The Freelancer – Chapter 4

The pilot had not been kidding about the weather; it was raining cats and dogs in Dallas when the plane landed.  What I had not expected was the damned heat.  As soon as I got off of the plane, I felt a thick curtain of hot and sticky air hit me in the face.  I always thought rain cooled things down, especially at the end of September, but I was wrong.

Very wrong.

This had to be what Hell was like.

Luckily, I didn’t have a lot of luggage to haul through the airport.  I always kept a suitcase packed and in my car, just in case.  I was also glad that my new partner would be meeting me here.  I had heard horrible things about Dallas traffic and I was not looking forward to getting out there in it while it was raining.

My first impression of Special Agent Collin McShae was not a good one.  He was leaning against the wall in front of the main security checkpoint wearing rumpled khaki shorts and a faded green golf shirt.  Water droplets were falling from his red hair as his eyes darted around, following the path of every attractive woman nearby.  In his hand was a torn half sheet of poster board with my last name scribbled on it in what could have been the handwriting of either a little kid or a serial killer.  Clearly, he was not the most seasoned agent Dallas had to offer.

If he was then God help us all.

I didn’t bother to hide my exasperation with him when I walked up.

“What the hell are you doing?”

He narrowed his bright blue eyes at me.  “Caldwell?”

“You’re supposed to know who I am.”

“I didn’t know what you looked like and I didn’t want to walk up to a complete stranger and start chattin’ him up about the case if it wasn’t you.  So instead…”

“Stop talking.  I don’t want to talk in the open like this.  Where are you parked?”

I could hear him muttering to himself about me as he led me to the parking garage.  I swear I must have followed him for fifteen minutes before he figured out where he had left his car.  At least the parking at DFW was covered.

Once inside his red Ford pick-up, I expected him to snap at me for the way I spoke to him.  He did not.  We drove for another ten minutes before I broke the silence.

“Sorry I snapped.  I just figured you would have pulled my file to know what I looked like before you came to pick me up.”

“I didn’t have time.  I get called in on my day off, walk into the office, was given your name and told to pick you up at the entrance to terminal A.”

I could tell he shared my exasperation.

“You never know who might be watching,” I began.  “Tell me, how would it look if you see a guy holding up a sign at the airport one day and the next day he begins to introduce this guy as his best friend from college?  You have to admit that it would make you suspicious, wouldn’t it?”

“I get it Caldwell, I fucked up.  Can we please drop it now and talk about the case?”

He didn’t bother to wait for my answer.

“I don’t know what your office told you about Blackstone, so I’ll fill you in on what we know so far.  We have an informant down in Houston who sent us a tip about a month ago that one of the terrorist groups had approached him about freelancing for them.  They, of course, are all on our watch list and they need someone who is not.  They want someone average looking, who won’t raise suspicion going through airport security and Blackstone doesn’t fit the profile for any of this.  He’s a biochemist for a pharmaceutical company, for chrissakes.  He probably doesn’t know the first thing about building bombs.”

“Maybe not, but any man who has spent a great deal of time studying the way the human body reacts to different chemical agents is definitely a formidable adversary,” I retorted.

I was not happy with the way my new partner was underestimating the destruction that this Blackstone guy could cause.  This partnership was clearly not getting off to the best start.  We drove the rest of the way to the FBI Headquarters in Downtown Dallas in silence.

Continue Reading…

…Go Back