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prison.”
    “Criminals are getting younger and dumber,” Nick remarked. “Thanks for telling me. I will go say hello. Is the plane packed today?”
    “No,” Sorensky answered as he tucked the magazine into his pants pocket. “We’re only half full until we land at Logan. Then we’ll be packed.”
    After insisting that if Nick needed anything he was to let him know, Sorensky went back to the cockpit, where a man wearing the navy blue uniform and identification of the airline’s ground crew was waiting with a clipboard full of curled papers. He followed the captain into the cockpit and closed the door behind him. Nick put his suit carrier in the overhead compartment, dropped his old, scarred, leather briefcase in his assigned seat, and then crossed over to the left side of the plane and started down the aisle toward the U.S. marshal. He was halfway there when he changed his mind. The other passengers were quickly filing on board now, and so he decided to wait until they were in the air and he’d gotten his legs back before introducing himself to Downing. He did get a good look at him though, and the prisoner too, before he turned around. Downing had one leg stretched out into the aisle, and Nick could see the fancy scrollwork on his cowboy boot. Tall and wiry, the marshal was all cowboy with his weathered complexion, his thick brown mustache, and his black leather vest. Nick couldn’t see his belt, but he would have bet a month’s salary that Downing was sporting a big silver buckle.
    Captain Sorensky had been on the mark in his evaluation of the prisoner. At first glance he did look like a kid. But there was a hardness Nick had seen countless times in the past. This one had been around the block more than once and had most likely killed his conscience a long time ago. Yeah, they were getting younger and dumber these days, Nick thought. The prisoner had been cursed with bad judgment and god-awful genes. His face was scarred with acne, and his marble cold eyes were so close together he looked cross-eyed. Someone had done a real hatchet job on his hair, no doubt on purpose. There were spikes sticking up all over his head, kind of like the Statue of Liberty, but then maybe he wanted to look that way. What did it matter what kind of punk haircut he had? Where he was going he would still have plenty of friends waiting in line for a chance to get to him.
    Nick went back to the front of the plane and got settled in his seat. He was in first class today, and though the seat was wider, it still felt cramped. His legs were too long to properly stretch out. After shoving his briefcase under the seat in front of him, he leaned back, clipped his seat belt together, and partially closed his eyes. It would have been nice if he could have at least tried to get comfortable, but that was out of the question because he knew that if he took his suit jacket off, he’d freak out the other passengers when they saw his holstered gun. They wouldn’t know it wasn’t loaded, and Nick wasn’t in the mood to calm anyone else down. Hell, he was hovering on the edge of a panic attack now, and he knew he’d stay that way until the plane had taken off. He’d be all right, sort of, anyway, until they began their descent into Logan Airport. Then the anxiety would start all over again. In his present, claustrophobic, neurotic state, he thought it was damned ironic that O’Leary wanted him to join the crisis management team.
    Mind over matter, he told himself, and in a panic or not, he was determined to catch up on his paperwork while he was in the air. He’d already checked and knew that no one was going to be sitting in the window seat. Nick always took the aisle, even if it meant moving another passenger, so that he could see the face of every single person who came on board the plane. After takeoff he would be able to spread his folders out while he deciphered his notes and fed the information into his laptop.
    Damn, he wished he weren’t