“That’s what my source said. Cage was riding shotgun. Joined up with Dennis at the station before the first busts.”
“Well, well. I’ll have to think about that.” Forrest set the milk on the counter, then took a croissant from a white cardboard box and bit a hunk off the buttery roll. “I wonder why they didn’t hit any Double Eagles . . .”
“I’ll get on Mayor Cage’s—” Ozan’s voice stopped, then started again, but seemingly farther away. Forrest realized he was speaking on another line. After twenty seconds, Ozan said, “I’ll call you back, boss. I think the shit just hit the fan, but comm is spotty. I’ll call you right back.”
“No, I’ll wait.”
Ozan’s voice rose in pitch as he barked out a series of rapid-fire questions. From what Forrest could hear, someone had been killed in the field, but he couldn’t tell who. Thirty seconds later, the Redbone was back on the line.
“It’s bad, boss. Shit.”
“Tell me.”
“Sheriff Dennis sent his SWAT team into a warehouse on the road to Jonesville. Somebody had precursor chemicals stored in there, and the damned place blew up. Looks like it was booby-trapped. CPSO’s got one deputy dead on scene and three more in critical condition. Two are being airlifted to Alexandria, one to Baton Rouge.”
“The Jonesville Road? Well, at least that’s none of our concern.”
“I’m not so sure, boss. One of the Double Eagles owns a warehouse on that road. Initials L.S.”
L.S.? Forrest thought about the initials. Leo Spivey? In his mind he saw a heavyset man with a ready grin, a Double Eagle since his father’s days. “Fuck, Alphonse. Did he go into business for himself?”
“I’m betting yeah. I just checked the address online, and it matches. L.S. must have got greedy. And paranoid enough to booby-trap the place.”
“Unbelievable.”
“What you want I should do?”
Forrest had been glad that Snake and Sonny were at Toledo Bend, on the Texas side of the reservoir, but now he wished Snake were close to hand. He would know where to find Leo, and how best to dispatch him. There was always the Black Team, but that seemed like overkill.
“Spivey’s a problem. Once they track him down and threaten him with a mandatory meth-trafficking sentence . . .”
“I know.”
“That can’t happen, Al.”
Ozan said nothing for several seconds. Then he said, “Don’t worry ’bout it, boss. I feel like that old man’s already dead.”
As always, the Redbone had gotten the message.
“How do you think he died?” Forrest asked with irony in his voice.
“I figure he killed himself as soon as he heard the news. But you never know. Maybe rival drug dealers killed him to send a message. What you think?”
“I think he killed himself, Alphonse. That’s a message all its own.”
“I hear you. Anything else?”
“Yes. If Dennis picked up that many foot soldiers, it’s time for a little negative reinforcement. Have somebody round up a couple of their kids and hold them somewhere. Don’t hurt them or anything. Just let the word spread through the jail. That’ll stop any talk.”
“Consider it done.”
“How long would it take you to assemble the Black Team for action in Concordia?”
“Two hours. I alerted everybody last night. They’re pretty much on standby. You want me to make the call?”
“I’ll call you back when I decide. What about Mackiever? Is he home yet?”
“Not yet. I’m running cruisers by there regular. Just his wife’s car at the house.”
“Where the hell did he go? I expected his resignation call before now.”
“He’ll turn up. You scared him half to death with that kiddie porn stuff.”
Forrest recalled the ashen face of his superior when he saw some of the pictures that could now be found on his home and office computers. “We need him to resign by noon,” Forrest said. “I never should have given him forty-eight hours.”
“Reckon you ought to go ahead and leak the story? That would flush him out of the bushes.”
Forrest thought about it, more instinctively than rationally. He’d always relied on instinct during battle, and that’s what this was shaping up to be.
“No,” he said. “But I’m going to call a press conference and announce that I’ve been carrying on a long investigation of a high-ranking state police officer, after members of the Technical Division brought certain workplace computer traffic to my attention. Also the disappearance of confiscated evidence checked out of the evidence room in violation of departmental procedure. When Mackiever hears that, he’ll feel the branch creak.”
Ozan laughed heartily. “What about them French Quarter boy toys?”
“We’ll keep them in reserve. That’s the nuclear option.”
“He’ll crack before noon. All a guy like the colonel has is his reputation. His wife’s a big churchgoer, too, and he goes with her.”
“That still leaves one loose cannon rolling around the deck. Tom Cage.”
“I got no idea where the doc is, boss. It’s like he fell off the planet.”
A couple of hours ago, Ozan had sent patrolmen to the houses of Peggy Cage’s Louisiana relatives, but no one they talked to seemed to know anything, and they’d seen no sign of Grimsby’s pickup truck.
“He’s still on planet Earth,” Forrest thought aloud. “And we’ve got to find him.”
“Are you still thinking about the deal he offered? I figured after Dennis and Penn Cage declared war on us, you’d be ready for the scorched earth plan.”
“Not if Dr. Cage can do what he says he can. Anything that ups the body count at this point is asking for more trouble. We’ve got to stabilize the situation.”
“Why don’t you just revoke the APB, like Dr. Cage asked for? Then Cage will come to us.”
“I can’t afford to go that far. Once we revoke that APB, we undermine the image of Dr. Cage as a cop killer. I won’t do that until I know he can neutralize the threat from his son and the Masters girl.”
“I see.”