Twisted Prey (Lucas Davenport #28)(95)
“Lots of politicians have that app,” she said.
The phone wasn’t in Claxson’s name; it was registered to a Gerald D. Wilson.
The second phone, an off-brand burner, didn’t have that app. On the day after Claxson admitted flying to Omaha, he made two calls, and received two calls, all on the same anonymous T-Mobile burner phone.
With the phone numbers in hand, Chase jacked up the FBI phone experts. A half hour after they’d opened the phones, she told Lucas that one of the calls was to Clear Lake, Iowa, two more were from and to St. Paul, and the final one went through a tower west of Des Moines.
“That’s when they hit Weather and Last,” Lucas said. “Clear Lake is on the Iowa border, right off I-35, on the fastest route to the Twin Cities from Omaha. The last one was on I-80, on the way back to Omaha. That ties him directly to a murder.”
“But doesn’t prove it, unfortunately,” Chase said.
“Oakes made four lunch boxes for the flight out,” Bob said. “That’s Claxson, Ritter, McCoy, and Moore.”
“Unless one of them was Suzie or Carol Ruiz,” Lucas said. He turned to Chase. “We need to ask McCoy who Suzie is. Or Carol Ruiz. And if they’re the same person.”
“We don’t have a deal yet, but he’s been giving up that kind of information—filling in the employee list.”
“She might not be an employee,” Rae said.
“We’ll ask,” Chase said. “I’ll make a call.”
“Let me in to talk with him,” Lucas said.
* * *
—
MCCOY WAS DELIVERED to an interview room in the Hoover Building from an Arlington lockup at the insistence of both Chase and Bunch, McCoy’s lawyer, a happy confluence of requirements. He was escorted by two marshals. One of them recognized Rae from a training program, and asked, “You guys are running an investigation? How’d that happen?”
She nodded at Lucas, and said, “Political pull. It’s corrupt, but we fly Business Class.”
“Are you shittin’ me?”
* * *
—
BUNCH AND MCCOY were locked up to talk privately for a few minutes, and, when they were done, Lucas, Chase, and a Department of Justice prosecutor named Steve Lapham went in, along with the two marshals. Lapham told Bunch, “We have a number of questions for both you and Mr. McCoy regarding arrangements for testimony. But before that, Marshal Davenport has a question for Mr. McCoy that has no potential legal liability for Mr. McCoy, as far as we know.”
Bunch said, “Ask. We’ll decide whether he should answer.”
Lucas asked McCoy, “Do you know, or have you seen, a woman known either as Suzie or Carol Ruiz?” He described her, and McCoy said, “I’ve seen a woman who George called Carol who looks like that, but I don’t think that’s her real name. I think it’s fake, and somebody told me she’s a NOC, a chick with a non-official cover working for the CIA or somebody else, I don’t know who.”
Bob asked, “You think she’d know where to get a silenced submachine gun?”
McCoy shook his head. “I don’t know, I might be able to, but I’d have to dig around for a while, and I’m not sure I could. I was more of a meat-and-potatoes, M16 kinda guy.”
Rae asked, “Would this chick have been hanging out with Jim Ritter?”
McCoy thought for a minute, said, “Yes, she did. I think they were—what do you call it?—an item? For a long time. Jim said she was a girl he could trust. I saw them once over at the Last Minute Grill, by the airport. I didn’t interrupt. I figured Jim was flying out, they were saying good-bye, but I was wrong. She was the one flying out . . . and they might have been worried, the way they were holding on to each other.”
Lucas said, “Huh.”
“I’ll tell you one other thing,” McCoy began, but Bunch put a hand on his arm, and asked, “You’re sure?”
“Shouldn’t be a problem,” McCoy said. “Maybe get a few more brownie points. I speak some Arabic. She speaks perfect Arabic. The one time I saw her at Heracles, she was talking to this Syrian guy like they were old friends, and, I’m telling you, I thought she was Syrian.”
Lucas had nothing more to ask, but he said to McCoy, “We’ve tracked the phone that Claxson used to call you boys on your way into the Twin Cities to hit my wife and murder Last. If I were you, I would sign anything that Mr. Lapham gives you, because, if you don’t, you’re looking at thirty years in Stillwater Penitentiary after the feds get done with you.”
McCoy gave him a sullen look, shuffled his feet, and said, “You ain’t from the Chamber of Commerce, huh?”
* * *
—
THEY WERE GETTING toward dinnertime, and Lucas, Bob, and Rae went back to the hotel, agreed to work out for a while and go to dinner together. When he was back in his room, Lucas called the number that Tom Ritter had given him.
“Marshal Davenport . . . I’ve only got a minute. We’re filling out papers to get Jim buried at Arlington. Lots of paperwork. It takes forever.”
“I’m calling about Jim’s girlfriend . . . Suzie. I’m now told that she might also go under the name of Carol Ruiz, and she might work for the CIA or some other agency and speaks perfect Arabic. Does that still sound like her?”