by Robert Greer
Julie fixed a penetrating stare on Else and then on Cavalaris. It was a go-for-the-jugular cross-examination stare that caused Flora Jean, aware that Julie’s mission to simply come get Damion had been derailed, to mouth, “Oh, shit.”
“In or out,” Else demanded. “If you’re here to get someone’s bond made, I suggest you come back later.”
Julie’s jaw muscles twitched in anger as she stepped into the conference room. Surprised by the move, Else said, “Your call,” motioning for Julie to move farther into the room. Turning to face Cavalaris, he said, “The man to my left is Lieutenant Gus Cavalaris of one of your Denver Police Department’s homicide units. I’m Agent Ron Else of the FBI.” Else flashed his FBI shield again for effect. “Some of you already know Lieutenant Cavalaris—Floyd, Benson, Satoni.” The hint of a smile formed at the corner of Else’s mouth. He’d done his homework, and in the process he’d dredged up not only a driver’s license and old military ID photographs of Flora Jean and CJ but a forty-year-old FBI file photo of a much-younger-looking Mario.
He’d gotten word a half hour earlier from the two-man stakeout team that he’d sicced on Mario that they’d followed Satoni from his house to a bail-bonding office on Denver’s Bail Bondsman’s Row. Else had decided to pounce, realizing that if he played his cards right, he’d have a chance to confront not only Satoni but also the black man who’d put such a scare into the Watsons. His voice boomed as Else said, “Lieutenant Cavalaris is here to help me ask a few questions.” Pausing to take a breath, he said, “Now that you all know who the lieutenant is and who I am, why don’t those of you I don’t know respond in kind? Young man over there in the corner, your name, please.”
“Damion Ma—”
“His name is Damion Madrid,” Julie said authoritatively. “And I’m Julie Madrid. His mother.”
“I see,” Else said dismissively, turning his attention to Pinkie Niedemeyer, the other person in the room whose face he couldn’t put a name to. “And you are?”
“Andrus Niedemeyer.”
A fleeting look of recognition flashed across Cavalaris’s face. He was about to ask Pinkie if they’d ever met when the steamrolling Else said, “Fine. Now that everyone’s accounted for, here’s our game plan.”
“No, here’s the game plan, Agent Else,” Julie said, spitting Else’s words back at him. “First, you’re going to stop barking orders. Then you’re going to explain to me in great detail exactly why you’re here. And finally, if you don’t have one hell of a good reason for being here—a warrant, a writ, a court order, or some other handy-dandy document that our courts recognize as reasonable cause for charging onto these premises and engaging any one of my clients in conversation, and a birth-certificate valid reason for detaining them—I am going to ask you and Lieutenant Cavalaris to leave.”
Else eyed Julie in disbelief.
Julie reached into her purse, took out her wallet, extracted one of her business cards, and handed it to the suddenly crestfallen agent. “And for the record, Agent Else, I much prefer the term ‘Counselor’ to ‘Miss.’” She flashed Damion, who could hardly believe his ears, a quick wink. “So, gentlemen, before you interrogate any of my clients, I’ll expect you to dot a few I’s and cross a few T’s for me. In case you’ve forgotten, we all tend to have to do those kinds of things when it comes to carrying out the intent of our laws.”
Kicking himself for forgetting bureau protocol and his manners—Else slipped his wallet out of his back pocket, extracted a business card from it, and handed it to Julie. “Certainly, Counselor.”
Scrutinizing the card, Julie said in a voice filled with sweetness, sarcasm, and theatrical courtroom charm, “So, Agent Else, you’re a long way from home. Tell me, how can my clients be of help to you?”
“You don’t expect me to believe that your son is a client, do you, Counselor?”
Julie smiled. “He is until he says he isn’t, Agent Else.”
“Okay. In order to save time, we’ll go there for the moment.” Addressing Julie but looking point-blank at Mario, he said, “Lieutenant Cavalaris has had a couple of recent homicides served up onto his plate. Turns out those murders are linked to a very old investigation of mine.”
“The Kennedy assassination?” Julie asked matter-of-factly, catching Else off guard.
“Yes,” said Else, trying to guess just how much the petite, curvaceous, feisty green-eyed attorney who’d caught him with his shorts hovering around his knees knew about his career association with the Kennedy killing, and whether she might in fact be a mob-connected attorney. The fact that he’d been getting noise from contacts and informants on the East, West, and Gulf Coasts the entire time he’d been in Colorado told him that people in very high places were suddenly nervous about the possibility of someone uncovering some dirty little assassination secret. It was possible that Ms. Madrid was part of a modern-day crime leadership organization that was far less sexist than the old.
Stroking his chin thoughtfully and trying his best to think three steps ahead of Julie, Else said, “I really only need to have one conversation, and that’s with Mr. Satoni.”
“Okay with you, Mario?” Julie asked, looking Mario squarely in the eye.
“I’ve got nothin’ to hide,” Mario said, looking at Damion, well aware of why Julie had so aggressively come to his rescue.
“Then by all means let’s talk, Mr. Else,” said Julie.
“I’d prefer to move the discussion to somewhere more private,” Else said, hoping to stake out a logistical advantage.
Mario eyed Julie for direction.
“Fine with us.” She gave Mario a thumbs-up sign. “Are my other clients free to go?”
Pleased that he’d closed the deal, Else, who’d landed the fish he wanted—the man most likely in his eyes to have insight into the Ducane and McPherson murders—glanced at Cavalaris, who nodded his okay. Looking back at Julie, Else said, “They are for now.” He knew he could always come back and put pressure on Floyd and Benson. All in all, he told himself, things had worked out to his advantage. “Ready to leave whenever you are, Counselor. My car’s parked out front.”
“Fine.” Julie walked over to Mario, hoping to usher him out the front door before Cavalaris, who kept eyeing Pinkie, scored a recognition hit that would, at least temporarily, have her representing a hit man. Clamping Mario’s right hand in hers, she asked, “Ready to go?”
Mario simply nodded.
As they moved to leave, she cast a parting glance Damion’s way. Noting his bloody clothes, while at the same time maintaining her seasoned lawyer’s cool, she asked, “You okay?”
“Sure.”
“Stay here with CJ until I get back,” Julie said. Leading Mario by the hand and thinking about everything that had happened in the past fourteen hours, she followed Cavalaris and Else toward the front door, recognizing as she descended CJ’s front steps that, of all things, she now found herself representing the kind of man who had caused her father’s death.
The clerk manning the FedEx service counter inside the dimly lit front lobby of an old cinderblock building in an aging Boulder, Colorado, industrial park eyed Willette Ducane with the frustrated look he generally reserved for the Christmas rush season. The only reason he hadn’t handed off the tired-looking old woman to his supervisor and called it a day was the fact that during the month of August, FedEx employees nationwide were being evaluated on how well they handled customer service issues, and calling in his supervisor to arbitrate a problem like the one he was facing would likely cost him valuable customer-satisfaction bonus points and a possible year-end raise. Cocking an eyebrow and tapping the business end of a ballpoint pen on the countertop, the man said, “I’ve told you, ma’am. I can’t give you that information.”
Exasperated, Willette said, “But the package was mailed from here in Boulder. The tracking number proves it.” She drummed three fingers across the address label affixed to the envelope she’d received with the Denver Post article about Antoine.
“I know that, ma’am,” the clerk said, struggling to control his temper. “But it’s the age of identity theft. I can’t give you the information you’re asking for. I’ve told you, the information’s confidential.”
Gritting her teeth, Willette shifted her weight onto the cane in her right hand. Thirty years earlier she never would have taken such guff off a woolly-headed, earring-wearing clerk, and if she were back home in Louisiana, even now, she might’ve grabbed the man by his collar, pulled him face to face with her, and demanded the information she was after. But she was in Colorado, not Louisiana. After two bumpy, exhausting flights from hell—flights on which she’d been served only flat-tasting soda and rock-hard pretzels—and a nerve-racking drive from Denver International Airport to Boulder, her arthritic knees were screaming bloody murder. Recognizing that she was too rest-broken to come to blows with some Neanderthal, she asked sharply, “What time do you close?”
“7 p.m.”
“Ummm.” Eyeing the clerk as if she expected him to make a run for it, she checked her watch. She’d booked a room at a motel just off the Boulder Turnpike, a room that the clerk had earlier told her was less than five minutes away. After a couple of hours’ rest, she’d have enough energy to come back and go another round with this clerk or a different one, but it might be less aggravating to simply speak right then with his supervisor. She was on the verge of asking the clerk to get his manager when a burly, freckled-faced FedEx driver with a receding hairline and a rosy-cheeked, cherubic face strolled into the room carrying a couple of boxes under his arm. Looking up at the clerk, he said, “How’s it going, Marty?”
When the clerk didn’t answer, the man walked over to the counter, placed one of his packages on a scale, and checked the weight of the package on the scale’s digital readout.
Willette glanced briefly at the man before again fixing her gaze on the clerk. “Can you get your supervisor for me?” she said finally.
Surprised by the woman’s tenacity and concerned that he might end up losing customer-satisfaction points, the clerk shoved Willette’s envelope, which was lying next to the scale, toward the driver and asked him, “Is the account number on that envelope one you recognize?”
“Not off the top of my head,” said the driver. “Let me scan it.” The driver extracted a bar-code scanner from a leather pouch that hung from his belt, scanned the nine-digit account number, and said, “Number’s for a place near Bellvue. Peak to Peak Bed and Breakfast up north, outside of Fort Collins in Poudre Canyon. Pick up and deliver there three, four times a week.” He quickly turned to leave.
“Thanks.” Pleased with himself for being so quick on his feet, the clerk grinned from ear to ear. The breach of protocol hadn’t been his but the driver’s, and to top it off, the driver was none the wiser. As soon as the driver walked through the front door, the clerk said to Willette, “Your envelope came from one of those bed-and-breakfast places. It’s a good hour-and-a-half drive from here.”
“Can you write the name down for me?” Willette asked softly, aware that the clerk had gotten the unsuspecting driver to do his dirty work. As the clerk wrote the name of the bed and breakfast on a scrap of paper, she teased her envelope back toward her, folded it, and slipped it into her purse. Taking the scrap from the clerk in one hand and gripping the head of her cane tightly with the other, she turned to leave. She was halfway to the exit when she looked back over her shoulder at the woolly-headed clerk. “Slick never beats savvy, son. Trust me. I’ve been around the block.” Her voice boomed with authority as the suddenly wide-eyed clerk’s supervisor walked up behind him and asked, “What was that all about?”
Willette left the FedEx office exhausted but buoyed by the fact that she now had an important part of the information she had flown and driven more than a thousand miles to get. The envelope that had resurrected so much pain for her and caused her to cry for nearly two whole nights had come from a place in some obscure Rocky Mountain canyon. She’d find that place, she told herself, if it killed her.
By the time she drove her rental car into the parking lot of the Harvest Hotel, every cell in her body seemed to hurt. A chipper-looking blond woman, whom Willette pegged as a college student, greeted her from behind the front desk as Willette limped, suitcase in tow, across the lobby. Noting Willette’s obvious pain, the receptionist said, “Let me help you with that.”
“No need,” said Willette, struggling with a suitcase filled with medications, cosmetics, three changes of clothes, Antoine’s notes and sketches from the day of the Kennedy killing, and every card, letter, and note that Antoine had sent to her after his move to Colorado. Parking the suitcase directly in front of the reception counter as if daring it to move, she said, “Need to check in.”
When the woman and Willette finished talking fifteen minutes later, Willette had directions on how to get to Poudre Canyon, the address and phone number of the Peak to Peak Bed and Breakfast, and the name of a good place to eat in Boulder that evening. Thanking the clerk, she struggled with one last gasp of energy to the first-floor room she’d requested, limped across the room, her purse tugging at her shoulder, let out a sigh, and sprawled across the bed.
Twenty minutes later she sat up on the edge of the bed, a little less tired but still in pain, and took a piece of paper from her purse. She dialed a phone number slowly, and when the person on the other end of the line answered, “Peak to Peak Bed and Breakfast; this is Lydia,” in a voice that sounded recorded, Willette responded carefully, “I need to make a reservation.”
“For when?”
“Tomorrow. And I need to check in early,” said Willette. She knew that should her visit to the bed and breakfast, which the hotel clerk had told her was in pretty remote country, turn out to be productive, she’d need as many daylight hours as possible, given her failing eyesight, to try to get at the heart of what had happened to her precious Sugar Sweet.
“I’m afraid our checkin time is 1 p.m.”
“That’s okay. I’ll just leave my bag and check out the area.”
“That’ll work just fine,” said the woman. “It’s a wonderful time of year for that. We have six rooms, all with baths. Prices range from eighty-five to one twenty-five. Any preference?”
Pausing to consider what she was sure was a Southern richness in the woman’s voice, Willette said, “I’m on a pretty tight budget.”
“I’d suggest the Longmont room. It’s eighty-five plus tax and lodging fees. You’ll love it. I’ll need a credit-card number and a name to hold the room.”
Willette paused before offering a response. “Ann Reed. And I’m gonna pay cash.”
“I’m afraid I can’t guarantee the room without a credit card.”
“That’s all right. I’ll be there by 8 a.m.”
“The room could be gone, Ms. Reed.”
“I’ll chance it.”
“Okay, but can I get a phone number from you in case we fill up? I’d hate for you to show up and there not be a room available.”
“Sure.” Willette eyed the number on the hotel’s phone and read it off to the woman.
“Got it. Is there anything else I can help you with?”
“Yes. Yes, there is. I’m gonna need to send out something by FedEx while I’m there. Can you handle that for me? Fill out the paperwork, expedite the mailing?”
“Surely. I handle most of those requests myself. I’m the manager.”
“That’s great.”
“And if you arrive early enough in the morning, we’ll still be serving breakfast. You’re welcome to join our other guests.”
“Well, thank you so much. I may just do that.”
“We’ll see you tomorrow morning, then.”
“You certainly will,” said Willette, cradling the receiver and thinking there was something hauntingly familiar about the woman’s voice. Something she was going to have to think long and hard about.
Chapter 21
The man known to his Gulf Coast contacts simply as Napp
er kept reminding himself that things were unfolding too easily. On Carmine Cassias’s orders, he had traced Willette Ducane’s junket from Baton Rouge to Dallas and ultimately to Denver simply by having a friend who worked for American Airlines, check travel itineraries out of New Orleans and Baton Rouge for her name. It had been far too simple, and that bothered him. In his business, simple on the front end almost always translated into problems on the back end. And since he was dealing with a house of cards that could easily collapse under the right kind of pressure, he knew he would have to use special precautions and exacting measures when it came to dealing with Ornasetti, Satoni, and the Ducane woman.
Now, as he sat at a coffee shop at the corner of Colorado Boulevard and Eighth Avenue, sipping hot chocolate in 90-degree heat, reading the Denver Post sports pages, and running through a series of killing plans, he had the feeling that just too many things were coming up roses.
Pausing to clear his head, he eyed the woman at the serving counter, who’d looked at him with surprise when he’d placed his order for hot chocolate. When he’d smiled at her and said, “Habit from a former life,” the woman had failed to return his smile, so he’d palmed a $3 tip as he’d headed for an empty table.
