Exit Strategy

by Steve Hamilton

  • • •

  A FEW HOURS after leaving the marshal’s car in the long-term parking lot at LaGuardia, Mason walked through O’Hare, the first time he’d ever come home from an assignment without blood on his hands. It should have felt like a relief to him. But, instead, it felt like failure.

  And something else. Like he was a different man walking off that plane. A man who would have done the unthinkable if he had been given the chance.

  The fact that he hadn’t gotten that chance didn’t play well with Quintero when he called him from New York, but Mason he’d made it clear: you can’t kill a man who’s not there to kill.

  Now as he made his way down the long terminal hallway, in the midst of the other travelers with regular lives, Mason tried calling Eddie, but the calls kept going through to voicemail.

  You always answer your phone, Mason thought. Where the fuck are you?

  Mason hung up, kept walking until he came to the security checkpoint. A half dozen valet drivers stood in a line, holding names on placards. At the end of the line stood Detective Frank Sandoval. He wasn’t holding a name, but Mason knew exactly who he was waiting for.

  • • •

  MASON AND SANDOVAL sat across a small table from each other at the airport bar. Neither man was drinking.

  “If you’re trying to call your friend Eddie,” Sandoval said, “I arrested him about two hours ago on suspicion of first-degree murder.”

  It hit Mason like a bucket of ice water. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

  “Victim owned a neighborhood bar down in Beverly. Eddie was the last man to leave, and when I went inside, I found the man dead in his kitchen.”

  Mason sat there looking at him with no idea what to say next.

  “Name was Eamon Burke. His cousin is Sean Burke, who just escaped from his Protective Custody Unit in New York about five hours ago. But you knew that already.”

  “Eddie’s got nothing to do with this.”

  “That’s what his wife said. Gonna be tough on her and their kids. The charges, the trial … But I can tie Eddie to you and you to Cole.”

  Mason glared at him. “Why are you doing this, you son of a bitch?”

  “Help me and I’ll make sure your friend goes home tonight.”

  “How?”

  “Come in with me, give me sworn statements on everything you’ve done for Cole.”

  “Why don’t you do your fucking job and go get Cole yourself? Whoever killed your vic, it wasn’t Eddie.”

  Sandoval leaned forward in his chair, shaking his head.

  “I don’t care,” he said. “Cole’s going to walk because you killed two of the key witnesses, and the third witness just escaped and slaughtered six guards. Why do you think he chose today to break out, anyway? He knows about the other two witnesses, knows he’s next on the list, and that you’re coming after him. Rather than wait, he’s coming after you. My guess is that Cole’s pretty nervous, too, which explains the hit on Burke’s cousin.”

  “Why are you telling me this?”

  “Because this is coming to your door and I’m the only way out,” Sandoval said. “You don’t even have Eddie anymore.”

  Mason shook his head, still working hard to keep a grip on himself.

  “This guy will destroy everything in your life,” Sandoval said. “He’ll move when you move, go where you go. Maybe your ex-wife’s house. Or your daughter’s next soccer game.”

  Mason clenched his fists at the thought, and in his mind saw Adriana standing on the other side of that fence in the playground, remembered how he thought that anyone could get to her there.

  Anyone.

  “Even that woman you live with now,” Sandoval went on. “Everyone’s in play. And you’re the one who brought him here.”

  Mason let that one go.

  “If we take Burke alive,” Sandoval said, “we might be able to turn him. That’s why he was in that place to begin with.”

  “He’s just killed six guards. You’re going to make a deal with him?”

  “Sammy the Bull killed nineteen people and the Feds granted him full immunity. That’s how much they wanted John Gotti. And that’s how much I want Cole. Personally, I think you’d make a better witness. But I can’t help you if you won’t let me.”

  Mason took a long breath, picturing the dead guards he’d seen in the bunker, the long line of them on the floor, the bodies torn up by an assault rifle, throats slashed with the sharpened edge of a metal tray.

  That’s the man who was on his way to Chicago.

  “Full immunity in exchange for your testimony in court,” Sandoval said. “Full protection for your family—”

  “WITSEC?”

  “We’ve got our own program in Illinois. Not federal. I’ll check up on your family every day, make sure they’re safe. I don’t have anything else in my life except this job, Mason. If part of that job is protecting your ex-wife and your daughter …”

  Sandoval left it hanging in the air. Another thing for Mason to think about, a real chance for Gina and Adriana to be safe.

  I can’t protect them, he thought, if I’m dead.

  Sandoval took out a business card from his breast pocket and put it on the table.

  “You’re running out of time,” Sandoval said as he got up to leave. “If Burke’s on the road, he’ll be here in seven hours.”

  17

  Rachel Greenwood was driven across town, with a U.S. marshal sitting on either side of her, to do something that could technically get her disbarred. But today, she had no choice. She had one last chance to stop the man who was about to torpedo United States vs. Darius Cole.

  She found the office on the second story of the anonymous-looking office building on Roosevelt, just down the street from the FBI building. The lettering on the door read Stanley Horton, Private Security. The receptionist asked her to sit down and wait for him, said it wouldn’t be more than a moment. Thirty minutes passed.

  When he finally came out to the waiting room, Greenwood saw little of the man who had approached her in that restaurant thirteen years ago. His hair was gone, including the Burt Reynolds mustache, and his jacket was filled out with at least seventy more pounds. The only thing he had left was his height and that same condescending half smile she still wanted to slap off his face.

  “AUSA Greenwood,” the retired agent said. “This is a surprise.”

  “So is this,” Greenwood said, holding up his deposition.

  She’d received it an hour ago, the supporting deposition that was hand-delivered to the court by Jay Starr, along with an official motion to vacate all federal charges against Darius Cole.

  At last, Cole’s whole legal plan had become clear:

  Retroactive jury tampering to win the retrial.

  Then the murder of every key witness.

  And now this.

  “What kind of bullshit is this?” she asked, waving the deposition. “McLaren and Wallace were both informants?”

  In the deposition, Horton had made the stunning claim that back in 2004 the FBI had already been conducting its own investigation of Darius Cole, long before Greenwood and the DEA became involved. And then an even more incredible statement: Ken McLaren and Isaiah Wallace had both been working not just as FBI informants but as TE informants—TE for Top Echelon—meaning that their identities were protected under the strictest of FBI protocols. Only the FBI agent directly in charge of the investigation, Stan Horton, and his immediate supervisor, Jonathan Lancer, were ever aware of McLaren’s and Wallace’s involvement in the case.

  “You waited all this time,” Greenwood said, “to bring this up now?”

  “Lancer was afraid the original case would fall apart. He sat on it, even though he knew it was wrong. Now that he’s dead, I had to come forward. It’s my last chance to tell the truth.”

  She looked at him with raw amazement. “Do you even remember that oath you took? The part about ‘bearing true faith’?”

  Horton straightened h
is tie. “I think you should leave, Counselor.”

  “You know what this does to the retrial,” she said. “This is the Scarpa Defense all over again.”

  Named after Greg Scarpa, the “Grim Reaper” of the old Colombo family, an FBI informant who had a thirty-year relationship with a single agent—a relationship that destroyed fifteen otherwise airtight cases against other members of the family. Hundreds of years of prison time down the toilet all because of the simple principle that in the eyes of the law an informant working for the government effectively becomes an agent of the government himself and anything he does must follow the same rules of evidence.

  In other words, if your informant keeps committing criminal acts—like transferring money overseas to avoid taxation or coordinating the delivery of illegal narcotics—even after he signs the cooperating witness agreement, every piece of information that informant collects for you is worthless.

  A mountain of evidence suddenly turns into a pile of shit.

  It had all happened before Greenwood even went to law school, but the “Scarpa Defense” had been sending chills down the spines of U.S. Attorneys ever since, and now this one retired agent was about to use it to blow up the retrial.

  “You tried to run me off Cole thirteen years ago,” she said. “So just tell me one thing: how long have you been on Cole’s payroll?”

  Finally, that condescending little half smile left his face.

  “Good luck in court,” he said.

  “I can help you,” she said. “What does he have on you?”

  He shook his head and didn’t say another word. Then he turned and walked away from her.

  “Horton,” she said, going to the door just as he opened it. “I’m throwing you a lifeline. Grab it before you sink so deep you can never come back up.”

  “You’re too late,” Horton said. He pulled the door closed and was gone. Greenwood stayed there for a full minute, composing herself. On her way out the door, she turned the ringer back on her phone, saw that she had gotten a call from Marshal Harper.

  She called him as she walked back to the two marshals waiting for her by her car. “We need Burke,” she said to him. “He’s our last chance.”

  She listened carefully to what Harper told her. When the call was over and she was sitting behind the wheel, the sickening truth washed over her.

  Darius Cole is going to walk.

  • • •

  IT WAS AFTER DARK when Mason got back to the town house after a long cab ride across the city, him staring out at the streets and thinking about everything Sandoval had said to him.

  When he was inside, he went to his room and slid out the gun case from beneath his bed. He took out the Browning Black Label 1911 Eddie had given him, loaded it with .45 ACP shells, and stuck it in his belt.

  Mason went back out to the refrigerator and pulled out a cold Goose Island, slid open the door to the terrace, and went outside. The pool was lit up a bright aquamarine, vapor hanging in the cool night air above the warm water. Mason went to the railing and looked out at the lights of the city to the south and at the dark horizon of Lake Michigan to the east. Above him, the red lights of the two surveillance cameras blinked.

  He looked down at the street, feeling the weight of the weapon tucked into his belt. It’s twelve hours from New York to Chicago, once he finds a vehicle.

  Sandoval was right. He’ll be here soon.

  Mason ducked out of the wind and sat down on one of the chairs. A few minutes later, the door slid open and Diana came outside. She was in her dark suit, finishing her own version of a long day at work. She went to the rail and looked out at the lake as Mason had done, shivering in the cold.

  Mason broke the silence. “I need to ask you something.”

  “What is it?”

  “Do you know a man named Sean Burke?”

  As she turned to him, even in the dim glow of the pool’s light he could see the sudden panic, first in her eyes, then in her whole body. “Where did you hear that name?” Her voice was brittle.

  He didn’t answer her.

  “He used to work for Darius,” she said, “then he disappeared. Why?”

  “He’s coming back.”

  She went completely still. The panic he’d seen in her turned into something else, something more like a sudden, galvanized resolve, as she turned and headed back inside.

  Mason followed her. She was already at her bedroom door by the time he caught up with her.

  “Diana, wait!”

  “No,” she said, reaching for the handle. “I’m leaving.”

  “We have to stay together,” he said as he took her by the wrist. “It’s the only way you’ll be safe.”

  “I was safe before you got here, Nick. I’m not safe anymore.”

  Their faces were close enough that he could feel the warmth of her breath against his cheek. He felt her heart pounding.

  “I’m working on a way out,” Mason said. “For us.”

  “Us? I don’t need your help, Nick. Or your protection. I don’t need anything from you.”

  She yanked her wrist free and swung open the door. She took a step into her bedroom. Mason grabbed her by both arms and spun her around to face him again.

  “You’re hurting me,” she said.

  He let go of her, but he didn’t leave. It was the first time he’d ever seen her bedroom. A four-poster bed, a vanity, a chair with a reading lamp. Everything elegant and functional. Beautiful in its own unassuming way.

  Just like her.

  “I’m scared, Nick.”

  “I know …” Mason hesitated before saying what he said next because it was something he didn’t want to admit even to himself. “So am I.”

  “I have to leave this place. I can’t take it. Not another minute.”

  He looked at her one more time and said, “Let’s go.”

  • • •

  MASON OPENED THE DOOR to the apartment. It was only the second time he’d been here. Diana stepped past him into the emptiness, looked around at the bare walls and then out the window at the lights and the nighttime traffic streaming by twelve stories below.

  “What is this place?” she said.

  “A place to get away. From everything.”

  When she turned to face him, Mason could see that she was shaking.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “You’re going to kill me,” she said, “that’s why you brought me here. You have a gun in your belt. You’ve never carried a gun before.”

  “I’ve never had Sean Burke coming to kill me before.”

  He took a step closer to her, looked her in the eye.

  “I would never hurt you,” he said. “I would kill anyone who tried.”

  He whispered in her ear: “We both know what I do. But I still know what I wouldn’t do. If he ever told me to kill you … I would kill everyone else I had to instead. Including myself. I swear to you.”

  She stopped trembling and leaned into him. He could feel the tension leaving her body. For just one moment until she tried to push away from him. He kept holding her, looking in her eyes. There was just enough light coming from the city outside to see the tears coming down her cheeks.

  “I don’t want him to touch me,” she said, her voice barely loud enough to hear.

  “I won’t let that happen.”

  “What are you going to do, Nick? You can’t stop him.”

  It was an idea that had first come to Mason when he was running down that hallway after killing McLaren, had taken form when he was working his way through those woods with a whole platoon of Army Rangers hunting him down. Had been brought to undeniable life when he walked through that bunker and saw a half dozen dead men and realized that the blood on the floor should by all rights have been his own.

  The idea was direct, and simple, and as clear in his mind as the bell at St. Gabriel’s:

  As soon as Darius Cole walks out of prison.

  Within twenty-four hours.

  Even if it means go
ing back to prison myself …

  “I’m going to kill him,” Mason said.

  From the look on Diana’s face, she seemed to be running through a dozen different emotions in quick succession: shock, then horror, then a desperate single moment of hope that died and turned right back to horror. She shook her head, tried to step away from him.

  But they had come too far together, were already too close, to be pulled apart. There was no turning back now, and as Mason drew her body against his, she didn’t resist. His mouth was close enough for him to breathe in her breath, his chest against hers and their hearts beating in counterpoint. She put one hand flat against his chest, not to push him away but to push him down to the floor. He put his hands on her shoulders and brought her down with him.

  They finally kissed each other, cautiously at first, then with more and more passion, until they were tearing off each other’s clothes. Diana dug her fingernails into his back as they came together. All of the fear and the tension melted away as they willed each other to feel something else, something real and immediate and good, at least for these few moments in the dying light.

  Afterward, Diana felt along the lines of the bandages on Mason’s shoulder and neck. Mason looked up at the ceiling and didn’t break the silence, didn’t disturb this moment of stillness he never thought he’d experience that day.

  “There has to be another way,” Diana said. “What if you …” She pulled herself up onto her side so she could look at his face. “What if you can’t do it? What will happen to you? And to me?”

  “I won’t fail.”

  “Let me help you,” she said.

  “No. I have to do this.”

  She lay back down with her head on his shoulder while the city of Chicago, beautiful and terrible all at once, waited for them outside the twelfth-story window. He knew they could only stay hidden away for a few more hours.

  Nobody can help me.

  The words kept ringing in his mind. Over and over again, the words collided and then finally connected to something else. Until suddenly, for the first time since he walked out of that prison, Nick Mason could see the one way to set himself free.

  Nobody can help me.

  Except one man.

  Sean Burke.

  18

  There aren’t many men who can change the life of a whole city.