Page 91 of Nixon’s Promise

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“What else did you find?” Nixon’s question filled the empty office.

“I looked into the mining companies around the area, like you asked. Everett’s Stone Quarry in Allentown, Pennsylvania, reported a break-in. The report is a month old and it is vague. So I poked around some more and found an internal memo from the CEO of Everett’s to his secretary, reminding her to file an insurance claim on the fifty pounds of ANFO. The memo also states a small amount of cyclonite was taken as well.”

“Good God.” I heard Alec say in the background.

Nixon had me on speaker phone. The team was back at their hotel room, everyone except Holden, who was sitting on a brownstone in Center City where James Shea had entered two hours ago and had not exited.

“Any mention of C4 or composition 4 in the memo?” Weston asked.

“No.”

“So we know where the Irish got the ANFO and they have RDX to make blasting caps,” Weston continued.

“RDX?”

“Cyclonite is known as RDX. It’s used to make the device that initiates the detonation of the charge. The ANFO won’t go off on its own, you need something to detonate it,” Weston explained.

Holy hell. I was going to need to start keeping a cheat sheet for abbreviations.

“Any other mining companies report any break-ins?” Nixon inquired.

“No.”

“Assuming all they have is the fifty pounds, properly placed and set off, they’d have an effective range of a hundred-square-yard radius. That could—”

“There’s a volley of texts going in and out of Shea’s phone.” I stopped Nixon. “It’s coming from a burner phone I’m still trying to trace. They’re talking about traffic, the marathon route, which streets are to be closed, and alternates to leave the city.”

“Forward me those texts,” he barked his demand.

Under normal circumstances I’d remind him that there was this word in the English language that is widely used when asking someone to do something for you. However, at this juncture I didn’t think he’d find my prompt of ‘please’ to be amusing.

I quickly did as he asked and waited for further instructions.

“Is it possible the Irish are trying to take over a rival’s territory?” I lamely asked, thinking about what I’d watched on TV about the mob.

“Chasin, check reports coming out of Boston, New York, Chicago, Philly, and Los Angeles for any big mob-related arrests and check out skips, too. If all of this has to do with territory, something had to have changed. This isn’t the twenties. Clear lines have been established—two crews wouldn’t go to war over a patch of land unless there was a reason,” Nixon instructed.

“McKenna?” Alec called. “Can you do something for me?”

“Of course.”

“I’m going to give you an email address and a password. Can you please sign into the email account and draft an email with all the information you found on Miller? Do not send the email, just leave it in the draft folder. Check the email account later and see if there’s a new draft in the box.”

“Sure.”

“Thanks. And no names. Don’t sign your name in the email. Just the intel.”

Freaking brilliant. They were communicating via email without actually sending emails.

“Got it. Anything else?”

“Keep digging into Shea and watch his phone. Please forward us anything you get,” Nixon said, and I smiled when he included a ‘please.’

“Copy that, boss. Call you back.”

“Good work, McKenna,” he said on a chuckle and disconnected.