I stood up, turning on Camila’s purple night-light. Thinking about how I’d taken my daughter’s mother away from her. Robbed her of a youth with Anna. When Camila understood the breadth of my actions, she would never forgive me. I’d lose her for good, and I’d deserve it.
“Your eyes, Daddy,” Camila said. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” I lied.
I hugged her again, squeezing the air out of Camila’s lungs before letting go. Turning without looking at her. Walking out to meet Cassie.
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
“Director Poulton,” I said, raising my voice as I banged on a hotel room door.
Cassie and I had driven to the Dolce, a hotel twenty minutes south of the office where she had heard Poulton would be after the ceremony.
“Why doesn’t he stay at the Fairfield?” I asked, referring to the hotel a block from the office which visiting agents used for lodging.
“He doesn’t want to consort with the muggles,” Cassie said.
We’d badged the front desk and received the director’s room number. But when we banged on the door, there was no response.
“He might have a six a.m. flight,” I said, wondering if Poulton was asleep already.
Cassie bit her lip. “I saw a rooftop bar from outside,” she said. “Maybe he’s schmoozing with Kemp from ATF.”
We moved to the elevator. Took it up to a bar on the top floor. Across the highway, the giant guitar of the Hard Rock Cafe danced with color.
Music played loudly, and I scanned the rooftop. A few chairshung from swings. and in between them were pillars filled with bougainvillea.
At a marble table that faced toward the street sat Craig Poulton and Barry Kemp, both still in suits but without the ties.
“Oh shit, it’s the dream team,” Kemp said as we approached. “Nowit’s a party.”
He pulled out a brown wooden chair for Cassie. But Poulton did not look as happy to have us join him.
“What is it?” he said.
Cassie sat down beside Kemp at the four-top, and I grabbed the seat beside Poulton.
“A development,” I said. “Maybe it’s more of a matter for ATF than FBI.”
Kemp sat up straighter, and Poulton kept his eyes on me.
“In the mobile home we burned down, we found some guns. Before we left, Agent Harris read me a serial number off the handgun slide.”
“Okay?”
“It didn’t match with the numbers Gardner memorized for that particular gunmaker,” Cassie said.
“What gunmaker?” Kemp asked.
“Venera,” I said. “I assumed when we got to D.C., we’d find serial number mismatches. Or blanks on weapons. But we didn’t.”
“Maybe you made a mistake?” Poulton said.
“There’s no way to tell that now,” I said, “because of what went missing at the crime scene in Hambis.”
Kemp squinted. “The guns went missing from that trailer?”
“We imagined the dirty cops took them,” Cassie said.
