The Highest Stakes

by Rick Reed

  Jack didn’t know if she was lying or if the CIA had made the information go bye-bye. He was getting pissed.

  “Give me a key to that room then,” Jack said.

  She made a sour face and said, “You’re the second one today asking for that guy.”

  “What guy?” Jack asked.

  “Room 322. Cold-looking bastard,” she said, and gave a theatrical shiver. “He rented the room about three weeks ago. Over the telephone, so I never saw him, but I remember when he checked in.”

  “I thought you didn’t usually work the front desk,” Susan asked.

  “I do when they pay what this guy did. I think I might have the registration card.”

  She dug through one pile of the registration cards, pulled one out, and handed it to Jack.

  * * *

  “Joe Casper’s the name he gave,” the clerk said and snorted. “Like in Casper the Friendly Ghost. Get it?” she asked.

  “Tell me about him,” Jack said. “Is he still here?” Jack took Quinn’s picture from his jacket and handed it to her.

  “That’s the same picture the other guy showed me. Yeah, that’s Joe Casper. Least that’s what he put on the card.”

  “What other guy?” Jack asked.

  “Some guy come in here before you. He took my key card and went up to that room, but he didn’t come down with nothing,” she said.

  “What did this other gentleman look like?” Jack asked.

  She dug down in her bra and scratched, then glanced up to see if Jack was watching. He pushed the picture in front of her again. “Now would be a good time.”

  Two minutes later, he and Susan were outside room 322 with the clerk’s key card in hand. Jack held his Glock by his leg and Susan had her hand in her purse as he slipped the card in the lock and heard it click. He pushed the door open.

  The room was pristine. “I guess the tattooed lady forgot that the room was cleaned,” he said. He was more interested in the room now that he had found out Allen Thompson was interested enough to come here. Thompson had found nothing or took whatever there was to find.

  They stood in the room, and it was like any other hotel room, only seedier. They went back to the desk. Ellert had made several calls from the pay phone to this hotel. Who was he expecting to be here?

  “We know someone called here today asking for that room. A man was asking for someone in that room,” Jack said.

  She scratched some more. “Yeah. I forgot. I got a couple calls a few hours ago. It was a man. I switched his calls to the room.”

  “Who did the man ask for?” Jack asked.

  “He didn’t ask for anyone,” she said as if that should be obvious. “He just asked for room 322.”

  “Was Casper here then?” Jack asked.

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Do you know or don’t you?” Jack asked. He was tired of pulling information out of her.

  “Casper wasn’t here because the other guy in a suit came in ten minutes or so before I got the phone calls from whoever.”

  Allen Thompson was right here when we were on the boat. “Describe the man again. The one that showed you the picture and searched the room,” Jack asked.

  “He seemed real wore out. Young, big, expensive looking suit, but it looked dirty, and he smelled bad. You know. Like . . .” She mimicked vomiting.

  Tired and smelly because I kicked his ass. “Did he show you any ID?” Jack asked and fought the urge to choke her.

  “Mister, he didn’t have to. He had a piece on his hip just like you.”

  “That’s Thompson,” Jack said to Susan. “Let’s go.”

  “Wait,” the clerk said. She handed Jack a business card and smiled. “I’m off weekends.”

  * * *

  Jack drove, and they were making good time down Vietnam Veterans Parkway. Jack was deep in thought when Susan’s cell phone rang again. She glanced at the screen and handed the phone to Jack, saying, “Liddell.”

  Jack answered and could hear loud traffic noise in the background at the other end. “Liddell?”

  “You’ve got to get out of town, pod’na,” Liddell shouted into the phone. “The CIA has everyone convinced that you killed Khaled.”

  Liddell was shouting so loud that Susan could hear him. “No one will believe that,” she said to Jack.

  “Jack, I can meet you.”

  “Not possible,” Jack said. “Don’t tell me where you are, Bigfoot. Just get off the phone and don’t call again. You hear me?”

  “Jack. There’s a warrant out for your arrest. Captain Franklin gave orders that you are to be detained by any means necessary. Do you understand? They have you as ‘armed and extremely dangerous.’”

  “Well, they got that much right. Now be a good Bigfoot and go away for a while. I got this. Thanks, partner.” Jack punched the end button and handed the phone to Susan and said, “Turn it all the way off.”

  She did so and said, “The whole police force is looking for you. And me. What can you do against all that, Jack? Maybe Liddell’s right. Maybe you should run.”

  Jack felt the knot on the back of his head and the anger built inside him. He turned a sharp right down Sycamore Street. Police headquarters was only ten blocks away.

  Susan said, “You can’t be serious. You can’t turn yourself in. The CIA—”

  “Hell with the CIA,” Jack said and gripped the steering wheel tighter. “I’m not turning myself in. The CIA wants to find me, so I’m going to let them.”

  “Your plan is to turn yourself in to the CIA? And that’s not crazy?”

  “No. It’s not crazy. It’s a plan,” he said. “I didn’t say who I was turning myself over to.”

  “You can’t go to the CIA, or the FBI, or your people. Your partner said everyone is after you.”

  “I’m going to the ATF. They have less reason to want me out of the picture, and they’re considered rebels by the system. They don’t always do things by the book, God bless them. I have a friend there who will help,” he said. “Not that you aren’t my friend.” Jack patted her arm. “By the way, have I told you how much I appreciate everything you’ve done for me? Are still doing. I never would have gotten this far if not for you.”

  “Now you’re scaring me,” she said. “You’re going to do something reckless, aren’t you?”

  “What? I can’t say something nice? What is it with you?”

  “Just promise me that you are going to be okay,” Susan said. “Katie would hate me if I let you get hurt.”

  He was surprised that she mentioned Katie because he was just thinking about her. “I’m going to be okay. I promise,” he said. Then he had to ask, “You said Katie would hate you. I hate to ask, but have you and she renewed your friendship?”

  “We never stopped being friends. And yes, we’ve talked quite a few times. Women are like that.”

  “I’ll have to check my woman manual. I guess I missed that part.”

  “Well, if it makes you feel more like not getting killed, she still loves you. She thinks you’re impossible, but she still loves you.”

  Jack didn’t know if Susan was saying that because it was true, or because she was worried about what lay ahead. It did matter to him if Katie loved him. But Katie would know he would do his job. She wouldn’t like it, but she’d expect it.

  “Thanks for sticking with me,” he said and took her hand. “You’re my kind of woman.” He grinned. “You have money and you carry a gun.”

  Susan forced a nervous smile. “Very funny. I am, how you infidels say, pretty when angry. Wuh huh.”

  “John Khaled Wayne,” Jack said. “That’s a pretty good impression. You’re all right for a tiny infidel woman.”

  “No problemo,” she said.

  Chapter Thirty-five

  The Winfield K. Denton Federal Building was a massive structure built in the early 1950s. The main branch of the U.S. Postal Service was added on to the federal building a few years later, and together they occupied four city blocks.


  The building housed the federal courts along with all of the other federal government offices, just as the Civic Center housed all of the local and county government offices. In fact, the buildings were across the street from each other in what could be considered the heart of Evansville.

  He’d been inside the federal building many times, but the sight of it was ominous now as he turned onto Sycamore Street. He pulled into the employee lot of the post office, and it started to rain. The rag top on Payne’s MG leaked through rips and tears in the fabric. He drove across the lot to the back area of the federal building. He could barely see the parking spots through the deluge. With the wipers on high speed, visibility was cut to those micro-seconds between swipes. Out a side window he could see police and sheriffs’ vehicles parked along Sycamore. It was shift change. Everything would be moving soon. He was in the lions’ den.

  The federal building’s windows were mostly dark. It was way past quitting time.

  “Now what?” Susan asked.

  Jack knew that if they’d gotten there a half hour later they would be sitting in the middle of a beehive of policemen heading to roll call or going home. For now they were safe.

  Jack had pulled the battery and chip from Susan’s cell phone after phoning Pons. He now put it back together for one short call and then he would disable it again. He hoped it wouldn’t be on long enough for a signal trace. He dialed a number. ATF Special Agent Greg Pons answered on the first ring.

  “I’m outside.” Jack didn’t identify himself.

  “Go to the door and come on up,” Pons said, and the line went dead.

  Jack tore the phone apart, opened the car door, and said, “You can take the car back to Payne now.”

  “No way,” she said. She opened her door.

  They both stepped out into the pouring rain and rushed to the loading dock of the post office. They were drenched when they reached the steel entry door marked PRIVATE. The locking mechanism clicked, and they entered a hallway where a freight elevator could be seen to their left. The doors to the freight elevator opened and they stepped on.

  “There are no buttons. Just key slots,” Susan said.

  The doors closed. By itself the elevator rose and stopped at the third floor. Jack took Susan by the arm and led her to the end of another long hallway and turned left, went down a shorter hallway to the end, and came to a heavy oak door with the ornate brass emblem of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. The door lock clicked. Jack ushered Susan inside.

  “I hope this is worth my not arresting you,” came a voice from the darkness. Greg Pons stood in the doorway of what looked like a break room.

  “This is Susan Summers,” Jack said.

  “Hi, Susan,” Pons said, and offered her a handful of paper towels to dry her hair. Jack noticed Pons hadn’t offered him anything to dry off with.

  “Ladies’ room?” she asked.

  “Out the door, down the hall on your right. Knock and I’ll let you back in,” Pons said.

  When Pons heard the outer door shut he pulled up a chair and sat. Jack sat opposite him. They had only known each other for a couple of days, so Jack didn’t have any credit built up in the “trust me” department. Pons looked angry.

  “Your department wants you on a murder charge. They’re saying you shot Killian. Now you’re here.”

  “Greg—Agent Pons—you know it’s all bullshit.”

  “Tell me why I’m not arresting you,” he said.

  Jack judged Pons to be an honest man. The consideration he’d shown for Killian’s wife said volumes for his character. Most street cops considered all Feds a bunch of paper pushers who were eager to grab the glory and headlines. Himself included. By the same token, most federal agents considered the local cops to be lazy and incompetent. In too many cases, both sides were right.

  Jack started at the beginning.

  “When Killian was shot, I went to the parole office—that’s where Susan works—to see where a convict, deceased now, had obtained a .40 caliber handgun. Susan told me about Khaled Abutaqa.”

  Pons was nodding. “I knew of Khaled. He’s the guy you allegedly killed and burned his van.”

  Jack told Pons how he had used Susan’s authority to lean on Khaled Abutaqa and about Coin’s information that Killian might have been checking out an arms deal that involved at least two city policemen. He told of the return trip to Khaled’s house, what he found there, and about the subsequent fire and the car speeding away. Pons listened as Jack told how the two phony FBI men had gotten into the mix, how they had changed their story and were really CIA. He told Pons about Quinn, and about Crenshaw outside Killian’s room, his tussle in the parking lot with Thompson, and his discovery of who the two cops were.

  “Susan and I followed Moon Pie, from his house to the Blue Star, where I saw him talking to the Chief of Security, James Ellert. Ellert was angry and wanted Moon Pie to get away from him. Then Ellert went to a pay phone and called a number several times in a short period. I dialed the number back and it was the Sugar Creek Inn in Henderson.”

  He told about getting financial information on Moon Pie, Shirl, and James Ellert, and their finding Shirl’s ex-wife at a conference at the hotel.

  “Shirl’s ex, Kathy Malbon, saw Shirl and Moon Pie meet another man and enter a room at the hotel. The third man she described sounded like James Ellert. I showed her the photo I have of Quinn,” Jack paused and took the soggy photo from his pocket and handed it to Pons. “She thought this man was hanging around the lobby around the same time that she saw Shirl there. We checked Ellert’s finances and found out that, suddenly, all three of these guys are doing strange things with their money. Moon Pie is spending like crazy, Shirl is making risky investments, and Ellert sold his house and a boat and is in financial trouble.”

  Pons said, “Let me get this straight. You assaulted this Khaled guy, then went back and broke into his house and dug a bullet out of his wall, found a burned computer and a partially burned photo?”

  “I didn’t really assault him,” Jack said. “We just had strong words.” It wasn’t a complete lie.

  “And then Khaled turns up dead?”

  “I was at the Two Jakes or with Susan most of the day after I left Khaled’s. I could provide an alibi if I had to.”

  “Okay. You threatened a FBI or CIA agent in front of your captain. You assaulted that same agent at the hospital after you fled from a female FBI agent. You and Susan Summers drop off the globe, you find out you’re wanted by your own department for murder, and you called me. Is that about it?”

  “Greg, I—”

  Pons gave Jack a hard look. “You have to see how serious their case is against you, Jack.”

  Hearing this version of events gave Jack reason to pause. The CIA guys had trumped up a convincing case against him.

  “I’m innocent, Greg. If I wasn’t, why would I come here?”

  Pons picked up a pad of paper and a pen from his desk and said, “I believe you.”

  Jack breathed a sigh of relief.

  “Tell me again about White and Thompson.”

  When Jack again got to the part outside the hospital, Pons laughed. “So that’s an Irish wedgie?”

  Susan knocked, and Pons buzzed the door. She came back into the room. “What did I miss?”

  “Nothing you don’t already know,” Jack said.

  “What do you want from me, Jack?” Pons asked.

  Chapter Thirty-six

  Ellert had to admire Mr. Smith. The smudge pot was a nice touch. The tear gas would make it almost impossible to see, much less breathe. Smith had given him a gas mask, but had told him not to tell the others about the tear gas. Maybe Smith had a plan. Maybe he was going to cut those prick cops out of the deal. Smith seemed to have thought of everything. Ellert just hoped people didn’t panic so bad that they jumped overboard. He didn’t want anyone to die; he just wanted to get even with his ex-wife and that bastard, Ken Taylor. And it wouldn’t hurt to be a mill
ionaire.

  As head of security he could waltz past every metal detector and hide the guns and masks in the restrooms. The smudge pot was a different story. He couldn’t carry something that big past security, but Smith had a brilliant idea. He instructed Ellert to hide the smudge pot in the landscaping near the port railing of the boat. Smith said there was going to be a big commotion near the pavilion doors at the other end of the boat at ten thirty p.m. When Ellert heard all hell break loose, that was his cue to slip off the deck and bring the gas onboard. The smudge pot was the size of a five-gallon bucket so he didn’t think he would have any trouble carrying it.

  He held two boxes from Donut Bank in his sweaty hands as he approached the turnstiles.

  “What’cha bringing us tonight, Major?” said the young guard named Clete. He eyed the boxes.

  “Hope you got some tiger tails in there, Major,” an older guard piped in. “Those are my favorites.”

  “Something better, Fred,” Ellert said with a wink. “You’ll be surprised.”

  “Make sure those hogs in the break room don’t eat it all, sir,” Clete chimed in.

  Ellert glanced at his watch. “I’ll try,” he said, and walked past the only security point to the casino. The metal detector beeped but the guards waved him through. He proceeded up the boarding ramp carrying the boxes containing the Halloween masks, plastic explosives, detonators, and silenced pistols. He had thought up this part of the plan himself. Mr. Smith was impressed with his creativity.

  * * *

  The man Smith/Quinn hired sat on the green metal bench outside the doors of the casino pavilion entrance and fingered a wad of new twenty-dollar bills. His shirt was denim, of the kind issued in prison, and hadn’t seen a good washing for months. His current residence was a place aptly called the Rescue Mission. It was a squat, one-story building that housed indigents, homeless, and recent parolees. He was tired of bad food. Tired of institutional clothes. Tired of being broke and homeless.

  Tomorrow he would stay in a nice motel and treat himself to a nice sit-down meal in a classy restaurant. Maybe he’d go to the Riverhouse Hotel downtown where he could get both. The waiters there wore short-waisted white jackets and served food on huge platters. Prime rib. Roasted potatoes, maybe expensive wine. He fingered the wad of bills again. Hell! He’d order a bottle of champagne.