Home Goes The Warrior Read Online Free PDF Page A

his silence. “Mr. Raines, please don’t get ahead of us. We have no intention of putting you in this position without training you first and then backing you up with all the assets at our disposal. This is a matter that has the attention of people at the highest levels in both the FBI and the Navy.”
    Lee had a retort ready, but he decided to restrain himself. He nodded. “Okay. Let’s hear your plan.”
    Agent Wright took over then. “If you don’t mind, Commander, I’d like to explain what we have in mind.” Commander Johnson agreed and Wright stood up, moving to the blackboard. “Okay Lee, the commander’s given you a look at the problem. The Navy is losing millionsof dollars on guided missile ship overhauls, and nobody has figured out where the money is going. The FBI has gone as far as we can go. We do have a few ideas, but we have no one available who can find their way through the shipyard bureaucracy and its paperwork well enough to get any results. We need someone who knows: (A) his way around guided missile systems and the ships they’re installed on and, (B) how to interpret and analyze shipyard paperwork. That’s where you come in. If your record is any indicator, you have these requirements down cold. Right?”
    Lee agreed reluctantly, “Yeah, I guess.”
    “Okay then, if we assume that is true, the thing that you do lack is a knowledge of investigative techniques. So we’ve set up a crash course at the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia. The course has been tailored to fit these requirements and we think it will take you about two months to complete it. When you’re done, you’ll have all the tools you should need to do the job.”
    The agent stopped to take a drink of his coffee, looking at Lee as if he were expecting a reaction. But Lee just sat there, his chin cupped by his hand as he leaned on the table and stared at the agent.
    Wright continued, “Right now we’re trying to get some people hired and placed on site in the shipyard. They’re backup people who’ll be in laborer and clerical positions. This effort will continue during the time you’re in school, so we have some assets on site if you need them. We have absolutely no intention of leaving you in there all alone.” He stopped again, looking expectantly at Lee.
    Lee directed his remarks, when they did finally come, to Commander Johnson. “Commander, I haven’t been in the Philadelphia shipyard, so I know nothing about it. But I was raised in a Philadelphia suburb. So I do know a bit about what happens in that area. If Philly crooks are getting millions out of the shipyard, the whole deal smells like the mob. The Mafia. So I’m putting my life on the line if I take this job. Not only that, but I didn’t ever plan to live there again. Can you promise me, in writing, that you’ll transfer me out of there when I’m done?”
    His remark caused immediate consternation. Johnson and Wright reacted almost as one, with both trying to talk at once. Finally the agentdeferred to the commander who asked, “When were you in Pennsylvania? Your record shows your home to be somewhere in Montana.”
    Lee smiled. “I was an only child, born in Philly and raised in the Philadelphia suburbs. I lived there until shortly after I graduated from high school. Then, during my first semester at Villanova, my parents were killed in a car wreck. I just wanted to get away, so I arranged to sell off everything we could get rid of in a hurry. Then I rented out our home, got in a car, and started driving.”
    “When I got to Montana, my car broke down in a little logging town called St. Dubois. I had to wait for car parts to be delivered. While I waited for the parts, I met people and found that I really liked the place. So I stopped running and got a job in the local sawmill. I worked there for about six months, until the snow got deep and the sawmill closed for the winter. I kicked around for a while, and then a friend and I decided to join the Navy.