“It’s a little over the top for me,” noted Decker.
“Well, I’d like the opportunity to try, at least once in my life.”
Decker looked out to the Atlantic Ocean, where Kanak Roe had disappeared from the face of the earth. Since people and large boats didn’t just vanish, something had caused them to do so.
Kasimira Roe came out onto the deck carrying a tray of full coffee mugs and a pot with cream and some sweeteners and spoons. The women doctored their coffees while Decker drank his black. The air was refreshingly chilly and the breeze invigorating as they sat around the flaming outdoor gas firepit.
Roe was casually dressed in jeans and a sweater, and boat shoes without socks. Her hair was pinned up and she wore rimless glasses.
“Thanks for agreeing to meet us on such short notice and this late,” said Decker.
“No problem. I haven’t been sleeping much. I heard about the arrest. The judge’s ex. Think it will stick?”
“His gun was the murder weapon for Lancer and Draymont,” said White.
Roe looked at Decker. “What do you think?”
“He had motive, means, and maybe opportunity.”
“But?”
Decker glanced at White. “There’s not always a but in my remarks.”
“I’m sure. But why would you be here if you thought you already had your killer?”
“Maybe to discuss your father’s case?”
“But you said you would only do that if you thought it was connected to these killings.”
“Maybe I do.”
“So there is a but,” noted White.
Decker leaned forward. “What can you tell us about your dad founding his firm?”
“What do you want to know?”
“Pretty much everything. He joined the Service right out of college. He put in sixteen years. If he put in twenty-five he could have retired with a full ride. That’s a big sacrifice to go off and start your own firm. He could have finished his tour of duty with the Service, banked his pension, and then started his company. That’s what lots of people do.”
“But not my father.”
“Did he ever talk to you about why he left the Service?”
“Not really. But I left after only five years.”
“There’s a big difference between five and sixteen years invested,” noted Decker.
“And Gamma was already established and successful,” added White. She looked around the luxurious space. “You had some place to go. Groomed to take over an empire.”
“I don’t think it’s suspicious that my father was naturally an entrepreneur. Lots of immigrants build businesses.”
“Yes, they do. But a lot of them do it right away. So I’m not sure how natural an entrepreneur he was.”
“What exactly are you suggesting?” said Roe in a bristling tone.
“I’m not suggesting anything,” said Decker. “I’m just trying to fully understand your father’s motivations.”
“Then I don’t know what to tell you.”
“Did he keep in touch with anyone he worked with in the Service?”
She sat back and mulled over this. “There was one agent that he was good friends with. I don’t remember the name offhand, but I can look it up.”
“Can you do it now?” asked Decker.
She glared at him. “You’re very impatient.”
“I like to think of it as very motivated to do my job.”
“Let me get my phone, it might be on there.”
She rose and left them.
White turned to Decker. “Okay, where are you going with all this?”
“We have one definite lead, Freddie,” Decker said in a low voice. “Slovakian money in the mouths of two dead people. That does not tie into either Barry Davidson or Dennis Langley. But it might be connected to Kanak Roe and Gamma Protection Services. And the two dead people worked for Roe. So unless leaving that money behind was some giant coincidence—which stretches plausibility beyond belief—it’s symbolic, and all symbols have meaning.”
“So Lancer and Draymont, and, I suppose, Patty Kelly, are dead because of Kanak Roe and something he did, what, while he was still in the Secret Service all those years ago? For me, that stretches plausibility to the breaking point. Why wait so long to take action?”
“That’s what we have to find out. And maybe they already took action, three years ago.”
“You mean, when Kanak disappeared?”
Roe came back out at that moment looking at her phone.