Free Off Course by Glen Robins

squeezed out of the van into the narrow gap between his vehicle and Mr. Cook’s. The driver’s door banged into Henry’s passenger door, leaving a mark. His cell phone dropped, as if by accident, hit his foot, and skittered under the back bumper of the Cadillac. He strode to the back of the car and glanced in all directions before leaning down to pick up the phone. As he bent over, his hand slid deftly out of his coat’s pocket to a spot beneath the bumper. He tapped the spot, collected the phone, stood up, checked his surroundings, and climbed back in the van. His visit to the clinic’s parking lot, according to the security camera footage reviewed two days later, lasted approximately two and a half minutes.

Chapter Six
    Los Angeles, California
    June 14, 1:05 p.m. Pacific Time
     
    Reggie let out a long, exasperated sigh as he leaned forward in his government-issued, vinyl-covered, swivel chair, and placed both elbows on the imitation wood grain-topped, metal desk. He had just read aloud for his partner an email from Nic Lancaster, the Interpol agent in London they had been working with on the Cook case.
    Spinner McCoy sat across from him and smiled that Texas smile of his. “Come on, Reg. You know you were just like that kid when you were starting out,” he said with a mile-wide smirk.
    Head still shaking, Reggie looked up at his partner. The gray hairs at his temples and the wrinkles around his eyes seemed more pronounced after the all night drive from San Francisco to San Diego the night before and the growing angst at all levels concerning the whereabouts of their quarry, Collin Cook. “I know. That’s what bothers me. He’s too impetuous, too heavy-handed, and too damn eager.”
    “Rumor has it you were much the same as our friend across the pond, this Junior Agent Lancaster,” McCoy said as he stood and stretched. He turned to survey the view of L.A.’s West Side from the sixth floor window of their borrowed office at the FBI’s Los Angeles Bureau. “Question is, Mr. All-Knowing Expert, how do we utilize his strengths without letting his bull-in-the-china-closet tendencies screw up another opportunity.”
    “Exactly. He can be useful, you know. He’s bright. He’s familiar with the case. Lord knows he’s hard-working―it’s what, nine o’clock over there and he’s still grinding away. The kid is just dying to show someone what he can do,” Reggie said with a check of his watch.
    “And don’t forget, he’s got those bankers in the Caribbean scared. Whatever he’s said or done, he’s got them working for him,” added McCoy.
    “It’s just a matter of harnessing all that energy he’s got. We need to keep him in the loop and share information, but somehow prevent him from rushing in too early and too heavy again. You know, kind of like having him prepare the patient so we can perform the surgery.” Reggie was now smiling, too. “Everyone wins, right?”
    “That’s what I’m saying, boss. Now, let’s look at that map again and see where that boat is headed.”
    “My guess is Panama,” said Reggie before Spinner had time to pull up a map.
    “Why do you think that?”
    “I’d bet Penh knows Cook was there. Probably suspects he hid a bunch of money in one of the many underground banks in the city, one of those that is supposed to be unknown and unknowable except to a select few―the real movers and shakers of the financial underworld. Either he’s the one that directed Collin there in the first place, or he is directing him there now. Collin may be trying to get away from him or on an errand for him. We have no way of knowing, do we?” Reggie stopped and rubbed his face as he thought. “There’s one more possibility: If Penh and Cook were working together, it’s feasible that Collin got caught trying to double-cross Penh. If Cook hid the money so well that we can’t trace it, then maybe Penh can’t either. All outward signs indicate that Penh must not be able to hack into the