She hadn’t always had the best of luck w
ith the feds, and wasn’t that crazy about them. But in this case the agent named David Burch said, “I’ll get on to the Vegas office and have them pick up the tape and get the manager to ID these guys. If we’ve got good head shots, we’ll run it through a facial ID program and see what pops up. Most of the time, nothing does, but if this is as high end and well organized as you’re making it sound, then maybe something will. These people sound like they’ve been doing it for a while.”
“How long before I hear?”
“Tomorrow morning, probably. We’ll push it hard. I hate these guys. Hate ’em,” Burch said.
“Amen.” Her anger hardened at the thought of the kids trapped in whatever the hell scam it was. “So, David. Can I call you David?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“And you can call me Regan or Pescoli. The ma’am thing makes me feel old. The thing is, I need to talk to you off the record.”
“We’re off.”
No hesitation.
Deciding to trust him, she launched into her story and told him about Virgil and Johnson, and about Phillip Weeks. “I have a feeling that the Weeks kid may be running from whatever was going down. The sex, or porn, movies, pictures, whatever.”
“Nothing good.”
“You got that right. I’m going to try to corner him tonight and see what he knows. He’s also running from his old man, who could be in on it. I think the dad uses his son as a punching bag.”
“Needs to be put in jail.”
Agreed. “While I’m handling the kid, Flowers and Johnson are going up to snoop around the Drake place where they saw the RV. Anything in particular they should look for?”
“If they were making movies or taking photos, we could use pictures of the inside of the studio, or whatever they’re using as a studio. We got a million miles of digitized film. What we’d be looking for is identifiable marks or structures inside the studio, like an identifiable window with a particular kind of latch. Anything like that. We can run a new image against the digitized film and it’ll kick out any exact matches. If we get a match, we’ll be all over them.”
“I’ll tell Flowers. I don’t know exactly how reliable these two are.”
“I started running Flowers as soon as you mentioned his name,” Burch said. “The DEA has been trying to recruit him for years. He’s been involved in some heavy stuff in Minnesota. There’s a note here that says he doesn’t much care for guns.”
“That’s the guy,” she said.
“Looks to me like you can lean on him,” Burch said.
“Good to know,” Regan said.
So Mr. Hang Ten was the real deal.
“Something else. He’s a part-time writer, mostly for outdoors magazines, but he’s had stories in both the New York Times magazine and Vanity Fair. Play your cards right—”
“I’ll keep it in mind,” she said dryly.
She rotated the kinks from her neck and decided she had to head to Butte, which was about a hundred and fifty miles from Grizzly Falls. That meant over two hours by car. She didn’t look forward to the drive, but had to go for it. The case had taken a serious enough turn that even the feds were scrambling. She stopped by Alvarez’s office. Before her maternity leave she and Alvarez had been partners, but they hadn’t been reassigned together.
Not yet, anyway.
Alvarez, always thin and lithe, was doing some yoga pose over her desk, her jet black hair rolled into a tight bun and gleaming under the ever-humming fluorescent lights. The position looked painful and ridiculous, but Alvarez swore by it. Alvarez had always been Regan’s diametric opposite. Into health foods, green tea, worked out at a gym and, of course, yoga.
“I’m stopping at home to see the kids and Santana for a sec, then heading for Butte. On the Daniel Cain case, the fisherman found shot in the river near the WJ Guest Ranch.”
Alvarez nodded.
“It’s gone from homicide to a much wider investigation. Got the feds involved. Zoller can bring you up to speed. Aside from what I’m doing we’ll need to look into who would benefit from Cain’s death. Insurance, wife involved in an affair, him involved in an affair, business problems, known enemies. The working theory was that he was killed by mistake, but I want to cover all my bases.”
Alvarez rolled back her desk chair, rotated her neck, then her shoulders. “I’ll work with Zoller.”