The 19th Christmas (Women's Murder Club #19)(49)

Brady didn’t speak.

“Brady? You still there?”

He said, “I’ll make calls. You’ll have contacts by the time you get out to SFO.”

“Okay. We’re on our way.”

Until a few years ago I’d been the Homicide squad’s commanding officer. The job had come with a title of lieutenant, an office the size of a bread box, and a hotline to the mayor, but it had made me feel older and crankier. It took me away from what I wanted to do—catch bad guys and have time at home with my family.

I’d stepped aside and Brady got the job. Good for him. Good for me. He was a first-class boss—honest, admirable, brave. I had no regrets.

Right now he was in a surveillance van handling the current shit-storm, and soon he’d call Mayor Caputo, brief him on the latest unconfirmed Loman tip, and ask him to release funds and send help quick.

The mayor would give Brady what he wanted, of course.

Way before my partner and I reached SFO, the SFPD Airport Bureau, Homeland Security, and International Arrivals and US Customs would be on high alert.

The SFO security command center would have cameras on every individual on-site, and agents manning the operation would relay information on any suspicious persons to undercovers throughout the airport.

All Conklin and I had to do was find and contain Loman, a man we had never seen and wouldn’t be able to identify because we had no idea what he looked like. “As they say, they don’t pay the big bucks for the easy jobs,” I said.

“Still standing by for the big bucks.”

We smiled and then left the squad room, trotted down four flights of stairs, and exited onto Bryant Street. We located an unoccupied unmarked car at the curb and signed it out. I felt the day slipping away, and at the same time I was having flashbacks of the shooting gallery on the sixth floor of the Anthony Hotel—the sounds, the smell of my own sweat. I was glad that Conklin wanted to drive.

We strapped on Kevlar vests and buckled our seat belts. Conklin gunned the engine.





CHAPTER 71





WE BURNED RUBBER as our car shot out into stop-and-go traffic. I flipped on the lights and the siren, then called the radio room and asked for a dedicated channel for communications with Brady and airport PD.

“You’re blue channel, Sergeant,” I was told.

Traffic slowed us down when we hit the intersection of Sixth and the 280 Freeway. Richie swerved, jumped lanes, and sped ahead. I gripped the dash, fighting carsickness, until we pulled off the highway onto the airport access road. We stopped minutes later under the International Terminal’s swooping marquee that glowed with the holiday light display.

I buzzed down my window and took a few deep breaths. The airport’s curbside looked as crowded as it always did during a holiday.

Travelers arrived and disembarked from cabs and hired cars with their luggage and families. They wheeled and humped their bags to airport check-in, unaware that cameras were on them, that some of the porters were undercover cops, that some of their fellow travelers were likewise plainclothes law enforcement dressed to blend in, all of them connected by wireless coms to the surveillance headquarters below the ground floor of the terminal.

I tried to remember if I had kissed my husband good-bye. Yes, I remembered his whiskery kiss and pat on my rump at the door. But I’d left Julie sleeping under the tree with her arm over Martha. I hadn’t said good-bye to Julie.

Conklin turned to me. “Ready?”

An airport cop rounded the front of our car, banged on the roof, and, while blocking my door, shouted, “Move your vehicle. You can’t park here.”

I tugged on the chain around my neck and showed him my badge, saying, “Sergeant Boxer, Homicide. Step aside.”

Brady’s voice came over the radio. “Conklin. Boxer. Captain Gerald Herz from airport security is commanding this operation. Good luck.”

Conklin crossed himself.

I checked that my vest was lying flat under my jacket.

Together, we got out of the car.





CHAPTER 72





SAN FRANCISCO’S INTERNATIONAL Terminal is an enormous structure, almost two million square feet enclosed by glass and steel. It’s got five floors, two concourses, and twenty-four gates, and it’s built to handle five thousand passengers an hour.

After entering from the street, Conklin and I stood at the far end of the Main Hall, staring out at the hundreds of travelers crossing several football-field lengths of terrazzo flooring between the airport shops and check-in booths spanning the hall.

We’d been here before, of course, but this time we were looking for one particular ant in this mammoth anthill. Unless that person was holding up a sign reading I AM LOMAN, I had no idea how we or any of the surveillance crew in the pit would be able to identify our suspect.

I phoned our contact, Captain Herz of SFPD airport security. When he answered, I told him our location and gave him our descriptions. I said, “I’m five ten, blond. My partner is taller. We’re wearing SFPD caps and Windbreakers.”

Herz answered, “Okay, good, I was told to expect you. Walk to the opposite concourse and you’ll see the travel agency.”

Chrome letters on the overhead marquee across the terminal from where we stood spelled out AIRPORT TRAVEL AGENCY. A man in a dark-blue police uniform and a billed cap raised his hand. I lifted mine.