He keened his ears, listening for any unusual clicks or hum on the line.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Joey finally said, growing more uneasy. “Tell you what. You ask your people to break Joey off a little waste-removal job, and I’ll see what I can do. Does that sound fair, reasonable?” He waited, now more sure than ever before that Laura had told him the truth. “I can’t make any promises, since, like I said, not to be redundant and repeat myself, but I just hear things—don’t get involved and that kinda business. I’m strictly legit.”
He passed on the bait, and ended the call with professional courtesies. Laura and James owed him, and in a way, he owed them for the heads-up on contracts that would have gone down without him. They could come to terms and settle up later, but not during what he was now sure was a federal wiretap. George Townsend was a dead man walking. Nobody set up Joey Scapolini and got away with it.
“He didn’t take the bait,” the federal officer said, looking at Townsend with an icy glare. “Got any other bright ideas, or people we should call? If your story doesn’t check out, you’ve got hard time staring you in the face, buddy.”
“Brother B, listen to me carefully and quickly,” James said under his breath from the cybercafé. “Go to the U.S. Embassy.” He cut off the elderly man’s words, too hurried to argue politics with him.
“Put Steve on the phone.” James paced as Steve got on the line. “Yo,” he said in a rush. “Get everybody out of the house, they blew the one in town—you’re sitting ducks in the bush. Go to the U.S. Embassy. Call in Milton Montgomery, Megan’s dad, if you need a witness, and you probably will. Then give ’em Cap’s number in the States. You guys go in unarmed, scared, as victims being hunted that need governmental protection. And, you spill the beans—it was Russians, by way of some Main Line boys. Whatever you do, don’t mention Caluzo or Scapolini. You’re just victims who are scared shitless and fully cooperating, and you don’t know shit about where me and Laura are at the moment.”
“Shit,” Steve murmured. “That role won’t be hard to play at all.”
Laura’s semi-charged cell phone vibrated on the side of her purse as their cab took its leisurely time to get to the airport. She opened it and stared at it, showing the text message to James: Watch your back. The feds are in it. GT called from an FBI joint, gut hunch. You owe me. Will settle later. It’s all good. Your pal, JS.
“Oh, shit,” James said, leaning his head back and closing his eyes.
“It costs to be the boss. Gotta break him off something, anyway,” Laura said, her tone philosophical as she stared out the dingy back window, hoping they weren’t being followed. “It’s the way of the world.”
Chapter 16
Full-blown paranoia strangled her as they waited for the next flight to Grand Cayman within the bustling airport. Each time a Jamaican officer passed, or anyone with a uniform on for that matter, her eyes felt like they would bug out of her head, even though James’s contained the command to be cool. The extra sets of phony ID that she’d stashed in her brassiere and underwear were making her sweat bullets. If they didn’t get on a flight soon, she was sure that she’d fall dead away from the stress. Now she owed the mob big-time, too?
Her hands were shaking as she used the last of her minimal battery to make a call. She wished that she’d had more time to get a solid charge on the unit, but that was the primary issue—they’d run out of time. She punched in Elizabeth Haines’s new cell phone number. She’d only heard it once, but had memorized it instantly. James’s eyes held a question, but he didn’t say a word as she worked. Their communication had deepened to glances and pure trust.
“Liz,” she said quickly, huddling down to make her muffled words private to the airport throng. “My battery is going. Listen to me carefully. The only way to get your ass out of this sling is to give Scapolini something he wants. Break him off a piece of the Gulf cleanup, somehow, and tell him Laura sent you. That will make him your friend.”
“But—”
“No buts!” Laura said in a tense whisper. “You do it. I have to go.” She hung up and looked at James. “Debt paid in full, I hope. At least that will temporarily keep Scapolini off our asses, and make him know that I heard him. Might even save Liz’s sorry ass.”
“Good move, ” James said, impressed. “I just hope Cap worked some magic on his end, before we touch down.”
The flight seemed interminable, even though it was a short hop by flight standards, island to island. Yet the fact that it was nearly dusk when they landed didn’t improve her case of the jitters. This situation was so different than the smooth operations they’d pulled in Philly so many years ago. This job had death-trap written all over it, and she hated not being in full control with a stacked deck. All of it was high-risk, high-stakes poker with an unknown wild card in the mix. This evening, she wasn’t inclined to be a betting woman.
The moment she saw what was clearly a plainclothes officer waiting by the Customs area, both she and James bristled. His line of vision went directly to them. Two more men in khaki suits were with him. His face was vaguely familiar. Tall, lean, handsome, dark brown complexion ... where did she know him from? He had cop oozing from his pores; it was the no-nonsense grit. James had clearly seen it, too.
“Be cool,” he told her under his breath, and handed off their forms to be stamped at the desk. “We walk by, nice and slowly. They’re looking for someone, might not know who, exactly, and you just smile, lean on me, and chill. We’re weary travelers. We do this like Union Station.”
She nodded, but her instincts told her that the thin plan wasn’t going to work. Her hunch was corroborated the moment they cleared Customs and three detectives advanced.
“A word, Mr. and Mrs. Carter,” the man in the lead said, not waiting for them to respond. He flashed an official shield, causing a mild stir of interest from onlookers.
James nodded and complied, and they crossed the small airport to get into a police minivan parked outside without a struggle.
“I’m Detective Hayward,” the man who’d accosted them said. He nodded to the driver. “That’s Officer Dowell, and the man beside you is Officer McFadden.”
Three sets of serious eyes greeted Laura and James within dark brown, deadpan faces.
“I’ve seen you before,” Laura said, trying to wrap her brain around the authorities that held her, and gain insight into their position.
Hayward nodded. “It’s always a surprise when you meet people out of context, isn’t it, Mrs. Carter?” His glare held quiet fury. “You put my family at risk.”
Instant memory soaked into her brain. “Mr. and Mrs. Melville ...” She glimpsed James, whose jaw muscle was working overtime in his silence.
“My elderly cousins who would have been at that house—”
“Which is why we sent them away,” Laura said, leaning forward. “Ask them.”
Hayward sat back in his seat and looked ahead, carriage erect. “We’ll discuss it all down at headquarters.”
Three very skeptical officers sat on the edges of desks and took to folding chairs in a small interrogation room as a very ornery-looking captain remained unreadable. James kept a close eye on each man’s body language. He knew cop unspoken language well, and was fluent in it.
Laura produced her laptop for them to inspect. “I have a missive from a person with State Department contacts. You have word from a police captain and the FBI in Philadelphia. See for yourself,” she added, theatrically, turning her laptop toward them. “All these men have been in business together for years. You have a copy of the original will, the more updated ones, and can see how me and my family were put at risk because of it.”
Hayward finally nodded. “I can see that much with my plain eyes. But what I don’t understand is this—why would they need to be so bold, create so much havoc, when they could have easily sent a messenger to threaten you into their position? This is the part that we cannot fathom.”
“Nor can we,” Laura said flatly.
>
“Listen, man,” James said, speaking slowly, his eyes going to each man in the room, but finally settling on the one who had the most at risk, since his family had narrowly escaped tragic involvement. “I’m proposing a sting, Hayward. We need to do that to bring your case to a close and seek justice for those two officers that got killed. I used to be a cop, too—and we both know good and damned well that it ain’t over till it’s over, once they’ve killed one of our own. They got two of yours.”
“You got dat right,” their captain said. “Not on my island.”
James eyed the man who’d finally spoken, and then sent his gaze back to Hayward, negotiating hard. “Me and Laura have to do it, to get the bounty off our necks.” The two men’s gazes locked in silent struggle. “Even if you just send us up the river to tidy up your paperwork, and to make it look good for the people on Grand Cayman, me and Laura will still be working to solve this crap from behind bars with a time bomb ticking over our heads.”
“Send us up the river, make us have to await trial, if you want to ... but how do you know whether or not they’ll send a cleanup crew after anyone who’s been in our house, might have seen anything, might have been in our employ—like your cousins?”
“All right!” Hayward shouted and stood. “What do you propose?”
Strained glances fell on Laura and James.
“We use the chaos of Carnival to see if they still have a gunman on our asses,” James said in a flat tone. “You put us in a downtown hotel, near the action, with a wire, and several men walking point. You take any bastard down that comes for us—with a tranquilizer gun—and then lean on his ass, if you get him. We’re gonna need a trust factor between us, though.”
“So, if we agree to your proposal, you’re talking about a possible incident in a crowd of tourists,” the captain said, shaking his head. “We depend on tourism as one of our primary industries, and it is already bad enough that there’s even been a hint that terrorism has reached our beautiful island!”
“That’s why you don’t do any blind shooting into crowds and only use tranquilizers to numb any target you profile,” Laura said, her voice straining with urgency. “Correct the bull in the media with a leak, stating that it was an unsavory Russian-inspired business deal gone down, linked to something in the U.S., not terrorism, so people can rest easy and think it’s gone back from whence it came. Give them a shred of the truth to go on; two Cayman officers simply got in the way by accident. Meanwhile, if you do capture an aggressor, tell them he’s being shipped back to the States so all can go back to normal here. But, ultimately, James and I are going to have to get back to Philadelphia to set up the ones behind this.”
“We’re not allowing you to leave here without assurances that you two aren’t more directly involved. The deaths happened here, thus, justice will be served here.”
James gave the men around him a disgusted scowl. “You want us to take lie-detector tests? Whatever.”
Laura allowed her tone to become more civil. “Listen, gentlemen,” she said coolly. “We’ll take whatever tests you want, and you can work out the details of dé-tente with our stateside authorities, even if that’s a hand-off from you all to them, with a guarantee of our return here, should things not pan out.” She glimpsed James. “We’re heavily invested in the Caymans, as I’m sure you know by now. I’m also sure you can seize our assets as a good-faith gesture, to ensure our return, if you haven’t already.”
She held Hayward in a steady, serene gaze, and then turned it on his captain. “Besides, think of the feather it will be in your respective caps to have solved an international crime that involved a senator from the States, several VIPS, a gun battle in the streets of Washington, D.C., and a filthy U.S. foundation ... as well as your unfortunate officers—who were simply victims that were in the wrong place at the wrong time, but due to Hayward’s shrewd observance, didn’t die in vain. That gunman was killed on the spot, justice served neat, from his revolver,” she said dangling the career-enhancing options before all the detectives in the room. “Even our local police and FBI in the U.S. couldn’t solve it alone, nor could Jamaican authorities, which experienced incidents on their island. You can send a clear message to the people of Grand Cayman that your expert involvement was the lynchpin that cracked the case here, and that will go out over the BBC. I have friends in the U.S. media, trust me.”
Laura sat back, folded her arms over her chest, and waited for the tender offer to sink in. James didn’t move a muscle.
“Fine,” the captain said, finally standing with the others. “But if you die trying, it will not be on our heads.”
“This is a loosely constructed, raggedy-assed plan, if ever I heard one, Laura,” James grumbled, changing into a bright red Polo shirt as she slipped on a bright red dress. “We’ve got targets on our backs,” he muttered, referring to the bright colors they wore so they could be easily spotted in the street crowd that was growing below the balcony of their hotel.
She didn’t immediately answer him, but simply listened to the steady calypso beat that thrummed through her as the noise of revelry cascaded through the closed sliding glass doors and windows. “We go downstairs, blend into the crowd, buy a rum and coke, and sip it calmly at a very open, outdoor café,” she said flatly, picking up her purse.
“And if the hit man puts a neat bullet in our skulls?” James folded his arms over his chest.
“Then we died fast and quietly,” she said picking up her purse. “And nobody else we love gets hunted or hurt.”
“That’s bullshit,” he said, following her out of the room. “These guys down here ain’t used to high drama, SWAT maneuvers, or anything else!”
“I know,” she said coolly, walked down the exit staircase, undaunted. “That’s why they probably won’t catch anyone, if there’s still anyone tracking us, and we’ll get a free pass home to wrap this up old school.”
James kept his eyes moving on the passing crowd of partying tourists and native revelers. Masks, giant floats, and colorful costumes moved like a sea of liquid human color. His wife was insane, so were the Cayman authorities. This plan had failure etched all over it, but as crazy as Laura was, she did have a point.
She was ice-cool. He observed the way she took a sip of rum and coke, glanced up at rooftops, windows, and then through the throng, her motions steady, unflinching, like a spider waiting to trap a fly. Suddenly, without warning, she leaned across the table to kiss him, and he lifted his drink between them to salute her.
Instantly, the glass shattered in his hand. Pandemonium broke out. They were on their feet, screams shattered the festival, and people ran like roaches scattering in the light. A blur of costumes and halted floats almost made the filled thoroughfare impassable. Café tables overturned, shouting officers and sirens blared. Chaos was in full effect.
Breathless, they took cover in a restaurant, rushed through past tables and shrieking patrons, hit the kitchen unsettling angry chefs, and ran out a back alley exit into the darkness. Unsure of which way to turn, they hesitated, and another shot hit a Dumpster and a trash can. James pulled her into a darkened doorway, and then they both made a flat-out dash to another building, hiding beneath the fire escape.
Police vehicles careened by both ends of the alley, flashing lights and making the crowds disperse and run like fleeing lemming in all directions. More shouts from authorities, and then several plainclothes men rushed past them. Within moments, the two-way that James wore squawked. “We got him!”
“He won’t be fully conscious for several hours,” the doctor said, his worried gaze going to Detective Hayward and then to Laura and James.
Hayward signaled to his men. “You both stay armed, in his room, and when the bastard comes to, you call me.”
“I guess that’s a pass for a flight to the States,” Laura said, trying to keep victory out of her tone.
“I’ll call the captain,” Hayward snapped, looking at both Laura and James with fury. “You just make sure t
hat your media friends get the story right. An incident like this during Carnival will have a bad effect on tourism for us.”
“Too close for comfort,” James said, rolling the tension away from his shoulders as they sat in the airport under heavy, plainclothes authority guard. “Any bright ideas for the move when we get back to Philly?”
“No ‘thank you, baby’? No ‘that was brilliant, sweetheart’?” she said under her breath. “No ‘not bad for thinking on your feet’?”
“No ‘you were right, James’?” he muttered under his breath. “No ‘glad a bullet missed the kiss, darling’?”
He didn’t answer her. She didn’t press her point. They had work to do.
“All right, gentlemen,” Laura said quickly as several FBI agents met them at the gates. “You’ve been briefed, I take it.”
They nodded without words.
“I’m gonna need a blue business suit, a wire. James is gonna need a car that can move.” She glanced at them. “Can you guys get into my old house on Pennsylvania Avenue, and sweep my Jag to make sure it’s not booby-trapped?”
“We’ll send somebody over there,” one of the suits said. “We’ll put the wire on you both down at headquarters—we’ve got a coupla cots down there you both can sleep on. Better stay with us, have several conversations, then we can discuss the plan in depth.”
“That’s a crazy bold move,” Captain Bennett said, adding his two cents into the discussion as FBI officials took weary seats around the war room. “Maybe we should just send in a team to arrest the bastard.”
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