Incriminating Evidence (9 page)

“I’m not wearing a wire.”

“I appreciate that.”

Time to cut the pleasantries and get down to business.
“Mr. Hernandez, I must say I’m a bit puzzled over why you wanted to meet with me.”

“I can imagine that you are.” Mick leaned forward in his seat. “I promise this won’t be a waste of your time, though. I know how busy you are in the prosecutor’s office. Especially after the acquittal. I can imagine that you’re trying to find your next target.”

She shook her head. “I don’t have targets, Mr. Hernandez. I go where the evidence and facts take me. Wherever that may be, even if there are obstacles in my way.”

He cocked his head to the side. “Well, you seem quite intent on prosecuting my children.”

“I don’t really think it’s appropriate to go down this road and have this discussion, and I find it hard to believe that’s why you called me here today.”

He crossed his arms. “Actually, that’s exactly why I called you here.”

“I’m sorry—I don’t follow.” She had no idea what he was talking about.

“Since you’re so intent on prosecuting my children, then I figured you’d want to hear what I have to say.”

“You’re speaking in riddles, Mr. Hernandez. Why don’t you just tell me whatever it is, and we’ll go from there.” She was quickly becoming exasperated with his tactics.

“If you want someone to investigate, then you should be looking at Luke.”

“As in your son?” Okay, now he’d thrown her for a loop.

His lips turned up into a smile. “See, I knew you would be interested.”

“I didn’t say I was interested. I’m surprised. Luke is a law-abiding member of the community. A Miami PD detective. So you’ll have to excuse my skepticism here. Especially coming from you.”

“I expected you to have that exact reaction. Which is why I wanted to meet with you face-to-face and have this discussion. I have evidence implicating Luke in a nasty corruption scheme. You do realize that good cops turn bad all the time.”

She had a hard time believing any of this. Mick had an agenda here. “And why in the world would you come to me to try to rat out your own son?”

“You need to understand the context to fully appreciate the situation.”

“All right. I’m listening.”

“My family is the most important thing to me in my life. So this isn’t something I take lightly at all.”

“But you still want me to—what? Investigate your son?”

“That’s what I am explaining to you. For me to be at this point, you have to realize how serious it has become. Luke sold out the family a long time ago. I have given him plenty of opportunities to ask for forgiveness, to change his ways. But after a long time, it became apparent to me that he was actively working against the rest of us. The only thing stopping me from acting against him sooner is because his mother has a soft spot for him. But I can’t turn away from this opportunity because things have escalated a bit and gotten out of control. Luke has to be stopped.”

“Let me get this straight. You want me to prosecute your son?” She was having a hard time even having this discussion with him.

“That’s right. I’ll provide the evidence, and then you can do your prosecutorial thing.”

There was always going to be a catch. She knew that. “And I take it you want something in exchange?”

He laughed. “I want you to leave the rest of my family, including my daughter, alone.”

“You know I can’t do that.”

His expression turned serious very quickly. “You can and you will.”

“Are you threatening me, Mr. Hernandez?”

“That was merely a statement of fact. You’re barking up the wrong tree, Ms. Hughes. What I’m bringing to you is so much bigger than anything else you would ever be able to do against my family.”

“Okay.” She was going to play along for the time being and see what she could find out. “Let’s just say okay for the sake of argument. What precisely are you claiming that Luke is involved in?”

“He’s part of a ring of dirty cops playing both sides of the drug scene. They’re skimming products, taking the extra cash from the busts and all sorts of other things.”

As she looked into Mick’s eyes, she wondered if there could be any truth to these allegations. “How do I know that you’re telling the truth?”

“I wouldn’t waste my time otherwise. If I was fabricating this story, you’d find out eventually and this would’ve been a silly exercise. That wouldn’t help me or you.”

“Okay, then. And where is this so-called evidence?”

“I have it. But you see—there’s something else.”

“Another catch? You sure are attaching a lot of strings here.”

“I don’t want any of this traced back to me. My wife wouldn’t forgive me. As far as everyone else is concerned, this meeting is about me telling you to back off.”

“Then how are you getting your revenge? Isn’t that what this is all about?”

“This is much bigger than revenge.”

A chill shot down her back at his calculating grin. There was no doubt in her mind that this man would make good on his threats. He was selling out his own son to a prosecutor. It made her sick. But what concerned her even more was whether there was any truth to his allegations. Or was this just a way for Mick to try to get her off her investigation into Ana?

“If I were interested in seeing this evidence? How would that happen?”

He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a thumb drive. He slid it across the table to her. Before she could grab it, he put his hand on hers. She flinched.

“Aren’t you a jumpy one?” he asked. “Although I guess after all that has happened, it’s to be expected.”

He assumed that she jumped because of the current threats against her. He had no idea it went much deeper than that. And she was glad for it.

Jessica pulled away from him quickly and put the thumb drive into her purse. “I’ll take a look in the same way I’d evaluate evidence against any other person. There will be absolutely no special consideration because of this conversation. As far as I’m concerned, it’s just like any other case.”

“I’m confident that when you see what’s on there, there will be an indictment forthcoming against multiple members of the Miami PD—including Luke.”

“I’ll be the judge of that.” His bravado bothered her. What if he actually had something here? The idea that Luke Hernandez was a dirty cop was not something she wanted to entertain, but now it appeared that she wouldn’t have a choice. Would Mick really orchestrate such an elaborate ruse if there was nothing to it? She didn’t know. Staring into his eyes right now, he looked deadly serious.

“I’m sure that there will be charges brought because I can tell that you’re a rule follower. You’re young and naive enough to think that it’s always about doing the so-called right thing. You have integrity and a blind sense of justice. For my current purposes, you’re the perfect prosecutor to take down my son.”

She didn’t have a comeback because it was pointless to try to argue that she wouldn’t follow the law—they both knew that she would.

“I think we’re done here.” Jessica let out a deep breath when Mick stood up from his chair. Then he turned around and looked over his shoulder. “And don’t forget what I said about Ana. She’s off-limits. For good.”

Her meeting with one of the biggest crime bosses in Miami was over. And his message was clear. If she went after Ana, he’d be coming after her. But her first problem would be explaining to the FBI everything that had just transpired.

Zach walked over to the table. “Let’s get out of here. We can talk en route back to the safe house.”

Jessica used the time it took to get escorted out to the vehicle to regain her composure and think about how she’d present the facts to Zach. She knew he was going to immediately pounce on this.

Once in the SUV, Zach glanced over at her. “Okay, give it to me. What happened? I want to hear everything. It looked like an intense conversation judging from both of your body language.”

“You’re right—it was. But I wasn’t afraid.”

“What did you talk about?”

“Before I tell you, I need you to promise me that you won’t jump to any hasty conclusions.” She didn’t want him to immediately convict Luke before they even knew all the facts or had viewed the evidence.

“Is that something I normally do?”

“I think you will on this, Zach. That’s why I wanted to preface what I’m going to say with that. Please just hear me out.”

“Of course.”

“All right. Mick wanted to talk to me because he had evidence he wanted to give me.”

“Evidence about what?”

She took another breath. There was no point in trying to back into this. Better to just say it. “He wants me to make a case against Luke.”

“What?” Zach asked loudly. “Are you serious?”

“Yes. That’s why I didn’t want you to jump to conclusions. You’ve had it out for Luke since the beginning. But we need to examine all the facts before any actions are taken.”

“Wow,” Zach said. “What evidence does he have? What’s the allegation? I have so many questions.”

“Let’s take it one step at a time.”

“Good idea. Walk me through the entire meeting.”

“I told him I was surprised that he asked to meet with me. Then he said that since I was so focused on targeting his children, he had something to offer me.”

“And he gave up his own kid, just like that?”

“Well, not without strings attached. He basically said that I should prosecute Luke, not Ana. And he threatened me if I continued with anything against her.”

“You’re thinking this is a ruse to try to protect his little girl.”

“It was my first thought, but unfortunately there is more.”

“Go on.”

“He gave me a jump drive that he claims has evidence on it specifically implicating Luke and other Miami PD officers in some sort of illegal drug ring.”

Zach whistled. “This is huge, Jessica. I’m sure that given the gravity of these allegations, Brodie will brief Special Agent in Charge Cox. Since this is an allegation against Miami PD, we need to keep them walled off from this.”

“We’re getting ahead of ourselves. This could all be nothing. A trick to try to divert our attention away from the real criminal here.”

“Or all of his children are dirty. But just thinking out loud here. Why would Mick turn against Luke if his son was truly on the dark side?”

“Good question. When I asked him about it, he said it was because Luke had sold out the family. I think he was alluding to the fact that Luke has not been loyal to them. There’s a backstory there that he didn’t get into.”

“I know you don’t want me to jump to conclusions, but we can’t just ignore these allegations because they came from Mick and might be self-serving. It could be that they have merit and Mick was also using that to his strategic advantage.”

They pulled up to the safe house. Jessica knew their conversation was far from over. “I agree that we have to investigate. I need to look at what is on this jump drive ASAP.”

“I want to get one of the FBI tech guys to make sure there isn’t malware or anything else on there first. The last thing we would need is for the Hernandez family to infiltrate our computer network. We should follow our normal protocol here.”

“The analysis of the jump drive has to happen right away.”

“Believe me. I have the same sense of urgency that you do. If there’s a police corruption scheme, it’s going to be a mess. I’ll call our tech people now, plus Brodie.”

She didn’t know where this path was going to lead, but she’d have to follow it.

As she settled down on the living room couch, Zach started making phone calls. She took the few minutes and started making a list of everything that Mick had told her while it was fresh in her mind. Having this meeting documented was going to be important. What she really wanted was to get access to that jump drive and review the evidence. But she completely understood that they needed to take precautions.

She was relieved when members from the FBI tech team arrived at the safe house and started their analysis. Now all she could do was wait.

When Zach rushed into the room a bit later, she knew something was up.

“We’ve got a problem,” he said.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“Luke Hernandez is missing.”

NINE

“W
hat do you mean he’s missing?” Jessica asked while her mind raced with possibilities.

“He didn’t report in for duty today, and there’s no sign of him at his house,” Zach said.

“Do you think Mick decided to take matters into his own hands? That wouldn’t make much sense.” The puzzle pieces weren’t clicking for her.

“No. I don’t think that at all. I think it’s more likely that Luke is guilty, and he realized he was about to be exposed, so he hit the road.”

“Or he could be in danger. Maybe he’s on the run because he’s worried about what his father will do.”

Zach shook his head. “I understand that you wanted to give Luke a fair shake, but in the face of the conversation you had with Mick and when the evidence he’s given you pans out, we have to start working under the assumption that Luke is not clean.”

As much as she hated to admit it, Zach was right. “I hear you. What exactly are you suggesting?”

“The FBI techs are working on the drive now. As soon as they’re done, we can start looking at what’s on there and see where that takes us.”

“Regardless of what happens with Luke, I don’t plan to stop our investigation into Ana.”

“I don’t see any reason why we shouldn’t go after both of them. Assuming, of course, that our bosses agree.”

“I’m pretty sure that Ian will want to follow the evidence—wherever that takes us is where he’ll want to go. But if there is anything going on with Luke that exposes a big and thorny issue with the Miami PD, then I realize that could get super dicey. Especially the citywide politics that could be at play. So I know Ian will want to be involved. I wanted to be able to find out what was on that drive before I called to brief him.”

He looked down at his watch. “They should be done with their review any minute now. Let me go check.”

Jessica took a seat on the couch and tried to wrap her head around everything. Was it really possible that Luke Hernandez was a dirty cop after all? It bothered her that her instincts about him could’ve been so far off. But she still wanted to review everything before declaring him guilty. She knew Zach was right, though. At some point things just didn’t add up and you had to face the facts in front of you, even if they were unpleasant.

After a few minutes, Zach returned with a laptop in his hand.

“They copied the files to this computer for us to review.”

“Great. Let’s get to it.”

He motioned toward the hallway. “We can use the dining room table.

“I’m assuming you’ll want to drive this operation,” he said as he took the seat beside her at the table.

“Thanks.” Jessica opened the laptop and saw the file folder on the desktop. “Here we go.” She took a deep breath as she double-clicked on the file. The folder contained a slew of picture files, spreadsheets and some other documents. She went to the pictures and clicked on the first one.

An image filled the screen. “That’s Luke Hernandez, but who is that man with him?” The two men stood together in what appeared to be the back of a tall building. The picture had captured them exchanging a legal-size manila envelope.

“I know him,” Zach said.

“You do?”

“Yes. That is Ivan Markov.” Zach frowned deeply.

“And who in the world is Ivan Markov?” she asked.

“One of the biggest players in the Russian organized crime syndicates in the country.”

“What?”

“Yeah. This just went from huge to epic, Jessica.”

“But how do we know that the picture is legitimate?”

“Our experts will be able to determine that.”

Thoughts raced through her head. “How do you know this Markov guy?”

“We did a case study on him at Quantico. He’s the real deal, Jess. If Luke is involved with Markov, then this is even more serious than I thought.”

She opened up the next picture, and there was Luke again with Markov. This time they were sitting together on a park bench. “How would Luke have even gotten connected with Markov in the first place?”

“Before Luke went to homicide, he did a stint in the drug unit. I imagine that’s how he and Markov met. Markov is a big player in the drug business on a national level. But he also has a huge foothold in Miami. Mick would love to get a chunk of that business.” Zach looked her in the eyes. “And this makes even more sense now as to why Mick would bring this information to you.”

“What do you mean?”

“Because Ivan Markov is Mick’s competition in the drug trafficking business. He gets to kill two birds with one stone. Take down his son, who has clearly sold out and is not only working against the Hernandez family but working for and with the Russians. It couldn’t be a bigger slap in the face. But it looks like Mick has outsmarted them all and found a way to get at them at the same time—which would ultimately further the Hernandez agenda, especially as it relates to moving up in the drug trade. It will pave the way for Ana to do the work.”

“Wow. This is so much bigger than anything I expected. I’ve got to talk to Ian about this.”

“We need to get everyone in one room to discuss our options.”

“You do realize that this doesn’t make Ana any less guilty.”

“I’m with you. I say we take the whole crooked family down.”

She flipped through the rest of the pictures, and they all told the same story—that Luke and Markov were tight. She didn’t find any pictures of other police officers. This set of photos was limited to just the two men. There were a variety of shots in different places, but the takeaway was that this wasn’t a one-off meeting between the two men. No, they had met multiple times on a variety of different turfs.

An idea occurred to her that she wanted to bounce off Zach. “Is there any possibility that Luke is working on an undercover operation for the Miami police? Or working in conjunction with the DEA or another agency?”

“You know, anything is possible, but that’s easy enough to verify quickly.”

“I already know that you think he’s dirty, but I don’t want to jump to conclusions without doing all of our due diligence.”

“Don’t worry about that. We’ll get to the bottom of this.”

* * *

Later that night, the safe house was a hive of activity. Zach knew things were really getting serious when he was told that Ford Cox was going to be coming over for the meeting. If the head of the FBI Miami field office was involved, then that let him know how important this was. Ford didn’t insert himself into investigations unless they were major and high profile.

Zach just hoped that they weren’t going to take him off these cases because he was a rookie. He had to prove that he could juggle both investigations if that’s what the higher-ups ended up wanting to do.

Jessica wore a deep frown and hadn’t said a whole lot since they’d finished reviewing all the evidence. The documents and spreadsheets appeared to show a money trail that led back to some offshore bank accounts. One thing was for sure; it wasn’t looking good for Luke Hernandez right now. And while it was true that Zach had always been suspicious of the man, he certainly didn’t gain any joy out of discovering how dirty Luke appeared to be.

When Ford Cox walked in, Zach rose and shook his hand. He’d only met Ford in person once before, right when he’d started. The tall, gray-haired special agent in charge was known to be tough, and he ran the Miami office like a very tight ship. While some other SACs might look the other way if there were minor indiscretions among agents, that wasn’t how Ford operated.

“Hope I didn’t hold things up too much,” Ford said. Zach introduced him to Jessica, and they all took their seats.

“Okay, who is going to fill me in?” Ford asked.

Zach looked toward the woman he was quickly falling for. “Jessica, why don’t you brief us on what happened in the meeting today?”

“Sure,” she said. “Mick Hernandez requested a meeting with me. We set it up, and once he arrived, Mick basically told me to stop investigating his daughter, Ana. He insinuated that if I didn’t, he would come after me. But then he told me that he could give me something much more valuable to us. He handed me a jump drive that he said had incriminating evidence against his son—Miami police detective Luke Hernandez. As you can imagine, I was skeptical that this was some sort of ploy to try to throw the investigation off Ana, but I’m sure you’ve heard that we found some disturbing information in what Mick provided me. This includes pictures and evidence showing a strong tie between Luke and Russian crime boss Ivan Markov.”

Ford nodded. “And I’m glad we’re all in one room so we can share our knowledge. What I’m about to tell you doesn’t leave this room, because there are a lot of moving parts and we can’t compromise our active operations—especially ones that we’ve been working so hard on for years. What everyone here needs to know is that we’ve been trying to take Ivan Markov down now for the past two years. Up to this point, the guy has been completely untouchable. So this latest development is of great interest to me and my team members working the Markov cases. These guys and gals literally eat, sleep and breathe Markov. And I must say that I spend a big chunk of my time managing our efforts. So what happened here is a big breakthrough that could have some pretty huge ramifications.”

Ian leaned forward in his chair. “From our perspective at the prosecutor’s office, we just want to be making the strongest cases we can. Obviously, if the evidence pans out against Luke, then we’ll take that ball and run with it. But we also don’t want to lose sight of Ana Hernandez. I feel like Jessica and Zach are making progress on that investigation, and now isn’t the time to back off just because Mick came to us with documents that may incriminate his son.”

“And I wouldn’t presume to tell you how to do your job,” Ford put in. “But I can tell you from an FBI perspective, Markov is at the top of our list—far above Ana. Yeah, Ana may be trying to expand her drug business, but Markov
is
the drug business in South Florida. And it doesn’t stop at drugs, either—he has his hands in everything. So from my end, we will work every angle we can to get hard evidence implicating Markov in the drug business and any other illegal enterprise.”

“If I may,” Zach ventured. “I don’t think these two things have to be mutually exclusive.”

“Right,” Ford said. “I already have a Markov team in place. They can take point in the investigation regarding Luke. But given the circumstances, we’ll need some assistance from you, Zach. And you, too, Jessica.”

Zach was thankful that he wasn’t being cut out or reassigned. He wanted to be in on the action.

“And what about the Miami PD?” Jessica asked. “How are you going to handle their role in this?”

“Good question,” Brodie noted. “I think they are on the sidelines. We will obviously need their help on factual issues and running down things, but we can’t have them investigate Luke because we don’t know who else is implicated in this illegal scheme.”

“Mick said that this involved multiple people at Miami PD,” Jessica said. “But the evidence turned over was strictly limited to his son and Markov. It’s possible that Mick was just bluffing about the full-on conspiracy to ensure that I would take him seriously.”

Ian cleared his throat. “I hate to bring this up, but has anyone considered that Mick Hernandez might be sending us all on a wild-goose chase here?”

“Our FBI experts are analyzing the photos now,” Zach told him. “We contacted DEA, and Luke isn’t working undercover with them. If the photos check out, then that’s pretty compelling proof that Luke is working with Markov. What we don’t know from the pictures is what exactly the two of them are up to.”

“It’s just a bit convenient that Mick brought this to me now, though,” Jessica said.

“No doubt he’s using us to do his dirty work in a vendetta against his son,” Ford said. “But at the end of the day, it benefits us to take these accusations seriously. If things go our way, then maybe we get to take down two criminal families.”

“Sounds like we should all get to work, then,” Brodie said. “We’ll defer to you, Ford, on how you want to run the Markov and Luke case, and we’ll provide whatever assistance is needed.”

“Let me touch base with my team and fill them in on everything that has happened. Then I’ll let everyone know what we need from you,” Ford said. “And in the meantime, Zach, you keep working on Ana, and we’ll see what we can put together.”

After a few minutes of small talk, the group broke up with everyone calling it a night and leaving Zach alone with Jessica once again.

“How do you think that went?” he asked.

“Ford really has his sights set on Markov. Hopefully that won’t cloud his judgment as far as Luke’s involvement goes.”

“Ford didn’t get to be in his position today by letting his emotions sway him. He’s thought to be one of the best SACs in the nation.”

“I get that Ford has his special team focusing on Markov, but we have to stay relevant. I don’t want to get totally iced out of the Luke investigation. I need to know what kind of legal case I could make against him if it comes to that.”

“Believe me, everyone knows that the prosecutor’s office has to have a key role no matter how things shake out.”

“Well, at least we have the green light to continue our work with Ana. You know that Mick won’t be happy about that.”

“He won’t. Which means we need to be particularly cautious. And it would also be good if he thinks that you’re aggressively following up on the Luke leads. Maybe that could give us a little breathing room as far as Mick’s concerned.”

“That’s a good point,” Jessica acknowledged. “And just between you and me, I’d like to do some of my own independent investigation into Luke and Markov.”

Zach wasn’t sure if that was a good idea. “Don’t you think we need to stick to protocol?”

She raised an eyebrow. “I’m not saying that we should mess with Ford’s work—I’m just thinking that I’d like to follow up on a few points myself.”

He reached out and squeezed her hand. “Nothing else can be done tonight.” What he really wanted to do was bring her into his arms and kiss her again. But he knew better. He didn’t want to move too quickly and scare her away.