Material Witness (26 page)

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“You've got to be kidding,” Jake
raged, bolting out of his chair in Russo’s office.

Captain Russo waved him back in his
seat. “Calm down.”

“An accident? That's what you're
blaming that inferno on?”

“That’s the official word. The FBI
hasn’t uncovered any evidence that the system was tampered with.”

Jake turned to Charley, who was
sitting on the edge of the credenza. “We were locked inside. If we hadn’t been
able to escape from the window we would have blown up with the house. That’s no
damned accident, Charley.”

“Though our investigation is still
open, all evidence is leading toward an accident,” Charley said coolly.

“How about the evidence I saw with my
own damned eyes.”

“Unfortunately you weren't around
until today to give that bit information to our investigators. It might have
helped.”

“Someone had to keep your star
witness alive.”

Kevin had been leaning back,
balancing his chair on the back two legs. He pushed forward and the chair hit
the floor with a thud. “He's been a little busy,” he said, his witty sarcasm
seeming to grate on Charley's nerves.

“So I gathered.” She folded her arms
across her chest and glared at him in his corner seat. She released a quick
sigh. “Write it up in your statement, Santos, and I’ll include that information
in the final report. If there was any tampering, we'll uncover the evidence
eventually. I'm expecting Agent Radcowski in any time now with the preliminary
report. I sent him down to Virginia to oversee the investigation. In the
meantime, I need to deal with why you decided to take matters into your own
hands and flee with the FBI’s material witness.”

“You handpicked Bellows and sent him
down to the safe house.”

She was standing now, face to face
with Jake. “I've worked with him for three years and have never had any reason
to believe he'd betray me. I've trusted him with my life more times than I can
count.”

“And you trusted him with Cassie's.”

“That’s right!”

It was at precisely that moment that
Agent Radcowski blew into Captain Russo's office with barely a knock on the
door. He gave a casual nod to Charley.

“Did I come at a bad time?” he said,
taking in the mood of the room.

“No,” Charley answered. “Is that the
report, David?”

Agent Radcowski nodded and handed it
to her. Charley grabbed the report and quickly opened the file.

“Nice of you to show your face,
Santos,” Radcowski said. “What the hell took you so long?”

With so many people in Russo’s
office, Radcowski took it upon himself to sit on the edge of the captain’s
desk.

The glare Russo pierced Radcowski
with was foreboding. His eyes crawled from the agent's face, to the toppled
over pictures now face down on the desk, back to Radcowski's face. Never once
did the intensity of his glare wane.

Radcowski merely smiled.

A few seconds passed and Russo
finally said, “Would you mind getting your big carcass off my son's picture?”

Radcowski glanced down at the desk,
seemingly aware for the first time of what he'd disrupted, but not of how
strongly it affected Captain Russo. He moved slowly and they all waited for him
to arrange the pictures back into place.

“Agent Tate tells us you were in
charge of the investigation at the safe house. Your boys are talking gas leak.
Is that right?” Russo said, cutting to the chase.

Radcowski glanced at Charley.

“One of my men almost died in that
explosion,” Russo said sharply. “Don’t give me the run around.”

Charley nodded her head and Radcowski
shrugged.

“See for yourself. They found some
fragments that might indicate the system had been tampered with. But until they
can do further forensics, they can’t rule on whether the damage was done before
or caused by the explosion.”

“They were only in the house a short
while. It wasn’t long enough to build up enough fumes to cause the kind of
explosion that took place. ” Charley said.

“The fire investigator thinks the
source of the spark was in the system itself.”

“In other words, instead of a little
explosion, they wanted the big bang,” Kevin called out from the corner of the
room.

“I’ll say,” Jake said. “The house
went up like a bomb. Someone definitely wanted us very much dead,” he added
sarcastically. Yet even as he said the words, the totality of what did happen
made him shudder.

Radcowski shrugged again. “It would
appear that way. I’ve asked that once the two doors are identified in the
rubble, if they didn’t burn to ash, they be checked thoroughly.”

“And there were no signs of this when
your men cleaned house before the guests arrived? Seems to me someone flunked
the white glove test,” Kevin added.

Radcowski scowled at Kevin before
turning his attention to Jake. “That safe house has been quiet for months. It
was thoroughly checked, and there wasn't any reason to suspect security had
been compromised. Bellows was with Cassie and Jake. But that doesn’t mean he
didn’t have opportunity to tamper with something.”

Charley pulled her attention from the
report she’d been reading. “Our experts are still sifting through fragments of
the rubble. Some traces of suspect chemicals were found. Whatever it was, it'll
eventually show itself when the full investigation has been completed.” She snapped
the folder closed. “Until then, we have other pressing matters to deal with.”

“Such as?” the captain asked.

“The security of our witness.”

Russo sighed. “She's in protective
custody until the grand jury trial. There isn't much more that can be done until
then.”

“We need to put things in place for
after the grand jury trial. This case has become too high profile and
unfortunately, so has our witness.”

Jake knew where this was going.
“We’ve already had a taste of what protective custody is to the Bureau. Cassie
wants her life back.”

Charley shook her head. “Yeah, well,
I'd love to see the Beatles do a reunion concert but that's not going to happen
in this lifetime.”

“She wants her life back, Charley,”
he repeated.

After a short pause Charley said, “I
know that. But it's not going to happen and deep down, if you listen to your
gut instinct, you know it, too. Don't you, Jake?”

She was right. It had nagged at him
ever since the phone call with Tyler. Initial relief quickly changed to dread.
He knew Cassie had sensed it, even though he'd tried his damnedest to keep his
feelings to himself.

“She's not getting lost, Charley.”

“You can't watch her 24/7.”

“You said Bellows was working with
Fagnelio.”

“Unfortunately, he was.”

“And Fagnelio's not talking.”

“There's no guarantee it will stay
that way.”

Jake's voice rose above Charley's.
“Just tell me what you're afraid of.”

Her voice matched his. “You know damn
well what I'm afraid of. Someone from Ritchie Trumbella's family might have
something to prove. It's a very volatile time with Ritchie out of the picture.
It's a bad break, but I don't think Cassie can go back to the life she had.
Ever.”

“Cassie’s no threat to Ritchie
Trumbella’s organization. Only Fagnelio is, and you have him in custody.”

Kevin’s voice broke into the tension
between Jake and Charley. “You’re going to lose Cassie in the system?” Kevin
blurted out.

Charley rolled her eyes. “I'm not the
heartless bitch you both think I am. I'm sorry for what Cassie has to go
through. But this situation is out of control.”

“I'll protect her,” Jake said
resolutely.

“Listen to yourself, Jake.” Russo
abruptly stood and leaned his weight on his fists, now firmly planted on the
coffee stains and doodles of his desk blotter. His face wore a haggard
expression filled with understanding. “No one man can do it all. God knows we
try, but as soon as we turn our back for one second, you have dirtbags like
Fagnelio invading your home with drugs and God knows what else.”

Charley let out a slow breath and
unfolded her arms in front of her. “Tell me, Jake, just how far are you willing
to go for this woman?”

It grated on Jake more than he could
think how Charley could refer to a woman as special as Cassie as “this woman.”

When he didn't answer right away,
Charley continued. “Say you give up your job here and guard her at a safe house
for six months, a year. Then what?”

Jake cast her a hard look. “I gave
her my word. To some people that still means something.”

Charley ignored his jibe. “I
understand you have a big family. Very close-knit. Are you willing to give them
up to be with Cassie no matter how this turns out?”

“What they hell does that have to do
with anything?” he charged.

At the same time, Charley's voice
rose above his. “Because that is what this is going to take.”

“Bellows didn’t leak Cassie’s name to
the papers, Jake,” Kevin said, cutting into his awareness.

Jake swung around to look at his
partner, looked directly into his eyes and knew Kevin believed what he'd said
was true. His gut bunched until he thought he'd keel over.

“What are you talking about? Of
course it was Bellows.”
It had to be Bellows.

Kevin shook his head.

Jake’s mind raced to thoughts of
Cassie, trapped in that hotel room swarming with federal agents and prosecutors
drilling her endlessly. He knew her well enough to know she was looking for the
light at the end of the tunnel, the light where she'd be free to come and go as
she chose, without worry that someone was waiting behind every doorway. That
would get her through the next few days. Without that light, she'd crumbled and
fade to dust.

“She can't live in a hole forever.
It'll kill her.”

“No, she can't,” Charley said in a
tone that Jake thought held genuine sympathy. It was more than he'd ever
expected from Charlotte Tate. “There are other ways.”

He gave a hard laugh that held no
humor. “Not witness protection.”

“Unfortunately, I think it may need
to be a bit more than just witness protection. Whether Cassie wants it or not,
this case is about to make her a household name. And it has nothing to do with
her writing career. The publicity her publishing company could cash in on with
the press will send her sales skyrocketing. I'm not sure there's any place she
could hide that people won't recognize Cassie Lang's face or know her name. She
may have to leave the country. And even then she’ll be recognized. But it’s the
only way to ensure she won’t be reached.”

“No, it would kill her.”

“I can't see it any other way.”

Russo sat back down hard, his chair
groaning and squeaking under the weight. “I'm afraid I have to agree, Jake.
This has gotten too far out of hand. Until this is over—”

“Bellows was the mole in the Bureau.
You caught him last night. He must have leaked Cassie’s name to the media so
that—”

“He wasn’t the leak, Jake,” Russo
said, his voice grave.

“He had to be,” Jake insisted.
Had
to be?
Jake wondered, waging war with himself. To think anything else would
mean only one thing—Cassie would be gone.

“Bellows requested a transfer up to
the New York office a little over a year ago,” Radcowski said. “That's about the
time we figured the bond fraud scheme started. He was in the city the night of
the shooting.”

Charley continued. “We were about to
bust Trumbella’s organization wide open. During our investigation, we were able
to plant an agent deep undercover, who then fed us information about the
organization and the bond fraud deal. They’d been working with a Colombian
company called The Aztec Corporation. The agent was able to tell us that he
suspected a mole in the Bureau was working closely with Ritchie to help him
stay one step ahead of us.”

Radcowski plucked the file folder
Charley had dropped on Russo’s desk. “Since Bellows walked right into Charley's
sting with Fagnelio by his side, it pretty much makes him number one suspect.
Unfortunately, he’s dead and we can’t ask him. But he never leaked Ms.
Alvarez’s name to the media.” 

“What makes you so sure?”

Charley cleared her throat and looked
at Jake directly. “Because Agent Bellows had an ironclad alibi the night of the
shooting at Rory’s. He was with me. The entire night.”

The air in the room was thick, almost
enough to choke every bit of breath from Jake's lungs.

Dammit, it was exactly what he'd
dreaded.
Too neat.
There was someone else out there.

Jake’s jaw tightened. “Where are you
taking Cassie?”

Charley shook her head. “That
information is not being released.”

“And that's it? You're just going to
take her away until Fagnelio decides to roll?”