Velocity (Karen Vail #3)(65)

“He left, without telling me. He disappeared.”

“More than that I don’t know.”

Vail shook her head slowly. Almost to herself, she said, “That would certainly explain the delay in getting Robby’s cell phone logs.”

“Don’t expect those records anytime soon,” Gifford said. “Obviously, there’ll be calls to and from sensitive targets. DEA’s got that data locked down tight.”

Vail brought a hand to her mouth. “Oh my God. Oh my God—” She rose from the chair and nearly knocked it backward. She grabbed both temples.

“What’s wrong?” DeSantos asked.

She turned to Gifford and pointed. “Get the name of the contact, of the guy Robby and Sebastian were meeting.”

Gifford chuckled. “Were you not listening? I can’t get that information. It’s classified.”

“Bullshit. Call Yardley, tell him you need to know.”

“He won’t tell me, Karen,” Gifford said. He shrugged. “He won’t.”

“I’ll get the name,” DeSantos said. “You have a secure line I can use?”

Gifford reached over and pulled a phone from a drawer. He handed the receiver to DeSantos. “Who are you calling?”

“The director. He’ll have a chat with the DEA administrator, and he’ll get us the name.”

Gifford held up a hand. “Above my rank. Good luck with that.”

DeSantos punched in the numbers. “Keep your fingers crossed.”





44


Vail watched while DeSantos began his quest to track down FBI director Douglas Knox. As he waited for Knox to take his call, Vail’s BlackBerry buzzed. She thought about whether to answer, noticed it was Dixon, and grabbed it as she moved out of Gifford’s office. Dixon . . . pretty early in California. Must be important.

“Roxx,” Vail said, “you’re not going to believe—”

“Are you near a computer?”

“I can be. What’s going on?”

“Don’t laugh,” Dixon said. “But I want you to go to YouTube.”

“No, wait. I’ve got some news for you.”

“Listen to me. Open it up and type in ‘Lugo confession.’”

Vail continued down the hall and slipped into her office. Sat at her desk and tapped on her keyboard. Opened YouTube. “Okay, typing in ‘Lugo confession.’”

“Scroll down. See Ray’s face?”

“Scrolling,” Vail said. “Wait—did you say Ray’s face? Lugo confession?”

“Just find the video.”

Vail passed the thumbnail that displayed Lugo’s image, then fingered her mouse wheel and clicked on the video. “Got it.”

“Turn up your speakers.”

Vail pressed Pause, then said, “Wait, what am I watching? Where’d this come from?”

“WITSEC approval came through for Merilynn Lugo. Surprised the shit out of me—out of everyone. Just guessing here, but maybe they figured that since Mayfield and Cannon are still alive, there was still a reasonable threat against her. When I met the U.S. Marshals Service at her place, she handed me a piece of paper with the name of this video written on it. Now just watch it.”

As she moved her mouse toward the link, she noticed that it said, in fine print, 4 days ago. “This was uploaded four days ago?”

“Yes, right before we caught Mayfield. Press Play.”

Vail did as instructed. As on the DVD, Ray Lugo’s face appeared onscreen, in a dimly lit room. The image jerked a bit, the result of a low-quality webcam. “If you’re watching this, it means I’m dead. Hopefully, I was successful in taking out the man who’s made my life a living hell. I don’t know his name, but he’s someone who kidnapped my wife and son five months ago. I guess Merilynn already gave you the DVD I left with her.

“If she didn’t, she and my son were returned unharmed, but with a warning that he’d kill them unless I did things to help him out. At first it was just getting some information for him. Then it became addresses, home addresses, and other information about people that I needed to use the Police Department and county database to look up. And then he wanted me to get him a prox card, which would give him access to the Sheriff’s Department.”

Vail closed her eyes. Shit, Ray, you should’ve told us all this. We could’ve done something. And it would’ve helped us.

“I didn’t realize what he was doing with the card, or all the info I was getting for him, until he asked for stuff on someone I knew, a friend of mine.” He bit his bottom lip and looked away from the camera. Seconds later, he turned back and tears were streaming over his lower lids onto his cheeks. “Our first vic, Victoria Cameron. Honest, I didn’t know what he wanted with her. I tried to ask him about it, but he told me to shut up and do as I was told. A couple days later, Vicky was dead. And I knew we had a problem.

“I tried. For months, I tried finding him. Son of a bitch was good. Too good. I got nowhere, and when I poked around, he knew. He knew.” Lugo tightened his jaw, then took a breath and blew it out.

“I should’ve said something. I’m sorry, I should’ve leveled with all of you. But there was nothing we could’ve done. I didn’t know who the guy was. I had nothing on him that would’ve helped catch him. But . . . ” He wiped at his eyes, looked off to his right, then back to the camera: “As we kept finding new victims, I felt like I should’ve been able to do something. I felt responsible. But I was just trying to protect my family. I had no idea what he was doing . . . ”