“What are you thinking about?” Bear asked.
Jake shot a narrow-eyed, steely glare to match his mood. “Justice. Let’s go.”
* * *
They crammed in a conference room on the second floor of the FBI offices. Jake felt like an unwanted stepchild as Foster swept around the room, directing the half-dozen men and women pecking on computers and scouring maps pinned to the walls along with photos of this saga’s players, the dead crossed out in bloody red ink.
“Jake,” Foster called from the far side of the room. “Bring Bear.”
Jake and Bear weaved through the crowd and found Foster behind Dale Lumsden who cued the hotel security footage on a twenty-inch computer monitor. The footage played while neon green squares highlighted faces as patrons moved in and out of the security camera.
“Hey, Jake,” Lumsden said. “We gotta stop meeting like this.”
“Tell him what we have,” Foster said.
“Right. Our agents in Lincoln, Nebraska obtained this footage from the Holiday Inn Express where they found gun guru Andre Fisher’s body. It’s a pretty busy hotel, so there’s a lot of data to crunch, but the computer’s doing a facial recognition of people against our databases, and we fed in the pictures in our files of Sokolov, Mack, Hart and Connelly aka the Wolf.”
“Any hits?” Bear asked.
“We found a felon wanted for armed robbery hiding out there, but nothing else yet. We started with an hour before Fisher checked in.”
They watched the footage flash by, and just when Jake thought they’d find nothing, one of the green squares flashed red with an audible beep and the footage froze.
Lumsden spun around and faced the monitor. He stroked a few keys and clicked the mouse. The image was a bit grainy but recognizable, and the computer confirmed the facial match. “Andrew Connelly. There’s your killer, the Wolf.”
Jake ground his teeth together, wanting to punch the Wolf through the monitor. “Let the footage play.”
The Wolf walked through the front door, trailed by a dark-haired woman in a long coat, head dipped toward the floor, hiding her face. They walked past the front desk and out of sight of the camera.
“Who the hell is the woman?” Jake asked.
“Maybe the other shooter in the car from the driveway. Time is 7:37 PM,” Foster said. “Go to the first-floor hallway camera and back it up a minute.”
Lumsden showed the first-floor camera on a second monitor and scrolled the timeline back. After a minute, the Wolf appeared, walked toward the camera, and disappeared through a door to his right. The woman continued toward the camera and vanished from view.
“It was a stairway door, I bet,” Jake said. “Go to the second-floor camera.”
Lumsden made a few more clicks, and the scene jumped to another hallway. Seconds later, the Wolf appeared through the doorway at the end of the hall. He passed the first door when the screen went blank.
“What happened?” Bear asked.
“Not sure.” Foster turned and called out the name Roerden. A thick-haired man in his forties with a bushy moustache and a gut making him look nine months pregnant came over. He explained someone sprayed the camera lens.
“If it wasn’t Connelly, I mean the Wolf, then who?” Lumsden asked.
Foster and Jake exchanged a knowing glance and simultaneously said, “The woman.”
“Let the camera roll on the lobby,” Jake requested. “Put it on fast forward. We need the Wolf and the woman leaving.”
The footage flashed by, Lumsden pausing it when someone zoomed by that could be the Wolf. The timeline passed two hours after the Wolf entered, when Jake told Lumsden to stop.
“If the Wolf went there to kill Fisher,” Jake said, “he wouldn’t wait two hours to do it. He’d be in and out.”
Bear said, “He also wouldn’t walk out the front door after popping two holes into a guy either. Any footage from the back door?”
“Sure.” Lumsden clicked a few more times. The camera showed a young kid smoking a cigarette on a small concrete pad. A sidewalk led out to a parking lot occupied by a handful of cars. After a few minutes, the kid flicked his cigarette in the grass and made a move toward the door as the Wolf walked out. The camera showed the Wolf holding open the door, letting the kid pass inside. The Wolf clipped up the sidewalk and jumped into a dark-colored sedan parked face out in the lot. Headlights blinded the camera and the car turned left off camera.
“Dark-colored Ford Taurus,” Foster said. “Newer model, no plate on the front. Check the other outside cameras and see if we can get a shot of the plate.”
Lumsden clicked again and the monitor jumped to another camera on the side of the building. This side was more packed with cars, but the headlights of the Wolf’s car bloomed. The car stopped, the woman who entered the hotel after the Wolf appeared and climbed into the Taurus. A second later, it disappeared into the night. Because of the other cars, they never glimpsed a license plate.
Lumsden sighed. “Damn, no plate.”
“Probably a stolen one anyway,” Foster said. “The important thing is he wasn’t alone. We need to figure out who the woman is.”
Something else tugged at the back of Jake’s brain. He’d seen something but couldn’t figure out what it was. The harder he chased after it, the more elusive it became, swirling away like water down a drain. He cleared his head and stopped trying so hard, knowing from experience it would eventually come to him.
“We know Connelly isn’t working alone,” Bear said. “The woman came in with him at the hotel, but they separated at the first-floor hallway. She’s the one who blacked out the camera on the second floor. Can you run your facial recognition software on her?”
Lumsden changed the view to the first-floor hallway, backed up the timeline and made a few mouse clicks. As the woman walked toward the camera, the neon green bars framed her face. After a moment, the bars turned red and the computer beeped. Lumsden clapped his hands together.
“God, I love this program.” Lumsden shot forward in his seat. He clicked on an icon, the computer chugged, and a minute later the woman’s face filled the screen with a data file displaying to the right. Attractive but harsh, pixie cut dark hair, high, sharp cheekbones set below dewdrop eyes. “She’s on the watch list. Mariya Volkov from Vladivostok. Came to the US ten years ago. Works as a high school biology teacher under the name Vanessa Daniels in Omaha. And, thanks to our new shared interest in this case with the CIA, we have access to their database. She’s a registered informant with the CIA.”
“Registered with who?” Foster asked.
Lumsden clicked a couple of links and whistled. “Samuel Stone.”
“Holy shit,” Bear said. “Why was she on the FBI watch list?”
“Give me a sec.” Foster approached Murphy who sat at the far end of the table talking to a doughy man with a bad comb-over in a tan suit. The doughboy retrieved a cell, talked for a minute, and called a couple of people over. He relayed the information to Foster who returned, face lit like a Christmas tree.
“She’s a known associate of the Wolf,” Foster said. “The fucking Wolf. Field agents are gearing to swarm her house in Omaha. Stone told me the other night he’s been close to the Wolf a few times but couldn’t snag him. According to the CIA guy over there, he hooked up with her during his time in Moscow and brought her here as an asset.”
The tickle in the back of Jake’s brain wavered again. What was in the video?
Bear waved his paws. “Wait a minute. I’m confused. This woman is one of Stone’s informants, but also tied to the Wolf? And I’m calling this dickbrain Connelly instead of some animal’s name, because I feel like an idiot when I say it.”
“Connelly, the Wolf, whatever floats your boat, Bear,” Foster said. “Let’s hope the agents nab her because time’s running out.”
Time’s running out. Time.
“Lumsden,” Jake said. “Cue the video from the back door of the hotel when the Wolf came out.”
“What for?”
>
Jake turned Lumsden’s chair to the monitor for him. “Just do it. Go to the point where he comes out the door.”
Lumsden dragged the timeline backward. The Wolf strode out the door, holding it open for the smoking kid. Jake told Lumsden to freeze the frame and zoom in on his arm. There it was, plain as day. The watch. The damn Rolex watch.
“What?” Bear asked. “What are you seeing?”
“Pull up Connelly’s picture from the file and put Stone’s next to it.”
Lumsden’s face contorted in confusion, but he did as Jake asked. Connelly’s longer blond hair versus Stone’s crop cut. Connelly wore glasses and Stone did not. But, take those two distinguishing features away and Jake’s discovery became clear to those around the table.
“Holy crap,” Foster whispered. “Sam Stone is the Wolf.”
Chapter Fifty-Six
Mariya whipped through the downtown Kansas City parking garage and pulled into an empty slot next to the Wolf’s car. She shut off the car, and they listened to the engine tick.
“How did they figure it out, Sam?” she asked.
“It doesn’t matter. The point is they know.”
She turned in her seat. “We need to run, get out of this town and this country like we talked about.”
The Wolf shook his head. “I can’t. I have to finish the mission.”
“But why? Your cover is blown, and everyone will be looking for you. We need to get clear of this if we are going to stay out of jail.”
The Wolf reached out and stroked her face, memorizing the way her midnight hair cascaded like a waterfall over her shoulders, the worry lines creasing her brow, the love in her eyes, and the tears that snaked down her cheeks. He wondered if he would ever see her again after today.
“I love you, Mariya,” he whispered, leaning in to kiss her gently. “But I have to finish this. I have to kill Sokolov and stop this madness, even if it costs us everything.”
“Sam,” she whispered, her emotions crushing his name as it blew across her lips.
“Go to the safe house,” he said. “If I’m not there by the morning, get out of the country. Use the fake passports and I’ll find you.”
She grasped his hands. “I’m not leaving you to finish this alone.”
He opened the door to the car. “Yes, you are. This is going to get bloody.”
“What are you going to do?”
He pulled free from her grasp. “Play the last card I have.”
* * *
Jake stepped toward his truck with Bear by his side. “Sam Stone is Andrew Connelly and the Wolf.”
“This shit makes my head hurt. How the hell would he pull off the different identities?”
“Connelly would be easy enough to pull off. Angela said he traveled a lot for work. Plus, he was a spy for the CIA. Probably doesn’t have a nine-to-five desk job. Hell, maybe the government knew what he was doing.”
Jake continued thinking about the implications when his cell rang. Number unknown. Probably a telemarketer trying to sell him crap he didn’t want, but he answered anyway.
“How did you figure it out?” Stone asked.
Stone, Connelly, the Wolf. Jake wondered what to call him. He stopped dead in his tracks and tugged at Bear’s arm as he passed. How did he know what they’d figured out? “Sam? Where’d you go, man?”
Bear mouthed “speaker” while jabbing at an imaginary phone in his hand.
“Don’t play dumb, Caldwell. My name and picture got blasted everywhere a few minutes ago. How’d you figure it out?”
Jake hit the speaker button and tipped his head toward the truck, and they both climbed in the cab as Jake talked. “Your watch. I spotted it on the surveillance footage in the hotel in Lincoln when you killed Andre Fisher.”
The Wolf groaned. “Ahhh…the watch. I’m impressed. I suppose I was a little careless with Andre.”
“Plus, we saw you at Centerfire.”
“There are cameras everywhere, aren’t there?”
Jake asked, “One question, why were you there with Hart?”
“Keep your friends close and your enemies closer. I hoped Hart could lead me to Sokolov. I had him turned weeks ago, which is why I got him out of the FBI office. Sokolov must’ve given him a better offer, because he brained me with the iron.”
Bear typed a note on his phone and flashed the screen to Jake. It read “Don’t mention the woman.” Jake gave him a thumbs up. Smart idea. She represented their last real lead to the Wolf, and they didn’t want to burn her bridge before they had a chance to cross it.
“Tell me something, Jake,” the Wolf continued, “are you hunting Sokolov as hard as you and your little friends at the FBI are going to pursue me?”
“We’re going to get both of your spying asses. And in the end, if you survive, you’ll spend the rest of your days rotting away in a super max prison.”
“Maybe,” the Wolf said. “After all, it’s little old me against the FBI, the CIA, and an Ozark Sheriff and his sworn deputy. But I should be secondary on your list compared to Sokolov.”
“Why? Because he’s the last one on your little dead pool list?”
“Exactly. I don’t kill for the sport of it. I kill when other alternatives are exhausted.”
“Oh, bullshit, Stone,” Jake spat. “I saw your torture pictures from your basement.”
The Wolf laughed. “You think that was my handiwork? No, my friend. That’s what Sokolov does to those who cross him. Do you know what will happen if he executes his plan? Thousands of citizens of this God-forsaken country will die. You should be thanking me.”
Jake’s temple throbbed. He wanted this scumbag’s head on a spike. “Thank you? Your little shit show got your wife killed and left Christopher an orphan.”
Expelled air rattled the speaker. “I never wanted it to happen. I only married Angela to get to Mack, but I love that kid.”
“You have a fucked-up way of showing it, man.”
The Wolf quieted for a beat. “Yes, I suppose I do, and it’s another reason you need to find Sokolov. He’s got Christopher. But even Christopher is secondary at this point. Sokolov has to be stopped. My country doesn’t want this plot to go through, and neither do I. The optics would be bad for everyone involved.”
“Where can we find him?”
“If I knew that, I wouldn’t want your help, now would I? Find him, Jake. Find him and cut his throat. Stay close to your phone. If I find him first, I’ll be in touch.”
The line disconnected, and Jake looked to Bear. “Any chance we’ll be able to trace the number?”
“Zero. Most likely a burner phone that’ll be in a hundred pieces in the next sixty seconds. Goddamn it. If they shoot blanks at what’s-her-name’s house in Omaha, then we’re shit outta luck. Without some sort of break, we’ll never find either one of these guys.”
Bear was right. They had nothing and it pissed him off. They had no way to track Sokolov. Or did they? Keats could get hold of Sokolov but wanted to stay out of it. Jake thought back to the conversation at the casino about the federal noose tightening around Keats’s neck. It was a long shot given the FBI’s hard-on for Keats, but what if he could really get the information causing that noose to go away?
“Hey,” Bear said. “What’s up? You have a look in your eye.”
“Who’s the one person we’ve dealt with that knows anything about Sokolov.”
Bear clucked his tongue off the roof of his mouth a few times. “Keats?”
“But he won’t talk if Sokolov is still in play since Keats helped with the programming contact and is probably worried about getting dragged in. But, what if there’s no more Blackbird? There’s enough circumstantial evidence on his ties to Sokolov to make his life pretty miserable.”
Bear cracked a heavy smile. “We tell him we stopped Sokolov’s plot, and if Keats helps us nab the guy and get the kid back, we’ll let him skate away.”
“Great minds think alike.”
Bear’s grin dropped. “Ho
w are you going to sell your little idea to the FBI?”
Jake started the truck and popped it in drive. “That’s the problem. Murphy won’t listen to me.”
“What do we do?”
“We go talk to the one person who hates Keats more than anyone in the world and let her sell it. Murphy won’t bite off on the idea from me, but he’ll listen to Snell.”
Chapter Fifty-Seven
Snell was propped up in her hospital bed, watching some soap opera on the television. Her daughter Beth lounged in a chair, reading a thick psychology textbook. Vases of flowers lined the windowsill, their fragrance beating back the antiseptic hospital smell clinging to the inside of Jake’s nostrils. The faces of both ladies lit like Christmas trees when Jake and Bear stuck their heads through the door.
“Can we come in?” Jake asked.
“Hell, yes,” Snell said. “The news is too depressing, and these soap operas are as bad as I remember them.”
Beth came around the bed and gave them both hugs. They exchanged quick pleasantries, and Beth told them about her senior year at school. She looked happy despite the fact her mother lay shot in a hospital bed. After a few minutes, she excused herself to grab something to eat from the cafeteria.
“She looks great,” Jake said. “Put some weight back on. She was too skinny last time I saw her.”
“She is great.” Snell’s color looked good, but her olive eyes seemed tired. “Once she found out I’d be fine, she lightened up.”
“What do the docs say?” Bear asked. “You getting out of here anytime soon?”
“Not soon enough. They say it’ll be another week, but I’m already losing my mind from boredom. What’s up with the hunt for Sokolov and the kid?”
Jake and Bear spent the better part of thirty minutes relaying the story, interrupted once by a squatty nurse checking vitals and a beanpole orderly delivering a lunch appearing halfway edible. By the time Snell finished her meal, Jake laid out his plan to enlist Keats’s help in exchange for dropping any potential charges for his part in this plot.
Jake Caldwell Thrillers Page 74