'Which I just don't see, Diz. Really. Still possible, I know, but you had to have heard this guy. If he didn't absolutely believe Scholler killed Nolan, he's gotta get himself an agent.'
'Well, if the alternative option was either himself or one of his relatives, it might sharpen his thespian skills a little bit, don't you think?'
Hunt shrugged. 'Possibly. But still, it's against my gut.'
'All right, then, let's go with that for a minute. Say whoever killed Nolan, it wasn't the Khalils and it wasn't Scholler. Who does that leave?'
'How 'bout the FBI? Maybe there was way more money involved and these two agents who have disappeared found it and left the country.'
'Maybe,' Hardy said without enthusiasm. 'And a good story. But I kind of doubt it.'
'Me too,' Hunt said, pointing at the entrance. 'And I hate that. But here comes Glitsky. Maybe he'll know something.'
It wasn't only Glitsky. Bracco came in with him. Hardy introduced Hunt around-he hadn't met either of the cops before. Lou came from behind the bar and took their orders, Glitsky's green tea and Bracco's Diet Coke. In the next few minutes of show and tell, everybody got reasonably caught up. The story Hardy had heard from Tara about the mugging incident in San Francisco's Tenderloin, implicating Nolan in those three deaths, significantly upped the buzz quotient around the table.
Bracco went last, revealing to the civilians what he'd already told Glitsky-that he'd located Bowen's secretary, Deni Pichaud, and talked to her for an hour or more about what her boss had been working on during the last few days before he disappeared. Ms. Pichaud didn't have much to offer. Bowen, as everyone already knew, had a varied and substantial practice, and according to Pichaud he tended to flit from one case to another as clients called and demanded his attention. She had no special memory of anything about Evan Scholler or his appeal.
When Bracco finished, the four men sat looking at one another for a long moment. Hardy finally broke into the silence. 'So where does that leave us?'
'Is shit creek already taken?' Hunt asked.
Glitsky, who eschewed profanity, gave the detective a quick bad eye but then blew on his tea, sipped, and said, 'It's the FBI and Iraq. That's all that's left.'
Hardy shook his head. 'The FBI didn't kill Nolan, Abe.'
'Maybe Scholler did.' Bracco held up a hand. 'I know he's your client and all, but-'
'Yeah, but that almost doesn't matter at this point,' Glitsky said.
'I'm afraid it still does to me, guys,' Hardy put in. 'That's why me and Wyatt are here. So if everybody's good with it, maybe we can just leave the whole question of who killed Nolan open and see where that leads us.'
'Good by me,' Glitsky said. 'I want who did the Bowens, and we know that wasn't Scholler.'
'So you're going with the Bowens being murders?' Hunt asked.
Glitsky nodded. 'Until I get proven otherwise.' He pointed a finger across the table at his inspector. 'Which means, while I'm thinking of it, Darrel, feel free to put in more time on both these investigations. Treat 'em both like they're righteous one eighty-sevens. Witnesses if you can find 'em, evidence ditto, phone and financial records, the whole ball of wax.'
Bracco, determination all over his face, nodded. 'Got it.'
'Meanwhile,' Glitsky continued, 'how are the FBI and Iraq connected to the Bowens?' In a rare display of humor, he channeled the line from
'I've got a thought,' Hardy said. 'Let's go back to Nolan. The FBI talked to him in person and his employer works in Iraq, which puts FBI and Iraq in the same sentence anyway.'
Hunt picked it up. 'All right. And Abdel Khalil says Nolan picked up the contract on his parents in Iraq from a guy named Kumar or something.'
Hardy, who rarely forgot anything, chimed in. 'Kuvan.'
'Okay, Kuvan. Kuvan paid Nolan forty or fifty grand to take out the Khalils. Then the Khalil family over in Iraq took out Kuvan.'
The four men sat with their thoughts and drinks. Finally, Hardy cleared his throat. 'My, what a tidy little package,' he said.
Glitsky turned to him. 'What are you saying?'
'I'm saying that this is all a nice cleanly closed circle, except for two little things-Charlie and Hanna Bowen. And I think we're all in agreement that, no matter what, the FBI didn't kill them. Right?'
Nods all around.
'Well, check me if I'm wrong on anything here, but how about if the trail leads to Iraq, all right, but instead of Kuvan paying for the hit, the order came from Allstrong?'
'The way it did with Zwick,' Glitsky added.
'Do we know that for sure?' Bracco asked. 'And even if we do, what does it get us?'
'Nothing with Zwick, as you say. The FBI never got involved in that investigation,' Hardy answered. 'But with the Khalils, it gets us the FBI covering for an American company with contracts over there, deflecting the blame-and the retaliation-on this Kuvan guy. Just another Iraqi businessman who got squeezed in the war. This totally satisfies the Khalils-they get their tribal revenge and they're happy. And over here, now nobody's looking at Nolan anymore, or at Allstrong. The story's completely over.'
'And the FBI did this, again, why?' Glitsky asked.
'Because Allstrong is connected high up in the government, both over there and back here. High enough that they could call off the FBI.'
'Uh-oh.' Glitsky was shaking his head.
'I know, I know,' Hardy said. 'You hate this conspiracy stuff. Which doesn't mean, Abe, that it doesn't happen.'
'I don't hate it,' Bracco said.
Hunt chimed in. 'Me neither. In fact, I kind of like it.'
'Maybe I'm missing something,' Glitsky said, coming back at Hardy. 'So, Diz, you're saying that the FBI went over to investigate what? Nolan's murder?'
'No. The Khalil murders.'
'I thought they'd concluded that was your client?'
'No,' Hunt corrected Glitsky. 'Redwood City, not the feds, concluded that that was Evan. According to Abdel, the FBI thought it was Nolan pretty early on.'
'So they went over to Iraq? Why?'
'To find the source of the frag grenades,' Hardy said, 'if nothing else. Interview Nolan's associates, maybe his boss, who has, it turns out, in fact actually ordered the hit.'
'But again, Diz, why?'
'Well, and here I'm extrapolating a little bit, but see if it doesn't sing for you, because Allstrong had a profitable relationship with this guy Kuvan. And the Khalils were getting in Kuvan's way. This is all stuff, by the way, that Wyatt more or less verified this afternoon with Abdel. So Allstrong orders its guy, Nolan, to do the hit. Which is, P.S., what he basically did for a living anyway.'
'So.' Glitsky, trying to make the tumblers fall into place, slowly swirled his teacup in front of him. 'How does this get us to Bowen?'
'Bowen gets Evan's appeal,' Hardy said, 'just like I did. He starts asking the same types of questions I've been asking, except instead of sending Wyatt here down to talk to Abdel Khalil, he starts with the assumption we're working with right now-that Nolan and not Evan killed the Khalils. So that changes his equation about who would need to cover that up if it comes out, and what's the answer?'
'Allstrong,' Hunt said.
Hardy nodded. 'Ten points.'
'Who needs to cover what up?' Glitsky asked.
'Allstrong. They can play fast and loose all they want in Iraq and nobody asks too many questions as long as they're fulfilling their contracts. But if it comes out-and it would be a huge story over here-that they're killing naturalized American citizens on American soil to promote their business interests in Iraq, I've got to believe that
