Chris hurried up the sidewalk, his head down. The last thing he needed was another meet with Alek, especially one he had to drive to Philly for. Alek had set it for two o’clock, and Chris had barely had time to change after practice. It had been an awful morning, with the team distraught over Abe’s death.
Chris hustled toward the massive sandstone-and-brick tower, rising seventeen stories and occupying the entire block of Second and Chestnut Streets, in the colonial section of the city. The building was on the National Register of Historic Places, though its history was undoubtedly irrelevant to the people outside, enjoying the last few puffs of their cigarettes.
He reached the building and hustled up the steps, through the stainless-steel doors, and inside to the metal detector, while his eyes adjusted to the darkness. There were no windows in the entrance area, and the brass fixtures were vintage, shedding little light. He slid his wallet from his back pocket—not his Chris Brennan wallet with his fake driver’s license, but his real wallet with his true Curt Abbott ID, his true address in South Philly, and his heavy chrome badge, with a laminated card identifying him as a Special Agent in the Philadelphia Field Division of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, & Explosives, or ATF.
Chris handed his open wallet to the guard, who scrutinized his ID and handed it back. He worked undercover, and he had to show his ID because he wasn’t at the office enough to be recognized by the security guards, especially on the weekends. He put his ID on the conveyor belt with his keys, walked through the metal detector, and collected his belongings; then entered the lobby. He experienced a sense of awe every time he crossed the dark marble floor, starting from twelve years ago, when he was first hired by ATF.
The massive space was flanked by two carved staircases and topped by an ornate plasterwork rotunda that soared three stories high. At its apex shone a circle of daylight rimmed by an upper deck with a stainless-steel railing. To Chris, the history of the building mirrored the history of ATF, and he was proud to be an ATF agent, even though he had to report to Alek Ivanov, who acted like a gangster even though he was a Washington bureaucrat transferred to the Philadelphia office.
Chris pressed the elevator button, uncomfortable to be in public as himself, as if he were wearing the wrong skin. He hated coming in while he was undercover. It wasn’t procedure, and he knew it wouldn’t have happened during any other operation, further evidence of the lack of support he was getting from Alek.
The elevator arrived, and he stepped inside and pressed the button, his thoughts churning. As a child, he hadn’t known what he wanted to be when he grew up, but he wanted to help the underdog—maybe because he was the underdog, raised in so many different foster homes. He’d been drawn to law enforcement and after college, had chosen ATF, an underdog of an agency that lived in the shadow of the FBI. Chris’s favorite movie was The Untouchables about the legendary ATF agent Eliot Ness, and after a string of successful operations, he’d felt honored when everyone started calling him The Untouchable. But lately, the nickname bothered him, reminding him that he was literally untouchable, disconnected from people.
He got off the elevator, took a right, and walked down a hallway that ended in a locked door, intentionally unmarked so that no member of the public would know it was ATF. For the same reason, ATF wasn’t listed on the directory downstairs and none of the security guards would confirm that ATF was even in this building, having been instructed not to do so. ATF’s Philadelphia Field Division employed two hundred people—Supervisors, Special Agents, Task Force Officers, Detectives, Certified Explosives Specialists, Fire Marshals, Intelligence Research Analysts, and many others, but none of their names was on the directory, either. Unsung didn’t begin to describe their status. Unknown was closer to the truth.
Chris unlocked the door and let himself into the office, which was as quiet as expected on a Saturday afternoon. He went down a gray-carpeted hallway past walls of institutional yellow, unadorned with any artwork. The hallway led to a large room of gray cubicles that looked like an insurance office except for the Glock G22 or subcompact Glock G27, agency-issued weapons, hanging in a shoulder holster on the cubicle’s corner, evidence that an agent was in.
Chris reached the conference room and opened the door to see Alek sitting at the head of the round table. The Rabbi was nowhere in evidence, though he was supposed to be here, too. “Hey, Alek.”
“Curt, thanks for coming in.” Alek half-rose and extended a hand, which Chris shook, though he could barely bring himself to meet Alek’s small, dark eyes, set deep in a long face. His dark hair thinned in front, and a thin scar on his cheek looked like it was from a knife fight, but it was from a car accident at the mall.
“Where’s the Rabbi?”
“He’ll be right back.” Alek sat down. “You know, that’s all you ever ask me. ‘Where’s the Rabbi?’ ‘Where’s the Rabbi?’”
Suddenly the door opened and the Rabbi came in, holding his laptop. “Curt, so good to see you!” he said with a broad grin, showing teeth stained from excessive coffee. His real name was David Levitz, but everyone called him the Rabbi because he was the smartest agent in the Division.
“Hey!” Chris gave the Rabbi a bear hug, almost lifting him off his feet, since the Rabbi was only five-foot-five and maybe 160 pounds. He was fiftysomething with frizzy gray hair, sharp, dark brown eyes behind thick, wire-rimmed bifocals, and his thin lips were bracketed by deep laugh lines, earned over the years.
“Sorry I missed you last night,” the Rabbi said, which was code for Sorry I didn’t rescue you from Alek.
“No worries,” Chris said, which meant, Can we shoot our boss and get away with it?
“Let’s get started, lovebirds.” Alek gestured Chris into the seat opposite the Rabbi, rather than next to him, and it struck Chris that Alek was the Coach Hardwick of ATF. Technically, Aleksandr Ivanov was the Group Supervisor, or GS, of the Violent Crimes Task Force, and the Rabbi was Chris’s contact agent, to whom he reported when he worked undercover.
“Okay, so Alek, why did you call me in?”
“I’m pulling the plug.”
“On my operation?” Chris wasn’t completely surprised. “There’s no reason to do that, Alek. I disagree—”
“I went out there to meet you. Sleepy little town in the middle of nowhere. It’s nothing but a total waste of time, and now that some teacher offed himself last night, there’s a possibility of you being blown.”
“I won’t be, and anyway, I’m not so sure it’s a suicide. The jury’s out for me, and it could be connected to the case.” Chris still couldn’t believe that Abe Yomes was really gone. He had liked Abe, and it had shocked him to the marrow to hear that he was dead, much less by his own hand. It was awful, and it sent up red flags in terms of the operation, which had been dubbed Operation Varsity Letter.
“What facts do you base that on?”