by Matt Lincoln
“Her grandfather was dying in an ambulance,” Diane answered in a droll tone. “I wasn’t going to interrogate her about the hotel’s structural integrity.” She softened her voice. “We can talk to her about it later. Since she was there, it’ll be helpful to get her take on it.”
“I can do that when she’s ready,” I volunteered. “We built a bit of a rapport while at the hospital.”
Holm snickered. “Yeah, while smelling like dried seaweed.”
“Nothing wrong with dry seaweed,” I countered. “It’s a great snack.”
“Only if you want to stay hungry,” Bonnie chirped as she packed up her laptop. “We’re refining the results on the explosives. It’s going to be hard since everything is underwater.”
“Even the lower level?” Muñoz asked with a raised brow.
Bonnie nodded. “Right. The explosive that took out the elevator weakened the reinforced wall that would’ve kept the water out. It was part of that Adapta-Build system. The explosive at the tunnel was trinitrotoluene.”
“TNT?” I leaned back. “Not a plastic explosive?”
Clyde flipped the image to a schematic of the tunnel and pointed to the seam in question. “We think it was placed outside. The blast pattern was difficult to put together, but it looks like it went inward.”
“That jives with TNT,” I acknowledged. “It’s good for underwater demolition. What about the other two charges?”
“We don’t have results back yet,” Bonnie admitted. “The debris around the elevator and the column has been too dangerous for the teams to be in there for long. Right now, all we know is the placement by the blast marks.”
“Get back to us when you know,” Diane ordered as she stopped pacing to sit back in her chair. “We only have one lead right now. Ethan?”
I stood and took my tablet with me. The smartboard was new, and I hadn’t had time to learn how to mess with it, not when hooking in with the old projector was nice and simple. All I had to do was open the right app to connect my tablet, and voila, we had images.
“Michael James.” I pulled up a collage of photos the FBI had kept on file about the guy. “Age thirty-seven, grew up locally. In college, he joined an environmental activist group. He had arrests for trespassing and disorderly conduct, but that was it until this past year. During the construction of Dragon Tide, he staged protests and information campaigns. Zhu got a restraining order to stop the harassment, and things died down.”
“No history of violence?” Muñoz leaned her elbows on the table. I shook my head, and she frowned. “Why is he a suspect?”
“He’s our only lead.” I nodded toward Holm. “We’re going to interview him later today. This guy sounds like a pain in the ass, but as far as we know, he’s never done more than annoy the hell out of developers.”
“That can change,” Birn rumbled as he glowered at the screen. “You’re smart not to rule James out before looking into him.”
I shot him a look. “Do you know James?”
“No, but I’ve known people like him.” Birn tapped his thumb on the edge of the table. “A kid I grew up with got into animal activism in the nineties. First, it was protests, sit-ins, things like that. It was activism until it turned into arson and theft at a testing lab. A security guard got burned pretty bad.”
“We’ll keep that in mind,” I told him. “I’m sorry that happened.”
Birn shrugged. “That kid threw away his future, but that’s what he got for getting mixed up with fanatics.” His closed expression suggested I let it go, and I did. If he wanted to talk about it later, he would.
Diane pointed at Birn and then Muñoz. “I want you two to start talking to contractors who worked on the site.” She tapped at something on her laptop. “I just sent you the records of who was there during what phases. Talk to foremen, critical personnel, you know the drill.”
Muñoz and Birn checked their tablets. It amused me sometimes to see the tablets given to us agents and laptops to the brass and squints. I knew it was because they needed the added tech on a laptop, and we needed less than half of what they used, but the optics were that we were big, dumb agents who needed simpler devices. It didn’t help that a certain partner of mine lived down to the stereotype when it came to tech.
“I can’t find the James file,” Holm told me under his breath. “I wanted to see if he finished college and what he’s doing now.”
I showed him where to find the file and then left him to it.
“We also need to interview Liu’s family and secretary,” I told everyone. “Even though it looks like the hotel was the target, we can’t rule out that John Liu was there for a reason.”
“Is that everything?” Diane asked me.
“Until we hear from the structural engineers and inspectors, this is it.” I smiled as I turned off the projector. “Isn’t that enough?”
Diane didn’t return the smile. “This case needs to be handled with kid gloves, everyone.” She sent me a warning glare. “No Hulk-smash stuff, Ethan. These people are connected in Hong Kong. We do not want a war, especially not with the Chinatown project they’re building in North Miami. This is not the time for bad PR of any sort.”
“Why do you always pick on me?” I complained.
She pointed at me and then Holm. “You two attract trouble.”
Holm grinned. “That means we’re doing our jobs.”
Muñoz groaned and shook her head while Birn chuckled. Bonnie and Clyde pretended not to notice the exchange. Then again, they were so deep in conversation that they probably did miss it.
“Oh, before I forget…” Diane sighed and rubbed the bridge of her nose. “Ethan, go talk to TJ. We need a quiet record search on all of the licenses, permits, inspections, everything, on that damned hotel.” She looked up. “See about anything else he might have for you.”
I got the double meaning. As much as I hated to keep it from the rest of the team, especially Holm, I’d kept in touch with the Cybercrimes genius TJ Warner since he was taken from our team and put back in the Cyber pool. He, Diane, and I were trying to find who was behind major cuts in our funding for the past six months, longer at smaller field offices.
“Copy that,” I answered her.
As Holm and I left the meeting, I thought about those cuts. An old friend had warned me that upcoming budget slashes were more than a simple attempt to cut federal spending. Other than his warning, he hadn’t contacted me about it. It had been months since then, and I decided that it was time to contact the person who was supposed to have answers.
CHAPTER 9
“Ethan, it’s been a while.”
Donald Farr was a former Fleet Admiral, former Joint Chief, and my commanding officer for a while, some years back. He had taken an interest in my career at some point, and now he dropped me the occasional message when he felt it necessary.
“Yes, sir, it has.” I resisted the impulse to ask how his niece, Tessa, was doing. It’d been a long while since she and I had talked, but now wasn’t the time to go into that. “Do you have updates on the situation we discussed?”
“I have some gears in motion.” He spoke to someone in the background, and then a door shut. “Our little savant may find he has access to new playgrounds before long.”
“He hates being called a savant.”
“Genius, then. When I have something critical, I’ll contact you.” Farr coughed away from the phone and then cleared his throat. His voice sounded a bit froggy. “Tessa’s on assignment. Otherwise, I’d have her give you a ring. She would’ve been interested in this case, given the eco-aspect of it.”
I wondered what kind of environmental journalism assignment would keep Tessa incommunicado. Anything that required radio silence had to be big and potentially dangerous. I didn’t like that, not that I got to have a say. Tessa and I had gone through two cases together, but someday, I hoped to spend some downtime with her. Unfortunately, her downtime always meant going to New York City, where she worked at Farr’s National
EcoStar.
“Have you put Tessa in danger again?” I asked with a slightly frosty edge.
“She’s a big girl, Ethan. She makes her own decisions.”
“In other words, she’s on a risky story.” I wanted to box the man’s ears, but I wasn’t in a literal or figurative position to do that.
“She’s fine. Go solve your case. By the time you’re done, she’ll be home safe and sound.”
“You sound awfully sure of that, sir.”
“Because I am.” Farr coughed again. “I’m hanging up on you now. Colds didn’t use to slow me down, but I’m not so young these days.”
“Feel better.” What else could a guy say to a pillar who wasn’t used to a simple cold dragging him down?
“Copy that, son.” Farr’s phlegmy laugh made me cringe. “Goodbye.”
The disconnected line left me staring at my smartphone. Making that call didn’t do anything to assuage my concerns. Worse, now I had to worry about what Tessa was up to. Whether we eventually got together again or not, she was a good friend who I cared about.
My phone vibrated before I moved to put it away. It was a text from TJ Warner asking me to go see him over in Cyber. How convenient.
The Cybercrimes department was headquartered in our building. Each field office had at least one or two Cyber agents, but at our office, we had the best of the best. As I went through the glass door that opened into their darkened room with multi-monitored desks, I saw that three stations were empty. They’d been busy a week earlier.
I made my way to Warner’s desk. He was so engrossed in his work that he was oblivious to my presence.
“TJ.”
He jumped backward in his rolling chair, which caused his headphones wire to pop out of the computer case. “Agent Marston!” He put his hand on his chest and scooted back up to his keyboard. “You scared me.”
“Clearly.” I didn’t correct him from calling me by my title and name anymore. The Cybercrimes supervisor was a stickler about formality, and he’d chewed out poor Warner for calling me by my first name. He’d damn near chewed me out for encouraging it. “Do you have anything interesting for me?”
“Only on this case,” he answered with a sympathetic frown. If he’d had news about the source of our funding woes, we wouldn’t discuss it anywhere near the building. “It’s not much, but I’ve been going through to see what connections the Liu and Zhu families might have. Financials, social circles, corporate, crime, you name it.”
“And?” I prodded. Warner enjoyed pausing for dramatic effect, but I didn’t.
“And, I’m seeing patterns to suggest a subtle connection between Zhu’s holdings and the Bamboo Dragon tong,” TJ explained. “It’s not much, and it might not pan out to mean anything, but it looks like Zhu and Liu knew each other back when they were young. Maybe the eighties. There were police reports about fights between them. After the reports stopped, it looks like those two saw each other every few years.”
“What do we have regarding Zhu and organized crime?” I sat on the edge of his work area. Without looking, he pointed at an empty chair for me to use instead. “There are rumors, but do we have anything solid?”
“The best I have are a few mentions of a low-key triad called ‘Jade Panda.’ They used his contractors for a complex they erected on the mainland outside of Hong Kong.” Warner plugged his headphones in and left the headset around his neck. “There are records on some of the guys he hires for security.”
“Aren’t security guys supposed to have clean records?” I leaned in to look at the monitors, but not a single screen showed me information that I could decipher on my own. “There are plenty of muscle guys with clean backgrounds.”
Warner shrugged. “Hard telling. They weren’t related. David Zhu, the guy who died down in the suite, was the only relative who worked with Shawn Zhu. He does have family, but I can’t find any information on why they don’t associate with him.”
“He could be a freelancer. Who knows?” I tapped my fingers on my thigh. “Is there anything at all about Liu and Zhu having business arrangements?”
“Not yet,” Warner admitted. “If there is, I’ll find it.” He looked up and caught my eye. “It’d be good to have a beer at Mike’s tonight.”
Warner hated beer, but he enjoyed the occasional adult cocktail at Mike’s Tropical Tango Hut. This meant that he had something to talk about, but not at the office. In other words, he didn’t want anyone there to hear what he had to say.
“Sounds like a plan,” I told him. “In the meantime, I want you to look into the records surrounding the Dragon Tide project, from the initial sale of the land through today. Let’s make sure all the bases are covered in this investigation.”
“Sure.” Warner jotted my request on a sticky note and stuck it to the bottom of a monitor. “Are you looking for any special angles?”
I thought for a moment and then shook my head. “You’re good at seeing patterns. See what you find and listen to your gut.”
Warner’s belly rumbled at that moment. “Yeah, I’ll listen to my head,” he said with a laugh.”
He rubbed his belly, which, given his love for Mountain Dew and Doritos, wasn’t small. That wasn’t what mattered, though. Warner was a damn genius, and we’d gotten used to his awkward humor up on our team’s floor. When MBLIS pulled him back to the Cybercrimes unit, it’d been a blow. Yeah, he was in the same building, but he wasn’t the daily presence he used to be.
“I’ll see you at Mike’s after your shift is over.” I stood and clapped him on the back. “Try not to outdrink me this time.”
Warner rolled his eyes and waved me off. He was immersed in the digital world by the time I reached the door to the department. I paused at the exit and looked at the empty desks. Six months earlier, Cyber pushed for a larger work area as their people were crowded, and that was with Warner out of their way on my team’s floor.
In the time since then, we were hit with several budgetary cuts. The cybercrimes unit had been halved, and Warner was recalled from his assignment to our team. He was available to us but no longer exclusive.
My phone vibrated. It was a text message from Holm.
Get up here. Now.
I stuffed my phone in my pocket and sprinted for the stairs.
CHAPTER 10
I burst out from the stairwell with my hand on my holster. Holm’s cryptic text could’ve meant anything. The last thing I expected was the black, orange, and white flash of fur that saw the door open door and raced for it. Guessing by the six or seven people chasing said furball, I figured I better not let it escape custody.
I slammed the fire door shut with a cringe-worthy boom that brought the calico cat up short. She skidded on the tile floor and stopped at my feet. I looked down, and the cat looked up with mismatching eyes of blue and green.
“Mreow?”
The cat’s pursuers made a circle around us, and some half-spoke and half-whispered the feline’s name, which was apparently, “River.”
“River, huh?” I squatted and let my hand hang down, just like when I was a kid playing with the kittens on my grandfather’s citrus farm. “A little out of your way, aren’t you, girl?”
She shoved her head into my palm and purred like an electric massager. I scratched behind her jaw and ears, and she was mine. With a soft sweep, I had her up in my arms before she knew it.
“Someone lose something?” I asked with a half-cocked smile. “She’s awfully pretty to be running around by herself.”
None other than Alice came flying around a cubicle corner. She stumbled to a stop when she saw me with a happily cuddling feline. Holm sauntered up behind Alice. He shook his head but had a bemused light to his eyes.
“I take it this is your little friend?” I asked her.
The people who had chased the cat dispersed as Alice approached me with flushed cheeks and a self-conscious smile. She had the same dimple as the photos I’d seen of her grandfather in his youth.
“I’m
so—Thank you,” she stammered as she held out her arms. “I thought the pet cab’s door was locked, but it popped open somehow.”
I handed the little fugitive over to her grateful human. “I didn’t know she was part of the statement.”
“Oh, I, uh…” Alice looked around, but Holm was the only other person still there. “My friend agreed to watch her for a few days while my family does family stuff.” Her lips twitched into a brief grimace. “I was early, and she wasn’t home, so I had to bring her in with me.”
The cat wriggled in her person’s arms and lurched toward me. Alice raised her eyebrows. Uh oh.
“Cats like me for some reason,” I admitted with a shrug and held out my hands with a resigned sigh. “I don’t hate them, but I’m not as big a fan of them as they are of me.”
Sure enough, River hopped back into my arms and recommenced the purring. Going by the amount of hair she left on my sleeves, I’d be changing my shirt right after Alice finished with her statement and interview. I started toward our smaller conference room.
“He’s not kidding,” Holm offered with a grin that meant trouble.
I glared at him over my shoulder. “No, I’m not, and no, you aren’t,” I warned.
“American cats aren’t so different from Afghani cats,” Holm informed us. “Their accents are a dead giveaway, though.”
“Shut it, Robert.” We went into the room, and I was relieved to find a very pink cat carrier on the floor next to the table. “This is just a guess, but that must be yours.”
Holm made a show of shutting the door so that we heard a clear click. Alice set the carrier on the table, and I tried to convince River to get in. She leaned into my chest, snagged her claws into my shirt, and looked up. That was the moment that I learned soulful cat eyes are a thousand times more lethal than puppy eyes.
“Dammit,” I muttered. I gave up and sat with Alice’s cat more or less glued to my chest. Maybe she didn’t have her claws all the way into my skin, but that cat was hard to put down.
