The 6:20 Man(94)
“How much asset value are we talking about?”
“Shit, maybe forty trillion.”
Devine gaped. “How far back do some of the transactions go?”
“I find slew of them back over fifteen years.”
“Okay, that fits with other things I’ve found out.”
“What is going on, Travis?”
“Money laundering, probably. For example, your buddy Putin and his friends have dirty money to get rid of. Money they steal from the Russian people. Right?”
“Shit, yes. Putin is so rich he makes Bezos and Musk look poor. But he say he is not rich, and nobody disagrees with him because they get shot or poisoned or put in prison.”
“So, the dirty money comes over here and it’s used to buy all sorts of assets. Then instead of dirty money, you own a house or a building or a company or a chunk of the Dow Jones, whatever. That’s why they call it money laundering.”
Valentine nodded. “I know this! Clean money, dude. That is name of game.”
“But it’s not just about owning assets. With radio and TV and newspapers and online streaming platforms and social media sites, and owning whole towns and city blocks, they can manipulate and control everything. From cradle to grave.”
“Dude, that is not good. That is Russia.”
“Can you send me all that stuff? I’ve got someone I want to show it to.”
Valentine looked at him curiously as he did this. “You are not what you want us to think?”
“Are you?”
“Just a hacker, dude.”
“A good one.”
“Take you long enough to say, asshole.” But he tacked on a grin to this. Valentine opened the fridge, grabbed a beer, and walked off, while Devine stared down at his hands, thinking. Something Valentine had said had stuck in his head and had made him think of Cowl’s own words from that old interview with the Journal: A partnership can be simply an idea or a perspective.
He grabbed his laptop from his room and plugged in the name Anne Comely, running it through a popular site on the internet that he had used before, but then only for fun.
There was nothing fun about the exercise this time.
It didn’t take long for the program to kick out what Devine knew was the exact right answer.
An anagram for “Anne Comely” was . . . CLEAN MONEY.
CHAPTER
63
DEVINE WOULD NOT BE TAKING the 6:20 in that morning. He knew that as soon as he saw Detectives Shoemaker and Ekman waiting for him at the Mount Kisco train station. Shoemaker tapped out a smoke and both men came forward.
“Pretty early for you guys to be all the way out here.”
“Come on, we’ll drive you to work this morning, Devine, courtesy of NYPD,” said Ekman.
His tone was friendlier, which bothered Devine greatly. Was it just a fa?ade before the hammer came down?
They started off, Devine in the rear seat. He was waiting for the question and it wasn’t long in coming. He just needed to pull off the surprised part.
“Fred and Ellen Ewes are dead.” Before Devine could reply in a shocked manner, Ekman turned and looked at him. “We know you already know.”
Devine nearly swallowed his tongue on that one.
“And we know you got an alibi. We talked to your ‘friend’ Helen Speers. You were with her at the town house during the time in question.”
“You talked to Helen? When?”
“That’s none of your concern,” pointed out Shoemaker. “I thought you’d be thrilled she’d provided an alibi.”
“So is that when they were killed?” he asked.
Ekman nodded. “Between eleven and one that night, yeah. Stabs to the heart. Died pretty quickly. But whoever it was just kept right on stabbing them. It was damn vicious. I’ve been doing this job a long time. It was one of the worst I’ve seen.”
Shoemaker said, “You have friends in high places. You should have told us.”
“I would if I could have.”
“So three people dead who were connected to Sara Ewes, who was also murdered. And what was her sin?”
“She was connected to Brad Cowl, who has disappeared.”
“So, he killed her?”
“He was probably in the building that night. He got a call that I believe was from Stamos on the night she was killed. He headed out in time to murder her. Her phone records should show that.”
“And why would he do that?”
“My friends in high places didn’t enlighten you?”
“The only message we got was that you were a good guy on a government mission and to have your back.”
Ekman added, “So, what’s so special about Cowl?”
“Some things have come to light. But I can’t share them with you. Not that I don’t want to, but fruit-of-a-tainted-tree sort of thing. If I infect the cops with it, the case is dead and the man walks.”
Ekman nodded. “Okay, that makes sense. So, Cowl is a bad guy. Is his money dirty, is that what this is about?”
“It’s not his money. It belongs to other people. People from outside this country. And that’s really all I can say. If the folks above me want to say more, that’s up to them.”