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It’s on my lips to ask what developments, but I’m not sure Rick would want me to bring up the investigation in front of his mother.

“If you need to go, you should go. I’ll be fine. I’d rather this case be resolved sooner than later. Monday is fast approaching,” I remind him of the looming deadline I was given.

“Sí, go!” his mother joins in. “I’ll keep Dana company.”

There’s a real battle playing out behind Rick’s blue eyes as he looks at me across the table. I lean forward and take his hand in mine.

“You can call Battaglia and give them a heads-up.”

The reminder I have security seems to sway him because ten minutes later he is out the door, the breakfast sandwich his mother whipped up in his hand.

Chapter 23

Rick

* * *

I join Tessa and Mancuso, who are waiting for my report, in Savvy’s office.

The last thing I was expecting this morning was a message from Carlos Garza. I’d left him with my card yesterday after talking to him, inviting him to let me know if he thought of anything. He seemed reluctant to take it and I half expected him to toss it the moment we left, but apparently he held on long enough to send me this message at the crack of dawn.

We were seen talking outside diner yesterday.

Need to talk.

10:30 in basement Cornerstone Methodist church. Be discreet.

* * *

I took his “be discreet” to mean come in under the radar, which was a challenge since I’m like a fish out of water in any kind of church. I conferred with Tessa and Savvy when I got to the office, and they agreed I should go by myself. We also bounced around some theories on who might’ve seen us talk to Carlos, and how that might’ve prompted him to send us that message, but it was all just speculation.

“So?” Savvy prompts me.

“Apparently, Merrick is back,” I open with the news that caught me off guard.

“Bullshit,” Mancuso responds. “We put an alert on his passport and we’ve been monitoring. It would’ve been flagged at any point of entry.”

“Unless he didn’t cross back into the country under his own name,” Tessa suggests.

“I guess,” the agent concedes before turning back to me. “So, has this Garza seen him?”

I nod, recounting how Carlos was approached by Don Merrick behind the diner when he was closing up.

“Garza admitted he hadn’t been straightforward with us before; that several months ago, the mayor had first approached him.”

I relay how at first, Merrick presented himself to Garza as a Good Samaritan. Eight years ago, Carlos married Reyna, a former journalist from Nicaragua who came to the US to seek asylum. The mayor suggested he might be able to assist expediting the agonizingly lengthy process of finalizing her citizenship. From there he quickly moved on to the topic of returning favors, and brought up a couple of important upcoming votes he could use Carlos’s support on.

“Last night he escalated to straight-up threats, warning Garza not to talk to law enforcement again. Otherwise, he might find immigration enforcement knocking on his door and hauling off his wife to be shipped back to Nicaragua.”

“Unreal. He’s a fucking bastard,” Tessa voices what all of us are thinking.

“No shit,” Savvy adds. “I never liked the man, never understood how he’d managed to get elected for another term, but had no idea he was this much of a nasty piece of work.”

“Anyway,” I continue, “Carlos went home, packed up his wife, and drove all night to get her somewhere safe before he sent me the message this morning. He’s offering to help us take Merrick down.”

“And how does he propose to do that?” Mancuso inquires.

“By talking to some of the other commissioners. He says with a board of five, the majority vote is three, so he wouldn’t be the only one approached to vote a certain way. He thinks he’ll be able to find out who the other two are.”