The Alberta Connection

by R. Clint Peters

  “You have gotten lazy in your old age. You never let the receptionist answer your calls in Billings.”

  Ryce blew her a kiss.

  “Perhaps since I am married, I am turning over a new leaf.”

  Tanya was still laughing when she walked into her office.

  Both offices were configured the same, with an office desk, a table with four chairs, a sofa, and a full-sized refrigerator next to a microwave. Ryce checked the contents of the refrigerator. Inside were three six-packs of Dr Pepper. Ryce smiled. John didn’t miss a thing.

  The morning passed swiftly. At 9:00 AM, Matt reported in an email that Dianne and Delbert had checked out of the motel in Sweet Grass. This time, they had driven to a fuel stop and had stayed for more than two hours. Matt included the name and address of the fuel stop.

  At 12:00 AM, Ryce received a text that Dianne and Delbert were again on the move. They were now travelling west on State Highway 214. Ryce quickly accessed Google Maps. State Highway 214 was a rural road. Tailing Dianne and Delbert had gotten significantly more difficult.

  Ryce sent Matt a text, asking how many tail cars he was using. When Matt replied he had only one car tailing Dianne and Delbert, Ryce told him to shut down the tail. The roads were too flat and too straight. Delbert would quickly spot a car that never left his rear view mirror.

  Ryce received an email from Vince at 11:00 AM, informing him that the FBI agents in Sweet Grass had been able to plant a tracker bug on Delbert Grant’s Silverado. They had also been able to plant an audio bug under the front seat. Ryce stared at the email for several minutes. He hadn’t requested a tracker.

  After a few minutes, he started laughing. Just before he dozed off in the hot tub, he had mentioned to Tanya that he wished he had the ability to get a bug in the Silverado. When he got out of the hot tub, he went straight to bed. Did Tanya call Vince and request a tracker be placed on the Silverado?

  Ryce pressed the intercom button on his phone.

  “Would Mrs. Dalton please come to the office of Mr. Dalton?”

  Tanya walked in and sat on the sofa. Ryce smiled at her for several moments and then thanked her for asking Vince to put a tracker on the Silverado. Tanya looked at him as if she had no idea what he was talking about.

  “I didn’t talk to Vince.”

  Now Ryce was confused.

  “You didn’t ask Vince to send the FBI agents in Sweet Grass to put a tracker on Dianne and Delbert? They also put an audio bug under the front seat.”

  Tanya shook her head “no.”

  Ryce grimaced. “So who told Vince to send the FBI in Sweet Grass to stick a tracker on Dianne?”

  Doug entered the room. “I think I can answer that question. When Vince and I were talking last night, he asked about Dianne and Delbert. You mentioned they were in Sweet Grass for the night and I repeated the location. He chuckled and said it was a good opportunity. I didn’t ask what the opportunity was. He must have made a call.”

  Ryce chuckled. “It is sure good to have Vince on our side. Doug, I have a very important question to ask you. What was Phil talking about when he said John made him walk; I thought you were going to pull the seatbelt out of the floor of the airplane, you were laughing so hard.”

  Doug started laughing uncontrollably once more and collapsed on the sofa. He finally regained his composure.

  “When we had the poison scare a couple years ago in Moses Lake, WA, Phil was asked to transport several agents out to the local FBI office. He flew into Grant County International Airport, which is a little deceptive as an airport designation, although it used to be an Air Force base.

  “Someone met him at the airport, took him across town to a motel to stay, and left him an FBI car to drive back to the airport. The next morning, Phil tried to find the airport, got lost, and ended up at the Ephrata Municipal Airport. He drove up and down the flight line for twenty minutes looking for his G650. And then, he ran out of gas. He had forgotten his cell phone in the G650, so he couldn’t call Vince to tell him where he was. He finally walked to the first 7-Eleven he could find and called the police. According to Phil, he had to walk twenty-five miles. I looked on Google Maps, and he maybe walked two miles.”

  Ryce chuckled. He was definitely going to miss being around this group. Ryce stood and looked over at Tanya.

  “We have some tracking data to look at and some audio to listen to. What office is being used by the audio group?”

  The audio group had set up three laptops in the conference room. Only one was being used as a transcript station. Ryce found an empty laptop and accessed the tracking program. The Silverado tracker confirmed that Dianne and Delbert were west of Sweet Grass, following Highway 214. They had passed the Loop Road. If they did not turn off Highway 214 on one of the smaller roads, their next exit was Highway 213, followed by Highway 215.

  As Ryce was contemplating the many places Dianne could go, a tech transcribing the audio handed him a sheet of paper. Ryce read the transcript and returned to his office to send an email.

  “Matt,

  “Vince got a tracker and audio bug onto the Silverado. Dianne is heading to the cabin. Let Russ and Damien know they will have company soon.

  “Ryce”

  Tanya walked into Ryce’s office with an extremely questioning look. “You sure left the audio room in a hurry.”

  Ryce grinned. “Dianne is heading to the cabin.”

  Ryce’s most pressing concern was to keep Russ and Damien safe from the occupants of the cabin. Neither of the agents had stealth training, so the observation post that Ryce had occupied on the hillside had not been re-manned. Until the Silverado drove past the two agents, they would be fishing as close to the road as possible. Ryce wanted an accurate visual confirmation.

  Ryce suggested he and Tanya celebrate with a soda in the cafeteria. He needed a Dr Pepper. As he walked down the hallway with Tanya, Ryce noticed signs had been placed on the doors to the work centers. Dylene’s request to transfer from the FBI to the JBTF had been approved. The first work center door was labeled “Dylene Operations Center.”

  As he continued down the hall, Ryce noticed the second door was labeled “Lynette Operations Center.” He chuckled. He was glad Lynette had decided to put some miles between her and Mark. The last door was labeled “Tanya Operations Center.” Ryce looked to his left and asked Tanya why her name was on the door.

  She got a puzzled look on her face and replied, “I don’t know. I didn’t do it.”

  Ryce opened the door and asked the occupants why Tanya’s name was on the door. Wasn’t this group going to be Kenny’s when he returned from Billings? Several agents laughed. Most had worked with Tanya in Idaho and wanted to continue the relationship, even if she was not the team leader.

  After lunch, Ryce asked the members of the “Tanya Operations Center” to closely follow the Dodge Caravan. Ryce had a good idea where the Silverado was going. He had the two remaining pieces to place in the puzzle. Ryce promised to find a map they could put on the wall in the conference room.

  At 4:00 PM, the Dodge Caravan was confirmed leaving I-90 at mile marker 276, near Spokane International Airport. The vehicle soon stopped in the parking lot of a Denny’s Restaurant. Before shutting down for the evening, Ryce asked a volunteer to stick around until it was confirmed that the Dodge was parked for the night. When he got a volunteer, Ryce, Tanya, and Doug voted to eat dinner at the Saigon Kitchen on Main Street.

  The first question at dinner was why Doug had chosen the Saigon Kitchen. When the chef saw the group, he rushed out of the kitchen, grabbed Doug and hugged him. Doug introduced the owner of the Saigon Kitchen as his brother-in-law, Joe French.

  “About a hundred years ago, Joe’s family was really from Saigon. When they moved to the U.S., Joe’s dad changed the family name to French. He gave Joe a name that sounds like Joe, but looks a lot like a tree on steroids. My sister met him when they were both at UCLA.

  “When I was eating at my sister’s home, I got to know that Joe
was a fantastic cook. When John built the Annex, I convinced him to invite Joe to be one of the chefs. Joe does French, Chinese, and Mongolian dishes. Ramona discovered that people were talking about Joe’s food more than hers, so she helped him buy this restaurant. She wants him to relocate to Idaho, but he says he can live with three days of snow a year. In Idaho, they have snow for five solid months.

  “And, like all other coincidences around here, Joe has a younger brother named Dallas, who just happens to have been a Navy SEAL.”

  Joe disappeared into the kitchen for twenty minutes and returned with three waiters carrying large serving trays. Doug grinned at Joe and then turned to Ryce and Tanya.

  “He’s always like this. I am going home tomorrow and can’t take food on the airplane. Your refrigerator is going to be crammed full with small cardboard containers. If you don’t have sufficient room in your refrigerator, Jeb loves the Saigon Kitchen.”

  Chapter 30

  The smell of Chinese food brought Ryce out of a deep sleep, but he did not remember the house at the Annex being located near a Chinese Restaurant. Tanya walked through the bedroom door carrying a bed tray filled with wonderfully smelling food. Ryce stuffed some pillows behind his back and sat up.

  “What is the occasion?”

  Tanya grinned. “I went looking for stuff to make you an omelet. I actually do like cooking for the father of my babies. I could not even find an egg among all the cardboard boxes. So you get the stuff we ate last night.”

  As he ate, Ryce wondered what was happening in Montana. Had Dianne and Delbert arrived at the cabin? Where were the two who were driving the Dodge Caravan? Just too many questions. He finished breakfast, got up, and walked to the shower.

  The problem with a snail shower is that it did not have a door. If it was a real shower with a door, and Ryce had his eyes closed to keep out the shampoo, he could hear the door click shut when Tanya entered the shower. He then could prepare for the temperature to increase. Now, all he could hope for was that she would not turn on the hot water before he could jump out of the way.

  When Ryce and Tanya arrived at their offices, they noticed someone installing a whiteboard in the conference room. When the JBTF was in Idaho, Ryce enjoyed having the team leaders in the conference room. Making assignments was easier and information flowed much better. And, if they needed a conference room for a conference, one was located across the hall.

  As soon as the whiteboard was mounted on the wall, Dylene and Lynette began filling it with information. The occupants of the Dodge Caravan had spent the night at the Best Western next to Denny’s. Dianne and Delbert had stopped at the Glacier Gateway Inn in Cut Bank. Neither group had departed.

  Ryce walked to his office. He was amazed that someone had installed a three-tier inbox on his desk. He had never used an inbox. He was surprised to find that he had several typed pages in one of the tiers of the inbox. He sat for a few moments and contemplated the value of an inbox on his desk. It might be valuable, but he needed to explore the situation a little more. He reached out and pulled the pages from the inbox.

  The task of monitoring the audio bugs had been given to Lynette’s group. She had filled the inbox with the audio transcripts. Dianne and Delbert had argued for an hour about visiting someone in Cut Bank. Delbert thought it was OK to stop, while Dianne wanted to complete the journey to the cabin. They eventually compromised on stopping, but Delbert could only visit for an hour. Dianne stopped arguing when Delbert reminded her that he needed fuel, and the person he wanted to see owned the fuel stop. The occupants of the Dodge were also having a bad hair day. Their argument began in Missoula and was still going on when they stepped out of the Caravan in Spokane.

  Lynette walked into Ryce’s office at 10:00 AM and slid more transcripts into the inbox. As he pulled the pages from the inbox, Ryce smiled. He could actually get used to having an inbox on his desk.

  Sometime during the night, the Dodge occupants had settled on a destination. They were driving to meet someone named Barney near Colville, Washington. Ryce quickly checked his notes. Someone with the initial of “B” had been mentioned when they were in Great Falls. Barney started with a “B.”

  When Ryce walked into the conference room before lunch to check the status board, he saw that Delbert and Dianne were driving west on US-2. If they continued on US-2, they would soon arrive in Browning. Ryce grimaced when he thought of Browning. He had run over something on his drive from the cabin and was losing air in one tire. That was not a big problem, until he discovered his spare tire had gone flat. Ryce chose to drive on the spare tire for almost five miles, effectively destroying it. The tire shop he stopped at to get the tires fixed could repair neither tire. They were just too damaged.

  Ryce knew he had some very exotic tires on his Dodge Ram, but didn’t think that a replacement was unavailable in Browning. He was delayed for over four hours and was forced to settle for a tire that fit the rim, but was not the right size. At the high speeds Ryce was driving to get back to Tanya, the truck pulled severely to the right. He could no longer drive with his knee and use both hands to eat tacos.

  Ryce stopped to check the cafeteria menu before they left the office for lunch. Tanya interrupted him and asked if he would like to eat out of the apartment refrigerator, go to the Annex cafeteria, or practice making their next baby. When Ryce asked if he could have two out of three, Tanya’s grin told him she liked his choices.

  Ryce glanced at the status board before he and Tanya left the Annex. Dianne and Delbert were slowly inching toward the cabin. They were approximately halfway between Browning and Babb. They should arrive at the cabin in less than three hours, even under the worst travel conditions.

  As soon as Ryce entered the apartment, he walked to his personal laptop, sat down, and watched Tanya open the refrigerator and start to warm up lunch. He watched her for several minutes and then began typing furiously.

  Ryce knew that when he finished the email he was writing, his upcoming conversation with Tanya would not go well. The JBTF needed to obtain accurate information on Dianne, Delbert, and the three at the cabin. They needed to know what she was doing and where she was doing it. Someone was required to put eyes on the cabin and Dianne. Moreover, when Dianne was ready to depart the cabin, someone must follow her across the border.

  Ryce had no one in the Joint Border Task Force capable of doing what needed to be done. His Ranger training would put him on a more even playing field with the men in the cabin, but he did not want to go in by himself. However, he did know someone he hoped would be willing to support the project.

  The email Ryce composed to O2 eventually filled three pages. O2 was familiar with the situation. O2 had been a team commander in the SEALs. And O2 had many friends who were former SEALs.

  As soon as Ryce completed the email, he asked Tanya to take a look at it. As she read what he had written, Ryce noticed a change in her demeanor. He was asking O2 for a team of at least six SEALs to accompany Ryce to the cabin. They would determine if it was still occupied and then follow Dianne across the border.

  Ryce estimated that, without any problems, the project could take up to two weeks. After the rescue of Brenda, Ryce was familiar with the trail leading from the lake to the border. Dexter was a telephone call away and could insert an observation team on the Canadian side of the border in a day or two.

  Ryce wanted to get a team to the cabin before Dianne could leave. He could then follow her across the border, and determine to whom she was passing the laptops. If this was the concluding activity of Dianne’s group, Ryce was confident that the whole place would be booby-trapped. He had seen what the group could and would do. The possibility of casualties was going to be high.

  As Tanya read the email, tears began to form and cascade down her cheeks. When she completed reading the email, she turned to Ryce, and kissed him.

  “I know it’s what you have to do, honey. Just come back to me and your new baby.”

  Ryce turned back to his laptop, and
pressed “send,” then turned to Tanya, pulled her into his lap, and gave her a long kiss. “I don’t expect a response for a while, if you have any ideas.”

  Tanya smiled, stood up, pulled Ryce out of his office chair, and turned in the direction of the bedroom. Before they had walked more than five steps, Ryce’s laptop announced he had an incoming email. He frowned, and turned back to his computer station.

  The email was from O2, who reported that he had been expecting Ryce’s email, and had already compiled a contingency plan. He suggested that the team include himself, Ryce, and eight other SEALs, for a total of ten. The group would include four snipers.

  O2 added that John had instructed the Pendergast G650 to return to Paine Field to pick up Ryce and whomever he was bringing to the party. For less than a minute, Ryce considered asking Tanya to remain in Monroe. He was not looking forward to that conversation. She had friends in Great Falls and would likely not even consider staying behind.

  O2’s team would be leaving the Ranch in a six-vehicle convoy very early the next morning. Ryce would fly directly to Great Falls, where he would be met by O2 at the Hampton Inn.

  When Ryce pointed out where the team was staying, Tanya chuckled. During the second week of the first three-week training program, Tanya had decided that she was in love with Ryce. She had made special plans for their first full night together. It was to be at the Hampton Inn. Tanya had walked out of the bathroom in her sexiest nightgown to find a deeply snoring Ryce.

  Ryce looked over at Tanya. “As soon as Phil is close to landing at Paine Field, he will call on the skyphone. Are you packed and ready to go?”

  Tanya silently shook her head “yes.”

  Ryce thought for a moment. “Bring your sidearm. I have an idea for a retrieval group at the campground. We can use a couple families in a bus, with enough room to bring everyone back in one vehicle, if we need to.”