The Two Gentlemen of Altona (Playing the Fool, #1) Page 4

  She slid a plastic folder over her desk. Mac picked it up.

  Ah. A death threat. It had been weeks since he’d gotten one of those. It was comprised of jagged letters cut from the newspaper, which gave it a nice retro feel. MCGUINNESS IS A DEAD MAN. Mac got a warm feeling knowing he’d made a difference in some shit-bag’s life. The kind of obsessive dedication to him was almost touching.

  “No prints, I suppose?”

  Val shook her head. “There never are. So here’s the part where I ask you about your personal security.”

  “God, Val, every time. Look, I’ll be careful. I won’t take risks. You’ve seen my place—”

  She cleared her throat.

  Um, yeah. The less said about that, the better. “Anyway, I’ve got good security.” He slid the plastic folder back toward her. “Is Jimmy Rasnick reading many newspapers in prison?”

  Val smirked. “That asshole.”

  They’d worked on Rasnick’s case together, back before Val had gotten her promotion to special agent in charge. A promotion half the office thought he was still pissed about, even though he’d never been pissed in the first place. They’d both worked hard on getting that asshole behind bars. Equally. And they couldn’t both get the promotion. The only thing that left a bad taste in his mouth was the speculation around the place that Val got the job because she was a woman, and a minority, and the higher-ups were just ticking the boxes to fill in some sort of quota. That was bullshit. Val had deserved that promotion.

  Still, he missed working cases as her partner. They’d made a good team.

  “It’s probably just a little love note from one of Rasnick’s associates,” Mac said.

  “So why aren’t I getting them? I didn’t make the same impression?”

  “The impression his head left in that wall when I tackled him?” He felt something very close to joy at the memory. “Nah, you didn’t make the same impression at all.” He had done a bit more than tackle Rasnick. Lucky no one had cared enough about Rasnick’s well-being to so much as slap Mac on the wrist, but God, it had felt good to plant a fist in that fucker’s gut.

  Val ran her fingertips over the plastic. “Well, be careful, okay?”

  “Always.” Mac found himself staring at her coffee mug and wondering what she’d do if he just leaned over and helped himself. Shit, he was having crazy thoughts. More addictive than heroin, he recalled, then tensed when he realized where he remembered it from. Henry Page. Con man, chatterbox, and cat thief. Or cat liberator. Mac had tried so hard not to listen. “So, Page wants protection.”

  “I can’t blame him.”

  “Yeah, but he’s not getting it. At least not the sort he thinks. I’m gonna keep him in the cells. Just so you know.”

  “You can’t keep a witness in a cell. That’s a lawsuit.”

  “If I let him out, he’s gonna run. Even from a safe house.”

  “You know this how?”

  “Trust me. And if he runs, he’ll either get himself killed, or he’ll get so far away we’ll never find him again. And there goes our only witness against Maxfield.”

  Val chewed her lip for a moment. “I can’t believe I’m even going to say this.”

  Mac leaned forward.

  “So, find something to hold him on. He impersonated a cop, right? Sounds like something a terrorist might do.”

  “Wait . . .”

  Val lowered her voice. “Hello, Patriot Act.”

  “You have a devious mind.”

  “Jealous?”

  “Fuck, yes.”

  “But Mac? This is just a one-time thing. You get his statement, and you convince him he’s going to testify. I’m not packing this guy off to Guantanamo or somewhere until the trial. Three days, okay? No more. You put him in a safe house after that.”

  Three days. In three days he had to get enough leverage to convince Henry Page not to run. Or, failing that, move into his safe house with him and chain the slippery son of a bitch to a radiator.

  Shit. The thought was doing strange things below his belt. Best not to dwell on it.

  Mac cleared his throat. “Three days. It’s a deal.”

  “Don’t fuck this up, Mac.”

  Mac was a laughingstock after Carmel. He fucking knew it, even if nobody was actually stupid enough to laugh about it to his face. McGuinness, the guy who’d brought down Jimmy Rasnick, had let a witness walk straight past him. Well, not straight past him. He’d let a witness impersonate a cop, then let him walk straight past him, and then ogled his ass. Not that Mac had mentioned the ass part to anyone. Hell no.

  He was taking that to his grave.

  Jeff was nice. A little awkward, with a perpetually furrowed brow and the kind of broad, crooked smile you saw on dads in car commercials. An earnest, all-American guy. But Henry could tell there was more to Jeff than how much he loved to get in his all-new Jeep sedan and take his family on off-road picnics. Jeff had gears working behind those baby blues. And Henry appreciated that.

  “That the new model?” Henry nodded at Jeff’s phone.

  “Uh, yeah.” Jeff didn’t look up from the screen. “Still working some bugs out.”

  “I’m lousy with technology, or I’d offer to help. Can barely turn on a computer.”

  “Ah. Computers are kind of my thing. I’m actually trying to . . .” Jeff paused, tapping the screen. “Don’t tell anyone this, but I’m sort of overriding some of the programming with my own code. I like adding a little Jeff Cavill flair.”

  Henry sat on the edge of the desk and watched him. “You must be, like, insanely good at your job. You’d have to be, right? Because all the big threats to the world today are technological.”

  Jeff looked up. “Uh . . .”

  “Nuclear weapons, sure,” Henry went on. “Still a big problem. But the future is cyber warfare. Terrorists hacking into our computer systems, stopping commerce, damaging infrastructure, stealing people’s information . . . Is that the kind of stuff you work against?”

  Jeff gave him that dopey smile again. “Well, not exactly. I mean, theoretically I could. But mostly I analyze data we get through various networks. Kind of boring.”

  “Jeff, Jeff.” Henry clapped him on the shoulder. “Don’t sell yourself short. We need people like you to balance out the idiots like me who use the same password for all of our online accounts.”

  Jeff chuckled. “I guess it is a pretty important job.”

  “But not as important as translating the reams of Arabic code we get here in Indianapolis.” A tall woman with curly hair stopped by Jeff’s desk. “Jeff, can we talk? After you’ve shown the witness to his quarters?”

  “Sure.”

  She continued on.

  Henry watched her go. “Who’s that?”

  “That’s Lina. She’s our linguist. Except, not a ton of translating opportunities come up at this office. She’s got other skills, though.”

  “Guitar?”

  “Huh?”

  “Her fingertips are roughed up. Not callused yet, though. So maybe she’s taken it up recently?” Henry could never resist showing off. Stacy always said it would be his downfall. His best bet with the FBI was probably to play at being a dumb guy who’d made a dumb mistake. Yet here he was Sherlock-ing it up with Special Agent Jeff Cavill.

  Jeff gave him a funny look. “Bass. She started a couple of weeks ago.” He glanced at his phone, then back at Henry. “So, I guess I’m supposed to take you to the cells. Mac’s orders.”

  “No problem.” He jerked his head toward Jeff’s desk phone. “Oh, hey—sorry. May I? I just need to give my mother a call. Let her know I’m okay.”

  Jeff’s forehead creased. “Uh . . .”

  Henry grinned. “Even prisoners get one phone call, right?”

  “Yeah. Yeah, just make it quick, okay?”

  The chain between his cuffs scraped against the receiver as Henry picked it up, He dialed from memory. There was an answer on the third ring.

  “Amazin’ Glazin’ Cakes and
More,” a woman’s voice said.

  “Hey, Mom, it’s me. I’m in Indianapolis. I can’t really talk long but, uh, I’m not gonna make your party. Sorry. I’m stuck somewhere.” He paused briefly for the barrage of curses, then talked over it. “Fiftieth birthday. I . . . I’m really sorry.” He winced at a particularly inventive string of profanities. “I’ll make it up to you. I love you.”

  “That sucks,” Jeff said as Henry hung up the phone.

  “Nah, she knows I’m kind of flaky. I’ll make it up to her. She and her friends are going out for drinks and a show at the Belle Theater.” He lowered his voice. “Thanks for that, by the way. I’m pretty sure McGuinness wouldn’t have let me do that. He seems kind of . . . scary.”

  “He’s okay . . . Um, I mean he doesn’t usually lose his shit like he did with you.”

  “Yeah.” Henry sighed, as though he hadn’t orchestrated McGuinness’s entire little breakdown just because it was funny.

  “Jeff!” Lina called again from her cubicle. “Seriously, you’re gonna love this.”

  “I’ll be there in a minute,” Jeff leaned back in his chair. “It’s probably just a picture of a kitten that’s friends with a pig or something.”

  “Serious stuff you’re dealing with here in Indianapolis, huh?” Henry said. “But I don’t want to get you in trouble or anything, so maybe you’d better put me in that cell, yeah?”

  Jeff nodded. “Okay, let’s go.”

  Henry had made himself at home by the time Mac went to collect him for his statement. He was lying on the floor of the cell with his feet on the narrow bench, his bag under his head, and a book on his chest. A couple of Skittles wrappers on the floor.

  Mac opened the door. “Brushing up on your poetry?”

  “Shakespeare.” Henry closed the book. “What’s your favorite sonnet? No, wait, you’re more of a tragedy guy, am I right? A Macbeth fan? Shortest play, biggest body count.” He clutched his hand to his chest. “‘All my pretty ones? Did you say all? Oh hell-kite! All? What, all my pretty chickens, and their dam at one fell swoop?’”

  “What the hell are you talking about chickens for?”

  “Well, he says chickens, but he means children. It’s very tragic. Which is the point, I guess. Personally, I’ve always preferred Julius Caesar.” He put the book aside and stretched out on the floor. “Plus, Brando as Mark Antony? He could inter my bones anytime.”

  “Seriously, do you ever shut up?”

  “Rarely. Mrs. Fleischman, my second-grade teacher, once said that I could talk under wet concrete.”

  “Yeah, well, I’m pretty sure that Dean Maxfield has some contacts in the construction business. I’ll bet they could help you test that theory.” Mac mostly said it to see that smile wiped right off Henry’s face.

  It was back in a heartbeat. “Harsh, Agent McGuinness. Very harsh.”

  “I need to take your statement.”

  “I was hoping you were here to take my food order.”

  “You just ate an entire box of donuts.”

  “Not an entire box.”

  Mac rolled his eyes. “Come on. Get up.”

  “I just got comfortable.”

  “Up!”

  “Sir, yes, sir.” Henry got lazily to his feet. Mac held out a pair of cuffs. “Aw, c’mon. Where am I gonna go?”

  “I don’t wanna find out. Hands.”

  Henry held his arms out. Mac put the cuffs on, trying not to notice the way Henry’s sleeves rode up, exposing lean, strong forearms that tapered to almost delicate-looking wrists. Tried not to hear Henry’s soft, even breathing in the small cell. Tried not to feel a jolt when his skin came into contact with Henry’s.

  Maybe he needed to get himself a pair of glasses and go out and get lucky. He snapped the second cuff into place and pocketed the key.

  “Let’s go.”

  Henry followed, and was surprisingly silent on the elevator ride up to the sixth floor. He kept playing with the cuffs, examining them, which Mac didn’t like at all. He couldn’t think of a decent threat to make since Henry wasn’t technically doing anything wrong, so he finally said, “You’re safer in here than you are out there.”

  Henry looked up at him. Smiled a funny sort of smile. “I know.” He dropped his gaze. “I want to help you. If it means I get protection, I’m definitely . . . I’m not gonna run, Mac.”

  A fine little performance, right down to the use of Mac’s nickname, spoken so softly that he supposed it would make him a lousy son of a bitch if he got angry. He didn’t care. He was a lousy son of a bitch. He just didn’t have the energy to fight right now.

  “Mmm.”

  Henry looked up again. “I just need to know if I’m gonna be safe after the trial.”

  That actually sounded sincere. And the little shit had good reason to worry. “You help us, we’ll help you.”

  The elevator stopped, and they got off. “That’s some party line bullshit.” Henry halted in the middle of the lobby. “It doesn’t tell me anything.”

  Mac stopped and turned. Henry was pale and tense, and while he couldn’t guarantee it wasn’t an act, he felt a twinge of something like sympathy. This was a kid wearing big-boy clothes. He didn’t stand a chance against Maxfield’s men. “I don’t know if promises mean much to you, since I doubt you’ve ever kept one. But you have my word. If you testify against Maxfield, I will make sure you get a complete makeover from WITSEC. New identity, new clothes, new digs. Wouldn’t be a bad excuse to make a clean start, either. Stop conning little old ladies. Okay?” He motioned Henry forward.

  Henry stayed put. Probably would’ve laid his ears back if he could have. “I can do all that. New ID. New digs. It’s what I would’ve done if you hadn’t gotten ahold of me. Tell me what you can offer me that’s better than what I could do for myself.”

  Mac gave Penny Vandenberg a nod as she passed with a coffee in each hand. Real coffee, not decaf. Was everyone at the office trying to torture him? He turned back to Henry. “What do you want me to say? What do you want?”

  Henry stared at him for a long moment, and he wished he knew what Henry was seeing. What he was looking for. Suddenly he gave Mac another weak smile. “My brains to stay in my head.” He jingled the cuffs. “I know you don’t like me. That doesn’t mean you can use me and then kick me to the curb to wait for some mob asshole to shoot me.”

  “That’s not what I’m gonna do.” He kept eye contact with Henry. Willed himself not to sound impatient.

  “Immunity,” Henry said finally. “A clean slate.”

  “Long as you keep it clean.”

  Henry nodded.

  “I mean it, Henry.”

  “I can keep it clean.”

  Mac sincerely doubted that. “All right. You ready?”

  Another nod. Henry’s gaze had moved to the pathetic potted plant. He followed Mac quietly down the aisle between cubicles. Stopped again when they were almost to the interview room. “Agent McGuinness?” he said quietly.

  Mac clenched his fists once, then released. “Yeah?” This time when he turned around, Henry’s face was pink. “What’s the matter?”

  “I, uh . . . Is there a bathroom?”

  “There was a toilet in your cell.”

  “Seriously? I thought that was a contemporary art installation. Something to brighten up the place.”

  “You knew exactly what it was, and you should have used it while you were down there.”

  Henry tilted his head. “You’re right. I did know what it was. But it didn’t look like it had been cleaned in a while. I’d really appreciate using an actual toilet. Being your witness and all.”

  Mac set his jaw. Someone ought to tell Turner Construction they could use this kid’s balls to knock down the condemned Belle Theater.

  “I find I think more clearly when I’m on the toilet,” Henry said. “Does that ever happen to you? There’s some scientific name for it, when your brain comes up with ideas while it’s distracted by something menial. But I can’t think wh
at the term is. Anyway, if I got to use an actual toilet, I wonder if I’d remember more stuff about Maxfield.”

  Mac silently counted to five. “All right. I’ll accompany you.”

  “That’s sweet of you. Gotta warn you, though, I had curry last night. You might not want to be in there.”

  “Nice try. But I deal with a lot of shit in this job. I’m not scared of yours.”

  Whatever Henry was doing in that stall, it was enough to make Mac wish he’d sent Henry in alone and risked letting him escape through the air vents.

  Mac stood by the sinks with his hand over his nose and tried to concentrate on his memories of the smell of hyacinths or freshly baked bread or that guy he’d slept with once last year who used some insanely expensive shampoo Mac had liked.

  Nothing helped.

  “Almost done?” He had to force the words out. He’d never understood talking to someone who was on the toilet. His sister had entire shouted conversations with her husband through the bathroom door, and it secretly horrified him every time he visited them. The bathroom was not a place for talking.

  “Yeah.” Henry sounded a little strained. “Sorry, Mac.”

  “Agent McGuinness,” Mac corrected. Agent McGuinness who’s been a federal fucking agent for the last eight years. Agent McGuinness who brought down Jimmy fucking Rasnick. Agent McGuinness who’s standing here smelling your shit because you wouldn’t use the fucking toilet in your cell.

  He was definitely going to have to take a firmer hand with Henry. Give the kid an inch, and he took several miles.

  “Hey, Agent McGuinness?”

  Mac gripped the edge of the sink. “Yeah?”

  “There’s no toilet paper.”

  Oh, for fuck’s sake. “Nice try.”

  “No, seriously. Can you get me some from the other stall?”

  He strode across the bathroom and into the stall beside Henry’s. No toilet paper there either. Fuck. This kind of bullshit never happened in Washington, he was sure of it. In Washington, the TP probably contained gold fibers. The Indianapolis office had gotten an update a couple of years ago, and while the new building was improvement, it still lacked for janitorial staff, decent desk chairs, and a plant in the lobby that didn’t look like it would require Rick Moranis’s blood in order to thrive.