J.M.J.

Author's note: Thanks for continuing to read! A special thanks to max2013, Candylou, ErinJordan, and Cherylann Rivers for your reviews on the last chapter! I know this chapter is kind of just three giant conversations – too much talking is something I struggle with as a writer. ;) However, there are at least three different very important points that get set up here, which will start paying off as early as next chapter. So, I hope you enjoy!

Chapter V

A Lead to Rockport

"It will be one adult and two children," Mitch Johnson told the front desk clerk at the hotel. Some confusion passed through the young woman's face as she noted that there were two men, one woman, and two children in the group, but she didn't say anything. One thing a hotel employee learns quickly is not to ask too many questions.

"I don't know about this, Laura," Fenton admitted quietly, shifting holding Joe from one arm to the other. "You'll be all alone this way. Don't you think you'd be better off going to stay with your parents?"

Laura shook her head firmly. "I don't want to be that far away, just in case anything happens. I'm alone with the boys often enough as it is when you're on a case."

"It's not just that," Fenton said. "What if someone else finds out you're here? Boston isn't all that far away."

"That's true," Laura agreed. "It's close enough that it wouldn't be hard for these people to look for me there, and if they happen to know that my parents live there, it will be one of the first places they look. We took enough precautions that I don't think they're any more likely to find us here."

Fenton couldn't argue that. They had taken every precaution they could to keep the hotel Laura and the boys were going to a secret. They had borrowed a car from Officer Nicholson, a rookie who had just been going on duty and was more than happy to help Lieutenant Hardy in any way he could. Then they had made sure they weren't followed by taking a roundabout route and watching carefully. That also ensured that even Nicholson wouldn't be able to guess where they actually went by checking the odometer. Finally, Mitch was registering the room in his own name, so that even a dishonest hotel employee couldn't slip Laura's name to anyone who might come asking. Fenton realized now that it would have been better if he and Laura had stayed in the car with the boys until Mitch had the room key, and then they could go in the back way so that the receptionist wouldn't have even seen them, but it was too late now. Chances were that she would forget them anyway.

The men helped Laura to carry the little luggage she was bringing and the boys to her room. Neither Fenton nor Laura were eager to be separated, and it would probably be best if they didn't contact each other much until all this was straightened out.

"This doesn't look so bad," Mitch said, appraising the room as they entered. "Two double beds, a TV, a mini-refrigerator. All the comforts of home."

"I think our home's a little more comfortable than this," Laura replied. "You know, small town life is starting to look better and better."

"Ah, you'd both be bored in a small town," Mitch said. "There wouldn't be any mysteries to solve or criminals to stop…"

"That might be preferable," Laura interrupted. She glanced at Fenton. "Are you sure you're going to be okay staying with him until this all cleared up?"

Fenton winked at her and continued the teasing, "I'll be spending most of my time at the precinct anyway. It might be for the best."

Mitch pretended to be offended. "Hey, I offer you, out of the goodness of my heart, to let you stay at my place, at great personal risk, I might add, and this is the thanks I get?"

"It might not be too much risk if those mobsters decide that you're a threat, too," Fenton pointed out. He shook his head as he reverted to the seriousness of the situation. "We've got plenty of leads, but none of them seem to take us anywhere. Even looking for Giovanni Beretta has led us to a dead end."

"He's probably gone as far away from here as he could get," Mitch said, lending little enough encouragement. "Or he changed his name so his brother couldn't find him or both. It would be anybody's guess what he might have changed his name to."

"He could have simply changed his first name," Laura suggested. "Maybe to John?"

"It's possible," Mitch agreed. "I guess I could suggest that to Casey."

"Speaking of which, we'd probably better get back to work," Fenton said reluctantly.

"I'll head on out to the car," Mitch volunteered. "You take care, Laura. Bye, Frank and Joe."

The boys replied accordingly before they went back to examining every nook and cranny of the room.

Once Mitch had closed the door, Laura and Fenton embraced one another and simply held on in silence several minutes.

"I wish there was someone to stay with you," Fenton said finally.

"It's okay," Laura assured him. "Someone else in this close of quarters would probably start driving me crazy, anyway. Let's just get through this."

Fenton kissed her. Then he said good-bye to Frank and Joe, who didn't completely understand what was going on and were much too excited by the prospect of staying in a hotel to catch onto the somber mood of their parents. Then, slowly, reluctantly, Fenton left the room and closed the door behind him.

HBHBHBHBHB

All the way back to the precinct, Fenton and Mitch talked over the possibility of a mole, a subject they hadn't dared bring up in front of Laura and the boys.

"If there is a mole, it's most likely someone working on the case," Mitch said. "No one else would have known what your plans were."

"Unless someone mentioned it to them," Fenton replied. "To find out about that, though, we're going to have to question everybody and then the mole will know we suspect he or she exists."

"Right. So let's start small. Let's start with just the people who were in the room when we made our plans. Once we can rule them out, we'll work on everyone who's helping them on the case. If we can rule all of them out, then we'll start looking at the entire precinct."

"Well, that only gives us three suspects to start with: Alex Casey, Danielle Harbinger, and Christine Roche." Fenton rubbed his chin. "We may want to include Dave Brink on this list, since I took him along with me, so he obviously knew that I was paying a visit to Moretti."

"Four suspects. Not bad. Not to mention that it will be easy going through the backgrounds for Casey, Brink, and Dr. Harbinger, being part of the department and all. Christine Roche might be a little trickier. We're going to have to tread carefully to get the FBI to give us any info on her."

"This part of the investigation needs to be kept completely secret," Fenton said. "I believe that Brink, Casey, and Dr. Harbinger are all trustworthy, but we can't take a chance on it. Even once we're ninety-nine percent sure we can rule somebody out, I don't think we'd better tell them."

"My money's on Christine," Mitch replied. "She's been working on investigating organized crime, specifically the Moretti Family for years without making much progress. It could just be bad luck or a target who knows what he's doing or even mismanagement on Christine's part, but it could also be because she's being paid off."

Fenton shook his head slowly. "Pulling something like that off for several years in the FBI? That's risky. Still, I'd rather think it was her than one of our people. There's one way we might be able to find out."

"What's that?"

"We pass along some false information about our plans, a different piece to each one of them. If Moretti acts on any of them, we'll know where it started from, at least."

"Not exactly original, but it is tried and true," Mitch agreed. "I hate to do this, but Laura might be good bait. Tell each one of them she's in a different place, watch each of those places, and see if Moretti sends any of his people. We wouldn't actually be putting her in any danger."

Fenton considered this for a few moments before he nodded. "I don't like trying it for all four. That might be pushing it, not to mention that two of us can't watch four places at once. We'll try it on Christine, since she'll be the hardest to investigate."

Instead of going back to the precinct right away, they went to a different motel. Fenton registered there under his own name. Then, while Mitch stayed at the motel with his list of tattoo artists to try calling about the rose tattoo while he waited, Fenton returned to the precinct. By some good fortune, he found Christine Rocha waiting outside his office for him.

She stood up as soon as she saw him. "They told me you were out on a personal matter, but I thought you'd want to hear this as soon as possible, so I waited for you. You told me that you wanted to know as much as you can about Gregorio's recent activity."

"That's right," Fenton agreed. "Let's talk in my office. I've got some updates for you, too, after my visit to Moretti's."

They went inside the office and Fenton closed the door to prevent them being overheard. Then, after Christine requested that he tell his part first, Fenton explained about how his visit to Moretti had been cut short by none other than Gregorio himself, and that the overheard conversation pointed toward the fact that it was indeed Gregorio who had orchestrated the attack on Moretti's men. Then, finally, he told Christine about the threat to his family.

"That's where I've been," he concluded. "I moved Laura and the boys into a motel." He then told her the name of the decoy motel.

"That was a good idea," Christine said, "but I wouldn't go spreading around where they're staying. The point is to keep them hidden, isn't it?"

That wasn't the response Fenton was expecting, especially if Christine was the mole. Just that alone nearly convinced him that Christine must be honest, but he still wasn't going to reveal his whole plan just yet. "Of course. I just wanted you to know in case there was emergency and I needed someone to go and check on them."

"Well, I probably wouldn't be a good one to ask," Christine said. "The information I've gathered looks like it will be worth my while to head out of town to follow it up. It's a little conflicting that Gregorio is here in the city, but that doesn't prove that the information is worthless by any means."

"What information is that?" Fenton asked.

"Gregorio has apparently been spending a lot of time in a little town in Massachusetts: Rockport, to be exact. He's been seen there numerous times in the last few months. As you know, Rockport is a tourist town on the Cape Ann Peninsula. It's tiny. Seven thousand people at most. Why would Gregorio be interested in a town like that?"

"Good question," Fenton agreed. "You're going to check it out?"

"I intend to," Christine replied. "There's just one problem." She paused.

"Which is?" Fenton asked when she didn't go on.

"You said Alessandro seemed to know you were coming," Christine explained. "However, the phone call to Laura is definitely more Gregorio's style. Alessandro's more careful than that. Yet, your visit to them confirms that they are not on friendly terms. They're not going to be sharing information with each other. There's only one solution: a neutral party is selling them both information."

Fenton's astonishment was not entirely feigned at that. If Christine was the mole, she wouldn't be calling attention to the fact there was one, and if she wasn't, she must be pretty sharp to put it together so quickly. The latter made far more sense, but Fenton wasn't ready to lay all his cards on the table just yet. "What exactly are you implying?"

"I'm implying that somebody who knows our plans is also working for both Morettis at once," Christine said. "Which also means that that person is probably going to end up dead soon if he or she is not very careful. How well do you trust your people?"

"I can't speak for all of them, but who's to say it's not one of your people?" Fenton countered.

"Nobody," Christine replied. "That's why I don't want my trip to Rockport to be broadcasted anywhere. I don't want Gregorio hearing about it. I don't have any doubt that he also happens to know where I live or where my fiancé lives or my mother lives. I'm sure you get the picture."

"Yeah. What are you going to do about it? And why are you telling me this? If you don't trust your own people, why would you trust me?"

Christine chuckled. "Excellent line of questioning, which incidentally answers itself. You haven't been on the NYPD for terribly long, certainly not long enough to have risen in the ranks as high as you have normally. That means one of two things: you have connections or you're one of the best cops this city has ever seen. Ordinarily, I'd assume the former, which is why I did a thorough investigation into you when you were promoted a couple months ago. You're cleaner than my grandmother."

"That's enough to convince you to trust me?" Fenton asked.

"You're also sharp," Christine went on. "Much too sharp to drop the name of the hotel where your wife and children are staying to someone you're not completely sure of, so you must have given me a fake name, probably because you're trying to trap me as the mole. That wouldn't make a lot of sense if you were the mole."

"I'm impressed," Fenton said. "I really hope you're not a mole, because if you are, frankly, I don't think we'd be able to catch you. So, what about Rockport? Was that a real lead or are you hoping that now that you have assured me that you don't suspect me, I'll go running to Gregorio and tell him that you're going to follow something up in Rockport when you're really going to be somewhere else?"

"I wouldn't be the first one to try that, would I?" Christine replied with a grin. "But, really, Rockport is a real lead, and going there could be dangerous. If you were an FBI agent or even a private detective, I would ask you to along with me as backup, but since you did the world a disservice by becoming a city police officer with no jurisdiction outside this city, let alone in another state, that would be useless." She took a brand-new Nokia cell phone out of her purse and handed it to him. "I want you to hold onto this. I need to be able to get hold of you at any time even when you're out of your office. Answer it when it rings; it will be me calling with an update or a request of some kind. In the meantime, I'm putting some of my people on Gregorio's tail. They'll contact me if he leaves the city. I'd also appreciate it if you would put some of your people on his tail as well, just to make sure everyone's being honest."

"Okay. I can arrange for that," Fenton said. "When are you leaving?"

"As soon as we're done here," Christine replied. "I think we've covered everything. Be careful. Alessandro wants to keep up a façade of respectability, so he won't do anything that he doesn't know he can away with, but Gregorio isn't so concerned with caution. If he takes it into his head that you or any of your people are too much of a nuisance to him, he'll take the first opportunity he can get to take you out."

Fenton nodded slowly. "I know."

It was a strange conversation all the way around. There was no denying that. Something about Christine still didn't sit right with Fenton. She wouldn't be so suspicious of her own people just based on Fenton's observations. Moreover, she had wanted to talk to Fenton about her trip to Rockport before she had heard it all. Either something else had happened to her that she didn't want to tell him about or she was trying to lull him into a false sense of security, either to trap him if she suspected him of being the mole or to arrange to get him out of the way.

Whichever it was, there was no point having Mitch Johnson sit around at that motel any longer. That trap obviously wasn't going to work at this point. Fenton picked up his office phone and dialed Mitch's number. Rather than going into details over the phone, he simply told Mitch to check out of the motel and come back.

"Something go wrong?" Mitch asked.

"Maybe," Fenton said. An idea struck him as he remembered something that Christine had said. "Do you know any good private detectives, by any chance?"