Nickel City Storm Warning (Gideon Rimes Book 3) Gary Ross (most popular novels txt) 📖

and a hate crime to me.” She shrugged. “We hand this off to Homeland Security, in a few years you could shake hands with Tim McVeigh.”

“I didn’t kill nobody,” Carey said. “An’ McVeigh was ‘fore my time. I mighta been in kindergarten.”

“But you know who he was,” Travis said. “You know he washed out of Special Forces just like you washed out of the army. You know, too, he got a needle nap for the Oklahoma City federal building.”

Carey snorted. “If you’re tryin’ to scare me, Whoopi, you’re doing a fuck lousy job. Let the greaser take over. Somethin’ tells me he’s been doin’ this longer ‘n you.”

Travis half-circled him and hiked a hip onto one corner of the table. “Something tells me you know the case against you is strong. You want to know how strong before you put yourself in the hands of a public defender. Otherwise, you’d have asked for a lawyer.”

“You don’t know shit,” he said.

“I know Liberty Storm doesn’t have enough cash on hand to keep a lawyer worth a damn on retainer. I know the FBI is so close to busting Morgan Krieger for hate crimes, they can smell his wrinkly old Ku Klux Klan ass all the way over in Kansas City. I know Wally Ray Tucker is about to go down because he, Owen Robbins, and all the other dickless misfit toys in your sad little group are the same—failures looking for somebody to blame for your piece-of-shit job, piece-of-shit car, and piece-of-shit life. But the sooner you see success is not a white birthright and tell us what your leaders are planning, the better your chances of saving the life you have. For once, man up and do the right thing.”

“Ouch!” Rafael said. “The lady’s tongue is sharper than the one on that snake you’re sporting. But if you think she was tough here, you should see what she said to your buddy.”

Travis nodded. “You know the game. First one to talk gets the best deal.” Sliding off the corner of the table, she moved to the door and opened it. Before she stepped out, she tossed a parting shot over her shoulder: “By the way, Robbins already lawyered up.”

Rafael caught the door before it closed. “You got some shit to think about, my man.” Then he was gone too.

Rafael and Travis repeated their performance for Owen Robbins, a sallow man with black hair, twitchy eyes, and baby fat jowls. Then the four of us went to a conference room.

“We’ll wait a bit before we charge them,” Rafael said. “They don’t trust the system but there’s nobody to get them a good lawyer. Sooner or later one’s gotta roll the dice on a p.d. who might care before unprepared counsel is snatched off a bench at arraignment.”

“Thanks for the Krieger stuff,” Travis said. “I couldn’t tell if it got to them or not.”

“I don’t know if it did,” I said. “But you did, both of you. No matter what Carey says, his eyes say he’s a little scared now. The longer he sits there, the more it’ll grow. Robbins, I’m not so sure. He looked lost when you walked in, lost when you walked out.”

Matt nodded. “It’s finally dawning on Carey that being a savior of the race could get him crucified. Robbins seems like a follower, maybe not too bright. It’s a tossup which one caves first.”

My front right pocket vibrated. “Hope they’ve got something to bargain with when they do,” I said, pulling out my phone and glancing at the text.

“We’ll let you know,” Rafael said, standing. “Thanks.”

On the way to Matt’s car, I told him about the text. “Drea wants to swim before dinner. Pete wonders if we can get the pool closed to the public for half an hour or so.”

“I’m sure we can,” Matt said. “If your team wants to suit up and take a dip, it’d be a good time to do it. Been hot lately.” He pulled out his key fob and pushed the UNLOCK button. “Wish I could pull on some trunks myself, but I think I’ll stand guard so you guys can cool off.” Then, opening his door, he stopped and grinned across the top of the car at me. “You could do me one favor though.”

32

The domed grotto-style pool on the twentieth floor of the South Tower was precisely what we needed. Drea used her platinum card to order hotel store swimsuits for everyone and have them delivered to the suite. We spent late afternoon and the start of the evening splashing about or drifting on inflatable floats beneath a sky with hours of remaining sunlight.

I swam across the widest section a couple of times but spent most of my time watching everyone else—and the door, though I didn’t need to. Sam lazed in the attached Jacuzzi for a while before sitting on the faux rocks and dangling his legs in the three-foot shallow end. Side by side, Pete and Drea swam back and across the center five or six times, she atop the water and he below it, coming up for air only at one end or the other. Afterward, she clung to the ladder on the five-foot deep side and he stood beside her as they talked. Head and dark glasses glistening with water droplets from the nearby waterfall, Yvonne drifted on a gator float and sipped something frothy from plastic stemware. Ramos tugged Cissy’s giant turtle along the irregular edges, eventually flipping her float near Sam. Laughing and sputtering, she came up and shook her wet hair at him before kissing him.

I could almost hear Bobby saying play was necessary for a healthy human mind.

Matt remained in his blazer, standing at the locked glass door as if to underscore the CLOSED: PRIVATE PARTY sign in the corridor. He smiled a lot, not at us but at three swimmers unconnected to Drea—his wife Sharon and their twin sons. Having seen too little of his family lately, he’d