She promised to look, although she said that Chad always tried for a light tone when he wrote or phoned her son. “He knew Jess was hurting bad, and he knew Jess felt like he was letting his unit down, not being in Iraq with them. But I’ll see what I can find.”
I thanked her, but my hopes weren’t high. Nothing was coming easy in this case. The thought of all the dead and walking wounded from that pointless war was heartbreaking.
You’ve got nothing to complain about, V.I. Get back in the trenches!
I made another cup of coffee and called the people whose names Tim Radke had given me last night, but none of them could tell me anything. The guys had all been part of their post-deployment counseling sessions at the VA, but none of them ever remembered Chad opening up about what happened on the road to Kufah. The therapist actually took my call on the first try, but she didn’t even remember Chad’s name until she’d looked him up in her files. She told me she needed to see his parents’ signed release before she could talk to me, but she waited while I faxed it to her.
“I see so many men that I can’t keep track of them all,” she apologized. “A lot of them are angry. I’m sorry to hear that Chad Vishneski got in trouble with the law, but frankly, we’re seeing it more and more.”
After looking through her file, she said Chad had never shown up for the one private meeting he’d scheduled.
I rubbed my forehead, frustrated, trying to come up with anyone who could talk to me about Chad or Nadia or Alexandra. Finally, I decided to put on my business clothes and return to the northwest suburbs.
24
Inside Fortress Tintrey
Tintrey’s corporate offices were only a quarter mile from Glenbrook High, as if Jarvis MacLean wanted to remind his alma mater how successful he’d become. MacLean had built his complex in the middle of a landscaped industrial park. Rustic bridges crossed the obligatory water feature, bits of shrubbery poked through the snow, and the walkways that surrounded the building and led into the parkland had all been shoveled and salted.
I parked in the lot in the same row where senior staff seemed to park, judging by the array of BMWs, Mercedeses, and Land Rovers. Nothing as cheap as a Buick. I paused behind a green E-Type Jaguar. Even in this weather, its body was clean and polished, not a mark on it. If Warshawski Enterprises ever got to be as successful as Tintrey, I was getting me one of those. Right after my corporate jet and all those other goodies.
I sighed wistfully but squared my shoulders and walked into a lobby that made no secret of Tintrey’s success. Unlike Anton Kystarnik, whose dingy building seemed designed to show the IRS that he had no assets, Jarvis MacLean had built to proclaim success to his prospective customers. Well-kept plants were potted around the entryway, along with a couple of sculptures of the kind my leasemate created—big abstract pieces of twisting steel and high-gloss wood.
A pair of receptionists, so highly polished I could almost see my face in their cheekbones, staffed a high rosewood counter. They were dressed in powder-blue blazers with TINTREY embroidered on the breast pockets. Behind them, electronic gates blocked access to the building’s interior.
On the far side of the gates, open glass-and-metal staircases invited you to walk to the upper floors. The elevators were along a far wall, but their doors were drab. A green architect clearly had been involved in putting the building together.
“May I help you?” one of the gleaming receptionists asked.
I produced a business card and asked to speak with someone in Human Resources. “I’m doing a background check on a woman who says she used to work here.”
The receptionist murmured into her telephone and then asked who was “the subject of my inquiry.” We fenced for a minute—me explaining that it was a confidential inquiry, she explaining that she was trying to save me time. In the end, she directed me to the third floor, where Belinda would see me. We smiled widely at each other, which made me very aware of my caffeine-stained teeth, and she pressed a switch that let me through the magic gates.
As I climbed to the third floor, I saw that MacLean was an unrepentant supporter of the Iraq war. The walls held some interesting art photographs, but these were overwhelmed by outsize pictures of Donald Rumsfeld and MacLean getting out of a Stryker together, of MacLean with Dick Cheney at an undisclosed location, and a blowup of the photograph I’d seen of MacLean online accepting some kind of award from Bush.
The personnel office was in the middle of the floor. Three people sat at computers in the outer room. The one nearest the door took my name, checked it against her computer log, and directed me to an alcove with the assurance that Belinda would be with me shortly. The alcove reminded me of a doctor’s waiting room. It was crammed with worried souls who were filling out forms on clipboards, each looking up hopefully when one of the receptionists came to call a name. They looked at me suspiciously. Each newcomer was a potential competitor. Suspicion turned to hostility when a receptionist came to get me after a mere ten minutes had passed.