Veil of Civility

Chapter Twenty-Four

Seth Castellano sat alone in the fourth floor field office his counterterrorism unit had taken over thirty-six hours earlier. The other agents assigned to the case were either out, following the hundreds of leads that had poured in through the FBI's eyewitness hotlines, or had taken a few hours off to freshen up and get some rest. He'd spent most of the night going over ways to spin the fact that Declan McIver had killed the four assassins that had been sent to make sure that what he knew never reached the ears of the public at large.

Castellano had had a pretty good idea that McIver was hiding something when he'd first begun to pull information on the man after learning his identity at the hospital, and the deaths of the four men all but proved it. Now the question wasn't if McIver was hiding something, but what.

Shortly before 11 p.m. the previous night, Castellano had received word from the Virginia State Police that a vehicle belonging to DCM Properties had been found overturned along a deserted section of a four lane highway between Lynchburg and Roanoke and that two bodies had been nearby. He'd immediately ordered his agents in the field to secure the scene and to prevent any of the local or state police from contaminating it. By the time he'd arrived to have a closer look, he'd also learned that the Roanoke City Police had found two more bodies near a warehouse owned by the same company.

Now, with four suspicious bodies attached to property ostensibly belonging to Declan McIver, he was beginning to feel much better about their chances of success. Even with McIver still on the loose, the bodies meant a huge hit to his credibility and he would have a lot of questions to answer when he was located. In the meantime, Castellano was sure that he could make the four dead men work in his and David Kemiss's favor if he could figure out the right angle.

Castellano's thoughts were interrupted by the bell on the elevator. He turned in his chair to see an agent entering the office. "Good morning, Agent Kelly," he said.

Kelly placed a black computer bag on one of the many desks and took a seat. "Good morning, sir. Have you been here all night?" She was one of the newest agents in his unit, but one of the most experienced investigators on the team, having had many years of prior service in the FBI. She was middle-aged with scraggly, dark hair and a lined face. Not the most attractive person, but certainly one of the most motivated agents he had under his command.

Castellano nodded. "No rest for the wicked, I suppose."

"No rest here either, sir, I spent most of the night trying to locate a lead that I thought you might be interested in, in light of last night's discoveries."

"Oh?"

Kelly zipped open the computer bag and withdrew a tip sheet. "I remembered seeing this yesterday morning and didn't think much of it. At the time it seemed like just another nutjob calling in conspiracy theories, but since those bodies were found near Kafni's former bodyguard's property… I thought maybe there was more to it."

Castellano reached out and took the tip sheet. Looking it over he said, "What kind of name is Lorcan O'Rourke?"

"Irish, I believe, sir."

"Well, let's see if we can get him on the phone, shall we?"

Kelly took the tip sheet back and dialed the phone number listed. Pressing the speaker button, the agents listened as the phone rang on the other end.

"Yeah?" a gruff voice answered.

"Is this Lorcan O'Rourke?" Castellano said, over-enunciating the name.

"Depends on who's asking, boyo." The voice was accented and when the man spoke it sounded as though he was gargling broken glass. Whoever he was, he needed to lay off the cigarettes or else he was going to have a serious disagreement with cancer before long.

"You're speaking with Assistant Special Agent in Charge Seth Castellano, at the FBI. I understand that you phoned one of our tip lines and said you had information on the Kafni investigation, is that correct?"

"Well, boyo, I have some information that might be related to your investigation and it might not be. It's more of an additional direction you could take a look in, besides Islamic terrorism."

"You indicated that your information had something to do with a former bodyguard. Why don't you tell me more about that?"

"Aye. Have you run across a man named Declan McIver in your investigation yet?"

Castellano couldn't believe his ears. Had the man just said Declan McIver? He sure as hell had, and now Castellano was listening intently. "I can't comment on an ongoing investigation, sir. You'll have to tell me what it is that you have and I'll decide from there whether it's something we need to pursue."

"McIver used to be a member of Kafni's security detail back in the late nineties, but before that he worked for me, as a smuggler. Turned out to be quite a lot of trouble, too, and cost me a damn fortune. After thirty years at sea, I can tell you that he's the worst thing I've ever plucked out of the Atlantic Ocean."

"I'm sorry, plucked out of the Atlantic Ocean?"

"That's right, boyo. McIver's an immigrant, and not the legal kind, at least not originally. He came to the States aboard a freighter that originated in Ireland. That freighter was carrying, well, we'll call it undeclared cargo, and when we offloaded it onto our own boat, McIver came with it. We used to get a lot of guys like him in the late eighties and nineties, all running from the British Army or the Royal Ulster Constabulary or some damn agency or another over there."

"Running? Why?"

"Three words, boyo: Irish — Republican — Army."

"The IRA?" Castellano said rhetorically.

"Yeah, the IRA, revolutionaries, terrorists, whatever you want to call them. My point is, Declan McIver was one of them, and if I was looking for a man close to Abaddon Kafni who was capable of the kind of violence that happened Friday night, I'd be looking right at this man. Do some digging and you'll see what I mean. And when you do… I want you to jam him up really hard and tell him Lorcan O'Rourke sends a hearty up yours."

The caller hung up with a laugh that quickly turned into a wheezing cough. Agent Kelly picked up the receiver and hung it up again to turn off the speaker system. "Sorry, sir, I guess he was a nut after all."

"Maybe," Castellano said with a shrug, "maybe not."

"I don't see how that could help our current investigation, sir."

"Well, it's a bit of possible background on McIver, which has been hard to come by, but no, you're right. It doesn't help us much at the moment. Good effort though, Agent Kelly. Keep it up. I'll be in my office for a while before heading out if you find anything else."

"Yes, sir."

Castellano stood from the chair he'd been sitting in near a wall mounted map of the Western Virginia area. He walked into the office he had commandeered and closed the door behind him. The caller hadn't given them anything that was really pertinent to the official investigation, but that didn't matter. Whatever the guy's angle was, three words that he'd uttered were more than helpful to the goals that Castellano wanted to accomplish.