Chapter FORTY-EIGHT
We sat in silence for a few moments, the idea of a Guatemalan connection coursing across the synapses of our brains, raising more questions than we had answers. Jock had been right. Maybe the men who tried to kill J.D. and me were really after Jock.
“Did you know about this on Friday when you said something about the Guatemalans getting you and me mixed up?” I asked.
He shook his head. “I’ve operated in that area of the world and I thought it reasonable that I might be a target. It made no sense to me that either you or J.D. would be in the gang’s sights for some reason.”
“I’m still not sure why or how they could make a mistake like that,” I said.
“It actually makes some sense, now that I know what Gene was doing. Suppose they—whoever they are—knew that Gene was working on the problem of the leaker and they had somebody watching him. Maybe a loose surveillance or something. They see me with Gene, probably take a photograph and send it to the leaker. He identifies me as an agent, and thinks I’m probably here to protect Gene. It never connects with them that I came here because of Matt.”
“Then how did I get in their sights?” I asked. “Or J.D.?”
“These guys aren’t the smartest people on the planet,” Jock said. “It may be something as simple as them finding out that I’m staying in your house and didn’t realize that anybody else was here. There was a different shift watching the house, one who hadn’t seen me. They saw you come and get in your car. They followed you downtown, thinking the man coming out of the house had to be me. They took their shot when you came out of the police station.”
“That kind of stupidity is a little hard to believe,” I said.
“Probably. But you can paint a lot of scenarios as to how they thought you were me. None of them need to make a lot of sense. Maybe you did something to piss them off. Maybe it’s a big coincidence that some Guatemalan gangbangers took a shot at you at the same time we’re closing in on a leaker with some sort of Guatemalan connection. Maybe the guys shooting at you aren’t related in any way to Gene’s death.”
“So, maybe they were after me,” said J.D.
“Who knows,” said Jock, “but I’d like to talk to the gangbangers.”
“Jock,” J.D. said, “I’m not sure the Mexicans on that landscaping crew were telling me the truth about there not being a stranger along with them on Friday. You speak Spanish, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“What if you talked to them?”
“I’d like that, but not at the police station. I’d want to come at them without any government connections.”
“You think they’ll be more likely to talk to you than if they thought you were with the police?”
“I think they’ll be more likely to be scared shitless of me if they think I’m not official.”
“More scared of you than of the gangbangers?” she asked.
Jock grinned. “Bet on it.”
I changed the subject. “Was Gene making any progress in identifying the leaker?”
“We think so. He called the director Thursday afternoon and said he needed to see him as soon as possible. He couldn’t talk about anything over the phone and was afraid to send anything over the Internet, even with the encryptions they were using.”
“And they never got together,” said J.D.
“No,” said Jock. “When I called the director on Friday to tell him about Gene’s death, he was just leaving his office to fly down here.”
“Did he tell you why?” asked J.D.
“Not on the phone. He just asked me to come to Washington.”
“And your interest in the laptop when you called me on Saturday was that the director thought information about the leaker might be on it,” said J.D.
“Right,” said Jock. “The laptop was so sensitive that the director didn’t want Gene to fly to Washington. He was afraid that something might happen to the computer on the way.”
“That’s pretty far-fetched,” I said.
Jock shrugged. “I agree, but they didn’t want to take a chance on the plane crashing, the laptop getting stolen, Gene having a heart attack, anything. It was that sensitive. That’s the reason the director was coming to Longboat Key to see Gene.”
“Did the director have any idea what Gene had learned?”
“Nada,” said Jock. “Not even an inkling.”
“But somebody knew what was going on,” said J.D. “We didn’t think to check for bugs on his phone. Maybe people were listening to his conversations.”
“Don’t think so,” said Jock. “Both Gene and the director were using encrypted satellite phones to communicate. Gene would never have used his home phone on something this important.”
“We didn’t find either a cell or a satellite phone,” said J.D.
“I’m not surprised,” said Jock, “but the phone wasn’t particularly important. Unless somebody has the encryption code, they won’t be able to use it.”
“What about the missing laptop?” I asked. “Do you think somebody can break that code?”
“I don’t know,” said Jock, “but that’s probably not important. We think Gene had somehow developed information that would give us the leaker’s identity. That’s probably what’s in the computer. Since the leaker obviously knows who he is, that information isn’t going to help him. The loss of it will certainly hurt us.”
“If we found the laptop, could the director get into it?” J.D. asked.
“Sure,” said Jock. “He knows the key.”
“So it would seem that the best way to find the leaker is to find the laptop,” said J.D.
“Yes,” said Jock. “But it’s probably somewhere at the bottom of the Gulf by now.”
She sat quietly for a couple of beats, chewing on it. Then, “That may not be the case. That might depend on how sophisticated the hitter was.”
“How so?” I asked.
“Think about it,” she said. “Suppose he was just some low-level gangbanger who happened to be convenient for the leaker to hire to kill Gene. Even if he’d been told to take the computer, he might decide that he can make more money by selling it back to the leaker. Or for that matter, he might be so dumb that he’d try to pawn it. He might not have any idea how valuable it is to the leaker.”
“You’ve got a point,” said Jock, “but I was under the impression you thought the murderer was probably a professional.”
“It looked that way, but I really wasn’t thinking about Guatemalan gangs. I thought you were off base on that one.”
Jock smiled. “Wouldn’t have been the first time.”
“Those gangbangers grow up killing people,” she said.
“Usually in a blood bath,” I said. “This one took some finesse.”
“Or maybe just practice,” said J.D. “What if the gang has a designated hitter, so to speak? One they use for their contract murders when they don’t want it traced back to them.”
“Could be,” said Jock. “Can you get me the name and address of the landscaping crew chief? The shooter couldn’t have gotten onto that crew without the crew chief’s knowledge.”
“It’s in my file back at the station. I’ll get it for you tomorrow.”
“I’d like to go see the guy tonight,” Jock said. “You up for a little action, Matt?”
I nodded. “I’ve got nothing else going on.”
“I’ll go with you,” said J.D.
Jock shook his head. “J.D., this is the place where you should bow out. There’re some things an honest cop shouldn’t be involved in.”
“I thought we were going to be a team,” she said.
“We are,” said Jock. “I’ll give you all the information we get, but you don’t need to be involved in how we get that information.”
“I’m not sure I like that.”
“You wouldn’t like the way I work, either.”
“I’m not a kid, Jock. I watched you work over a bad guy once.”
“And it made you sick,” I said.
She was quiet for a moment or two, chewing on her need for evidence and her gut-level hatred at the methods Jock was sometimes required to use. But she knew there was more at stake here than solving Gene’s murder or the whale tail killings. I could almost see the wheels turning in her head. Finally, she raised her arms in a show of surrender. “Let’s go to the station.”