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17
Tulane-Gravier, New Orleans, Louisiana
WEDNESDAY, JULY 27, 9:55 A.M.
Well?” Jackass demanded.
Burner phone in hand, Lamont shut the door to his office and walked to the window for better reception. “Ashley talked to Broussard. She said he bought it, but we’ll have to see.”
“Has he left the building yet?”
“No. He’s still in his office.”
The men he’d hired from his list were in place around Broussard’s office, checking in every hour. He’d decided to pay these men rather than blackmail them, as he’d done with the guard in the prison. The guard hadn’t been a hit man, had never killed for money. His sin had been the accidental murder of the man’s own wife when he’d hit her a little too hard. To keep her in line, of course. A man like that could do violence but had needed a little incentive to kill a prisoner like Eckert. A threat to reveal the file containing the evidence of the guard’s manslaughter had been incentive enough.
The exposure of the guard’s role in the death of his wife would cost him his job and his children. Plus, it would put him in prison with the very people he’d abused when they’d been awaiting trial.
Lamont had been judicious over the years, choosing who to save from prison by virtue of how much future value they’d be. Or how much money they’d paid him. Either worked.
Everything was going to plan. Eckert was dead. It was all over the news, and it appeared that the guard had been sufficiently stealthy. No one had any idea who’d gutted the hit man.
“It’s early yet,” Jackass said. “Broussard’s probably checking out the name we gave him.”
“I certainly hope so.”
“You hired men really fast,” Jackass said with that fake nonchalance that had been his tell for more than thirty-five years.
“I did.”
“And you trust them?”
“I paid them well, and I can track them.”
“Oh yeah?” Now Jackass was overtly suspicious. “How?”
“I sent them texts with links to the address they were to surveil. When they clicked to open the address in their phone’s map app, the tracker downloaded. I know exactly where they are.”
Technology really was a beautiful thing. And saving a few hackers from prison had netted him his very own computer experts. Blackmail was even more beautiful.
“Slick. You’ll have to show me how to do that.”
I don’t think so.When this was over, when Xavier Morrow, Gabe Hebert, and Broussard were dead, Jackass would be the next loose end he’d snip.
“I’ll be happy to show you,” he lied smoothly. “Now, for new business. How did Rocky’s boy know to do a private autopsy?”
“I’m not certain, but I think he was suspicious because of Cresswell.”
Lamont sighed. The cop was a thorn in everyone’s side. Not that he was a goody-goody. Quite the opposite. He’d been taking bribes from pimps and skimming drugs from busts and selling them back to dealers for decades. But he knew where a lot of bodies were buried, so they kept shoring him up.
“What did Cresswell do?”
“He found the coke we left in Rocky’s house. Had it tested.”
“Which we planned for,” Lamont said, trying to hide his impatience. “And?”
“And he told Gabe.”
“Which we planned for,” he repeated more sharply. “And?”
