Chapter 9 – Tango on the Catwalk (Part III)

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Agent Toller waited for him to grab his latte before she waved hers at him speculatively. “I take it that Harwood is sticking to his man-of-little-action routine again?” She, of course, referred to the Dean of Engineering, one Richard Harwood, and possibly the least exciting surveillance subject that Agent Warren had ever found himself the displeasure of watching. Except for the fact that he kept extremely strange office hours of late, he appeared to spend almost all of his time dictating into his phone (he didn’t dial out) and reading from stacks of papers on his desk.

The only interesting thing he’d done all day involved sending several obviously coded messages from his personal account to an e-mail address inJapanthat seemed to be connected to an inbox that went nowhere.

Agent Warren sighed into his coffee and savored the taste.

“Anything new from the tap?” his partner asked. “The techs tell me that it hasn’t checked in at its usual interval. Do you think he found it?”

“It’s much more likely it fried,” Warren said. “Either that or Mercer found it. I wouldn’t put it past her. After looking at her dossier, I’d say that she probably knows more about counter-surveillance than most of the Bureau knows about surveillance. For example, take that batch of burner phones that we have the blanket tap on. I call the techs today for an update on what they’re being used for, and you know what they tell me?”

“What?”

“They’re using some sort of distributed encryption with a ‘rolling-cipher’ that they’ve never even seen before. These are college students and they’ve got a more sophisticated communication network than the United States government. If these kids are conspiring to commit terrorism we won’t know until after the fact at this rate.”

“We could still tap Mercer’s phone,” Agent Toller said, taking a long drought from her cup. “As long as you don’t want to do it my way, we could come at her sideways.”

Agent Warren watched the dean for a moment through the binoculars again as the man shuffled papers around his desk into neat piles, reached up and turned off his lamp, and then went about the long process of putting on his coat to leave his office. The agent checked his watch—nearing themidnighthour. He wondered for a moment if the man slowly vacating the office had any social life outside of his job.

The dean was probably a dead end. There was some connection to Mercer that he couldn’t quite put his thumb on.

“You think she doesn’t know already?” Agent Toller said. “It’s not like we’ve been that discreet questioning people directly related to her. What’s the point of beating around the bushes? I say we go head on and see which way she runs.”

The steam from the coffee fogged the glass of the window in front of him as Agent Warren mulled over his partner’s position. She always was the get-out-and-get-them type and this sort of operative surveillance that involved bugs, wiretaps, and a lot of talking to people who only had tangential association with the target operation didn’t sit well with her. It didn’t sit well with him either, he concluded. However, the psych profile on Mercer suggested a cold, analytical mind that created corridors of contingency everywhere she went. She also had powerful political allies spanning an entire spectrum of social strata from the kids of well-to-do politicians to a parent who worked with the US Department of Defense.

“If there’s anything we’ve learned about this girl is that she’s well entrenched and extremely smart,” Agent Warren said. “I’d like to take a page from Machiavelli and undermine her support before we try to take her head on. Something tells me she’s not the type who we’d learn anything from if we sweat her under a bright light.”

The chuckle that floated back from the other seat cancelled itself in a snort as Agent Toller almost did a spit-take with her coffee. Even the Phoenix FBI field office didn’t have any small brick interrogation rooms with a single bright light. All of them were carpeted and beige—the two agents had checked upon arrival. In fact, there’d be soon little room in the field office they couldn’t get their own desk in the bullpen. The local agents had been kind enough to set them up in one of those unused rooms. Right there with the blue carpets, beige walls, and one-way-glass.

“Alright, alright,” she said. “Well do it your way. The long, drawn-out, boring way.”

“Why are you complaining?” Agent Warren asked. He turned the key in the ignition and brought the car’s tinny engine to life. “Manny signed off on all the overtime we need. What, you late for a dance or something?”

Agent Toller shook her head. “Just drive me back to the hotel. I need some good old fashioned boring TV time.”

His hand hung over the key in the ignition for a moment when Agent Warren felt the blood drain from his face.

“Where’s Harwood?” he asked.

Agent Toller sipped at her coffee and made a waving motion towards the now-dark office. “He headed out the front door and started locking up, I didn’t see where—” she paused a moment, grabbed the binoculars from the dash, and leaned forward. “Well that’s not on the menu.”

“I don’t see him.”

“Dark red van, two-o’clock,” Agent Toller said. Squinting, she adjusted the focal length trying to get a better view of what was going on amid the dimly lit buildings. “He seems to be arguing with someone inside the van. Now he’s getting in.” With her free hand, she reached up and grabbed her seatbelt. “No, the person inside the van grabbed him and pulled him in.”

“I’m on it,”Warren said.

The engine buzzed to life and he kicked the vehicle into gear. Agent Warren kept the lights off as they followed the van towards the edge of campus. The van sped casually down Terrace and made a hastily signaled right turn onto Rural Road. Warren carefully dogged its tail and turned on the lights of the car when he felt there was enough other traffic to hide them.

“Well, this is an unexpected turn,” Agent Toller said.

“No kidding. After this, when we get back to the room, I need to change my pants.”

Agent Toller suppressed a smile. “It couldn’t have surprised you that much.”

“No, not that,” Agent Warren said. “I spilled my coffee.”

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