“One of our bunch?” Sam asked.

“Rich man,” Lester said. “Influential, affable. If he is a crook, it makes sense he’d have someone on the inside, just as a friend, not necessarily a bad cop—maybe a part-timer or a constable.”

“We’ll probably never find that out,” Joe said. “Could be, though. It wouldn’t be the first time.”

“I say we go back,” Willy stated. “With a warrant this time. We have enough for probable cause now. Seamus claims Shaw’s house as his personal address, doesn’t he?”

“Far as I know,” Joe agreed. “Although convincing a judge to let us in is going to take one hell of a persuasive affidavit.”

They didn’t invoke a show of force like last time. Joe was as sensitive to not acting high-handedly on foreign turf as he was to enlisting help once too often. As a result, only Fred and a few of his fellow deputies had been invited.

That being said, they did have a warrant based on the probable cause they’d built against Seamus, combined with Cheri’s stolen ashtray. However, they didn’t get a response when they reached Shaw’s residence later that afternoon. It didn’t affect their action. They could still enter the place. But one of the primary incentives had been to corner Seamus and perhaps Shaw and use the circumstances to ramp up the pressure against them.

But the place was empty and, as they discovered, seemingly abandoned, with cleaned-out drawers, tidied-up bathrooms, and a garage devoid of vehicles.

It also contained no drugs, signs of drug use, or anything else pointing to criminal activity. It was just an enormous, echoing, oddly cold showboat of a building, as reflective of its owner as any high-end commercial resort.

A few hours after their arrival, and following the departure of their companions, Lester approached Joe with the obvious conclusion. “They knew we were coming.”

“Again,” Sam added, flopping down in one of the overstuffed armchairs in the cathedral-ceilinged living room, surrounded by mounted animal heads, rifles on racks, and painted scenes of peerless hunting.

Joe pursed his lips in thought, wandering over to the wall of French doors leading out onto a large deck. “I would love to know how.”

Willy appeared from the kitchen, fresh from the outdoors, and contributed, “I may’ve found one way. Probably not the only one, but I bet it was their first heads-up.”

“What?” Sam asked.

Willy’s expression showed only empathy when he pointed to her and Lester while answering, “You two. I found a couple of wireless cameras at the bottom of the driveway, trained on the road. Nice units, very high-tech, virtually invisible. My bet is they run nonstop and most likely record what they see.”

Joe caught where he was heading. “And they saw Sam and Lester driving by days ago, when they were following Kalfus’s travel log.”

“Not only,” Willy continued. “I’m thinking they had a movie of Don ripping them off before, too. That, together with you two sniffing around later—not to mention our ordering the autopsy as confirmation—was all they needed to beat feet.”