Page 39 of Carry on Wayward Son

Whatever this department had been before, it wasn’t that anymore. It was a place where everyone was being looked at. Everyone knew it, and nobody wanted to be painted with the stink associated with Carson.

Rios’s office was the last door on the left. He was at his desk, a furrow dug between his brows as he frowned down at an open case file on his desk. One of many, judging by the small mountain at his elbow.

He glanced up as we came in. “Close the door.”

Jace did. The ambient sounds of the station went muffled.

Rios leaned back. “Nice to see a pair of friendly faces.”

“SBI giving you grief?” Jace asked.

“Less than the others, since I wasn’t part of this department under Carson’s reign. Nobody’s suggested I offed him in order to get my hands on this mess.” He spread those hands to encompass the files burying his desk and both visitor’s chairs. “Y’all have something?”

Jace straightened, legs braced, hands folded at his back, as if he were reporting to senior naval personnel.

Did he realize he was doing that?

“The marina was sold eleven years ago to a company called Tidewater Marina Group LLC,” Jace said. “Registered in Wilmington about a month before the sale closed.”

“Who’s behind it?”

I picked up the thread. “The registered agent is a law firm out of Wilmington—Calloway and Pierce. They’ve handled every annual filing since the company formed, which means they’re actively managing it, not just serving as a formality. Managing members aren’t listed on the public record, which is standard for that structure.” I set the notes on the desk. “But the firm has other clients, and some of those clients are starting to appear in more than one place in what we’ve been pulling together.”

Rios picked up the notes and read without speaking. “Such as?”

“A real estate LLC that bought two waterfront properties on the island the year after Miles took office,” I said. “And a company whose listed principal shows up in the correspondence around the Strand development proposals. We can’t get to the beneficial ownership layer through public records. But the connections are there.”

“Sale price? Financing?”

“Slightly below market. Not enough to flag on its own. Commercial loan out of a bank in New Bern.”

“Paid off in full inside two years,” Jace added.

Rios looked up. “That’s fast.”

“Very,” Jace agreed. “Which either means significantly more capital on hand than the loan suggested, or money was coming in from somewhere that accelerated the payoff considerably.”

Rios set the notes down and was quiet for a moment. Outside his closed door, a voice said something in a clipped and professional tone. Rios’s jaw worked. No doubt the SBI babysitters were interfering with his efforts to correct whatever mess Carson had left behind.

“I can run these names,” he said. “I won’t pretend I have unimpeded access to everything right now, but I can work with what I’ve got.”

He didn’t elaborate on what unimpeded access meant in a department where state law enforcement agents were sitting twenty feet away going through files that used to belong to his predecessor. He didn’t need to.

“Any movement on getting access to the original case files?” Jace asked.

“Still waiting on the judge. The SBI has everything locked down, and I have to go through them to get to my own department’s records.” The frustration was controlled, but definitely there. “I’ve followed up twice. I’ll go back tomorrow.”

“Miles’s files? The prosecutor’s records?”

“Request is in. Nothing back yet.” He looked at me. “I know that’s not the answer you need.”

“It’s the answer I expected,” I said. “We work around it in the meantime.”

He nodded once. I had the sense that he appreciated not being apologized to about a situation that wasn’t his fault and that he was clearly doing everything in his power to navigate.

The door opened without a knock.

One of the men from the front room leaned in, did his quick inventory of the space, and landed on Rios. “Carrera. Need the Galef file when you get a chance.”