Robert Crais - Indigo Slam

Jasper stood and leaned across the table at me. 'Get in the goddamned chair.' Yelling.

'You're going to have to put me in the chair, and it's not going to be as easy as you're thinking.' I didn't shout. I was proud of myself for not shouting.

Jasper started to move around the table, but Scully caught him. 'Reed.'

Jasper stood there, breathing hard. I was breathing hard, too, but I was tired of getting shoved around and kept in the dark. Something was going on and everybody seemed in on it but me. I was seeing bits and pieces of it, and I wasn't liking what I was seeing, but I knew there was still more to the picture. Maybe it was time to start sulking. Maybe I could phone Charles for a couple of pointers and sulk these guys into submission. Or maybe Jasper would try to put me in the chair and I could get in two or three good shots before half a dozen federal marshals boiled through the door and rode me down. Might be worth it.

Scully, William P., had stared at me for what seemed like an hour when the door opened and Lemming whispered something in his ear. Scully listened without saying anything, then nodded and the tension seemed somehow lessened. 'Hang on for a minute.'

He patted Jasper's shoulder and the two of them stepped out with Lemming, but now I was feeling better about things. I was probably thirty seconds away from being thrown into jail, but you always feel better when you tough off to a guy.

Three minutes later Scully and Jasper came back without Lemming. Jasper had a nine-by-twelve manila folder and Scully had two Styrofoam cups of coffee and a baggie filled with fresh ice. Scully tossed me the ice, then put one of the cups by me on the table. He sipped from the other. 'We came on too strong and that was a mistake.' He gestured at the envelope. 'The office down in LA faxed up some information on you. You seem like a square guy, Cole, so let's take a step back and start again.'

'I'm listening.' I put the ice where the Glock had bitten me.

Scully said, 'Andrei Markov is looking for Clark Hewitt to kill him. We're looking for Clark to protect him. That's the difference between us and Markov.'

I looked at him without responding. The tough detective refusing to cut them any slack. Or maybe I was just the sulky detective. 'Don't tell me: Clark Hewitt used to be involved with Markov, but he turned state's evidence, and now he's in witness protection.'

Jasper smiled, but there wasn't a lot of humor in it. 'What else do you know?'

'I don't know any of it, Jasper, but I'm a hell of a guesser. Markov wants Hewitt, and so do you. You aren't the cops or the Treasury or the FBI. You guys are U.S. Marshals, and the marshals oversee the federal witness protection program.' I moved the ice to my ear and leaned back. 'And since you guys don't seem to know Clark 's location, that means you've lost him.'

Reed Jasper frowned. 'We didn't lose him, goddamnit. He left. You don't have to stay in the program once you're in. You can leave any damn time you want.'

Scully said, 'Did Markov have any idea as to Clark 's location or current identity?'

'Nope. That's what he wanted from me.'

'How'd he pick you up?'

'They had someone on Rachel Hewitt's grave.'

Scully whistled. 'Jesus Christ, three years and they're still on that place.' He shook his head. 'When that Russian swears an oath, he means it.'

I said, 'Who's Markov?'

Jasper said, 'Markov is a big man in the Ukrainian mob. He came over here a few years ago with his brother, Vasily. Vasily was the boss. They set up shop and began expanding the business, and one of these new ventures was printing counterfeit dollars to ship back home and sell on the Ukrainian black market.'

I nodded. Clark the printer. Clark the artist. ' Clark was a counterfeiter.'

Scully said, 'Yeah.'

'So what happened between Clark and Markov?'

'Vasily thought Clark was skimming his print and laying it off on a couple of locals. Clark got word that Vasily was planning to bump him off, and came to us for help.'

'He turned state's evidence to buy into the program.'

'Didn't have a lot of choice. The Markovs never made a threat they didn't carry out.'

'Was Clark skimming?'

Jasper shrugged. 'Who knows? Because of Clark, Vasily's doing twelve to twenty on Mercer Island, and Andrei swore he'd spend the rest of his life hunting down Clark and his family, and that's what he's doing. It's been three years, and he's still got people on it. Now you show up, and he sees you as a lead back to Clark.' Great.

I said, 'If Clark went into the program, how come you guys lost track of him?'

Jasper stared at me for a time, then wet his lips and looked away.

Scully made a little mouth move as if his lips had gone dry, too. 'The night we brought Clark in things went bad. Middle of the night, raining, we were going to put him and his kids into a safe house, then begin the relocation. We told him not to worry. We told him it was safe.'

I was watching him. 'Only it wasn't safe.'

Jasper's eyes narrowed and he looked back at me. 'Somehow Markov's people found out. We had everything in the truck, we were five minutes from driving away, and they surprised us.' He stopped and stared past me some more and I wondered if he wasn't reliving that night. 'My partner was a guy named Dan Peterson. He was killed.'

Scully said, 'Go get some water, Reed.'

Jasper shook his head.

I said, 'You couldn't get Markov for the shooting.'

Jasper sucked a breath, then focused on me. 'Peterson ordered me to get Clark and those kids out of the kill zone, and that's what I did. He stayed. I didn't see it, and I still don't know for sure what happened. SPD moved on our call. They found Danny inside. He'd been shot in the backyard, then dragged himself in.' He shook his head again. 'We never had a name or a face, but we know it was Markov.' He shook his head some more. 'Everything went wrong that night. It shouldn't have happened.'

Scully said, 'We finished the relocation, but Clark never trusted us after that. He changed his name as soon as they got to the relocation city and the whole family disappeared.' He shrugged yet again. 'That's his choice, of course. You don't have to stay in the program.'

Jasper made a little wave, then suddenly sat straighter, folding his feelings and putting them away. Every cop I've ever known could do that when he or she had to. 'And now you show up, asking about Clark Hewitt.'

Scully nodded. 'A guy from Los Angeles.'

I stared at Reed Jasper, and then at William P. Scully, and then I thought about Teri and Charles and Winona, waiting for Clark to come home. I wondered how much of this they knew, and I thought they must know some of it. Probably why they weren't thrilled about my coming to Seattle. I thought how terribly afraid they must be of losing him to risk bringing me into their affairs. I thought about what it must've been like for them three years ago, and what it must be like to live a life defined by secrets and lies. Secrets never stay secret, do they? Not even when you want them to. Not even when lives are at stake.

I looked Scully squarely in the eyes and spread my hands. 'I don't know where Clark is, or his kids, or anything about him.'

Jasper stared at me, and you could see he didn't believe me. Neither did Scully. 'Look, Cole, it's not our job to protect him anymore, but we feel what you might call a sense of obligation, you see?'

I smiled my best relaxed grin, and said, 'Man, this has to be one of the world's biggest screw-ups.' I told him the exact same story I'd told Andrei Markov. 'I came here looking for a drug connection named Clark Hewitt. I was just following a name, and the name's the same, but my guy doesn't have anything to do with Russians or counterfeiting or any of this other stuff.' I let the grin widen, like I was enjoying the enormous coincidence of it all. 'All of this is news to me.'