Part 30 (1/2)
”So it was Singer's idea in the first place?” Villatoro asked.
”s.h.i.+t, I don't know whether it was Singer or Gonzo. It didn't matter. But Singer was in charge, thank G.o.d. He wasn't the kind of guy to rush into anything, either. We talked about the robbery and planned it for a year and a half. We had meetings where we went over everything and tried to shoot parts down. We did a couple of run-throughs at night so we could walk the route and time everything. Once we decided on the perfect plan, it was still another four or five months before we decided to do it. Singer didn't even want to try it until he could figure out how to launder the money. I hadn't even thought about it, but Singer was so f.u.c.king smart. He said the only thing worse than robbing a place these days was figuring out what to do with all of the cash, because n.o.body uses cash anymore. That's when he came up with the idea to create a foundation and to make all of us officers in it. We'd hide the cash and dribble it into legit accounts, not deposit it all at once. Pay ourselves in officer's salaries and big bonuses. It was f.u.c.king brilliant.”
Villatoro wished he was wearing a wire. But if nothing else, even if he never gained Newkirk's trust, even if the ex-cop later denied everything, Villatoro would know how the robbery happened, who had been involved, where the money was.
”Also,” Newkirk said, tapping the dashboard with the mouth of the bottle, ”we had to wait until all of the stars lined up perfectly. A big cash day at the track, me and Rodale on security, Singer and Gonzo off duty so they could trigger the gas and rush the truck, Swann on patrol so he could escort the getaway vehicle to the auto salvage yard, where it was crushed. Remember, no one ever found a car?”
”I remember.”
Newkirk chuckled. ”Swann drove Singer and Gonzo and $13.5 million in cash back to L.A. in a police van we took the seats out of and dropped them off at their houses. Imagine that.”
Villatoro whistled. ”But a security guard got killed.”
Newkirk seemed to darken. ”Yeah, that still p.i.s.ses me off. Some yahoo tried to be a cowboy. Gonzo had to take him out.”
”His name was Steve Nichols,” Villatoro said. ”He had a wife and two children.”
Newkirk didn't respond at first, just stared out the winds.h.i.+eld. ”That wasn't supposed to happen,” he said.
The ex-cop remained silent while Villatoro drove. Finally, Villatoro said, ”What about the guy, the employee, who fingered the other employees in the counting room? Why did he do that if he wasn't involved?”
Newkirk shrugged. He seemed to be losing enthusiasm for telling the rest of the story. ”Singer's boy,” he said. ”The lieutenant had something really incriminating on the guy-totally unrelated to the track. Pictures of him dealing drugs, or with boy prost.i.tutes or something. I never did know what it was exactly, but it was bad enough that the guy did what Singer told him.”
”But the employee died before he had a chance to testify in court,” Villatoro said.
”Yeah, wasn't that convenient?” Newkirk said darkly. ”He gets caught in a cross fire while he's buying a pack of cigarettes at a 7-Eleven. The clerk gets popped, the witness gets popped, and the robber empties the cash drawer and escapes scot-free. All they can see on the security tape is a big masked guy in black walking in and blasting away.”
Villatoro let it sink in. ”Gonzalez?” he asked.
Newkirk nodded slightly. ”And Swann was the investigating officer.”
Jesus, Villatoro thought. It's worse than I imagined.
”Creating the charity was a master stroke, I agree,” Villatoro said. ”Making small deposits in a bank in northern Idaho never attracted any attention at all for years. The only problem was tracing a few of the hundred-dollar bills back to here. You must not have realized that some of them could be traced to the robbery.”
Newkirk turned, his face screwed up in contempt. ”Of course we knew about the serial numbers on some of the hundreds. Me and Rodale were in the counting room, remember? We knew about that. Do you think we're stupid?”
”No,” Villatoro said, feeling outright fear rise up in his chest. He tried not to show it.
”That's where Tony Rodale screwed the pooch,” Newkirk said, his voice rising, his eyes flas.h.i.+ng with either anger or tears, Villatoro couldn't tell which. ”He was the treasurer. He made the deposits. Singer had it all worked out. On a schedule, Tony made a cash deposit supposedly collected from random cops in L.A. and other places. But we knew about the hundreds, how a few of 'em were marked. So Tony's job was to get in his car and drive all around the country to break the hundred-dollar bills in restaurants, or gas stations, or bars, or wherever. He told his wife he was going fis.h.i.+ng, but his job was to cash the hundreds and deposit the change later. That's all he f.u.c.king had to do.”
Now, Villatoro started to understand. He thought of the mounted steelhead on Rodale's wall, thought of the years Rodale had deceived his wife about his absences. Thought of the places of origin from some of the marked bills that had been identified, California, Nevada, Nebraska. All within a day or two driving distance of Kootenai Bay, but far enough from each other that no pattern could be established.
”But the a.s.shole got greedy,” Newkirk said. ”Singer noticed that some of the deposits were off, and figured Tony was skimming, which he was. The idiot was using some of the hundreds to bet on football, of all things, with some lowlife bookie in Coeur d'Alene. Tony wouldn't admit it, of course, but Singer found the bookie and shook him down and proved it to us.”
Newkirk leaned across the car so his face was inches from Villatoro. When he talked, Villatoro could smell his sour whiskey breath.
”Tony risked everything. Not just for himself, but for all of us by paying his debts to a bookie in stolen hundred-dollar bills. Our money. When Singer found out he was afraid it would be a matter of time before someone like you came up here, tracing those bills back.”
”And here I am,” Villatoro said, not sure why he'd spoken.
”Here you f.u.c.king are,” Newkirk said, as if in pain.
”But where is Tony Rodale?”
Newkirk started to speak, then looked away. Beads of sweat sparkled on his forehead. The anguished look on his face was lit by dash lights.
”That's what I'm going to show you,” Newkirk said.
”Oh no,” Villatoro whispered. ”You killed him.”
”Not just me. All of us. The agreement was we all put a couple into him, so we were all equally responsible. All of us except for Swann, who was late.”
Another murder, Villatoro thought. It was too overwhelming to process. Steve Nichols, the inside witness, the convenience store clerk. Now, one of their own.
”It might have worked, too,” Newkirk was saying, ”except that those two f.u.c.king kids saw us take Tony out. Hey, keep driving.”
Villatoro hadn't realized he had slowed the car to a crawl. Things were connecting in a way he had not antic.i.p.ated. He felt as if all of the blood had drained from his hands and face.
”The Taylor children,” Villatoro said. ”Oh, my G.o.d.”
”Everything keeps getting worse,” Newkirk said, and this time there were real tears streaking down his face. ”One crime, one perfectly planned crime. We were set for life. Then Tony f.u.c.ked up, and those kids saw us, then the UPS guy. I feel like I'm already in h.e.l.l.” His voice cracked. ”In fact, I think h.e.l.l would feel nice and cool to me right now.”
Villatoro sped up but realized his hands were shaking. He had trouble staying in his lane. What did Newkirk's reference to a UPS man mean?
”This is so much bigger than I had imagined,” he said.
Newkirk's reaction surprised him. The ex-cop laughed bitterly, then wiped tears from his face with his sleeve before reaching behind him to withdraw his black semiautomatic. He aimed it at Villatoro, shoving the muzzle into his neck.
”It's about to get bigger,” Newkirk said softly, his voice sincere. ”I'm sorry I've got to do this, man. Especially since you were a cop yourself.” It was as if Newkirk could not force himself to stop what he was doing, what was in motion, even though perhaps he wanted to.
”Slow down and turn here,” Newkirk said, nodding toward a wet black mailbox on the side of the pavement marking a dirt road.
”What are you doing?” Villatoro asked, his voice stronger than he thought it would be.
”Turn here,” Newkirk said, with more force.
”Someone is coming,” Villatoro said, nodding toward a pair of headlights approaching a quarter mile away on the highway.
”s.h.i.+t, I wonder who that is.”
”They'll see us,” Villatoro said. ”They'll see the gun.”
Newkirk lowered the weapon but jammed it into Villatoro's jacket beneath his armpit. He hissed, ”I said turn, G.o.ddammit.”
The road he wanted them to take was a two-lane dirt road pooled with rainwater that inclined up the hill into the trees.
”I don't think this little car will make it,” Villatoro said. ”We don't have any clearance, and the road goes up the hill.”
”Take it fast,” Newkirk said, clearly worried. ”Don't slow down.”