Forty-Seven

Rivera gathered them in his war room to discuss Fager’s meltdown. He had ordered take-out. The sight of red, white, and blue Lotaburger bags made Aragon smile.

Tucker, the agent who had posed as a reporter, was there. Lewis had wrangled time away from the kids for the late-night meeting. Goff wanted to come, but Aragon kept him away.

“He really hates Fager. Foaming at the mouth,” she told Lewis on their way to the FBI’s office. “Ready to kill him for making Thornton look believable. He’ll feel better when Fager’s in jail. The motion to revoke his conditions of release is Judge Diaz’s first hearing tomorrow. She assigned it to herself, saving us the trouble of guessing the outcome.”

She told Goff to make himself useful. Park outside Fager’s office. Let her know if he went home, where he kept a loaded Beretta. Aragon was prepared to use the conditions of Fager’s bail to stop and frisk him as soon as he stepped out the door.

Gathered around Rivera’s conference table, they dug into the food, ate quietly, all hungry after a long day of work.

“Feels great to deliver good news,” she said. The men had to wait for her to swallow the last bite of her burger to explain. She wiped her lips, took a sip of Coke. “Bronkowski’s on his way back with a human scapula from inside one of Geronimo’s statues.”

“A huge break,” Rivera said. “We can see if it matches any of the bodies at the ranch.”

Lewis said, “We get a match, it gives us PC to go after the other statues and see what’s inside them. We can get into his house, his gallery, that modern wing at his ranch.” He caught Aragon’s eye. “Lord knows what’s in there.”

“Right. Who can imagine what we might find?” she said.

She liked the energy. For the first time she could remember, she had complete confidence in every law enforcement officer she saw.

“We have to include Geronimo’s sales records in the first warrant.” She added a serious tone to her voice. “Find out who bought the other statutes. Collectors are not going to be happy having us dismantle artwork that’s soaring in value as news of this case spreads. Bronkowski lucked out. He found probably the only person ready to turn a Geronimo masterpiece back into worthless trash.”

Rivera said, “We’ll get sued.”

“DOJ has a million lawyers. They can figure it out. We’ve got another problem.” She laid her hand on Rivera’s arm. “We need your help staying with this. Tomorrow we go back on rotation.”

“What if the FBI formally requests the participation of detectives Aragon and Lewis in a joint task force?” he asked. “Linda Fager will be an integral part of that investigation. I’ll insist you carry that case for the task force, since you were the first detectives on scene. We’ll also request you reopen the Tasha Gonzalez inquiry. I can have the U.S. Attorney make the pitch. He knows we owe this show to you.”

“Dewey won’t buck DOJ. Hell, he’ll take credit for getting Santa Fe PD included,” said Lewis. “You’ll have to put up with him at the table.”

“He’ll be pulling out chairs for your boss,” Aragon said.

“We’ll give him a spot to stand for every media event. In the background, with the potted plants.”

“So what’s next?” She hunted loose fries in the bottom of her bag.

“The skeletons are en route to Quantico. Those bones will tell a story.” Rivera handed her the last of his fries when she came up empty. “Rick, I can give you five people to canvas relatives of the missing women on your list. You tell them what to do.”

“An army,” she said with food in her mouth.

“Also on its way to Quantico is that table Montclaire ditched. Cost us twenty bucks to buy it from the junkyard. Maybe the best investment the agency ever made. We find hair or blood, we get another match to the skeletons. Since the table came from inside Geronimo’s ranch—we’ve got Montclaire on video trying to sneak it into her Expedition, you can tell what’s under the sheets—we’ll get any warrant we want.”

“We’ll get Geronimo’s gallery with what Bronkowski’s bringing,” she said. “And if that table has any DNA match, we’ve got Montclaire on felony obstruction. She wasn’t destroying evidence without Thornton telling her what to do. Maybe Montclaire would roll on Thornton.” She thought a little more. “Shit, and then maybe Thornton rolls on Judge Judy.”

“We’d have to prove Montclaire knew there was evidence of homicides on that table to get to Thornton,” Lewis said.

“Why else would she be scattering pieces along the interstate? She knew it was evidence that would hurt Geronimo. And there’s the fire Bronkowski thinks she started to destroy the bar table where Geronimo sat after killing Linda Fager.”

“We can’t prove that bar table had Linda Fager’s blood on it.” Lewis and her kicking a case back and forth, the way they’d do it at Killer Park. The FBI agents sat back and watched. “It’s all ashes,” Lewis continued. “So much for a second obstruction charge.”

“I’m more interested in arson, a second-degree felony. How do we wrap that around Montclaire? I bet I can break her. I don’t think there’s much steel behind that pretty face.”

“We won’t get to talk to her without Thornton at her side. We won’t get two words out of Montclaire.”

“We’ll get two: ‘Fuck you.’ We need to split them up. But how do you peel a client away from her lawyer who’s also her boss?”

“All good. Lots of work for everyone. Lots to think about,” Rivera said, reclaiming control of the meeting. “Now for news you may not like. I have to open a file on Fager.”

Nobody seemed surprised.

Rivera explained anyway. “DOJ’s war crimes people have to consider Thornton’s allegations about Bosnia. It’s a huge distraction. But if we don’t investigate Fager as thoroughly as Geronimo, maybe more so, we pay for it at trial.”

“We not only have to prove Geronimo did it,” Lewis said, “we have to prove Fager couldn’t, didn’t, and wouldn’t.”

“Absolutely. And we have to tackle the fact that Linda Fager didn’t fit with the other women. We don’t know exactly why Geronimo killed Linda Fager. It’s troubling out behavioral analysts.”

“She looked at him. That’s all it took,” Aragon said. “We got it on tape.”

“We must get that tape in evidence,” Rivera said. “I’m confident we’ll succeed in federal court. You wouldn’t have retained a copy? One you missed in complying with Judge Rivera’s ridiculous order, one you left in a tape player perhaps?”

“I don’t know everybody in this room well enough to answer that,” she said. She looked across the table at Agent Tucker. “We just met today, no offense.”

He nodded, showing he understood what she was saying under the words.

“Or,” Rivera said, “we sever Linda Fager from the others, separate trials, and don’t give Thornton an invitation to confuse the jury.”

“That’s an invitation for her to confuse two juries,” Lewis said.

That’s why Goff’s rabid, Aragon thought to herself. He sees Fager letting Geronimo off the hook, again. It doesn’t matter why he fell into Thornton’s trap, or how much he’s suffering. It just makes Goff hate him more.

“Can’t blame him,” she said.

“What?” Rivera and Lewis asked at the same time.

“Nothing.”

They divided tasks. Lewis would contact families of the missing women with Tucker assisting. Rivera was going to be occupied obtaining authorization and funding for the joint task force. Aragon would run down a current Mujeres Bravas crew. Their blue and green station wagons were easy to spot. She would ask how the women found work, who they considered their boss, who paid them, and show photos of the missing women.

Aragon left feeling confident, though the Fager thing was a loose end. Thornton was going to get run over, her client crushed under her. Too much physical evidence was coming at Geronimo from too many directions. Even the sort of jurors who made it into the box in a Santa Fe courtroom would not be fooled.

She headed to her apartment and collapsed on the sofa in time for the night’s last news broadcast. There was Fager throwing Thornton around like a rag doll. It was worse on camera. She watched herself putting Fager on the ground and Agent Tucker holding him there. The contorted, unshaved face under Tucker’s knee was hard to recognize.

Her phone rang. Joe Mascarenas was watching the same news from his hospital room. She was prepared to tell him everything was under control. But the cameras caught something she had not noticed in the chaos: Thornton’s satisfied smile as Fager’s hands closed on her throat.

“You see that?” Mascarenas said. “Defense exhibit one.”

Linda Fager’s killer had strangled her, crushed her windpipe. Thornton could show the video, with blown-up stills on corkboard in front of the jury box. Have them out through trial, she forgot to take them off the easel by her table, apologizing to the judge but doing it again and again. And every time, needing no words at all to tell the jury Walter Fager was the one who should be on trial.