Mortal Dilemma (29 page)

Youssef shot the poor man in the head, and he and Saif drove to the marina where the ambush had been set up. No sign of either Tariq or Abdullah, or of Tariq's taxi. They called all the burner cell numbers given to the men. No answer on any of them. The phones were shut down, turned off.

Monday had been a day of frustration. They had heard nothing more from their source on Longboat Key, and when Youssef called him, the man could only assume that Royal and the woman were still on Longboat. He hadn't seen them since Saturday night. And he had not seen or heard of Jock on the island since he'd disappeared on Friday and left for Key West.

There was no word from his men. Youssef decided they were lost, either dead or in custody. The best evidence he had was that Royal and Duncan were in Longboat Key. It was time to move north.

They left Key West late Tuesday afternoon and drove to Florida City, the first town on the mainland of Florida. They checked into a small mom-and-pop motel, spent the night, and started the four-hour drive to Longboat Key at daybreak.

“What is your plan, Youssef?” Saif asked as they finished their Wendy's breakfast. “How do we find the woman and Matt Royal?”

“The American we have hired will strike this morning and kill the woman. I should have heard from him by now. Maybe he was delayed. He is not to touch Royal. They often spend the night together in Royal's house or the woman's condo. If they are together, our man is to wait until the woman is alone and then kill her. I don't trust him to take Royal alive, and we need him to tell us where Algren is.

“We'll take him alive and find out what he knows about Algren's location,” Youssef continued. “Our contact told me where he lives, and what kind of car he drives. We'll strike at midnight. He'll be grieving over the death of the woman. He will not be expecting us.”

“What if he resists?” Saif asked.

“He won't. You're a big man, Saif. Even if he does resist, you can take him. All you have to do is get the drug in him and he'll be unconscious.”

“How are we going to take him?”

“My contact had an idea on how to do that. He will have to leave the island as soon as he has killed the woman, but he has associated another American to assist us. He'll have a place for us to hide out and even hold the prisoner if we have to. It'll all be over by tomorrow.”

W
EDNESDAY
, N
OVEMBER
5

I
MUST HAVE
dozed off because the ringing of J.D.'s cell phone awakened me. It was on the arm of the sofa where she'd set it down after calling in the shooting. She stirred and reached for it and turned it off without answering. I looked at my watch. It was a little after eleven. We'd been asleep for the better part of an hour.

“Are you hungry?”

“We never did eat our muffins.”

“I can make ham sandwiches and we can have the muffins for dessert.”

“You want to go out? We could get something at the Dry Dock.”

“I don't think so,” she said. “I'm sure the island telegraph has been active and I don't want to have to explain what went on here this morning.”

“Ham sandwiches it is.”

We ate on J.D.'s sunporch, chatting and watching the boats on the Intracoastal Waterway. “You know, we're going to have to face them sooner or later,” I said.

“Who?”

“The islanders.”

She chuckled. “I think I'll be better able to do that with a couple of glasses of wine. I'm surprised we haven't already had a bunch of phone calls.”

“They're just giving you space. I'm surprised that we haven't heard from the local TV stations and newspapers. They're usually out right away knocking on doors and asking penetrating questions, like ‘How did you feel while you were being shot?'”

“Bill Lester may not have released anything to the press yet. And besides, I doubt they could get hold of my department cell phone number. I turned my personal phone off.”

“Maybe, but they monitor police radios and have all kinds of nosey people feeding them information. They'll probably be here soon enough. You want to go to my place?”

“No. They'll just show up there. Let's sit it out here. We just won't answer the door.”

My cell phone interrupted us. I answered. David Parrish. “Do you know where J.D. is?” he asked as soon as I answered.

“She's sitting right across the table from me.”

“I've been calling her for the past two hours. She's not answering.”

“We've had a pisser of a morning.” I told him what had happened.

“I'm sorry as hell, Matt. Is she all right?”

“Mostly, I think.” I looked at her and grinned. “She's tough. She'll be okay. You want to talk to her?”

“I need to talk to both of you. Put me on the speaker.”

I found the right button on my phone and pushed it. “You still there?”

“I'm here,” Parrish said. “I wanted you to know that the FBI is going to arrest your buddy D. Wesley Gilbert late this afternoon.”

“The bank had a video of the withdrawal.”

“That they did. It clearly showed Gilbert withdrawing the money on Tuesday of last week. The bank account records show that was the only cash withdrawal in a couple of weeks.”

“Why did they have that account?” J.D. asked.

“It was a not very slick way to move money. Fortson deposited money
in varying amounts on an irregular basis. It looks like the only money going out was on checks written by Gilbert and the occasional cash withdrawals, but we don't have any way now to determine whether they were made by Gilbert or Fortson. Had to be one of them.”

“Was there a lot of activity?” J.D. asked.

“A reasonable amount. The account has been open for about four years. There's been a lot of money deposited in it over the years by Fortson.”

“Do you know where the money went?” J.D. asked.

“We've got people looking at that now, but it seems there were a lot of checks to something called Wayfarer, Inc. and quite a few to a Wally Delmer.”

“His lawyer isn't going to let him say a word,” I said.

“No, but he won't have a lawyer. We'll tell him that we picked him up on a warrant from the FISA court, the one that oversees terrorist activities. We'll use Gilbert's connections to Ishmael's Children as the wedge. We don't have to let him have a lawyer. At least not right now.”

“That doesn't ring true to me, David,” I said.

“That's because it's not true, Counselor. We do have some leeway in how we interrogate suspects. We might be taking a little advantage here, but I doubt this idiot will figure it out.”

“What's your plan?” J.D. asked.

“We're going to let him spend the night in the federal lockup in Sanford, and one of our agents is going to talk to him at eight in the morning. I thought you might like to sit in, J.D., and maybe have some questions based on your investigation.”

“I'd like that,” J.D. said, “but I don't think I can get to Orlando tomorrow. We've got lots going on here with Matt having to kill the guy who was trying to kill me this morning.”

“We'll do it virtually,” Parrish said. “I guess that's the right term. All this newfangled technology kind of buffaloes me. Anyway, I'm told
that we can somehow plug your computer into our video system, so that you can watch and hear the proceedings in real time. You won't be able to join in and ask questions, but before we cut Gilbert loose or lock him up, I'll get with you by phone and you can ask him any questions you might have.”

“That sounds good,” J.D. said. “How do we go about setting it up?”

“I don't have any idea. Can you get your geek in touch with our geek? They can figure it out.”

“I'll have him call your guy. Give me a name and number.”

J.D. hung up and said, “Have you checked on Jock today?”

“Not yet. I need to call Paul Galis.”

“I need to change out of this suit.” She disappeared into her bedroom, and I called Galis' cell phone.

“How's our boy doing?”

“Better, I think. He went jogging this morning for the first time since he's been here. He turned off the TV yesterday and hasn't turned it back on. I saw him reading up on back issues of newspapers on my computer last night. Said he was trying to catch up on world events.”

“Booze?” I asked.

“Nothing. He hasn't had anything alcoholic since he's been here.”

“How's he sound?”

“Good. I'm not sure he's ready to go back into the field, but he seems better.”

“Are you with him now?”

“Yeah, but he's taking a nap. You want me to wake him up?”

“No thanks, Paul. I'll check in tomorrow. Let me know if anything changes.”

J.D. came out of the bedroom wearing a pair of jeans, a golf shirt, and tennis shoes. “Is Jock okay?”

“Paul says he's doing better. He's turned off the TV and he went jogging this morning. He's even catching up on world events.”

“I'm glad to hear it. Maybe he's starting to pull out of whatever kind of funk he's in.”

Her phone rang. She checked the caller ID, answered, listened for a minute and said, “I'll be right there.” She hung up and said, “I've got to get over to the Seafood Shack.”

“What's up?”

“We've got the warrant to search Bates' boat. You want to come?”

W
EDNESDAY
, N
OVEMBER
5

T
HE BOAT WAS
as filthy as I had expected. I couldn't imagine how a human being could live in such conditions. The search warrant had come through at three o'clock and by four the forensics people were doing a careful search. I was standing in the cockpit, looking through the hatch and down into the salon. J.D. and Reuben were standing on the pier that jutted out from the Seafood Shack.

“I've got a laptop,” one of the techs called up from the salon.

“Hand it up,” I said. “I'll give it to Reuben.”

Reuben Carlson took the computer, walked up the pier, and took a seat at one of the tables that served the diners who chose to sit outside on the deck overlooking the bay. J.D. and I followed him. I was getting bored standing on the boat breathing in the noxious fumes Charlie had generated in the years he'd spent aboard.

Reuben raised the umbrella that stood by the table, giving himself some shade in order to better see the laptop's screen. J.D. and I took seats at the table enjoying the view of the bay and pelicans diving for fish. One had caught his snack and was floating on the surface, the fish flapping in its throat pouch as the pelican let the water drain out. Before the bird could swallow his catch, a seagull landed on its back, waiting patiently, I guess, for some leftover morsel. After a minute or so, the gull gave up and flew away. The pelican raised its head and swallowed the fish whole. Patience truly is a virtue, I thought.

Reuben spent a few minutes fiddling with the keyboard and talking to himself. Finally, he grinned. “I'm in,” he said. “What are we looking for specifically?”

“Can you run a search through all his correspondence looking for two names?” J.D. asked.

“I've got a program that'll do just that.” He pulled a thumb drive from his pocket, plugged it into a USB port, hit a couple of keys and waited a few moments. “Got it. What am I looking for?”

“Try the names Wally Delmer and D. Wesley Gilbert.”

Reuben tapped a few keys and sat back. In a minute or so he leaned forward and examined the screen. “I've got a number of documents with Wally's name on them. None for D. Wesley Gilbert, but there are a couple for somebody named Wesbert. That's probably the guy you're looking for. Kind of a crude attempt at deception, I'd guess.”

“Charlie Bates wasn't exactly a genius. Can you get those back to the station and print them all out for me?”

“I can do better than that. I've got a portable printer in my car. I'll have them for you in a few minutes. You want all of them with both Wally's name and Wesbert's?”

“Might as well. I'll be down by the boat.”

The techs were still scouring the vessel, looking for anything that might lead to answers to the many questions we had. Maybe the documents Reuben had found would lead us in a new direction.

A few minutes after we returned to the boat, Kevin Mimbs, the Longboat Key PD forensics guy, popped out of the hatch. “We're done, J.D. There's really nothing else here of any evidentiary value. We did pick up a few fingerprints that didn't seem to belong to Bates. We'll run them and let you know who they belong to.”

“Thanks, Kevin. Maybe the laptop will kick out something that'll help.”

“You want to come down and look the place over?”

“No thanks,” J.D. said. “I can smell it from here.”

J.D. and I walked back up the pier. Reuben was coming our way, stopped, and waited. He had a large manila envelope in his hand. As we approached, he held it out for J.D. “This is every one of the emails with the names you wanted on them. Most are addressed to the name or came from the name, but some just have the name in the body of the email.”

“Did anything catch your eye?” J.D. asked.

“No, but I wasn't looking. The search program I was using gave me a list of the emails and I just printed them out and put them in the envelope. If you don't need me anymore, I'll head back to the station and see if I can find anything else in the laptop.”

“Thanks,” J.D. said. “Looks like Matt and I've got some ground to cover with all these documents.”

“This is a police matter,” I said to J.D. “I think I should go to Tiny's and leave you with it.”

“Really? I'll remember that.”

“For how long?”

“At least a month,” she said. “It's hard to forget that kind of abandonment.”