The Last Family (32 page)

Reb climbed into his sleeping bag and put his thumb in his mouth and lay there with his eyes open, wondering if the message had got through with all the millions of other prayers that were making their way to God’s ear.

The agents had moved back across the street after Laura and Reid had returned. Thorne Greer was sitting with the earphones in place watching the perimeter of the Masterson
house on the monitors as the camera views were alternated every five seconds. He wasn’t aware that he was watching until something moved on a screen. He watched as a cat jumped over the wall, and then he tracked the animal’s progress until it disappeared into the tall grass beside the path. Woody and Sean were asleep on the twin beds across the bedroom. As he listened to Reb’s prayer again, he prayed silently for the son he had lost in the canal. A son who could never kneel and pray for his father. And he prayed that Reb’s prayer be answered.

Thorne waited until Reb was back in bed for a few minutes to shift in his own chair. It was as if he thought he would disturb the boy by moving. Thorne poured another cup of coffee from the pot and sat back.

He looked over at Woody and Sean, who were sound asleep. How much help would they be when Martin came at them? This was their first job together. Woody was often silent, strange around the edges. His sense of humor seemed forced, as if jokes were something he saw as unnecessary. He never really got into the spirit of things the way Sean did. He was detached, observing and filing everything away in his mind for future reference or something.

Sean, the proverbial baby face, was another matter. With his game-show host looks, he didn’t seem overly competent. He was short, but the women’s movement and the relaxation of physical minimums had allowed him to enter the agency as an agent in the field. Maybe some disguised skills would show up when they were in a pinch, but by then it might be too late. Sean reminded him somehow of Joe Barnett, one of the rookies killed in Miami. It was then that Thorne realized that all of the agents on this job were single. As far as he knew, there wasn’t a husband, a wife, or even a serious relationship in the bunch.

Woody and Sean had certainly never discussed girlfriends, beyond making boastful conversation about their conquests. Sean and his father shared a house on an island in Puget Sound and raised bloodhounds. Woody
lived alone in Los Angeles but didn’t have a California tan. The only person with a wife or kids was Paul. Thorne realized that Paul didn’t want to have to worry about anyone’s family except his own, and he didn’t want anyone in the field to be worrying about any family other than his either.
Were better-qualified agents discarded for that reason?
It was a good question, and someday he thought he might confront Paul with it.

Thorne had serious doubts that he could take Martin in a fair fight. Not that there would be a fair fight, because it was against Martin’s nature. But Thorne would certainly lose if things were within spitting distance of equal. At forty-seven Martin Fletcher would still be in fighting trim. Thorne wasn’t, however he might look to the untrained eye. Fighting trim was a way of life—mental, physical, and emotional. Traveling with celebrities, watching party guests, playing volleyball, and working out with weights wasn’t even a good start on it. He worked out at a gym three times a week, and he could run a few miles without passing out, but Martin was a different story. Martin was the sort that had to be taken by surprise, from ambush.

34

E
VE
F
LETCHER AWOKE TO DISCOVER HER SMALL DOG LYING LIKE A
paperweight on the foot of her bed. She sat up and probed at his body with her toe under the sheet. “Puzzle? Mr. Puzzle?”

A block away, inside the DEA van, Larry Burrows sat with a cup of coffee watching the screen.

“Goddammit, Mr. Puzzle!”

“Hey, come see this!” Larry yelled. Sierra rolled from the bunk, rubbing her swollen eyes, her hair pressed against the side of her head. She looked at her watch. “What the heck, Burrows? It isn’t time for my shift.”

“Look, old Eve’s got herself that fur-covered doorstop she’s been praying for.”

“Owww, her’s gonna be in a foul mood today,” Sierra said.

On the screen Eve had got out of bed and stood hunched over, punching at the stiff dog’s flank with a pencil.

Sierra poured a cup of coffee and sat down in a swivel chair. “You taping this?”

“I’m going to send it to
America’s Funniest Home Videos.”

Eve lifted the dog’s leg with the eraser end and peered at his belly.

“What’s she doing now?”

“Maybe she’s gonna give him the fuck-of-life maneuver.”

“Please, I haven’t had my coffee yet. Mouth to mouth,” she said, laughing.

Then, as Sierra and Larry watched, Eve rushed down the hall and into the kitchen. Larry switched the views so that they had the back of her leaving the bedroom, a long shot of her approaching the kitchen down the narrow hallway, and the top of her head and shoulders as she rummaged through the kitchen cabinets. When she straightened up, one of her sagging breasts came free of her gown.

“God, that turns me on,” Larry said.

“Grief,” Sierra said. “Have some respect for the bereaved. She just lost her sole companion and best friend. He was like her own child.”

“Does she look like Jerry Clower in drag, or is it just me?”

“Who’s Jerry Clower?”

“Country comedian … a hayseed Tip O’Neill clone,” he said.

The camera shots changed as Larry turned the selector switch to maintain continuity. B: hallway south, C: kitchen. When Eve came back, she stopped and put her hands into sandwich bags for mittens. Then she used one to lift the dog by its tail and the other to open the dark, already partially filled, garbage bag. She dropped him in, removed the sandwich bags from her hands, and tossed them in. Then Eve pulled the drawstring tight and tied it into a knot. The roof-mounted cameras followed her back to the kitchen and out the back door, where she opened the lid to the refuse can, threw the bag in, slammed the
lid down, and then went straight back into the house without so much as a peek over her shoulder.

“Nice service,” Larry said. “But she wasted a bag that coulda held a lot more. Coulda used one of those little candy-sized bags.”

“Forget what I said about respect. I hope she catches her tit in a drawer,” Sierra said.

“I guess different folks deal with grief in different ways,” Larry added. “Something tells me she’ll get over this loss, somehow.” He removed his wire-framed glasses and wiped the lenses inside a pinched fold of Polo shirttail.

He changed to an image of Eve’s legs protruding from the closet in what had been Martin’s room. The room was as Martin had left it when he’d joined the service. Twin beds with baseball players depicted on the spreads. A round braided rug and a chest of drawers with Martin’s artifacts still displayed on the top, as though he could return at any minute to assume his previous life.

“What the hell’s she doing now, looking for the dog’s insurance policy?”

Sierra sipped at the cup of coffee. “Look,” she said. “What’s that she’s throwing out?”

Rectangular objects were hitting the floor behind Eve’s feet.

“Money!”

“Jesus, it’s bills! Old bitch’s got herself a stash of cash.”

“If those are C notes … there’s over a hundred thousand showing. She coulda bought the little carpet crapper a cigar box or something.”

Eve finished and then started stuffing the cash into a large wicker purse that had been under the closest bed. Then she pulled three wig boxes from the closet and took the wigs out and lined them up.

“She’s going somewhere as a woman,” Larry said.

Sierra tapped his shoulder and he ducked. “Ouch!” he said, laughing.

“She’s taking the money to Martin,” Joe McLean said
over their shoulders. “Let’s get ready. She’s leaving for Florida. Fifty bucks says next flight.”

He lifted the telephone and dialed Paul.

Larry and Sierra looked at each other and wondered how long Joe had been standing there behind them.

35

P
AUL HAD LEFT
S
HERRY’S APARTMENT, GONE HOME FOR A SHOWER
, and had taken Joe’s call while he was drying off. He dressed hurriedly and drove straight to the office, pausing only then to call Rainey and Sherry on the cell phone to tell them to hurry over to the office without any explanation. Then he had armed the phone’s signal scrambler to make sure the call was secure before he called Thorne in New Orleans.

“When you leaving for Miami?” Thorne asked.

“As soon as Eve leaves her house,” he said. “I’m headed to the office first to make sure everything’s in motion,” he said.

“I wish I was going in with you and the boys,” Thorne said.

“I’m depending on you to take care of things in New Orleans. No one else I can trust, Thorne.”

“Okay, Paul,” he said, not masking the disappointment.
“See you after the shoe drops. Don’t lower your guard for a second. Good-bye.”

The telephone went dead.

It was quiet in the conference room. Paul made a pot of coffee, but he didn’t need it—Joe’s call had him wired. The dream was still haunting him. Maybe “haunting” wasn’t the right word. Stalking him.

Paul spent the next hour trying to decide what Martin would do between the time he met his mother and the time when he returned to complete his revenge against the family.

Rainey came in and interrupted Paul’s thoughts.

“Tried to call you last night,” he said. “I was afraid you’d left without me. You wouldn’t do that, would you?”

“No, Rainey. I had some thinking to do. What about the Buchanan kid?”

“He doesn’t remember anything,” he said. He shrugged his shoulders and sat in a chair, which he turned to the window. “It’s October the first. That means it’s going to come down real soon.”

Paul nodded his agreement. “Sooner than that,” he said, smiling. “Today.”

“Thank you, Jesus,” Rainey whispered.

The telephone rang and Sherry’s voice came over the intercom. “Mr. Masterson, Tod Peoples on one,” she said. There was a new, playful lilt to her voice.

Rainey stood and walked toward the door. “Want coffee?” he asked as he opened it.

Paul shook his head as he picked up the telephone.

Tod Peoples seemed pleased with himself. “Back from the dead? I must’ve called the Hyatt twenty times. Your cell phone was off.”

“Battery was dead,” he lied.

“I got some very hot news for you.”

“Eve is flying out today,” Paul said.

“Very old news, that. I’m talking about what our bad boy has been up to in the Crescent City.”

“He was in New Orleans?”

“Oh, yes, he certainly was. And … he most definitely isn’t working alone.”

“Tell me what you got, Tod.” Paul lit a cigarette and listened to the account of Lallo Estevez’s murder and the finding of two other bodies, one a known hit man.

“There’s no proof it was Martin,” Paul said at last.

“No,” Tod agreed. “No proof. But we both know it was.”

“Okay. I’ve got some things to do.” Paul was fighting the urge to scream out loud.

“Oh, by the way. Remember the prints you sent?”

“What? Oh, the envelope.” He felt strange, lightheaded.

“I ran them against every known and unknown. Amazing. We collect prints from all over the world and—”

“Tod, please cut to the chase. I’ve got a lot to do.”
Like get things in motion and figure out what these dead Latins mean
.

“Kurt Steiner’s left thumb and index finger. Maybe he mailed it.”

“You know him? Fax me a picture! Christ, that’s great!” Suddenly Paul was ecstatic.

“Can’t help you on that one, Paul. His prints came to me from a police ID card from Argentina. I only had it on file because the Colombian army came across a print or two on a weapon they happened across at a jungle training facility. One of those resorts for the cocaine barons.”

Paul was squeezing the tennis ball furiously. “So you know who he is. But not what he looks like? I presume he isn’t a mail carrier these days in Colorado.”

“Yes and no. I mean, I know who he is … but nothing else.”

“Tod. I hope you won’t take this wrong, but if you had more information on this Steiner, you’d tell me, right? I mean, you wouldn’t limit my information? I know you parcel out bits and pieces and that you have your own agenda. But, Tod. We’re talking about my children. My wife.” There was an edge to his voice that he couldn’t control.

There was a strange silence for a few seconds.

“I’ve told you what I know. I wish I could do better.”

Paul slammed down the telephone receiver, sat for a few seconds, and then lifted the phone and pressed a preset speed code.

When Rainey came back into the room, Paul was talking feverishly into the telephone. “I don’t give a rat’s ass whether she likes it or not. Get your people in that house and all around it. For the next few hours don’t let them leave the premises for any reason.” He listened for a beat. “Get what you need—agents, cops, the fuckin’ Army and the SWAT team. If she gives you any trouble, you call me.” Paul slammed the telephone down and lit a cigarette even though he had one burning in the ashtray at his right.

“Peoples?” Rainey sat on the table looking down at Paul.

“No, Thorne. Remember a Colombian coffee broker named Lallo Estevez?”

“Sure, the dapper coffee dealer.”

“We knew he was connected with the Medellín cartel, but we couldn’t pin anything solid on him.”

“Yeah, I remember him. Influential pals in D.C.”

“He’s dead. A towboat crew fished a guy out of the Mississippi River yesterday ten miles south of New Orleans. No ID, but he had his throat slit from ear to ear with his tongue pulled through above the Adam’s apple. Feds ID’d him by his prints.”

“And it was Lallo Estevez?”

“No. Was a guy named Ramon something. I’m ahead of myself. The floater was a freelance Colombian hitter.”

“Maybe it was a Colombian suicide,” Rainey laughed. Paul smiled at the fact that Rainey had made a joke.