The Girl Beneath the Sea (Underwater Investigation Unit #1)(53)

“George, scared? How can you tell? Is it a more concerned grunt?”

“Ha. Don’t underestimate. He’s more sensitive than he looks.” She pauses. “And probably the most decent man you’ll ever meet.”

We drive on I-95 southbound for a while. I wrestle with whether to ask her the question that’s been at the back of my mind since I saw her wall of newspaper clippings.

She seems blunt and to the point, qualities I pride in myself. “Can I ask you a question about George?”

“Maybe. What do you want to know?”

“Back at your house, the articles on the wall.”

“He framed those. Not my idea,” she replies.

“Yeah. But why the one about his arrest? That just seems weird.”

Cynthia smiles. “We don’t get too many guests. That article’s from when we met. I covered the story.”

“Okay. But it doesn’t paint him in a flattering light. I get that he was young and maybe didn’t do it. But still.”

“George knew what he was doing,” she replies. “You don’t, apparently.”

“Wait, what? If he knew what he was doing, why was he arrested for taking bribes?”

“When George joined that police department, he quickly found out that everyone, and I mean everyone in that unit, was on the take. Not all of them wanted to, but they went along with it. He was given a pretty easy choice early on: quit or stay on and keep your mouth shut.”

“So he took payoffs?”

“First he drove all the way to the FBI office in Tallahassee because he didn’t know who he could trust. The last thing he needed was another South Florida police officer seeing him talking to the FBI down here and mentioning it to his bosses.

“The FBI put him undercover. Their plan was to use him as a secret informant, then force the others to turn on each other so George never had to testify and expose himself as the one who reported them.

“But he knew it wouldn’t be enough. He told them they had to arrest him too. It was the only way it wouldn’t look suspicious. If they didn’t, he’d have a target on his back for the rest of his life.” She pauses. “It hurt him to see some of those guys go to jail. They were friends. He went to their kids’ birthday parties.”

“So, George sacrificed his reputation . . . his career, for that?”

“Basically. The charges against him and a couple others were dropped because of insufficient evidence. He was able to get hired again after sitting out for a couple years. A private recommendation was made that he be hired, and he went back to doing what he loved best. What he was made for. Of course, not everyone trusted him. Good cops thought he was crooked. Bad cops thought there was something suspicious about him.”

“And he never went public?”

“Nope.” Cynthia smiles. “He’s too goddamn stubborn. But I had him make me a promise. My last article, before I retire, is about a cop who spent his entire life letting people think he was a crook because he wanted to do the right thing.”

Jesus wept. What was it like to walk into the police station every day and know that some of your closest colleagues were calling you a crook behind your back? What’s it like to have every action scrutinized because there’s this huge asterisk by your name?

What’s it like to volunteer for that?

Who does that?

“You okay?” asks Cynthia.

“Yeah,” I reply, wiping my nose. “It’s been an emotional day.”





CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

BARGE

“Why is she looking at me like that?” George asks as we sit in Cynthia’s living room and he redresses my leg wound.

She nods to the article wall. “I told Sloan about how we met.”

“Oh, that story,” he says, rolling his eyes. “I was young, idealistic, and too stupid to let them do it their way. That’s the real story. The FBI was already onto what was going on. Cynthia loves to make it out like I’m some kind of tragic hero.” He gets animated. “Want to know who the real villain is?” He points to her. “That woman right there! I’m twenty-two, in jail, afraid I’m going to get shivved when someone forgets to keep their mouth shut, and in walks this wet-behind-the-ears reporter telling me she wants the real story . . . or else.

“There was no or else. But I didn’t know that. So I swear her to secrecy, being the dumb ass that I am, and tell her.”

“And I didn’t tell,” says Cynthia.

“You’ve told everyone that sat on that couch!”

“But I didn’t write about it,” she fires back.

“Oh brother. So, she keeps coming back to the jail, asking me for details. Well, how long do you think a white cop can have a pretty black woman visit him in lockup before certain people start asking questions?”

“So, I dressed a little more . . . sexy.”

“Like a stripper. And I told everyone she was my girlfriend.”

“It worked.”

“Hell, yes. Everyone assumed I was just another idiot cop who got himself an expensive stripper girlfriend—the whole reason I went on the take. Nobody questioned it after that.”

“You did an excellent job of convincing everyone you were a dumb ass. Lord knows I still believe that after all these years.”