Shock Wave

twenty-one

Nothing was adding up on this case. No matter what Tasker did, Daniel Wells seemed to stay one step ahead of him. This wasn’t some kind of master criminal, either. He had no record. Or maybe that was the mark of a master criminal: no tracks. Either way, with the effort and manpower Tasker was putting into looking for this guy, he’d have thought someone might at least run into him at the grocery store. The southern section of Dade County just wasn’t that big. He had people covering every angle but had yet to put his hands on Wells. The Big Rig Academy proved he was still in the area. Tasker and company couldn’t even find his stripper-wife.

Along with the case problems, Tasker felt guilty about leaving the girls alone during the morning. It was so unusual to have them on a weekday. Thanks to a Jewish holiday that the Palm Beach County school system called a “fall break,” he had been able to have them on a rare Thursday and Friday.

Now Bill Tasker sat at his kitchen table while his girls played a PlayStation game. He’d worn them out before dinner shuttling from a Home Depot to hobby shops, letting them think he was looking for a certain type of glue, when he was really looking for signs of Daniel Wells. He figured that Wells might be looking in places like that for supplies of some kind. If Donna knew he was dragging the girls around on that kind of mission, he’d have been in for a fight. And that woman could fight. He still missed her, but she could lay a big hurt on you if you crossed her.

He looked up at Kelly and Emily as they concentrated on the TV screen. The two sisters shared no qualities other than being sweet. Kelly, the artistic, cerebral, quiet ten-year-old. And Emily, the athletic firebrand. He didn’t deserve such beautiful, well-mannered girls. That was one of his biggest problems in a nutshell. He didn’t deserve much of anything. He’d always been focused on work and tended to exclude everything else. Even after the West Palm shooting, while he was under investigation he could only focus on that. After he’d eventually been cleared, he’d still sulked about it to the point that Donna had thrown his ass right out of his own house. Now that he did deserve.

Every time he made a promise to himself that he’d spend time with his family, something happened to side-track him. He loved them and loved doing things with them. He just couldn’t let things at work drop. Tomorrow he had one meeting in the morning at the office with everyone-then he was coming straight back to these two. He didn’t care what happened.

He looked down at his and the other agent’s notes and knew there was a pattern somewhere, he just couldn’t see it. Unlike the FBI profiler, he didn’t think his own analysis was beyond question. He needed something confirmed. The one thing that the profiler had said that he continued to contemplate was the bomber’s motivation. To be in control. Tasker ran that through his maze of a mind to see if he could relate to it at all. From some of the shit he’d pulled, it seemed like Wells liked to lose control, not gain it. But maybe he was misreading what the profiler had meant. That psychobabble tended to cloud issues. Tasker thought in practical terms, and he couldn’t see a practical reason for Wells to risk his family and bomb that ship. On the other hand, he was running awful hard if he was not involved. What scared Tasker the most was that he felt Wells was working on something else. That had to be the reason he hadn’t left town. That’s why he had a gas tank welded in his step van. Tasker knew he was up to something, and that’s why when he looked up at his daughters and saw they were occupied, he went back to his notes.

Derrick Sutter followed Tasker through the front doors of the Miami Regional Operations Center of the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. It was a severe culture shock after the constant bustle of activity at the Miami PD. In the city, local citizens stood in line to get accident reports, report minor crimes and complain about some unknown cop who either didn’t enforce some city ordinance or enforced it too rigorously. Here, west of the airport, in a brand-new, sparkling clean, three-story building, no one waited in the lobby. One well-dressed, nice-looking woman sat comfortably behind thick, bulletproof glass. Sutter was shocked to see her smile and wave to Tasker as he walked inside. That shit wouldn’t happen at the PD. Sutter realized that the mission of FDLE was entirely different from that of a local PD. FDLE worked on big cases which generally weren’t reported directly to them by the public. Sutter decided police work was more efficient if you didn’t include the public.

On the third floor, they turned into an immaculate squad bay with big, clean windows and working computers on every desk. In a spacious conference room at the end of the bay, Sutter could see the delicious Camy Parks sitting with her perfect legs crossed. As he came closer, he saw she was talking to that FBI moron, Jimmy Lail. Tasker’s analyst, Jerry something, stood at the end of the conference table, not even concealing his feelings about Camy’s legs, or the rest of her.

Tasker said, “Sorry we’re late. Thanks for seeing them in, Jerry.”

The older, portly man nodded, not taking his eyes off Camy.

Sutter grabbed the seat next to Camy. “Hey, baby,” he said quietly. It still got a harsh glance from Jimmy Lail. Sutter wondered when he’d realize that a real black man was trying to move in on his territory.

Tasker addressed the whole room. “Let’s see where we are. Who’s first?”

Camy started right up. “No clues from any of the companies he worked for. They all said he was a great guy who worked hard.”

Tasker asked, “None of ’em had any idea where he might be hiding out?”

“Nope. One place, South Florida Metal Works, said he worked on some welding and even hauled away bags of metal scraps that had been lying around for a year. Just little corners and shavings from making shelves and things like that. They loved the guy. Kept turning them down for a permanent job.”

Sutter gazed at her while she delivered her professional report. He nonchalantly let his hand drop off his lap and brush her leg. He got no response.

Sutter said, “Bill and I covered all the truck-driving schools in Dade and found out Wells used the name Westerly at the Big Rig Academy, but didn’t graduate. In fact, they booted his ass ’cause he couldn’t get the hang of it.”

Camy asked, “When was his last lesson?”

“An hour before we got there.”

“So he’s still in the area.”

Tasker said, “That’s what bothers me. If he didn’t have some kind of plan, wouldn’t it be smart to leave Florida?”

Jimmy Lail chimed in, “That’s whack, my man. You guys love jumping to wild conclusions. We don’t even got any four-one-one this cracker even bombed the cruise ship. So far, all we got him for is running from you.” He gave a hard look at Tasker.

Sutter said, “Then why’s he running? As a cop, that always raises my suspicions.” Sutter doubted the FBI man would catch the inference that he wasn’t a real cop.

“That’s off the hook, my brother. I think we might be running on a wild-goose chase.” Jimmy moved his hands like an L.A. gang member making a point with different fingers pointing down.

Sutter said, “You get anything from your intelligence index, J. Edgar?”

Jimmy opened his notepad. “We got this dawg all over the script. He hangs with the original ragheads all the time.”

Tasker, swallowing his annoyance, asked, “Who are the ‘original ragheads’?”

“The nightriders, homeboy. You’re from Florida, you don’t know them?”

Sutter said, “Who the fuck are you talkin’ about?”

“The Ku Klux Klan, my brother. The KKK. Our dawg Wells is one of their butt-boys. He’s been seen at the KKK crib off Krome, west of Tamiami Airport.”

Tasker said, “You sure? He’d didn’t strike me as that kind of nut. I mean, it was bad FBI intel that helped get him locked up for the wrong crime.”

“You tell me to check the intel base, and when I find something, you don’t want to hear it. Don’t be dissin’ my work product.” He slid the chair out like he was prepared to fight anyone who challenged his credibility.

Sutter said, “Sit your white ass down. He was just asking a question.”

Camy jumped in: “We could keep a little watch on the house. We don’t have too much else to check.”

Tasker turned toward his analyst. “What about it, Jerry? You got anything else for us to work on?”

Sutter knew that Tasker revered the heavy older man with the funny dark-tinted, Coke-bottle-thick glasses. He could see the deference the FDLE agent showed the analyst with his every move.

Ristin started slowly. “I have a couple of odd numbers in the personal phone books taken in the search warrant at Wells’ house.” He cut his eyes hard to Jimmy Lail. “I want to get the subpoena information back before I make any comment on the numbers. Right now I only have a hunch I don’t want to throw on the table yet.”

Jimmy spoke up, virtually ignoring Ristin. “Camy’s right. We need to drop a five-O cover on the Klan house. That’s better than wasting our time on all these useless leads.”

Tasker asked, “What’s a ‘five-O cover’? Surveillance? You need to cut that shit out.”

Sutter stepped in to ask Jimmy directly, “Who says the leads are useless? I’ve found that in police work you don’t know what’s important until all the pieces are in place.” Sutter couldn’t believe he’d gotten two shots in on the witless FBI man in one conversation.

Jimmy fired back. “Okay, what do we do, then?”

At once everyone looked to Tasker. He shrugged and said, “If that’s what we have, that’s what we have. All we need is one eye on the house, and it doesn’t have to be round-the-clock. That way we save a little manpower.”

Camy agreed. “Three six-hour shifts shouldn’t tax us too much.”

Tasker nodded. “Seven to one, one to seven, and the last guy goes till midnight or so unless the place is dark before that. But no one try and grab him alone. He gave us the slip too many times and proved he’s smart enough to be dangerous.”

Everyone nodded. That was all there was to do. Sutter liked the way Tasker could articulate a decision and jump right in.

Camy said, “I’ll take this afternoon.”

Sutter said, “I’ll take tonight. It’s all OT for me.”

Tasker turned to Jimmy and added, “If you take tomorrow morning, I’ll take both shifts in the afternoon. My daughters are here today, but I’m free tomorrow.”

Jimmy Lail nodded, obviously not happy to be giving up a Saturday. None of the federal agents got extra pay to work weekends.

Camy looked at Tasker. “I’ll get ahold of you when I’m done today. Let you know what it looks like.”

Sutter wasn’t sure, but he thought he saw something in Camy’s eyes that had nothing to do with being a lesbian or being hooked up with Jimmy Lail.

Daniel Wells slowly cruised past Emerson-Picolo Transportation in Miami, near the Miami International Airport. He’d welded some of their perimeter fence a few years back and knew the layout of the big yard. Most nights they stored three or four big tanker-trailers. Some even held aviation gas. That was some of the most flammable material an artist like him could work with. He picked up speed so he wouldn’t be obvious as he passed the main office that faced Thirty-sixth Street. He still had a key to the gate. He doubted they had changed it in the past year or so, and they liked that he worked at night and didn’t interfere with business. They trusted him with the key, and they were right. He had never stolen anything from an employer and never overcharged on a job. His dad had always insisted that he give a fair day’s work for a fair day’s wage. Even as a kid, when he was a bag boy at Winn-Dixie in Ocala, he’d never taken long breaks or left early. He’d bag groceries and be polite to the customers because that was his job. He would flirt with the cashiers occasionally. That was something he couldn’t help. A pretty girl was a pretty girl. But he didn’t mind working.

Today he could see three long trailers and three shorter ones. He couldn’t risk going in to say hello because he had already heard that the cops had been talking to his former employers. The woman from the ATF, the cute one with big boobies, had gone by several of his old jobs. He had friends everywhere. That was one of the reasons he could stay ahead of the cops. Friends in key places.