Hard Shot (A Jon Reznick Thriller)

by J. B. Turner

  Cortez took off his gun and slid it across the table to her. “What about my badge?”

  “That’s up to the OPR. For now, I’m going to put this in the field office main safe. At least for now.”

  Cortez nodded, staring at the floor. “I just wanted to say, ma’am, that I’m truly sorry.”

  Meyerstein just stared at him, feeling nothing but contempt.

  Nineteen

  Reznick was deep in conversation with Greer on the beach in Sag Harbor when his cell phone rang. It was Meyerstein.

  “Jon, I got something,” she said.

  She gave him a terse update. It centered on a face-to-face conversation with Special Agent Leon Cortez. It hardly seemed possible.

  Reznick looked at his watch. “This just gets worse. The Aryan Brotherhood and MS-13. Where’s the chopper?”

  “Ten minutes out. I just wanted you to know.”

  “Appreciate the heads-up.”

  “Stay safe, Jon.”

  Reznick ended the call.

  “That your boss?” Greer said.

  Reznick nodded. “Well, the person I report to,” he said. He took a couple of minutes to explain what he’d heard. “Does all that sound probable? Or even credible?”

  Greer said, “I might be able to help you here. I know Cortez.”

  “You do?”

  Greer nodded, shielding his eyes from the setting sun. “We worked surveillance on gang and drug task forces over the last few years. Yeah, I know the kid.”

  “What was he like?”

  “He was very good. Diligent. Serious. Steady. But . . .”

  “But what?”

  “What you told me doesn’t surprise me.”

  “What doesn’t surprise you?”

  “The addiction.”

  “I don’t understand. You just said he was diligent.”

  “Six or seven months ago, I caught him passed out. It was a Joint Task Force investigation—FBI, DEA, NYPD—and he was slumped in the back of an unmarked car.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “The guy was doing heroin.”

  “Was this reported?”

  Greer sighed. “Look, I didn’t want to get the kid in trouble. I just told my boss I didn’t want to work with him. And that was that.”

  “Jimmy, we don’t believe this is simply about the O’Keefes or one rogue agent.”

  “I think you’re getting closer to the true picture. The big picture.”

  Reznick said, “Tell me what you know. What is the big picture?”

  “Look . . . this is difficult for me. I signed a nondisclosure agreement. My lawyer says this would open up future actions against me. I need my pension.”

  “Fuck your pension, you’re talking to me. And only me. Ten cops dead? Tell me what you know. Don’t give me any nondisclosure agreement bullshit.”

  Greer stopped on the beach, hands thrust into the pockets of his jeans. “The O’Keefes—all three of them—were low- to mid-level drug smugglers across the United States. We were keeping an eye on the whole operation. The drugs came up through Mexico and then connected with the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas.”

  “That’s better. I’m starting to get a feel for the big picture.”

  “The ABT in turn used their members in that area—Houston, Dallas, Corpus Christi—as mules, including the O’Keefes, who frequently came up to New York. But this goes beyond just a joint operation smuggling methamphetamine and heroin. This was so much more. And that’s what you really need to understand.”

  “Jimmy, you’re killing me. What else do you know?”

  “This all comes down to one guy. Charlie Campbell.”

  “The O’Keefes’ stepfather?”

  Greer nodded. “He was a top guy in the Aryan Brotherhood. A player. When he was released seventeen years ago—and by the way, I have no fucking idea how they let him out of jail; he still had a twenty-nine-year stretch ahead of him . . .”

  “Hang on, so Campbell should never have been released?”

  “Check the guy’s record. He was given forty years. He served eleven years.”

  Reznick stopped walking as he contemplated the ramifications of releasing someone like Campbell. But also the chances of being released with that kind of criminal record. They began to walk on. “OK, so are you saying, and I don’t want to put words in your mouth, that you believe he was being protected?”

  “He was an asset. A major-league informant. And so much more. I probably don’t know the half of it.”

  “Tell me about the half you do know.”

  Greer shook his head. “I had some serious run-ins with the Feds in New York, just in the last couple of months. We’d been working together, but all of a sudden the task force seemed like it was a constant battle, and I didn’t like how they kept on interfering in our intelligence operation.”

  “The field office?”

  “Yeah. We were getting stalled left, right, and center. It got to the stage where we were just going ahead and ignoring the Feds, and it was all sort of shit after that.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I suddenly had some disciplinary black marks against me, complaints piling up—anonymous complaints. It ground me down. Department of Justice lawyers were suddenly questioning whether NYPD and the New York AG had any state-level case against Campbell and the O’Keefes or whether we needed to hand it all over to the Feds—who, as I mentioned, were showing zero interest in pursuing these guys. Eventually, my lawyer made a deal to get my pension and full benefits early, just so long as I kept my head down and shut the hell up.”

  “How did it all get so crazy, Jimmy?”

  “Cortez was a weak link in the chain. But he wasn’t the main problem in the scheme of things. Campbell was involved with the Mexican Mafia and MS-13. But those mean motherfuckers would have tortured and killed him if they realized he was a government asset.”

  “American government asset?”

  “Got it.”

  “Tell me about Campbell’s arrest and sudden death, which seems to have sparked this.”

  “Happened about a week after I was moved out. NYPD undercover gang officers were furious that Campbell was still free despite the great case they had against him and the O’Keefe boys, and they decided to move against him, without the FBI’s or the DOJ’s say-so. Without the DEA’s say-so. And the bastard was put in some choke hold, was struggling like a madman, and the fuck died. I for one won’t shed any tears over the bastard.”

  “And from there?”

  “And from there, all the rest followed. Complete shitstorm.”

  “If I told you that members of the Mexican Mafia made veiled threats to Special Agent Cortez, what would you say?”

  “The Aryan Brotherhood and Mexican Mafia are businesses. They need to make money. And any threat to that is a threat to them. But also, Jon, I don’t know if you know this about Campbell, but he was a regular visitor to Mexico once he got out of prison. DEA photographed him with several cartel associates. He was running an operation across the border, undoubtedly with the O’Keefes.”

  Reznick was starting to get an inkling of the multiple strands and complexities of the investigation. “So if the task force investigation led to arresting Campbell, the primary conduit into and out of Mexico, the cartel’s go-between with the Brotherhood would be gone.”

  “That’s just the beginning. He was also running guns into Mexico and the US.”

  “Guns? Are you kidding me?”

  “AK-47s. But—and I heard it from a CIA guy who was on a joint terrorism task force a couple years back—Campbell was also tight with the Agency.”

  “The CIA?”

  “Langley had operatives who trained the Mexican military, federal police—they exchanged information, intelligence, but also had links with those at the top of the Sinaloa Cartel.”

  Reznick stared at Greer. He was only now starting to understand exactly how Campbell had gotten away with so much for so long. “Campbell was a strategic i
ntelligence asset—is that what you’re saying?”

  “Precisely. And he was protected. By the cartel, but also by the CIA. The Sinaloa tipped off the Agency and the DEA about drugs being trafficked by other cartels, and they were left alone. Friend of mine on the force told me the Department of Justice made sure the FBI was out of the loop. And Cortez was a useful idiot in the whole complete mess.”

  Reznick ran his hands over his face, trying to get a handle on a seriously fucked-up situation.

  “Charlie Campbell was essentially a logistics coordinator for the Mexican Mafia and the AB,” Greer said. “But the CIA knew this. They had their fingers in many pies. Mexican politicians, police, army, cartel. They were pulling the strings. And the end result was all that junk flooding into the United States. Methamphetamine, heroin, and cocaine. Tons of it. They left Campbell alone. Why? Campbell was supplying intelligence to them. Opening up contacts. Secret back channels to and from Mexico.”

  “This is crazy.”

  Reznick looked at Greer, who was facing him, the beach stretching behind him. He could see, plain as day, that the ex-cop was telling the truth. The unvarnished truth.

  Suddenly, Greer’s face exploded, blood and brains everywhere. The crack of a rifle shot echoed in the distance.

  The ex-cop collapsed in the sand, his body lifeless.

  Reznick instinctively threw himself on the ground and scrambled for cover. He turned around. Farther down the beach, about half a mile away, a sniper rifle was aimed straight at him.

  Twenty

  Bullets peppered the sand, dangerously close.

  Reznick dove for the cover of nearby sand dunes. He hunkered down. A dull phut sounded as a shot tore into the long, sandy grass. He was breathing hard. Another bullet. And another. Then nothing.

  He waited, not daring to move.

  Reznick couldn’t just keep wondering how long the gunman would hang around. He scrambled up the dunes and peered over the top. In the distance he saw what looked like a thickset white man getting into a black SUV. The car sped off.

  Reznick ran back down the beach and crouched over the dead cop’s bloodied body. “Oh shit, Jimmy.”

  The sound of chopper blades echoed in the distance. He turned and saw the FBI helicopter swooping in low as it prepared to land on the beach.

  He looked up, frantically waving his arms. “Here! Here!”

  Reznick felt the downdraft from the rotor blades. The sand was whipping up in his face. He screwed up his eyes and turned his back on the chopper. He felt a terrible chasm begin to open within him. He was responsible. He wondered if he could have prevented the killing. Was it just bad timing? Had the sniper been keeping watch on Greer, or had someone followed Reznick and he’d led them straight to Greer? Was the killer Todd O’Keefe?

  His mind began to race ahead as the chopper set down. He realized he couldn’t leave Greer’s still-warm body just lying on the beach. It would soon be swarming with cops and God knows who else. He needed to get Greer’s body out of there. Besides, the bullets that had killed him could also be identified by the medical examiner during an autopsy.

  He hunkered down for a few more moments as the helicopter landed. The door opened. The guy inside signaled him toward the chopper.

  Reznick slid one hand under Greer’s torn, bloodied head and one under his legs, and carried the body. The Fed inside the chopper nodded, pulling the body inside.

  “Jon Reznick?” the Fed asked.

  Reznick nodded. “Yeah. We need to get out of here, son.”

  “Who is he?”

  “Ex-NYPD cop, Jimmy Greer. We are not leaving him here. Under any circumstances.”

  The Fed nodded. “Agreed.”

  Reznick slumped in a seat and buckled himself up, a million thoughts running through his head as he strapped Greer’s lifeless body in beside him. The Fed adjusted his headset and strapped himself in on the other side.

  The pilot leaned back and handed Reznick a headset. He put it on.

  The pilot’s voice filled his ears. “I was just asked to pick you up here and take you back to Manhattan. What the hell is this?”

  “This is a dead ex-NYPD officer.”

  “That’s not my problem.”

  “It is now. Listen, a sniper just took this guy out. He got in a black SUV and sped off. I want you to find the bastard that did this. Can you try and track him?”

  “Negative,” the pilot said. “My orders are very specific. To pick you up, and only you, and take you straight back to Manhattan.”

  “I’ll get you the authorization. Get me Martha Meyerstein, patch her through onto the headset. I’ll speak to her. We don’t know if the guy in the SUV is going after anyone else.”

  “Roger that. Stand by.”

  The helicopter took off, banked in a southerly direction before heading due west. A few moments later, Meyerstein’s voice crackled through the headset. “Jon, what happened?”

  “The cop—the undercover cop, Greer, I was speaking to—has just been taken out. Long-range sniper.”

  “Are you kidding me?”

  “Negative. Happened on the beach here in Sag Harbor.”

  “Copy that.”

  Reznick sighed. “Martha, the guy escaped in an SUV. Black SUV. He’s three, maybe four, minutes ahead of us. But we should be able to catch him. I want the go-ahead.”

  “Jon, this is coming at us from all angles. I think we should leave that to an FBI SWAT team.”

  “It’ll take too much time to get them out here. We don’t know what this guy is up to. We don’t know if it’s Todd O’Keefe. No fucking idea.”

  “Let’s do it.”

  “Thanks. Martha, I’ve got Greer’s body here in the chopper. I didn’t want him lying on the beach.”

  “What?”

  “We’re dealing with a concerted attempt to kill cops. I want authorization to take him with us.”

  “You’ve got the go-ahead from me. Get him to Manhattan, we’ll get him to the mortuary. This is too much for one day.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “One final thing, Jon. Probably seems incidental after what’s just happened, but did you find out anything at all from Greer?”

  Reznick relayed their conversation. “Charlie Campbell was being protected. He was a government asset. And he was also linked with the Mexican Mafia. I’m telling you, this is fucked up. And it ain’t over.”

  “I got that, Jon. I’ll get the backup you need.”

  “Whatever it takes.”

  The pilot came back on. “He’ll probably want to get onto the turnpike, and then head to the Montauk Highway.”

  “Let’s get there. I want that bastard taken down.”

  The chopper veered back to the south over the turnpike, flying low. They scoured the roads below, mile after mile, but no vehicle matched the description Reznick had given. The chopper swooped low as it skirted the back road toward Bridgehampton.

  Reznick swore. “Nothing!”

  “He could have headed east in the direction of Montauk. Then again, he could’ve gone west toward Southampton.”

  “Try Southampton. That’s also the road back to Manhattan.”

  The pilot nodded. “Copy that.”

  The chopper veered west and then flew directly over the westbound traffic on Montauk Highway.

  Reznick scanned the road for black SUVs.

  “Could be anywhere,” the pilot said.

  “Copy that. Let’s just follow this road. And if we get nothing, hopefully the cops will be able to catch him.”

  Reznick wondered how the hell they weren’t seeing anything. Had the driver changed vehicles? That was a possibility. But as it was, there was no trace. It was as if the car had disappeared into the affluent Hampton oceanfront communities or adjacent verdant farmland, gone forever.

  The earpiece crackled to life. “Jon, it’s Martha. We have a visual.”

  Reznick clenched his fist. “Copy that.”

  “Our forensics guys have been lo
oking over surveillance cameras in and around Sag Harbor. They’ve located the SUV. It’s a Mercedes, a rental. Hired by a Bobby Campbell.”

  “Campbell?”

  “Yeah. Brother of Charlie Campbell. Been based down in Florida for about twenty years.”

  “Location?”

  “That’s the thing. The SUV is approaching a house located at 253 Meadow Lane, Southampton. Ultra-exclusive oceanfront community.”

  Reznick tapped the pilot on the shoulder. “You get that?”

  “Copy that,” he said, and pointed the chopper directly to nearby Southampton.

  Reznick said, “What else do I need to know?”

  “The house is owned by Tom Friedkin, none other than the attorney general of New York.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

  “Friedkin was the guy who prosecuted Charlie Campbell and his brother all those years ago.”

  “Out for revenge?”

  The chopper was swooping dangerously low over huge mansions by the water, right on the beach.

  Meyerstein said, “That and helping the O’Keefes to carry out numerous headline-grabbing spectacles.”

  Reznick tapped the pilot on the shoulder. “Land at the rear of the house.”

  “Roger that.”

  Reznick adjusted the headset. “Martha, one final request.”

  “What?”

  “Get the number for the Friedkin home, call and tell them to hide. I’m on my way.”

  “Good luck, Jon. SWAT team is en route.”

  “It’s going to be too late for that.”

  Twenty-One

  Reznick looked at the Fed in the back of the chopper. “You got a rifle?”

  “A rifle?”

  “Simple question. Have you got a rifle on board?”

  The Fed nodded. He reached under the seat and popped open a metal gun box. “Sir, I don’t know if this is part of the orders we were given.”

  “Assistant Director Meyerstein has given the go-ahead to intercept the shooter in the SUV.”

  The Fed handed Reznick the high-powered rifle. “It’s only supposed to be myself or the pilot who can use that, sir.”

  Reznick checked the sights, then clipped on the magazine. Flicked off the safety. He adjusted his headset. “Pilot, get me within two hundred yards at a height of seventy-five yards! I need to see what’s going on.”