Free After the Rain by Chuck Logan Page A

only evaluate. He had a chalky air-conditioned pallor acquired in some unnamed Pentagon sub-basement. He’d told them, just the three of them who were the sharp end—Hollywood, Nina, and Jane:
    “We believe the intelligence is too provocative to pass up. They may have something, possibly a suitcase; one of those KGB tactical nukes. They could be bringing it into the States through North Dakota. Virtually anybody can claim refugee status and enter Canada. We know there’s Al Qaeda activity in Winnipeg, just to the north of Langdon. So it could already be here, and maybe there’s a fresh trail.”
    He told them it was a real long shot. They’d be going into a very fragile intelligence matrix. He concurred with Nina’s plan, given thetarget, to lead with D-girls. He advised them to plan their approach carefully. He bid farewell saying, “This meeting never happened.” Then he packed his briefcase and departed.
    Fragile intelligence matrix.
    That meant a small town where everybody knows everybody and strangers stick way out.
    The information on Ace Shuster was already spitting out of the fax machine.
    Wonderful. He killed a guy in a bar fight. Although, even in the official record, the incident looked like self-defense. But Shuster was convicted and did a year on a manslaughter rap at the state farm.
    Then—Jesus—the FBI had pictures of him in the spectators gallery at Waco. This raised the specter of anti-Semitic American militias finding common cause with Al Qaeda.
    No subsequent arrests. No known militia affiliations.
    Shuster’s father had been investigated repeatedly as a major player in the liquor traffic along the border, but the charges never stuck. He wasn’t breaking any North Dakota laws.
    The Colonel had put together a fast synopsis after a consult with Shuster’s former probation officer. Shuster had served his time, went back into the community, and caused no real trouble. He’d had his conviction reduced. Probation described him as an underemployed heavy-machinery operator, and real smart. But the brains went wasted, because he tended to brood and drink. The drinking was probably self-medication for moderate depression. He’d dabbled in sports, smuggling, and women. Possibly peripherally involved with the biker gangs who ran the smuggling on the Canadian side of the border. No solid evidence linked him to the looming meth traffic. Remember, he was smart. He could be mixed up in almost anything out in all that empty country. Potentially a very dangerous guy, but not so’s you notice it right off.
    A ladies’ man.
    Nina had looked out the window toward Ann Arbor, where Kit was staying with her mother’s sister, and came up with the idea.
    “It could work if it’s bold enough,” Holly said.
    Bold enough…The gloves were off. They were in the serious black on this one.
    “You still sure you want in?” Holly said.
    The serious black. Lie, cheat, steal.
    “We’re not carrying copies of the Geneva Convention in our kit,” Holly said.
    Jane, the sharp tack, cracked wise. “There’s killing in combat and then there’s murder. You ain’t talkin’ about combat.”
    “Correct. I ain’t necessarily talkin’ about combat. And there’s other things you might have to do.”
    “Things?” Jane had said.
    “What, I gotta draw you a picture?” Holly said pointedly to the two women.
    So Nina told Jane, “He means like whatever it takes. Like you might have to suck some smuggler’s dick. Not your favorite thing, Jane.”
    Jane came back fast. “Just as long as it ain’t Holly’s.”
    D-girls. Nothing but hardcore. Behind the bravado they were all picturing Paula Zahn on CNN going zombie-cottonmouthed, trying to get her words out while in the background a nuclear plume mushroomed over downtown Chicago, or Kansas City, or…
    Fuck it.
    Nothing else mattered. Mission first.
     
    But the way the plan worked, Jane drew a pass. Jane was in the motel in town probably reading Harry Potter and the