“Point being,” Pete said, “one of those people is across the river at the moment, not that far away, and Jake called me last night to say that they had lost contact with this individual and that they have drone video suggesting that he might be in serious trouble. He asked me if I might consider going across the river today and in a peaceable and neighborly way trying to sort things out.”

“You control more money than the Roman Empire at its peak,” Sophia reminded him.

“Yup.”

“Don’t you have people for this?”

“At times like this, the ‘Ameristan’ label becomes more than just a clever bit of wordplay,” Pete said. “Think Afghanistan or Pakistan. How does it work there? They have warlords. The warlords are big men, respected just because they are big men. If the big man shows up to a parley, it’s a gesture of respect and it helps to calm things down. If the big man sends a lackey, it can . . . have the opposite effect.”

Pete Borglund, warlord. It was such a bizarre juxtaposition that it shut Sophia up for a little while. He turned his attention back to Tom. “We pretty much have to go to Sioux City anyway, because of where the bridges are.”

“We could pay someone to ferry us over,” Tom pointed out.

“I don’t want to mess around with those ferry guys. Too sketchy for me. I’m a fan of bridges.”

“Okay. Bridges it is.”

“That works out great for these guys,” Pete said, nodding at Sophia and waving at the Land Cruiser. “Sophia and her crew can hand the LC back over to you guys and jump back into the car they sent ahead. Then we can use the LC as part of our caravan across the river.”

Tom nodded. Sophia didn’t. Pete’s plan made perfect sense. But now she had this feeling of people going on an adventure to which she clearly was not invited.

“If sending a warlord is a gesture of respect,” she said, “isn’t it even more respectful to send a warlady too?”

The warlady insisted on swapping places with one of the lackeys in Pete’s SUV who was qualified to take her place behind the wheel of the Land Cruiser. She didn’t even want to think about what the conversation was like in that vehicle. But here in Pete’s SUV, the topic was the wild tribes across the river and their practices.