Shit!
He sprinted across the room and grabbed the phone message from Holly and punched the numbers into the nightstand phone and heard an annoying beeping. He hadn’t punched nine first. He stabbed the button and waited an eternity before hearing a dial tone, forcing himself to slow down and dialing Holly’s cell number carefully.
“Holly Simpson.”
“Holly, listen to me very carefully. We blew it, blew it badly.”
“Who is this? Nathan?”
“We blew it.”
“What are you talking about?”
“The farmhouse. I think they were there last night, the Bridgestones, Leonard and Ernie.”
“What? How? That’s impossible.”
“Get back out there Holly, get SWAT out there as fast as you can.”
“Nathan-”
“Holly, please, just do it.”
“But we’ve had the farmhouse under constant surveillance, even before the raid. Nobody’s come or gone from there.”
“Last night I saw what looked like a large diameter pipe sticking up above the ground near the property corner under the windmill. I didn’t think twice about it until now.”
“Another tunnel,” she whispered.
“Holly, be careful, have your people check the garage again, the light switch.”
“I’ll call you later.”
Nathan began pacing the room. “They played us, Harv. They put on a dog-and-pony show and we bought it.”
“You could be wrong, they may not have been there.”
“They were there.”
“Nate, you can’t know that for sure.”
“I didn’t put it all together, I should’ve. Their cousins could’ve lasted a lot longer than they did. They gave up the cabin and the cash to satisfy us, to make us think we’d gotten something valuable. They threw us a bone to get us out of there. I think they had this whole routine planned in case they were ever questioned by the FBI or police. That place was their safe house by design, from the beginning.”
Harv said nothing.
“It was the garage. It kept bugging me. I thought to myself, no way. There’s no way this garage should look this neat and tidy. These guys were total slobs.”
“What if you’re wrong? Holly’s risking a lot taking a SWAT team out there. Suppose they don’t find anything.”
“Harv, you saw those guys, they were covered with oil and grease, especially their hands. The bandage on Billy’s arm was clean. There should’ve been smudges on the tape from tearing it off the roll. It was the only thing in the entire house that was clean. I remember thinking it to myself.”
“Let’s assume you’re right and there was a tunnel and they were there. Why didn’t the cousins give them up? The money would have been theirs.”
“Maybe they were more afraid of them than us. Or maybe they were promised a bigger chunk for keeping quiet. Who the hell knows?”
“Okay, tell me this: Why were they there? What reason could they possibly have for going there?”
Nathan said nothing, didn’t have to.
“The Semtex,” Harv said. “The missing crates from the compound.”
Nathan nodded. “Yep.”
“And the cousins?”
“Dead,” Nathan said. “They wouldn’t risk leaving them alive. Those two don’t leave loose ends.”
“If you’re right, we have to tell Ortega about this.”
“Not yet. Things might take a nasty twist for Holly. I don’t want her taking the fall for this. I know how it works, crap flows downhill. If I have to, I’ll take the blame.”
“How? We weren’t officially there.”
“I’ll threaten to expose everything. The way I see it, crap is going to flow uphill if they try to throw Holly to the wolves.”
“Nathan, you can’t blackmail the FBI.”
“Watch me.”
“No, I mean you can’t do that. I’m not aboard with that.”
Nathan stared out the window. “Then I want a conversation with FBI Director Lansing. Tomorrow.”
“There’s no way Ortega will arrange that.”
“It wasn’t Holly’s decision to involve us, Harv. It was Ortega’s, with Director Lansing’s blessing, the don’t-ask, don’t-tell business. Besides, I’m pretty sure I know who’s behind all this cloak-and-dagger crap.”
“Your father.”
“Yep. Remember Ortega’s answer when I asked if dear old Dad knew of our involvement?”
Harv said nothing.
“He wants a political victory for his CDT, and he’s willing to break the rules to get it. It’s a big feather in his cap if he pulls it off. It’ll guarantee funding for the next five hundred years. It’s front-page, headline-grabbing material.”
“I think it’s Occam’s razor.”
“All right, I’m listening.”
Harv lowered his voice. “Frank Ortega called your father. He’s the one pulling the strings. He wanted his grandson found at any cost. If the civil rights of a couple rat bags get violated in the process, so be it.”
Nathan heard the pain in his partner’s words and softened his tone. He stopped pacing. “Look Harv, if it was you who went missing, I’d do the same thing. You know that. Don’t condemn Ortega for wanting closure. Will he tell you the truth?”
“Yeah, I think so.”
“We need to know for sure. I want that call with Director Lansing. If he doesn’t already know the score, I’ll tell him everything. All of it, from the beginning. No threats. I’ll take full responsibility.”
“Come on, Nate, that’s not fair to you, to us. There’s plenty of blame to go around. It was the FBI’s stakeout.”
“It was all there, right in front me. I should’ve put it together. I want to make this right. We need to make this right.”
“We have to protect ourselves.”
“That’s why I want the call with Lansing.”
Chapter 9
Nathan couldn’t sleep. He stared at the ceiling, his thoughts on James Ortega. When the phone rang, he glanced at the clock. Almost midnight.
“Nathan, it’s Holly. Did I wake you?”
“No.”
“I’m five minutes away, can you meet me in the lobby?”
He hesitated, not sure he wanted company, but there was something in her voice. “Five minutes.”
“You were right. About everything.” The line went dead.
In the bathroom, he brushed his teeth, rubbed a wet washcloth over his face, and made his way out to the elevators. About to press the button, he stopped. No cell phone. He went back for it. During the elevator’s descent, he thought about Holly, what her last twelve hours must’ve been like. He shook his head as the elevator dumped him into a deserted lobby. The clerk behind the counter smiled as he walked past. Holly Simpson entered the hotel three minutes later. Her white shirt was tucked into blue jeans secured by a silver-and-turquoise Indian jewelry belt. Even exhausted, she looked beautiful.
He stood as the automatic glass doors pulled open.
“Hello, Holly.”
Her expression told all.
“Oh man.” He held his arms wide open.
She moved forward and embraced him. Tightly.
“Rough day?” Nathan felt her nod and rested his chin on her head. He needed this hug as much as she did.
“What happened to your hand?”
“The bathroom mirror lost an argument.”
“You okay?”
“Just embarrassed.”
She released him and stepped back. “Look at me, some professional.”
“Nonsense, you’re a human being with deep feelings.”
She managed a smile. “Thanks for the hug, I really needed it.”
“Me too.”
“You saved our lives at the farmhouse last night.”
“The light switch.”
“It was rigged to several claymores concealed in an empty toolbox. If Bruce had flipped it, we would’ve been killed. He’s really torn up over it, threatening to resign.”
“Don’t let him quit.”
“I won’t.” They sat down, facing each other. “There’s more. The Bridgestones killed our two techs in the surveillance van. Tortured them first, like Ortega. We found them in the farmhouse, both shot in the head. Everything was recorded. The machines were running when they grabbed them. It was horrible.… Their screams.”