The drive back to Caroline"s house had gone by too quickly. She watched Caroline disappear inside the house. The only redeeming feature was the knowledge that she would be seeing her again tomorrow.
Edwards spread the stack of surveillance photos out in front of Laura and Stevens. He picked up the ones that had a large red aX" marked across the face and slung them across the table. He looked back and forth at the two agents. He slammed his fist down on the table, causing Laura to jump. She reached out to grab the cup of coffee, but not in time to keep it from spilling on the photos.
"This son-of-a-b.i.t.c.h has killed at least four people since we began, and we don"t have s.h.i.t. We can"t tie him to any of them." He turned and directed his anger at Stevens. "What are we getting from the restaurant?"
"Nothing we can use. It"s all babble. They never talk about business and if they do, it"s pretty well coded."
"This is bulls.h.i.t. That"s what this is." Edwards was just plain p.i.s.sed off. He looked at Stevens and shook his head in disbelief. "Pretty well coded? Are you f.u.c.king kidding me? A rookie could have figured out that they ordered a hit on Paul and George, and you should have known that!" he yelled.
It was totally out of character for Edwards to dress down one of his agents in front of another agent, but he had reached his limit. He pointed his finger at Stevens. "You"re the Sr. agent on this G.o.d d.a.m.n operation and it was your responsibility to warn the agents in L.A."
Stevens" face flushed red as his own temper flared. "How the h.e.l.l was I supposed to know that having dinner meant that it was a f.u.c.king hit order? We"ve never had a case like that before."
"Okay, you guys," Laura intervened. "This isn"t solving anything. All of us are stressed, but you two fighting doesn"t get us answers."
Edwards paced back and forth in front of the window. He stopped to look out across the street at Pal Joey"s. "You"re right, Laura, it doesn"t. Castrucci knows we"re onto him." He turned and looked at Laura and Stevens. "He"s been too careful and I know he"s not that smart."
Stevens ma.s.saged the side of his temples with his index fingers. "Maybe we can rattle his cage," he said.
Laura leaned back in her chair. "Let"s go after Baysh.o.r.e. We know for a fact that they"re funneling money through the Cayman"s and Rheyna"s pretty confident that he"s using the computer in his office to make the transactions."
Stevens nodded his head in agreement. "It would make sense to use the one operation that appears to be the cleanest and we all know from past experience that they"re usually the ones that turn out to be the dirtiest. Unfortunately, we"ve failed at all attempts to get any information from his office. He doesn"t do much talking in there. In the past, we"ve tried to upload a remote tracker, but failed. It"s obvious that he has some sort of security measure on his end that runs interference."
Edwards considered the information and nodded his head. "Okay then, well, I guess it"s up to Rheyna. Since we need to get around his security devices, she"ll have to do the upload directly at his computer," he said, turning to Laura. "Laura, you find out what Rheyna needs and get it to her."
Laura nodded, absentmindedly tapping her pencil on the edge of the table. "I think Rheyna"s right about this one. We know that Castrucci"s into gems and he"s getting them from Sierra Leone. I"d be willing to bet that he"s using Baysh.o.r.e as the main front company."
Edwards took a cigarette out of his pocket and lit it. "Okay, I"m convinced. Let"s apply some heat and go after Baysh.o.r.e. I"ll set it up and get the warrant." He blew a puff of smoke in the air. "Carl, you"ll lead on the raid."
Stevens got out of the chair and grabbed a set of keys from the table. "I"m gonna go grab us something to eat, you guys want anything in particular?"
Edwards shook his head.
Laura pulled a couple bucks from her pocket and handed it to him. "I"ll have whatever you"re having," she said.
Edwards walked over to the window and leaned his hands against the sill. He watched Stevens get in the car and pull away from the curb. His cell beeped, indicating he had a voicemail waiting. He dialed in and listened to the message, and then immediately called Ron.
"I was just about to call you again," Ron said through the phone.
"I just got your message. Have you talked to the bank manager yet?" Edwards asked.
"Yeah, he was very cooperative. He said it would take a couple of days, but he"d get the info together and give me a call as soon as he"s done."
"Okay, Ron. As soon as you hear back from him, let me know and I"ll have someone swing by and pick it up."
"You got it."
"Where is he now?" Edwards asked.
"I told him to meet you down at the L.A. bureau office."
"Did you fax the doc.u.ments?"
"Yeah, you should be getting them any minute now."
"All right, I"ll give you a call later." Edwards hung up the phone and walked over to the fax machine. Within seconds, it started humming and then beeped as it spit out the fax. Edwards pulled the doc.u.ment off the tray. He looked at it and then handed it to Laura. She glanced at the circled areas and shook her head.
Edwards picked up the next sheet and looked at the grainy photo. He still couldn"t believe it. He waited for the fax machine to spit out the last doc.u.ment and pulled out a chair next to Laura. He laid the photos on the table. If he hadn"t just seen the pictures himself, he still wouldn"t have believed it. He was not shocked easily, but this downright surprised the h.e.l.l out of him.
Laura picked up the photo of Artie standing outside the bank with a dark-haired young man. She looked at the next photo, showing the young man handing doc.u.ments to Artie. She instantly recognized the man. She flipped through the rest of the photos and tossed them back on the table.
She was the first to break the silence. "You know who that is, don"t you?" she asked.
Edwards nodded. "Marco Mancini, one of Castrucci"s foot soldiers."
Laura shook her head. "I still can"t believe this-Artie, of all people."
"It just goes to show that when you think you know someone, you realize that you really don"t know them at all."
"But Artie?" Laura was dumbfounded. She picked up the bank doc.u.ment and looked at it again. "This shows a deposit of fifteen grand. Surely he"s received a lot more than that."
"My thoughts exactly, and that"s one of the questions I"m going to ask him."
"It doesn"t make sense, Kyle. If he"s the mole, why would he get so careless after all these years?"
"I"ve been asking myself the same question, and the only thing I can come up with is that he didn"t know about Ron"s program until it was too late."
"But Rheyna said Sonny specifically mentioned the program. Is there any way he could have figured it out?"
Kyle shrugged. "I guess anything"s possible. h.e.l.l, he"s gone undetected for more than ten years, so he"s obviously resourceful."
"What about Rheyna?"
He shook his head. "I don"t think Castrucci knows about her."
"What makes you so sure?"
"For two reasons-If Castrucci knew, he would"ve already taken steps to eliminate her, and Artie, if he is the mole, would"ve known that outing Rheyna ..." he stopped and smiled, "pardon the pun, but outing Rheyna would"ve pointed directly to someone on the team and he knows this."
"Do you think we should go ahead with the plan?"
He stood up and grabbed his jacket off the back of the chair. "Yeah, he doesn"t know that we"ve decided to have Rheyna try and access Castrucci"s system, but run it by Rheyna first. If she"s okay with it, then we"ll proceed. If not, we"ll pull the plug ASAP."
"All right, I"ll give her a call and fill her in on what we got so far."
"I"ll call you as soon as I"m done talking to Artie." Edwards gathered up the photos and went out the door.
Laura turned at the sound of voices and reached over to turn the volume up on the receiver. She was listening in to the conversation going on inside Castrucci"s office. A few minutes later, she glanced up as the door opened.
"I just saw Kyle drive away. Where"s he going?" Stevens asked as he set the bag on the table.
She held up her hand to silence him. "Hold on, I"ll tell you in a minute."
Big Tony glared at Sonny and Henry.
Sonny tried to calm him down. "They haven"t got s.h.i.t, Tony and that"s why they"re doing this. Trying to shake us up, that"s all."
Big Tony wasn"t buying it. He vehemently shook his head at Sonny. "Carlos is behind this. He has to be."
"It don"t make no sense, Tony."
"Paulie and Georgie, that"s why!" he yelled.
Sonny shook his head. "Carlos don"t know s.h.i.t, either."
Henry"s cell phone rang, interrupting their conversation. "Yeah? How long ago ... He down there now ... Yeah ... Okay ... Call me when they"re released." Henry flipped the phone shut.
Big Tony looked at him.
"That was Louie. Marco and Connie just got pinched in front of Pal Joey"s."
"What the h.e.l.l for?" Big Tony asked.
"Some bulls.h.i.t about consorting with known criminals and Connie was packing."
Big Tony looked as if his head was going to explode. "See? What"d I tell you, Sonny? Last week, they got Richie for no reason."
Sonny sat calmly, taking it all in as he lit a cigarette. "Has Ramono been called?" he asked Henry.
Henry nodded. "He was there waitin" when they brought aem in."
Laura smiled as she and Stevens listened in on the conversation. She could only imagine the look on Castrucci"s face. If he"s p.i.s.sed now, wait until we go into Baysh.o.r.e, she thought. Better yet, wait until he finds out that we got Artie. She wished she could be there to see the look on his face.
Chapter 18.
Rheyna had no idea of what took place inside the house, but she knew it was bad and she figured it had to be from the pressure Edwards was instigating. Big Tony looked like a volcano about to erupt.
He jerked the chair back away from the table and sat down. Sonny and Henry took a seat at the table next to him. The patio table next to the pool had turned out to be Big Tony"s preferred place to discuss business and it had paid off highly for her. She grabbed the towel off the table and wiped her face and arms while glancing over at the table.
Today was a real scorcher. The thermometer outside the pool hut put the temperature at ninety-eight degrees. She looked down at her legs and was grateful for cosmetic makeup-namely, waterproof concealer. It had done a good job of hiding her scratches. Of course, Caroline had noticed, just as she had suspected she would. She felt bad for blaming it on Annie, but the explanation seemed to satisfy Caroline.
She watched Big Tony reach inside his breast pocket, take out a handkerchief, and use it to mop the sweat off his forehead. What he did next shocked her. Henry had been leering at Caroline almost from the instant he saw her. With a movement quicker than Rheyna thought possible, Bog Tony slapped Henry upside the head so hard that he nearly knocked him out of the chair. "Put your G.o.d d.a.m.n tongue back in your mouth before I cut it off," he snarled.
She tried not to laugh and actually felt a little bit sorry for the man. She knew how he felt. Her tongue fell out when she looked at Caroline, too.
"I think he likes you," she said just loud enough for Caroline to hear.
Caroline frowned and playfully slapped her with the magazine she was reading. "Yuck. He can like all he wants."
"He"s not that bad-looking," Rheyna teased.
"You think so? Maybe you should take him for yourself."
Rheyna glanced over at Henry and shook her head. "Nah. Not my type."
A look of amus.e.m.e.nt crossed Caroline"s face. "And ... what exactly is your type?" she asked.
Rheyna wanted to say, you are, but held her tongue. "I prefer blondes."
"That figures."
Rheyna turned over on her side to look at her. "What"s that supposed to mean?"
Caroline shrugged. "Nothing. Just that most people like the opposite of what they look like."
"Is that true for you, too?"
"Yep," she answered and then ducked her face back behind the magazine.
Rheyna sighed. She"s flirting with me again, she thought. Come to think of it, she did that a lot these days. She heard a phone ring and looked up to see Henry talking into his cell again. She heard him say, "Yeah and okay" before hanging up. Her ear bud was useless. She hadn"t had the opportunity to get the receiver from under the table to replace the batteries, and she was not about to test fate by being careless. A few minutes later, she heard the door slide open and turned to see Terasa walk out onto the patio.
"Where"s Rosa?" Big Tony asked.
Terasa placed a tray of sandwiches down on the table. "She has the afternoon off," she said.
"Thanks, Mrs. Castrucci," Henry said, biting into the club sandwich.
"Thanks, Mrs. C," Sonny said, taking a sandwich for himself.
"You"re welcome, boys," she replied with a smile.
She"s always smiling, Rheyna thought as she watched Big Tony half stand to kiss Terasa on the cheek.
"Is she great, or what?" he asked the two men.
Terasa picked up the tray and came over to her and Caroline. Caroline sat up and pulled one of the loungers over.