more like weeks, Navarro.”

  “But we can’t leave things to chance. Every encounter is a new encounter with him. Haven’t you noticed? No two interviews have been the same. There’s always something we have to deal with, something we have to coax out of him. I’ve got a list a mile long of things in my head that we’ve got to cover, not just to satisfy the intelligence community but also for trial.”

  “How about the reports?” Terry goes on, ignoring my rising voice, and the way that guy two stools down has started leaning our way again. “They don’t have to be this thorough, and they don’t have to be on Koerner’s desk by 11 a.m. every single damn day.”

  “You’re wrong! Moody, you screw up a criminal report, and it’s no big deal—nobody gives a shit. Oops, we’ll catch them another day. But this is counterintel. This is espionage. You know where these reports go? Did I ever explain that?”

  “Sure. Koerner. SAC. HQ.”

  “That’s the beginning, Terry. The very beginning. They go to the CIA, the State Department, Army, and Justice. Can it get worse? Yes, of course, it’s the Bureau. Now we have to send it to the NSA, and did I forget the National Security Council? Also the White House gets a brief, just in case they get an inquiry. This is why we send ten copies. This stuff counts. That’s why we have it done by eleven o’clock each morning and why I’ll keep having it done by eleven o’clock each morning until this case is done, if it’s ever done, even if it kills me.”

  “Navarro.” There’s alarm in her voice now, as if maybe I’ve just sounded my own death knell. “You may be right on all counts—in fact, you’re always right when it comes to work—but I know a thing or two about life, Mr. FBI man, and this lifestyle you’re leading will destroy you.”

  “You don’t understand. You know what I feel like?” I ask.

  “No. Tell me.”

  “I keep thinking I’m in a football game where I don’t know what the playing time for each quarter will be or where the goalposts are located. All I know for certain is that I have to keep running, nonstop, until the whistle blows. When will that happen? When are we going to pull the trigger and arrest Rod? That’s all beyond my control, you understand, but at the same time it’s all-consuming because we’re dealing with existential threats, not another bank robbery. I’m being told to keep Rod talking by people who often have no faith in what he tells me or in the techniques I’m using. And just for a little kicker, every confession Rod makes adds to the certainty that he’ll spend the rest of his life behind bars. That’s okay—prison is what he deserves—but I’m the guy who has to lie to him and lie to his mother, day in and day out. And I’m also the guy who has to get this perfect because I’m the case agent, and I have to undo the nonfeasance of WFO. I might have been sucked into this case gradually, but I sure as hell can’t get out of it now that it has become almost unmanageable. And . . . ”

  “Yeah, and?”

  “And it’s not just me doing this, Terry. It’s you, too. All that time away from your husband. All that time away from your son. Who knows what will happen when your baby is born. I feel guilty about that, too.”

  I’m watching Terry sop up her yolk with a piece of toast speared on her fork when she carefully lays her utensils down, wipes her lips with her napkin, and swivels on her stool to face me head-on.

  “What’s my son’s name?” she asks.

  I can’t say anything. There’s a memory there somewhere, but I can’t pull it back.

  “How old is he?”

  “I don’t know,” I say. “Little. Maybe ten.”

  “His name is Kyle. He’s fourteen years old, Joe, growing like a weed. He’s going to be up to my shoulders soon. You want to do the math?”

  “Math?”

  “Yeah, math. I’ll help you. I’m thirty-three. Terry and I were married two years ago.”

  “So, maybe he’s not He-Moody’s child?”

  “Good, you can subtract. I was nineteen when Kyle was born, not what I expected, but it happened just like your parents always warned you about. His father was drop-dead handsome, but he sure as hell didn’t stick around. I put myself through college, Joe. I had no help. I worked and went to school with Kyle at my side. The point is this . . . ”

  “The point?”

  “Yeah, Joe, the point. I’m not just telling you all this for the fun of it. Everyone else in our office already knows this, even Shirley, maybe most of all Shirley. We come to social events. We ask after each other’s families. We tape photographs on our cubicle walls of our kids sitting in Santa’s lap. If Kyle walked through that door right now, everyone at Mr. Moody’s table back there—and yes, he is his father as far as I’m concerned—would know exactly who he was.”

  “And?”

  “And for all the hours and hours and hours we’ve spent together, you don’t really know anything about me or my family. You don’t come to the social events. You don’t stop at people’s office door and ask how the kids’ soccer games went over the weekend. You’re a stranger to the office socials and the FBI Recreation Association. That photo of you and your daughter . . . ”

  “She was eighteen months old then. That was in Puerto Rico . . . ”

  “I know all that. My point is this, Joe. You keep it on your desk surrounded by files where almost no one can see it. You’re so damned solitary and inaccessible.”

  Linda agrees. “You scare people,” she says as she slaps our checks on the counter. Terry as usual has left a clean plate behind: two eggs, toast, grits, and sausage all down the hatch. Meanwhile, I’ve left half a bagel and cream cheese on my plate.

  We’re halfway to the cashier, edging our way between counter stools and tables, when Terry leans into me in another of those gestures that a bystander might well take for intimacy and whispers, “Remember when I said you didn’t have to be an asshole?”

  “Remember?” I whisper back. “How could I ever forget?”

  “Well,” she says, her mouth practically in my ear now, “you don’t have to kill yourself, either. And you don’t have to be so alone or aloof.”

  Don’t I? I wish I could be so sure.

  15

  FIRST DATE

  February 12, 1990

  When it comes to espionage cases, Marc Reeser is quite simply the best analyst the FBI has ever produced. He also may be the most un-FBI-looking FBI employee I’ve ever worked with.

  Face it, there’s a certain cookie-cutter look to agents. Most of us are athletic, square-shouldered, and probably way too buttoned-down. Not Marc. He looks permanently disheveled—wrinkled clothing, shirts that always seem way too big, a tie that’s never pulled tight. M
arc did time in the military, but he never acquired military bearing, that’s for sure. What he’s really good at is what most agents (this one included) detest: poring over databases and studying lists for hours on end. He finds patterns in the phone numbers used by suspects, and thanks to his prodigious memory, he recognizes addresses in, say, Vienna that have been used by previous spies.

  But here’s the really nice thing about Marc: Despite being a brainiac, he’s a regular Joe, an ice-hockey fanatic, and an incurable optimist. I found all that out back in early December, on the day I picked him up at Tampa International, less than a week after he’d been detailed to the Ramsay case. The first item he grabbed off the baggage carousel was a normal-sized suitcase crammed with whatever clothes and other accessories he figured he needed for however many months he was going to be detailed to me. Item Two was a huge, overstuffed duffel bag—almost as big as Marc himself, who’s a compact five-eight or so.

  “What’s in that?” I asked.

  “Skates, pads, and pucks.”

  Before he could explain further, Item Three came clattering out of the shoot: half a dozen hockey sticks bound together with duct tape.

  As we struggled our way to the parking garage, I asked, “What the hell is all this shit? Are you going to play sand hockey on Clearwater Beach?”

  “I checked it out. There’s an ice rink near I-4 and I-75.”

  There is? That’s not far from where I live.

  “Besides,” Marc said, handling all the bags with expert skill, “Tampa is going to get a team soon.”

  “Huh?”

  “The Lightning, or whatever they end up calling it. Hockey’s going to be bigger here than Cuban cigars, Joe.”

  “Hockey in Tampa? Right. Make way for the Stanley Cup!”

  “O ye of little faith. In any case, I’ve been in touch with a local amateur team, and they’ve invited me to play.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah, tonight.”

  “Tonight? You just got here.”

  “I know, and we have to get moving.”

  “What about the case?”

  “Who do you think reads everything you send up? The agents don’t read it. Jane is the only one who follows everything. I’m the only guy at HQ who has followed this case from Day One. I don’t know as much about Ramsay as you do, but I know more about the overall case than anyone else. Besides, you’re stuck with me, and tonight I play hockey.”

  Bottom line: Marc is his own man. And in the two-plus months he’s been with us in Tampa, he’s become damn near indispensable. His military experience—mostly as an MP—means he can help me out with a lot of basic stuff I don’t understand about the army. More important, he knows all the names in the case, all the players, all the dates, and all the key facts. In the Bureau, analysts are seen as support staff. But to me, Marc is more valuable than an agent. I treat him as such, and so does Koerner.

  * * *

  EVER SINCE EARLY JANUARY, Marc and I—and Terry if she’s not otherwise obligated—have been meeting daily a little before noon to plot where we’re headed next. Today’s no different. Marc starts out by handing me a chart. I look at it, but I’m too preoccupied with other matters to focus on what’s written there.

  “Do you see what’s missing?” Marc asks, forcing the paper closer to my face.

  “Yes, the eyesight I once had and a working mind. For God’s sake, just explain it to me. I don’t have time to guess.”

  “These are the documents Rod has told us about,” he says, running his finger down one column. “These are the ones that we have confirmed, these are the ones that the army knew about, and these are the ones the Swedes think they saw.”

  “Okay, what am I missing?”

  “The list looks fairly robust, doesn’t it?”

  “Agreed. A lot of work went into this.”

  “Well, it’s not.”

  “It’s not?” I say, taking it from his hand.

  “True, Joe, you’ve gotten a lot out of Ramsay. More than enough to prosecute and put him away for sure.”

  “But?”

  “I can tell there are documents missing.”

  “How?”

  “I checked with a similar base in Germany through our friends at the army and I talked to a few other people.”

  “And?”

  “For G-3 Plans to function at the Eighth ID, there had to be more documents—many more, and far more sensitive documents, things Rod hasn’t even hinted at.”

  “Shit.”

  “Like I said, we have a lot, but the only person who can give us the full inventory is Ramsay himself. Right now we don’t have an accounting; we can only speculate.”

  Before he’s finished, I’m on my feet and headed for the door.

  “Where you going?”

  “Where do you think? I’m going to call Rod and see if he’ll go on a little date with me.”

  “I thought that wasn’t until tomorrow.”

  “No, thanks to you, it’s going to be today.”

  “Joe, don’t go there half-cocked.”

  “I’m not. I just don’t like to think there’s more out there I don’t know about.”

  “What about Moody? She’s on her way here.”

  “Tell her to take the rest of the day off—she can use it.”

  * * *

  ROD, IT TURNS OUT, tells me he needs to work extra hours. He’s just about flat broke and way behind on his cab rental payments. His boss has told him he has to drive tonight or find another job. It’s the old story—I thought clearing up the clap and getting Typhoid Mary out of Rod’s camper might steer him onto a better path. But if you gave Rod a million bucks a year and a free suite at the Plaza, he’d still find a way to screw everything up.

  “Tell you what,” I say, “pick me up at the usual place—Embassy Suites at six-thirty in your cab and don’t be late.”

  “You’re not listening, Joe. I have to drive tonight. I gotta work, make some money.”

  “I am listening, Rod,” I say, “better than you give me credit for. I’m hiring your cab for three hours tonight just like those Japanese tourists you get every once in a blue moon. I’ll bring us dinner, and while we eat, I’ll be on the meter.”

  “Perrera’s? That’s so good.”

  “Perrera’s it is.”

  “Ropa vieja and plantains, the twice-fried?”

  “Yes, for crissake. Ropa vieja and plantains, and would you like to supersize that with a side of frijoles negros, sir?”

  “Por supuesto,” Rod answers with a near perfect accent, “and ice tea, sin azúcar.”

  “Got it,” I say, feeling a good deal like that burger flipper out near Busch Gardens I’ve always feared becoming. “And, Rod . . . ”

  “Yes?”

  “Clean out the damn cab before you pick me up. I don’t want to eat dinner knee-deep in pages torn out of Foucault’s Pendulum.”

  * * *

  REMARKABLY—OR PERHAPS NOT, considering—Rod arrives at 6:29 p.m. And a nice surprise awaits: Except for a small sheaf of torn-out book pages crammed between the passenger seat and the center console, Rod’s cab has clearly been spruced up. Rod, too. He must have ducked into a McDonald’s men’s room on the way over.

  “You look nice,” I say.

  “Thanks. You, too. But you always look professional, Agent Navarro.”

  “Thanks yourself.”

  “No Moody?” he asks, pouting.

  “She needs a break.”

  “Where to, then?” he asks as I break taxi tradition and settle into the front seat beside him. The smells from his Perrera’s feast are already filling the car.

  “SeaWorld,” I say, “and start the meter.”

  “You sure?”

  “Start it.” Rod puts the cab in gear and the meter is running.

  “We’re going to watch Shamu while we eat?”

  “No, we’re going to sit in the goddamn parking lot.”

  Which is, in fact, what we do, since taxis are al
lowed in for free. I have Rod park away from the hard clot of cars close to the entrance gate, but not back in some distant corner. We might be having nothing more than dinner and a chat, but I want clean lines of sight in all directions. (This is why I don’t pick Disney World. Except on Christmas Day, the lots there are always too full for this.)

  “This is sort of like a date,” Rod says as I unbag the containers and hand him his dinner. “Are we going to neck after we eat?”

  “Yes, some serious necking,” I say. “In fact, as soon as you finish eating, I’m going to place my hands around your neck and throttle you for making me come to Orlando almost every day.”

  We both laugh, even though Rod knows that I’ve felt like doing just that on more than one occasion.

  Dinner doesn’t take long. Rod is devouring the food, all but shoveling it in, while I snack on a bag of chicharrones—basically, fried pork skins, empty eating but comfort food for me as I try to put on some weight. When he’s through, I bag everything and place it down by me feet.

  Rod has NPR on, listening to a recap of the day’s news.

  “Rod,” I say, “we know each other pretty well now. We talk more than most people do at work.”

  “We do. I mean, no one else knows about my situation,” Rod says, looking down at his genitals.

  “That’s true, we talk about things few others do. And don’t worry, Moody doesn’t know.” Another lie I’ll live with.

  “But you know, as much as we’ve talked, I have to tell you, I feel, I sense, that you’re holding back, that you have more to tell me, lots more.”

  Rod looks straight ahead but doesn’t say anything. He tries a little smile but he can’t manage it.

  “I think I know why, but I want to hear why from you.” This is what I call a presumptive: I already know you did it; I just need to know why. It makes an admission much easier. “I can understand why answers,” I tell him. “I have so far, haven’t I?”

  “You have and you do.”

  “Think about it. If I sense it, so does Koerner.”

  “Is Koerner giving you a bad time?” Now I don’t answer, I just perform a deep exhale.