“He was. And there’s something I want to say to you. This is between us, okay?” Doogan said.
“Sure. I always confide with the guy who fires me. Not a problem.”
Doogan snorted a small laugh. “You know I’m no more than the messenger boy, right? The mayor and the judge are close. The judge’s wife is a major contributor, so the mayor has some obligations, if you catch my drift.”
“I do.” I fumbled with Angelina, held her tight to me. “But this is bigger than that.”
“What do you mean?”
“Remember when we talked about Malcolm Harris?”
Doogan nodded.
“Do you know who his connection was here in Colorado?”
He shook his head.
“Aubrey Coates, the Monster of Desolation Canyon.”
Doogan was lifting the cigarette to his mouth, but he froze.
I said, “Like I told you the other day, the mayor may have a bigger problem on his hands than he realized. If it turns out a major international pedophilia ring is headquartered in this city right under his nose, that won’t help out his political ambitions, plus his pal the judge may be blamed for letting Coates walk. How will that one play on 9 News?”
Doogan said, “No, no. That wasn’t the judge. That was lousy police work. No way that could be linked back to the mayor in any way. You’re just throwing crap out there.”
I was just throwing crap out there, but some of it stuck. I could tell his head was spinning a little. He was thinking how to mitigate the situation.
Said Doogan, “You’re grasping at straws-anything to get back at that judge.”
I didn’t respond.
“I heard you tried to force your way in to see him the other day,” Doogan said. “And when you couldn’t get in, you called him, using my name with what could be construed to be vague threats. The mayor asked me to look into it, but I haven’t gotten around to it yet.”
“Thank you.”
“I’d suggest not making a habit of that.”
He turned his attention to Angelina, who was still struggling and had knocked my hat screwy on my head. “This is your little girl, eh?”
“This is her.”
“She’s the one…”
“Yes.”
He shook his head and looked away. He seemed genuinely moved.
I said, “Yes, she’s the one the mayor’s good friend Judge Moreland plans to take away from us Sunday.”
Doogan took a long pull from his cigarette and blew the smoke out in an endless stream. “Judge Moreland, he’s something else. He’s a type, Jack, a rare type. I see his kind all the time, but he’s a rare specimen.”
I let him go on. “You’re looking at things the wrong way. You’re making wrong assumptions. In my line of work, the politicos who are really going somewhere are never about the here and now. The good ones-and Moreland is a good one-think long-term. They fixate on the prize. Because they do, sometimes it isn’t easy to figure out the moves they’re making right in front of your eyes. You’ve gotta think long-term if you want to figure ’em out, and you haven’t been thinking long-term.”
I said, “What’s he fixated on?”
Doogan said, “The Supreme Court.”
I shook my head. “How can taking our little girl possibly help him get on the Supreme Court?”
“I don’t know, Jack. You need to figure that one out. But I know that’s what he wants.”
I LEFT DOOGAN there by his tree. Sanders was a few feet behind again. As we approached the parking lot, I heard a powerful burbling engine fire up, and I instantly recognized it. The sound was like a straight razor to my throat.
Garrett’s yellow H3 backed out away from us. I couldn’t see inside well because of the dark-tinted windows, but I thought I saw two profiles-Garrett and his father.
“What, do you know who that is?” Sanders asked, noting my reaction.
So Garrett had come to the funeral of the man he’d stomped to death to what, gloat? And why would Judge Moreland have come? To see what?
Angelina squirmed in my arms and pointed toward a squirrel scrambling down a tree. She said, “Cat!”
I started to laugh when something hit me so hard my knees nearly buckled. I looked from my little girl to the departing H3 and back to my little girl. I thought, He came hoping to see her.
Which went back to the beginning, the simple unanswered question: Why did they want her?
And everything seemed to make sudden and terrible sense.
Bulletproof. What could be more bulletproof than a pedophile being a partner in crime with a judge? The judge in whose courtroom the Monster of Desolation Canyon- another participant in the international ring-had gone free?
Angelina cried out, and I realized I was squeezing her too hard. I eased up and looked at her. She was beautiful by all accounts, with her dark flashing eyes, her smile, her manner, and not just proud-parent beautiful.
I felt like I’d had the breath punched out of me.
I carried her toward the back parking lot of the chapel where I’d seen a couple of black-and-whites and Torkleson’s nondescript Crown Victoria. The cops were there, no doubt, to see who came to the funeral because the case was still wide-open. Torkleson leaned against his Crown Vic talking with another detective-they stood out as cops even at a funeral where there were more suits and ties than usual- and a couple of uniforms.
Torkleson must have seen something in my face as I approached because he excused himself from his colleagues and met me on the sidewalk.
“Hello, Jack,” Torkleson said.
“You said Malcolm Harris was connected with Aubrey Coates,” I said. “How did you find that out?”
Torkleson shrugged. “Phone records, e-mails, uploads, downloads. A lot of technical evidence concerning ISPs and proxy servers and other stuff I really don’t understand, but from what I was told, Coates transmitted big files and images overseas from that trailer of his. The Brits traced it back from Harris’s computer. Unfortunately, we don’t have the original files anymore, as you know.” He shot a look over my shoulder to see if Cody was lurking anywhere and could attack.
“I don’t know where Cody is,” I said. “Don’t worry about him.”
“Why are you asking me this?” he said.
I said, “Because I’m pretty sure if you dug into the evidence for the charges, you’ll find communication between Harris and Coates and someone else here in this city.”
Torkleson looked at me closely. “We’ve got a team assigned to that,” he said. “They’re working with the Brits and Interpol. Perverts are getting arrested one by one all over the world. Are you talking about someone in particular?”
“Judge Moreland or his son Garrett,” I said. “Or both.”
Torkleson closed his eyes and took a deep breath and moaned. “Not again,” he said. “You know what happened when I sent officers to his house based on your so-called tip.”
“This is different,” I said. “Of all the places he could relocate, Malcolm Harris chose Denver. He said he was coming here because he would be bulletproof. Somebody assured him it would be fine for him. And what better proof of it than when a child pornographer and molester like Aubrey Coates gets set free in Judge Moreland’s own courtroom?”
Torkleson started to argue, but stopped. I could see wheels turning, things falling into place for him as they did for me.
“How do you know Harris?” Torkleson asked.
“I met with him on behalf of the CVB,” I said. “Before we knew what he was.”
“Jesus Christ,” he whispered.
“Do you have access to the evidence against Harris?”
He nodded. “I’d have to get with one of our tech guys to interpret it,” he said. “But I think we have all the supporting documentation that’s been compiled. It’s just a matter of cross-referencing phone calls, e-mail addresses, IP stuff-I think.”