Crown's Law (47 page)

Bo took a large swig of her vodka, felt the
courage rush through her veins, then said, “Sam, how did you happen
to have a credit card and driver’s license in the name of Samuel
Hammer?”

Sam shrugged with a laugh, “I go undercover a
lot. The ‘Sam’ is for Sam Spade, and the ‘Hammer’ is for Mike
Hammer, two of my favorite private eyes. Plus, keeping the first
name the same gives me one less thing to remember. Don’t you use
aliases when you go undercover?”

“Yes, of course, but each case is unique. I’m
issued ID for the job, then I turn it in afterwards. I don’t carry
it around with me,” replied Bo.

“I tote mine around for emergencies.
Situations like this.”

You have a lot of
situations like this?
she mused.

Bo took another sip of vodka, then blurted,
“Who is Ziggy? Who is Raven?”

Sam put his own drink to his lips and mulled
over her questions. How much to tell her? He was too fond of her to
lie to her, but he still wasn’t sure what she was involved in.

“I’ve never seen Ziggy before. He’s just
someone Raven sent to pick us up. As for Raven . . .”

Bo interrupted, “That Ziggy was not your
ordinary do-your-friend-a-favor pilot. He pointed a damned gun at
us for Chrissakes! And what was that password crap? You could have
let me in on that! He looked like a drug runner to me!”

Sam smiled at her outburst and put his hand
over hers.

“Maybe he was,” Sam smiled. “I don’t know,
but I doubt it. Raven doesn’t consort with overtly criminal
elements. The gun and password were to make sure we were the right
people to pick up. I’m sorry I didn’t clue you in. Ziggy got us out
of there, didn’t he?”

“Yes, and quite professionally, I have to
admit. Now, tell me about the mysterious Raven. Is he who you
called from the ranger tower?” urged Bo.

Sam now saw a way out of his dilemma without
lying to her.

“I called my father. He’s the only one I
could think of that I trust. During his CIA days, he amassed a
large number of favors owed. I asked him to spend one for us, and
he did.”

Bo’s mind began racing again.
Is Ziggy really CIA? And Raven is CIA? This is
crazy! I have to know!

“Sam, are you saying that Ziggy and Raven are
CIA?”

“I would say probably not. Maybe ex-CIA, or
CIA contractors. I doubt if active CIA agents are at my father’s
beck and call,” shrugged Sam, but he wasn’t completely sure about
that himself.

“Jeez, Sam! You’re scary! What about this
safe house? On loan from the spooks?”

“Oh, no! It belongs to my mother,” chuckled
Sam. “Nothing sinister. It’s not in the Crown name, though, so it
won’t show up in a property search. We’ll be safe there—at least
for awhile. Only my dad knows that we’ll be there. I’ll call him on
the secure phone when we get settled in. He’ll want to know that we
got out safely.”

The waiter appeared before Bo could continue
her interrogation. She discovered that she was famished! She
ordered a large, rare prime rib and a baked potato with the works.
Sam opted for the same, then they got up and went to the salad bar
and built themselves large salads.

Back at the booth, Bo asked, “Are you telling
me the truth, Sam Crown?”

Sam peered into her beautiful eyes and
replied, “Yes, Bo, as much as I can. My father is a mysterious man.
I have no idea how much covert power he still has. Now for you.
What are you working on, Bo? I think our problem may be related to
something you’re involved in.”

Bo knew this was coming. She couldn’t tell
him very much without violating her security clearance, and a whole
bunch of regulations.

“Sam, you know I’m not allowed to tell you
very much. It’s not secret that I’m a member of JTFE—Joint Task
Force Espionage. I obviously work in the area of espionage.”

“That would include ferreting out moles in
government agencies, right? People with big, black choppers,”
interjected Sam.

“Among other things,” evaded Bo. “Sam! You
know I’ll violate security if I tell you anything! Give me a
break!”

Sam sympathized with her. He hadn’t been
exactly forthcoming with her either. He had a big decision to make.
He was on the verge of losing her forever. Is that what he wanted?
He never shared his innermost feelings with anyone. Was now the
time?

“OK, Bo. I’ll lay off for now. Let’s enjoy
our dinner. Then there’s something we need to do when we get to the
cabin,” said Sam.

“I know what you want to do!” smiled Bo.

Sam shrugged and laughed. “Ah, yes! That.
Don’t you?”

She lowered her eyes. “I admit it. I do.
You’ve converted me into a sex addict.”

“Good! But that’s not what I was talking
about. We need to talk about trust. I think we are going to need it
before this nightmare is over.”

“I’m all for trust. I like trust. But don’t
ask me to break my oath.”

He smiled. “We’ll talk later. Now, I could
use another drink.”

***

The cabin was a 4-bedroom, 4-bath,
3000-square-foot Tudor design with a great view of the lake down
below. It was nestled in a stand of tall Jeffrey pines.

“This is not a cabin!” exclaimed Bo when she
saw it. “It’s a mansion in the mountains!”

“To my family, it’s a cabin,” replied Sam as
he fished out his key ring and opened the front door.

Sam got a roaring fire going in the den’s
fireplace—not because it was super cold, but because it was
something he enjoyed when he was here—and found some of his
father’s expensive French cognac. He poured some in two snifters,
one for each of them, and they settled on the couch in front of the
fire. They clinked glasses and then sipped for several moments in
silence, Bo smoking as she stared at the crackling fire, her feet
tucked up on the couch. Sam had told her she could smoke in the
cabin because the Lowensteins had always done so.

Bo broke the silence. “First things first,
Sam. We left quite a bit of carnage back there and if I don’t call
my boss and let him put a lid on it, we could be in big trouble.
Besides, he has the resources to find out who they are.”

Sam waited a beat, then answered, “I guess
you’re right. Do you trust your boss?”

“Yes. He couldn’t be involved in that
attack!”

“Hmm. I told my father I would call him as
soon as we were settled in here. Let me call him first,” replied
Sam.

John told Sam that as far as his contacts
could determine, there were no rogue alphabet agencies involved,
and that JTFE was staffed with only the most trustworthy of agents.
He suggested that Sam let Bo call her boss using the secure phone.
He did so.

Bo was on the phone for 30 minutes with her
boss, whom she had caught at home just as he was going to bed. He
said he would dispatch a team from Denver immediately to contain
the situation, but he would have a ton of questions for her in the
morning. She said she would call him back then. She hung up and
looked at Sam.

“Well, he’s not happy with me. He said I
should have called earlier,” she said. “And he’ll want to talk to
you, too. After all, you shot a man and downed the chopper. I told
him we had no choice—we were under attack. Hopefully, everything
will be routine.”

Sam shrugged. “Well, I hope his crime scene
guys can pin down who they were. I think the attack on the boat and
this attack are related. That means I was probably the target, not
you.”

“How do you figure that? I was at both
places, too. It could all be a coincidence.”

“Do you believe in coincidences like
this?”

After a beat, “I guess not. What have you
done that makes you think you’re the target? Does it have to do
with those video tapes?”

“Indirectly. It has to do with how I
knew about that meeting in the park. I think. Is the FBI ready to
move against
Dynology
yet?”

Bo stared at Sam, not knowing what she
should—or could—say. Sam sensed her dilemma.

“Come on, Bo. We’ve been attacked
twice! And if I’m right about this being
Dynology
, then Becky is in danger too! I promise
you that if the Feds aren’t going to take care of them, I will!”
exclaimed Sam.

Hearing that Becky could be a target too
really frightened Bo. She made a life-changing decision.

“God, Sam! Becky? Where is she now? Is she
safe?” gasped Bo.

“Yes. She’s with my parents and they’ve moved
hotels. They’re safe for the moment.”

“All right! You win! We have to share
information and do what we can to put an end to this. The Bureau
hasn’t moved in because their surveillance hasn’t picked up
anything incriminating yet. What conversations they pick up are
inane ones, and the long-range high-tech listening device only
picks up static. It’s as if they know we’re listening.”

Sam shrugged. “Good assumption.”

Then he told her about the bugs Becky had
placed and his assumption that they had been found. He told her
about D’Orr killing Winston and how he knew about the meeting in
the park. Bo was angry at first that he had let Becky plant the
bugs and the fact that he hadn’t shared any of this with her. It
took him 5 minutes to get her calmed down. He explained his
rationale for not telling her because not only was the data
unusable in court, he was protecting Becky.

Bo lit another cigarette while Sam poured
them some more cognac.

“OK,” she said finally. “I reserve the
right to revisit your endangering Becky like that, but for now
let’s move on. The
Dynology
people must definitely know they’re under surveillance. They
probably have another place where they conduct their illegal
business. We need to find out where that is. We picked up the FBI
agent you caught on tape switching backpacks and she spilled her
guts, but the Bureau needs corroboration for a solid court case.
Some names she gave us are hearsay legally.”

“Are you watching their container ships?”
asked Sam.

“No. Why would we? I’m sure they wouldn’t use
ships to steal military secrets.”

“That’s the trouble with task forces.
They have tunnel vision. There’s more that I know. Do you know that
William Winston was an ATF agent running a sting on
Dynology
—trying to sell them weapons
to be smuggled from Hong Kong?”

Bo sat upright and looked Sam in the eye.
“Yes. How do you know that?”

Sam pondered how to continue. He couldn’t
tell her one of his sources was Carole—and that he had been
screwing her. There was a limit to how much truth you can tell one
woman about another.

“As I told you before, I have many sources.
Let’s try it this way: I’ll reconstruct what I think has happened
so far. That way, you won’t have to tell me any secrets if you
don’t want to. You can just nod if I get it right. First of all, I
know about task forces. I was on a couple when I was a cop. Too
much bureaucracy, too slow. For example, Winston’s body was found
on May 11. You didn’t show up to look into it until June 1.
Homicides not solved in the first 48 hours seldom are.”

“I wasn’t even informed until . . .”
interjected Bo.

Sam waved her off. “I know, I know. This is
not an attack on you. Or anyone. Just an example of the uselessness
of task forces. William Jackson aka William Winston had several
aliases, but his real name was William Wainwright.”

Bo’s eyes widened. She gulped some cognac.
That was a deep, dark secret.

Sam continued, “He had a sister named
Carole. She also had several aliases because she was an undercover
agent working for the insurance fraud unit of the FBI. She had a
sting going on a Mrs. Rosemary Wellington in Newport Beach.
Wellington was suspected of insurance fraud and diamond smuggling.
Wellington is connected to
Dynology
also. I heard her on tape talking with D’Orr and Bryce, the
CEO.”

Sam paused and sipped his brandy. Bo lit
another cigarette. She had no idea how he knew all this. He had to
have sources other than the illegal bugs Becky had planted.

Sam continued. “Both Winstons—actually,
Wainwrights—got involved with Mickey Malone by accident. A true
coincidence, which doesn’t happen in nature often. Hence, my
involvement. On Sunday, April 30, William was at
Sparky’s
slugging down drinks. Why
he was there I don’t know. He had a meeting scheduled with
his
Dynology
contact for
Monday night, but he felt nervous about it. He thought they might
be wise to him. So he wrote down everything he knew about them and
sealed it in an envelope. He wanted to give it to his handler, but
for some reason couldn’t do that before his meeting. So he called
his sister to tell her about the envelope. She had discovered that
Mrs. Wellington had a private
Dynology
phone number stored in her cell phone.
She knew her brother had also stumbled across Dynology, so she told
him the number so he could compare it to what he had. That’s when
he grabbed a Mickey Malone card and wrote it down.”

Bo interrupted. “Damn, Sam! You can’t know
all this!”

“Have I said anything that doesn’t fit the
facts as you know them?”

“No. But how did you know he was talking to
his sister? We don’t know that!”

“It will become clear as I spell out the
rest. William needed a safe place for his sealed envelope, and he
couldn’t be seen in the company of his sister, so the Mickey Malone
card gave him an idea. Attorneys and P.I.s often hold documents for
clients. So he told Carole he would leave the envelope at Mickey
Malone’s office and if he didn’t call her by Tuesday, she was to go
to Mickey’s and get the envelope. It was left for her under the
name of Cheryl Wright. She picked up the envelope from Pearl and
wanted to hire Mickey to look for her brother. She couldn’t tell
the FBI because she wasn’t sure anything was really wrong, and she
shouldn’t have been talking to an ATF agent in any case. That’s how
I got involved in looking for William Winston.”