A few minutes later, armed with Ferris’s signed order, Erin called Speedy Rentals back. The unfortunate Carl answered.
“Speedy Rentals, Carl speaking. Do you have a reservation?”
“Hi, Carl. This is Detective O’Reilly. Did you get my e-mail?”
“Yes.”
“Well?”
“That 4Runner was rented yesterday… by a Diego Rojas.”
Bingo, Erin thought. “Thanks, Carl,” she said. “Did he pay cash?”
“Yes.”
“Okay, thanks.” Erin hung up and looked at the clock on the wall. It said 12:55. Rolf, his chin between his paws, looked expectantly up at her.
“I know,” she said to him. “I don’t want to be here either.”
What she wanted was to call Carlyle, have a drink, and relax. What she did instead was call Agent Johnson.
“Johnson.” He sounded wide awake and alert. Erin wondered if Homeland Security guys ever slept, or if they just plugged batteries into the backs of their skulls.
“Erin O’Reilly,” she said. “I got a hit on Diego Rojas.”
“Talk to me.”
“He rented a car at JFK, Toyota 4Runner, black, BPC 2987. Paid in cash, yesterday.”
“O’Reilly?”
“Yeah?”
“We know about that already.”
“Oh.” Erin felt suddenly stupid. Of course Homeland Security would know. They were following Rojas and he’d used his own name to rent the car. What a waste of an evening.
“Good follow-up, though,” Johnson said. “How’d you tumble to that?”
“I got some traffic cam footage with that car outside the restaurant.”
“Yeah, we figured. Like I told you, we thought he was meeting with the Italians. At least you’ve confirmed he was probably there. You know if he’s one of the dead guys?”
“Not sure,” she said. “I don’t suppose you guys have a DNA sample we could run on the bodies?”
“We’re working on that,” Johnson said. “If I can swing it, I’ll make sure it gets to your medical examiner.”
“Agent Johnson?”
“Yeah?”
“There anything else I should know about Rojas?” She didn’t add, “So we don’t chase our tails any more than we have to,” but was pretty sure he heard it in her voice.
“He flew into JFK out of Bogota yesterday with three associates: Sebastian Alvarez, Javier Montero, and Francisco Contreras. All of them are known narcotics guys, cartel connected. Alvarez and Contreras are sicarios, hitmen.”
“You let guys like that just fly into my city?” Erin demanded. “And you call yourselves Homeland Security!”
Johnson didn’t take the bait. “I told you, we were letting Rojas run in the hope he’d lead us to bigger game. I’m sorry it worked out this way. Do you think Rojas and his team were the shooters, or the targets?”
“I’m thinking targets,” she said. “But we’re still trying to sort out what happened.”
“Tell you what,” Johnson said. “I don’t need to do this, and it’s a little outside our usual line, but I’ll send you pictures of these bad guys. Maybe your doc can match them to the bodies. Believe me, if Rojas is dead, we want to know it. We also want to know who killed him.”
“Okay, thanks,” Erin said. “For a government goon, you’re not half bad.”
“And you’re okay, for a flatfoot gumshoe,” Johnson volleyed back. “Good working with you, O’Reilly. Check your e-mail.”
Sure enough, a message popped up in her inbox with several pictures attached. She opened them up on her monitor, flicking back and forth between the new images and the traffic camera footage.
“Thanks,” she said again. “Yeah, two of these guys are the ones in the front seat of the rental car. Rojas is driving, Contreras is riding shotgun.”
“Great,” Johnson said. “Let me know once you’ve got confirmed ID on your stiffs. See you on the flip side.”
Erin fired off the pictures to Levine. Then, finally, she shut down her computer and pushed back from her desk. Rolf immediately sprang to his feet, tail wagging. He’d had a good nap and was ready for action.
“Lieutenant?” she called.
Webb held up a hand. He was on the phone with some agency or other. After a moment, he put the phone down and looked at her.
“I’m gonna bounce,” she said. “I got possible IDs on four of our victims. I’ll put them up on the board on the way out.”
“See you tomorrow,” Webb said. “Bright and early.”
Then she and Rolf were free and clear, leaving the Major Crimes office behind. Erin had her phone up before she’d even gotten downstairs, calling Carlyle.
“Evening, darling,” he said.
“Where are you?” she asked. She couldn’t hear any of the usual background noise that would’ve indicated he was sitting in his usual spot at the bar.
“I’m up in my office, taking care of a few small matters. Is your business concluded for the night?”
“Yeah. Is yours?”
“Nothing that can’t wait for tomorrow.”
“I hate to break it to you, but it is tomorrow.”
He laughed. “Fair enough. Shall we say, it can wait until I’ve slept on it.”
“Planning on going to sleep?”
“Unless you’ve a better plan.”
Erin smiled as she walked to her car. “I might.”
“May I call on you in a short while?”
“Sure thing. I just have to get home, run Rolf around the block, and get cleaned up. I smell like a cookout.”
“I’ll be there in, shall we say, forty minutes?”
“Better make it an hour. I have to wash my dog.”
“I still smell like charcoal,” Erin said.
Carlyle kissed her neck just below her ear. “It’s not as bad as you’re thinking,” he murmured. “The dirt we’ve got on ourselves is always more obvious to us than to everyone else.”
“That’s what you tell yourself?” she replied, curling herself against him. They were sitting on her couch, glasses of Glen D scotch on the table. Rolf, damp and bedraggled, sulked in the kitchen. The NYPD hadn’t figured out how to train a dog to like being bathed.
“Aye,” he agreed pleasantly. “My priest, on the other hand, tells me to stop sinning so much. Then he gives me a few Hail Marys and Our Fathers as penance.”
“You do that?” she asked, straightening and turning to look at him.
“Aye,” he said again. “Don’t you? You’re a Catholic lass.”
“Well, yeah, but not regularly.” In point of fact, Erin couldn’t quite remember how long it’d been since she’d
