"I can't see the harm in that," Mike said. "It might buy us a little time. What do you think, Aaron?"
"If nothing else, it will give us a shot at getting another location for that prepaid cellphone he's using."
"Good point," Mike said. "Finn?"
"Sounds okay to me."
"Good. Mary, send your text to Aaron on your secure phone when we hang up. Aaron, you send the text from an untraceable number that appears to be in another state. If you can get a location for the burner phone that the Russian is using, scramble a team to see who's in the area, but no contact, okay?"
"Okay."
"Good. We'll talk again at 7:00 a.m. unless something comes up sooner. Goodnight, everybody."
"Goodnight," Mary and I said. I disconnected the call.
"Ready to sack out?" Mary asked, yawning, as she sent her text to Aaron.
"I'm beyond ready," I said.
16
Having turned in early last night, Mary and I went to breakfast and returned to our room before our 7:00 a.m. conference call. We were sipping from large cups of takeout coffee when my encrypted phone rang.
"Hello, Aaron, Mike," I said, answering it.
"Good morning, Finn," Aaron said. "Is Mary with you?"
"Yes, I'm here," she said. "Good morning."
"Good morning to both of you," Mike said. "Aaron's team was busy last night. Aaron, why don't you start things off?"
"All right. We sent that message you composed, Mary. The phone that received it was on a motor yacht at one of the big marinas in Fort Lauderdale. Anastasia is her name. Her hailing port's Georgetown, Cayman Islands. You know what that means, right?"
Mary shook her head, looking at me.
"Owned by some brass-plate corporation?" I asked.
"Yeah, exactly. We're working to find out who's behind the shell company, but don't hold your breath. We have the vessel under surveillance, though. I take it the name means nothing to either of you."
"Not to me," Mary said.
"Nor to me," I said. "Was there any reaction to the message?"
"There hasn't been a reply yet, but yeah, there was a reaction, all right," Aaron said, chuckling. "We sent Mary's text from a burner phone after we spoke last night. We left the phone in a motel room just south of Savannah. The room is in the name Mary Helen Maloney, to match the name he used for you in the voice mail, Mary. About two hours after we sent the text, two men picked the lock on the door and tossed the room."
"Two hours, huh? Quick response," I said.
"Yeah. They're from Savannah," Aaron said. "Not a big surprise that he has troops there. That's one of the places where he met with O'Hanlon's people, from what Mary picked up earlier. Good chance they're working for the man who was going to be your next target, before the Russian reared his head."
"Was anything in the room for them to find besides the phone?" Mary asked.
"The bed was slept in, and there was some luggage, but that's it. The car listed on your room registration wasn't in the parking lot. We don't know for sure if they checked for the car, but they probably did. They were thorough. After their search, they put the room back the way they found it and set up surveillance outside the motel."
"You still have a team in place, then?" I asked. "Watching the watchers?"
"Yes, for now. And that's everything, so far."
"Thanks, Aaron," Mike said. "Good work. We need to figure out where we go from here. Any ideas, anybody?"
"What about that car?" Mary asked. "You said the license plate number was on the room registration?"
"Yes. It's a rental, in the Maloney name. They'll probably know that by now. We have the car, still, pending our decision as to what's next. But it's not where they'll find it."
"Let's do a quick list of options from here," I suggested.
"Sure," Mike said. "Lead the way, Finn. I'll make notes."
"Okay. Here goes:
"One: Pick up the two men who're watching the hotel and interrogate them.
"Two: Use the car to lay a false trail to lead them to somewhere of our choosing.
"Three: Send in a decoy who can pass for Mary and see what they do when she goes into the room.
"Nothing else comes to mind just yet."
"What about that cellphone?" Mary asked. "The one in the room?"
"It's there, turned on, plugged into the charger," Aaron said. "Why do you ask?"
"Because that's the only contact number he has for me, as far as we know. If he sends a text or leaves a voicemail on it, we won't know."
"Good for you, Mary," Aaron said. "But thanks to the miracles of modern technology, we will know. We're able to monitor that phone remotely. We can even make calls or send texts that will appear to come from it."
"Okay. I was wondering about that. Then here's my idea. Let's send him another text from that phone. I'll point out to him that by sending those men, he's proven I can't trust him. I'll tell him I'm still interested in doing business with him, but I'm not willing to meet with him."
"We can do that," Aaron said, "But his two men are watching the room. They'll tell him there was nobody in there to send the message."
"Yes, I know," Mary said. "There are two ways to deal with that. I'm not sure which one I like better."
"Let's hear them," Mike said.
"First option, we kill his surveillance team."
Mike laughed at that. "I like your style; it must be in your genes. That was Bob's idea, as well. Before we explore that one, what's your other option?"
"Send the message anyway and let him wonder how I did it. It tells him something about the technical resources at my disposal."
"Any other ideas? Finn? Aaron?"
"Not as far as the motel goes," I said. "I have a few ideas about the motor yacht, but let's work through Mary's two first."
"Yeah, I'm for that, too," Aaron said.
"Mary?" Mike asked.
"Yes?"
"Give us the pros and cons of killing the surveillance team."
"It doesn't raise the question of how we manipulated the telephone network. It's the kind of thing he might do if the situation were reversed, so it reinforces his appreciation for my skills, maybe piques his interest. It doesn't give him the idea that there's a big, technically savvy organization behind me — just makes me look better at the game than his own people. Those are all consistent with why he said he wanted to do business with me."
"Good," Mike said. "What about the cons?"
"Two dead men, maybe for no real reason."
"Does that bother you?" Mike asked.
"No. They took that risk when they came after me. But it's a complication. There will be the problem of the bodies — whether to leave them as a message or make them disappear, say in the Okefenokee Swamp. It's close by there. And we risk escalating things. Maybe he was just flexing his muscle. He may have sent them to pick me up, even though I wanted to delay meeting him — just to set the tone of our relationship going forward. To show me who was the boss. If that's the case, he'll almost have to bump the violence up a notch. He's not likely to let a woman have the upper hand for long."
"Anything to add?" Mike asked, after a few seconds of silence.
"No," I said, and Aaron echoed that.
"Tell us more about your second option, Mary," Mike said.
"Okay. If we send the message from the phone and his people know there was nobody in the room, he learns something new about me. That could be good or bad, depending on how we play it and what he really wants from me.
"So far, he thinks I killed the Daileys and stole the records and the money they managed for O'Hanlon. He would have learned that from O'Hanlon. Most likely, he suspects I killed O'Hanlon and his people in Martinique.
"He may or may not know I was part of taking out George Kelley and his thugs in St. Thomas. Ditto for the hit on Senator Lee, and Nora Lewis, or whoever he thought she was."
"But all that happened a while back," Mike said. "Why did he wait so long to cal
l you?"
"Uh… Maybe it took him that long to find me?"
I hit the mute button on the phone. "I think you should come clean with him, Mary. He may know anyway, and he won't pry into why you went walkabout. Bob's fixed that for you."
She scrunched up her face for a second and nodded, touching the mute button. "Sorry for the delay; I was thinking."
"No problem," Mike said. "Thinking's good. Any ideas?"
"Yes. About that personal business I took care of in the last week or so…"
"You think it's related?" Mike asked.
"Well, as Finn is fond of saying, it's hard to overlook coincidence. I took the time off to nail two personal targets, but I had no idea they were part of this. They were people who — "
I put my hand on her arm and leaned toward her, whispering in her ear. "Skip the explanation. Cut to the chase."
She looked at me and nodded. "Sorry. I was wandering. What you need to know is that I killed Louie Rayburn. Louie may have told the Russian about me after he took me in."
"Aha!" Aaron said. "You were the girl in the 'skirt slit up to here?' The one the Wells woman claimed to have seen."
"Yes," Mary said. "And that business card that Brandon slipped me in the Pink Parrot that night? It had a note on it asking me to come to his office at 5:30 the next evening."
"And?"
"And I did. He let me in without anybody knowing, and I killed him. There was a lot of coincidence between those two hits. My bet is that's what brought me to the Russian's attention."
"Okay," Mike said. "That fits; once he identified you and knew you were in Miami, it wasn't too hard for him to find you. That's a good explanation for the timing, anyhow."
"Right," Mary said. "The Russian already knew what I was from O'Hanlon, but after Rayburn and Brandon, he knew who I was. Or so he thinks. This is all useful background, but unless you have more questions, I'll get back to my point about sending him another text about his two goons."
"Yes," Mike said. "Thanks for the fill-in, but please do go ahead with your second idea."
"All right. If he gets a text from that phone and he knows it's in an empty motel room, he'll know that I'm not just a garden-variety contract killer. I — "
Mike's laughter interrupted Mary. "Sorry," he said, "but the notion of you as a 'garden-variety contract killer' just hit my funny bone. Please, go ahead."
Mary smiled. "Okay. What I was trying to say is that he won't be expecting that kind of technical capability from somebody he thinks is just a hired gun. It might make him suspect I'm working for a government agency."
"But he has the government in his pocket," Aaron said. "Or he thinks he does, anyway."
"Our government, yes," Mike said. "There are other governments that might be after this character, for all we know. He may have worked in other places besides the U.S. But Mary makes a good point. If we send him a text from that phone when he knows there's nobody around it, it will put her in a different league in his eyes. As it stands now, he might underestimate what he's up against. If we send that message, he'll be on full alert. Finn, you've been quiet. What do you think?"
"We're overthinking this," I said. "Let's say Mary sent that first message and left the phone in her room. Then she went out for a drive. What would happen when she came back and discovered someone broke into her room?"
"But wait," Mary said. "They're watching the hotel, waiting for me to come back. They know I haven't returned."
"No," I said. "They know they didn't see you return. Suppose you were covering your tracks and you ditched the car? You could sneak back into the hotel without them seeing you. You would check the door to your room for intrusion. You could have left a tiny length of thread, or a feather, or something they dislodged when they broke in."
"Oh, right," Mary said. "We've both done that kind of thing. So if I spotted that, I might not go into the room. It could be booby trapped, or they could be waiting in there."
"Exactly," I said. "Then what would you do?"
"Get the hell out of Dodge?" she asked. "That's what you're thinking?"
"Yes. And what about responding to his message?"
"How do I know about it?" she asked.
"You checked for text messages to that phone number with another device, maybe. Or maybe you were there when the message came in and that's why you split. You left the phone because you figured they were tracking it once you sent them the text."
"Then I would respond from another burner phone, right? I have his number; I don't need to use that phone in the room."
"Bingo! Like I said, we were overthinking the situation."
"That opens a range of new options," Mike said. "Thanks, Finn. What else can you add?"
"I think Aaron should send a response on Mary's behalf. Say something like she suggested — 'Now that I know I can't trust you, I'm not willing to meet, but I'm still interested in doing business. For now, though, I'm busy with a job for somebody else. If you make me a better offer, I could drop this deal — but it will cost you.'
"It should come from a burner phone somewhere that we've staked out, just to see if he scrambles a team to find it. Kind of like recon by fire. We'll see how he reacts and go from there. Meanwhile, he thinks she's still in the Savannah area. He will warn the target there, if he hasn't already. That means we should hit somebody else the Russian has recruited. Maybe Charleston?"
Mary laughed. "You're going to make him paranoid."
"Maybe," I said. "We could use you like one of Medusa's sisters."
"Medusa's sisters?" Mary asked.
"The Sirens," I said. "Well, maybe the Sirens weren't exactly her sisters, but the Romans thought Phorcys was their father and Medusa's, so they were related."
"What are you talking about, Finn?" she asked.
"The Odyssey. If you sing your siren song sweetly enough, you can lure the Russian and his motor yacht onto the rocks, at least figuratively."
"I like it, Finn," Mike said. "Let's make it happen. Aaron, you know what to do. Mary, you and Finn head for Charleston. That's an easy drive from where you are, right?"
"Five or six hours, depending on traffic," Mary said. "Should we leave now?"
"You may as well. Get yourselves situated there. We'll queue things up and touch base this evening for the target briefing. Anything else we need to cover now?"
I looked at Mary and raised my eyebrows. She shook her head.
"Not from our end," I said.
"We'll talk to you this evening," Mary said.
"Good," Mike said. "You two drive safely. Aaron, stay on the line, please."
There was a click as the connection dropped. Mary smiled at me.
"So I'm a siren, now? Luring sailors onto the rocks?"
I nodded. "It worked with me; the Russian doesn't stand a chance. Let's hit the road, siren."
17
"What's on your mind?" I asked.
She looked over at me and smiled. "Thinking about Mike's reaction to my confession about Rayburn and Brandon."
"What reaction?"
"That's what I mean. He didn't have much of a reaction. Do you think he knew already? You didn't tell him, did you?"
"I told you I wouldn't, Mary. That was your story to tell, or not. But I thought it would be best for you to tell him just now."
"I agree; I'm glad you suggested it. But he didn't seem surprised."
"No. But guys like Mike guard their reactions. You'll never know what he's thinking, unless he wants you to."
"I think he knew. Or at least suspected. How could he have found out?"
I shrugged. "You didn't give Bob Lawson any details?"
"None. Just that there were two men I needed to settle up with for my mother."
"Well," I said, "there are two things that could have tipped Bob and Mike off. One is my old friend, coincidence. They knew you were on the loose and that you started out when you got to Miami. Five people were killed in Miami in ways that misled the cops. That points to you, or som
ebody like you. And they know I didn't do it."
"Okay. That's one thing. You said there were two. What's the other thing?"
"Your Uncle Bob may know more about your mother's life than you think."
Mary frowned and didn't say anything for 30 seconds. Then she asked, "Why do you say that, Finn?"
"It wouldn't be surprising. He was her older brother, and you said he tried to help her from time to time."
"Half-assed attempts," she said, frowning again.
"You were 12 when she died, right?"
"Yes. So?"
"Her life was a wreck for as long as you can remember; you've told me that. Isn't it possible that Bob tried to intervene, maybe before you were old enough to know what was going on?"
"I suppose. But when she died, where was he? When I was caught up in the foster care system?"
"You told me he was in the Middle East when she died, Mary. And that he hired private detectives to try to find you."
"Yes. You're right. He did. I thought I was past being angry about that, but…"
"I understand. The reason I even brought it up is that there's every reason to believe that he might have discovered her connection to Rayburn and Brandon. It could have surfaced when he was looking for you, or even before she died, you know?"
"I never thought of that," Mary said. "But why didn't he do something about them earlier?"
"There could be any number of reasons. If you want to know, you'll have to ask him. But it wouldn't be surprising if he guessed which two men from your mother's past you were going after, would it?"
"No, it wouldn't. You're right. So there's a good chance Mike already knew I killed them. Did you figure that out earlier? I mean, is that why you encouraged me to come clean with Mike on the call this morning?"
"Yes. Like I said, Mike and Bob aren't the kind of people you want to mislead. Not when they're on your side."
She was silent for a few seconds, and then she looked over at me and said, "Thanks, Finn."
"You're welcome, but you would have gotten there on your own."
"That's not why I said thanks. You had it all figured out, but you let me save face. You're a good, kind, thoughtful man."
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