“Do you recognize these numbers?”
He could say no, but that could get tricky. He could say yes and remember that Juan made a call to him on July 4 from the phone that was supposed to be broken. We hadn’t told anyone, but that phone was found in the pouch cut in the underside of Juan Menderes’s mattress. The drug dog found it, and I brought it to the office in an evidence bag. It was very unlikely he knew that. Why did Juan leave it there? Was he protecting himself in some way? Was it insurance?
“I don’t recognize them,” he said. “I don’t have the memory for phone numbers I have for other things.”
“Okay, thank you, that’s all. Thank you for the tea.”
I took the paper back and refolded it and let myself out the front door.
Late afternoon, I sat alone with Venuti and talked through my interview with Smith. Venuti, of course, had already heard the tape.
“What do you think, Grale? Did he recognize the number?”
“I think he did, and I think he’s always known we’d get there. It was just a matter of time before we reconciled the different phone numbers and matched that July 4 call to the allegedly broken driver phone. He was ready.”
“If he recognized it, then he recognized it was Menderes calling him and had a reason to answer. Do you believe he’s not good remembering phone numbers?”
“I don’t believe that. I’d guess he’s good.”
“I would too.”
The bigger question was why Menderes hid the phone. It had meaning, but whether it had bearing on the investigation, we couldn’t say yet. But safe to say, it was another thread needing chasing. We weren’t going to solve that sitting here guessing, and I moved the conversation on to the road trips Mondari made to Arizona then California. Before starting in on the next thing I wanted to talk about, I reached out and shut his office door.
“Mondari’s trips might tie in with a folder called ‘Vacation Ideas’ that Jane kept,” I said. “Inside that was a file called ‘Short Trips.’ This morning I looked at ‘Short Trips’ again. I couldn’t figure out what the ‘Vacation Ideas’ was doing with all these other work files, but I think you figure in.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You tell me, but here’s what I’ve got so far. In May, Jane was at a four-day conference in San Diego. So were you. It was joint with ICE and DEA. You flew back here from San Diego, but she drove back to Vegas and made an overnight stop in Borrego Springs. That might tie to the bomb-maker tip. She mentions DV in her notes, which sound to me like the initials of Dan Venuti. Were you with her, and do you know where she went?”
Venuti nodded and looked like he’d just taken a blow and was trying to get his breath back.
“I was with her in Borrego Springs for a night. She would remember the hotel. I don’t remember the name of it. There should be a room in her name and one in mine.”
“There’s one in her name, but I’m not asking about that. I want to know why else she was there. We believe Mondari was in Borrego Springs as recently as a few days ago. We’re trying to figure out what he was doing there.”
“It could be about the airport. Mondari had said something to her. I don’t know what he said, some gobbledygook that made her want to go to the Borrego Valley Airport. She didn’t get anything from the airport staff and never said anything more about it. I’d forgotten about the airport visit. She did that on her own. I got there later that day and drove back to San Diego the next morning.”
“Mondari went from Vegas to the Phoenix area and then into California and possibly to the Anza-Borrego. We have a credit card trail and a traffic ticket from the CHP for a late June trip, and it looks like he went again. What was he doing there? Why would he make two trips to the area within two weeks?”
Venuti shook his head. “I don’t think her going by the airport had anything to do with the bomb tip.”
“I think it did. I think Mondari said something more to her.”
Venuti shook his head and said, “Jane concluded it was a waste of time. She was like you, she was close to giving up on him.”
“I’m going there. I know a San Diego County deputy in Anza-Borrego. I’ll connect with him so I’m not alone. Lacey is very good but for this to work, she needs to be in the office. It’s going to fall on you to find Mondari while I’m gone. We need him. I’m heading there today, inside of an hour if I can do it.”
Venuti didn’t argue. I was at my desk, getting ready to leave when the front desk transferred a phone call. I picked up and a deep male voice said, “G’day, mate, this is Captain Phil Ramer.”
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