“Did he touch you?”
Thomas looked at the photograph. “He told the others not to hit me in the face. Said a mechanic with a broken jaw would attract attention.”
Eli felt his jaw tighten.
Cho made a note. “Do you know where he lives?”
“Outside Albany. He had a place on the lake.”
The state bureau requested records on Shaw. His consulting firm had received payments from three companies under investigation. Two of those companies had reported serious workplace accidents. In each case, internal safety complaints had been dismissed shortly before the incident.
The bureau obtained a warrant for his office and home.
Shaw was not there.
His assistant said he had left for a conference. The conference organizers had no record of him. His car was found at the airport, parked in a long-term lot. His passport had been used at a border crossing two days earlier.
Cho stood in the bureau's operations room, looking at the map.
“He knows we're coming,” Naomi said.
“Someone told him,” Cho replied.
“Could be Eleanor.”
“She's in custody.”
“Her attorneys?”
“Maybe. Or someone else inside the network.”
Eli studied the map. “If he has the original records, why leave?”
“Because he doesn't need the records,” Cho said. “He needs the people who can explain them.”
• • •
Mara Voss received the second warning on a Tuesday.
It came as a phone call from a blocked number. The caller said nothing for several seconds. Then a man's voice asked whether she still wore the red scarf.
Mara hung up.
She called Cho immediately.
“I think they've found me,” she said.
“Where are you?”
“At home.”
“Stay inside. An agent is on the way.”
“I don't want to be moved again.”
“I know. But I need you to take this seriously.”
Mara looked at the red scarf lying across the back of her chair. She had worn it to the meeting with Walter because she wanted him to recognize her from the photograph. She had not worn it since.
“Daniel,” she said, “there's something I didn't tell you.”
Cho was silent.
“Thomas didn't just give me copies of the ledger. He gave me a name. A person who was supposed to protect the workers who reported the accidents.”
“Who?”
“An investigator named Paul Danner. He worked for the state labor office. He told Thomas he could take the evidence to federal authorities. Then Danner disappeared from the case.”
“Was he involved?”
“I don't know. But Thomas believed he was.”
Cho wrote the name down.
“Why didn't you tell us before?”
“Because I saw Danner at the courthouse last month. He was standing with Eleanor Vale's attorney.”
Cho's face hardened.
“Are you certain?”
“I would recognize him anywhere.”
The line went quiet.
Then Mara said, “I think he was the one who called.”
• • •
Paul Danner was found living under his own name in a retirement community near Hartford. He was seventy-four, used a cane, and had a carefully trimmed white beard. When Cho and two agents arrived, Danner was watering a row of geraniums outside his apartment.
He looked at their badges and sighed.
“I wondered when this would happen.”
“Mr. Danner, we'd like to ask you about Thomas Bell.”
Danner turned off the hose.
“I don't know that name.”
Cho showed him a photograph.
Danner's eyes lingered on it for a fraction too long.
“I said I don't know him.”
“You were assigned to a workplace-safety complaint involving Vale Industrial in 2004.”
“I handled hundreds of complaints.”
“This one concerned falsified maintenance records and possible sabotage.”
Danner leaned on his cane. “That was a long time ago.”
“People were hurt.”
“People get hurt in industrial work.”
“Some of those accidents were staged.”
Danner looked past Cho toward the parking lot. “You should speak to the company.”
“We have.”
“Then you know they had lawyers.”
“We also have a witness who says you met with Eleanor Vale's father.”
Danner's expression hardened. “Arthur Vale is dead.”
“That doesn't answer the question.”
For a moment, Danner seemed ready to shut the door. Then he looked at the photograph again.
“Thomas was a stubborn boy,” he said.
“He was twenty-one.”
“Old enough to know when to stop.”
Cho stepped closer. “Did you tell Arthur Vale where Thomas was?”
Danner's mouth tightened.
“I told him the boy was making accusations he couldn't support.”
“Did you tell him where to find him?”
“I didn't know where he was.”
“Did you take money?”
Danner looked at the geraniums. “I took a consulting fee after I retired. It was legal.”
“From Vale Industrial?”
“From a subsidiary.”
“Which one?”
“I don't remember.”