Chapter 8 - The Interception
The kitchen grew deathly still. The ticking of an old brass wall clock sounded deafening against the background hum of the refrigerator.
"What do you mean he didn't make it to the terminal?" I asked, standing up so sharply my chair scraped loudly against the wooden floorboards.
"Federal airport marshals met his aircraft at the jet bridge the second the door opened," Sterling said, his voice grim. "They didn't arrest him—they didn't have grounds for a criminal charge. But they exercised an emergency Transportation Security Administration administrative hold, pulled him off the aircraft under federal aviation guidelines, and sequestered him in the airport security holding facility."
Marcus cursed, slamming his hand down on the edge of the table. "They intercepted the package. Vance’s people must have tracked his digital routing when he checked into the pre-flight roster last night."
"No," I said, my mind racing through the mechanics of what Evan had done. "Evan’s smart. He knew they’d monitor his digital routing. He wouldn't carry the physical drive in his primary flight bag."
Sterling crossed his arms, looking at me intently. "Then where is it?"
"With a passenger," I said, a sudden realization hitting me with cold clarity. "Evan told me before he boarded that he switched seats with an off-duty civilian flight attendant deadheading back to Denver. He handed off the encrypted micro-drive during the in-flight beverage service, wrapped inside an ordinary airline magazine."
Marcus blinked, staring at me in astonishment. "A passenger? Chief, if they locked Evan in a security holding room, they're going to interrogate him until he tells them who he gave it to. We don't even know who the passenger was."
"Yes, we do," I said, reaching into my pocket and pulling out my phone. "Evan texted me the passenger’s seat assignment right before pushback from Seattle. Seat 14C. A civilian logistics analyst named Sarah Lin who works for the Department of Transportation regional office in Denver—the exact person we were planning to hand the files to anyway."
Sterling’s expression shifted, a rare note of approval crossing his weathered features. "The boy played chess while Vance’s team was playing checkers. If Miss Lin has the drive, she’s already outside airport security by now. Commercial passengers cleared the terminal ten minutes before the administrative hold was slapped on the flight crew."
"Not necessarily," I said, tapping rapidly on my phone screen to pull up the flight tracking data Evan had sent me. "If Vance’s security contractors have reach into the Denver airport authority, they’ll lock down all exit checkpoints for passengers coming off that specific flight."
I looked up at Marcus and Sterling. We were four hundred miles away in a remote Montana farmhouse kitchen, holding a ledger of historical proof, while Evan was locked in a security holding room in Colorado and a civilian analyst was walking straight into a corporate trap at Denver International Airport.
"We need to get to Denver," I said flatly.
Marcus didn't hesitate. He grabbed his jacket from the back of the chair. "My truck is fueled up and ready. But Chief, driving from Bozeman to Denver takes twelve hours through the mountains. By the time we hit Colorado, Vance’s people will have intercepted Miss Lin three times over."
"We aren't driving," Sterling said, walking over to his desk in the corner of the room and unlocking the bottom drawer. He pulled out an old, leather-bound pilot’s logbook and a set of heavy brass keys. "My private Cessna 182 is fueled and sitting in the hangar behind the north pasture. The engine was overhauled last month."
Marcus stared at him. "Colonel... you have a plane?"
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"I didn't spend thirty years in command logistics just to sit on a porch and watch the grass grow," Sterling said, tossing the brass keys directly into my open hand. "The weather over Wyoming is clear until late afternoon. But if we're going to intercept Miss Lin before Vance’s security detail finds her at the Denver terminal, we leave in ten minutes."
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