Crown's Law

by Wolf Wootan

  “But Sam! Those tapes had information . . .”

  “. . . that helped your investigation,” he finished.

  “Immensely.”

  “Then use that info and leave me out of it.”

  “You’re good, Sam! The FBI never got a hint of the . . . event on those tapes, but somehow you knew,” she said, taking his hand in hers. “What else do you know?”

  “All I’ll say for now, Bo, is that all roads lead to Dynology. I assume you already know that. Did Becky’s stuff get you the court order you needed?” he replied.

  Bo was silent for a couple of beats, smiled, then said, “No comment.”

  “Good. I thought it would. Let’s change the subject for now. I have an overpowering urge to kiss your scar. What are we going to do about that?”

  “Now, that is a poser,” she giggled. “Definitely not here! Let me think on it.”

  ***

  By the time they got back to the beach house it was after 4 o’clock. Helena’s guests had departed and the caterers were cleaning up. Sam found a pitcher of lemonade on the wet bar and poured two glasses full. He joined Bo at an umbrella table. Becky wandered up, poured herself a glass, and joined them.

  “Where’d you two disappear to?” asked Becky.

  “We walked down to the pier. I didn’t want to be a distraction on your day with your grandparents. They’re really proud of you, Beck, and overwhelmed. You gave them the greatest gift you could have,” replied Sam.

  “You’re never a distraction, Sam! Thank you again for supporting me in this—helping me do it. I’m really your daughter now, aren’t I?” said Becky.

  “Yes, I guess you are. Come here and give me a hug, Doctor Crown!”

  Becky got up and sat on his lap, hugging him tightly. Tears formed in Bo’s eyes as she watched them. John and Helena came out on the deck and pulled up chairs to join them.

  Helena said, “This has been quite a day, hasn’t it?”

  Bo said, “Yes, it has. Thank you for letting me be a part of your family milestone.”

  “Thank you for being here, dear. It meant quite a lot to Rebecca. I think we all owe Samuel a debt of gratitude, too, for arranging things so that Rebecca could become an official part of the family. Not that she wasn’t, it’s just . . .”

  Becky interrupted, “I know, Nana. Nothing has changed except my last name. I’ve always loved you the same!”

  She got up from Sam’s lap and hugged her grandmother, then her grandfather.

  Bo got up and went to the bar and got a handful of tissues. She handed some to Helena, then used the rest herself. John puffed on his pipe and watched his granddaughter, his eyes smiling.

  ***

  When John and Helena left to take an afternoon nap, Becky said, “I’m going down to Billy’s to play video games for awhile, Sam. OK?”

  “Sure. Keep the door open and your foot on the floor,” laughed Sam.

  “Sam!” exclaimed Bo and Becky in unison.

  When Becky was gone, Bo remarked, “I’m having a very hard time grasping this situation, Sam. Becky just received two doctoral degrees this morning, and now she’s off to play video games!”

  “A healthy sign, I’d say. She still has some child in her,” smiled Sam.

  “You know that scar you wanted to kiss?” said Bo, changing the subject. “Not far from that scar is an area that needs a lot of attention right away! Or am I being too aggressive? I know some men don’t like that.”

  “Lesson Number Six. Don’t apologize for letting your needs be known. I like a woman who can discuss her sexual needs openly. That way, there’s less guessing. Let’s head down to the boat for awhile. I’d like to check that area out for you,” laughed Sam.

  “Let me throw some clothes on over this bathing suit and grab my purse. I don’t want to be far from my badge and gun. I’ll be down in a sec!”

  ***

  Saturday night dinner was just for the four Crowns and Bo. Sam had fixed a gourmet feast of small, thick, bacon-wrapped filet mignons and Alaskan king crab legs. John broke out some bottles of his best Portuguese white wine and his Spanish red. Bo and Helena fixed a fancy mixed green salad. Baked potatoes and baby asparagus were available for the very hungry.

  Helena probed Bo’s personal history occasionally and Bo gave candid answers. Bo found Helena a pleasant conversationalist, not as stuffy as she had expected after some of Sam’s descriptions of her. By the time dinner was over, Bo had related how she had grown up in the Colorado mountains, gone to law school, and other personal details even Sam hadn’t known. Both the Crowns liked Bo by the time the cognac was served. Everyone turned down the cheesecake except John and Becky.

  Bo and Becky cleared the table, and the three women then cleaned up the kitchen. Out on the deck, John lit his pipe and said, “Where did you find this filly, Sam? She seems like a keeper.”

  “Just my luck, she lives 3000 miles away,” he shrugged. “She is different than my usual choices. Happened by accident. She came out here to investigate Mickey and found me instead.”

  “I hope to hell you told her the truth about that scam! Why you ever started it is beyond me! You’re always good at solving problems, Sam. If you want her bad enough, you’ll figure something out. Becky seems to adore her for some reason,” said John between puffs.

  “Don’t push, Dad. After all, I’ve only known her a couple of weeks. I learned more facts about her tonight at dinner then I ever knew before. But I admit I do like her.”

  “Well, she has my stamp of approval, as if that ever mattered,” harrumphed John as he played with his pipe. “Even though she’s FBI. We in the CIA never much trusted the FBI.”

  ***

  Sunday was a lazy day, and Bo and the Crowns became closer. Becky was thrilled at how well her grandparents and Bo were getting along. One more hurdle down! Things were moving along just fine!

  Sunday afternoon, Bo got a call from her boss on her satellite phone. He told her to go to L.A. on Monday morning and officially arrest Katie Carlisle for treason, and sundry other violations of the Secrets Act. Bo was personally to escort her to D.C. immediately thereafter.

  Bo told the Crowns that she had to leave in the morning. This news saddened them all. She didn’t tell them about Katie Carlisle, of course, just that she was called back to Washington on business. Sam told her that he would drive her to the L.A. FBI office in the morning.

  After everyone had retired for the night, Sam and Bo slipped into the spa and got naked. It would be their last time together until who knew when.

  Chapter 40

  Monday, June 18, 2001

  Santa Ana, CA

  On the way back from L.A., Sam stopped at the Mickey office to check in with Pearl. He got there at 2 P.M. He told Pearl that Agent Trout had received the tapes and the FBI had found them useful. At least for their espionage investigation.

  He continued, “But I doubt if it helped solve Winston’s murder. I’m not sure anyone is even focusing on that. I don’t know what to do next.”

  Pearl was in the client chair.

  “Oh, that reminds me! I got so caught up in those video tapes, I forgot to tell you that I tracked down where Winston’s body was taken. Still interested?” asked Pearl.

  Sam replied, “Hmm. I do owe Ms. Winston a visit. Maybe she has some information I can use. What do you have?”

  “The plane landed in Green Bay, Wisconsin. So she didn’t lie about Wisconsin. I got online and searched Wisconsin newspapers for obits for the week following the body’s arrival. Nothing for a Winston.”

  “Crap!” exclaimed Sam as he leaned back in his chair, put his feet on the desk.

  Pearl smiled. “There’s more. Three days later, a William Wainwright was buried in Niagara, Wisconsin. According to the obit, he was survived by his sister, Carole Wainwright, and his mother, Mabel Wainwright. Quite a coincidence, eh?”

  “I’ll be damned! She even lied about Winston!”

  “I called the funeral home. The Wainwrigh
t family has lived there for years. They have a horse farm outside of Niagara. Mabel is a widow. William and Carole visited her occasionally. Carole was there for the funeral. The mortician described her as a pretty woman with black hair,” Pearl added.

  “You did good, Pearl. Figure out how to get me there. I’ll pay Ms. Wainwright a visit tomorrow.”

  “Already checked. You can go into Chicago, then to Green Bay. Rent a car and drive up to Niagara.”

  “Book it.”

  ***

  On Tuesday, June 19, at 5:30 P.M., Sam parked his rented Taurus on the gravel area in front of the quaint, white farm house. He could see the stables off in the distance and a fenced-in oval used for training horses and at least an acre of green grass surrounding the track. He wore a dark blue light-weight suit, white shirt, a red-and-blue striped tie, and sunglasses. He wanted to look like a Fed.

  He went up two steps to the covered porch and thought how peaceful it would be to sit in the white rattan rocker on the porch and stare off into the distance, let his mind go blank.

  He rang the doorbell. He heard footsteps inside and then the door was opened by a pretty woman in her early sixties. She had Carole’s facial features.

  “Yes?” she said in a soft voice.

  “Mrs. Wainwright?” asked Sam with his wilting smile.

  “Yes, I am. How may I help you?”

  “I’m looking for Carole. I’m a colleague of hers,” replied Sam as he extended his hand. “Sam Crown.”

  “Oh.” She shook his hand. “She drove to town to get some supplies. The old fridge is running low. Come in, Mr. Crown. Get out of the heat.”

  Sam entered the comfy living room and Mrs. Wainwright pointed to the chintz-covered couch.

  “Take a load off, Mr. Crown. Carole should be back any minute. How about some iced tea? I was about to pour myself one,” she said.

  “That would be great, Mrs. Wainwright,” smiled Sam as he sank into the soft couch.

  “Please call me Mabel. I feel like family around Bureau people. Although, I’m not that happy with you folks right now. You here to straighten things out?” she said as she walked toward the kitchen.

  Sam hated conning the lady, but he needed to see Carole. Also, Mrs. Wainwright certainly didn’t look as if she were dying of cancer. Carole had conned him big time! He needed some answers.

  “Yes. I hope so,” lied Sam, though he wasn’t sure what Carole’s trouble with the FBI was. He was now certain, as he had suspected, that she was an FBI agent. Sam was squeezing a lemon wedge into his tea when he heard someone drive a vehicle onto the gravel out front and kill the engine.

  “There’s Carole’s pickup now,” smiled Mabel. “I’ll get the door for her.”

  She got up and opened the front door and then the screen door and Carole came in with her arms full of grocery bags. Mabel took some of the bags from Carole and said, “Let me help with those, dear. You have a visitor.”

  Carole stared at Sam as he stirred his tea in her mother’s living room. She was slightly in shock at his unexpected presence. Mabel came back in and took the rest of the groceries and disappeared back into the kitchen. Carole was wearing blue jeans and a linen blouse with tiny daisies on it. Her long black hair was pulled back into a pony tail and she wore very little makeup, just a smear of pale lipstick. She took Sam’s breath away! She was actually sexier than she had been in California where she attempted to dress outrageously.

  “Sam,” she murmured after her mother had left the room.

  “Didn’t you think I’d find you?” he asked, also in a whisper.

  “I should have. I didn’t think you would try.”

  “You played me for a fool, Carole. I needed to know why.”

  “Let’s take a walk. We need this conversation to be private,” she said as she held the front screen door open for him.

  He brushed past her, smelled her feminine scent. Different than he remembered it. Simpler, more real. They walked towards the distant stables on the graveled road.

  “I’m sorry, Sam. Shit happens. I didn’t mean for it to be the way it was. You’ve probably guessed that I’m with the FBI. At least I was. I’m not sure now. I’ve been suspended with pay pending an investigation into the botched robbery at Gotrocks’ house. That’s OK. I needed to spend some time here on the farm with my mother. It reminds me of what real life is all about.”

  “Your mother recovered from her deathbed quite nicely,” said Sam, sarcasm dripping.

  “I told you I was sorry! Here, let’s sit on this log. It’s quite famous. It’s called the ‘Kissing Log’ in these parts. I had my first kiss here when I was 11. A lot of kids have used it. Are you going to kiss me, Sam?”

  Sam looked at her and wanted to—badly. But he didn’t. Not yet.

  “Do you deserve a kiss?” he asked, but he couldn’t resist putting his arm around her shoulders.

  “I guess not. But if you’ll give me one, I’ll spill my guts. I’m cheap,” she laughed.

  He kissed her. Not deep and passionate. He knew where that would lead.

  “Here’s what happened . . . ,” she started, then she told her side of the story.

  She was undercover as Mrs. Wellington’s social secretary trying to get proof that she was involved in insurance fraud and diamond smuggling. The FBI suspected she would stage another robbery during the annual Diamond Gala. Carole had got a peek at the phone numbers stored in Mrs. Wellington’s cell phone and had run reverse checks on them. One number was a private line into Dynology, so her superiors were just beginning to look at that group as possible players.

  Then, on that fateful Sunday her brother Bill Wainwright—aka William Winston aka William Jackson, et al—called her. He had been undercover with the ATF for years. He was posing as an arms dealer and was about to make a deal with his buyer the next night. Her brother felt uneasy about the meeting for reasons he didn’t elaborate on, and he had information for his handler whom he was unable to contact until Wednesday. He wanted Carole to hold the information he had put into an envelope until after the meeting. During the phone conversation Carole mentioned Dynology and Bill said he had heard that name, too. Carole gave him the phone number she had gotten from Wellington’s phone and Bill wrote it down on a Mickey Malone card that was in a box on the bar at Sparky’s. That’s when he got the idea to drop the envelope off at Mickey’s on Monday for safe keeping. If he didn’t call her, she was to retrieve it and give it to her FBI handler.

  When she picked up the envelope from Pearl, she panicked. She shouldn’t have gotten in the middle of an ATF undercover operation, plus something must have happened to her brother. That’s when she decided to hire Mickey Malone to find her brother—and met Sam instead. She made up the story about her mother dying to give some urgency to the search.

  Sam interrupted her. “And I suppose the sex was to keep me focused on you and your problem?”

  “At first. Then I just couldn’t stay away from you. You’re quite addictive,” she replied, eyes down, hands clasped on her lap.

  “So why are you in the dog house with the Bureau?”

  “The Diamond Gala. We expected it to be robbed—or, at least, we hoped it would be. We had a helicopter in the air, and three cars hidden strategically nearby. We were going to follow the thieves to their contacts and see where it led us. You foiled that quite nicely,” laughed Carole. “I got blamed for taking you there.”

  “Wow! Why didn’t you tip me off?”

  “I tried to, but you dashed off into the night. I called our controller and warned them off; then I called 911 like you told me. You know the rest.”

  “Not all of it. What was in the envelope?”

  She hesitated. Sam watched a man riding a lawnmower out on the huge lawn, the odor of fresh-cut grass assaulting his senses.

  “Look, Carole, I know who killed your brother, but I have no evidence that would hold up in court. I need everything you have to help smoke him out.”

  “You know who killed Bill?”
she gasped.

  “Yes. Don’t ask how I know.”

  “I gave the sealed envelope to the FBI.”

  “But you took a peek first, didn’t you?”

  Hesitation. “Yes. I thought it might help me find Bill. I knew nothing would move fast, what with the FBI and ATF trying to sort out who was in charge of what. I steamed it open and then resealed after I had read it. It mentioned Bill’s worry that his contact suspected him. He mentioned Dynology as a possibility. Nothing concrete, however. He documented some of the meetings and a description of his contact—a man who called himself Gunther.”

  “Probably an alias. Crap! Nothing to sink my teeth into!” exclaimed Sam. “Unless you’re still lying to me, Carole!”

  “I’m not! I’m sorry I didn’t tell you in California. Things might have turned out differently.”

  “I can’t believe any of this! The Feds stumbling all over each other. Nobody talking to the other. In the meantime, the bad guys are still on the loose! Shit! And they’re trying to make you the goat,” grumbled Sam. “Or me?”

  “My FBI group and the ATF have been ordered to stay away from Dynology. Another group took over the investigation.”

  “Typical. Study it to death. Have meetings. Solve nothing!” exclaimed Sam.

  He thought, Bo’s group must be the investigating group de jour and they seem to have no interest in the murder.

  “I shouldn’t have taken you to the gala. But I wanted to be with you one more time before I left town. I never considered you’d take them down!”

  “You shouldn’t have underestimated me. I’m good at what I do.”

  “I have from the beginning, I guess. Forgive me?”

  “Hell, of course! You’re not the first to do that.”

  “Do you have a hotel room? Maybe we could . . .”

  He interrupted. “No, Carole. I’m taking the next plane home. Not that I’m not tempted. But I have a killer to bring down.”

  He kissed her gently on the lips.

  “Be careful, Sam. Bill was good, and they got him.”

  “I’m not easy to kill.”