The Last Family

35

Paul had left Sherry’s apartment, gone home for a shower, and had taken Joe’s call while he was drying off. He dressed hurriedly and drove straight to the office, pausing only then to call Rainey and Sherry on the cell phone to tell them to hurry over to the office without any explanation. Then he had armed the phone’s signal scrambler to make sure the call was secure before he called Thorne in New Orleans.

“When you leaving for Miami?” Thorne asked.

“As soon as Eve leaves her house,” he said. “I’m headed to the office first to make sure everything’s in motion,” he said.

“I wish I was going in with you and the boys,” Thorne said.

“I’m depending on you to take care of things in New Orleans. No one else I can trust, Thorne.”

“Okay, Paul,” he said, not masking the disappointment. “See you after the shoe drops. Don’t lower your guard for a second. Good-bye.”

The telephone went dead.

It was quiet in the conference room. Paul made a pot of coffee, but he didn’t need it-Joe’s call had him wired. The dream was still haunting him. Maybe “haunting” wasn’t the right word. Stalking him.

Paul spent the next hour trying to decide what Martin would do between the time he met his mother and the time when he returned to complete his revenge against the family.

Rainey came in and interrupted Paul’s thoughts.

“Tried to call you last night,” he said. “I was afraid you’d left without me. You wouldn’t do that, would you?”

“No, Rainey. I had some thinking to do. What about the Buchanan kid?”

“He doesn’t remember anything,” he said. He shrugged his shoulders and sat in a chair, which he turned to the window. “It’s October the first. That means it’s going to come down real soon.”

Paul nodded his agreement. “Sooner than that,” he said, smiling. “Today.”

“Thank you, Jesus,” Rainey whispered.

The telephone rang and Sherry’s voice came over the intercom. “Mr. Masterson, Tod Peoples on one,” she said. There was a new, playful lilt to her voice.

Rainey stood and walked toward the door. “Want coffee?” he asked as he opened it.

Paul shook his head as he picked up the telephone.

Tod Peoples seemed pleased with himself. “Back from the dead? I must’ve called the Hyatt twenty times. Your cell phone was off.”

“Battery was dead,” he lied.

“I got some very hot news for you.”

“Eve is flying out today,” Paul said.

“Very old news, that. I’m talking about what our bad boy has been up to in the Crescent City.”

“He was in New Orleans?”

“Oh, yes, he certainly was. And… he most definitely isn’t working alone.”

“Tell me what you got, Tod.” Paul lit a cigarette and listened to the account of Lallo Estevez’s murder and the finding of two other bodies, one a known hit man.

“There’s no proof it was Martin,” Paul said at last.

“No,” Tod agreed. “No proof. But we both know it was.”

“Okay. I’ve got some things to do.” Paul was fighting the urge to scream out loud.

“Oh, by the way. Remember the prints you sent?”

“What? Oh, the envelope.” He felt strange, lightheaded.

“I ran them against every known and unknown. Amazing. We collect prints from all over the world and-”

“Tod, please cut to the chase. I’ve got a lot to do.” Like get things in motion and figure out what these dead Latins mean.

“Kurt Steiner’s left thumb and index finger. Maybe he mailed it.”

“You know him? Fax me a picture! Christ, that’s great!” Suddenly Paul was ecstatic.

“Can’t help you on that one, Paul. His prints came to me from a police ID card from Argentina. I only had it on file because the Colombian army came across a print or two on a weapon they happened across at a jungle training facility. One of those resorts for the cocaine barons.”

Paul was squeezing the tennis ball furiously. “So you know who he is. But not what he looks like? I presume he isn’t a mail carrier these days in Colorado.”

“Yes and no. I mean, I know who he is… but nothing else.”

“Tod. I hope you won’t take this wrong, but if you had more information on this Steiner, you’d tell me, right? I mean, you wouldn’t limit my information? I know you parcel out bits and pieces and that you have your own agenda. But, Tod. We’re talking about my children. My wife.” There was an edge to his voice that he couldn’t control.

There was a strange silence for a few seconds.

“I’ve told you what I know. I wish I could do better.”

Paul slammed down the telephone receiver, sat for a few seconds, and then lifted the phone and pressed a preset speed code.

When Rainey came back into the room, Paul was talking feverishly into the telephone. “I don’t give a rat’s ass whether she likes it or not. Get your people in that house and all around it. For the next few hours don’t let them leave the premises for any reason.” He listened for a beat. “Get what you need-agents, cops, the fuckin’ Army and the SWAT team. If she gives you any trouble, you call me.” Paul slammed the telephone down and lit a cigarette even though he had one burning in the ashtray at his right.

“Peoples?” Rainey sat on the table looking down at Paul.

“No, Thorne. Remember a Colombian coffee broker named Lallo Estevez?”

“Sure, the dapper coffee dealer.”

“We knew he was connected with the Medellin cartel, but we couldn’t pin anything solid on him.”

“Yeah, I remember him. Influential pals in D.C.”

“He’s dead. A towboat crew fished a guy out of the Mississippi River yesterday ten miles south of New Orleans. No ID, but he had his throat slit from ear to ear with his tongue pulled through above the Adam’s apple. Feds ID’d him by his prints.”

“And it was Lallo Estevez?”

“No. Was a guy named Ramon something. I’m ahead of myself. The floater was a freelance Colombian hitter.”

“Maybe it was a Colombian suicide,” Rainey laughed. Paul smiled at the fact that Rainey had made a joke.

“He was an enforcer with Perez years ago. Lallo was reported missing by his wife about the same time this guy was surfacing… so to speak. The investigating cops found something on the coffee baron’s desk-a list he’d evidently made the day he died, which they turned over to the feds.”

Paul crushed out the cigarette that he had left in the ashtray before he continued.

“Estevez’s wife called the police because he hadn’t come home. The driver, his bodyguard, didn’t come home either. The last thing on the list was an entry to meet ‘M’ at eleven on his company-owned dock on the Mississippi River. The cops snooped around the dock, and there was a place where there was a lot of broken auto safety glass and where something had scraped the edge of the pier. So they brought in a portable sonar, which picked up something downstream. They dropped cameras, and voila… Cadillac with two corpses inside.”

“Estevez?”

“The chauffeur was buckled in his seat belt with a round just behind the ear. Same gun as Mr. Necktie was killed with. Estevez was in the trunk.”

“You said he had his throat slit?”

“The hitter did.”

“Was it Fletcher? Martin has time to wander around killing everybody he’s pissed at?”

“Peoples is ready to bet big bucks on it,” Paul said.

“So he’s been in New Orleans.” Rainey had a faraway look in his eyes. “Could he still be?”

“For the moment I’m assuming that’s possible,” Paul said. “He’s capable. Thorne’s team is moving in with Laura until this is over. He’ll meet his mother in Disney World and double back for the finale, but there is a slight chance he might be planning to escape to Florida after he attacks my family and meet his mother while we’re running around chasing our tails.”

“Or he might not be after your family. He said he wasn’t going to kill them. Maybe he just wanted you to worry and commit a force to protecting them while he lounged around in Disney World with Mama.”

“Possible.” Paul allowed himself to smile. He lifted the cane and tapped it against his palm. “But I don’t think so. He’ll double back if he gets the chance. I don’t plan to let that happen.”

Rainey sat down on the edge of a chair, nervously tapping his hands on the armrests like a speed freak about to impart the truths of the universe. “Let’s think this through for a minute. If Martin killed Estevez and his pals, he’d have to be pretty sure no one could put him on the scene. At least not this fast. What if the hit man was just there to take Martin out? Maybe Estevez set him up. Martin trained the Medellin boys’ army, so maybe the hit man was working for Martin. Maybe the hit man dropped Lallo into the drink, and then he was killed in turn because he could finger Martin.”

Paul squeezed the tennis ball. “If Martin is in New Orleans to hit my family, why would he take a chance of clipping someone else in New Orleans first? He would have to assume we could find out he was there. Or he’s using the hits in New Orleans for misdirection… which is what it has to be. We look our asses off in New Orleans while he lies in the sun in Florida unmolested. Then when we’re stir-crazy a few weeks down the line, he pops in and hits my family. I can see that.”

“He wants to sucker us to New Orleans so he can be safe in Florida?” Rainey asked.

“We’re going to nail him,” Paul said. “This time it ends. One way or another.” Hell wait for me to be there before he acts. He wants me to see them die. Otherwise they’d already be dead.

Sherry entered the conference room. “Mr. Masterson, you have a visitor.”

“I wasn’t expecting anybody.”

Sherry handed him a business card, which Paul read. “A lawyer? Do I need a lawyer?”

“He says it’s important. And highly confidential.”

Rainey stood. “I’m going for an Egg McMuffin. Want anything?”

“No,” Paul said.

Rainey walked from the room. Sherry smiled. “How you feeling today?”

“Great. Thanks again for last night.”

“Thank you.”

“I’ve been doing a lot of thinking since. You helped me, I just wanted to let you know. Sorry I left so early, but it had nothing to do with you or the night. I’ll make it up to you, promise.”

“Anytime.”

“By the way-see if D.C. will send us something with real speed. The Merlin won’t do. Ask for a Gulf-stream or a Falcon. We’re going to Miami in the next few hours.”

“It’s drawing to a close?” Her voice shook a little.

“Looks like it. Let me know as soon as you hear from Peoples and”-he held up the card-“send this guy in.”

Sherry left the room, and seconds later a young man dressed in an expensive suit and patent-leather cowboy boots came in. Paul gestured and he took a seat across the table.

“I’m Paul Masterson,” he said.

“Ben Tackett.”

“Sherry tells me it’s confidential. I’m right in the middle of something, and I’m not doing drug investigations. You may want to see the-”

“This isn’t about drugs. It’s about Ed Buchanan.”

“Buchanan… should I know who that is? Coffee, Mr. Tackett?”

“No. I’ll do this fast.” The attorney scrambled his fingers and locked his hands on the table surface. “Rainey Lee was in the Buchanans’ home last night.”

“One of the scouts,” Paul said, remembering. “Sorry the name didn’t stick. I sent him. He said it didn’t produce anything.”

“Sir, this is Tennessee, and there are specific laws in Tennessee to protect our citizens from out-of-control federal officers.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“Are you not aware that Agent Rainey Lee threatened the Buchanans at gunpoint?”

“What?”

“Ed Buchanan is a client and friend of mine. He is aware of the pressure that Agent Lee has been under-what he has been through-and that’s the only reason Mr. Lee isn’t already under arrest. Ed says he isn’t the same person he was before. Their sons were close friends.”

“I know.”

“In the kitchen. Evidently Rainey got verbally rough with the child because he couldn’t recall seeing some accomplice this killer was supposed to have had. Betty Ann grew hysterical, and when Ed went to the kitchen to call the police, Mr. Lee took his gun from his holster under his jacket and aimed it at Mr. Buchanan.” The attorney pulled out a pad and read the lines he had written on it earlier. “Then he told Mr. Buchanan to ‘sit the fuck down and shut his fucking mouth and stop interfering in federal matters or all hell was going to break loose.’ He told him if he ‘said one,’ again I quote, ‘fucking thing he’d come back and bury him in the flower garden.’ He told Mr. Buchanan he had nothing to lose. They said his eyes were”-the attorney looked at the paper-“feral.” He pushed it away. “In a word, it scared the shit out of my client and his family.”

Paul exhaled loudly and lit a cigarette. “Mr…?”

“Tackett. Call me Ben.”

“Ben, Agent Lee is under a lot of stress, as you have said. Tell the Buchanans that they have the apology of the DEA and that Mr. Lee’s firearm was not loaded. We have him under the care of the agency psychiatrist, and we are humoring him by giving him some busy work. Tonight I am flying him out of here. By tomorrow night Mr. Lee will have been committed to a facility where he can get the professional help he needs so desperately.”

“Not loaded? The gun wasn’t loaded.” The attorney raised an eyebrow.

Paul shook his head. “I unloaded it myself. Rainey is an old friend. I didn’t know he had done any of this. Please accept my deep and sincere apology.”

The attorney stood. “Well, I leave this in your hands. The Buchanans also ask that they be left out of this. They’d rather Mr. Lee…”

“I understand completely.”

After the attorney left, Paul sat down and thought about what Rainey had done. It was irrational. It was irresponsible. It was, in fact, criminal. Rainey was a dangerously loose cannon.

Paul picked up the telephone and dialed.

“This is Paul Masterson. I need to speak to T.C. Robertson.” He lit a cigarette. “A status report. Urgent. Yes, I’ll hold for the director.” Acting director.

“Hey, Paul. How’s it going?”

“It’s all coming together, but I’ve got a problem we have to discuss.”

“God, you know how I hate problems. You assured me-”

“It’s Rainey. I think we might have to put him on ice until this is over. He pulled a gun on a citizen. Man and his wife. Parent of one of the Cub Scouts. Looks like he’s over the edge.”

“What do you want me to do?”

“He needs a few months in the Barn.” “The Barn” was slang for a facility in Maryland where troubled federal agents were sent for extended rest and rehabilitation. It was obvious to Paul, looking back, that he should have been sent there after he’d been released from the hospital, but it never came up. Someone near the top of the DEA had probably short-circuited normal procedures because they hadn’t wanted him back in the picture for some reason. Politics, rivalry for a higher position, or maybe whoever it was thought they were doing him a favor by keeping him free. There was no proof, except that the Barn and intense therapy would have been a normal step in his rehabilitation. Maybe he had just been cast off because he was damaged goods, not worth the investment.

Something alerted Paul that he wasn’t alone. He turned as he spoke and realized that the conference-room door was standing open.

“I’ll call you back, T.C.”

Paul picked up his cane as he went to the door. The hallway was clear. He went to Sherry’s office and stuck his head inside. She was seated at her desk. “Oh, good.” She picked up a pink message slip and held it up so he could see it. “The Falcon is coming later this morning.”

“You seen Rainey?”

“He was just here while I was on the line. Isn’t he in the conference room? I thought he was going there.”

“Get on the telephone, Sherry. Tell security to drop the gate to the garage.”

“Why?”

“Just tell them to do it. Now. Tell the door guards no one leaves the building.”

“What’s happening?”

“Just do it!” Paul cleared the door and ran for the elevators as fast as he could, given the limp. No telling what Rainey would do if he knew Paul had plotted with T.C. to lock him up.

Paul stopped short because Rainey was standing at the elevators with a McDonald’s bag in his hand. There was a cup of coffee spilled on the floor at his feet. He was crying. Paul approached slowly and put his hand on Rainey’s shoulder. “You okay?”

“It’s embarrassing being out of balance,” he said between the tears. “I am not in control, Paul. I’m sorry, God, I’m so sorry. Please… help me. I’ll go to the Barn after Martin’s down.”

Paul embraced his old friend. “I will help you. I promise I will. It’ll be fine again, you’ll see,” Paul said. “Now, I’ll have your weapon,” he said. He backed off and extended his left hand.

Rainey had overheard Paul planning his incarceration, turned, and made for the elevators in a momentary panic. But as he’d waited for the cab, he’d heard Paul’s orders to Sherry and had known he couldn’t get out of the building. Even if he could, where would he go? Nothing but Martin mattered, and he couldn’t hunt Martin blind. He couldn’t very well follow Paul on the chase from a distance, either. He knew he’d have to take another tack. It was easy. The tears were real as rain.

Inside he felt a calm. It was what God wanted so his family could be reunited. There would be a blood atonement. When the time came, the weapon for Martin’s destruction would be at hand.