The 24th Letter ((Mystery/Thriller)) (32 page)

“He’s the best.  I just want you to hang in there, Charlie.  Don’t give up hope.”

“Hope’s all I got left, O’Brien.”

“You’ve got more than that, Charlie, believe me, okay?”

“I wish I was as sure as you sound.”  Charlie laughed nervously and said, “This death watch thing has its upside.  I got a little bigger cell.  They moved me out of my nine-by-six cage into a twelve-by-nine box.  Had to leave my pictures behind.  They wouldn’t let me bring the picture of Mama and Lexie from the other cell to this.  I got a cot and a blanket…and...that’s about it…”  His voice broke, emotions rising in his throat.

O’Brien said, “You’ll be out of there soon, Charlie.  Then you can go home to see your mother.”

There was a long pause and Charlie said, “They asked me what I wanted for my last meal.  I feel like my life has turned into a movie with no good ending.  I got about fourteen hours left.  One of the guards told me the first drug they give to knock you out, don’t always completely knock you out.  Then, when they give the other drugs, you just lie there.  You can’t move.  Can’t talk.  But you can feel, hear, and think.  You feel the pain as your organs begin to shut down…one by one…especially your lungs.  I don’t want to go out like that.  For God sakes, this is no way for an innocent man to leave this world…help me, O’Brien…”   

EIGHTY-SIX

It was dusk when O’Brien pulled his jeep into the oyster shell parking lot at Ponce Marina.  A fog was building off the estuary, rising low over the boats.  Through the old mercury vapor street lamps, the fog became flickering orbs of diffused light, like Halloween pumpkins glowing above the docks.

Max heard O’Brien coming before she saw him.  She jumped up on an ice chest in the cockpit of Nick Coronus’ boat and barked twice.  “Hot dog, who you talkin’ to?” came Nick’s voice as he stepped from the salon.

 O’Brien squatted at the stern and rubbed Max’s head.  He could see a television on inside Nick’s boat.  He said, “Thanks for keeping an eye on Max.”

“I’m going to take her out fishing with me.  When one gets off the hook, I say go get ‘em hot dog.  She jump in the water and bring the fish back to me.”

“Max might turn into the world’s smallest Labrador retriever, or shark bait.”

“Wanna beer?  You eat yet?”

“Yes and no.  I’d like a beer and I haven’t eaten.  But right now, I don’t have time for either.  I need to sit on
Jupiter
in a quiet place and think.  There’s something I’m failing to see about the events surrounding this—”

“Sean, it’s all over the TV.  Fox News was just interviewing that Miami lawyer.”

“Where’s Dave?”

“Said he was going to the store for spaghetti fixings and wine.”

O’Brien lifted Max up and set her down on the dock.  She darted after a cricket.  “Thanks, Nick. Come on, Max.”

Max trotted down the dock behind O’Brien.  He picked her up to lift her over the transom.  “No place like home, right Max?”

She looked up at him, her eyes bright, tail wagging.  “We have to get back to our house on the river.  The old dock needs a few new boards.  Plus, I’ve been missing you—maybe missing our routine, too.”

She barked once, almost nodding her head.  O’Brien opened the salon door, Max following him inside.  He poured some dry dog food in Max’s bowl, opened the windows, set up his laptop, and spread the Alexandria Cole case files out on his small table.  He looked at arrest and arraignment dates, hearing dates and times.  Trial dates.  Postponements and reschedules.

His cell rang.  It was Ron Hamilton.  “Sean, I spoke with Todd Jefferies, DEA.  He told me that Mike Chambers played a big role in the Russo investigation and bust.  But agent Christian Manerou worked the case hard, and was damn good at it.”

“I wonder if Manerou had any speculation as to what happened to the heroin.”

“Don’t know, but I do know you Sean...and when you get this tone, it’s usually because you’re getting close.”

“As in dropping the hammer.”  

“What?”

“Something Christian Manerou said.  How difficult would it be for you to remember a dialog from one of your interrogations more than a decade ago?”

“Depends, the bull shit lines and lies all run together after a while.”

“I know.”

“What are you tinkering with, Sean?  You got something on  Manerou?”

 “Talk with you later.  I have a little homework now.”  O’Brien disconnected and closed his burning eyes for a moment.  Something wasn’t clicking.  What was it?  He remembered what Judy had said that Alexandria told her shortly before she was killed:
“You can put your trust into the wrong people…even those people paid to protect you.”

O’Brien leaned back in his chair, his eyes locked on the case files, his thoughts focused on Christian Manerou’s face.

“You son of a bitch…”

EIGHTY-SEVEN

 O’Brien jerked his cell off the table in front of him and hit Lauren Mile’s number.  “Why didn’t you tell me you had a break-in at your place?”

“What?”

“Ron Hamilton told me.  When was the break-in?”

“Friday or Friday night.”

“It was after I’d given you the second page from the notebook that Sam Spelling used to write his letter to Father Callahan.”

“Yes.  That night I left work and joined some of my girlfriends at a watering hole.  As I recall, I invited you to join us.”

“Lauren, has Christian Manerou’s lifestyle changed much since the Russo investigation and bust?”

“What do you mean?  And please be careful with your answer.”

“I know it’s been a decade, everybody changes, but did you see anything tangible with Christian, not things out of character per se, but maybe a slight lifestyle change…maybe a few vacations to places that a special agent’s salary might not stretch, but yet things or places that wouldn’t raise an eyebrow?”

“Not at all.  And I don’t care for this line of conversation—no, this questioning.  What’s this about?  Christian is one of the finest, most ethical agents in the bureau.”

“Did you take the Spelling paper, the file, home with you?”

“Yes.”

“Did Christian know it?”

“I mentioned it to him in passing that afternoon.”

“Lauren, did he ask you about it, or did you bring it up?”

“Let me think a second…he mentioned it, why?”

“Nothing yet.”

“Sean!  Please, for Christ-sakes, come on!  Drop it, okay?  I trust Christian with my life!  You’re way off base.”

“You’re right!  I was way off base because Christian helped point me there.  He pointed me in the direction of Russo, and he did it very well.  Maybe because of the deadline in the race to save Charlie Williams, I didn’t see it.  Maybe, like you, I had no reason not to trust an FBI agent.”

“No!” 

“I’ll call you back.”  O’Brien hung up and began looking through Alexandria‘s file.  He started to glance at his watch to see the number of hours left for Charlie Williams, instead he poured through the files in front of him.  Where did he see or hear something that was incongruous with the timelines of Alexandria Cole’s murder and Charlie William’s sentencing?  He closed his eyes and let the slate go black in his mind.

Think.

Max sat at his feet and looked up at him.

When O’Brien had originally questioned Russo and Sergio Conti, it was a time when Russo had already been arraigned on a drug charge.  And his trial was not even on the radar.

“As we were about to drop the hammer on a big bust, it looks in retrospect, that he may have killed the girl the same night.”

The words played back in O’Brien’s mind.  He could see Christian Manerou standing in Lauren Miles cubicle, quoting Russo’s alibi:  “
Ate them from his penthouse balcony and tossed the shells down to the beach below them.  Called it ‘raining crabs.’”

O’Brien leafed through the case files, found the spot and read
:  Subject, Jonathan Russo stated he had dinner on the terrace of subject Sergio Conti’s condo and said they picked up a jug of chardonnay, a few pounds of stone crabs from the marina, ate them from his penthouse balcony, and tossed the shells down to the beach below them.  Called it ‘raining crabs.

O’Brien looked at the dates.  Alexandria Cole’s murder was Friday, June 17th, 1999.  He went online, typing fast.  In a few seconds the arrest records of Jonathan Russo were on the screen.  O’Brien scanned the information and stopped at the dates of Russo’s arrest for possession of contraband—cocaine—more than two kilos with the intent to distribute in the United States of America.   The date of the arrest:  May 3, 1999.

Why was the FBI doing a wiretap after Russo was arrested and booked?     

“As we were about to drop the hammer on a big bust, it looks in retrospect, that he may have killed the girl the same night.”

O’Brien leaned back and his chair and whispered, “You didn’t tie the wiretap alibi to Alexandria Cole’s murder because you never heard it...you
read
it.  You weren’t about to drop the hammer.  You didn’t hear Russo’s statement in a wiretap.  You read it
my
report.  You bastard!”

EIGHTY-EIGHT

O’Brien called Lauren Miles.  He said, “Lauren—”

“Sean,” she was almost breathless.  “I hope this isn’t about Christian.  He’s gone out of his way to help me on things time and time again.  I trust that man.  You will, too.  I called you because I just heard from Simon Thomas.  He had some luck with Spelling’s letter.  He managed to make out another line before it faded into oblivion
. 
Spelling wrote:
 
‘
Later I hid the knife in St. Augustine on Tranquility Trail...at my mother’s…’
  At that point, Sean, the print was no longer detectible.  When Simon called, I conferenced Christian in on the call.”

“What!  Why?”

“Because he’d offered to help you!  I’ll prove to you how far off base you are.  Also, in view of your short time window, it was generous of him to offer and for Mike Chambers to authorize.  As a matter of fact, Christian’s in Lakeland doing a deposition, and said he’d head over to St. Augustine for you.”

“He’s here because he just killed a woman!  If Sam Spelling’s mother is there, he’ll kill her to get the knife.”

“Sean!  Have you been drinking?”

“Christian didn’t hear Russo’s alibi with Sergio Conti in a wiretap.  He read it in my case report.”

“What?”

“Listen to me!  Since the cases, the murder of Alexandria and the drug bust of Russo overlapped, Christian, or the DEA, pulled information from my files, probably to add to whatever they had on Russo.  But the bust and arrest of Russo happened more than a month before Alexandria’s murder.   Christian was investigating Russo close enough to know of Russo’s associates and employees…and Alexandria.  She was one of the most beautiful women in the world.  He knew she was heavy into coke, threatened to arrest her and ruin her career unless she had sex with him.”

“Sean, you’re accusing a respected FBI special agent of having an affair with a subject he was investigating.  That’s a very serious.”

“So is murder.  Two kilos of heroin, drugs found in the coke bust, were stolen.”

“What’s that have to do with Christian?”

“He took it, or he took some of it.  Alexandria was addicted to heroin and I think it was because Christian forced the poison into her.  Did it enough and she was addicted.”

“I can’t believe you seriously think Christian hooked a supermodel on heroin.”

“Hooked her, sexually took advantage of her, and killed her.”

“Sean!  Enough!  I can’t allow you to ruin this man’s career on speculation.”

“Manerou was near Ocala silencing the last living witness that could tie him to Alexandria’s murder, the wife of the D.O.C. guard.  The same guard that Manerou killed the day he murdered Spelling and Father Callahan.” 

“No!  I can’t believe this.”

“It’s true.  If he hasn’t tossed it, look for a ski mask in his car.  Go to his house.  See if he owns an all black suit, something like a priest might wear.  If it hasn’t been

cleaned, see if there’s any blood, hair, or fibers that will tie him to the three vics he killed in one night last week.  Also, pull some hair out of a brush, get his damn toothbrush.  I don’t care what you use just get—”

“Sean—”

“Was Manerou in the service?  The military?”

“Army, I believe.  Why?”

“Check his records.  See if he went to sniper school.”

“Why?”

“Only somebody with an expert rating could have shot Spelling like he did.”

“Sean, you need to—” 

“The name—Manerou—what’s that?”

“What do you mean?”

“Nationally!”

“Probably French or Greek.  Why?”

“Where was Manerou born?”

“I don’t know.”

“Are you at a computer?”

“Yes, why?”

“Go in the FBI’s bio on its agents.  Wherever it is you people keep that and see where he was born.”  O’Brien paced inside his boat.  Max watched him.

There was an audible exhalation and she said, “Give me a minute.”

O’Brien could hear her fingernails hitting the keys, then a long moment of silence.  Lauren’s voice dropped to above a whisper.  “He was born in Greece.  On the island of Patmos…that’s the same place you mentioned, Sean…oh my God…”     

EIGHTY-NINE

O’Brien called Detective Dan Grant.  “Dan, FBI got a better read on part of the letter that Sam Spelling left behind.  Spelling may have left the knife that killed Alexandria Cole at his mother’s house.  Tranquility Trail, St. Augustine.”

“I’ll see if I can get a search warrant.”

“You don’t have time!”

“Judge Franklin will sign it.  His house isn’t far from—”