Under the Color of Law (26 page)

"I've got people questioning me about this special training you sent Molina and Sloan to," Otero said.

"Questioning you about what?"

"The training supervisor knows nothing about this academy class. He says it's not on the schedule. The union rep wants to know why other officers weren't offered a chance to sign up for it, and the two detectives forced to pull doubles and work the weekend on short notice aren't happy campers. What's going on, Chief?"

"I've put you in an awkward situation," Kerney said.

"Big time, Chief."

"I won't do that again." Kerney explained what Molina and Sloan were really doing. Otero's look of skepticism faded when Kerney laid out the facts of the faked evidence in the Terrell murder case, the hard evidence of a tie-in between Father Mitchell and Phyllis Terrell, and the listening devices he'd found at his quarters.

"If I get the boot because of this, you're going to have to run the department," he added.

"Not likely. Demora will have me back in technical services within a week. What can I do to help?"

"For now, just keep covering for me," Kerney said, "and make whatever decisions you need to. Act like it's business as usual. I'll call if I need you to do more."

They separated on the first floor. Otero went to his office thinking it might be wise not to get too attached to the three stars on his collar.

In the years since Kerney's graduation from the law-enforcement academy, the facility had been transformed from a spartan, barracks-style operation into a modern campus with comfortable classrooms, up-to-date equipment, and a strong training curriculum.

After learning why Sloan and Molina had dropped their surveillance, Kerney asked for a briefing.

Andy Baca walked in just as things got started.

"Don't let me stop you," he said, sliding into a seat.

Kerney nodded and made notes while Sal Molina talked. Molina sketched the recent events at APT Performa, the airport, the appearance of Timothy Ingram on the scene, and the little they knew about him.

"Ingram may be military," Molina said, passing over the verbatim transcript of the snatches of conversation between Thayer and Ingram that Sloan had picked up outside of APT Performa.

"But he's carried on the books as the security chief for Touch Link Satellite Systems, headquartered at Kirtland. The company has a big government contract to do remote nuclear weapons disarmament monitoring."

"More hush-hush stuff," Kerney said. He wrote down IN GRAM Molina nodded.

"But what it has to do with us is anybody's guess. We put vehicle-tracking devices on the cars at the airport parking lot."

Kerney wrote down

"TOUCH LINK," and "KIRTLAND AFB," in capital letters, and looked up from his notepad.

"What else?"

Bobby Sloan pushed photographs toward Kerney.

"Ingram?" Kerney asked.

Sloan nodded.

"Back up and give me a surveillance chronology," Kerney said.

Molina started with Perry's body-snatcher trip to the Albuquerque HMO, followed by his return to Santa Fe and visit to the federal courthouse.

Kerney scribbled

"HMO" and drew a line to

"What's at the courthouse?" Kerney asked.

"That's unknown for certain, Chief. I checked with an informant who says there's a secure basement room that's off limits to all courthouse personnel. It was used by the Secret Service when the vice president came to town, and a bunch of computer gee ks have been going in and out for the last couple of months."

Kerney wrote down "SECRET ROOM, COMMAND CENTER, LISTENING POST," and put a question mark at the end. He thought about how convenient it would be to have a listening post within a few steps of the resident FBI agent's office.

"Stop there for a minute," he said.

"Is there any way to confirm this information?"

"Not likely, Chief," Molina said.

"The guy's a federal employee, bound by a signed oath to keep the government's secrets."

"Let's move on."

Sloan picked up the ball. He detailed Applewhite's trip to Kirtland and Ingram's first appearance on the scene.

Kerney wrote down IN GRAM RENDEZVOUS, WHY?" and circled it.

"Andy, you're up next."

"After you," Andy replied.

Kerney went over some of the basics: the phone logs that showed Mitchell and Terrell had personal contact with each other, the possibility that Phyllis Terrell may have passed information to Mitchell, and the strong likelihood that Mitchell had been delving into the possible existence of a U. S. intelligence plot to destroy the drug cartels and bring down the Colombian government.

"If Phyllis Terrell was passing on information," Kerney said, "it mostly likely came from her husband."

"That would explain a lot," Molina said.

"But we still don't know what the information was."

"I'm betting it had something to do with the trade mission along with all the interviews Mitchell conducted. He was trying to determine the extent of the operation, learn what was on-line and what was in the pipeline."

"That would be enough to have Mitchell and Terrell whacked," Sloan said.

"But we still don't have anything that ties the ambassador to the murders."

"In a roundabout way we might," Kerney said.

"My meeting with Professor Valencia led me to one of Mitchell's Internet providers. It's part of a conglomerate owned by Trade Source, APT Performa's parent company. Up until the time Terrell was given a new appointment as an ambassador without portfolio, he sat on the Trade Source board of directors, but his ties to the company are still strong, and he has a relationship with Clarence Thayer, the APT Performa CEO."

"You think these corporations are involved in government espionage?"

"Perhaps not directly," Kerney answered.

"But these are hightech companies developing cutting-edge computer tools. They could be supplying part of what's needed to implement the next phase of the intelligence operation."

"I can take Terrell's involvement a step closer than that," Andy said.

"Applewhite called Ambassador Terrell to report on your trip to Red River, and gave him reassurance that everything was under control. She later met with Charlie Perry, learned that you'd cracked the murder cover-up, and made a second call to Terrell, revising her report.

Unfortunately, his phone is encrypted, so we've only got Applewhite's side of the conversations from the remote room bugs."

Andy passed transcript copies around.

"If you read between the lines, I'd say that Kerney and possibly Charlie Perry are next in line for the disappearing magic trick."

"So far, that trick has only been used with Santiago Terjo," Kerney said.

"Wrong," Andy replied, glancing at Molina and Sloan.

"To bring you up to speed, I made contact with Fred Browning, a retired state police captain who now works as security chief for a computer chip manufacturer in Albuquerque. I asked Fred if he could quietly use his contacts to verify Agent Applewhite's identity and credentials. He reported that she was who she appeared to be. Browning may have been fed bad information."

"What makes you say that?" Kerney asked.

"Fred has gone missing, according to his daughter. She called the Albuquerque PD this morning and reported that her father had flown out to California on a quick one-day trip for a job interview. He promised to call her when he got home last night to tell her how it went. He got off the plane in Albuquerque, didn't go home, never called, and hasn't been seen since. His car is still in the airport parking lot.

APD is checking the passenger list and flight crew to see if anyone knows anything. So far, zilch."

Andy poked the paper.

"Fred is the state chapter president of a national professional security society. I borrowed a copy of the chapter membership roster from one of my agents who recently joined. Timothy Ingram is also a member."

"What time did Browning's plane land?" Sloan asked, flipping through his field notes.

Andy read off the time.

"Give Browning five minutes to clear the terminal, a couple more for Ingram to drive to the air base, and that's when I saw him pass by."

"Did you see a passenger?" Kerney asked.

Sloan shook his head.

"Too dark."

"Look at the transcript of the Applewhite-Perry conversation," Andy said.

"Aside from the fact that Applewhite is clearly in command, note Perry's demand to know who sanctioned the hit on Randall Stewart and what was going to happen to Chief Kerney. Applewhite feeds him pure bullshit about both questions."

Andy flipped more pages.

"Jump over to the second Applewhite terrell phone transcript. Terrell asks or says something. Applewhite replies that 'the itinerary is finalized." Another statement from Terrell. Applewhite replies that someone is more resourceful than originally thought, and that a regrettable but not damaging connection has been made. Applewhite listens and then asks, "Take no action' followed by the phrase "And Agent Perry7' " Andy looked hard at his old friend and placed his palm on the papers.

"This is all about you becoming a target, Kevin. Are you sure you want to keep pushing this?"

"For now, it's just talk, Andy," Kerney said, thinking that the last thing he wanted, with a baby on the way, was to put himself at risk.

"Let's keep watching and listening before we overreact."

Kerney smiled reassuringly at Andy, who shook his head in response.

"Moving on," Kerney said.

"Clarence Terrell may be supplying the intelligence community with a new toy. Let me tell you about SWAMI."

Charlie Perry's in-flight reading consisted of a briefing document on Enrique De Leon Drugs were his bread and butter, but De Leon dabbled in the theft of historical artifacts and fine art. Kerney had spoiled two of De Leon heists: a cache of mint-condition nineteenth century military equipment discovered in a secret Apache cave at White Sands Missile Range in southern New Mexico, and millions of dollars in twentieth-century art taken from the New Mexico governor's suite. De Leon attempt to have Kerney whacked had failed, but he'd succeeded in eliminating a number of competitors, and was now jefe numero uno in northern Mexico.

Applewhite and Perry disembarked at the El Paso Airport. A special operative from the El Paso Drug Interdiction Intelligence Center logged their arrival and handed the information off to an army criminal investigator. Perry drove Applewhite across the bridge into Juarez. A U.

S. Customs agent pulled the videotape of the crossing, made a copy, and sent it by courier to an intelligence officer at nearby Fort Bliss.

On a dirty, gaudy, crowded Juarez street a DEA undercover agent wheeled his taxi three cars back behind Perry's car and reported the start of his surveillance to a special army intelligence drug-interdiction unit at Fort Huachuca, Arizona.

With Applewhite at his side Perry rang the doorbell at an opulent house on a tree-lined street close to the Juarez mayor's mansion. The DEA taxi driver broke off contact and ended his surveillance as a CIA deep-cover agent snapped front-step photos of Perry and Applewhite from a slow-moving car passing by. The undeveloped film would be flown to Headquarters, Air Intelligence Agency, at Kelly Air Force Base in Texas.

A stocky, balding Mexican Army general wearing civilian clothes and a wire opened the front door. The feed went to an upstairs room, where a U. S. State Department counterintelligence operative manned a remote receiver. Wordlessly, the general ushered the two agents into a mahogany-paneled library and closed the door.

"Senor De Leon has asked me to cover the preliminaries for him," the general said.

"What preliminaries?" Charlie Perry asked, casting a glance at Applewhite, who merely shrugged.

"No De Leon no meeting." He turned on his heel to leave.

"Let's hear the general out," Applewhite said.

Perry swung around, gave Applewhite a harsh look, and nodded abruptly.

The general continued.

"Senor De Leon wishes me to inform you that you will be paid five hundred thousand dollars for the elimination of Kevin Kerney, half today and half upon completion of your assignment."

"Where's De Leon Perry snapped.

"The task must be done in such a way as not to draw attention to Senor De Leon While he has full confidence in your discretion and abilities, if at the end of your assignment he believes otherwise, he will not release the balance due you."

"Forget it," Perry said.

"This isn't going to work, General," Applewhite said, "unless we include De Leon in on the proceedings."

"If you agree to these terms, the ground rules for meeting with De Leon are as follows: You will be searched by my aide for weapons and listening devices. He will then drive you to a place outside the city.

There you will finalize your agreement with Senor De Leon in person and receive your first payment."

"Why all the hoops?" Perry asked.

"Senor De Leon is a cautious man who wishes to make sure that I am thoroughly embedded in the transaction. Since you are unknown to him personally, and he is accepting you on the basis of my recommendation, my complicity in the operation is required."

"Let's get on with it," Perry said.

Applewhite sat up front with the general's aide. They rolled south past the Juarez Airport, through a couple of ugly shanty towns, and into the desert-a vast, dusty, windblown expanse that made Charlie yearn for the Beltway, traffic congestion, and mobs of people.

On a dirt road they pulled up next to a black Lincoln limo. A driver got out and opened the rear door. The general's aide got out and stood at attention. De Leon emerged from the backseat. Perry half expected the young officer to salute.