The Alberta Connection (7 page)

When the ceremony was complete, John
announced that dinner would be served in ninety minutes on the
portico of the Sanctuary Hotel. Ryce smiled. He liked the word
“portico.” He was not really sure what it meant, but he liked
it.

John also mentioned that there would be a
fishing tournament at the lake after dinner. The grand prize was a
week for two in the Jill Memorial Suite at the Sanctuary Hotel. The
second prize was a three-day weekend for a family of six in one of
the cabins at the Sanctuary. The third prize was a coupon for a Big
Mac. Fishing gear would be provided.

As Tanya and Ryce waited for dinner to be
served, Ryce checked the large sign near the front door of the
hotel. He was looking for the Jill suite. It was the four-bedroom
suite at the head of the grand staircase. He counted the stairs as
he and Tanya walked to the top floor. He was extremely happy to see
benches on every floor.

As they waited for dinner, Ryce and Tanya
strolled many of the paths and trails of the Sanctuary. Signs
handcrafted by volunteers described flowers, trees, and even the
road used to drag the logs out to the drying shed. After four
years, the road was almost overgrown. Benches were installed along
the trails and in the groves for meditation. At one bench, Ryce and
Tanya sat in silence for several minutes, until Ryce looked at
her.

“Have I told you lately how happy I am that
you agreed to marry me?”

Over sixty people descended on the lake after
dinner. The rules were simple: The angler who caught the first fish
was awarded one point, the entrant who caught the largest fish was
awarded one point, And the entrant who caught the most fish was
awarded one point. There was, however, a three fish limit on the
lake. The first to catch three fish would be awarded the point for
most fish. If there were three winners, each would be awarded a
four-day weekend in one of the cabins.

John put Jill on the official’s table and
asked her to count to three as loud as she could. When she got to
three, the crowd all shouted “GO!” and began running toward the
lake.

When Tanya and Ryce found a place on the
lakeshore, Ryce pulled a slightly greasy napkin from his pocket.
Tanya was horrified to see the napkin covered the strip of bacon
from his bacon-wrapped steak. Ryce carefully trimmed a sliver from
the bacon slice, threaded it on his hook, and cast the hook and
bobber into the lake.

There was a collective “awe” heard from the
anglers near Ryce when a large fish hit the bacon and jumped. Ryce
quickly brought the fish to shore and hurried to the officials’
stand. John and Marge were standing near the table when Ryce placed
his fish on the tray. John turned to Marge.

“That is certainly the first fish of the
contest, and I don’t think I have seen anything bigger pulled out
of the lake since we have lived here. Ryce just may have won two
points.”

Ryce did win two points. And Tanya, after
removing the bacon slice from Ryce’s pocket, was the first angler
to hook three fish. John asked the participants to donate their
catch to the Sunday morning fish fry. Each donated fish would
receive a two-dollar coupon good at Barracks 5, the Ranch’s answer
to an upscale Wal-Mart.

Ryce was the first place winner, Tanya was
the second place winner, and Marge came in third with the second
largest fish. Since he and Tanya would be sharing the first prize,
Ryce suggested that the second prize be auctioned off. The money
would be donated to the Jill Pendergast Memorial Fund.

As they lay in bed, Tanya pulled Ryce
close.

“That was sure nice of you to donate the
$300.00 from those tickets to Jill’s memorial fund.”

Ryce laughed. “They were your tickets.”

Tanya gave him a long kiss. “But you did the
right thing with them. And someone got a deal. A three-day weekend
in a three-bedroom cabin is $750.00.”

After a long shower, Ryce and Tanya decided
that Sunday should be a day of rest. However, by noon, both had
become bored with sitting around the apartment. Ryce located a
tourist map that included ten pages of local attractions. They
decided to explore.

Dinner at the Pendergast table in the chow
hall was missed once more. Tanya and Ryce ate in the rotating
restaurant halfway up the main run at the ski resort.

Chapter 8

Ryce awoke more than
an hour before his alarm clock was scheduled to go off. He thought
about sleeping in, but today was just too important to chance
arriving late at the office. And he remembered John had promised to
send him into the cavern of lost hope. He just hoped he wasn’t
going to lose too much hope.

He looked across the bed. Tanya was looking
at him like an owl focused on a mouse. Ryce smiled. He might be
breakfast, but he was not going to surrender without a fight.

Mark was waiting in the conference room when
Ryce and Tanya arrived.

“Well, it looks like it will be just us three
spending some time together for a few days. Doug is doing some
crisis management. Three of his top customer service techs went on
maternity leave yesterday.”

Mark chuckled. “More than half of the people
who work for John do it from home, but not customer service. I have
seen some service calls with six people sitting around a monitor.
Doug’s customer service is the best in the industry.”

Mark turned to his computer, typed for a few
moments, and then turned to Ryce.

“Doug mentioned you witnessed the murder of
four men at a cabin in Montana. If you got a good look at all of
the killers, we have the best forensic artist in the state working
here. Do you think you could sit down with her and get a good
artist’s rendering of the men at the cabin?”

Ryce reached in his pocket and pulled out a
flash drive. “I can do better than that. My spotter scope had a
digital camera attached. You should be able to get some good
portrait shots from this.”

He passed the flash drive to Mark who slid it
into one of the USB ports on the laptop. A few moments later, Mark
chuckled.

“Great pictures. These will work wonderfully
with the search program I am going to show you next.”

During the following two days, Mark showed
Ryce and Tanya all of the things his search program could do. By
the end of day three, Ryce had compiled significant biographies on
the four men who had been killed at the cabin. However, the three
shooters remained a blank page.

As they walked to the elevator to leave the
building on Wednesday, Mark turned to Ryce.

“We will get in to some software tomorrow
that is a little more specific in its access, more along the lines
of law enforcement stuff.”

During the family dinner, Ryce was asked what
he planned to call the JBTF Internet research group he was forming
on Monday. He thought for a minute.

“Maybe we’ll have a contest to name the
group.”

Ramona started laughing. “I have always been
partial to Internet Insanity.”

John snorted. “That is not a good name to
print on a business card.”

Ryce and Tanya walked into the conference
room on Thursday to find both Doug and Mark waiting. Mark looked
up.

“Doug got his crisis solved, so I asked him
to come over and help with the three unknowns at the cabin. Even
with all his expertise, they are still unknowns.”

Doug finished typing on his laptop and looked
at Ryce.

“I have used every program at my disposal to
try to find the three in the cabin. They do not show up anywhere.
Mark and I developed a program to search driver’s license
databases, but those searches will take forever. Each individual
state is a separate protocol. And you have three pictures, so each
state must be searched three times.”

Doug turned back to his laptop, which had
alerted him a search had completed.

“Well, that was the third killer who doesn’t
have a driver’s license in Arizona.”

Mark looked over at Ryce.

“I still have one more program we can try. It
is one John helped develop with the military. They have an immense
service record database of present and former service members. Our
biggest hurdle is the service branches do not talk with each other,
so we have to go through each branch individually. Also, before we
can use the program, John has to talk with the Secretary of
Defense. When he gets finished jumping through that hoop, he must
talk with each of the service secretaries.”

Mark began typing on his laptop. After
several minutes, he looked back at Ryce.

“It could take several days before we get an
OK. Depending on how tight they pulled their underwear on this
morning, we may never get permission.”

Ryce, Tanya, Doug, and Mark worked all
morning trying to find the three men in the cabin. Suddenly, Doug
looked around the room.

“The best lunch for today is the cafeteria in
this building, and we are almost late.”

He clicked several keys and then flipped his
laptop closed.

As they departed the conference room, Mark
pointed at Doug and chuckled.

“About half the time I work with him, he
forgets to eat lunch. Karen called me one afternoon to ask why he
was wearing a belt all the time. I asked her if it was because he
wants to hold his pants up. She said it was not a trick
question.”

Doug laughed and then said, “That’s way too
much information.”

During lunch, John asked how everyone was
doing. Doug asked if John had gotten Mark’s email. When John
responded he had, Doug smiled.

“I am sure Ryce will be doing much better
when he has learned the identity of the three men in the
cabin.”

Doug was recalled halfway through lunch to
the main Pendergast Holdings office building on Sanctuary
Boulevard. He had another customer service technician become a
mother. Ryce casually asked if the customer service department was
totally comprised of mothers-to-be. Mark laughed so loud, almost
half the cafeteria looked his way.

“Doug is convinced that the best customer
service reps are ladies. He does have a few guys working in
customer service, but they are only tokens.”After lunch Mark, Ryce,
and Tanya focused on the four men killed at the cabin. The four
were all former FBI agents who had been assigned to the New York
bureau office. They had all resigned on the same day four years
earlier.

The agents had all been under investigation
for suspected corruption. They had been put on administrative leave
thirty days prior to resigning, but were never connected with any
criminal activity. And, nothing had shown up in their financial
records.

Mark laughed. “The FBI didn’t have Doug to
chase down financial records. He will find something if there is
something to find.”

Mark picked up his cell phone and sent a text
message. He also composed an email on his laptop.

“When Doug is in crisis mode, you have to
contact him using both email and text messaging. Sometimes he is so
deep in his laptop, he doesn’t check his email.”

For the rest of the day, Mark, Ryce, and
Tanya searched for additional information on the FBI agents. A few
minutes before they departed the conference room, Mark received an
email from Doug.

“
Mark,

I found a joint account for the FBI agents
with $800,000.00. I will let you know when I find more.

Doug”

While they waited for the elevator, Ryce
looked at Mark. “Does it seem like we still have more questions
than answers?”

Chapter 9

Ryce and Tanya
arrived at Suite 425 nearly an hour early Friday morning. Ryce had
been working in the conference room for most of the week. He
thought it was time to set up his office so he felt comfortable
working in it.

Relocating the office desk was the first item
on the list. After Ryce moved the desk three times, it stood
exactly where it had been when he started.

As Ryce relaxed in his office chair, he heard
a faint laugh coming from the doorway, and then Tanya walked into
the office.

“I am really sorry I didn’t think to bring my
video camera. The last ten minutes have been very revealing.”

She walked over, sat in his lap, and kissed
him. “I moved my desk only once.”

Mark arrived at the conference room at his
normal time. Ten minutes later AP walked into the room followed by
two men dragging mobile whiteboards.

AP laughed at Ryce’s expression. “Doug
thought you could use the whiteboards. I was happy to get them out
of my office storage room. John ordered too many. I think he put
the decimal point in the wrong place.”

When Ryce walked into the conference room,
Mark was busy writing on one of the new whiteboards. Across the top
of one of the boards, he had written, “We Need Answers!!!!!” and
below the heading Mark had scribbled several questions.

Ryce picked the question he had been fighting
with for five days: Who are the three killers at the cabin?

By 4:00 PM Friday, Ryce had reached his
saturation point. He was accessing driver’s license databases. An
average search took more than thirty minutes, and each database had
to be searched three times. Ryce had concluded his third state
without success. He was certainly ready for a weekend.

Ryce and Tanya attended the Pendergast Family
dinner in the chow hall as requested. Ryce thought for a moment. It
had been more of a requirement than a request. He chuckled. He and
Tanya might not be actual family members, but O2 made it clear he
would be applying for a formal adoption. Ryce had, as O2 reminded
everyone within hearing distance, saved his butt in
Afghanistan.

The dinner conversation centered on the Joint
Border Task Force. John could see Ryce was less than pleased with
his success for the week. Additional information had been
discovered about the FBI agents, but still nothing about the three
executioners. How could they disappear so completely? Suddenly,
Ryce had a thought. Perhaps he was looking in the wrong country.
Ryce made a mental note to send an email to Dexter Reynolds, the
head of the JBTF in Canada. Perhaps Dexter had some of the same
resources to research the pictures. Any information was better than
no information.