The charges were drafted.

The Thai authorities had been notified of the hotel theft.

Every legal instrument that could be brought to bear was being brought to bear, in parallel, on separate tracks, converging on a single point in space and time: the jet bridge Julian would walk down, unsuspecting, some sixteen hours from now.

“The moment your husband steps off that jet bridge onto American soil,” Martin said, “his reality terminates.

He will walk down it a man executing a clever plan, and he will reach the bottom of it a man under arrest.