Roy gives her the evil eye.
She swats at him. “Stop it, Roy. If this man found our house, anyone can. So much for police protection. And if he can tell me about my baby girl, I’ll tell him whatever he wants to know. I’m tired of this. It’s been over a year, and they haven’t even started the trial. If they had, we’d have heard of it. We want this to be over, and I don’t think it ever will be. I want to see my daughter. And my grandbaby? Is that true?”
Tears fall down the woman’s cheeks. If I weren’t a wall, I’d feel some sympathy. But I am a wall, so I don’t.
“He’s a criminal, Sidney,” the man says.
“I’m the only man interested in keeping her alive. The others will kill her. The mobster will kill her as soon as he finds out she’s a witness. Count your blessings that there’s no trial yet, because I promise you, nobody could protect her from that man. And the cops will throw her under the bus as soon as her usefulness runs its course.”
“The man will go to prison for what he’s done,” he says.
I’m starting to think the world isn’t stupid, but just delusionally hopeful. They want to believe in better days and justice. But that’s just not the case. At least not in my experience. “The man might go to prison, but he won’t stay there for long, and even if he does, he has a brother or a cousin or a sister, even, who won’t stop until vengeance is served. A man like that rarely acts alone. Renne and the cops are up against an organization that has existed for over a hundred years. The authorities can’t take them down with one witness. They will bury her. You will never find her body. Or the body of your grandchild. Help me help her.”
Silence. I’m not sure if the parents know anything. It’s possible they’ve been kept in the dark, but I’ve got a feeling that Renne told them what she saw on the yacht. I need the details. Faces. Dates. Anything they know.
I continue trying to persuade them. “I’m fairly skilled with computers. It’s extremely difficult to hack into witness protection systems. Even if I can hack into it, the information I’m looking for will be fragmented and walled off, so I can only grab bits and pieces. None of those bits and pieces will make sense unless I have your story. I need that so I can put it all together.”
“If you know Renne, why don’t you ask her yourself?”
“Because she’ll run.” But if I don’t want her to run, does that mean I want her to stay? Do I? “She’ll run off on her own, andI will have to look for her to protect her. And I can’t do that if I don’t have the entire story. I need to know who her contacts are. There are moles who are willing to sell information. If I can buy your address, they’ll buy it too as soon as the trial starts and they find out there’s a witness. Bad people will come here and shoot you through the peephole. I’d rather shoot them first.” I pause, letting them fill the silence. They’re staring at me. “Guys, please work with me, before I lose interest in doing anything good and walk back to the hell I came from.”
“What do you want to know?” Roy asks.
Chapter 20
Connor
The Richardsons describe the event Renne witnessed the night she went to a yacht party. They confirm the dates and times of the events and the location of the yacht, as well as what happened to it after the incident, namely that the perp sank the yacht.
The witness protection records include Renee’s testimony, but they don’t contain the name of the man she’s hiding from. There is a description, but the cops were smart enough not to log in a name. I wonder if the Richardsons know who he is. Whoever can confirm his identity will die.
From what the couple told me, multiple people gathered on the yacht that night. The Richardsons can’t help me identify which individuals, but they’re locals and would recognize strangers they might have seen in town.
From my computer, I show them the faces, mostly of our enemies, though some friends too. I save two pictures for the end for fear that my speculations are correct.
The Richardsons say that Renne told them the argument started between two men wearing suits. One of them pulled outa gun, and the other followed. Suddenly, there was a shootout in a confined place in the middle of the ocean. No witnesses is the standard policy.
“This is what happens when a big deal goes bad,” I tell them. “Otherwise, the carnage isn’t worth the exposure. Were there drugs on the yacht?”
“Yes, Renne mentioned drugs,” Roy says.
“Do you know if that was the main product exchanged?”
“We think so. What else could it be, you know?” Sidney asks. “These men want to poison the youth.”
“There are many other things to sell and make money from that aren’t drugs. Nukes, for example. Governments sell uranium all the time. But we can’t say that. That would question the righteous decision makers you place on pedestals, evoke self-critique, and invite independent thought. We can’t have that. We might find that we disagree with the majority, and then what? Stand alone? Horror. Don’t stand alone when you’d rather be a part of the herd.”
They stare.
“I digress.” It’s late in the evening, and the couple yawn as they hover over my computer.
Sidney offers me another piece of bread. I accept.
“You mentioned your brother, but you never told us anything about him,” she says.
“Sorry, I got carried away with the important work.” My brother is not important. Protecting their daughter is. Identifying everyone who knows anything about her is critical. We are so close. I can feel the finish line even though I have no idea what it is yet. I can tell they’re hiding something from me.
“Declan Crossbow,” I say. “That’s his name.”
