Page 2 of Caught
“Ah, Cape Henlopen?”
“Yes.”
“She did a photo shoot for a sponsor there once. Are you two still using Chelsea’s ride?”
“That’s why I’m calling. We can’t be on the street in it. We came into town. Leilah’s buying a used car. I picked up some necessities and the new phones. We need to make arrangements to get the car back to you before we move on.”
“You’re not moving on,” Omar countered. “Go stop Leilah from buying a car. You don’t need one. Trent will drive out to pick you up. He knows how to evade a tail.”
“What about the Subaru?”
“We’ll send a team. They’ll get it off the street without attracting the attention of law enforcement.”
“You hope,” Ryan said.
Omar laughed. “Brother, the things we do, the work we do, hope is the constant. We’re always hoping the mission turns out right.”
“So far, this one’s been a disaster. But there’s someone I need to talk to. I can’t come back yet.”
Omar exhaled loudly. “You have to. There’s a BOLO out on you and Leilah. You’re persons of interest in the murder of Grover Anderson.”
Ryan’s heart hit his gut. He was a suspect in the murder of his mentor and friend. And worse, he’d dragged Leilah into his muck.
“Hayes?” Omar asked.
“Yeah, I’m here.”
“We’ll get it cleared up.”
“Will we, though? I’m the lawyer, and from where I sit, it doesn’t look good for me and Leilah.”
“Jake and Trent are working the phones. They know everyone. We’re gonna figure something out. Well, they’ll figure something out. You can count on them.”
“Speaking of figuring things out,” Ryan interjected, “we have a theory about what’s going on.
“A theory?”
“Right. We found some files at Grover’s place.”
“The guys who killed him didn’t take them?”
“They looked for them. Tossed the place. But they were well hidden. We got lucky.”
“What’s in these files?”
“Grover, Natsuo, and I caught a case captioned United States versus Cortez. It was the last case I worked on before I left. It was also the last case that Grover worked on before he retired.”
“Okay.”
“Cortez was a low-level dealer. He got popped in Columbia Heights with some ketamine.”
“Special K?”
“Yeah.”
“Personal use?”
“Only eight vials. But based on the packaging, there was an argument that he could go away for felony intent to distribute.”
