FORREST HAD FELT SOME relief after Ozan joined him. Having a man who was willing to follow any order without question gave you a certain confidence. But the plain fact was, they were in a tough spot. Something had clearly gone wrong with his plan to bust Sheriff Dennis. He didn’t know what it was, but he wanted Snake and his crew out of the sheriff’s office. Somehow, a dumb ex–baseball player had turned the tables on him. Forrest wasn’t really worried about Walker Dennis; he was worried about the sheriff giving Penn Cage and John Kaiser access to the Double Eagles. Forrest had reviewed the records of both men, and both had proved themselves expert at wringing the truth out of hardened criminals. If he couldn’t find a way to get Snake and his crew out of that jail, Cage and Kaiser would get a real shot at turning somebody. The fallout from Glenn Morehouse’s deathbed confession had yet to be controlled, and if one more Eagle decided to unload the sins of his youth, Forrest could say good-bye to all his ambitions for the future.
He cussed his own stupidity when it hit him that he’d been wasting time waiting for Claude Devereux to come through. The simplest solution was just to call Snake and tell him to walk the Eagles right out of the building. After all, they hadn’t been arrested. They were free to leave anytime they chose. They could flip Sheriff Dennis the bird as they walked out! Instead, they were sitting there—on Forrest’s orders!—patiently awaiting an interrogation they were confident would never happen, because they expected Dennis to be busted by his own men at any moment.
Forrest picked up his burn phone and speed-dialed Snake’s cell phone. The phone rang several times, then kicked him to voice mail. Ozan asked what he was doing, and Forrest explained. Then, while Forrest tried Sonny Thornfield’s phone, Ozan began dialing the other Eagles at the station.
None answered.
Something began to thrum in Forrest’s chest, like a wire stretched taut between his heart and his voice box.
“What do you think happened?” Ozan asked.
“Nothing good.”
“Where the fuck is Claude Devereux?” muttered the Redbone. “He should’ve been down there by now. He should’ve called you back, at least.”
Forrest licked his lips and thought about Devereux. Given Brody Royal’s death, and the manner of it, the crafty old Cajun might just have bolted. . . .
“Maybe Claude is down there,” Ozan suggested.
“I don’t think so. I want you to alert every trooper in the southern half of the state. Claude’s daughter lives in Lafayette. Tell them to look out for Claude’s car. If they see it, pull him over and tell him to get his ass back to his office and wait for instruction.”
“Do you think he—”
Forrest’s StarTac was ringing.
“That’s probably him now,” Ozan said, grinning.
Forrest shook his head and answered the phone. The caller was his primary mole at the sheriff’s office.
“Talk,” Forrest said.
“Sheriff Dennis just arrested everybody, Colonel.”
Forrest balled his left hand into a fist. “Define ‘everybody.’”
“Snake, Sonny, and the other four old guys.”
“On what charge?”
“Meth trafficking. Dennis and two deputies found a shitload of crystal under Sonny’s and Snake’s houses. He’s strutting around here like goddamn rooster.”
Forrest’s pulse began to pound. “What about Billy’s houses?”
“I haven’t heard anything about Billy. But Mayor Cage and that FBI guy are here, too. This is some serious shit, Colonel. I gotta go, but I knew you’d want to know.”
“Hold on! As soon as you can get word to Snake, make sure he knows I had nothing to do with this. I don’t want him thinking it was some kind of setup.”
“Ten-four.”
“And tell him I’ll get them out. Today. You hear me? Tell them I’ve got a lawyer on the way.”
“Yes, sir. Will do.”
The connection went dead.
“What the hell happened?” Ozan asked.
Forrest told him.
The Redbone shook his head, his eyes bright with outrage. “Why would Sonny and Snake have meth at home? You think they been skimming or something? Putting back a nest egg?”
“Hell, no! Don’t you see? Sheriff Dennis found the meth we planted under his house and planted it on our guys. Goddamn it!”
“How the hell could he have found that? A K-9 unit?”
Forrest nodded. “Had to be. But he’d never think to look for it. Not Walker Dennis. Kaiser, maybe. But an FBI agent would never risk planting dope like that. They leave that kind of shit to the DEA.”
“Then who?”
“Penn Cage. The old prosecutor. I’ll bet he saw every trick in the book out in Houston. He’s probably sent cops to the pen for planting dope to get a conviction, but now that his old man’s life is on the line . . . Yeah, it was Cage.”
Ozan’s mouth twisted into a jagged line. “Maybe it’s time we did something about that fuck.”
Forrest nodded thoughtfully. “Maybe. I was hoping to do a deal with that boy.”
“I don’t see that happening now.”
“This definitely puts a kink into things. But first things first. We’ve got to get Snake out of jail ASAP. I guarantee you he’s going to think I set him up. Because I’m the one who made him march in there for this. He didn’t want to do it. And it looks like he was right. Shit.”
“Snake can’t screw you over without screwing himself, can he?”
Forrest rubbed his chin and stared out over the lake. “I don’t know. Snake’s a lot smarter than people think. That crazy act is just that—an act.”
“What’s our play, then?”
“First, find Devereux. Claude’s the only lawyer who knows the whole backstory, and he’s got as much to lose as we do. Second, have somebody search my house in Baton Rouge. For all we know, they planted a pound of meth on me, too.”
“Christ. Good thinking, boss.”
“And last . . . find somebody local who knows somebody at the hotel where the FBI is staying. I want wireless bugs planted in their rooms by noon, and somebody stationed one floor above them monitoring the bugs. I’m getting the feeling there’s something personal about Kaiser’s interest in me. And it’s starting to piss me off.”
“You got it, Colonel. Is that it?”
Before Forrest could answer, he heard a car door slam on the other side of the house. A couple of loose guys from the Black Team were scheduled to arrive, so he relaxed. Then something shifted inside the house. The sound hadn’t been loud, but Forrest had been here long enough to know it wasn’t part of the normal background noise of the place. He looked over at Ozan, who nodded once.
“Go,” Forrest whispered.
WALT HAD BEEN AIMING through the glass door when he heard something from the other side of the house. It sounded like a car door.
The voices on the deck went silent.