“She did tell me one thing. The night they learned the outcome of the DNA tests on the dead brothers, an unknown person tailed them in Caracas.”
“What?” Mathew asked in a surprised voice.
“They left the clinic after talking with the head geneticist,” Callie said. “Annetta, well Julio then, detected a tail behind their rental car. They zigzagged around, picked up their luggage and engaged a private jet to take them to an island in the Caribbean where they docked her speedboat.”
“Someone understands the Fuentes well enough to figure out where they went for the genetic analysis or who tracked them in the Caribbean, not easy on the open seas, but also not impossible if they planted a transmitter on her boat,” Mathew said.
“She say how they got to Caracas?” Steve asked.
“Same way. Hired jet service."
“Why didn’t she tell me about this?” Mathew posed the question with a tone of annoyance.
“I don’t think Annetta shares anything about herself easily. She is reserved,” Callie said.
“Information constituted her stock and trade for many years,” Steve interjected. “She needed the talents and contacts to acquire saleable material and understand when to disclose the info to the right person at the best price.”
“How did anyone know about the graves and the bones taken?” Callie asked.
“By tracking Cruze and Annetta or perhaps we have a rogue at the FBI or DEA with security rights to the Fuentes files,” Steve said. “I’ll find out who accessed those files from the logs in Sentinel. None of our findings from this year are in the system, but the theft of the brothers’ femurs is.”
“Let’s jot down notes on possible scenarios. Well done getting that nugget out of Annetta, Callie,” Mathew said, turning to her with a smile.
“I only listened,” Callie said.
“Sometimes you can be the right ear at the right moment with the interest and patience to let the person talk,” Steve said.
Ivy sat frowning. “Did you get shots from the street cameras in London and the station videos at Gare du Nord?”
“Usual fuzzy stuff,” Steve said with a wave of dismissiveness.
“Did you run comparisons to check if any of the fuzzies matched?” Ivy said in that persistent way she had.
“Waiting for copies of the media from Gare du Nord as they sent super-fuzzy screen grabs. When they arrive in the D.C. office, I’ll tell them to run the photo comparison software.”
“We should understand what video or still shot recorders the police have in place in Caracas,” Ivy said. “See if any photos are similar.”
Steve raised an eyebrow at her suggestion and nodded. “Mathew, reach out to the Fuentes for the date this tail went after them and where in the city they noticed him.”
“Will do,” Mathew said. “Also, Annetta should revert to the Julio image to keep her real self concealed until this is over. I’ll tell Brian to talk with her tonight.”
Mathew nudged Callie’s foot under the table and smiled at her. “You just earned your way into the Spook Hills Gang.”
A little smile came to her lips at his praise. Mathew could see that she liked being useful and enjoyed belonging. All those years she had expended on John Henry, where her life centered on that selfish prick of a man, had frozen her personal development. Each day now she became more his, but Mathew also wanted her to be her own person too.
The plane started to descend as they neared Atlanta where they made reservations at an airport hotel for lodgings and a meeting room. Once they landed and taxied to the gate, Mathew verified the signal on his cell phone and selected Brian’s number with his good hand. Unclear photographs or not, the murkiness around who shadowed the Fuentes might soon disperse.
Late in the afternoon Mathew received a call back from his buddy in the New York office. He reminisced with him on the phone about a case they had worked together against a ring transporting heroin out of the Middle East across the Canadian border and down into Seattle, Chicago and New York.
“Whatever happened to the Warthog?” Mathew said into the phone. “I was called upon to testify, but I never heard the result.”
"The Bureau canned him. Now the DEA uses him to consult on a few matters as an adjunct field agent,” his friend said in reply.
“Always at his worst in the office. If they keep him doing undercover work, the arrangement might work. Didn’t he smoke some funny foreign cigarettes?”
“Yeah, black ones as I recall – Turkish or Russian.”
Mathew mouthed the word ‘Bingo’ to Steve, using his interjection for a definitive match.
“Well if Turkish, I’d bet on Djarums. What’s the Warthog doing these days?” Mathew asked.
He continued talking to his pal for another ten minutes and hung up and said, “The Warthog got fired from the Bureau for the harassment issue this past spring. Last my contact heard about him, he took off for South America – Caracas to be precise. He consults now with the DEA.”
“Might be he wanted to extort money out of Cruze and Annetta or pump them for connections,” said Steve. “Sounds like this Gerkasky is our prime suspect but we’ll continue keep researching the rest of the short list the Fuentes gave us. We need to keep in mind that Gerkasky could have a grudge against you as well as me.”
Steve thought for a moment and then asked, “One thing puzzles me -- why did the Fuentes call him PercyNarc?”
Mathew flushed as he slid his eyes to Ivy. “Still the boy scout? I’ll tell you later.”
Ivy smirked a little and said, “Steve, the Narc part you know.”
“Yeah, narcotics agent or DEA, but what about the Percy part?”
“Genital warts. The street name is ‘Percy’.”
Both men regarded her with surprise.
“I sometimes used to read the Urban Dictionary to stay current with my younger staff,” Ivy said smiling a little smugly.
Steve raised an eyebrow at her. Mathew snickered, even though he was starting to slump in his chair from tiredness.
“Time for your pills and a lie-down,” Steve said.
“We’ll need to send an update later to Brian and Moll,” Mathew said, his voice quavering with pain. Be back in a couple of hours.”
Chapter 31
The three of them boarded the Bubird in Atlanta long before dawn the next morning to fly back to Miami where they planned to locate in protected nooks in the cemetery near the parents’ burial place. Steve worked most of the night pursuing useful evidence on the Warthog, making Mathew amazed as ever at his stamina.
“Here's what I’ve found so far,” Steve said, as the plane queued for takeoff. “Gerkasky, traveling under his name, was in Paris and London the same time as you, Moll and the Fuentes. It is possible that he planted and used those tracking devices the cousins found in their clothing and gear.”
“When did he return to the U.S.?” Mathew asked.
“Two days ago, via New York.”
“Which means he either tailed us in London, or he embedded a tracker still not discovered.”
“The question is, why did he go after you in the restaurant?” Steve asked.
“Not Gerkasky. He wasn't one of the two men,” Mathew said.
“A contract might be out on at least one of the Fuentes which means Gerkasky could be working as an informant,” Steve said. “One more time, who did the shooters aim at in the London restaurant?”
“For sure Julio, since the bullet hit me when I hurled myself on top of him. Any insights on Gerkasky after arriving back stateside?” Mathew asked.
“Nothing yet. I put requests out to obtain airline ticketing every hour. Gerkasky could be traveling under another name. Or if he is consulting with the DEA, he could be flying on one of their planes,” Steve replied.
Steve finished the early breakfast served on the flight and cranked back his seat for a few minutes sleep. Ivy spread a blanket over him and kissed his cheek, letting him drift off into a power nap. They need
ed him as sharp as possible for their operation that morning.
Mathew reviewed the cemetery layouts Ivy downloaded, pointing out possible hiding places at their scheduled stops. As the plane descended to land at the Opa Locka Executive Airport in Miami, they selected a small mausoleum with a good view of the Fuentes parents’ gravesite. Then they gathered up what they would need at the cemetery and hurried out to the car waiting for them on the tarmac. Ivy slid behind the wheel while Steve gave her directions from the GPS on his phone.
They arrived in darkness at the cemetery, moved to their stations and settled into their surreptitious positions to protect the Fuentes. Steve had a hunch any attempt on their lives would happen during their last stop at the graves of the brothers. Hunch or not, they needed to secure all three sites.
Once at the graveyard, Ivy shook as if from a chill, even though the Florida air felt warm after the damp days in England. She zipped up her fleece vest and did the same with her windbreaker. Mathew suspected her nervousness made her chilly. Nevertheless Ivy stood with Steve. Mathew missed Callie, but he knew she needed to be at home with Susannah. The whole gang met Callie at the airport when she arrived the previous evening, relieving him of worries about her.
Ivy had the job of acting as a lookout behind them, pressing herself against Steve’s back. Mathew focused on the view of Cruze's parents’ headstone. As the day began going light, a dark limousine pulled up. He muttered into the wireless transmitter. “No danger noted so far.”
Brian and Moll jumped out, assessed the area and gestured to the car. Julio and Cruze stepped from the limo cautiously and approached the gravestone for his parents. Each cousin carried two white roses. They stopped, bowed their heads, prayed and crossed themselves, then laid each bloom by the grave marker with reverence. Cruze walked forward to place his hand on the polished gray granite stone and then he backed up next to Julio.
All continued undisturbed around them. Cruze took out a small camera and took a few photos of the gravesite in the soft morning light when the sun popped up above the horizon. From what Mathew saw from a distance, each of them wiped tears from their eyes, likely thinking of their lost youth, his parents, and their memories of better times.
They stayed about twenty minutes before walking back to the car with dragging footsteps, reluctant to leave Cruze’s parents’ resting place for the final time. By reverting to her Julio image, Annetta conformed to his instructions to keep her real identity concealed. She slung her arm around Cruze’s shoulder as they walked back, oblivious to those who guarded them.
After the departure of the limo, Mathew signaled their need to hasten to their next flight. Steve indicated that tying up two Bubirds on one operation was causing ripples at the Bureau, but with a smaller, faster jet, they would arrive at the property in Madrid about an hour in advance. Once there they would stake-out the scene out in a similar way. If all went well at the Fuentes place this afternoon, they would pass the night in Albuquerque and slip out to the brothers’ graves early the next morning. As they drove away from the cemetery in Miami, Mathew glanced over his shoulder, caught a movement and turned to stare behind them.
“Ivy, stop!” he said from the back seat of the car. “Someone is behind us.”
“Turn around or back up?” Ivy asked.
“Turn around. Proceed at a reasonable pace. Be ready to accelerate if needed.”
Ivy turned the car around in a big arc before cruising back past the entrance to the cemetery where a man attempted to run to a car parked on a side street. A noticeable limp hampered his pace. When the man turned, they realized it was Lenny.
“So now we have another level of protection on the Fuentes,” Steve said shaking his head. “Who the hell is guarding Spook Hills?”
They stopped and rolled down the windows to talk with Lenny.
“Guess I’m too old and lame to be sneaking around,” Lenny said in a voice even gruffer than usual as if to mask the weakness in his shot-up body. “We kept worrying about you. Good thing I was here too. A man studied your movements through field glasses. Flat on the ground behind one of those big floral blankets over in the easy-mow zone by the cremies. He came in about a half hour before you did and left by crawling backward after you headed to the car.”
Mathew choked back a laugh at Lenny’s calling the cremated remains cremies, “You see the guy?”
“Long, thin face. Dressed in black, even covered his head with a skullcap. I can tell you what he smokes.” Lenny rummaged in a pocket and showed them a small baggie containing the stub of a black Sobranie cigarette.
“The Warthog. Who’s on guard at home?” Steve asked.
“I called in a couple of retired agents from last year’s sting – hope I did right,” Lenny replied. “Rick wanted me here with you. So did Sassy, Susannah and the Terry guy. Terry, the two cats and the corgis all moved over to Rick’s house. Nothing going on but they thought Terry should have company. The alarm is set at Spook Hills and agents are patrolling it.”
Steve turned to Mathew, raising one eyebrow as he did.
Mathew said, “Bunch of worriers. Glad you are here. Best person I know to cover our backs. Let’s get to the airport. We’ll drop off the cars, and you can hop on the Bubird with us where we can bring you up-to-date.”
Lenny grinned and nodded, both pleased and a little sheepish. Mathew closed the window and said, “I’ll call Rick later to make sure all is well. What the hell is the Warthog after?”
“Passing information on to someone – DEA, narcotics kingpin, underworld mob leader or whatever,” Steve said. “Gerkasky may be smart enough to conclude the Fuentes cut a deal with us and somebody is interested in what they are handing over.”
Ivy straightened the car out, turned around and started for the airport, glancing in her rearview mirror to make sure Lenny followed her.
“We should activate some troops out of the Albuquerque FBI office,” Mathew said. “If a powerful figure is plugged in with Gerkasky, we will have a bloodbath wherever and whenever a strike is scheduled.”
“I’ll line up a crew of ninjas on standby. Call Brian or Moll and tell them to hold in Albuquerque until they hear from us,” Steve said.
“Arrange an assault van like we had last year,” Mathew replied, sliding his eyes from Steve to Ivy. “We’re conveying precious cargo.”
After finishing his calls, Steve leaned over to whisper to Ivy as she turned into the airport and she smiled and nodded, making Mathew wonder what secret they shared. Little moments enhanced affection. While not at the same point with Callie, he anticipated the day they too would collect such tiny treasures. Waking up to her sitting next to him in the hospital made him more confident of her love. When the divorce from John Henry went through, he hoped the only remaining obstacle to their future together would be removed. For now, his mission was keeping them all alive to enjoy benefits yet to come.
Hours later, Ivy eyed the Fuentes square modern home lurking against the dry landscape. She rose out of the car as cautious as a prairie dog poking its head above ground.
"Same as before," she said, nodding towards the house.
From his slumped posture, Ivy could see that he Mathew was tiring even though he caught some sleep on the plane. Daylight and even their energy levels dictated the necessity of moving this stop along. As long as nothing untoward happened, their schedule allowed the cousins to spend up to an hour at the property, before hustling back to Albuquerque to settle into their hotel rooms.
With a SWAT team in place, Steve went to confer with the FBI leader out of the Albuquerque office who stood at attention after his last encounter with Steve. Warmth lingered here in New Mexico, although a cool tinge in the breezes said autumn hastened this way. Ivy scanned the prominences and the sky, searching for a sign of any threat.
“This place gives me the willies,” Ivy said to Mathew, as they walked over to the house. She struggled to repress a fission of fear. “It affects Steve too, I think because he virtually died here.<
br />
“When you walk away from the house, the acreage opens up and the air seems free of the menacing vibe. That arroyo we explored a few weeks ago was magical with its steep cliffs and narrow flat bottom. Seemed almost enchanted until I encountered that electrified field where the brothers hid an SUV for escape purposes.”
Steve walked back to them. "Mathew, you stand in the entry foyer along with one of the sharpshooters from the Albuquerque office. Then go through the house with the Fuentes, giving them privacy as they move around to let them share the experience in their own way. Ivy, pull this van behind the old well. We’ll shelter there with Lenny when the Fuentes arrive. Right now, let’s go through the house just to be sure it is as we left it.
After about a half hour when Steve, Ivy and Lenny were back at the van, the limo carrying the Fuentes stopped near the front portico. Moll exited first, swiveled his head around the site, gave a wave to Steve then turned to face the house. He nodded at Mathew and opened the rear door. Brian bounded out, surveyed the location and gestured for Julio and Cruze to join him. The little group went into the house, Brian leading and Mathew and Moll walking in last.
An hour or so later, with the evening gloaming started, Mathew came out of the front door. As he neared Ivy and Steve, he noticed Ivy gazing up at the nearest hill. Her grip tightened on Steve’s arm.
“Someone is out there,” Ivy said.
“What?” Steve said whirling around, gun at the ready, pulling Ivy down next to him.
Mathew squatted down behind the van, then bent around by the bumper to peer at the vista around them.
“Ivy, what did you see?” he murmured.
“I detected a presence,” she said, uneasy about signaling an alarm based on nothing but a sense of someone creeping around.
“Always trust your instincts,” Steve said. “Mine helped me more times than I can count.”
Mathew called Brian to tell him to keep the Fuentes inside. A couple of agents ran up and raked the hillside with their night goggles.
New Growth (Spook Hills Trilogy Book 2) Page 28