Logan sat at the receptionist’s chair and grabbed a pen, twisting it in his free hand.
‘You’re jet-lagged and I’m up in the middle of the night,’ Irvine laughed. ‘We’re making a lot of sense.’
Logan put the pen down and ran his hand up, through his hair. He leaned back in the chair as the female agent came out into the reception area. She glanced at him as she walked past and went out to the elevators.
‘Where’s Alex?’ Irvine asked.
‘He’s locked in with the FBI chiefs and the cops right now talking about this stuff.’
‘How come you’re excluded?’
‘Nobody likes lawyers.’
‘I kind of like this one.’
He smiled. ‘Nice of you to say.’
‘Listen, I’m going to go back to bed. See if I can’t get some sleep before the alarm goes off. I expect I’ll be up to my neck in paperwork tomorrow. It’ll be a nightmare.’
‘Okay. I’ll see you when I get back.’
Irvine sat the phone handset down on the kitchen table and sipped at a cup of tea. It was comforting in the middle of the night when the darkest kind of man was still out there.
She thought about Frank Parker and his son. They were so secure in their place in the world. No matter how reasonable Parker seemed, or how desperately he wanted to be considered some kind of old-fashioned gentleman, he still ruled by violence. People died on his say. He sold drugs that ruined lives. And what now?
Soldiers turned drug dealers shot in the head.
People laundering drug money tortured and killed in their own homes.
Parker had shaken her with his visit. No doubt that had been part of his strategy too. Letting her know that it didn’t matter that she was a cop — he could still get to her whenever he wanted to. Business would be done on his terms.
She drained her cup, rinsed it in the sink and went upstairs to her room. She used to love getting into bed and pulling the quilt up to her chin, safe in the womb-like warmth. But tonight she couldn’t get warm, the cold ingrained in her bones.
And when she closed her eyes all she could see were the faces of the dead.
16
Hunter took his time explaining his investigation from start to finish, giving a lot more detail than he had to Cahill and Logan back at the police headquarters building. He spoke in depth about the information that the DEA had shared with him and the intercepted communications.
‘If Tim Stark was here he might be able to tell us if this Mexican had been in touch with Raines,’ Webb said when Hunter was finished.
‘Maybe he heard something and that’s when he put it all together,’ Cahill said. ‘And was going to get in touch with you, Detective Hunter.’
Webb nodded, looking thoughtful.
‘It’s plausible,’ he said. ‘But there’s absolutely nothing concrete to back it up, is there?’
‘No,’ Hunter said. ‘You’re right.’
‘But you’re going to do something about it, right?’ Cahill asked, feeling a little exasperated.
‘Of course,’ Webb answered. ‘We’re going to treat it as a line of inquiry. Try to find out if there really is a link.’
‘But it’s obvious.’
‘No,’ Hunter said. ‘I know it kind of sounds like it might be, but it’s not. Look at what we have. The only thing actually linking the two investigations is your e-mail. It might have been a reference to me, or it might have been something else altogether.’
‘And because Tim Stark is dead we can’t know for sure,’ Webb added. ‘So we have to treat it like any possible lead. Run it down properly.’
Cahill knew they were right, but still fought against it. He wanted Stark’s death to mean something. To lead somewhere.
‘So what now?’ he said.
Logan’s eyes were starting to close when a phone in the office rang. It pulled him from his near sleep, the ring tone slightly different from the other phones he had heard go off since he had been there.
Martinez got up from his desk and went to a phone on the wall next to the door out to the reception area. He spoke into it for a moment and listened for what seemed like a long time, though it was probably no more than a minute or so.
He hung the phone up without speaking again and went back to his desk. He spoke quietly to his partner, Ruiz, and they both put their suit jackets on and left the office in a hurry. Logan followed them out and saw that they headed up the corridor to where the meeting was.
Webb stood as if to signal that the meeting was over.
‘Let’s speak again in the morning,’ he said to Hunter. ‘Work out where we go from here.’
Hunter nodded.
‘And who does what,’ he said. ‘I mean, we can’t just hand our investigation over to you guys. You know that, right?’
‘Of course.’
There was a knock at the door. Agent Martinez opened it and walked in, followed by Ruiz.
‘What is it?’ Grange asked.
‘There’s a man downstairs says he needs to speak to the agent in charge.’
Everyone looked at Webb. He was impassive.
‘Well,’ Webb said. ‘Is that all the information he gave you? Because I’ll tell you right now, it’s not much to go on.’
The more he saw of Webb, the more Cahill liked the man.
‘Uh, sorry,’ Ruiz said. ‘He says his name is Matt Horn and he has information about Seth Raines and Tim Stark.’
17
Raines knew straight away what Horn was doing at the building on Stout Street. Knew that the FBI had their office here. He wanted to feel something about it. Felt nothing. He looked again at the gun sitting on the passenger seat beside him.
Raines watched as Horn climbed out of the back of the cab and went to the intercom at the side of the main entrance to the building. The place was locked up tight at this time of night, but there was a security guard inside in case anyone came around. He guessed that happened a lot. Given the FBI’s line of business.
The cab pulled away, leaving Horn alone with one hand pressed on the glass of the building’s door while he leaned in to speak to the guard through the intercom.
Raines grabbed his gun, opened the door of the car and stepped out. He walked around to the front of the car leaving the door open. He stopped at the edge of the sidewalk, thought about running over there and taking both of them out in an instant. No witnesses.
Horn leaned back from the intercom and Raines saw the guard inside get up from his desk. He looked like a retired cop. Carried himself that way.
Raines took a step forward into the road.
He tightened his grip on the pistol.
But the moment passed as the guard opened the door and ushered Horn inside. The guard looked over at Raines before turning to go inside the building.
Raines went to the car, sat inside and dropped the gun on the seat.
He picked up his mobile and dialled the number for the compound.
‘Change of plan for tomorrow morning,’ he said when his call was answered. ‘Bring everyone.’
Part Nine:
1
Logan was alone in the main part of the office when Cahill came in through the door from the reception area. Cahill walked over and sat on the edge of the desk beside him.
‘What’s up?’ Logan asked. ‘Looked like something was causing excitement.’
‘Yeah, you could say that. One of the soldiers in the group showed up. Guy called Matt Horn.’
‘Seriously?’
Cahill gave him a look.
‘What are you, a sixteen-year-old girl?’
‘What?’
‘ Seriously,’ Cahill repeated, shaking his head.
Logan stood and went to the window. He looked down on to the street and saw a car parked on the other side of the road. He watched it for a moment before it drove away, then turned to Cahill.