Page 68 of Witness Security Breach

The girl was skittish, but careful. Garcia made their weekly meets as fast as possible to keep her at ease and lessen her exposure.

Whatever McCaffrey wanted would have to wait. She thumbed the reject icon.

The slim brunette pushed through the door of the Tulane University School of Social Work building. They rotated their meeting spot to a place she regularly continued to sell drugs to maintain her cover. The girl came up to the passenger’s side of the car, and Garcia rolled down the automatic window.

Colette dug in her voluminous boho tote bag that had a colorful patchwork design and handed over the small six-by-six-inch box through the window. Inside was the special saltshaker that had been designed to match the others at Avido’s and had a hidden recording device. The surveillance tool was voice-activated, with up to fifty hours of storage and battery life, and it didn’t transmit a signal. Colette kept the saltshaker in the soundproof box in her purse, transporting it to and from the restaurant every day. It was only activated when she served Bill Walsh his lunch.

Garcia gave Colette the replacement device that she’d use for the next seven days.

The exchange was quick and fluid, and to anyone watching, it would look like a drug deal.

“You good?” Garcia asked.

Colette nodded. “Peachy.”

Any other response meant something was wrong, like she was under duress or being followed or had been asked to hand over a fake recording. Anything seriously bad.

Colette walked off and Garcia drove in the opposite direction.

Instead of hitting the Windfall tonight, she would go home and start listening to the seven to fourteen hours of audio recording. Walsh was careful. Even in his office he tended to talk around things. But every week she hoped for another nugget while forgoing sleep.

Her phone rang again. This time she answered. “Garcia here.”

“It’s Jensen,” said one of the guys on her surveillance team. “There’s a lot of activity with Walsh. We just lost him. Something is up.”

Garcia swore into the phone. “We need to find him. Do you have eyes on the nephew?”

“No. We lost him, too.”

Going home and getting to slip off her shoes was out of the question. She was in for a late night, trying to track down Walsh and his sidekick Tommy Guillory.

She slapped the steering wheel. “I’m on my way.”

“Also, call the boss. He’s looking for you. It’s urgent.”

Garcia disconnected and dialed Special Agent McCaffrey. “Sorry I couldn’t take your call a few minutes ago, sir. What’s up?”

“I hope you’re sitting down,” her boss said.

“As a matter of fact, I am.”

“Good. Because you’re never going to believe this.”

“Well, don’t keep me in suspense.”

“For starters, you’re getting your extra agents tomorrow.”

On a Sunday?

“I’ve got three driving down in the morning from some of the resident field offices in Mississippi,” McCaffrey added. “Pascagoula, Hattiesburg and Gulfport.”

They were all within a two-hour drive, but that would’ve taken approval from the director up in Washington, DC, and coordination with the special agent in charge in Mississippi. “How in the world did you swing that?”

“You’re going to need heavy backup for a meet tomorrow in Jackson Square at noon.”

Chapter Sixteen

The bread truck came to a jerky stop. Big Bill caught hold of one of the steel racks lining the inside to steady himself.