by Sam Jones
And then she met Billy Reese.
“The spark plug.”
The two of them were on opposite ends of the spectrum: style-wise, taste-wise. Hell, even some elements of their scruples.
But they were assigned to work together.
And like most “opposites attract” situations, somehow it worked.
Out of all the handlers, SACs, division chiefs, and sections chiefs that were tethered to Billy over the course of his career, Ferris was the only one who was able to reel him in when it became necessary. She gave the orders; he followed them. She would point; he would shoot. It was a chemistry that seemed to work well, one that yielded results. It was an arrangement the bureau didn’t want to mess with, so until the day came when “the spark plug” got completely out of line, Special Agent Billy Reese belonged to SAC Rebecca Ferris.
The guy was effective. He produced results. Whether it was luck, or some genetic predisposition that made him that way, Ferris didn’t know. All she knew was that she trusted her agent. She had for two years.
And then Santoro got shot.
“How’re you holding up?” Ferris asked.
“Just chalking it up to a rough day at the office,” Billy said. “I’ll live.”
She eyeballed his busted lip and took note of his tiresome appearance. As frustrated as she was, she understood Billy’s situation, and she admired his resolve. He wasn’t going to quit.
He never did.
You had to practically restrain the guy to make him back off a situation; hence Ferris’s role as his handler. The man was dedicated to the job and never seemed to succumb to the darker, more lucrative elements of it that tempted—and even seduced—many individuals who served in his line of work before.
Billy may have been unorthodox, and a little off book, but nonetheless he stuck to his team. He was loyal.
He was one of the good guys.
But Ferris knew that there were only so many chances and risks you could take in his line of work, and Billy took a lot of them, and a lot of the results were contingent on a kind of “lucky streak” that Billy seemed to have.
But Ferris knew, like most people did, that luck eventually runs out.
And perhaps today was that day.
She took a step forward and pressed her palms together in a kind of prayer pose. “Listen,” she said to Billy, “if you want to come in, maybe we can talk about options.”
It didn’t take long before Billy started shaking his head. “This is where I belong,” he said. Flat. Like he’d said it a million times before.
Billy didn’t want to do anything else.
He couldn’t do anything else.
Ferris said, “You just seem a little jaded. Nothing wrong with taking a break. That’s all I’m saying.”
Billy rapped his knuckles on the trunk of her car. “Na…I don’t think I need one. I’m too wound up.”
Ferris waited as he tapped his knuckles.
He was always wound up.
But living that way certainly had some advantages.
And the FBI relished in taking advantage of those advantages.
She stopped about two feet shy of Billy, fuming. It wasn’t the first time he landed them both in a dicey situation.
Probably wouldn’t be the last, either.
“What the hell happened today, Billy?” she huffed.
“We shouldn’t be meeting like this,” he said. “It’s too exposed.”
Ferris pointed a finger. “You should have called for backup. I listened to what happened on the tape,” she said.
“Wearing a wire was a bad call. I told you that.”
“That’s not why it fell to shit. You lit the situation on fire the second they started pushing your buttons.”
“They pulled shotguns on us.”
“Then you should’ve bailed out. Maybe if you did, Santoro wouldn’t have gotten shot.”
Billy’s gaze fell to the pavement.
Guilty.
It was all he had been thinking about for the past few hours. He wasn’t able to ride with Santoro to the hospital or linger outside the operating room while he waited for an update. The other feds told Billy to split and hide out until Ferris got a hold of him. They didn’t want to blow the case. It was an operation six months in the making. It was about justice for one of their own.
They needed Billy to stay undercover.
“How’s Santoro?” he asked Ferris as he braced himself for the answer.
It took her a moment to reply. “Doctors said the bullet missed his jugular by about a millimeter.”
Billy breathed. “Is he going to pull through?”
She took a beat. “It’s looking good. Yeah.”
Billy felt a slight weight being lifted off his shoulders.
“What happened, Billy?” Ferris asked. “This was supposed to be an easy meet-and-greet.”
Billy leaned against the trunk of his car and took off his Wayfarers. “I don’t know,” he said, hands out in submission. “It just escalated to a ten within seconds.”
“It escalated because you think this is a goddamn John Wayne movie.”
“I actually like Gary Cooper more.”
“Stop.”
Billy started pacing and rubbing his stubble, switching back to the more important topics of discussion. “What about the guy I kicked in the face?” he asked.
“We’ve got him,” Ferris replied. “He’s a little out of it, but as soon as we collect all of his teeth, we’ll start asking him questions.”
“I’d like to be there.”
“That’s a strong maybe on that request, slick.”
“What about our people? Do they still want me to stay under?”
“Your identity was compromised. And the assistant director in charge got wind of what went down. He was thinking about pulling the plug. He thinks our whole operational security might be blown.”
Billy closed his eyes. In many ways he was addicted to what he did for a living—the action, the excitement, the drama. He loved what he did. He thrived on it. Billy was a the bureau’s ever-loyal and ever-effective spark plug that rubbed shoulders with bad guys on a daily basis and aided in bringing down a significant number of them as a result.
But a good guy got shot today. Another federal agent was put in harm’s way.
Santoro getting plugged was not only making Billy a little hot under the collar but threatening his employment status as well.
It was a dire thought. He couldn’t function as a desk jockey.
He was a street guy.
“What’s the next move?” he asked Ferris. “What am I supposed to do, just hide out in Layton until I can start making plays again?”
“This whole operation has turned into a fiasco. I’m of the mind to let it go. We’re risking too much to try to avenge a fallen agent. The bureau thinks we’d be sending some kind of message by trying to take Castillo down, but I don’t think it’s that simple.”
“Is that their call? Or yours? You and I may not see eye to eye on a lot of things, and I tend to do as you tell me to do, but when push comes to shove, if the big bosses say I get to go, I’m gonna go.”
Ferris wanted to call it quits.
But the big wigs had other plans.
“You’re staying undercover,” she said to her agent, who did his best to not sigh in relief. “I’ll run the necessary interference with local police in the meantime over this botched deal that went down today.”
Billy was relieved.
Very relieved.
Ferris said, “Just to be clear, I wholeheartedly disagree with this. You’re playing this game like checkers, Billy. I’m working it like chess. You’re only thinking one move ahead. I’m looking at the bigger picture. And I’m telling you: this whole situation doesn’t feel right to me.”
“Doesn’t feel right to me either,” he said. “But justice is justice. Sykes died prematurely, and I’m going after the guys that did it. I trust you. I do…but I gotta do what I gotta
do.”
Ferris took a step toward him. “I’ve never fooled myself into thinking this wasn’t personal for you, Billy. That’s why I said no when you put in a bid to do the job because personal makes things messy.”
“And the people running the show know that my kind of messy is the way things get done. Otherwise the bad guys get off on technicalities or they completely evade justice. They need people like me to do the things everyone is too afraid to do but wants to.”
“And how long will that last, Billy? How long until your lucky streak runs out, you screw up, and the people who backed you up completely disown you to cover their own asses?”
The thought had never occurred to Billy.
No way. They need me.
And I’m good at what I do.
“What’s the next move, boss?” he said. “I’ve got a job to do.”
“You really want to go down this road, huh?”
Billy nodded. “Most definitely.”
She sighed. “The guys in the car said they wanted you alive,” she continued, back to business. “What that means, I’m not sure, but maybe we can use that somehow. I’m going to call into the office so I can book a room and we can grill Rodriguez.”
“That’s his name? The guy I kicked in the face?”
“Yeah. Manuel Rodriguez. We’ll find out what he knows and go from there.”
“Where’s that toothless little twerp held up right now?”
“We’ve got him in a holding cell.”
“I want to talk to him.”
“Out of the question,” Ferris said.
“How do I get a lead from him then?” Billy said.
“I’ll work him.”
“I’m formally requesting that I be in the room when that happens.”
“And I’m telling you that I’ll let you know if I think that’s a good play. Until then, you’ll keep your mouth shut. End of story.”
She gave him that look; he shut his mouth.
Ferris turned back to her car. “Head back to Layton,” she said. “Soon as I finish with Rodriguez, I’ll call you.”
Billy said, “I wanna take a stab at him.”
Ferris stopped.
Now she was getting perturbed.
“Billy—”
“Look,” he cut it, “put me in a room with him. Let me sweat him. If he’s our only lead, if I’m the one leading the charge, then let me lead the charge. This is what I’m good at. You know that.”
Ferris thought about it.
After a moment, she agreed.
With a slight adjustment in the plan.
4
BILLY REESE WAS in jail.
The Miami-Dade pretrial detention center, to be more precise.
Ferris had arranged through an associate to bring him in on “charges” related to the busted drug deal and threw him in a cell under his undercover moniker, Eddie Price. After locking down a plan, they made it a point to put Billy in a cell next to the guy with the missing teeth, Manuel Rodriguez, who had been screaming every five minutes for someone to get him a dentist and his attorney, his nice clothes now wrinkled and tainted brown with dried blood splatter—his own and Santoro’s.
He was healthy and breathing, so as far as the cops were concerned, he could live with the gaps in his mouth for another day or two.
He shot an FBI agent.
Fuck him.
Ferris brought Billy, a.k.a. “Price,” into the cell about four hours after Mr. Toothless, who froze up the second he saw them hauling the undercover agent into the cellblock as they pushed Billy inside and locked the cell door before leaving.
Billy made it a point not to look at Rodriguez as he popped a squat on the cold and compact metal bench built into the wall near the toilet and bided his time.
The objective was simple: find out what the guy knew.
He just needed to find an angle.
Confidence.
Patience.
Calculation.
Control.
Rodriguez came to the edge of his cage and stared at Billy for a solid minute through the bars before speaking up.
In his native tongue he said, “You knocked out my teeth, gringo.”
Billy closed his eyes and replied in the same language, “You’re lucky I didn’t kill you, asshole.”
“You speak Spanish, eh?” Rodriguez said, more offended than he was impressed.
“Spanish and a dash of French,” Billy replied. “I’m trying to remember the French phrasing for ‘go fuck yourself,’ but I’m coming up short.”
Rodriguez folded his sleeves and leaned against the bars. “You’re in a lot of trouble, cabron. You think us getting locked up is the end of this?”
He pulled away from the bars and began to pace.
Billy waited.
Patience.
A few beats later, he asked, “Where were you trying to take me?”
Rodriguez gave him a look. “The hell with you.”
Billy stared the guy down. “No, the hell with you. You and your partner blew this whole thing sky high. Now I’m in a cage because of it. Like I said before: you’re lucky I don’t kill you.”
“Thought you got away from this, man. You ran off after you knocked me out. Where’d you go? How’d the cops find you?”
Okay, good.
He doesn’t know I’m FBI.
Or does he?
Billy stood up and faced Rodriguez, Rodriguez still against the bars as Billy walked toward him and stood an inch from his face, the missing teeth caked with dried blood now in crystal-clear view.
All Billy had to do was just reach through and choke the guy if he wanted to.
It was that easy.
He said to Rodriguez, “Do me a favor and ask the guard for a Tic-Tac. Your breath smells like ripe road kill.”
Rodriguez smiled, and Billy finally saw that he had knocked out two of the guy’s bottom teeth and one off the top. Billy wasn’t a dentist, so he wasn’t quite sure of exactly which teeth he had knocked out, but he had significantly messed up the guy’s mug, and that was all that mattered, as far as he was concerned.
“He’s going to find you,” Rodriguez taunted.
“Your boss? Hector?”
Rodriguez shook his head.
“Then who?” Billy pressed.
“You’ll find out,” Rodriguez said.
Billy motioned around the cold and gray and windowless jail cell. “Hate to break it to you, bud, but we’re both in police custody now. I don’t think we’re getting out of here for a while. If your ‘boss’ wants to see me, it’s most likely going to be behind glass and through a phone, if you follow what I’m saying.”
Rodriguez turned away, sat down on the bench built into the wall, and looked straight ahead.
He had nothing else to say.
Now Billy was getting agitated.
“Come on,” he said, “spill it, you gapped-toothed bastard. What do you want with me? What does Hector want with me?”
Rodriguez glanced toward the corner of the cellblock at the security camera pointed right in their direction. “People are listening in, man. You should keep your voice down.”
Billy breathed.
We’re just running in circles.
Press the guy!
“How many priors you got?” Billy grilled as he lowered his voice.
Rodriguez said nothing.
“Guess it doesn’t matter,” Billy said. “They like nailing guys like you to the wall. State attorney probably got wind of the situation and made a beeline down here to press major charges against you. White boy like me? They’ll probably cut a deal. I’ll do something like a twostretch for snitching on you. Probably get out on good behavior. You? Well, it really just depends if my partner pulls through or not. He might not make it. If that’s the case—they got you on murder charges along with everything else, bub.”
Rodriguez took a pause. “What are you getting at, white boy?”
“What I’m getting at,” Billy said,
making sure his tone was just above a whisper, “is that maybe we could figure something out. Work together. Dizzy Alvaro was the one that helped put that deal together. We come up with a story and rat on him together, it may buy us some time.”
Rodriguez stood and motioned Billy over with a finger.
Billy obliged and once again came almost nose-to-nose with the toothless thug between the bars.
Rodriguez took a beat.
“Fuck you, dead man.”
He turned his back on Billy and sat back down.
Done.
Billy frowned, and his nostrils flared. It felt like losing a hand at poker. He turned around and looked straight at the security camera with a “get me the hell outta here” look.
All Rodriguez did was showcase his toothless smile.
5
BILLY WAS BACK in Layton.
When he got back to the seaside safe house after being sprung by Ferris, things were quiet for a couple of hours. Ferris didn’t want him making any more contact with their people. He was too exposed as it was.
He was pacing the cold tile floors of the kitchen with the lights off and the cordless receiver to the secure landline of the house pressed against his ear, Ferris on other end of the line, most likely in her office, far away from Billy’s location.
She asked, “Did you get anything from Rodriguez?”
Billy checked the lack of contents in the safe house’s fridge: toast, jam, a few eggs. Not much to work with, but he was used to it. His body had become accustomed to eating when he could, sleeping when it was convenient, and working out with a regiment provided to him by a SEAL buddy that kept him in effective and toned shape. He was in great physical condition—though he was only thirty-one, which helped—and depending on the length of his facial hair, he was able to pass for older—or younger—than he really was. Assisted immensely with the job. Being able to add or subtract a few years from his mug was one of Billy’s more notable traits.
He made his way to the sliding glass door that led out to the beach.
“Rodriguez kept saying that someone was going to find me,” he said to Ferris over the phone. “Other than that, I got nothing.”
