Sidney Levine rarely found himself in the role of host. On the odd occasion when his basement apartment became party central, it was because Colleen invited mutual friends over and took care of setting out food and drinks.
The Thursday lunch meeting with Mullins and Sullivan had been scheduled at a time before Sullivan officially went on duty and when Mullins would normally be running errands. Both men could drop off the radar screen to collaborate with Sidney in their efforts to rescue Khoury’s wife and daughter. With unusual forethought, Sidney went shopping for a deli platter. He also picked up beer and soft drinks.
So, he became annoyed when neither Sullivan nor Mullins showed at noon. The three men had agreed there would be no phone contact, which meant Sidney could only wait. After twenty minutes, he suspected the other two had dumped him and were pooling their information without him. If so, they would regret it. He’d spent most of the night planting Internet seeds in an effort to link Luguire and Archer, and then he read posts as various blogs picked up the speculation and passed it along.
Most went off on wild tangents, spouting conspiracies against small banks who threatened to stand up to the bullying Fed and FDIC, those banks and bank leaders outside the cartel of the New Yorkers protecting their cronies with bailouts while smaller institutions were carved up. Or conspiracies that Archer had been silenced as revenge for the killing of Luguire. The theories grew more fantastic and ridiculous.
But two seemingly unrelated posts caught his eye. One tagged with the name Congressional Confessional claimed inside knowledge that Paul Luguire was set to give secret testimony on how the Federal Reserve used its anonymity to further the War on Terrorism. Luguire was going to reveal that freezing the assets of terror-sponsoring nations was only the tip of the iceberg. In order to secure the compliance of governments and international companies holding unpaid trade balances, the Federal Reserve made secret, low-interest loans with the receivable accounts as collateral. In other words, the American taxpayer could be holding a debt payable from Iran. A subprime mortgage to the unemployed looked like solid gold by comparison.
The other post appeared from Roanoke by someone named Mountain View and stated a person close to Craig Archer thought the murdered bank president had been involved in a sting operation that went bad. That morning Archer had a closed-door meeting with a man named Walter Thomson, and afterwards wrote a lengthy memo on a legal pad he refused to let his executive assistant type up. Then he received a suspicious phone call from someone named Nathaniel Brown, suspicious in that Brown refused to specify the nature of his business, only saying that Archer expected his call. No one at the bank had heard Archer speak of either Thomson or Brown before.
Sidney knew Walter Thomson was the name Archer fabricated to hide Rusty Mullins’ identity. But why? And the phone call from Nathaniel Brown couldn’t be verified, but sounded like it had been actually taken by Archer’s executive assistant. Sidney knew she’d seen a manila envelope with Brown’s name sitting on Archer’s desk. It made sense that she would connect a mysterious caller with a lengthy memo Archer kept from her. The executive assistant had to be the blogger’s source.
And a missing legal pad fit the shape of the object Detective Sullivan said had been removed from the interior of Archer’s blood-spattered car.
Sidney believed the two posts had the smell of a government coverup. But was the information so sensitive that some dark op would murder two American citizens? If Sullivan and Mullins shut him out, he’d put his theories and their underlying evidence up on the web. To hell with them.
Two sharp raps sounded on the door.
Sidney’s speculations made him so paranoid he stepped to the side as he called out, “Who is it?”
“Mullins. Sorry I’m late.”
“Is Sullivan with you?” Sidney reached over and unlatched the door.
“No.” Mullins entered and scanned the room. “You mean he’s not here?”
“No. And I haven’t heard from him.”
Mullins didn’t stop moving. He paced back and forth across the small living room. “I don’t like that he’s late.”
Sidney closed the door and went to the counter that separated the kitchen from the rest of the apartment. “You were late.” He pointed to the deli platter. “You want a sandwich? There’s beer and sodas in the fridge.”
The question brought Mullins to a halt. “What I want is Sullivan here. He doesn’t strike me as a guy who misses an appointment.”
“He probably says the same thing about you.”
“I had to shake a tail.”
Sidney’s eyes widened. “Someone’s following you?”
“I have to assume so. And I have to assume they’re good and I might not spot them. I doubled back over Memorial Bridge twice before finally coming into Georgetown over the Key. The second loop on Memorial Bridge was spur of the moment.”
“Maybe Sullivan was called in early. Another case.”
“Maybe.”
Sidney leaned over the counter, his pudgy belly brushing the cheese portion of the platter. “I found some interesting speculation on Luguire and Archer.”
“Save it. Let’s give Sullivan till twelve-thirty. Then we’ll share information.” He eyed the food. “But I’m not waiting on him for lunch.”
Mullins constructed a triple-decker ham and cheese, liberally smothered with mustard, and carried his sandwich and a bottle of Heineken to the sofa. Sidney had cleared the coffee table and both men used it to hold their plates.
Sidney took a large bite of pastrami and rye. A heavy knock came from the door. He tried to say, “Just a minute,” but the wad of food in his mouth muffled the words into a strangled cough.
“Just a minute,” Mullins shouted. He waved for Sidney to stay seated and went to the door.
Sullivan entered. He wore a blue blazer, slightly frayed at the cuffs, and a white button-down shirt whose collar remained unbutton. In his left hand, he clutched a curled sheath of white papers.
“Nice of you to join us,” Mullins said.
“Did you save me anything to eat?” He marched straight to the kitchen.
Sidney turned in his chair. “Help yourself to whatever you like. Beer’s in the fridge.”
“And it will stay in the fridge. I’m on duty at two.”
“We thought maybe you got called in early,” Sidney said.
Sullivan laid his papers on the counter, bypassed the bread, and started piling meat and cheese on a plate. “I was at my desk. Unofficially. Two things happened just as I was leaving. I received an email from the M. E. that the depth of the puncture wound under Luguire’s jaw matches the length of the needle on the insulin pen. And the name Asu generated a hit.”
“What do you make of the needle match?” Mullins asked.
“That an injection was made with an insulin pen, but the dose was ketamine, not insulin.”
“Does ketamine come packaged in those pens?”
“No. Since ketamine is primarily used in veterinary medicine, that won’t happen until dogs learn to inject themselves.”
Sidney gulped down a mouthful of food and wiped his lips on his sleeve. “You’re saying Khoury killed Luguire?”
“No way,” Mullins said.
“I agree,” Sullivan said, “but I took the pen to the M. E. first thing this morning. He said an injection by a regular syringe wouldn’t have matched Luguire’s wound so precisely.”
“I don’t get it,” Sidney said.
“A diversionary tactic,” Mullins explained. “Confuse things with too much coincidental information. If the suicide falls apart and the investigation persists, the clues will lead back to Khoury. But this would be after the shit hit the fan and everyone is looking for the bomb maker and his conspirators. Khoury and his insulin pens would close the loop.”
“Couldn’t that really be the case?” Sidney asked.
Mullins returned to the sofa. “Khoury was nothing but an errand boy collecting fertilizer and opening bank accounts. Luguire was killed by a professional just like Archer was killed by a professional. If Khoury was a trained assassin, he would never have let himself be ambushed up close in that pickup truck.”
Sullivan carried his plate of meat and cheese to the chair he occupied the day before. “And you don’t motivate a trained assassin by holding his family hostage.”
“This Asu character?” Sidney asked.
Sullivan slid the papers across the coffee table to the reporter. “A postman found a note jammed in an outgoing mailbox in an apartment building in Little Havana. Fortunately, it was on his first round of the morning.”
“This morning?” Mullins asked.
Sullivan nodded to the papers in Sidney’s hand. “The note was written on a page torn out of a coloring book, neatly printed in red crayon. Read it,” he told Sidney. “It’s on the top fax sheet.”
Sidney found the paragraph. “‘Help. My daughter Jamila and I have been kidnapped by men named Asu and Chuchi. They say they are taking us to Washington, D.C. But I don’t believe them. My husband Fares Khoury is in trouble. Please help us.’ Signed Zaina Khoury.”
“Did you get this from the feds?” Mullins asked Sullivan.
“No. I’ve got a friend on the Miami force. I floated the name Asu by him last night. He promised to check it out. When the mailman’s discovery flashed across the department, he called immediately.”
“What had you told him?” Mullins asked.
“I said I was investigating a homicide with drug connections to Miami and the link at the other end of I-95 might be a dealer known only as Asu.”
Mullins nodded. “Plausible cover story. Your friend have a last name for Asu?”
“No.”
Sidney passed the Miami report to Mullins. “So, the mother and daughter could have been removed any time from after the mail delivery yesterday up to just before the postman came this morning.”
“Probably during the night,” Mullins said. “Khoury was shot early before yesterday’s mail delivery in Miami. If the wife and daughter were leverage, then Khoury’s death meant they were no longer valuable. They’d either be let go or disposed of. They weren’t released and we know they were alive to leave the building. Why risk that during the day? Now whether they’re headed to D.C. or not is another matter. The captors might have created that story to buy cooperation.”
“I agree,” Sullivan said, “but only because the tenant across the hall from the mailboxes is a light sleeper. She heard a child crying and looked out her window. Two men were helping a woman and child into the backseat of a van.”
“Helping?” Mullins asked.
“That’s what she thought, but she said the taller of the two men had a tight grip on the woman’s arm.”
“What time was this?”
“Close to four o’clock. She’d also seen the van park on the street around midnight.”
“Could she give a description?” Sidney asked.
Sullivan shrugged. “The van was just a minivan. She’s pretty sure it was silver, although it was lit only in the front by a streetlamp. Not a cargo van, but she had no clue whether it was foreign or domestic. The Miami police checked some surveillance cameras in the area. They got a plate off a silver van. A rental leaving Little Havana about that time.”
“Still not much to go on,” Mullins said.
Sullivan smiled. “Except she recognized one of the men.”
“Asu?” Mullins and Sidney asked together.
“No. The witness is an elderly Cuban-American widow who’s seen most of the kids grow up in the neighborhood. The streetlamp illuminated the shorter man as he got in the driver’s side. She identified him as Jesús Colina. He goes by Chuchi. A local punk who’s been busted a few times for car theft and petty larceny. Definitely doesn’t have the brains or the resources to orchestrate what’s transpired.”
“Could she be mistaken?” Mullins asked.
“I doubt it. Chuchi’s uncle owns the building and keeps an apartment. Sometimes Chuchi housesits.”
“Like the last three weeks?”
“You got it. The old lady says the uncle got a visa to visit family in Havana.”
“So, Asu is the taller guy,” Sidney said. “Did you tell your friend that Asu is Syrian?”
“Yes. And they’re checking their local contacts in the Arab community.”
“What about the FBI?” Sidney asked. “If there’s suspected flight across state lines, they should be involved.”
“They’ve been notified,” Sullivan said, “along with highway patrol divisions in states from Florida to Virginia. The van’s a Ford Windstar, but they haven’t put out a public alarm.”
“Because of the terrorist investigation?”
“I assume it’s for the safety of the hostages,” Mullins interjected.
“Right,” Sullivan said. “I stressed that we have reason to believe Asu’s been involved in two homicides. I let the Miami police assume they were drug-related. We’re concerned that if Asu learns we’ve got his name and the van description, he’ll ditch the woman and girl.”
“You mean kill them?” Sidney asked.
Sullivan looked at Mullins. The two lawmen understood the realities they faced.
“Asu’s got nothing to lose,” Mullins said. “Right now he must have some reason for keeping them alive. We don’t want to force him to change his plans.”
“Why’s he coming to Washington?” Sidney asked.
“Because this is where it started and this is where it will end.” Mullins’ voice rang with determination.
Sullivan and Sidney were quiet for a moment.
Then Sullivan said, “I agree. We have to assume Asu is coming here. We now know Chuchi Colina was in Miami with the mother and daughter. Asu could have been in Staunton, which is why he didn’t get back till midnight. Someone else must have helped him eradicate any trace of Khoury. Removing the body and truck was a two-person job. And he probably had help with Luguire.”
“Why do you say that?” Sidney asked.
“Because I examined the flat tire that kept Luguire’s daughter and grandsons from meeting him the night he died. The puncture was on the side. Someone used an ice pick.”
Sidney set down his half-eaten sandwich. “At least two people in two locations. At the ball field and at Luguire’s apartment.”
“Probably,” Sullivan said. “But Asu could have punctured the tire at the start of practice and still had time to get to Luguire.”