David Rosenfelt - Dog Tags

Once Benson leaves, Laurie and I get into bed. The implications of what happened here hit me full-bore, and being able to hold her is a substantial comfort. Of course, momentous events are not a requirement for me to enjoy holding Laurie, but tonight it seems even more necessary.

It’s not until the morning that I think to check my phone messages, and I have one from Willie, telling me that he thinks he has seen Jason Greer. My very strong hunch is that he’s imagining things, especially since it now seems very unlikely that the M sighting in Everett was real.

I call Willie back, but his cell phone doesn’t answer. I leave a message expressing my doubts, in gentle terms, and tell him to call me.

Now it’s time to experience the absolute best part of my job. I head down to the prison to get Billy, who is being processed out. I have to wait less than twenty minutes, a blip in prison time, and there he is.

We do a real firm handshake, and he grabs my left arm with his left hand, but we avoid the full-on man-hug. Then we head outside to my car, with him stopping briefly to look up at the sky and take a deep breath. I can’t imagine what it’s like to be cooped up in a cell, so I have no insight as to how it feels to be finally let out of that cell.

But if Billy’s expression is any indication, it must feel great.

CHAPTER 88

BILLY DOESN’T WANT TO GO OUT FOR A BIG BREAKFAST. He also doesn’t want to have a beer, or go to a park, or see any friends. He wants to go directly to my house, because that’s where Milo is.

On the way he asks me to tell him what has gone on, and I tell him I will when we get home. For the time being I describe how Milo saved my life last night.

He smiles and says, “I know what that feels like. He saved mine when I got back from Iraq.”

We pull up in front of the house, and I tell Billy to hurry up and get inside. I say this because Milo is at the window, clawing at it and going nuts at the sight of Billy, and I’m afraid he’s going to come crashing through.

I open the door and let Billy in first, and Milo re-creates the flying-dog trick he did on M. Except this time he’s not after anything in Billy’s hand; he’s after Billy. They roll around on the floor for a while, with Billy laughing the whole time. Tara looks at me as if wondering who these two lunatics are on the floor.

Laurie hears the chaos and comes downstairs, laughing when she sees Billy and Milo. I wait until they’ve calmed down before introducing her, since she and Billy have never met.

Laurie makes pancakes, her specialty, and Billy inhales them in Marcus-like fashion. “I never thought I was going to have food this good again,” he says.

Billy pauses chewing long enough to again ask me to fill him in on everything he’s missed relating to his case. I do that in some detail, only leaving out the parts about the FBI’s being on the murder scene that night, and the jury tampering. I promised Benson I would keep that to myself, and I don’t want to jeopardize the financial payoff I’ve arranged for Billy.

“So it’s over?” Billy asks.

“Yes. You’ll be fully exonerated today.”

He shakes his head. “I don’t mean my case. I mean the operation they were running.”

“I think so, but I certainly can’t be sure. And I don’t think Benson agrees, though he’s not in a position to just assume the best.”

“I agree with Benson,” he says.

Laurie nods. “So do I.”

“Why?”

“Two reasons,” Billy says. “One, there’s a lot of money that’s been made, and a lot more to come. If Landon and M were alone at the top of this, then that money has no one to collect it, and no one to spend it. In my experience money is always surrounded by people.”

“And the second reason?” I say, though I am formulating my own.

Laurie provides it for him. “Erskine. He doesn’t figure. If he was bad and in on it, then he would have no reason to blackmail them; they were his money source and there was plenty to go around. If he wasn’t bad, then who recruited the other soldiers?”

Billy nods. “Right,” he says, though I already knew that. “There’s got to be someone else, someone who could get to Erskine’s people, who also has the smarts to handle the financial end of this.”

It hits me like a ton of bricks. I know exactly who that someone is. My mind is racing such that I can barely hear Billy continue.

“You know who worries me right now?” he says, but doesn’t wait for an answer. “Greer.”

I grab the phone, in the moment deciding which of two crucial phone calls I should make first. I call Willie, but again his phone goes to voice mail. I leave another message, this time far more urgent.

As I’m dialing the second call, I say, “Laurie, please Google ‘Everett, Massachusetts’ right away. I want to know what industry they have there.”

“What am I looking for?” she asks.

“You’ll know when you find it,” I say, as she rushes over to the computer.

I call Benson, but he’s not in his office and not answering his cell phone. I leave a message that it’s absolutely urgent that he call me.

When I get off the phone, Laurie is getting up from the computer. The look on her face says it all. “Everett has one of only five liquefied natural gas terminals in the United States. It’s where the tankers dock.”

That is exactly what I was afraid of. “Shit,” I say, substantially understating the case.

“The terminals are considered prime targets for a terrorist attack.”

“Shit.”

“It’s only four and a half miles from Boston.”

This time I don’t say shit.

I say, “Willie.”

CHAPTER 89

WILLIE SET A WAKE-UP CALL FOR SIX O’CLOCK IN THE MORNING.

He figured that would be early enough to keep track of Greer, unless Greer was in Everett to do dairy farming. Not being used to tailing people, he was faced with a dilemma. If he waited inside the hotel to see him, then he might not be able to get to his car in time to follow Greer wherever he might go. If he waited outside, then he was worried that he’d have no idea at all where Greer was.

Willie solved the problem by giving the valet fifty bucks to let him park his car on the hotel driveway, where he could get to it quickly. He then waited in the lobby near the only elevator bank that stopped at the ninth floor. If Greer came down, Willie would see him and be able to get to his car in time.

At around eight o’clock Willie realized that he had left his cell phone in the room. He debated whether or not to go get it, and came down on the negative. If he did, he could miss Greer, and then wind up spending the rest of the day waiting for someone who was already gone.

By noon Willie was bored and starving, not necessarily in that order. He saw a room-service waiter pushing a cart, and asked if he would consider bringing him food there. The waiter seemed generally okay with it, and his enthusiasm increased when Willie gave him another fifty dollars as an incentive.

Willie ordered just about everything he could think of, and ate quickly, since he knew that sitting in the lobby with all those trays looked weird. He finished and called for the trays to be picked up, and that was accomplished by one o’clock.

One hour later, Geer came off the elevator and went outside. Willie followed him and watched him walk to the self-service parking lot. Willie then went to his own car, and when Greer came out driving a van, Willie followed after him at a decent distance. Fortunately for Willie, the van was large and therefore distinctive and easy to pick out in the traffic.

Greer drove north for about a mile and a half, and then east toward the water. He drove slowly and carefully, so Willie had no trouble following him.