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SEATTLE (Friday, Nov. 30, 2012) — Danny was waiting for him by the express baggage check-in, just as Mac had told him to. Mac pulled next to the curb, leaned over and opened the passenger's side door.
"Get in," he said tersely.
Danny tossed a duffel bag into the back of the 4-Runner and climbed into the vehicle. "Man, am I glad to see you," he said. "It's been a long time."
"Be quiet until I get us out of here," Mac said. "See if anyone is following us.” He pulled into traffic going through the airport and then started to circle through a second time.
"Hey, you missed the exit," Danny said.
Mac just glanced at him and relaxed a bit. Mac watched his mirrors. No one else seemed to be circling twice. He exited this time, took Highway 99 again, and exited into an abandoned warehouse parking lot with plenty of empty space on three sides and the highway overpass on the fourth. He felt better when he could see flat barren concrete in all directions. Nothing for anyone to use to sneak up on him.
Getting the 9mm out of the backpack, Mac slid it under his jacket. He got out of the 4-runner, leaned against its hood.
"OK, now talk," Mac said, glancing around. He pulled out the picture of Danny's sister. "Start with why the guys who tried to kill me two nights ago had a picture of your sister."
Danny glanced at the picture. "It is Kristy," he said. "The picture I carried in the Marines."
"So what is a picture of Kristy doing in Seattle?" Mac repeated patiently.
"She was teaching school in Shreveport. We bought a house there together. I stay there when I'm in port. I'm working on the oilrigs in the Gulf, did you know that? Good money, work one week, one week off. And it's nice to have a place to come home to.” Danny was rambling.
"So why would killers have a picture of her?" Mac repeated. Again.
"Because they have her," Danny said. He didn't look at Mac. "She doesn't have the shadows and ghosts you and I have. That's all that kept me sane over there, knowing that she was back home and she'd never know what it was like. Even now when the nightmares get to me and I think what the fuck, there's Kristy. Now she's involved in a mess she didn't make, and I'm going to be responsible for the shadows and nightmares in her eyes."
Mac glared at him, and Danny fell silent. "Let me get this straight. You get yourself in over your head in some deal with killers. They kidnap your sister, and you come running to me? What kind of pussy are you?"
"Just listen, will you?" Danny shouted, then more quietly, "Just listen."
Mac nodded. "I'm listening."
Danny walked a few steps away, hands jammed into his jeans pockets. He stared at the overpass, his back to Mac. "Troy called me couple weeks ago. I keep in touch with most of the guys, even you some. Troy's family got him a fine gig in D.C. working for a senator from Illinois. He's been having tons of fun, and really likes being in the know. Likes being in the thick of things. "
Mac prompted, "So he called you."
"Yeah. He said he'd uncovered something of national importance, and he wasn't sure where it would lead. Could he count on me? And I said, sure Troy, if you can't count on your friends who can you count on?"
"And then?" Mac now knew who his aunt's lover reminded him of and why her dithering drove him crazy.
"He said good. It might not come to much, but he'd be in touch.” Danny turned and looked at Mac. "Didn't hear from him until about two weeks ago when he showed up on my doorstep. He looked scared. Serious. We talked awhile, and he gave me a sealed package to hold for him.
"'Hide it,' he said. 'Don't give it to anyone. Nobody. I don't know how deep this goes. If I don't come for it, toss it out to sea and pretend you never heard of me.'
"You took the package."
"Yeah. You wouldn't have, not without knowing what was in it, but Troy was scared, man. Nothing scares Troy. I took the package, and.... I hid it.” Danny let out the breath he was holding. His eyes didn't meet Mac's.
"So three days ago, I come in from my shift on the oilrig, and the house is totally torn apart. Someone had gone through everything. They took lots of shit, including my footlocker with all my military stuff—medals, a diary, letters, pictures—including that one of Kristy. A message on the voice mail said they had Kristy and I was supposed to get the package Maxim brought me and... and give it to them. Then I'd get Kristy back."
Danny closed his eyes. "Sorry, this is rambling. I haven't had any sleep in days. Too scared to close my eyes."
"You always rambled, sleep or no sleep," Mac said sourly. "So, you obviously didn't do what you were told."
"No. I couldn't give them Troy's package. Besides, what are the chances they'll let her go?" Danny shook her head. "So I went to D.C. to Troy's place. He's disappeared, his family is in shock, think he's dead somewhere. I don't know if he's dead, or just hiding. I didn't know what to do. Somebody jumped me in D.C. — I suppose it could have been a mugger, but...." He trailed off.
"Then what?"
"I went back to Shreveport. Someone was at the house waiting. I got in close enough to make sure it wasn't Troy. Was nobody I knew. So I came here."
Mac thought about the story, what Danny had said and what he hadn't. He'd never been a very good liar; the story had holes. Big, giant, holes. "You come here under your own name?"
"Of course," Danny said surprised. "They check ID at the airport, you know."
So he'd been tracked every step of the way. Mac didn't doubt Danny could hold his own in a fight. He'd fought in a few bar fights beside him. Oilrigs weren’t for pussies. But Danny was still alive because the killers wanted the package more than they wanted to kill Danny.
Mac started to press harder on a few points, when a light flicker caught his eye.
He looked up. A car was parked along the highway above the warehouse. Someone was watching them. Binoculars, he thought. "Get in the car," Mac said. "Don't hurry, just turn casually as if you're done looking around and get in the car."
"What?" Danny looked at Mac's set face and did as he was told. Danny casually tapped Mac on the shoulder as if he'd told a good joke and opened the truck door. Mac got in the driver's side and locked it.
"What's wrong?" Danny asked.
"There's a dark blue Ford up on the highway. Watching us. Saw the glint of binoculars," Mac said tersely.
"What are you going to do?"
Mac's pager went off. He glanced at the number. Janet. His stomach growled. "We're going to mosey out of here, as if nothing is more important than getting some Kentucky Fried Chicken for supper. Then we're going to my place so you can sleep."
"Who's the page?"
"My boss," Mac answered briefly.
"You're really a reporter? Hard to believe.” Danny shook his head. "Not what I would have pictured you doing."
Mac snorted. Most people who knew him from earlier days pictured him in jail somewhere.
"Tell me honestly, Danny. Do you have that package with you? In your duffel bag. On you? In this town somewhere?"
Danny shook his head. "I told you, Mac, I don't have the package. Truthfully, it's somewhere I can't get to right now. I swear to God, I'm telling you the truth."
"You never could lie worth a shit. I count at least three lies you've told so far. This had better be the truth."
"I haven't lied to you. I may not have told you everything, yet. But nothing I've said is a lie. I don't have the package with me.” Danny met Mac's eyes and didn't flinch.
Mac nodded. He pulled onto the highway and looked in his mirror. The blue Ford was still sitting there. Bird watchers, maybe, he thought sarcastically. In a big Ford. Buy American. The government does. Right.
Just as he started to take an exit onto South First Avenue the blue Ford pulled in behind him. The driver rolled down his window and stuck a blue light on the roof. Mac hesitated, and then pulled over. It could be Warren, he thought. Or it could be trouble. Most likely trouble.
"Tell me for sure, now," he said to Danny. "You don't have the package with you, right?"
"I do not have the package with me," Danny said steadily. His face was white as he glanced at the car with the flashing light behind them.
Mac pulled over, raised his hands where they could be seen easily by the approaching men. Danny did the same.
"Get out of the car, please," one man said at Mac's window, while his partner stood back and to the side.
"What did I do, officer?" Mac said politely, not moving from the car.
"Get out of the car," the man repeated. His partner stiffened, his hand moving to the shoulder harness inside his jacket.
Mac kept his hands in view. "Can I see some identification?" he said. "You're in an unmarked car, not wearing uniforms. I apologize, but I was attacked recently, and so I'm a bit jumpy these days. ID?"
"We don't have to tell you anything," the second man growled. He was the older of the two, maybe 50, beefier, short-cut gray hair. Been in the military and proud of it, Mac guessed. Much like the men who’d dumped him in the Sound. Didn’t sound quite the same, however.
The man at the car window, however, was more polished. Slimmer, better looking suit, haircut at a salon instead of by a barber. He reached into his jacket and pulled out a blue folder with a gold badge in it. FBI badge. "Now get out of the car," he ordered.
Mac looked at the badge. "I didn't know they had FBI agents doing traffic these days," he said dryly. He ignored Danny who was trying to catch his attention. Stay calm, dude, he thought at him. Just stay calm.
"We got a tip you were picking up a drug carrier at the airport. We want to search your vehicle," the second man said.
Mac laughed, but his eyes stayed cold. "You've got the wrong car, guys. I'm just going to get out my wallet, OK?" He reached carefully for his wallet, handed it over to the nearest FBI agent with his newspaper identification showing. "I'm a reporter for the Examiner. I'm just picking up a friend who's on vacation."
"Right. As if being a reporter makes you too respectable to deal drugs?" asked the one Mac had mentally dubbed Tough Cop.
"And FBI agents do DEA work?" Mac said back. "Look. If you want to search my car, let's all go down to the police station — it's only a few blocks away. Or if you need someone to vouch for me, call Agent Stan Warren."
Smart Cop looked at Tough Cop out of the corner of his eyes. "How do you know Warren?" he asked, handing back Mac's wallet.
"Talked to him this morning.” Mac didn't add what about.
Smart Cop nodded. "Well, I think we have the wrong vehicle, too. Sorry to bother you, Mr. Davis.” He nodded again and headed back to his car. Tough Cop hesitated, looked at Mac, as if he wanted to say more or shoot him or something. Mac said nothing to give him a reason, and the agent slowly followed his partner back to their car.
Mac rolled up his window, put the car into gear and pulled out onto the highway.
"They didn't want to go to the police station for some reason," Mac mused out loud. "Or like the name Stan Warren."
"Mac," Danny said slowly, once they were underway, "You know I said someone was waiting at my house in Shreveport?"
"Yeah," Mac said, taking the exit ramp. The more he thought about it, the more Kentucky Fried chicken sounded good. Why had those two wanted to toss his rig? The drugs bit was bogus. Something Danny was carrying? Or something they thought he had?
"It was that guy, the FBI agent."
"What?" Mac turned to look at Danny. "Which one?"
"The older guy. The one that stood back a ways. Why would the FBI be waiting for me in Shreveport? In my house?"
Mac glanced in his rearview mirror. "Shit, if I know. What the fuck has Troy stirred up?"
It wasn’t until after the two of them had finished the fried chicken and Danny was sacked out in Mac’s room, that Mac remembered he was supposed to call Janet. He dialed her at home.
"Bout time you called," she said when she picked up the phone.
"Sorry. Got stopped by some FBI agents. Thought I was a drug dealer," he said.
"Yeah, right. Look, I've been in meetings all day about this story. You've got a hold of something big we think."
"Tell me."
Janet had called a friend who still worked at the Examiner's D.C. office. He'd made a couple of calls and then called her back. "Stan Warren is heading up the background group for the new cabinet nominations," she said.
"Which means?"
"Come on, Mac. He's the key FBIer to do records and background checks on all the people the president is planning to nominate for his incoming cabinet. You don't think he'd take time out to sit in on an attempted murder investigation for the fun of it, do you?"
Mac was silent. Janet went on. "My friend at the D.C. office went to his chief with the info as well as telling me. He's fairly slobbering at the chance to get at this story. The bureau chief calls the managing editor, the M.E. calls me and then we have a meeting to end all meetings."
"And?" Mac prompted.
"I argued, successfully, that it was your story. Yes, you're just a beginner, yes, this is a bigger story than a cop beat story, yes, you may be too involved in the story, yes, yes, yes. Still, it's your story.” She paused and then continued, "That is, if you plan to be a reporter on this thing and not the Avenger.” She waited to see if he would say anything. Mac didn't.
"Mac, I put my reputation on the line, and possibly my job," she continued slowly. "Most certainly your job is on the line. You’ve got to decide now, what it's going to be? If you can be a reporter, then fine, it's your story to run with. If you can't, then tell me now. Jason will be glad to take the story off your hands, and I'll put you on leave to go off and play Avenger games."
Mac had considered Janet's earlier insistence to the cops that he was a reporter, and this was a story as a fib to allow her time to call in an attorney for him. This was personal. He was involved. He'd been attacked. His aunt had been attacked. People he knew were in danger. By all rights, he ought to tell Janet to give the story to someone else. Then he'd be free then to pursue this his way. No rules but one: Get the bastards before they get you.
If he stayed the reporter on the story, there were rules. Not many, but some. He had to come back with a story that could be printed. It had to have provable facts in it. He couldn't just bury the bodies and pretend he'd been in Hawaii the whole time. His name would be attached to this.
But he couldn't say give the story away. To his own surprise, he wanted the story. He could almost taste it. Something was up involving nominations of people for some of the highest positions in the country. Shit, yes, he wanted the story—what reporter wouldn't?
"I want the story," he said finally, shaking his head at himself.
"No playing Avenger?"
"No playing Avenger," he said, adding to himself, for now.
Janet heard the unspoken part, apparently. "If that changes, Mac, you gotta tell me, you hear? I'll put another reporter on it, no questions asked. This is too big a story to taint because you're off playing macho Marine."
"I hear you. Tell me more about what you found out?" Mac asked. It wasn't the macho Marine side of him she should be worried about, he thought.
"Just some conjecture. Stan Warren has an impeccable reputation. He's supposedly one of the good guys. Near as anyone knows, he can't be bought or silenced. I suppose he can be killed, but no one's proved it yet. I gather a few have tried. Decorated war veteran, commendations for service in the Bureau, yadda, de yadda. He's 47, divorced, has two kids, with whom he has a good relationship. Bring him back by again, will you?"
Mac snorted. "Just what you need, a long-distance relationship with an FBIer."
"Yeah, well. Anyway, he's one tough dude, and straight as they come. That's something everyone agreed on, Jason says."
"Jason is your friend in the D.C. bureau?"
"Yeah, Jason Whitcomb. I have all kinds of telephone numbers from him for you. He says if he can be of any help, just give him a call, day or night."
"I bet."
"Seriously, Mac, Jason's a good reporter. And he will help you. You may need him at that end."
"Give me the numbers," he said. He wrote them down on a scratch pad and tucked the sheet in his wallet next to Warren' card. "Do we know who he is personally investigating? I gather he has a team of folks to do this."
"Yeah, it's a big job. No, we don't know who's on his list. I gather the FBI doesn't know either. He's been somewhat hard to get a hold of these days. Jason's source said there's some consternation about it at the Bureau."
Mac fiddled with the pen in his hand. "I need a list of all the possible positions Warren could be investigating," he said finally. "And who's rumored for those positions. Start with those positions that traditionally require military background, DOD, FBI, CIA, NSA, Department of Homeland Security. Jason might be able to help there."
"Okay. Why those?"
"That seems to be the connection with me," he said. "I got a call from an old Marine buddy. His house was ransacked."
"Got it. Set your FAX to receive in the morning. I’m working the early shift again. I’ll send the list on.”
Mac woke Danny up. “You up to going out?”
“You mean like to a bar?” Danny said, sleepily. “What time is it?”
“Almost 10 p.m. There’s someone I need to talk to.”
“And you can’t just call them on the telephone?” Danny got up and headed toward the shower. “Give me a few minutes.”
Mac could hear the music down the block from Bohemian as he and Danny walked toward the bar.
“Rap,” Danny said.
Mac nodded. He DJ’d here some nights when things were slow, mixing songs, making people dance. It was a form of music all its own, he thought. This was a Friday night crowd; the place was packed.
“Mac,” the guy at the door said, waving him on in. Danny followed along. Mac shouldered his way through the crowd, nodding to some, a few low fives.
“What’s happening,” one guy shouted at him.
“You seen Jules?” he shouted back.
The guy gestured his head toward the back. “She’s sitting with friends near the dance floor.”
Mac turned toward Danny, but he’d already disappeared into the throng of people. Mac saw him chatting with a girl. He smiled.
Mac bought a pitcher of beer, grabbed a couple of glasses and headed in the direction of the dance floor. He stood off a bit, watching Jules at the table. She was beautiful, he thought. Tall, slim, long straight black hair, blue eyes. The combination had enthralled him once. They’d known each other it seemed forever. Back when they were teens running the streets. After the Marines, he’d looked her up. They’d dated for a while. She’d broken it off, finally. He had been relieved, he thought now.
She looked up, saw him. He saw the hesitation on her face. He held up the pitcher, gestured to a spot along the bar. She smiled, got up and came over. He watched her come toward him, watching her body move to the music.
“Didn’t expect to see you here tonight,” she said. Mac poured her a beer. He didn’t touch the one he poured for himself.
“Friend from out of town came in. Thought we’d come down and listen to some music for a bit.”
“Friend?” Jules looked around. Mac pointed out Danny. “Not bad. Not bad at all. You going to introduce me?”
“He lives in Louisiana,” Mac said mildly.
She shook her head. “That’s what I don’t need — a long distance romance. Already had one of those with you.”
“I was right here,” Mac objected.
She patted his knee. “Physically,” she conceded. “But emotionally? You were someplace else.”
Mac didn’t say anything. Old news, this conversation.
“Cops questioned me this morning,” he said.
Jules pulled back a bit. “So I hear.”
Mac grabbed her hand; she didn’t resist. “What else do you hear?”
She hesitated, looked back at the table of her friends. Courthouse friends, Mac knew. He could name some of them.
“Donnelly is still in a coma, but he was mumbling your name earlier,” she said at last.
“Rodriguez said something like that,” Mac said with a nod. “What else?”
She rubbed his knee while she thought. “You know he had a file on you? Had your juvie records and everything?” At Mac’s nod she went on, “Rumor has it he had more than one file and the other one is on Howard Parker. They are about to shit bricks over there — a bad cop collecting data on him for God’s sake. Can you imagine?”
“I don’t suppose anyone thinks that’s motive for Parker to kill him,” Mac said bitterly. “I’d like to see that file.”
“Dance with me?” Jules asked wistfully. He smiled and pulled her out to the dance floor.
“Any time, babe, any time.”