Minutes after the phone call ended, my cell went off. I answered, and it was Burns himself. “So how’d I do?” he asked. I could hear the smile in his voice. I could also almost see the cocky upturn of his lip when he grinned. He knew how he’d done.

I walked away from the group into a far corner of the room and told him what he wanted to hear. “You did good. They’re pumped to do the job.”

Burns exhaled. “Alex, I want you to turn up the heat on this punk. I sold you hard to Dallas as a key member of the team. They bought you, and your reputation. They know how good we think you are. I want you to make Lawrence Lipton very uncomfortable. Do it your own way.”

I found myself smiling. “I’ll see what I can do.”

“And Alex, contrary to what I said to the others, don’t make any mistakes.”

Chapter 94

Chapter 94

DON’T MAKE ANY MISTAKES. It was a hell of an exit line, I had to give him that. Kind of funny, in a sadistic, hard-ass way. I was starting to like Ron Burns again. Couldn’t help myself. But did I trust him?

Somehow, I got the feeling that Burns wasn’t that worried about the mistakes, though. He wanted to catch the kidnappers, especially Pasha Sorokin—even if we didn’t know yet who he really was or where he lived. According to Burns’s orders, all I had to do was figure out a way to break Lawrence Lipton down, do it in a hurry, and not embarrass the Bureau in any way.

I met with Roger Nielsen on possible strategies—we had already resumed surveillance on Lipton. It was decided that it was time to put real pressure on him, to let him know we were in Dallas and that we knew about him. After Burns’s phone call, I wasn’t surprised that I had been chosen to confront Lipton.

We decided that I would go and see Lipton at his office in the Lakeside Square Building at the intersection of the LBJ Freeway and the North Central Expressway. The building was twenty stories high, with lots of reflective glass. It was practically blinding as I looked skyward in the Texas sunshine. I walked inside at a little past ten in the morning. Lipton’s office suite was on the nineteenth floor. When I got off the elevator, a recorded voice said, “Howdy.”

I stepped into a large reception area with half an acre of wine-colored carpeting, beige walls, and dark brown leather sofas and chairs everywhere. There were framed, signed photos of Roger Staubach, Nolan Ryan, and Tom Landry on the walls.