Dead Heat (13 page)

“It was just a thought,” she said. Brad and Ryan walked in, faces long and tired. “I have to go, Mr. DeSantos. I’ll call you if I get a lead.” She hung up and turned to her teammates. “Bad news?”

“We’re chasing our tails,” Donnelly said, then walked out to take a call.

She looked at Ryan. “What happened?”

“We got a warrant and dumped all the phone data from the five gangbangers we arrested yesterday. Found a pattern of usage and targeted a run-down apartment building four blocks from the hardware store. Thought it was a hot lead, but there was nothing. If Sanchez was there, no one’s talking, there’s no cameras or other security, and there’s no sign of him. Donnelly has his analysts going through the data to see if they can pick any more potential leads, but it’s a long shot.”

“Why didn’t he send out uniforms to check it out?”

Ryan glanced behind him, then closed the door so they could have a modicum of privacy. “My guess? He wants the collar. Personally. He has a stick up his ass about Sanchez. I think there’s something more here than what we know.”

Lucy had suspected the same thing, and was glad to have Ryan’s confirmation.

“Personal?”

“I don’t know. But something’s going on with him and Sanchez. He wants him bad.”

“Maybe it has to do with the rookie who was killed while on one of his ops,” Lucy said, almost to herself.

Ryan scowled. “What? What rookie?”

“Something his partner, Nicole Rollins, said to me. About why he doesn’t like working with rookies.”

“I don’t know anything about it. Must have been before my time.” Ryan ran both hands over his drawn face, took a deep breath and slowly released it. “I don’t like this. I need a plan of action, and right now we’re just reacting.”

“I have some news.” She told him what she’d learned from Bella about Michael, and the information she was gathering about his father. “Do you think maybe Vince Rodriguez might have information about Sanchez?”

“Long shot,” Ryan said. “He’s been in prison for four years. But it’s definitely no coincidence that the kid was raised in the same neighborhood as Sanchez’s hangout. You found other connections?”

“Not directly between Sanchez and Rodriguez, but between Rodriguez and some of Sanchez’s people.”

Donnelly walked in alone. He took off his tactical vest and dropped it on the table. “What about Sanchez?”

He didn’t look at them, but was staring at the information Lucy had added to the board.

Lucy repeated everything she’d just told Ryan. Then she said, “I’d like to talk to Vince Rodriguez. About his son,” she added.

“It’s too long ago, too many variables. But it’s another angle. I’ll contact our DEA unit there and have them send two agents to talk to Rodriguez. Write up what you have and get it to me by tomorrow morning.”

Lucy tried not to show her disappointment about not being the one to talk to the father, but she had to admit, it probably wasn’t the best use of her time, especially when it was a two-hour trip each way. She said, “See if you can get someone with psychological training. Someone who might be able to manipulate information out of the father.”

“Someone like you?” Donnelly said.

“I said I’d go.”

“I need you here.”

Ryan bristled. “We work for Casilla, not you. If Lucy thinks this is a lead, we should follow it up.”

Donnelly shot Ryan an angry glare. The tension was rising between the two men. Lucy intervened before it escalated. “Let’s see what Donnelly’s people can get from him and depending on what he says, decide if we need to visit ourselves.”

Before Ryan could say anything else, Donnelly tapped Bella’s drawing. “What’s this?”

“A scar or tattoo on Michael’s arm. Have you seen something like this before?”

“No. Is this from the girl?”

“Yes.”

“Gangs and drug cartels tat or brand themselves with symbols all the time,” he said, “but I haven’t seen this one. They start them young.”

“Maybe Michael wasn’t a willing participant.”

Brad didn’t say anything.

“He was held against his will,” Lucy said.

“We don’t know that. Maybe it was a gang-related punishment because he didn’t do something Sanchez wanted. We can’t assume that this kid is an innocent victim.”

“He
is
a victim.”

“You don’t know that. Don’t go all soft on me now, Kincaid. Kids can kill just as easily as adults, especially if they’re brought up to be killers.”

“You don’t have to explain what we’re up against, but this kid is different. I can’t explain why, except that Bella let him go because she was worried about his safety. If he was violent, I don’t think she would have trusted him.”

“Her uncle is Jaime Sanchez. The kid’s been raised around hardened criminals.”

“And she warned me about Jaime. She said that her uncle George was nice and sometimes made mistakes, but that her uncle Jaime wasn’t nice, and she was scared of him. Kids get it, even if they can’t explain it in big words.”

Donnelly looked back at the board, whether because he was irritated with her or in an attempt to wrap his head around the information they had, she didn’t know.

“Gangs recruit young,” he said, but his tone was much softer. “Maybe this kid was enticed with money, or maybe he was threatened. All we know is that Jaime Sanchez is on the run and has something big coming down, that there’s a missing teen who allegedly ran away from a good home fourteen months ago and wasn’t seen until he turned up in the Borez family basement, and that our witness is seven years old. And someone got to George Sanchez, which makes me think that there’s someone on the inside.” He obviously hadn’t meant for that to slip. He glanced from Ryan to Lucy. “That’s not a public theory.”

“It’s the only theory that makes sense. Someone who turned his back so Sanchez could be poisoned. Did you get the autopsy report?”

“Preliminary. The guy had an allergic reaction, but the ME thinks there was a secondary factor, and is rushing some tests.”

“He has to have a guess.” Lucy had worked at the morgue for a year as a pathologist. MEs always had a guess, and were usually right. They just didn’t routinely share with the investigators until they confirmed their findings.

“He said the allergic reaction seemed to be far too extreme—it happened too fast. There’re some drugs that may have increased the reaction, or a poison that killed him but the allergic reaction to fish was a red herring.” He stopped, then suddenly his entire body relaxed and he smiled. “I can’t believe I said that.”

Lucy relaxed, too. They needed to all take a step back and reassess.

“We’re running all the guards who were on duty, the food prep, anyone who potentially could have come in contact with Sanchez or the food. But it’s not going to be easy to prove without physical evidence.”

He glanced away and then Lucy saw it, the familiar focus in Brad Donnelly’s eyes. She was well aware of how fixated a cop could be when pursuing a violent predator. Focus was important, but there was a fine line between being committed to the job and being obsessed with the job. Lucy had been on both sides of the line. She knew the signs better than anyone.

Brad Donnelly was obsessed with Jaime Sanchez. Lucy needed to know why.

*   *   *

Sean said he had a meeting and couldn’t make it to the Casillas’ for dinner. He didn’t elaborate on it so she didn’t push, but it seemed odd to her that he had a business meeting late on a Sunday afternoon.

She and Ryan drove to the Casillas’ house north of the outer loop, in an older neighborhood filled with families in simple one-story ranch-style homes, no fences; all of them looked like they’d been built in the early 1960s. Instead of being crammed together, each house had a large lot and established trees. Kids of all ages rode their bikes up and down the street, and Lucy had to stop for a football pass that required the kid to run into the middle of the road to make the play.

Ryan stared wistfully at the kids as they waved their apology. Lucy said, “You miss your boys.”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

Lucy didn’t know exactly what had happened between Ryan and his second ex-wife, but Nate said it was a combination of Ryan’s job and his ex-wife’s desire for more than Ryan could afford. He didn’t say it that kindly, either, and since the divorce had just been finalized at the beginning of the year, before Lucy arrived, Nate had gone through much of it with his friend.

Lucy parked in the driveway and they walked up to the house. It was six fifteen, and the street started clearing off as bells were rung and voices raised throughout the neighborhood to bring the kids in for dinner. Lucy smiled, remembering that her mother had a whistle. If you weren’t in the door within five minutes, you had kitchen cleanup duty for the week. Lucy remembered a summer when she was six and her sister Carina was seventeen when Carina had cleanup duty for nine weeks straight. Before that, their older brother Connor had the record at six weeks.

A handsome ten-year-old boy rode his bike up the driveway and parked it against the wall. Chris was the oldest of the soon-to-be-six Casilla children, and the only boy. “Lucy!” he exclaimed. “Where’s Sean?”

“He had a meeting,” she said.

Chris’s face fell.

“Next time,” she promised.

Boys loved Sean, and Lucy knew that was because Sean was a kid at heart. Video games, electronics, computers were only part of it. He also played ball, told slightly inappropriate jokes (cleaned up for the religious Casilla clan), and talked to them like people, not children. The last time they were here, Sean had rallied not only the older Casilla kids, but another half a dozen kids in the neighborhood, for a game of street hockey that went on until it was dark. He’d had as much fun as anyone.

When Lucy saw Sean with kids like Chris, she felt the pang of regret that she was unable to have children. He’d make a great dad.

Someday
, she thought.
Someday we’ll adopt.

But someday was far from now. She was barely used to being responsible for herself; she didn’t want to think about being responsible for anyone else, not yet. Especially someone wholly and completely dependent on her.

Chris led them inside, where there was organized chaos. Melina, the oldest girl, was setting the large dining room table with the “help” of three-year-old Beth. Nita, Juan’s very pregnant wife, greeted them both warmly, asked about Sean. She offered drinks and told them that Juan was in the kitchen, they should join him.

Juan had two faces—his professional, serious work profile, and his relaxed, happy family-man face. He wore jeans and a white polo shirt under a bright-red apron. He never dressed in anything less than an impeccable suit at FBI headquarters. His hair wasn’t perfectly combed—the humidity and lack of product made it curl even though he kept it trimmed short. He looked younger than his forty-one years.

“Lucy, Ryan. So glad you could come.”

“Did you get my message?”

“Sean’s busy, and you want to debrief me. You have five minutes. No cop talk at the table.”

Juan was dishing food into bowls, and Lucy fell into step. She’d done this for years at home. Her father wouldn’t have been caught dead in the kitchen, which was a good thing because on the rare occasions when the colonel did attempt to cook, they ended up with sandwiches or a rare night out for dinner.

Lucy and Ryan filled him in on the big picture, and then Lucy said, “I want to talk to the Popes tomorrow morning, see if they saw Michael again, and check his room.”

“Will it be the same as last year?”

“I don’t know, but they probably kept his belongings. They had planned to adopt him, and they haven’t taken in another foster child since he ran away.”

“I would do the same.”

“Donnelly is sending a local team to interview his father in prison, because there might be a connection to Sanchez, but I might want to follow up.”

Juan glanced at Ryan, then said to Lucy, “Only if you have good reason to believe he has information about Michael’s whereabouts. That would be a full day going to McConnell, interviewing him, getting back. Your time would be better spent here. You don’t have any other leads?”

“The old Rodriguez neighborhood, which is in Sanchez’s territory. Except—I don’t think he would go there if he was running from Sanchez. Based on the note he left for the Popes, he’s planning to do something specific.”

Ryan said, “Donnelly thinks the scar on his arm might be a gang tat, but he hasn’t seen it before. It’s not one of the larger, known drug gangs. He’s sending it to his analysts, but we also sent it to Zach.”

“Good. If the kid is in a gang, he’s not going to turn on them.”

“He’s barely thirteen,” Lucy said.

“I’ve faced younger criminals. Keep your mind open, Lucy.”

She did, she knew what abused kids faced, she knew how killers were created. But she couldn’t forget the way Bella spoke about Michael. There was something else there, something kind and protective in the boy. Lucy needed to find him; she needed to save him. She didn’t believe he was beyond redemption.

Dinner lasted nearly an hour with rapid-fire conversation and plenty of good food. Juan walked them out while the kids cleared the table. “If you stay much longer, you’ll be roped into a game,” he said.

“I would,” Lucy said, “but it’s been a long day.”

“I’m glad you both could come. I know this case is all-consuming, but everyone needs a few hours’ downtime. You’ll come back to the case fresher in the morning.”

“How long have you known Agent Donnelly?” Lucy asked.

“Years, mostly by reputation and a few cases that crossed jurisdiction. Is there a problem?”

“No, nothing like that.”

“I meant what I said this morning. Donnelly’s rep is solid, but he’s a maverick. If you have questions about anything, call me, day or night. I mean that, too. I can’t protect my people if I’m kept in the dark.”

“Thank you, sir,” Ryan said and shook his hand.

“Next week, bring your boys with you, Ryan. As you can tell, we always have plenty of food.”

CHAPTER 11

Lucy dropped Ryan off at his car at SAPD, then drove home. She pulled into the garage, surprised that Sean’s black Mustang was still gone. She sent him a message that she was home, then went upstairs to the master suite.