Who would leave Paris for Boston the week before Christmas? People smuggling in cheese, wine, and jewelry, that’s who. Bless ’em. I pull out my iPad—just another sales rep checking the next day’s calendar—and call up the twenty cameras zooming in on the maze of stanchions as the rear doors open and the passengers of Flight 405 trudge out. They look none too pleased to have to wait in these holiday lines. It’s a long flight and they want to get out of the airport and home to sleep off the jet lag. Gosh, it’s almost ten their time and a lot of them probably had connecting flights, like our number 27.
First class is, of course, first. Easy and familiar. While I wait for 27, I watch the parade entering ahead of him. There’s the couple who fly to Paris monthly and then there’s the businessman with the mole on his cheek. Haven’t seen him in a while. (I bet she ended the affair.) Whoa, there’s that supermodel who was on the cover of Vogue a while back. Man, she’s tall. They head straight to Global Entry and the fast pass to freedom. No tedious questions for them.
In what is bound to be a futile effort, I conduct a quick sweep for Kit, checking each passenger for any one of the trifecta of quirks that can’t be surgically altered—her swanlike neck, the unconscious hair flicking, the way she favors her left leg, the one she broke at sixteen. No match. As always, I feel a fresh pang of disappointment. I don’t know why I put myself through this torture.
Because she might be out there somewhere, an inner voice whispers. Right. I take a deep breath and refocus on my duties. There will be another flight, another group of passengers, another remote possibility. I must never lose hope.
Now comes economy class. Families. Grandparents. Students. I enlarge number 27, my backpacked target from Iraq, and clear him right away. He’s some sort of environmentalist, if I’m not mistaken. He was in a group from MIT on their way to the Arctic last spring.
“AC on 27,” I tell CBP.
“You sure? He seems kind of sketchy.”
I have to resist the temptation to inform CBP for the umpteenth time that just because a man has a beard and dark hair and dark skin and comes from the Middle East does not mean he has come to this country to detonate a car bomb during rush hour on Storrow Drive. “He’s a scientist. Recently returned from an expedition in the Arctic to protect endangered ring seals or something.”
“If you say so. He also visited Iran last year. Never heard of seals in a desert.”
There are no deserts in Iran, a piece of geographic trivia that’s not worth explaining to this numb nut. I sigh and text him all clear on Delta 405.
Five minutes later, the rear doors open again and passengers from JetBlue 924 enter, most of them in short-sleeved Hawaiian shirts, shorts, and sandals because it’s eighty degrees in the Dominican Republic. Wait until they get outside and find the skies are raining ice water.
They dutifully weave through the maze. Only half of these faces are familiar to me. Many of them belong to children whom I haven’t catalogued before. Even so, I have to study each one, hitting pause on my iPad, expanding, resuming play, and working down the line.
Wonder why Customs takes so long? This is why.
“How come you’re working that side today, anyway?” Renee asks in my earpiece. “Don’t tell me DHS understaffed the holiday rotation again. Honestly, they’ve got to get their shit together, budget cuts or no.”
“Who knows?” I flick the screen and text CBP: All clear on 924. There are four hours left in my shift and I’m already counting the minutes until I can hop the Blue Line to the Orange Line and then hike the eleven blocks from the Sullivan Square stop to the top floor of our East Somerville triple-decker to feast on congealed leftovers from last night’s Chinese takeout.
“Intel reports there’s a Level 5 incoming from Bogotá,” Renee says. “All I get from CBP is it’s a potential high-security risk. No further details.”
“That’s helpful.” I still have no idea if the Level 5 is a VIP or a drug lord. CBP can be sloppy that way. “Anything else?”
“Lemme check the manifest and see if I can find out more,” Renee replies.
I can hear her artificial nails clicking on the keyboard. She lets out a whistle. “Definitely a VIP. I don’t know why he didn’t fly private, especially if there’s a security concern. Not like he can’t afford it.”
“Politician?” I ask, standing on my tiptoes for a clearer view.
“More like a pretty-boy trust funder whose daddy made a fortune investing his millions as a hedge-fund manager into his wife’s influencer empire. He is super cute, though, so maybe there’s something to be said for the coffee enemas they’re pushing on everyone.”
“Eww!” Relaxing slightly, I slide onto a plastic seat and kick off my flats, grateful for the break for my feet. “Can’t wait to see this Adonis.”
“Yeah. He’s definitely gorgeous.”
“Copa 311 from BOG incoming,” CBP interrupts. “This is our Level 5.”
So much for the respite. Hopping up, I flex my knees, making a mental note to buy new insoles. “I don’t know, Renee, sometimes I wonder what I’m doing here. It’s not like I’ve ever helped catch a terrorist.”
“You don’t know that. Even I don’t know that. We just have to do our jobs to the best of our abilities and hope our colleagues do likewise. Besides, you’re getting a decent salary, nice bennies. Those are key until Erik lands a full-time job.”
“If he gets a job.”
When it comes to academic openings for MD/PhDs in psychiatry who want to do research instead of actually analyzing people, you’d have better luck winning Megabucks. And even if Erik did land one of these plum positions, research pay would barely cover his student loan debt. I just wish he’d join a practice and rake in the money shrinking depressed Back Bay socialites. But, no, he says that’s not why he invested seven years in grad school. Meanwhile, here I am, keeping us both afloat by making sure bazillionaires like our VIP don’t get harassed while dirtying themselves among the masses.
Speaking of which, the rear doors open and first class from Copa 311 enters. I call up the cameras on my iPad, flicking through the faces: a pair of doctors who fly to Colombia quite frequently. A few men in golf shirts and a handful of small businessmen who are not themselves particularly small. A beautiful couple straight from the pages of Town & Country. Two hikers in muddy boots.
Hold on. I go back to the power couple, numbers 6 and 7. These must be my VIPs. I zoom in on the trust funder Renee’s so gaga about. He is definitely model material. Expensive haircut close on the sides, full on top, with natural sun-kissed highlighting. Square jaw peppered with stubble. Thirtyish, rich, confident, and . . .
. . . disturbingly familiar.
I’m supposed to be scrutinizing those around him for his safeguarding. But I can’t stop staring. I’m riveted.
“What’s the ID on our VIP?” I ask Renee, though I already know the answer.
“William Pease. Family owns Love & Pease lifestyle empire. Hot, right?”
Didn’t you break up with him right before you went missing, Kit? “I know this guy.”
“You know everyone. It’s your job.”