Die Trying by Lee Child

“Why?” she said. “Why the hell does everybody assume everything that

ever happens to me is because of who my damn father is?”

SIXTEEN

MCGRATH BROUGHT BROGAN WITH HIM AND MET MILOSEVIC AT Meigs Field

Airport in Chicago. He brought the four computer-aided mug shots and

the test picture of Holly Johnson. He came expecting total

co-operation from the airport staff. And he got it. Three hyped-up

FBI agents in the grip of fear about a colleague are a difficult

proposition to handle with anything other than total co-operation.

Meigs Field was a small commercial operation, right out in the lake,

water on three sides, just below the 12th Street beach, trying to make

a living in the gigantic shadow of O’Hare. Their record-keeping was

immaculate and their efficiency was first-class. Not so they could be

ready to handle FBI inquiries on the spur of the moment but so they

could keep on operating and keep on getting paid right under the nose

of the world’s toughest competitor. But their records and their

efficiency helped McGrath. Helped him realize within about thirty

seconds that he was heading up a blind alley.

The Meigs Field staff were certain they had never seen Holly Johnson or

any of the four kidnapers at any time. Certainly not on Monday,

certainly not around one o’clock. They were adamant about it. They

weren’t overdoing it. They were just sure about it, with the quiet

certainty of people who spend their working days being quietly sure

about things, like sending small planes up into the busiest air lanes

on the planet.

And there were no suspicious take-offs from Meigs Field, nowhere

between noon and, say, three o’clock. That was clear. The paperwork

was explicit on the subject. The three agents were out of there as

briskly as they had entered. The tower staff nodded to themselves and

forgot all about them before they were even back in their cars in the

small parking lot.

“OK, square one,” McGrath said. “You guys go check out this dentist

situation up in Wilmette. I’ve got things to do. And I’ve got to put

in a call to Webster. They must be climbing the walls down there in

DC.”

Seventeen hundred and two miles from Meigs Field the young man in the

woods wanted instructions. He was a good agent, well trained, but as

far as undercover work was concerned he was new and relatively

inexperienced. Demand for undercover operators was always increasing.

The Bureau was hard put to fill all the slots. So people like him got

assigned. Inexperienced people. He figured as long as he always

remembered he didn’t have all the answers, he’d be OK. He had no ego

problem with it. He was always willing to ask for guidance. He was

careful. And he was realistic. Realistic enough to know he was now in

over his head. Things were turning bad in a way which made him sure

they were about to explode into something much worse. How, he didn’t

know. It was just a feeling. But he trusted his feelings. Trusted

them enough to stop and turn around before he reached his special tree.

He breathed hard and changed his mind and set off strolling back the

way he had come.

Webster had been waiting for McGrath’s call. That was clear. McGrath

got him straightaway, like he’d been sitting there in his big office

suite just waiting for the phone to ring.

“Progress, Mack?” Webster asked.

“Some,” McGrath said. “We know exactly what happened. We got it all

on a security video in a dry-cleaner’s store. She went in there at

twelve-ten. Came out at twelve-fifteen. There were four guys. Three

on the street, one in a car. They grabbed her.”

“Then what?” Webster asked.

They were in a stolen sedan,” McGrath said. “Looks like they killed

the owner to get it. Drove her five miles south, torched the sedan.

Along with the owner in the trunk. They burned him alive. He was a

dentist, name of Rubin. What they did with Holly, we don’t know

yet.”

In Washington, Harland Webster was silent for a long time.

“Is it worth searching the area?” he asked, eventually.