Page 18 of Letting Go

I must adjust. Compartmentalize. Focus. This is my job.

It just feels like an endless trip, only to arrive somewhere back in the '60s. The Portland Jetport is small, tidy, and easy to get around. Completely unostentatious you can nearly miss the road leading to it. There's no fancy highway, no lights, no glittering new signage—just an access road with a couple of fast-food restaurants and gasoline stations dittoing each other in bright neon colors on one side of the street.

Don't get me wrong; I love Portland. It's a little jewel sitting like a diamond on the coast of the Atlantic. Winters are fairly mild, considering it’s New England. Portland also has great food, great music, craft beer bars, and a scrappy by-the-bootstraps feeling that should put Bostonians to shame, and definitely New Yorkers.

Catching up with Jackson Sterling and the client should be interesting. Jackson, with his good looks, flashing smile, perfect teeth, and depthless black hair is almost too good looking for surveillance. He hates it when I call him "pretty boy," but that's really what he is: he's pretty and he's a boy. Nic recruited him out of college during the second year Finn was gone, and the kid is not military or intelligence like the rest of us.

With my earpiece in place, I adjust the frequency. "I'm in position," says Jackson. "Everything looks clear. Plane is on time."

If our client is in some kind of danger, I don’t get the sense it's going to unfold here, at the Portland Jetport.

Raymond Graham has both a generous grin and a generous handshake. The guy has quite a presence about him. Jackson, who keeps about twenty feet behind us probably never got close enough to smell the guy's cologne but it's expensive. This bottled confidence wafts as we three stride quickly out of baggage claim. No one seems star-struck or approaches the guy—maybe that's why he picked Portland for his four-day seminar titled Living Your Potential. Incredibly charismatic and in his early forties, with thinning blond hair, not a line on his face, and a little stubble around the jawline, it's clear that people are just drawn to him. More than a handful of men and women approach him for passing conversation. I'm not clear they even recognize him. He's just magnetic.

"I'll introduce you to Jackson over there when we're at the hotel. Anyone approach you or handle your carry-on?"

He shakes his head.

The Jetport doesn’t have a VIP terminal, but there's a lounge. Motioning towards the VIP lounge, he follows my lead and lets Jackson carry his suitcase. We stepped inside and continued to the opposite door. Behind that, lies a suite of security offices.

Jackson waits outside while Raymond Griffin and I step into a tight nine-foot by nine-foot security cubby. I lift a black light off a wall hook and turn the fluorescent lights off. Griffin's smile glows.

"I would have brushed my teeth," he says and seems nervous.

"We're looking for residue."

Lights come back on and I take a cloth from a dispenser and wipe down his bag and briefcase and run both through an ion-spectrometer. Nothing. That's what we like. Nothing.

"I'm sorry sir, but I have to pat you down."

Raymond Griffin is clean—no one put a bug on him or slipped anything into his pockets. We're good to go.

We exit the examination room into a semi-empty corridor. Jackson has jogged ahead to pull the car around and cued his own. I text Finn we are in transit. Raymond gets in the back seat. With a nod to Jackson, I get behind the wheel and he disappears into another company Lexus. Pulling out onto Interstate 95, I keep Jackson in my review mirror and then tip it to check on my passenger. For all his warmth and smiles, Raymond Griffin looks beat. Check that. He's stressed out. It's a short drive to the Exeter Hotel.

"Have you ever used protection agents before?"

Raymond stares at the buildings whipping by. "No. I haven't. I've never felt the need before." His smile evaporates and he wipes his hands on his suit pants. "This has been a very difficult year," he starts then stops, as if trying to decide whether to say more. His accent is soft, southern, New Orleans with a dash of Cajun.

"My partner and I went over the emails you received. This was a good decision."

Raymond glances up in the mirror.

"Both Nic Silvano and Finn Colton believe this to be a plausible threat." I find it's best to support the client rather than telling them there's nothing to worry about. In my experience, unless it's a routine detail, there's usually plenty to worry about and the client turns to us when it's almost too late.

"And what do you believe?"

Good question. How should I answer: That I think a high-priced motivational speaker for people who are lost is a little snake-oily? The chance that one of his groupies might be off-balanced enough to hurt him is probably real. I pull in to the Exeter Hotel, arguably the most expensive hotel in the city. I'd only stayed there when on duty—too rich for my blood. Chic, elegant, beautifully designed the place practically breathed money. The main floor showcased international art—you had to get to the third floor before scenes of Maine appeared: rocks, dinghies, the shore.

We get to the room and Jackson slides the keycard and steps ahead into the suite. There's an elegant kitchen table, two sofas set up in a square, beautiful views of the city, chic hanging urban lamps, cheeses from international locations, a box of fine Burdick's chocolates, and, beyond thick doors, a bedroom with a full walk-in executive closet.

I have Raymond stand in the center of the room while we sweep it for bugs. After twenty minutes we come up empty-handed. It would have taken longer but Nic just invested in a multi-frequency bug detector that looks like a TV remote. Finally, formal introductions are made, and I can tell Raymond's a little suspect about Jackson's professionalism. The guy looks eighteen even though he's a nearly decade older.

"I can't thank you enough for your thoroughness," Raymond says.

"That's our job." Jackson runs him through basic protocols: public places, eating, shitting, crowds, windows. How we'll switch off, but Jackson will cover him most of the time, with a double-team for the trip back to the airport on Friday. This list is long. Jackson wraps it up with, "Will you be dining off the hotel grounds this evening?"

"I don’t plan to go nowhere, sonny. The seminar is four solid days in conference room B. There's one session on day three on the patio and day four end in the morning with an exercise on the roof."

I bet that's where the coals come in.