Kirk Russell - Dead Game

“My scoutmaster?”

“Your Chief of Patrol, whatever. I can’t keep up with these state agencies. Give us word for word your conversation with Ms. Burdovsky.”

“I’ve already given it to you.”

Another call would go today, of course, to Fish and Game headquarters, and the language would get a lot rougher.

“Do it again.”

“She said she had information for me, and I took a chance she might help us. We’ve been looking at a Nikolai Ludovna, Don August, Abe Raburn, and Richie Crey. Do any of those names mean anything to you?”

“You were told no contact,” the crow said.

“No, we were backed off a couple of times. Check with Ehrmann. We’ve been looking for Anna Burdovsky since she vanished.”

“And you were backed off her when you found her.”

“Yeah, after we found her for you we were backed off.”

Now the balding older agent spoke for the first time. “There was really no choice with that, Lieutenant, but you know that.”

“Yeah, but the story made more sense yesterday.”

“The way I hear it you’ve already been allowed unusual access.”

The crow cut back in. “Which you just abused. Listen to me, Lieutenant, a lot of people are at risk and this is not a game of who’s hooking those bizarre-looking fish.” Her nostrils flared. “If you aren’t one hundred percent straight with us, you’ll put agents at risk. I guarantee you, you’ll lose your badge, your job, and your honor.”

“My honor?”

“That’s exactly right.”

“Where’s Ehrmann?”

“Unavailable.”

Marquez looked at Peres. “Are you part of the undercover team watching Weisson’s? I feel like I saw you in a window.” Peres stared hard at him. “Am I right?”

Peres turned to his companions. “The only safe thing is to lock him up until this is over. We’ve got him up on a levee road playing James Bond, and I don’t want to take this risk. Let’s find her and let’s hold him.”

“You’re making the risks,” Marquez said.

Peres turned to the balding agent. “Who is this horse’s ass?”

But the balding agent had a question now for Marquez. “What do you mean you saw him in a window?”

“He didn’t see me,” Peres said.

“We saw a surveillance team, and Peres here looks like the guy that was in the window. I looked at him with binoculars, but I could be wrong. We were checking out everything surrounding Weisson’s because we’d followed two suspects there.” The balding agent nodded. “Look, I’m sorry, maybe I shouldn’t have met with her, but we’re still trying to crack this poaching ring. She told me she had information on the poachers she’d give me today and I bit. I should have called you first.”

He realized he’d started to get through to them and continued talking. The balding agent was Stan Sullivan. He introduced the crow. “This is Special Agent Walker,” and Marquez gathered that she was out here from the East, possibly Quantico. She was dead serious as she faced him again.

“We have significant charges we’re prepared to file against a number of people. I don’t know the details of the promise made to Burdovsky, but I’m certain we haven’t reneged on anything. We wouldn’t do that. That’s all I can say about it. I know about Seattle, and despite what you may believe, the Bureau is very sympathetic to what you are trying to do.”

The door opened, and Douglas walked in. He took a seat and looked across the table at Marquez.

“John,” Douglas asked, “did she tell you anything else?”

In this room full of people Douglas focused on him, was trying to communicate with him. He waited for Marquez to respond to the cue. Marquez told the story again. Left out nothing, added what he was saving for Ehrmann, that she’d asked him not to stop her from trying to get away.

“Why wouldn’t you stop her? She burned you.”

“She was three steps and in the water and there were two blacked-out Suburbans closing on me. I didn’t see any reason to chase her.” Then the last thing, what he was saving for Ehrmann. “She said you have another source inside this Eurasian crime ring and that you don’t need her.”

“She told you we have another source?”

Marquez nodded, added that he’d been waiting for Ehrmann to arrive.

Marquez heard Peres to the crow, “What did I tell you?”

Douglas silenced Peres with his hand.

“Did she name this other source, John?”

“No, and she didn’t say any more than that.”

“That’s disturbing.”

The room was quiet. The crow’s stare had turned opaque. But the balding agent seemed to understand his holding out for Ehrmann.

“How soon is your bust?” Marquez asked.

“Too soon to have her running around.” Douglas looked from Marquez to the balding man. “We need to get Ehrmann right now.”

He was another hour at the Sacramento Field Office, and when he walked out he was no longer angry that he’d been hauled in. He knew what the hours before a bust felt like, the countdown after the hour was picked, the premeetings done, the safety talks, warrants in place, everything ready to go. Then something unexpected happens and you don’t really know what to do with it, par t icularly at the Federal level where the momentum is harder to start and stop. Momentum acquired its own life as a big bust neared, and in the hyped-up, sometimes near paranoid state before a significant takedown anything could rattle you.

But he was disturbed by what he’d learned and what he was piecing together. They hadn’t found Anna and were frustrated and surprised she’d eluded them. Ehrmann had walked into the room where Marquez sat with Douglas and asked, “Where is there to hide out there? There’s nothing there but vineyards and orchards. There aren’t six buildings on that levee island. Is she scuba trained? Is it possible she swam out underwater in the slough? How could we lose her out there?”

Now darkness was coming. Ehrmann had made it clear they were going forward with the bust, and Marquez had guessed that explained Douglas’s presence in Sacramento. Not even Douglas would tell him when the go hour was, but it wasn’t hard to figure out it was within twenty-four hours.

He drove to the safehouse and continued on to Bell’s house. Everything was in place for Ludovna’s visit. Roberts would be his wife for the night. She had put on bright pink lipstick and cut up celery and emptied bags of baby carrots and potato chips onto a platter. There was a sour cream dip.

“I’m in here, honey,” she called, and he heard Cairo laugh. “Would you bring me a martini?”

He walked into Bell’s study, and they were arranging fishing trophies and had hung photos. In a loose way they’d decorated the house for the guy he was. Roberts smiled and batted her eyes at him.

“I forgot the martini.”

“That’s okay, sweetie, but do you think everything looks nice? Should I run out to the market and buy more potato chips, and do you think your friend will go through more than one bottle of vodka?”

“He might but we’ll pour champagne first. He told me he’s bringing some caviar.”

“That’s too bad, I thought we should poach our own sturgeon. I thought that’s why you’re late. Wouldn’t the party be more fun that way?”

He smiled at her. “You look nice. I’ve been with the Feds and that’s why I’m late.”

“I went all out,” she said, and she wore a tight black dress, her long legs stretching from underneath it. “I bet I know what you’re wondering,” she said. “You’re wondering where my gun is.”

“You’re not wearing it.”

“Not tonight. I have it here in the kitchen and I could change, what do you think?”