“Mack’s going to be okay?” I asked.
“Define okay. He’s going to prison, and he won’t ever be a cop again.”
“I made a deal.”
Her head whipped around. “You what?”
“That’s what this is all about. I made a deal that Mack walks if we find enough evidence to put away the SS.”
Hope in her expression faded as I said the second part about evidence and the SS. “Evidence?” She said, “Did you actually see anything at all while you were in there?”
I looked away.
“That’s what I thought. This is a fishing expedition.”
“It damn well better not be,” Chulack said.
We rode in silence for a few seconds. Every increment of time went by far too slow. Tick-tock.
“Do you have the file on Jonas, the one that was in the back of his T-Bird?” I was grasping at the least little bit of intel that would help bust through the mental road block.
She still didn’t look at me. “No.”
My mind scavenged around for something, anything at all to keep her talking. I had the need to hear her voice. Maybe we would happen on something of mutual interest, and that would once again bring us close together as friends. And, as friends, we could figure this thing out. I had an itch, a niggling in the back of my brain, that I had missed something. Something vital and I just needed it to float to the surface. Talking with her could trigger that effect if we could put aside this emotional wound between us.
We rounded the last turn and headed for the clubhouse one block away.
“What happened with the car?” I asked.
“What car?”
“The Rent-a-Wreck Jonas rented two years ago?”
“That was a dead-end. It comes back to a vacant house on Roswell Avenue in Montclair. No one’s lived there for years. He used it as a dead drop, an address only, for the rental forms, social security, and a fake driver’s license.”
“Roswell?”
Ahead of us, the SWAT vehicle smashed through the wrought-iron gate to the clubhouse and sped right up to the front door. The team jumped off and ran. The lead man threw the ram through the door as men lined up and entered, long guns at the ready, all of them yelling, “Get down. Get down.”
We pulled into the parking lot and stopped, waiting for the “all clear.” This time the parking area was loaded with Harleys of every style and model. Most had the ape-hanger handlebars. Toys, stuffed animals, and games were strapped to various parts of the bikes with bungee cords, highly visible on purpose, the rebranding, their attempt to shift the public’s perception. I could only hope the public did not easily fall prey to such elementary school tactics.
Six fifteen. An hour and forty-five minutes left.
Within seconds, the SWAT leader came out and gave Dan the thumbs up. Dan and Barbara got out. I opened the door and put a foot on the ground. Dan blocked my exit.
“The location is secure. I fulfilled my end of the deal, now tell me where inside? What are we looking for?” He wore anxiety like a wild, unwanted monkey on his back, an emotion that didn’t suit him. He liked to be in control, and now everything depended on me. He’d gone way out on a limb, and I still held the saw.
Barbara came up behind him. I lowered my voice, said to him, “No, your end, the difficult end, is when you have to let me walk.”
He nodded and didn’t say anything else. He didn’t want to risk my anger, or to hear me suddenly burst out in laughter, that this had all been an elaborate gag just to ruin his career and make the FBI out to be a bunch of buffoons.
I pushed past them, my hands cuffed in front. “Follow me,” I said.
CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
For the second time in the last seven hours I walked into the Sons of Satan clubhouse. This time at least sixteen bikers sat on couches in the front room, hands zip-tied behind them. Another eight lay face down on the floor amongst their biker detritus. Most had shaved heads, all had ugly antisocial tattoos that blared out to the world that they would not cross the street to help a person and that they’d rob you while you were down. Some wore bandanas around their heads or hanging from pockets. All wore their denim ‘cuts’ with the SS rocker and death head accented with their evil, angry scowls. By not wanting to look like everyone else, they’d ironically created their own conformity. What a bunch of lost sheep.
Clay Warfield sat amidst the people he lorded over, pretending to be just one of the guys. “Come back for some more, Deputy Johnson?” he asked.
I didn’t answer. Clay saw my handcuffs. “That’s right, now you have the right man. You don’t have a thing on us.”
“Have you read the warrant to him?” I asked Dan.
Unlike in the movies, which take short cuts for dramatic effect, the warrant had to be read to the person in control of the premises before any search could be completed. Dan nodded to an agent in a blue windbreaker. The agent took out a folded piece of paper and a micro recorder. He read from the paper.
Clay smiled, unconcerned. He knew there wasn’t anything in his clubhouse, so why should he worry? He smirked. “When you assholes get done with your little game of cops and robbers, I want to press charges against Deputy Johnson for burglary and grand theft auto. He stole our plumbing truck. Roy Boy will also press charges for kidnap and attempted murder. What do you think about that, Deputy Johnson?”
I looked at Dan. “The gold’s in Clay’s office.”
Clay lost his smile. “There isn’t any gold in my office.” He tried to struggle up off the couch. His zip-tied hands, and the other bikers packed hip-to-hip, made the move impossible. “You’re not going to plant any evidence, not on me you won’t. I’m going along. I’m going to watch.”
Dan nodded to the agent who’d read the warrant. The agent helped Clay up off the couch. We all walked down the hall through the trash, most of which by now had been flattened against the crusty carpet.
We entered the once-immaculate office still tossed from our last visit.
“Okay,” Dan said, “What gold, and how does it work as a predicate crime?”
I had taken a big chance believing Drago.
Clay yelled, “There isn’t any gold in here. If there was, I’d know about it. Don’t you think I would know about it?” His eyes blazed a hole right through me.
Dan asked again, “What gold? Where?”
“It’s in the safe,” I said.
Clay’s anger shifted away and he smiled. “Go ahead and look, there isn’t any gold in the safe.”
“We don’t need your permission to look,” said Dan.
Someone had closed the safe doors. The dials were still knocked off and the holes Drago had drilled still in the door. Dan moved quickly over to the safe and swung open the heavy doors. His head whipped around. “It’s empty.”
Clay threw his head back and laughed. “Just like I told you. Is this the best you got?” He snapped back to anger. “Now untie my hands and get the hell out of my clubhouse. You’ll be hearing from our attorneys. We’re going to own the federal government.”
“Johnson?” asked Dan.
“It’s underneath the safe,” I said.
Clay’s eyes went wild. He didn’t know what was under his own safe and didn’t want to find out. “Hold it, stop what you’re doing. I want my attorney here before you do anything else.”
Dan smiled, sensing victory. “You don’t have that right. In fact, you don’t even have the right to be in this room right now. You’re here out of courtesy.”
While he spoke, I moved over to the safe. I had to see the four bolts Drago had described.