Double blind

Chapter Thirteen

David Halahan, chief of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's covert investigations branch, looked up when his obviously frustrated deputy walked into his office.

"What's the matter?" he asked.

"They can't find Boggs."

Halahan frowned.

"What are you talking about? Who can't find Boggs?"

"Charlie Team… and Boggs's secretary," Moore explained. "Riley just called in. They've been out to his office and his house a couple of times, left a half dozen messages on his answering machine. Checked in at a couple of his favorite watering holes. No Boggs."

"What does his secretary say?"

"Well, apparently it's not unusual for him to be out in the field two or three days without calling in."

"Yeah, but he knew we were sending Charlie Team out there — " Halahan started to protest, but then hesitated.

"Assuming he got the message in the first place," Moore verbalized the thought in both of their minds. "He never did call us back to confirm."

"Yeah, that's right."

"And to make things just a little more confusing, Riley says his house is locked up tight, the government rig's in his garage — they could see it through the side window-and his personal truck and boat are parked in the carport."

"What about the government boats, other vehicles?"

"He's got two boats and a four-wheeler assigned to his office, and they're all present and accounted for in the storage shed next to his office."

"Maybe he went out on a detail with some of the state guys?" Halahan suggested.

"Yeah, Riley's checking on that now. Thing is," Moore went on uneasily, "we don't want to burn the guy or his operation if he's got something going that we're not supposed to know about, but…"

"But he's a district agent, not a covert operator, and he's supposed to keep himself available," Halahan finished.

"Yeah, right." The deputy Special Ops chief nodded glumly.

"What's Charlie Team doing now?"

"Riley's got them staying in a couple of the local hotels while they work out vehicles and comm links. The plan is to break them up into three units — Donato and LiBrandi for the hunts, and Riley, Wu, Green, and Marashenko for the two rotating cover units, but we're going to have a problem with transportation if we don't get hold of Boggs pretty soon. We can get by on a rental for Donato and LiBrandi, no problem, because they're acting like they've got more money than brains anyway. But I was counting on Boggs to track down a couple of trucks and a van with Oregon plates for the cover units. Jasper County's a place where you pass your old car down to your kids, then go out and buy a newer used one. Brand-new rental cars won't blend in too well out there."

"Christ, I never thought about that."

"We can always wire them more money to pick up a couple of halfway decent clunkers from a used-car lot," Moore suggested, "but we've got to be careful about buying local. It'll look pretty suspicious if somebody starts poking around, tracks down some sale or registration paperwork, and then starts comparing dates."

"These Chosen Brigade of the Seventh Seal characters don't like or trust the government," Halahan reminded his deputy. "You really think they'd walk into the DMV and ask for information?"

"No, but the way our luck's been going lately, Riley'd probably end up buying a car with a countywide history from some Chosen Brigade of the Seventh Seal member's used-car-dealing uncle. Far as we know, all of the members of the group were born and raised in that area."

"Good point."

"So I figure the best thing to do is send them over to Jackson, or even better, Josephine County, where they can spend a little more money and get something only a couple of years old that they can depend on not to fall apart in an emergency."

"And in the meantime," Halahan grumbled to his deputy, "Donato and LiBrandi get to troll themselves through the local bars like a couple of county-next-door idiots looking for a quick and easy way to connect with a big-game trophy hunt. Jesus."

Freddy Moore shrugged. 'Yeah, I know, but what else can they do if they can't find Boggs? I sure don't want them trying to approach one of these paranoid Seventh Seal militants out of the blue and try to bring the conversation around to illegal hunting. That's something a guy like Lightstone might be able to pull off, but he's in a different league."

"Just make sure they know to take it slow and easy. I don't want them pushing too fast and blow the whole operation. We've got to respond to that congressional in a reasonable amount of time, but we're not in that big of a hurry."

"Slow and easy are my middle names," the Southern-born deputy Special Ops chief replied with a smile.

"You and Paxton, God help us all." Halahan grinned, but then immediately grew sober again. "Getting back to those vehicles. Another thing to keep in mind is that the more time those kids spend wandering around outside the target area, the more likely they'll run across Bravo Team, or vice versa. We don't need that right now, either."

"Yeah, I know. That's why I wanted to talk to you about wiring the money this afternoon. According to my schedule, the shipments from Newark and Miami should be arriving by air freight" — Moore glanced down at his watch — "right about now."

The deputy Special Ops chief smiled cheerfully at Halahan.

"I figure that by tomorrow morning, our favorite band of renegades ought to be fully occupied with a little matter of unpacking."