The Alex Troutt Thrillers: Books 1-3 (Alex Troutt Thrillers Box Set)

by John W. Mefford

  “My research shows the same thing, Alex,” Gretchen said. “Nothing more than what I found earlier. Just a few blog posts where Leo asks a few questions. He seemed curious, even cordial, which actually stood out quite a bit.”

  “Why?”

  “Most of the others were ranting about one thing or another. Of course, the main theme was how federal agencies like the FBI were going to seize control of the government and put martial law in place.”

  “Ha! I can’t even keep bullies from picking on my son at school. So your Leo info is interesting, but it still doesn’t resolve the bomb exploding in his car.”

  “I’m not sure if I told you that his record is clean. Not even a speeding ticket,” Gretchen said.

  “He could have just been experimenting,” Nick said with a heavy breath.

  “But for what? Is there any way that the most innocent-looking guy in this whole thing could have been the mastermind?”

  The group went silent.

  “Everyone thinking?” I asked.

  “It’s possible, but it seems like a stretch,” Brad said. “No history of violence. No bragging in these online forums, not even when the crowd is bomb-friendly, so to speak.”

  “Okay. I’m partially convinced.”

  “If it makes you feel any better, I was actually on my way to Finnegan’s Tavern,” Nick said as a tire iron banged off the pavement again. “Lyons said that Leo mentioned going to Finnegan’s occasionally. I thought I’d drop by, show his mug around, and see if anyone can remember him hanging out with anybody.”

  “The same place where Jerry met the Cullen brothers.”

  “True. You think there’s a connection?”

  “I think you need to get to Finnegan’s and let me know if anyone ever saw Leo talking to either of the Cullen brothers.”

  Four surging grunts, then Nick said, “Fuck you!”

  “Everything okay, Nick?” Gretchen asked timidly.

  “Oh, sorry. It’s just this last lug nut. I think I stripped the screw and now I’m...screwed.”

  We all laughed at that one.

  A car door slammed shut, then Nick added, “I’ll just drive with three lug nuts. No time to waste.”

  I could hear his engine turn over as I eyed Jaw Man pacing by the front gate. His head turned back toward the house every few seconds.

  “Someone might be leaving the estate soon,” I said as much to myself as anyone on the line. “What else can you tell me about Sean...”

  “Maguire,” Gretchen said.

  “Right, the owner of the GOW estate, whatever that is. Must be some family name.”

  “First of all, he’s a doctor. Actually, a heart surgeon. And a very rich one.”

  “Is there any other kind?” I asked.

  “Well, he’s a CEO on top of that. Runs this company called Hearts of Gold Surgical Group.”

  Something sounded familiar. I tapped my chin. “Can you send me his picture, please?”

  “I’ve got that one,” Brad said. “Give me five seconds.”

  A distant flickering light caught my attention from deep in the estate. The flickering stopped, and I could see it was a pair of headlights getting larger by the second. I could feel my pulse tap a little quicker.

  “You should have the photo now, Alex.”

  I swished my thumb across the phone screen and up popped a photo of a man with gray hair, sporting a stately beard and a red sports car in the background. “Son of a bitch. I know this guy.”

  “How?” Nick asked.

  “Ezzy’s doctor. Well, he’s on all the brochures. It’s more accurate to say she goes to a doctor at his medical group.”

  Lights flashed in my eyes as the car moving toward the gate went over a ridge.

  “Guys, I’m going to have to drop in a second. Anything else?”

  “Oh, a little tidbit on Patrick Cullen. His limp? He worked construction on the Deer Island Sewage Treatment Plant and was involved in a really bad accident. Killed three people, injured a dozen.”

  I tried to connect a few dots that weren’t connecting. “So, the big man on campus is Maguire, although we have no idea what he and Jerry talked about tonight. And we can probably assume Patrick Cullen was in there as well. I don’t know...I’m not sure we’re really getting much traction.”

  “There’s got to be a connection between Gavin O’Hara and the other victims, the two priests. You found anything yet?” Nick asked.

  “I might if I had time,” Gretchen shot back.

  “We’ll work on it, even if it takes all night,” Brad said.

  “I’m game if you’re game,” Gretchen said with a giggle.

  “I’ve got twelve hours before I need to produce a suspect. And something tells me we may not have that long before there’s another bomb. Gotta go.”

  I tapped the line dead just as the gate opened and brakes squeaked. Jerry’s Impala. I knew it without even looking. It turned in my direction, and I sunk low in my seat. A few seconds later, it motored by. I raised my head to see if Jaw Man was looking my way. He’d walked back to talk to his buddy.

  I started the car with the lights off, then put it in reverse and tapped the gas until I was below the sightline from the front gate. Then I whipped the car around until it faced the opposite direction and slipped the gear into drive. Jerry was already a quarter mile in front of me, and then he disappeared around a curve.

  I punched it and accidentally peeled some rubber. Trees hugged both sides of the road as I accelerated into the dark abyss. I zipped up and over a hill and spotted Jerry in the distance. The closer I got, the more anxious I felt. This whole setup smelled like crap, and part of me was pissed at Jerry. Why the hell was he hanging out with people like Ahmed Shaheen and Patrick Cullen? Well, I supposed he could justify Patrick. And now this Sean Maguire fellow. Did Jerry have some type of anger toward our country? Did he resent people connected to the IRA? Or was he just trying to live life on the edge, almost like some type of warped midlife crisis? I had no fucking clue, but I’d be damned if I was just going to play watchdog and wait for another bomb to kill people, regardless of whether their roots were from Ireland or Idaho.

  My fingers squeezed the grips on the steering wheel as my speed reached sixty. I leaned into a curve, the tires squealing like a wounded animal, but I kept my foot on the gas. I thought about the carnage at the post office, the possible tie-in between the IRA and bombs killing people in Iraq. It was just wrong, dammit! My jaw muscles flinched from my intensity.

  The Civic pushed through another blind curve. Suddenly, Jerry’s brake lights were fifty feet in front of me. I jerked the car left and slammed the brakes. For a brief moment, I’d lost complete control of the vehicle. My breath caught in my throat. A second later, my tires gripped the pavement again, and I stopped the car at an angle in the middle of a deserted intersection. Jerry’s lights shone right into my car.

  I jumped out of the Civic and yelled, “Jerry, get out of the car.”

  Holding my hand in front of the blaring headlights, I tried to see if he was moving. No movement and no response.

  “Jerry. I’m not going to play games with you.” I put my hand on my holster. “Get out of the car, dammit. We need to talk.”

  A few seconds and a few hundred beats of my heart. Was he going to make me pull out my gun and turn this into some type of bloody showdown? Now I wished I’d called for backup. I looked inside my car and spotted my phone, then shifted my eyes back to Jerry’s car.

  “Jerry. Last time. Get out. Now!” I yelled so loud my chest rumbled.

  The Impala door swung open, and then a large man rose to a standing position. “Holy shit, Alex. What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”

  “What are you doing? Why were you at Maguire’s house?”

  The purring of the engines acted like white noise.

  He shuffled around, then he moved his hand inside his jacket.

  “Jerry, stop what you’re doing.” I pulled my gun and aimed it right at hi
s chest.

  “What the fuck, Alex? I’m not drawing my weapon.” He came around the door and plodded toward my car.

  “Jerry!”

  I stepped back a half step. I did not want to shoot him. But it seemed imminent. He could be using his friendship with me to get close and then kill me, allowing their sick, terrorist plan to carry on without a hitch.

  Three steps and counting. “Jerry, stop.” I tried to steady my arms as my muscles tensed like never before. I realized I wasn’t breathing.

  Blam!

  He’d just pounded his hands on the top of my Civic. “Alex.” I could finally see his face. It was pinched, but also tired.

  “What, Jerry?” I kept my gun raised.

  “I need to talk to you. But not here. Someone will catch us.”

  “I’m not getting in your car, Jerry.”

  “There’s a Dunkin’ two miles from here. We can talk in public. Follow me.”

  I holstered my gun and did as he said.

  ***

  Sipping my hot chocolate while sitting in the corner table away from the six patrons inside Dunkin’ Donuts, I watched Jerry load up on napkins and get his refill—he’d spilled his first batch when he attempted to sit down. He was like Shrek. He had no clue how much space he used.

  Normally, I’d start chuckling about now. Instead, I glanced through the foggy window and noticed a light rain under a cone of light from one of the parking lot fixtures falling horizontally. I could feel the chill seeping in from outside, which is why I still wore my jacket and wrapped my hands around the cup of hot chocolate.

  Jerry scraped his chair across the tiles and wiped up his spill, then tossed the napkins in the trash and finally sat down. Our eyes locked on each other. First, he slurped in a mouthful of hot chocolate, and I followed suit, although mine was far less of an audible distraction.

  “You followed me.” He didn’t blink.

  “That’s how you’re starting the conversation? ‘You followed me’?” I shook my head and took in a deep breath, trying to keep my emotions at bay.

  “What were you doing at Sean Maguire’s estate? What were you planning?”

  My finger pressed against the sticky table as he arched an eyebrow.

  He glanced out the window while taking another sip. He carefully set down the cup and laid his hands on the table. I didn’t bother asking why he was doing that on such a sticky table.

  “Alex, I’ve been involved in something no one has known about, not even Tracy.”

  I nodded, my lips pressed hard against my teeth, which helped contain the fire that was about to shoot out of my mouth.

  He sat up, leaning his elbows on the table, and he opened his jaw, but didn’t say anything. After a few seconds, I couldn’t take it anymore.

  “Jerry, do you know how many people are suffering because of you? Not just the ones you’ve killed and injured, but your so-called friends. I’m not sure what you think this conversation is going to accomplish, but within five minutes, I’m going to have to cuff you and take you in.”

  “Hold on.” His forehead folded like an accordion. “Do you think—”

  “Think? I know it. I’m just giving you a minute to give me some type of justification. Frankly, I’m not sure I can listen to it. I’m sure it has something to do with how your young life was so tough, and how you had to walk to school through a foot of snow, and you had no shoes and no food, and everyone made fun of you. Blah, blah, blah. Is that about right?”

  He blinked a couple of times. “Give me thirty seconds before you say another word, okay?”

  I lifted my phone, tapped the stopwatch app, and set it for thirty seconds. I laid the phone on the table. “Go.”

  “About a month ago, I got wind from another old running buddy of mine that Patrick Cullen was talking about doing something that people would never forget. He would create his own legacy...and it wasn’t writing his memoir or giving all of his money to the poor.”

  “I didn’t think he had a lot of money.”

  “He doesn’t. I’m just telling you what my old buddy told me. The way I saw it, I had three choices. Confront Patrick and risk him turning on me and doing the deed anyway, go to Drake and have him start a formal investigation, which could have spooked Patrick away before we knew his plan, or...essentially go undercover.”

  My breath stopped halfway up my windpipe. “Wait. You’re telling me you’re undercover?”

  He nodded, then slurped in another loud mouthful of hot chocolate. My phone buzzed and vibrated across the table. The timer had hit zero.

  “You going to cuff me now?”

  “No. Not yet.” I tried to force down a swallow as my eyes glanced outside. I swung my eyes back to Jerry and stared at him.

  “Trying to see if I’m telling you the truth?”

  “Tell me more, starting with why the hell you didn’t stop these first three bombings?”

  “Because I didn’t know. I hadn’t spoken to Patrick in years. We kind of went separate ways. He into crime, me into the FBI. Those two career fields don’t overlap, not in a symbiotic way.”

  “And?”

  “When I reached out to him, we met for beers at Finnegan’s and just shot the shit. Talked about old times a lot. Laughed. It was actually kind of cool.”

  “Did he brainwash you into following whatever cause he’s supporting?”

  “I guess I’m not really good at this ‘legend’ lifestyle. I couldn’t get him to tell me a damn thing. I could see something about him was off. At times he traded odd signals with his brother Dermot, but he’s been damn good at keeping a secret.”

  “Or many secrets. Let’s start with the priest bombings. What have you found out?”

  “Nothing, I’m telling you. In fact, I never made the connection back to Patrick. Not once. He grew up in a family of devout Irish Catholics. Harming a priest was a quick ticket to hell. It wasn’t until yesterday’s bombing at the post office that it hit me. I’m pretty sure that Patrick has some type of involvement, or at least awareness.”

  I emptied my lungs, then bit into my lower lip. “Those people who died, the priests, the post office employees. It’s just...”

  “Fucking sick, that’s what it is. I punched a hole in the garage wall last night. Tracy thinks it’s all about the pressure I feel from Drake. But I had to release my anger in some way. I...I couldn’t believe I let it happen on my watch.”

  His green eyes twinkled from the extra water that had pooled in them. He inhaled, lifting his huge torso a few inches.

  “So, what happened back at Maguire’s estate?”

  “Just a bunch of bullshit. They danced around all the jobs they’d done or were planning. I could see they want to use me to help steer any investigation away from them. No matter what angle I tried, they wouldn’t tell me anything.” Jerry realized he had goo all over his hands, and he tried wiping them with a dry napkin. It tore off in his hands. “I will say that Maguire is a charismatic guy. No wonder he’s worth a half billion dollars. The way he speaks is really convincing. He acts like he’s God’s gift to...everything.”

  “Okay.”

  “Okay, what?”

  “I believe you. Mostly.”

  He shook his head, while looking toward the bathrooms.

  “You can go wash your hands.”

  “I’m afraid that if I do, I’ll come back out and you’ll have the place swarming with FBI agents, all ready to arrest the greatest traitor in our nation’s history.”

  “That would be an epic story.” I tried to smirk.

  “Epic, my ass,” he said, taking in a tired breath. “Look, I knew I was taking a huge risk. But I think I felt partially responsible. Patrick is from my old neighborhood.”

  “That’s an absurd thought.”

  “Maybe. So where do we go from here?”

  Just then my phone buzzed. “It’s a text from Gretchen.”

  “Don’t tell me she knows too?”

  I walked him through the debacle outsid
e Finnegan’s and how Nick was also in the loop.

  He shuffled his empty cup around the table. “You haven’t told me how you found out and how you’ve been tracking me.”

  “Holt.”

  “The assistant director?”

  I nodded once.

  “Oh shit. There goes my career. Crap!”

  “But it wasn’t for your association with Patrick, and now Maguire, not initially. In fact, I need to know the answer to one more key question.”

  “I’ve told you everything. What else could you want to know, the size of my belly?”

  I closed my eyes. “Please, no. Ahmed Shaheen. What’s his role in this...plot?”

  “Ahmed Shaheen?” He cocked his head like a dog who’d just heard a high-pitched whine.

  “Look, Jerry. I know you know him. That little Eiffel Tower souvenir in your office. He gave it to you, didn’t he? What was in it?”

  “Ahmed Shaheen?” He started chuckling.

  “What’s so funny?”

  “If you knew Ahmed, then you’d be laughing too. He’s a smart guy, but a little goofy. I’ve known him for years since I was stationed over in Kuwait for a summer. He was working at the American embassy, and we became friends. Everyone made fun of us because we were just so different.”

  His lips dropped into a straight line.

  “Wait, how did you know about Ahmed? I last saw him in Paris.”

  “I heard and saw. He wasn’t at Maguire’s?”

  “I just told you I last saw him in Paris when Tracy and I celebrated our anniversary. He happened to be in the city at the time.”

  “Why was he in the city at the same time?”

  Jerry’s expression changed in an instant. “Are you wearing a wire?”

  “Wired bra? Yes, but that’s the only wire.” I popped my eyebrow.

  “Ahmed works for a university in Kuwait, so he travels to various academic conferences across the world, especially in Europe.”

  I ran my fingers through my hair and caught a big snag. “Ouch.”

  “You haven’t told me how you know about Ahmed?”

  I licked my lips. “I’m not sure I should be telling you this, but the French DGSE and MI6 were tracking Shaheen when they saw him meeting with you. I spoke to the MI6 agent who took the pictures and gave me the background on Shaheen.”