Viz laughed. “Didn’t we all.”
Alex Z was sitting in the passenger seat next to Gage. He’d come along to talk about the case in a world where, as Viz always told him with a grin, “the rubber meets the road, kid.” Alex Z never knew what he meant, but it always made him nervous.
Gage heard Viz’s engine turn over.
“Time to go to work, boss. Scooby Doo’s just pulling out. He’s in a silver BMW, four-door, 760Li. Heading southeast toward Big Basin.”
Viz reported in five minutes later. “He’s not on his way to his office. Not even toward San Jose. He just turned north on the Saratoga-Sunnyvale Road, toward the 85.”
“I’ll swing around.”
Matson indeed took the 85. He drove north until he hit the 280, then the 101 along the bay toward San Francisco.
“He must be going downtown,” Viz said.
Gage and Viz traded places, then followed in silence until Matson approached the financial district.
“Looks like he’s aiming toward Van Ness Avenue,” Gage said.
Matson turned east from Van Ness just after passing the gold-domed City Hall, then swung around the Federal Building and parked in the lot across the street.
“Viz, I don’t want him seeing me yet and I want you out here snapping pictures. I’m sending in Alex Z.”
“What? Me?” Alex Z recoiled toward the passenger window. “You said I could just come along for the ride.”
The man who spent his nights performing onstage before crowds of adoring women was panicking in the wings.
Gage grinned. “It’ll be something you can tell your children about.”
Alex Z shook his head. “Did I tell you I don’t want kids?”
“Too late, hop to it.”
“What do I say if-”
“Say you got busted in an ecstasy case.”
“But I don’t use ecstasy.”
Alex Z’s eyes tracked Gage’s as he scanned his earrings, tattoos, and unkempt hair.
“But everyone will think you do.”
Heart pounding, Alex Z climbed out of the car and followed Matson through the security checkpoint and into the elevator. Matson pressed 11, then glanced over at Alex Z.
“Thanks, I’m going there, too,” Alex Z squeaked out.
Matson stepped out of the elevator on the eleventh floor. Alex Z followed him down the hall into the lobby of the Office of the United States Attorney.
Alex Z took a seat, then waved a clammy hand toward the receptionist behind the bulletproof glass, mouthing the words, “I’m waiting for my lawyer.”
Matson walked up to the counter.
“I’m here to see Mr. Peterson.”
Two minutes later, after the receptionist handed Matson a stick-on security badge and buzzed him in, Alex Z slipped back to the elevator.
“He went into the U.S. Attorney’s Office,” Alex Z told Gage when he got back into the car. “He asked for someone named Peterson.”
“Damn.”
Gage noticed Alex Z’s hands shaking. “It wasn’t the answer I was hoping for, but good job getting it.”
He radioed Viz. “The little punk is setting up Jack in exchange for a get-out-of-jail-free card. Go down to SatTek. The workers still there are either unemployable elsewhere or real tight with Matson. Try to figure out who’s who, but be careful. We’re going to have to stay in the shadows until we can shine a little light on the inner workings of this scam.”
CHAPTER 17
Z ink looked over his notes from the previous day, wondering how much Matson was holding back. He didn’t glance up, but sensed Matson inspecting his thinning hair.
He knew more was churning in Matson’s mind than was coming out of his mouth. Fifteen years in law enforcement taught him that’s the way crooks were, even when they were telling the whole so-called truth.
Matson studied Zink’s lowered head, wondering how Zink became an FBI agent. Hackett told him that Zink’s career stalled out six years earlier, something to do with a sexual harassment complaint by one of the secretaries. He didn’t even put in his name for promotions anymore. Now just a day laborer, counting the months and years until his retirement, which Matson could see was still a long way away.
Matson decided that thinking of Zink as a rodent was probably a little unfair. Zink didn’t choose his scrawny features; they were a result of his parents unwisely choosing each other. He could only be held blameworthy for failing to mitigate his physical disadvantages. Plastic surgery might’ve helped, Matson thought, but he knew of no operation that could enlarge Zink’s minuscule ears. Matson figured he’d ask his wife. She had personal experience bumping up against the limits of plastic surgery.
Actually, Matson thought, Zink’s not a bad guy. Just doing his job. I can work with him, but he’s hard to read.
Zink felt Matson trying to gauge how he was doing. He knew snitches always did that. Are they pleasing their masters or not? Are they saying too much or too little? They’re always wondering where’s the finish line. Of course, there wasn’t one. It took most crooks a long time to figure that out, and Matson hadn’t even started.
He stepped to a chalkboard, then charted out the companies Fitzhugh set up in Guernsey.
“Now tell me about the bank accounts,” Zink said, turning around, and wondering how much of the truth he would get.
Matson got up and walked to the map on the wall. He pointed at a city next to a lake in Switzerland, just north of the Italian border.
“I didn’t even know where Lugano was until the day before we flew in.” He faced Zink. “Ever been to one of those Swiss banks?”
Zink shook his head.
“If it weren’t for the brass plate mounted outside that said ‘Banca Rober,’ I’d never have known what it was. No teller window. No signs advertising mortgage rates. Just security like the CIA and a bunch of little offices.”
Matson sat back down. “You know why Fitzhugh chose Lugano?” He laughed. “A woman. Isabella. This pipsqueak set up the Azul Limited and Blau Anstalt accounts there just so he could get laid.”
“Just like you.”
Matson blushed, then flared. “I’m not the one who chose to run this thing out of London. She just happened to be there.”
“Sorry,” Zink said. “I didn’t mean for it to come out that way.”
“Hell, not only did I not know why he chose London, I didn’t even know how the scam was going to fit together. All Granger had said up to that point was that he wanted to put a structure in place. I didn’t even realize that when I told Burch we needed a flexible structure, I was telling the truth. And at that point, it was all form and no substance.”
“Did the banker know that?”
“Of course he did, but you couldn’t tell by looking at him. He was about as expressive as a dead carp. He had the account opening forms filled out even before we walked into his office. Fitzhugh introduced me, then threw out the phrase, ‘strategic partnerships,’ and the guy slid the papers across the table for him to sign. Like some choreographed dance. I’m laughing as we’re driving away because the banker didn’t even ask what the companies did.
“I elbowed Fitzhugh and told him that I must’ve missed the wink again. He just grinned and said, ‘No wonder,
