Troubleshooter

Chapter 59

The detention enforcement officer waited respectfully, key in hand. Tim pressed his knuckles on the cool steel door, gathering his focus. The command post was humming with activity; he'd slipped out unnoticed. By comparison Cell Block was peaceful, the quiet broken only by the squeak of boots on tile and the incessant hacking of a prisoner a few cells over.

The search of the clubhouse had turned up all order of incriminating evidence to shore up the case against Uncle Pete. Dana Lake's files would likely prove a treasure trove, but first the FBI would have to navigate through a minefield of legalities regarding confidentiality-the U.S. Attorney's office was on it full bore and feeling more confident than Tim had seen them regarding a major case. On his way into the command post, he'd caught Winston Smith, the AUSA, whistling in the hall in an uncharacteristic show of buoyancy.

Bear and Guerrera had followed Babe Donovan back to an apartment in West L.A., where they'd made the arrest. In the laundry room, they'd discovered a laminating machine around which were scattered the raw materials from a number of forged IDs, including an access card for a Burbank Airport maintenance worker. They'd also found a drawerful of badges from different law-enforcement agencies, awards for successful assassinations. The Cadillac Miller Meteor hearse had been hiding in the covered garage. An elderly neighbor reported that Babe used to park a yellow Volvo in her second space, the same make and model of the car left behind on the 10 freeway to clog traffic minutes before Den and Kaner's break. The building's garage security camera confirmed the plates; the Volvo tied Babe to the murder of two federal officers and a civilian.

Six hours after the clubhouse raid, the deputies continued to sift through seized papers. From the first wave of analysis, Smith was preparing to indict eleven other Sinners. Tannino had stopped by the post to declare that they had enough to sink the organization.

But, not surprisingly, nothing had turned up on Den Laurey.

Tim had put out alerts at the borders and airports and BOLOs to all agencies in the surrounding states. He'd contacted law enforcement in each city where the Sinners had a chapter, urging increased surveillance. The Service's public-information officer had released a selection of Den's photos to the news stations and was negotiating with the Times for tomorrow's front page. The more time passed, the greater likelihood that Den would slip away. And after a while Dray's assailant would recede into the Top 15, his face becoming one of many in the lineup of flyers posted in the admin corridor at the rear of the courthouse. Unsolved cases. Open investigations. Dangerous individuals whose pictures the deputies walked past every day on their way to new business.

Tim nodded, and the officer pulled back the steel door. Through the mesh gate, Tim could see Babe sitting on the molded plastic bench, her legs spread in a slightly masculine manner. He entered and stood opposite her.

Her feathered hair, seventies sexy, stood up in the back from her leaning against the wall. She had a big-perhaps enhanced-chest but a petite frame, so the orange jumpsuit bagged around her like a clown costume. A band of sunburn saddled her pug nose. Her surprising cobalt eyes remained impenetrable, but her face had loosened with fear or dread, her jaw held slightly forward as if to control her breathing. For the first time, Tim saw her as a kid, not far removed from college girls or the daughters of his older colleagues. Her file showed she was from a middle-class family. She'd taken a wrong turn and wound up on the back of a Harley and now here. It was almost hard to believe the role she'd willingly played in Den Laurey's assault on Greater Los Angeles.

"Hello, Ms. Donovan. I'm Tim Rackley."

She pulled her head back, regarding him over her nose. "You got a smoke?"

"Not on me, no." He crouched, bringing himself eye level. "There's no way around you doing some time, but I can help you."

"If I sell out my man? You gotta be joking."

"You're looking at a lot of time, Babe. Maybe life."

"So what? You can live on the inside. You can have a life on the inside."

"Who told you that? Den?"

"No, it wasn't him. We've had plenty of family go down."

"Being inside is hell, Babe. A year feels like a lifetime. After a few you won't remember who you are now. It's not a life."

"Neither's being a traitor. You citizens don't understand that."

"You don't think taking marching orders from bin Laden is being a traitor?"

"Sinners don't take orders from no one. Least of all a bunch of ragheads."

"So think for yourself now, Babe. This is the end of the road for you. It's the end of the road for Den, too. Help us close this thing out without anyone else getting killed."

She made a derisive noise deep in her throat. "Man, you're clueless. Even if I didn't love the Man-which I fucking do more than anything-selling out a Sinner is the lowest thing a member of the family can do. The lowest. There's a code, and you don't break it. No matter what."

"But you're not a Sinner." He watched the rage flare in her shiny eyes; his remark had cut her deep. He continued, more placatingly, "If you help us find him, we'll have a better shot at taking him alive. We can plan the takedown better. Control the situation. Make sure he doesn't end up coming in in a body bag."

"Why? So he can get the lethal injection or the chair or whatever you fuckers use nowadays? No way. We both know why you're here. You don't know where he is. And when the Man doesn't want to be found, he doesn't get found. You don't stand a chance."

"You gotta admit, we've done pretty well so far."

She broke eye contact, slumping back on the bench and blowing her bangs out of her eyes. The stretched collar of the jumpsuit dwarfed her delicate neck. "Sure, you got your news headlines. But a month from now, he'll just be another bad guy on another list. You'll forget all about him. He can live how he wants, even." Her eyes held a hope that was at once naive and affecting.

"He shot my wife," Tim said. "I'm not gonna forget about him."

She jerked her head back. Her voice came high with her surprise. "Who's your wife?"

"The sheriff's deputy."

"Right." She bit her lips. "Right. So, like, I'd believe you that you'd try to take him alive."

"You're the only one who can help us arrange a lower-risk take-down."

"And if I don't?"

"I don't want to kill him. But if I have to…"

"You will." She read his face. Her eyes teared up, and she lifted them to the ceiling. For the first time, her voice trembled. "He'll never come in alive. Never."

"You don't know that. I've seen things play out in ways I never would've predicted. You help us, we can work something out with the prosecutor. You don't want to be in a penitentiary for the rest of your life."

"You don't get it, asshole." Her sudden anger caught him off guard. She shoved back into the corner of the bench, hugging her knees to her chest. "I'm fucking done. That's the deal. And I honor my deals."

"What do you mean, you're done?"

"You think the Man's gonna talk to me now? Pop by for conjugal visits? You think he hasn't already changed all his numbers, ditched all his hideouts? Our hideouts. I'm in here-that means he's closed the book on me." Tears clung to her dark lashes. "If he walked by me on the street now, he'd keep walking. And I'm glad. Because that's what he needs to do to keep alive." She let the tears run, not bothering to wipe her cheeks. They slid down her neck and darkened the seam of her jump-suit. "Even if I wanted to help myself, I couldn't. He's too smart to trust me anymore."

Her face twisted, and she lowered her head into her arms and wept. Her cries were resonant and mournful, seeming to rise from deep within her. He could hear them even after he closed the steel door behind him, even after he reached the end of the cell-block corridor.

Already the other prisoners were screaming for her to shut the fuck up.