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“Ready and wasting time, Daphne, but so be it,” Phineas said, and the two of them walked away. The dogs followed them, wagging their tails.

The counter lady kept her smile intact as she looked at us. Her name tag read NANCY BRINKER.

“Hi, Nancy,” I said, showing her my badge.

The smile disappeared. She looked over at the couple, who were getting coffee from a fancy machine, and said softly, “What can I do for you, Detectives?”

Sampson took the hint and lowered his voice. “We were told that a guy named Alejandro Rodriguez works here.” He showed her a photo on his phone.

“Oh, Hawk? Yeah, he works here off and on,” she said. “He’s here today.”

“What job does he do?” I asked.

“Pumping fuel,” she said, and lowered her voice even more. “Thank God that’s all he does for us, because I’d swear the guy’s on drugs half the time. But he somehow passes all the tests.”

That was more information than I’d expected.

Sampson said, “You keep fuel logs?”

Nancy nodded. “Of course. Coming and going.”

“Any avgas missing?”

Her brows knit. “I wouldn’t know about that. Gerard Daily, the manager, he tracks that kind of stuff. But he won’t be back until two.”

Sampson said, “Mind if we have a chat with Hawk while we wait for him?”

She shrugged and gestured to a door. “He’s running the fuel truck on the tarmac. Go through there and out the far side of the hangar.”

We followed her directions. The hangar was cavernous and echoed with the sounds of mechanics working on a pair of Gulfstream jets. No one looked twice at us as we walked behind the jets and out the wide-open hangar doors.

To our left were several personal aircraft lined up in rows, many with shades drawn and cockpit windows covered. To our right sat a navy-blue Cessna 208 Caravan with the door open and the stairway down.

Parked next to the plane was a Ford F-450 with a big jet-fuel tank on the rear chassis and a second fuel tank marked AVGAS on a trailer. They were about forty yards away, and orange cones were set on the tarmac along with a sign that said STAY BACK. NO SMOKING. FUELING IN PROGRESS.

Up on the frame of the avgas tank, holding the fuel line connected to the Caravan’s fuel port, was Hawk. He was identifiable even with his back to us and wearing a green Verified Air Services workman’s suit, safety helmet, safety glasses, and a set of protective earmuffs.

We stopped at the warning sign, putting us about thirty yards from Rodriguez.

“Hey, Hawk!” Sampson yelled. For a moment it looked like the roar from commercial jets taking off and the earmuffs had prevented him from hearing.

But then he glanced over his shoulder and saw us. The former Special Forces operator showed no surprise, just gave us a quick wave with his free hand.

Rodriguez checked the fuel handle, then jumped off the tanker trailer and landed between us and the plane. He crouched and did something we could not see, then came around the back of the trailer as if he was going to approach us.

Instead he went to the rear of the pickup and, with his back to us, bent over the mechanism that held the trailer to the truck’s towing ball.

“What’s he doing?” Sampson asked.

“I don’t know, but I think there’s fuel dribbling out the other side of that tank,” I replied. “Hawk!”

Giving no indication he’d heard, Rodriguez climbed into the Ford, started it, and ducked down for a moment. When he popped back up, he had something in his mouth. He threw the truck in gear and hit the accelerator.

The tanker trailer lurched forward after the truck with a loud clank, swayed, then sped up. More fuel dribbled out the far side.

Then the fuel line stretched and tore free of the tank. The hose dangled from the Caravan, gushing avgas onto the tarmac.

Hawk looked right at us as he went by, grinning, then swung the fueling truck hard to his right, slinging the tanker trailer behind him our way.