needing his signature, Detective Sloan wanted a few minutes of his time, dispatch had three messages to pass on from Cloudy Herrera's pushy lawyer.
He didn't respond and drove out of town along the two-lane state road that passed by the state penitentiary and the new county jail. He kept his eye on the rearview mirror as he passed the jail and didn't turn around until he was certain he wasn't being tailed.
He had to assume that his office, house, and car were bugged, tapped, wired, and videotaped; that Andy was also under some sort of electronic surveillance; and that vehicle-tracking devices had been planted on department vehicles to keep tabs on the whereabouts of key personnel.
Doing a sweep or a grid-search for wiretaps and bugs at police headquarters wouldn't catch everything, not with the new remote technology that made long-distance eavesdropping easy. Ripping out bugs and inspecting vehicles for tracking sensors wouldn't be smart anyway.
You could never be sure if you found everything and it would only serve to alert the listeners that their surveillance had been compromised.
He parked and went inside the county jail. It was a safe place to put his plan into motion. Cops went in and out of jails all the time, so his presence at the facility shouldn't raise suspicions.
He introduced himself to the receptionist, showed his shield, and asked to use an empty office. In a small space used by shift supervisors he dictated everything he knew and all his conjectures about the Terrell-Mitchell homicides into a micro tape recorder. When he finished he wrote out a message to Helen Muiz that read:
Hand-carry this confidential message to It. Sal Molina and Detective Robert Sloan. Do not speak to anyone about this message or make a copy of it. Destroy this message immediately after the officers have read it.
TO; It. Molina, Det. Sloan Assemble all remaining Terrell-Mitchell case documents and meet me at the county jail ASAP. Do not travel together or use departmental vehicles. Do not reveal your destination or engage in any radio or telephone communication about this assignment after you receive this message.
He signed the message and faxed it, hoping that the two officers didn't show up looking at him like he was a paranoid nutcase.
Kerney's early-morning phone call to the Red River marshal, and his voice message to Helen Muiz canceling all his scheduled appointments, had forced Elaine Applewhite out of a warm bed in her hotel room and into her car.. She'd followed him all the way to Questa before turning back. She didn't give a damn if the fatal accident got turned into a homicide. It had been a good hit that wouldn't come back to bite her.
None of them ever had.
What bothered her was Kerney. He was acting a bit too clever. What put him on to Randall Stewart in the first place? What made him think that Stewart was a target?
Applewhite knew the ambassador wouldn't be happy when she called him in Washington with the report of Kerney's snooping. He expected everything to go smoothly, thought that all field contingency problems were caused by sloppy procedures, and stomped hard on operatives when pissed off.
Maybe there wouldn't be a need to raise the old boy's blood pressure.
Applewhite decided to wait and see what shook out from Kerney's little jaunt up north. She had lots of time before a call had to be made;
Terrell wasn't scheduled to return to South America until tomorrow morning.
She'd watched for Kerney's return from the outskirts of Santa Fe, monitoring the Taos district state-police- band frequency through a computer satellite link that fed directly into her laptop. The last transmission from the officer at the scene came in when Stewart's body had been loaded on the meat wagon for transport. He'd coded his report as an accidental death and resumed patrol.
That had made Applewhite smile.
When Kerney passed by, she'd switched the laptop to a vehicle tracking program that would record the travel and location of his vehicle in a fifty-mile radius. Then she went back to the hotel for a late lunch, feeling much more positive about the phone call she needed to make to Ambassador Terrell.
Maybe fuss-bucket Charlie Perry, whom Applewhite longed to whack just for the fun of it, had been right about Kerney being an over-the-hill lightweight cop who occasionally got lucky.
Kerney hoped that Molina and Sloan would buy into his scheme. While he waited for their arrival, he faxed a request to Andy Baca that would put the plan into play, if his officers agreed, and got a good-to-go response back. Bobby Sloan arrived first, carrying a cardboard box. He dumped it on the table in the meeting room Kerney had taken over and gave him a wily smile.
'What's all that?' Kerney asked.
'Applewhite didn't get everything, Chief. I stayed late at the office last night and copied all the Mitchell documents and tapes.'
'Did anybody see you do it?'
Sloan shook his head.
'Nope. I've got more news, Chief. Phyllis Terrell made two five-thousand-dollar cash withdrawals on the same days that Mitchell entered identical deposits in his checkbook.'
Kerney smiled. The link between Terrell and Mitchell was now real.
'What will it be, Bobby? A commendation or a promotion?'
'I'll pass on the promotion, Chief. I've already got the job I want.
But a commendation for my personnel file would be nice.'
'Consider it done,' Kerney said.
'Thanks.' Sloan popped an antacid pill.
'I figure we're meeting at the jail because some naughty FBI agents have been listening in on our private conversations.'
'You're not wrong. They haven't been playing nice. It's our turn to bend a few rules. Are you game?'
'You bet, if I'm allowed to do great bodily harm to Applewhite. She freaked my wife out last night.'
'That's not a good idea.'
'I can dream, can't I?' Sloan said with a grin.
Sal Molina arrived. Kerney asked Sloan to bring the lieutenant up to speed on the Mitchell case. Bobby summarized the important events and what had been learned from the new evidence.
Molina sat silent and stone faced.
'I should have known about this, Detective,' he said when Bobby stopped talking.
Irritated by Molina's officious response, Kerney fiddled with a loose paper clip before reacting.
'Detective Sloan came to me because you were out in the field, Lieutenant. I asked him not to talk to anyone about the developments in the Mitchell case without my permission.'
'You don't think I can be trusted?' Molina asked.
'You wouldn't be here if I thought that. It's almost a sure bet that we're under electronic surveillance. On top of that I acquired conclusive proof today that the FBI lied big time about Scott Gatlin.'
Kerney spelled out the facts surrounding Randall Stewart's murder and the DNA test results. Bobby Sloan sat wide eyed in his chair, rubbing a hand over his stomach. Molina let out a low uncharacteristic whistle.
Kerney continued.
'In about an hour Charlie Perry will know that we know Randall Stewart's death was a homicide. He'll assume, quite rightly, that the Terrell murder cover-up has been blown. We've been under surveillance since day one. As of now I'm returning the favor to the fullest extent possible.
There are phone taps, video cameras, and microphones planted in Perry's and Applewhite's hotel rooms.'
'You got a court order for that?' Molina asked disbelievingly.
'No.' Kerney leaned forward in his chair, concentrating his attention on Molina.
'You were right to bust my balls about shutting down the investigation, Sal. But I'd been warned off by Perry and I didn't want to telegraph my intentions to keep digging into the case-not with the Feds listening. I thought I could do enough hunting out of season on my own to get a handle on what is really going on, but I can't. I need help.'
Molina thought about his career and his short-timer's calendar. He thought about doing time in the slammer if the feds decided to hand him his balls on a silver platter. There would be no trips in the camper, no fishing excursions to Idaho.
