The Sum of All Fears.pdf - Delta Force

'What are you telling me?' the sergeant asked.
'I think it might be a good idea to check it out.'
'Okay, call it in. I'll give it a walk-past.' The sergeant looked at the
clipboard to check the tag number. 'I was headed off to help out the Wells Fargo
guys at the loading dock. You take that for me, okay?'
'Sure, Sarge.' Dawkins headed off.
The watch supervisor lifted his Motorola radio. 'Lieutenant Vernon, this is
Sergeant Yankevich, could you meet me down at the TV place?'
Yankevich started walking back south around the stadium. He had his own personal
radio, but it lacked an earpiece. San Diego stopped the Vikings on downs.
Minnesota punted – a good one that required a fair catch at the Chargers'
thirty. Well, maybe his team could get the game even. Somebody ought to shoot
that Wills kid, he thought angrily.
Officer Dawkins walked to the north end of the stadium and saw a Wells Fargo
armored car parked at the lower-level loading dock. One man was trying to sling
out bags of what had to be coins.
'What's the problem?'
'The driver's beat his knee up, he's off having it fixed. Can you give me a
hand?'
'Inside or outside?' Dawkins asked.
'You hand them out, okay? Be careful, they're heavy mothers.'
'Gotcha.' Dawkins hopped inside. The interior of the armored truck was lined
with shelves holding innumerable bags of mainly quarters, it looked like. He
lifted one, and it was as heavy as he'd been told. The police officer stuck his
clipboard in his belt and went to work, handing them out to the loading dock,
where the guard set them on a two-wheel hand-truck. Trust the sarge to stick him
with this.
Yankevich met the lieutenant at the media entrance. Both walked over to the
truck in question. The lieutenant looked inside. 'A big box with "Sony" written
on it . . . wait a minute. Says it's a commercial videotape machine.'
Sergeant Yankevich filled his boss in on what Dawkins had told him. 'It's
probably nothing, but – '
'Yeah – but. Let me find the ABC guy. I'm also going to call the bomb squad.
Stay here and keep an eye on the thing.'
'I have a Slim Jim in my car. If you want, I can get in easy enough.' Every cop
knows how to break into cars.
'I don't think so. We'll let the bomb guys think it over besides, it's probably
just what it looks like. If they came down to replace a broken tapedeck – well,
maybe the broken one was fixed and they decided they didn't need it.'
'Okay, Lieutenant.' Yankevich walked inside to get another cup of coffee to keep
warm, then returned to the out-of-doors he loved so much. The sun was setting
behind the Rockies, and even in zero weather with a bitter wind, it was always
something beautiful to watch. The police sergeant walked past the network
up-link vans to watch the glowing orange ball dip through one of the blowing
snow clouds. Some things were better than football. When the last edge of the
sun dipped below the ridge line, he turned back, deciding to take another look
at the box inside the truck. He would not make it.