The Eye of the Tigress

by Paul Coggins

  “If you’re looking for Maggie,” Bowers said, “she doesn’t want to see you.”

  “How do you…?” Cash clammed up. Better not to discuss Maggie with the Bureau’s biggest backstabber. “She’ll be the judge of that.”

  “She’s already made her decision, and it’s set in stone.”

  “What do you mean?” Cash said.

  “Since that involves a personnel matter, it’s for me to know and for you not to find out.” Bowers pushed the button.

  From the sixteenth floor, down was the only direction.

  ***

  Cash followed Bowers to the corner office on the third floor of the courthouse, but he stopped at the doorway. “Hey, Gina, isn’t this Webster’s office?”

  “It was.” Delgado’s stockinged feet rested on the desk, ankles crossed. “And I go by Regina now. That’s twice you’ve been told.”

  Cash entered the office, wondering what would happen on the inevitable and imminent third strike. No need to guess what had befallen poor Webster.

  The D.C. bigwig had rolled into town and displaced First Assistant U.S. Attorney Webster, who then bumped the Criminal Chief, who in turn booted the Civil Chief from her digs.

  And so on and so forth. In the bloodless coup, only the high-and-mighty U.S. Attorney had held firm. Her minions had fallen like dominoes, surrendering their space in the bowl to the bigger fish.

  Cash studied the familiar diplomas on the wall (Duke B.A., summa cum laude; Harvard J.D., magna cum laude), as well as the constellation of kiss-ass plaques from law enforcement agencies who owed Delgado big time.

  “I see you’ve made yourself at home,” he said.

  “I’d be more than happy to pack up and leave.” She swung her feet off the desk. “All you have to do is persuade your guilty-as-hell client to do the right thing.”

  “The right thing being….”

  “Plead guilty and do a little stretch. He’ll come out with plenty of time to line up a fresh crop of victims. Rinse and repeat.”

  “Define little,” he said.

  “Four.”

  “Months?”

  She laughed. “Years. He cops to conspiracy, draws a nickel but does only four years behind bars. Maybe three if the judge has a soft heart.”

  It was Cash’s turn to laugh. “Fergy and soft are not words found in the same sentence. Come to think of it, neither are Fergy and heart.”

  Bowers stood by the door, useless as an umbrella in a hurricane.

  Cash nodded toward the agent. “What’s doughboy doing here?”

  Bowers clenched his fists but didn’t make a move. Cash gave him a get real look.

  “He’s my case agent,” she said.

  “Thought by now you would’ve learned your lesson about saddling up the wrong horse.” Cash pointed to the agent. “This nag will never cross the finish line.”

  Bowers took a step toward Cash, who stood his ground. Bluff called, Bowers backed away.

  “Stan, let me talk to McCahill alone.”

  The agent started to protest but shook it off. He stormed from the office, slamming the door behind him.

  “Now that you don’t have to put on a tough girl act for the Bureau,” Cash said, “care to make me a real offer?”

  “I can do better than that. I’ll make you a package deal.”

  “Define package.”

  “You deliver Fine to us,” she said, “and we’ll give you points for cooperation on your case, cut you an ex-friend and ex-family deal.”

  “My case?” Cash’s knees buckled, but he recovered quickly. “A deal on what? A new car? A refi on my mortgage?”

  “One that shaves a year or two off your sentence. Once we figure out your role in the murders of Mariposa Benanti and Rob Rhoden, you’ll need a friend with a badge, and Agent Burns won’t be around to bail you out this time.”

  The mention of Maggie rattled Cash, almost as much as the threat of a return to prison. He hoped his face didn’t show it.

  “This isn’t El Paso,” he said. “You actually need hard evidence to bring a case here.”

  “Both Benanti and Rhoden were killed shortly after you visited them. That makes you either part of a conspiracy or, like the media says, the Angel of Death. Not sure which is worse.”

  “If you had anything on me, you would’ve pitched Fine a deal to dime me out.”

  “Who says we haven’t?” She smiled. “Between you and your client, let’s see who flips first.”

  ***

  Maggie leaned against Cash’s Porsche. Strike one. Her briefcase lay atop the roof. Strike two. Her flats adorned the hood like twin ornaments. Strike three.

  The muted lighting in the underground garage played tricks on Cash’s eyes. Made Maggie’s blonde, white bread beauty look darker, more exotic.

  “Scratch my wheels, young lady, and I’ll have your ass.” His voice echoed in the nearly empty garage.

  “You’ve been there, done that.” She managed a weak smile.

  “Practice makes perfect.”

  She pushed away from the car. “Practice? Is that what I am to you?” She sounded more sad than hurt. “Gutsy move back there in the courtroom, announcing ready for trial this month when you’re nowhere close. Incredibly stupid and certainly suicidal, but gutsy as hell.”

  “At the end of a long, hard day, I knew I could count on you for some words of encouragement.” He unlocked the car and tossed her briefcase into the backseat. “Care for a lift?”

  “Sure.” She opened the passenger door. “Take me to a fancy restaurant for a farewell dinner.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  “First time since my arrest that I’ve set foot in the Ritz.” Cash recognized about half the diners in Fearing’s, mostly lawyers and those in need of their services. “First time ever with you.” He reached across the table and took Maggie’s hand.

  Her hand was twitchy. No way would she pass a polygraph in this condition. She pulled free of him. “Technically, it’s the second time, if you count the night we busted you here for jury tampering.”

  “Let’s not.” He lifted his glass for a toast. “Here’s to taking our relationship to the next level.”

  She didn’t reach for her glass. “What level would that be?”

  “The one where you’re willing to be seen in public with me. In the past we’ve skulked around back streets and eaten at holes-in-the-wall, like a couple of cheating spouses.”

  “Because I feel like one,” she said.

  He lifted his glass higher. “Here’s to freedom from irrational feelings of guilt.”

  When she raised her glass, her hand shook. “In the gospel according to Kris Kristofferson, freedom means you’ve got nothing left to lose.” She clinked glasses. “Here’s to nothing left to lose.”

  Cash savored the aroma of the Hall cabernet. “What was that nonsense about a farewell dinner?”

  “I’m being transferred.” Her tone turned bitter.

  He killed the glass of wine. Didn’t help. Not enough wine in the world to lift his spirits. Or deaden the pain.

  “To a new division?” he said.

  “New city.”

  “The bastards are sending you to the mother ship in D.C., aren’t they?”

  She shook her head. “Bismarck, so it’s more like they’re booking me on the Titanic.”

  “Bismarck!” Cash’s raised voice drew glares from surrounding tables. A waiter hustled toward them. Cash waved him off.

  He leaned in and whispered, “Is this some kind of sick joke?”

  “Do you see me laughing?” Her eyes misted. “I thought that exiling fuckups to the frozen tundra went out with Hoover.”

  Cash’s mind warped to defense lawyer mode, grasping for any loophole, delay, or backdoor deal that would keep her in Dallas. He had nothing.

  He pounded the table hard enough to rattle dishes and diners nearby. A contagion of cleared throats and stern looks swept across the room. He could give a flying leap.

  “You
’re not the fuckup here,” he said.

  “What would you call an agent who’s sleeping with the lawyer voted most likely to be indicted? Make that, indicted again.”

  “I would call it the best thing that has happened to me in a long, long time.”

  A tear slalomed down her cheek. “Sorry, but it looks like you and me, well, it just wasn’t meant to be.”

  Cash wasn’t ready to give up. “Alternatively, this could turn out to be the best thing that has happened to us.” He reached across the table. “Shake hands with your new partner.”

  She didn’t take his hand. “What exactly are you proposing?”

  The proposing part threw him for a loop.

  She laughed. “You look a little green in the gills, Cash. Don’t read too much into my poor word choice.”

  He breathed easier. “Quit the FBI and come work with me. I can use a crack investigator, especially one who knows where the Bureau has buried the bodies.”

  She laughed harder. “Me, working for you?”

  “No, you working with me.”

  “You’re not serious,” she said.

  “I’m dead serious.”

  “Dead being the operative word, because if we were thrown together twenty-four seven, I’d shoot you within a week.”

  “How do you know until we try?” he said.

  The waiter filled their wine glasses, emptying the bottle. “May I bring another bottle of the Exzellenz?”

  “Keep ’em coming,” Cash said.

  Maggie dabbed her eyes with a napkin. “I’m touched by your offer.” Her smile faded fast. “But you’re delusional if you think we could ever be on the same team.”

  “You believe that working with me would mean defecting to the dark side, but it’s not like that. When the U.S. Attorney’s Office tossed me out, I thought my world had ended. It took years to get over the blow to my ego. Hell, I never would’ve bounced back, if Goldy hadn’t taken me in.”

  “You might want to share that with him someday,” she said, “and make it soon.”

  Point taken.

  “Sure,” he said, “carrying a badge has its rewards. You work nine to five, try to do a little justice, go home feeling all warm and fuzzy inside, and sleep soundly. But the defense world has its own set of rewards, and I’m not talking about money.”

  “Though there is that.” She made it sound like a bad thing.

  “There’s far more than that. People come to you at the lowest points in their lives, with no one else to turn to, desperate for a champion. The game is stacked against them, and they’re the ultimate underdogs. You’re their white knight in a land of dragons.”

  “Some might say more like a black knight,” she said. “And correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t I hear this spiel about champions, underdogs, and dragons in your closing argument in the Campos trial?”

  He smiled. “Good memory.”

  She stared into a bowl of tortilla soup, still untouched. “I can’t leave the FBI.”

  He shook his head. Not in disbelief but in sadness. Hardly the first time he’d encountered A.S.S.—Abused Spouse Syndrome. Married to the Bureau for life, she’d take all the shit the agency could dish out and crawl back for more.

  He made a last stand against the inevitable. “For someone who grew up in the Deep South, spent four years at Ole Miss, and scored plum postings in Miami, LA, and Dallas, every day in North Dakota will seem like a year in Siberia.”

  “You could travel north every month or so,” she said, “to thaw me out.”

  “Yeah, maybe.” He failed to muster an ounce of false hope. Reality hit him hard. She was already gone, and the asshole Bowers had been right. Maggie had made her choice, and it hadn’t been close.

  FBI, one. Cash, zero.

  “I’ve lost my appetite,” she said. “Can we get out of here?”

  “Sure.”

  “But before we leave, hear me out.” She paused until they locked eyes. “You’re officially a person of interest in the murders of Mariposa Benanti and Rob Rhoden.”

  Cash nodded. Delgado had already dropped that anvil on him.

  She went on. “You’ll be offered all sorts of deals to cooperate. Get everything in writing. Don’t trust Bowers and trust Delgado even less.”

  “Tell me something I don’t know.”

  She leaned in and lowered her voice. “The FBI and DEA are waging a turf war over the La Tigra investigation.”

  “Same old, same old.”

  “No, this one’s different. Bloodiest internal battle I’ve ever seen. It’ll go up the ladder to the AG to sort out.”

  Bingo.

  Maggie had come through with something he hadn’t known. The agencies had brought guns to a knife fight. Possible that one or both would wind up wounded. Even better, she had offered something he could potentially exploit. Maybe an angle to keep her in Dallas. Or reel her back soon.

  Before Cash could share his seed of a strategy with Maggie, his cell phone chirped. He made the rookie mistake of taking a collect call from the county jail.

  A life-or-death one.

  He stood and threw his napkin on the table. “Time to slay another dragon.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  The collect call from the county jail came too late to spring Chris Campos before lights out. That would be a bummer for most prisoners but could be curtains for one whose survival turned on whether he got tossed into the clink as Chris or Tina.

  DEA agent Duane Leroy Lee—the arresting officer—had given the trans prisoner a break by taking Campos home post-arrest and allowing her to shed the clingy dress, Cher wig, stiletto heels, and layers of makeup, before booking him as Chris.

  Actually, Campos had caught a double break. Not only had Leroy done him a solid with the transformation from Tina to Chris, but the agent also had a history with Cash. Unlike most of his bros with badges, Leroy had a soft spot for the turncoat.

  A dinosaur at the DEA, Leroy had roamed the streets of Big D since the days of dime bags and Dilaudid cocktails. In the distant past, he had worked a string of low-hanging dope cases with a green prosecutor who had a funny first name.

  Cash. As in the stuff Leroy had too little of. Cash McCahill.

  They had made a good team, with Cash not asking much of the agent, who had obliged by doing the bare minimum to secure convictions.

  During his decade on the dark side, Cash had defended only a handful of druggies, never by choice but only on court appointments. Luckily, Leroy had not been the case agent on those court-appointed cases, so Cash had never crossed him on the stand.

  Today, Cash made a flurry of calls to friends in low places, scrambling to locate Leroy. His feelers extended to smoky dives, dark bars, and rent-by-the-hour motels. He tracked down the agent at Spike—a bar in Deep Ellum that catered to teens with fake I.D.s and the pervs who preyed on them.

  Slouching in a back booth, Cash watched Leroy chatting up an easy mark and noted how the sands of time had shifted. Back in the day, the agent had been broad-shouldered and narrow at the hips. Today, he was pear-shaped.

  Susie Sorority’s wide-eyed wonder made it clear that she was swallowing Leroy’s bullshit. With both hunter and hunted perched on barstools, the seduction played out like a scene from Beauty and the Beast.

  A more apt title would be Beauty and the Bust. The tragic tale of a clueless coed in the crosshairs of a grizzled grunt during the last gasps of the drug wars.

  Cash’s defense lawyer instincts kicked in. He walked to the bar and stuck out his hand. “Agent Lee, it’s been years, but you haven’t changed a hair.”

  True enough. Same patchy comb over and bad dye job.

  Leroy didn’t take Cash’s hand. “Sorry, hot shot, but you’ve mistaken me for someone else.” The fuck off was silent.

  “Agent!” The prey had caught the keyword.

  “Why, yes,” Cash said to Muffy, or Buffy, or whatever. “Allow me to introduce you to a living legend in law enforcement. Special Agent Duane Le
roy Lee has been with the Drug Enforcement Administration for as long as runs the memory of man. What’s it been now, Leroy? Twenty-five years?”

  Long enough for the agent to recognize a cockblock when he hit one. He turned to the ashen-faced girl. “Twenty-two years, three months, and twelve days to be exact, and my next official act will be to arrest this asshole attorney for obstructing justice.”

  The teen took off, leaving behind an untouched Cosmopolitan but holding onto her fake I.D.

  “Now that the minnow has wiggled off the hook,” Cash said, “join me at the booth. I’ll treat you to a beer.”

  “I’m on duty, so no booze.”

  Cash gave him a don’t-shit-a-shitter look. The agent’s claim of abstinence would’ve been more convincing, if he hadn’t had a beer mustache and an empty mug in hand.

  Leroy shrugged. “Okay, McCahill, one brewski before I bust you.”

  The tone told Cash that the agent wasn’t serious about the bust. Nor about stopping after the next beer.

  After they settled into the booth, Cash took the first shot. “Who’d you piss off to wind up on this shit detail? I mean, come on man, buy-busts of college kids? Can you go any lower on the food chain?”

  The look on Leroy’s leathery face straddled amusement and annoyance. “You want to take her room in the Graybar Hotel? Make my night, mouthpiece, and offer to buy a rock from me. Be sure to speak up, so I can get it all on tape.”

  “If the DEA is so hard up for stats that it’s targeting trust fund babes,” Cash said, “the agency needs to send in someone who doesn’t remind the kids of their grandpa.”

  “A lot of these chicks dig older men.”

  Cash ordered a round of Coronas. “By older, Leroy, they mean thirty, not three hundred.”

  “What’s your excuse for being here?” Leroy said. “You scrounging for a buck, a fuck, or both?”

  The beers came. Leroy guzzled his. Cash nursed his drink but ordered another for the agent.

  Leroy went on. “When you turned in your badge, you swore to steer clear of dopers. What a load of crap. Well, go ahead and spread your cards around the bar, then get the hell out of here. You’re killing my business.”