Gina Cresse - Devonie Lace 01 - A Deadly Change of Course--Plan B (14 page)

Chapter Seventeen

Florida
—
1996

I
t was past ten o’clock when I woke up in
a
strange place and had to think for a moment where I was.  I made my way to the bathroom and took a nice long shower to try to wake myself up.  I
’d
missed the hotel’s complimentary continental breakfast, so I went to the hotel restaurant and ordered fresh fruit and a bowl of cereal.  When I returned to m
y room, I logged back onto the I
nternet to continue my search.  I was notified I had E-mail.  I opened the inbox and read the message.  It simply read: 
Press this button to notify and meet me in my chat room.
I followed the instructions and waited.  Several minutes passed,
then
some text came across the screen.

“
Who are you?
” it read.

I entered, “
Who are you?
”

“
I asked first
,”
came
the reply.

“
Devonie
.
  I’m nobody, really.  Just an innocent bystander who got caught up in a real nightmare
,” I typed.

“
Do you have any connection with the CIA, FBI, DEA or FAA?
” the mysterious correspondent asked.

“
No.  I’m just a self-employed treasure hunter who stumbled upon something very dangerous.  What’s your connection with Flight 9602?
”

“
I was at the crash site.  I uncovered evidence that would substantiate your theory about the electronic device
,” was the reply.

I read the words on the screen but they somehow seemed unreal. 

Again, I typed, “
Who are you?
”

“
That isn’t important.  Like yourself, my safety has been jeopardized, and I need to stay anonymous
—
for my own health.  Do you still have the device you found?
”

“
No.  The FBI has it
,” I answered.

“
I thought you said you had no connection with the FBI.
”

“
I don’t.  I just found the device, along with some other stuff, and reported it to them.  Shortly after, the boat I live on was blown up, and I’ve been on the run ever since
.”

“I
see.  Blowing things up seems to be their M.O.
,”
came
the reply.

“
Who are
they?” I asked.

“
I’m pretty sure it’s the CIA.  Of course, they would be acting in the interest of some higher authority.  My guess is it goes all the way to the White House.  Are you familiar with the names David Powers and Michael Norris?
”

“
The two DEA agents killed in the plane crash.  How do they fit in?
”

“
Over the past year, I’ve done some investigating of my own.  Powers and Norris were working to shut down a major drug cartel in Mexico.  My guess is they were stepping on some pretty big toes
.”

“
And whoever belonged to those toes had big feet
, too
.  Big enough to squash Powers and Norris like a couple of ants
,” I responded.

“
Exactly.
  The problem is, unless someone comes up with some hard evidence and gets it into the right hands, you and I are stuck hiding out
.”

“
What kind of evidence would it take?
” I asked.

“
That device you found would have been a good start.  The actual device that brought the plane down is long gone. I was corresponding with someone inside the FAA who was on my side, but he’s been killed
.”

“
Frank Eastwood?
” I asked, remembering the name of the FAA inspector who originally reported finding the device.

“
No,
” was the reply.

“
I have copies of E-mails
that prove a contract existed to assassinate the two agents
. 
I’m not sure how they’d stand up as evidence.”

“
By themselves, they probably wouldn’t carry much weight
.”

“
How much do you know about the two agents who were killed?  Maybe they left some evidence behind that could be useful
,” I typed.

“
Any evidence they had was destroyed in the crash.  Everything else has mysteriously disappeared.  I’ve used all my resources to check on the cartel investigation and have come up
with nothing.  As far as the DEA is concerned, there was never any operation in existence
.”

“
That’s crazy.  There has to be someone out there who knew what they were working on
.”

“
Probably, but have you come up with a foolproof way to know who you can trust?  And what about getting someone killed because they tried to help.  Can you live with that?
”

“
No.  One of my friends has already been
killed,
and another
one hurt
, but I have an idea.  Can I reach you any time at this connection?
”

“
Pretty
much any time.
  Why?  What are you up to?
”

“
It’s a long shot.  I’ll fill you in if it turns up anything
,” I replied.

“
Be careful
.”

“
I will
,” I typed, then left the chat room.

Before I closed down the
Internet
connection, I reread one of the articles about the crash of Flight 9602.  David Powers
was
survived by his wife and daughter, who lived in San Diego.  I used all the people search engines I could find to see if I could turn up an address on Amanda Powers, but nothing came up.  I would have been surprised to find a DEA agent’s family listed in the phone book.  I dialed information and requested the number of someone I knew could help
—
if only he would.

“
Spencer?”

“Yeah.
  Who’s this?” he asked.  He sounded like he thought he was talking to a ghost.

“
It’s me,
Devonie
.”

There was a long pause.  “Spencer?  Are you there?” I repeated.

“You’re supposed to be dead.  What the heck’s going on, Dev?  I went and made a fool of myself at your funeral.  I think I even cried, and now you’re not even really dead?  What a friend you turned out to be.”

“Take it easy, Spencer.  I can explain everything,” I said.  “Did you really cry?”

“Darn right I cried. 
Crocodile tears and horse snot.
 
The whole nine yards.
  You better have a good explanation or I swear I’ll put your name on every telemarketing call list in the country.  You’ll never be able to eat dinner in peace again.”

“Not the telemarketing torture. 
Anything but that.
  Please have mercy on me, Spencer,” I begged, playfully.

“Start talking.  But remember, I’ve got my finger on the big TM button.”

“Okay, here’s the short version.  I’ve discovered some evidence implicating the CIA, FBI, DEA, FAA, and any other government acronym you can think of, in a commercial plane crash that killed two DEA agents last year.  I reported it to the FBI, and you saw what they did to my boat.  I had to let everyone think I was dead, to save myself.  Right now, I need your help to get the address of Amanda Powers.  She’s the wife of one of the DEA agents who was killed.  You should know that if anyone discovers you’re helping me, you could be in a lot of danger.  So, will you do it?”

Spencer made a nasally, “Wrong answer” buzzer sound into the phone and said, “Sorry, Dev.  One more
chance, then
I’m
putting your name in the big telemarketing database in the sky, never to be deleted.”

“I swear it’s true.  I won’t blame you if you don’t want to help me.  It’s really dangerous, but you’re the only person I know who can get into the records of people who don’t want to be found.”

Spencer hesitated.  “You’re serious?”

“Dead serious.
  Do you think you can do it without anyone finding out?”

“Piece of cake.”

“Are you sure?  I don’t want you to get caught or killed or anything,” I said, worried about his probation.

“No need to worry about me.  I can be in and out and no one will ever know I was there.  I’ll have it for you in a couple hours.  Where can I call you?” he asked.

“You can E-mail it to me at [email protected].  Please be careful.”

“I will, Dev.  You just watch yourself. 
Here me?”

“I will.  Thanks for your help, Spencer.”

“No problem.  Bye Dev,” he said,
then
hung up.

I turned my attention back to the computer sitting on the desk.  Unconsciously, I danced the mouse pointer around the screen while I thought about what I should do next.  That
VideoService
icon just kept glaring at me.  What was it?  I had time to kill so I clicked on the icon and launched the application.  I wasn’t quite prepared for what I stumbled upon. 
VideoService
didn’t have anything at all to do with movies as I had earlier suspected. 
It was a Swiss online service
—designed to manage bank accounts.  Once again, Mr.
Kephart
had
saved his password, so I proceeded to connect to the bank account and browsed the available screens.  It didn’t take long to figure out how to navigate around the many options.  I found a menu option for balance information and clicked it.  A bright blue screen painted before my eyes and figures began scrolling down the page.  At the bottom, a final total
—
with
yesterday’s
date.  I blinked and rubbed my eyes to make sure I was reading it clearly.  Could that figure actually be thirty-eight million dollars?

Chapter Eighteen

I
checked the E-mail box two hours later. 
Nothing.
  I checked again, every hour on the hour then began to worry that Spencer was having trouble.  It was late.  I picked up the phone and dialed his number.  No answer.  Then I was
really
worried.  Had I gotten Spencer into the same trouble I
’d
inflicted on Jason and Joe?  Finally, at almost midnight, the message came through.  Along with Amanda Powers’ address, he wrote a short note:

Sorry it took so long to get this to you.   Someone has really gone to a lot of trouble to make sure no one looks up your friend Amanda.  I decided to use a client machine at the office to ensure nothing could be traced to my house.  You be careful,
Devonie
.  I don’t want to go through another one of your funerals
—
again.

Spencer came through for me.  I checked out of the hotel early the next morning and caught the next flight to
San Diego.  The taxi dropped me at the address Spencer found.  It was a cute little New England style house located right on the water.  I rang the bell and waited.  A little girl in blonde pigtails opened the door.

“Hi.  Is your mommy home?” I asked.

From another room, I heard the voice of a woman, “Who is it, Emily?”

“I don’t know, Mommy.  It’s a lady,” the little girl called back.

Immediately, a woman came to the door to see who it was.  She had a baby on one hip and a bottle in her other hand.

“Can I help you?” she asked.

“Are you Amanda Powers?”

“Yes,” she answered, with a little hesitation.

“My name is
Devonie
Lace.  I wonder if I can talk to you about your late
husband?
”

“David?”

“Yes.  It’s very important.  I won’t take up too much of your time.”

“Well, I’m not sure….”  Amanda shifted the baby to her other hip, and checked her watch.

“Please, Amanda.  It could be a matter of life or death,” I pleaded.

She reconsidered.  “You said your name is
Devonie
?”

“Yes. 
Devonie
Lace.”

“Come in.  Just let me see if I can get my mother-in-law to take the baby for a while so we can talk,” she said as she opened the door wider to let me in.

Amanda looked down at Emily. 
“Honey.
  Go see if Grandma can come in from the garden to help me with Eric for a little while.  Okay?”

“Okay, Mommy,” she replied and skipped off toward the back yard.

“Please.  Sit down,” Amanda said as she gestured me toward a sofa in the living room.

An older woman entered the room.  “Emily said you need help with Eric?”

“Hi, Mom.
 
Devonie
, this is my mother-in-law, Martha.  This is
Devonie
Lace, Mom.  I wonder if you can take Eric and put him down for his nap so I can talk with
her?
”

“Certainly.
  It’s nice to meet you,
Devonie
,” the woman responded as she took the baby from Amanda and carried him into another room.

“What is it you want to talk about?” she asked.

“Amanda, did you know anything about what your husband was working on when he died?”

“Well,” she thought for a moment.  “As I recall, he was working on a case with the Mexican government.  They were investigating one of the many drug suppliers down there.”

“Did he tell you anything about what he found while he was there?” I asked.

“No.  He never talked much about his work.  Everything was always very hush-hush.  Why do you want to know?”

“I think the plane crash that killed your husband was no accident.”

She stared at me.  “What?”

“I think your husband and his partner stumbled onto something very sensitive and they were killed to shut them up.”

“Killed by whom? 
The Mexican drug producers?”

“No.  I know they would seem like the logical suspects, but I’m afraid that someone else caused that plane to crash,” I answered.

“Who?”

“I think it’s possible that someone within our own government was responsible for destroying that plane, to keep your husband and his partner quiet.”

A look of skepticism spread across her face.  “That’s preposterous.  Where would you ever get an idea like that?”

“I know it sounds incredible, but it’s true.  Are you sure your husband never mentioned anything?  Or maybe he kept some records, or notes about things he was working on?”

Amanda nervously twirled the silver locket she wore around her neck
with her quivering fingers.  L
iving with a DEA agent,
I was sure
she would have been warned about giving information to strangers.  Her mother-in-law returned from putting the baby down and took a seat in the chair next to the sofa.

“What are you girls finding to talk about?” she asked.

“
Devonie
thinks someone in our government purposely caused the plane crash that killed David,” Amanda said as she reached for the phone.  “I think I should call Victor and see what he knows about this.”

“No.  Please, Amanda.  Hear me out before you make that call,” I pleaded.

The cheery smile left Martha’s face.  She placed her hand gently over Amanda’s and pushed the phone back into its cradle.  “Wait a minute, Amanda.  Why don’t you let her finish.  It couldn’t hurt to hear her out.  Could it?”

Amanda removed her hand from the phone and started fingering the locket again.  “I suppose it couldn’t hurt to hear what she has to say.”

“Thank you,” I said as I unpacked the laptop from its case and booted the little machine up. 

I explained to the two women how I came to acquire the machine and briefly described the events of the past few days.  Then I o
pened the first E-mail document
—the one that contained the pictures of David Powers and Michael Norris and the direction to Robert
Kephart
to eliminate them.  Amanda read the document silently,
then
placed a hand over her mouth. 

“There’s more,” I said as I proceeded to open the second document.

“No.  I don’t want to see any more.  I know that David didn’t keep an
y notes or files from his work—
not here at home, anyway.  I’m not sure how I can help you.”

Martha finished reading the second document.  She studied the
laptop
.  “Wait a minute, Amanda.  Remember the CD he mailed here before he left Mexico?”

Amanda gave her a blank stare.  “I don’t remember.  That was such a horrible time.  Wait…I sort of remember something like that, but I don’t recall what I did with it.”

“You didn’t do anything with it.  I put it away in David’s desk for you.  Have you moved any of his things?”

“No.  Everything is still where he left it in his office.”

Martha hurriedly left then returned with an envelope with a CD in it.  “
Here.
  See what this has on it,” she said as she handed me the envelope.  I inserted the CD.  Along with dozens of Word documents, I found one Read Me file in the directory and opened it.  It was a message to Victor from David:

Victor:  Pay dirt.  Here are the documents I told you about.  We were able to get copies of all of them.  Some pretty big players are going to go down after this stuff hits the fan.  Who would ever think one of the biggest problems in America was being financed by the biggest banks in the U.S.  What do you think this is going to do to our economy?  I predict another bailout.  What do think?

Then I opened document after document.  I could hardly believe my eyes. 
Billions of dollars in loans to a company whose major product lines included cocaine, heroin, marijuana, and methamphetamine.

“Wow.  This is the evidence we need to blow this thing out of the water.  Amanda, please let me take this and give it to someone who can do something with it.”

“Okay.  But what if someone asks about it?”

“Don’t tell anyone.  Especially don’t tell anyone I spoke with you.  For your own safety, just forget I was ever here and that this CD ever existed.”

I packed up the laptop and started for the door,
then
I realized I didn’t have any transportation.  “Can I use your phone to call a taxi?” I asked.  I glanced out the backyard window and noticed one of the neighbors on his dock, polishing the chrome on his speed boat. 

“Sure.  It’s right there, on the table,” she said.

“Maybe I won’t need to call after all.  Is that your neighbor out there, working on his boat?” I asked, pointing in the direction of the dock.

Amanda peered out the window to see what had caught my attention.  “Oh, yes.  That’s Aaron.”

“I’ll be right back if I need to use the phone,” I said as I walked out the door and headed down to the dock.

“Hi,” I said. 

He flashed a surprising smile that sent tingles up from my toes to my fingertips.  Locks of sandy blonde hair frolicked dangerously close to his piercing blue eyes until he shook them out of the way.  The muscles in his bare, tanned arms flexed as he put the final touches on a beautifully detailed speedboat. 

The sleek machine looked as though it were travelling seventy miles per hour, just sitting there next to the dock. 

“Are you Aaron?”

“That would be me.  And you are?”

“I’m
Devonie
.  That’s a pretty fancy boat you’ve got there. 
Looks like she’s pretty fast.”

“Amazingly fast,” he boasted as he continued to polish the chrome.

“You don’t suppose I could hire you to run me up to the Lace Marina, in Del Mar?” I asked.

“Well,” he scratched his head and thought for a moment. 
“Won’t be free.
  You sure you can afford it?”

I pulled a hundred-dollar bill from my pocket and handed it to him.  “Will this be enough?” I asked.

Aaron looked at the bill and smiled.  “Actually, I was thinking more along the lines of a six-pack, but this’ll do.  Any friend of Ben Franklin’s a friend of mine.  Hop in and hang on.”

If that boat could have sprouted wings, I believe it would have flown.  Actually, I think we were flying half the time.  What a rush it was to feel the power of that engine lift us right out of the water. 
Quite a different sensation than the relaxing feeling of the
Plan B
.
  The warm sun on my face and the cool spray of water felt good.  For a short time, I forgot about the trouble I was in and enjoyed the moment.

Aaron dropped me on the dock of my uncle’s marina.  I thanked him for the lift.

“Any time
—
and hey
—
the next one’s on the house,” Aaron said as he helped me off the boat.