Caffrey Flashback

Chapter 41: Mr. Hyde - Part 1

Graham's hotel suite. Monday morning. March 8, 2004.

Last night the hotel suite had been the setting for Neal's birthday party, filled with laughter, music, even dancing. Now the dining area had been turned into a war room, filled with FBI agents and consultants.

Reese Hughes had called Peter early in the morning with the update from OPR. They had enough evidence to charge Hitchum, but they hadn't been able to get much out of him about Mr. Hyde. Peter's team would have a chance to interrogate him today, and needed to do everything they could to convince Hitchum to implicate his partner in crime.

It was now 8am, and Hughes had joined Peter in the suite, along with Jones, Tricia, Neal, Henry and Graham. Noelle was on the periphery, as she was staying at the suite and was getting breakfast from the buffet of food Graham had ordered. Tricia and Jones eyed Neal warily, not surprising since only a week ago he was lost in flashbacks of his childhood. Peter guessed that was another reason Noelle was hanging around: to see how Neal handled his return to work.

The hotel had conference facilities, and Graham had convinced them to wheel in a large whiteboard and other office supplies. A timeline had been drawn on the board, spanning 1990 to 2004. They had the years written, allotting the smallest space to the earlier years and the most space to 2003 and 2004. But so far no notes had been added under each year.

Hughes put down his cup of coffee to stand in front of the board. "You've done good work over the last few weeks. The arrests of Dixon, Churchill and others from Highbury, Seamus Bickerton and August Hitchum is something to be proud of. But we know they are the tip of the iceberg. We have a long road ahead of us to find Vincent Adler. And we still don't have enough evidence to get a warrant to arrest our suspected Mr. Hyde. We get one shot at interrogating Hitchum before OPR takes him back to D.C. to face charges. We have to get this right. And it won't be easy. Hitchum has decades of experience being in our shoes, interrogating suspects. He knows our tricks, knows what we're allowed to do and what we can't do. We need to go into this fully prepared. Agent Wiese?"

Tricia stood up. "On Thursday and Friday, Jones and I went over the Highbury and Bickerton files, building a timeline. Jones is going to put what we have on the board." Jones stood, file folder in hand, and started placing sticky notes along the timeline. "Blue stickies represent what we learned from employees of Highbury. Orange represents what we learned from Bickerton. We used yellow for what we got from Hitchum. We also met with Mr. Winslow about what Win-Win has learned, and those are on green."

Graham held up a file folder. "You want me to add mine?"

Henry took the folder. "I'll do it. I want to read them, anyway." He stood and joined Jones at the whiteboard, but he worked slower because he paused to read each note before he posted it.

Tricia continued, "We've placed red dots on the notes that are speculation or inferences. Those help us, but we can't use them to gain a warrant or to get a conviction. These are the areas where we need Hitchum's help."

Soon all the notes were on the board, and everyone read through the timeline. It started in 1990, with Robert Winslow making the transition from Baltimore PD detective to Win-Win investigator. After everyone else read through the timeline and sat down, Graham remained at the board to say, "When Robert joined Win-Win, I was CEO. He was full of ambition, certain he'd follow in my footsteps, and that his son would follow in his. I was happy to think of a family legacy, and pleased with what I was already seeing of Henry's talents. Two years later, Noelle filed for divorce. Robert and I were both concerned that she would turn Henry against Win-Win, and I did my part to make sure my grandson still had ties to the company."

Noelle raised her glass of orange juice in a toast to her ex-father-in-law. "You were certainly wily." She met the curious looks of the non-Winslows in the room and said, "I was already a professor making a good salary. Alimony wasn't a concern in the divorce settlements. But Graham insisted that half of Robert's shares in Win-Win go to me. That meant I had a seat on the board of directors and had to stay involved with the company. And it meant I continued to take Henry to company events like the annual picnic, the Christmas party, and so forth."