Wake Me When It's Over
Page 21
Charlie, Don, Gil and Hoyt were checking the third-floor access to the People Mover. The doors leading to the Congress Street stairway were locked, but would reopen again at noon. The group checked along the inside window frames, along the textured walls, and around signage. They crouched to rub gloved hands along the underside of the escalators and to inspect the tripod arms on the waist-high rider turnstiles.
“Are we done here? My knees are killing me with all the crouching I’ve done tonight,” Don complained. “Let’s go up and look at the passenger platform.”
Like all the People Mover stations, the Cobo station had unique artwork. The glass mosaic of vintage cars adorning the walls and a stretch of the tunnel was a tribute to Detroit’s longtime dominance in the auto manufacturing business.
“That turquoise car is a ’55 T-bird convertible,” Don said with admiration.
“I wouldn’t mind having the real thing,” Gil responded.
“What’s behind those doors?” Hoyt asked, pointing to an unmarked door in the wall behind them.
Charlie looked at her blueprints. “It’s marked storage. Probably cleaning supplies. The carpeted areas must get pretty dirty from foot traffic in and out of the station.”
The Detroit Transportation Corporation had already increased the security cameras on the People Mover system in anticipation of next month’s Super Bowl. The Cobo Station was just one of thirteen along the 2.9 miles of elevated single-track. Charlie counted four surveillance cameras on the third level entry, and now she noted another four in the passenger waiting area. The station platform was cold because the narrow tunnel, which cut through the northeast section of Cobo Hall, allowed not only the automated train, but winter’s cold gusts, to enter.
“It wouldn’t be impossible to climb down onto the tracks and plant an explosive device,” Don said, pointing. “How long is this tunnel?”
“I don’t know,” Charlie said. “Tomorrow, let’s make sure to check in with DTC’s office. I assume they do a regular check of the tracks, but we’ll ask them to do a special walk-through tomorrow. We’ll need to get DADA involved for that.”
When they were finished at the People Mover, they joined the search group on the rooftop. Slowed down by the snow, the other teams were still painstakingly checking the walls, entrances, and vents. The rooftop could accommodate twelve hundred cars, but at 5:00 a.m. on a Saturday, only six cars were parked on the rooftop, close to the west elevator entrance.
“They’re probably monthly renters,” Charlie speculated as they passed the cars.
“We only have this side to complete,” Mandy reported to the partners. “We’ve searched all the other sides, but we haven’t checked any of the cars yet.”
“Okay, we’ll take the cars,” Charlie said. Don made a wide turn in the accumulating snow, followed by Hoyt and Gil in the other cart.
The group stopped and gathered around a Dodge truck. Charlie used her glove to wipe away snow on the driver’s side windshield.
“Yep. It’s a monthly parker. Look, there’s too much snow to pat these vehicles down. Let’s just do a visual check and take pictures of each one and the monthly parking permit. We’ll have Judy get the names of the owners and call them later today.”
“I’ll take pictures of the license plates too,” Hoyt said.
“Good idea.”
Gil used his BlackBerry to take a close-up of the parking permit, making sure to get a clear view of the permit number. Hoyt used his scarf to clear the rear plates to take pictures. Don and Charlie stood together watching the snow fall. The flash of the phone cameras made the flakes look like winter lightning bugs.
A couple of hours before daybreak, Dudiyn drove the white-paneled van to the church. A fresh layer of snow had fallen overnight, and the van’s tires made the first tracks in the lot. He removed the tags and wiped down the handles, mirrors, seats, and steering wheel. He popped the lock on the blue van and hotwired the vehicle. The parking lot camera would record his activities, but it didn’t matter. By the time someone reviewed the church’s security tape, he and the stolen van would be long gone. He left a second set of tire tracks as he exited the lot, turned left away from the house, and drove toward the freeway so the tire treads would blend in with those of other vehicles. He turned north on Woodward Avenue and then doubled back to the house. The early weekend hour and the snow kept the nosy neighbors indoors as he backed the church van into the garage.
The pipe bombs were neatly stacked in boxes on the far side of the garage. Each plastic casing had a stick-on logo of a well-known pest control company. When planted, the bombs would look like industrial-sized rat traps. The chemicals had been measured, placed in quart bags, and labeled. That would make them easier and faster to mix. The rewired circuits were in a bag. It would take only a few hours to pack the pipes with the explosives and shrapnel, and attach the fuses.
Dudiyn looked at his watch; he had at least four hours before Heinrich returned to help him load the vehicle. He entered the house, relieved himself in the fancy toilet, and stared into the mirror. He hadn’t slept in twenty hours. He gauged whether he was hungry enough to go out for food, but settled for orange juice, which he drank from the plastic container. He returned to the garage and climbed into the roomy backseat of the church van. Within minutes he was sleeping soundly.
Last night’s search had been exhausting, but useful. It gave them a baseline for noticing any modifications to the public landscape of the building. It was one thing to study the blueprints of Cobo, another to have, literally, touched the surfaces of the building.
The wind howled outside Charlie’s hotel room, and she watched the flurries dance in front of the window. She was checking out today. There would be no more breaks for phone calls to her mother, meals away from Cobo, or sex. In the next twenty-four hours, they had to discover— and prevent— the threat to Cobo. If they couldn’t, Detroit would be a sad footnote in the age of terrorism.
“We need to leave soon,” Charlie called out. She looked at Mandy’s black turtleneck, jeans, boots, and ski parka on the side chair. “You’re all packed, right?”
“Yep. I basically packed two days ago, I’m just wearing what I had on last night. Are you finished?” Mandy asked, sticking her head out of the bathroom door and holding a string of floss.
“Almost. I have some toiletries to get when you’re through.”
“Okay, I just need to brush; then I’ll get dressed.”
“You don’t mind Heinrich seeing you in the same clothes?” Charlie hollered to the open bathroom door.
Mandy came to the threshold with a toothbrush in her mouth, wearing only panties and a bra. She held up her index finger to signal the additional time she needed, then reappeared. “Nope. What can you expect from someone who’s more corduroy than cashmere?”
Charlie and Mandy knocked on Judy’s door. She hadn’t taken easily to the order that she return to the office. She’d pouted, and rationalized why she shouldn’t be sent home. But Charlie, Don, and Gil held fast to their decision. It wasn’t until Judy invoked a Broadway show tune that Charlie began to have a change of heart. Like Judy she was a sucker for musicals, believing they were the source of all practical wisdom. As a last resort, Judy had belted out a few bars of the show-stopper, “And I Am Telling You I’m Not Going” from Dreamgirls. That’s when Charlie knew she had lost the fight so she pulled rank on the partners, and proposed a compromise. Judy would spend minimum time at Cobo, but would continue to monitor communications and coordinate the Mack partners’ needs from her hotel room. Judy answered the door with an enormous smile, which Charlie mirrored.
“All ready to go?” Judy asked, stepping aside to allow Charlie and Mandy to enter.
“Yep. We have a meeting with Spectrum staff, and then with Tyson’s boss. I’ll come back for you around one o’clock.”
“Wow. You’ve already got this place laid out like a command center,” Mandy said admiringly.
Judy had, undoubtedly, worked wit
h the hotel staff to accommodate her room’s new function. She’d negotiated for two phones and two desks, which were cleared for her array of laptops, file folders, and phone chargers.
“I’m already coordinating with Carter on today’s last-minute deliveries. I’m speaking with the drivers if they need to be appeased while he’s checking out their paperwork. I can monitor the radio transmissions from here, but I need to get the rest of the BlackBerry equipment and set it up.”
“Got it. We’ll see you later. I’ll call if I need anything,” Charlie said.
Spectrum staff meetings were held bullpen-style. Chairs were grouped in an orbit of the company’s self-proclaimed celestial object— Geoff Heinrich. He remained on his feet, the better for his audience to see his tailored black wool slacks and black linen tunic. Today his boots were made of some dead reptile. Department heads had given their reports, and were now listening to Heinrich trivialize the auto dealers’ concerns about a threat to the show.
“Nevertheless, we want to be at the top of our game for the next ten days, ladies and gentlemen. The North American International Auto Show is why we exist. Questions?”
“When the Secret Service is here, do we follow their orders?” an employee asked.
Heinrich pirouetted to face the young man, who began to shrink under his angry glare. Veteran staff shifted uncomfortably and stared at the floor. Cynthia was mortified that this new weapons technician didn’t understand the unspoken rule that Heinrich’s call for questions was just for show.
The Mack team sat together, Charlie between Don and Mandy. They were there to give Heinrich the impression that they carried no suspicions of him. Charlie felt movement at her right arm and was too late to object as Mandy rose to make a point in support of the hapless employee.
“My experience with the Secret Service is they will give us a wide berth to protect the show. Their primary concern is the protection of the commerce secretary. But, if the needs of the show conflict with their protection detail, they’ll pull rank.”
Heinrich stared at Mandy. His countenance changed from anger to amusement. The staffer looked at Mandy and smiled; she smiled back, shot Heinrich a look of disdain, and sat down. She wouldn’t return Charlie’s glare.
“That’s very useful, Ms. Porter. Do you or Ms. Mack have any further observations or helpful information?”
Charlie spoke up before Mandy could. “No, we don’t. We appreciate being included in your staff meeting, and this is also a good time to thank you for the extra people you’ve assigned to us. I know you have protocols to follow for the first-day activities, and we’ll try not to get in your way.”
“What was that all about?” Don asked Charlie. They were taking a golf cart to the fourth level to meet with Cobo’s general manager.
“What?”
“That interaction between Porter and Heinrich. She can really push his buttons, huh?”
“I guess so. He’s a creep.”
“I see you’ve come around.”
“We’re going to take him down.”
“Before he blows up something?”
“That’s definitely my preference.”
“When you think about it, Mack, all we still have is a lot of speculation that something bad will happen if we can’t stop it. Gil said it reminded him of his first year in the Special Forces. He’d be in the outskirts of some country hunting down bad guys, but didn’t always know what the bad guys looked like. So, all he and his company could do was get up in the morning and drive around, waiting for a reason to shoot at somebody.”
“That’s a pretty good analogy. The difference is, we know the identity of the bad guy.”
“That’s the part that stinks. We should just grab him and the other guy.”
“How do we know there’s just one other guy? Maybe there’s a whole bunch of bad guys. There was more than one man when Josh was shot. Maybe some of the bombs are at Heinrich’s house and some are somewhere else. What if we raid the house, and he blows up the neighborhood?”
“You’re doing that Post-it thing in your head again.”
Don and Charlie were met by Ty outside the office of Mike Mathers, Cobo’s General Manager. When Ty had called to set up the meeting, he had discovered there was a problem.
“He’s mad as hell.”
“About what?” Charlie asked.
“I don’t think he really believes there’s much of a threat to the auto show. He thinks it’s just DADA being paranoid. But a couple of the department heads have called in to say they’re afraid for their safety and are not coming in to work. Now, he’s worried about the possibility of damage to Cobo and potential lawsuits. If there’s a real threat, he’s obligated to inform our insurance company and board of directors.”
“Holy Jesus, and he’s just thinking about all of this stuff now?” Don asked.
“Like I said, he and DADA have been going back and forth about auto show security for years. He reluctantly agreed to bring in Spectrum, and he thought bringing you guys in was just another precaution. But now he’s freaked out.”
Mike Mathers was built like a fullback. His shirt strained to contain his shoulders, and he stood six or seven inches above Don. He had a firm handshake and would have been handsome had he allowed his barber to completely shave his head rather than trim the swaths of hair on either side of his dome. After shaking hands, he landed in his chair in a thud and leaned over the desk.
“Jesus Christ, Ms. Mack, what the hell did you say to my staff yesterday?”
Don recognized a kindred spirit and didn’t give Charlie a chance to respond. He stood and leaned over the desk. Even so, he had to look up at the man.
“Look, Mathers, don’t make us play guessing games. Time is too short. What the hell is the problem?”
The two men assessed each other. Players face-to-face on the line of scrimmage. Charlie and Tyson watched, not knowing quite what to expect. Finally, Mathers leaned back in his chair and entwined his fingers over his massive chest.
“I’ll tell you the problem, Rutkowski. I’ve had three department heads call in sick today. The day before the auto show begins. That’s never happened before, and it’s a huge pain in the ass for me.”
Don lowered himself back into the chair and rubbed his hand through his thinning hair.
“Well, I can see that would be a big problem, Mathers. We told your staff what we believe. There’s a chance that tomorrow, or the next day, or the next, some fool will try to set off explosives at Cobo to disrupt the auto show. I understand your people are scared, but we can’t stop this thing by being afraid. We’re committed to stopping it, but we’re going to need your help.”
Mathers looked at Don, then over to Charlie and Tyson, and offered a wry smile. The tension in the room plummeted.
“You’re right, Ty; he’s a pistol.”
“I told you, boss.”
“What is it I can do to help keep us safe?” Mathers asked.
Ty walked Charlie and Don to the golf cart and took the backseat. Mathers had agreed to approve overtime for staff in food services, facilities management, engineering, and parking management rather than bring in temporary staff. Bringing in new people meant doing more background checks, and there was no time for that. Mathers would also call Hartwell for advice on how to handle his board and the insurance company.
“So, what’s his story? Is he an ex-football player, or something?” Don asked.
“He played two years with the Packers before he busted up his knee. He’s run convention venues in Sacramento and Toledo, and was the number two in Dallas. He knows what he’s doing, but he’s very practical, not much out-of-the-box thinking. One thing I’ll say about him: He doesn’t run scared. I once saw him make Heinrich blink.”
“Good man,” Don said matter-of-factly.
“Is Elise Hillman one of the people who called in sick, Ty?” Charlie asked.
“Yes. I was a little surprised. Her husband probably insisted she stay out of danger.”
“Bill Fox. He’s been around a while, knows the ropes. Team player. He’ll be okay.”
“What about facilities and parking?” Don asked.
“Now, that’s a different story. I’ll need to check to see who’s filling in, in those departments.”
“Where to?” Don asked, starting up the electric cart.
“Can we check in with facilities?” Charlie asked.
“I don’t see why not,” Tyson responded.
“I’m surprised you have a full-time facilities staff. I thought most organizations outsourced that kind of work,” Don said.
“Maybe the smaller guys do, but we have a constant need for maintenance services. Besides the general cleaning staff, we have specialty cleaners for our elevators and escalators. We have a landscaping and green-space crew, and a few others.”
Ty took the lead when they entered the facilities office. “Hey, Amanda. I know the boss is out today, but who’s in charge when he’s away?”
“Dennis Calhoun. He’s been up and down all day. He’s probably at the loading area. They were finishing up the inventory and doing a schedule for the week. You want me to call him?”
Ty looked to Charlie for direction on the question, and Don and Charlie stepped out of the office to confer.
“We could go down to the dock and see Calhoun in action,” Charlie suggested.