Colt stopped beside Sully and saw Nowakowski was seated not across from the kid, beside him. The kid was at the middle of the table, Nowakowski at the side. Friendly, approachable, non-threatening. Warren was standing, shoulders against the wall by the door, head up, eyes looking down his nose at the boy, arms crossed on his chest. Unfriendly, official, a threat.
“I swear I didn’t know,” the kid said, his voice hitching, about to unman himself and trying like hell to stop it. “He said he was a cop. Had a badge and everything.”
“We understand,” Nowakowski told him though Colt knew he didn’t. He thought the kid was a dumb fuck which he probably was. Though for the life of him, Colt couldn’t read that in anything Nowakowski was sending the kid. The guy was good.
“He said I was deputized, an official part of the operation,” the kid said, his eyes on Nowakowski, disbelief at being duped on his face. “Said we needed to keep an eye on her all the time so we could keep her safe. She was under threat.”
Yep, a dumb fuck, Colt thought as he watched Nowakowski nod with understanding and the kid picked up the pen and bent over the pad.
“Um, bad news, man,” Sully mumbled to him, leaning close, “Lowe had eyes in Feb’s apartment. We didn’t find ‘em. Feds did about an hour ago after we saw what all the monitors were picking up. Those were put in professional by Ryan here. Whiz kid, works at an electronic shop, does this shit as a hobby but also part side-business. Nanny cams. Shit like that. He’s good, idiot savant. Chris did the sweep and he didn’t pick them up. Feds said they’d have trouble findin’ ‘em if they didn’t have the angles and a shitload more equipment and experience than a small town PD.”
Rodman’s eyes came to him and Colt kept his reaction to the news that Lowe and his lackey watched Feb in her apartment under control. It cost him but he didn’t even bite his lip.
“He got cameras in my house I didn’t find?” Colt asked.
“Nope. Just on the street.”
“Where else?”
“Meems’s. Boys are there now, yankin’ ‘em out.”
Mimi was going to flip. Al was going to flip a fair bit harder.
“Someone sent to contain Al?”
“Did that myself before comin’ in,” Sully hesitated, his meaning clear before he said, “he’s okay.”
Which meant he wasn’t at first until Sully talked him into being that way. Sully could work for the United Nations he was that good of a diplomat which was the reason why Colt didn’t do bodily harm to Craig Lansdon the day before.
“How’s he gettin’ around the security systems?” Colt asked.
Sully jerked his head toward the mirror. “Ryan here, dab hand at a lotta things, the little fuck. Unfortunately, he taught Lowe along the way.”
“Why the fuck did he do that?” Colt asked.
“Lowe told him he was you. Had a badge and looked official. Lowe told him he’d be helpin’ out the law if Ryan gave him some tutorin’.”
“He half-idiot or something?”
“My experience, the smarter they are at one thing, the dumber they are with everything else. Ryan’s the example that proves the rule.”
“Will I get into trouble for this?” Ryan asked, calling their attention back to him and shoving the pad away, the email written on it, his eyes on the pad like it would come alive, jump up and take a bite out of him.
“Cooperate, Ryan, and we’ll see what we can do,” Nowakowski said and Colt’s eyes shifted to the video equipment recording the interview, assessing if it was turned on and recording. Likely it was if the Feds, Sully or Chris set it up. Likely it wasn’t if Marty had been there and done it. Colt figured Sully wouldn’t let Marty anywhere near the equipment. They had learned that lesson the hard way.
“So,” Nowakowski said, “just wanna go over what you said, make sure I got this right. Mr. Lowe hired you to disarm the alarms, assist in setting up the cameras and the feed. And he paid you to monitor them and email him recorded files.”
“Yeah,” Ryan replied. “He told me what he wanted and I set up face recognition software to get some of it. Most of the other stuff, I had to scan fast forward to get it.”
“What’d he want?”
Ryan shifted uncomfortably in his chair.
Nowakowski read his discomfort and broke it down for him. “Let’s start with the face recognition. Who was he watching?”
“The bar. The blonde and that guy when they were there together. The big guy. The other cop. He came in all the time. Sometimes to the coffee shop. Lieutenant Colt… I mean your guy, Mr. Lowe, said he was dirty.”
Colt bit his lip then, he didn’t give a fuck if Rodman saw it. Not only was Lowe impersonating him, he was also telling folks he was a dirty cop. That happened to him, fucking Rodman would bite his lip too. At least.
“Tall, dark hair, athletic build?” Nowakowski asked and Warren’s head turned toward the mirror. He knew Colt was watching.
“Yeah, him.” Ryan nodded. “I didn’t get it. What your guy wanted. They knew each other, the blonde and the big guy. You could see they knew each other. And he watched her ass but fuck, anyone’d watch her ass. I watched her ass. She has a nice ass. Other than that, nothin’. Until recently.”
“Recently?” Nowakowski asked.
“They’d disappear together in the office. We didn’t put cameras there. Then they seemed unfriendly. Then real friendly. You know what I mean?” Ryan answered.
“You were watching February Owens and Lieutenant Alexander Colton, the real one, Ryan. He is a cop but he isn’t dirty,” Warren put in. “You were surveilling a clean cop and his girlfriend.”
Ryan wasn’t such a dumb fuck as to be sitting in a room with two cops and find out he’d been watching another one and not know he was fucked. His face got even paler, the pimples coming out in bold relief and his hands clenched and unclenched on the table in front of him.
“I didn’t know,” Ryan said. “They barely used to speak.”
“They’ve been havin’ some problems,” Warren shared. “They worked ‘em out.”
Ryan swung his head between Warren and Nowakowski. “He won’t know, ‘bout this, ‘bout me? Will he? Witness safety and all that?”