She didn't let up. "Didn't you and Félix notice he disappeared for a few days? Did you wonder where he went?" She looked up at the ceiling and said, "Jeez."
Duarte said, "Well, I…you know…"
"You guys are too interested in roughing people up and the rest of that police bullshit that you missed something close to you. There's a lot to intell, and that guy had something going on. It may have been a personal thing. Maybe a kinky one, but I don't know."
"He's that weird?"
"I definitely got a funky vibe from him."
"You don't think he was involved in any of the deaths, do you?"
"No way to tell."
Duarte looked off in space and said, "Wish I had some DNA to send to Alice to compare with our sample."
"Like what?"
"Anything, I guess. A hair or even an old cigarette butt with his saliva on the end."
Lina looked out onto her balcony. "We might be able to work something out."
***
Ike drove the pickup slowly along the access road the way they had come, hoping to catch a glimpse of the fleeing man. It had been two hours since he'd lost him, enough time to have made it back to the highway, but Ike thought he would've seen him by now.
He felt like he was on some big-game safari in Africa, hunting the dreaded white-trash moron. He smiled, thinking about his cool as he'd fired at the two men he had sent to the bottom of the canal. Sure, they were two unarmed men in a confined space, but it was still something Ike wouldn't have thought he could've done just a few months ago.
Now he had to find this man to avoid possible trouble with the Houston cops. He had heard not to fuck with Houston cops, and he didn't intend to ignore that advice.
His eyes scanned the acres of low brush on either side of the road. The problem was that the smelly, decaying racist could've just laid down and taken a nap, and Ike wouldn't find him. He now understood why they used so many men to search for escaped prisoners.
He stopped the pickup occasionally and walked out into the open fields, hoping to scare Charlie out of hiding, but had no luck. Finally, after two hours of searching, Ike decided to head back to the hotel, clean out his stuff and wait for Mr. Ortíz in case Charlie made it to the tough Houston cops and told them what had happened.
As he drove up the road and approached the highway, he could just make out the main building of his hotel. The sun was dipping in the west, and long shadows were cast over the area behind the hotel. He blinked his eyes when he thought he saw a figure just off the road about two hundred yards from the hotel.
It was a man, walking unsteadily, his shirt dark with sweat from his back and underarms. Ike smiled. It was Charlie. The older man apparently could walk pretty fast.
Ike smiled as he rolled down the window and idled up next to the exhausted man.
Charlie was so tired he barely looked over, and when he did, he showed no signs of surprise or fear. All he said was "Why?"
Ike pointed the pistol out the window with his left hand, point-blank at Charlie's weathered face. "Because now I can." He pulled the trigger once, hoping that if anyone at the hotel heard it they'd write it off to a backfire or part of a distant storm. He left Charlie where he lay just off the road. Who would ever notice an old drifter dead on the side of a little-used access road?
***
Alex Duarte looked at Lina as she studied what had been faxed to them from Lina's FBI office. On the small, round table they had notes, some computer phone tolls that Lina had gotten really fast through a contact with a phone company and a LexisNexis address profile on Cal Linley and Forrest Jessup. They hadn't dared ask for any information on William Floyd because they hadn't wanted to draw any attention to their efforts.
Duarte stretched his arms and looked up at the ceiling. When he finished, he looked at Lina. She had been telling him about the FBI and William Floyd.
"He's considered a domestic terrorist because of some past connections. When we first heard about him making contact with a known drug smuggler, we figured he was using the pot to finance something they were doing. Whatever he's up to, it's not at our direction."
"What would he be financing?"
"That's why they sent me instead of using a local agent. I'm supposed to find out what he's doing. He's on his own now. We need to rein him back in."
"Were you ever going to tell us your agenda?"
"No."
He looked at her.
"I wasn't authorized. You had no need to know."
Duarte nodded.
"I was only following orders." She gave him one of her crooked smiles, looking like a Picasso masterpiece.
"That line didn't work for the Nazis."
"The FBI is not the Gestapo either."
He went back to looking over the phone calls to and from Forrest Jessup's house. "These aren't normal toll records."
She smiled, "I used a different source to get them."
"What kind of source?"
"The NSA."
Duarte tried to keep the shock off his face. "Is that legal?"
"Do you care?"
He shrugged and went back to the records. "Here, look." He pushed the sheet of paper toward Lina. "He got one call." He looked closer. "Jesus, that was today? How'd they get these?"
She just smiled.
Duarte continued. "He got one call. It originated from Houston. See the eight-three-two area code."
Lina nodded. "So."
"Cal Linley thought his package had something to do with the oil business. Jessup used to be in the oil business and lived in Houston."
"Could be a coincidence."
"We need to start taking some chances. This may be a viable lead."
He pulled out his cell phone and dialed the number. After four rings, a man answered. "Hello?"
"Hey," said Duarte. "Where is this phone? I got a call from it."
"In the Santa Anna's Pit Stop off Brylan Street."
"In what town?"
"Jacinto City, Texas."
"Near Houston?"
"Yep."
"Thanks," Duarte said as he hung up.
He looked at a small map on the back of an advertisement booklet. It showed the Gulf Coast and East Texas. "If I were on my way to Houston, I'd go through Lafayette."
"Based on one call, you think he's in Houston?"
"It's where the information points."
"It's a stretch."
"You think they drove to Lafayette, then back to New Orleans?"
"I didn't say that."
Duarte said, "But what would be in Houston?"
Lina said, "A lot of Middle Easterners."
"That the FBI paranoia coming out?"
"No, it's just that there's not much else to Houston that might relate to a dirty bomb."
Duarte stared at the map as he considered their options.
47
ALEX DUARTE WOKE UP IN HIS NEW ORLEANS HOTEL ROOM CONFUSED and tired. He had dreamed of Agent Ruley and the case. In the short hours he had slept, Ruley had come to him in some kind of uniform, in her business suit and in a bikini, and each time she had said the same thing. "You fucked up. Now it's time for the first team to take the field." In real life, she had been the model of professionalism and quiet competence. He wished she had the confidence in him to let him work with her, but he knew he was essentially on his own. He had made a mess of things. He did not deserve to work with the team now trying to find out what was on the Flame of Panama and where it had gone.
He sat up in bed and saw it was seven on the nose. He tried to clear his head and decide on his next move. Then his Nextel rang.
"Duarte."
"Good morning, sunshine."
He could picture Alice Brainard's smiling, pretty face behind the voice.
"Good morning."
"Sounds like you had a rough night. Did the NEST people get up with you?"
"Oh, we spoke."
"They were really nice to me."
"That's a shocker. How many di
nner invitations did you get?"
She laughed, then said, "Two."
Duarte sat up in bed and said, "What are you doing now?"
"Just looking through newspapers and breaking news online."
"Anything on this mess?"
"Nope, not a word."
"That's something, then." He thought about it and said, "Can you look in the Lafayette paper?"
"What for?"
"I don't know. I'm just looking for something that might point us in the right direction. Anything on murders, racists, Nazis. Anything at all."
After a few seconds, she said, "Here's an article on a set of three murders in Lafayette. A U-Haul worker and a young couple."
"I knew about them."
"Let me take a look in some of the other regional papers."
Duarte heard her hum to herself while she scanned some pages.
"Here's a dead man found outside of Houston. They call it breaking news, and the cops are still on the scene. "
"Anything unusual?"
"The body was that of Charles Kilner of Daytona Beach. Wanted in Florida for possession of crack. What do you think?"
Duarte considered it. "Don't know. That's the first time I've heard his name." But it still sat in Duarte's brain. He went on to say, "I know you got the one blood sample. I'm sorry, it's just happening so fast I can't keep up with everything."
"So you're still working on the case?"
"Not as far as the Department of Justice is concerned, but we're still poking around."
"Who's 'we'?"
"Félix, Lina and I."
"Anything else I can help with?"
"You've already done enough." He paused, then added, "I do have a cigarette butt for a DNA sample."
"Send it on." She chuckled at her intentionally tired tone.
He said, "Alice, I can't tell you how much I appreciate the help. When I get home, I intend to spend a lot of time showing you how great I think you are."
There was another silence, then Alice asked, "When are you coming home?"
"As soon as I can. I promise."
He had never meant something as much in his life.
***
William "Ike" Floyd had all of his belongings together and was all set to meet Mr. Ortíz later that evening at a warehouse in Houston. Mr. Ortíz had e-mailed him that everything was in order. Ike wrote back that he had no problems. He smiled a little writing that because he had had some problems but solved them himself. Three problems that had been eliminated, and no one would ever know.
He walked into the Jacinto Arms' small front office. The same, tired-looking young woman who had sat there the last two days never even set down her People magazine. Her big, brown eyes just gazed up at him.
Ike smiled. "Just need to settle up."
She leaned up on the stool and tapped a few keys of her computer. "That'll be one seventy-seven fifty, Mr. Johnson." Her eyes stayed on the keyboard of the computer.
Ike dug out some money and laid down a hundred and eighty bucks. "You know where this address is?" He showed her the warehouse address Mr. Ortíz had given him.
She squinted at his handwriting on the small notepad. She hit a few keys on her computer and then typed in the address.
After half a minute, Ike heard a printer working hard. Then the girl silently pulled out a Mapquest map to the warehouse.
Ike smiled and started to thank her when he noticed a police car turn down the access road next to the hotel. He stepped over to the big window and saw several cars and one set of police lights down the road near where he had left Charlie.
"What's going on?" he asked the doe-eyed girl.
She shrugged. "Cops found a body."
"When?"
"Last night. You didn't hear the sirens?"
"No. I was out like a light."
"They already had a photo of the dead guy. Asked me if he was registered here."
"Was he?" Ike didn't think she had seen him with the Charlies.
"Nope. Only you and two families from Illinois. Cops talked to them. They talk to you?"
He shook his head, then said, "Thanks for the map."
The woman said, "You give back the Ryder truck?"
Ike nodded and said, "Yeah, all set. Have a good day." He walked out of the small office smiling, knowing that once he left here, there was no way to trace him. Nothing could stop him from his mission now.
***
Alex Duarte had spent forty minutes on the phone trying to track down a Houston ATF agent who knew about the murder Alice had told him about.
Now he had on a young man with a slight Spanish accent who had graduated from the ATF academy in Glynco, Georgia, a few months earlier.
The new agent explained all he knew about the body the cops had found with a bullet in his head.
The agent said, "Yeah, the cops think he had been hitchhiking, and a trucker or someone tossed him out of the vehicle, then shot him. Oh yeah, and he's got a Klan tattoo on his arm."
Duarte said, "Was the body found anywhere near a place called Santa Anna's Pit Stop?" He heard the agent ask someone else in the room.
"Yeah. Someone says it's across the street near an old motel." There was a pause and then, "How'd you know that?"
Duarte considered this, then said, "I've got some more checking to do, but I'll call you back tomorrow. Then I'll give you everything."
He hung up without waiting for an answer.
He was on to something.
***
Pelly felt his mouth drop open when they entered the cavernous warehouse in an industrial section of Houston. It felt like a giant aircraft hangar. The sheer space inside the metal walls and roof was mind-boggling. The stacks of crates and even full cargo containers were almost as impressive.
What surprised Pelly most was the fact that this giant industrial complex was owned by the Balast Corporation, which was a subsidiary of the Central Trust of the Americas, which was wholly owned by an unnamed individual whom Pelly knew to be Mr. Ortíz. Or, more accurately, his boss, Lázaro Staub.
Staub nudged him as someone hustled off to find the manager. "Not bad, eh, Pelly?"
"When did this happen?"
"We bought it three years ago as a transshipment point for goods going into and out of Central and South America."
"I never knew."
"No need to. This is completely legitimate. We never send loads here."
"But we'll use it for a nuclear bomb?"
Staub chuckled. "You worry too much. It'll only be here long enough for Dr. Tuznia to arm it. Then the professor will be paid, and he'll go back to whatever low-paid college job he has."
"What are we paying him with?"
"Cash."
"You have that much cash with you?"
"Of course not. I had it shipped here."
Pelly saw a heavyset middle-aged man hustle down the steps of a glass office in the corner of the giant hangar. Even though the whole facility was air-conditioned, Pelly could see this piglike man sweating as he bolted toward them.
He wheezed. "Mr. Ortíz. It's an honor to have you visit."
The man had the Texas twang Pelly had heard in the movies.
The colonel said, "Thank you indeed, Mr. Duplantis. I hope you were told I might be utilizing the warehouse this evening for an hour or so."
"Yes sir. We slow way down after five, so it's no problem."
Pelly caught the man's eyes darting to him and noticed the startled look on his face. Pelly didn't care. He was still upset over meeting, then losing, Lina and then finding out she was the FBI agent Colonel Staub had been working with all along.
Pelly ran his hand over his cheeks, and even he was a little surprised how hairy they had become. He gave the warehouse manager a slight snarl and smiled to himself when he saw the man flinch.
There was nothing to do now but wait for the Ukrainian nuclear scientist Dr. Tuznia. And for William Floyd.
48
IT WAS MIDAFTERNOON, AND ALEX DUARTE HAD PU
SHED THE tiny Cobalt he had rented to its limit of about seventy-five miles per hour. It was the last car in the Hertz office at their hotel in New Orleans. Now, Duarte, Lina Cirillo and Félix Baez were already past Lafayette, well on the way to Houston.
Lina, in the passenger seat, said, "I gotta say that when you called me this morning I never thought I'd be on my way to Houston this afternoon. I'll say one thing for you, you are decisive."
From the backseat, Félix Baez chimed in. "I still think this whole thing sounds thin. The radioactive cargo. The lead. Our trip. I don't see how this will help us find out who killed Gastlin." He sat amid a half-empty case of Beck's beer.
Duarte didn't like that his partner had started drinking as soon as they left at nine in the morning. He said, "I told you, I did some checking with the Houston ATF. The phone call to Jessup's house from Jacinto City near Houston is only a few hundred yards from where the body of the Klan guy was found last night. It's too much of a coincidence." Duarte didn't want Félix to think they had forgotten about his murdered informant. "Besides, this might tie into Gastlin's death. If we're really trying to help find that cargo, then this is the right move. New Orleans is covered by the NEST team. They wouldn't be following up on something like this."
That answer seemed to satisfy Félix.
Duarte kept his foot pressed to the floor as the small engine whined and they moved closer to Houston.
Félix said, "Still wish we could've found a flight."
Lina shot back, "You wouldn't have been able to drink this much on a plane."
Duarte calmed them both down by adding, "If none of us are supposed to be on this case, it's best that there is no record of where we travel right now."
***
Thanks to the wonders of computer-generated maps, they found the crime scene a few minutes after exiting the interstate highway. A lone patrolman sat in his cruiser keeping the scene secure until a final search could be made.
The sun was low, but still provided enough light to see the area.
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