The 6:20 Man

Chapter 62

Devine left work around eight and headed to check in with the Eweses. They might go back to New Zealand anytime now. Ellen Ewes had made it clear that she loathed the city. And he wanted to find out if they knew about Stamos and their daughter. Or about Sara’s being artificially inseminated. Ellen Ewes hadn’t mentioned that fact. She hadn’t really said whether she knew her daughter was pregnant before the police had told her. She was just furious about the termination of that pregnancy. Devine wanted to ask her directly. She struck him as the sort that kept a lot back.

He got to the house and knocked, but there was no answer. He looked through the sidelight next to the door, but could see nothing.

“Mr. and Mrs. Ewes?” He knocked again, then tried the knob. It was unlocked.

Just like in the movies.

He pushed it open and poked his head in. “Hello, Ellen, Fred? It’s Travis Devine. I just wanted to talk to you for a minute.”

He went inside and closed the door behind him. “Hello? Anybody here?”

The place was dark, with the dim outside light being the only illumination.

He walked through the front room and peeked into the kitchen.

Nothing, although there were some dirty dishes in the sink and an empty coffee cup was on the table.

He walked toward the bedroom and looked in there. The bed was made and the bathroom was empty. His gaze lingered on the bed for a moment. It was there that he and Ewes had had sex. Once. And then she had broken it off. He thought she had found another guy.

But then to find out she and Stamos were in love? He shook his head. He’d had no inkling that Ewes had been gay or maybe bisexual. Yet she had obviously wanted a child. But then why go through all the steps necessary for artificial insemination and then terminate the pregnancy?

But now that he thought about it, the timing was off. The pregnancy had occurred before Devine had even met Ewes. If she and Stamos were going to have a baby together, why would Ewes sleep with him? They must have gotten together afterward.

Then maybe Sara had a relationship with someone else along with the pregnancy. Then was that relationship broken off and the pregnancy terminated? Was that how she fell into bed with me? A rebound off another guy? Or another woman?

With Ewes, Devine had thought he might have finally found a woman with whom he could spend the rest of his life. In addition to being beautiful, Ewes had been kind and funny and smart and caring. There had been a spark from their first meeting, which led to other meetings. During firm outings they had ended up spending time together, talking and secretly planning to see each other. Everything had to be kept on the QT because of company rules. And then they had come here and slept together. It had been immensely satisfying to Devine. He had even thought about quitting Cowl and getting another job so that Ewes and he could come out in the open.

But after that night together, she had withdrawn from him, and finally the end had come. Not in an email or a text. Just a look from her in the hallway and a mouthed I’m sorry, Travis. And that had been it. And if Ewes was attracted to women instead of men, he could understand her decision. One had to be who one was.

He turned and walked to what he knew was the guest bedroom. Outside in the hall were two large roller suitcases. He looked at the tags. They were the Eweses’. They had flown on United from California to here, after the much longer journey from New Zealand to the Golden State.

He stepped inside the bedroom and flicked on the light.

And Devine stopped right in the doorway.

Ellen and Fred were in bed. They would not be waking back up. There was blood all over the bedcovers and they were staring up at the ceiling with lifeless eyes. Ellen Ewes looked surprised. Fred just looked like he was watching TV.

Devine slipped over and touched the woman’s skin. Ice. He tried to bend her arm. Still pretty stiff. He knew that meant rigor was already well established. They’d been dead awhile, he knew. Devine had seen his share of stiff bodies in the Middle East.

He looked for what had killed them. There were slashes in the covers around their chests. A knife, probably. It was a savage attack.

He retreated, wiping off his prints along the way.

He poked his head out the front door and looked all around.

The coast right now was reasonably clear, at least he hoped. He stepped out and closed the door with his coat sleeve over his hand. He set off at a rapid pace and called Campbell along the way and told him what he had discovered.

“Get as far away from there as you can,” said the old general. “Full retreat, Devine.”

“But what about the bodies? The police have to be notified.”

“Leave that to us.”

Devine clicked off and picked up his pace. He reached the subway on Fulton Street and made his way back to Grand Central, covering the four miles in about twelve minutes. He retraced his train’s morning route and eyed Cowl’s place closely when they reached it, looking for any sign of activity, but saw none.

He had seen his share of violent death in war. Bodies mangled beyond all recognition. People he knew and fought alongside. He had grieved and moved on because you had to in a war zone.

But the two bodies in the bed? It had sickened him, shaken him right to his core. He was no longer in a war zone, but it felt like he was.

Devine didn’t make eye contact with anyone the whole ride home.

He grabbed a cab at the station because his legs were rubbery, took it home, went up to his room, and sat on his bed, trying to make sense of what had just happened.

Who would want to kill the Eweses? The same people who killed Sara? But Sara was killed because she had found out that Cowl and Comely was a laundering machine. She knew about the Lombard. She probably knew a lot more. Stamos the same.

But why the parents? Ellen Ewes said she and her daughter were estranged. Why would Sara have told her mother and father anything about Cowl and Comely — and if she hadn’t, why would someone kill her parents? Because the killer was afraid she might have told her parents something? Or since her mom and dad were staying at Sara’s place the killer might have feared the Eweses would find something damaging?

Something felt off about that, but what else could it be?

He went downstairs and grabbed a Coke from the fridge. There was no one here, which was a good thing, because Devine didn’t want to deal with any of his roommates right now.

He sat at the small kitchen table and looked out the window. Someone might have seen him enter and leave Sara Ewes’s old home, where two butchered bodies lay. Campbell said he would take care of notifying the police. But even with that Devine expected a visit from Shoemaker and Ekman. And as unpleasant as the first few encounters had been, he assumed the next one would be the worst of all. If they could find any reason to arrest him, they would.

He heard the front door open, and a few moments later Will Valentine poked his head into the kitchen.

“Locust Group?” he said.

“What about it?” asked Devine, perking up. “Did you find stuff?”

Valentine sat down next to him and opened his laptop. “They own shitload of stuff. I mean shitload.”

“I know of three different places in the city alone.”

“Three! Dude, give me fuckin’ break.” He hit a key on his laptop and screen after screen of line items associated with properties and other assets flashed across it.

“Wait a minute, that’s all Locust?” exclaimed Devine.

“I have computer stop count at one hundred forty-one thousand three hundred and twelve different properties, assets, and businesses. In fifty-seven countries, but most of it in America. That is tip of iceberg. It is serious shit. In all fifty states. And they are buried deep, so nobody will find out. I track Locust Group through shell companies, consortiums, SPACs, investment funds, tax shelters, CBOs, derivatives, debt funds. They own whole fuckin’ towns in Idaho and Wyoming and Montana and Alabama and Arkansas and other places. And they own whole blocks in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Houston, and other big cities. Gold and silver mines, uranium, chemical, and manufacturing plants, oil refineries. They own sports teams and TV and radio stations and newspapers and streaming platforms, social media sites and a whole shitload of other stuff. Never seen anything like it, dude. I mean, not even Putin is this fuckin’ big, and never in my life did I think I would ever say that.”

“How much asset value are we talking about?”

“Shit, maybe forty trillion.”

Devine gaped. “How far back do some of the transactions go?”

“I find slew of them back over fifteen years.”

“Okay, that fits with other things I’ve found out.”

“What is going on, Travis?”

“Money laundering, probably. For example, your buddy Putin and his friends have dirty money to get rid of. Money they steal from the Russian people. Right?”

“Shit, yes. Putin is so rich he makes Bezos and Musk look poor. But he say he is not rich, and nobody disagrees with him because they get shot or poisoned or put in prison.”

“So, the dirty money comes over here and it’s used to buy all sorts of assets. Then instead of dirty money, you own a house or a building or a company or a chunk of the Dow Jones, whatever. That’s why they call it money laundering.”

Valentine nodded. “I know this! Clean money, dude. That is name of game.”

“But it’s not just about owning assets. With radio and TV and newspapers and online streaming platforms and social media sites, and owning whole towns and city blocks, they can manipulate and control everything. From cradle to grave.”

“Dude, that is not good. That is Russia.”

“Can you send me all that stuff? I’ve got someone I want to show it to.”

Valentine looked at him curiously as he did this. “You are not what you want us to think?”

“Are you?”

“Just a hacker, dude.”

“A good one.”

“Take you long enough to say, asshole.” But he tacked on a grin to this. Valentine opened the fridge, grabbed a beer, and walked off, while Devine stared down at his hands, thinking. Something Valentine had said had stuck in his head and had made him think of Cowl’s own words from that old interview with the Journal: A partnership can be simply an idea or a perspective.

He grabbed his laptop from his room and plugged in the name Anne Comely, running it through a popular site on the internet that he had used before, but then only for fun.

There was nothing fun about the exercise this time.

It didn’t take long for the program to kick out what Devine knew was the exact right answer.

An anagram for “Anne Comely” was... CLEAN MONEY.