Every Last Fear(90)
She ran her finger across the phone and the scene of the boys chugging beers popped up, Danny in his undershirt surrounded by boys in letterman jackets, the mystery man’s profile—no, Ricky’s profile—on the fringes of the frame.
That’s when Matt saw it, and it nearly leveled him.
He turned and ran out the door.
CHAPTER 60
SARAH KELLER
Keller scrutinized the man in the conference room of the US Attorney’s Office in Lincoln. Next to the man was a lawyer. She had curly hair and an air of confidence.
The lawyer looked at Keller, then at Trey Barnes, the prosecutor heading the case against Neal Flanagan, the former governor’s henchman. “So now you want to hear what he has to say?” the lawyer asked. “What’s changed?”
“I’m not sure anything has. But the FBI asked for a sit-down”—the prosecutor gestured to Keller—“so here we are.”
“He’s got plenty to say. But I need a commitment. Time served.”
The prosecutor guffawed. “Sylvia, there’d be a lynch mob outside my office. Some of the girls were fourteen years old.”
Flanagan chimed in: “I didn’t know—”
“Shut up,” the lawyer said to her client, not looking at him. To the prosecutor, she said, “They’ll understand that you did what you had to do. This’ll be the biggest case of your career.” She looked at Keller. “Both your careers.”
“You keep saying that,” the prosecutor said, “but I need more than the fairy tales you’ve been floating. I’m not going to ruin the reputation of good people without some corroboration.”
“I’m sorry,” Keller said. “I’m late to the party. I have no idea what either of you are talking about. How about we go off the record, a proffer, let me ask a few questions, and then you all can see if there’s a deal to be made?”
Flanagan’s lawyer crossed her arms, then nodded reluctantly. The prosecutor gestured for Keller to ask her questions.
Keller leaned in, looked at Flanagan. “I need to know why you visited Daniel Pine in prison.”
Flanagan smirked.
The indictment said he’d cultivated a troupe of young girls—runaways, wannabe models, lost souls—and held parties for rich and powerful benefactors who funded his lavish lifestyle. He was, in short, a pimp for sycophants and pedophiles. One of his patrons had been the governor of Nebraska, who’d been forced to resign when one of the girls had the foresight to secretly videotape their encounters, then sold the tape and tales of debauchery to a tabloid. The Nebraska FBI field office soon uncovered the full sinister conspiracy. The hub of the wheel in the entire mess was Neal Flanagan.
The vile man finally spoke. “In addition to my, ah, parties, I used to do other work for the governor.”
“What kind of work?”
“You know, special projects. Digging up dirt on political rivals, finding doctors with lax prescribing standards, keeping people quiet who needed to be quiet, stuff like that.”
“You’re a fixer,” Keller said.
The man made a face, but he didn’t deny it.
“So, anyhow, a reporter on Turner’s payroll tipped him off that she heard someone had something on him—something big—but she didn’t know what. And Turner, he’d been in office forever, so he had no idea what it might be.” Flanagan chuckled. “I mean, he’s so dirty, it could’ve been anything. But he had a bad feeling that the jig was up, that he needed to cash out, so he started looking for everything he had of value. And he decided to try to sell some pardons, so he had me make the rounds. Anybody who’d filed a pardon application who might have access to cash. Pine was on the list.”
“You offered to get him a pardon for a payoff?”
Flanagan nodded.
“He’s in prison. Why would you think he’d have any money?”
“He had the support of a lot of wealthy people, book offers, so it was worth a shot.”
“What did he tell you?”
“He said the same thing you did: he ain’t got the money.”
Keller looked at him, waited for him to go on.
“I thought that was it, you know. We had other things in the fire, selling some legislative bills to lobbyists and whatnot, trying to get Turner his retirement fund.”
“But…”
“Then I get a call. My encrypted business line I only give out to select people. You had to be in the know to get it.” The guy sounded almost proud of all this.
Keller bit the inside of her cheek as he went on.
“So I get this call, and the guy—he won’t tell me who he is, but I think I know—says he wants to be connected to someone who does wet work.”
“A contract killer?” Keller asked.
“Yeah. I said I don’t do that stuff. I’m a businessman. But for a fee I might be able to liaise. Friend-of-a-friend kind of thing.”
The man was sleazy, but he made the job sound almost corporate. Keller was literally on the edge of her seat. She wanted to shake the guy to get to the point. But she had a sinking feeling she knew the trajectory of this story. That the person who called Flanagan hired a pro to kill Evan Pine. That Maggie had gotten a photo of the hitman, so he killed them all and staged the scene to look like an accidental gas leak. That he went after Matt to retrieve the photo.