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“Now, Detective. Right now.”

Shit.

EIGHT

My captain went with Jimmy and me to the Federal Building to have a long talk with Special Agent Carlene Summers. She knew all about Clay Wells. She even let us listen to the chatter on the line of where he had ordered one of his guys to go to Posh and deal with Evan Polley, who was freaking out because he felt strange. The next phone call was the guy calling Mr. Wells back.

“Due to unforeseen circumstances, a nonscheduled package has burst. Please advise.”

“Repeat.”

“A package that did not appear on the manifest has burst, sir. Please advise.”

“An extra?” Wells sounded surprised.

“Affirmative.”

“Our cargo was not affected?”

“No, sir, our packages are in transit.”

“But the other has burst?”

“It has. We await instructions.”

He cleared his throat. “Alter delivery confirmation to suspend tracking.”

“Affirmative.”

I looked at Agent Summers. “That’s Wells’s guy shooting Evan Polley in the head?”

“Unfortunately, yes.”

“So then, what we thought was wrong. Polley wasn’t a mule.”

“No.” She shook her head. “He was a mule, just not the kind that normally shoved uncut cocaine up his own ass. He used a plane to move drugs for Clay Wells.”

“But he got greedy and tried to make a little extra on the side?”

“That’s correct.”

“So you think, what? Evan Polley died of a cocaine overdose?”

She sighed deeply. “No guess, Detective. We know from that brilliant recording you just heard, and I’m sure your coroner already confirmed cause of death, did she not?”

“She did.”

“And?”

“And, like you said, he OD’d and then got shot in the head to cover it up.”

Her eyes never left mine. “Let’s stop the second-guessing, Detective. You can safely assume I know everything you do.”

“But that’s not quite true, is it?”

“In what way?”

“Well, you guys didn’t find Polley.”