The Ideal Man

TEN

Greg Roper was a dream come true. Agent Hughes was overjoyed to have found such a strong witness to testify against the Landrys. The twenty-six-year-old had come forward the day after the shooting and had told Hughes he had seen both Cal and Erika Landry in the park.

When Hughes met Roper at the police station to look at the photos Sunday afternoon, the agent had his suspicions that Roper was a bit of a flake because of the way he kept hitting on Ellie Sullivan, but as soon as she left the station, Roper got down to business and quickly pointed out the suspects.

As far as Hughes was concerned, Roper was an ideal witness. He had never had any trouble with the police, had never even gotten a speeding ticket, and he had held down a good job for more than four years. Most important to Hughes was the fact that Roper wasn’t at all ambivalent about what he saw. He explained that he was crossing the park and was taking a shortcut through a thicket of shrubbery to get to his car when he saw Erika Landry. She was sitting in the passenger seat of a big Mercedes that was driving slowly down the street.

“What was she doing?” Hughes asked.

“She pulled down the visor to look at herself in the mirror, and then she tugged on her hair, and it all moved at once. It was a wig, and I think she was trying to fix the thing.”

“And Cal Landry?”

“I didn’t see his face yet, but when he parked the car at the end of the block and got out, I saw him. He stood there surveying the street, but he turned as he was bringing up his sunglasses. I was close enough to see the scar on his cheek.”

“Why did you stay where you were? Why didn’t you keep going?”

“I was curious. At first I thought maybe the woman was going through chemo or something and didn’t have any hair, but when she adjusted the wig, her long red hair fell loose, and she pushed it back in. She had pretty red hair. Why was she hiding it under a wig? Then I saw the man reach into his pocket and look down at something, like he was checking on it. I couldn’t see what it was, but it made me even more curious. I could tell they were up to something, and I had time, so I decided to follow them and see what it was. I guess you could say I was being nosy. They didn’t know I was there. They walked into the area of the park where the trees are pretty dense, and then suddenly they turned around and started walking really fast in the opposite direction. That’s when I saw the FBI agent running after them.”

“Did you see Landry shoot Agent Goodman?”

“I sure did. I saw him fire his gun in that direction where the agent was, and I saw the agent drop down, so, yes, I saw him shoot him.”

Roper insisted that the Landrys never saw him. “Never even looked my way, but the bushes hid me. I don’t think they would have seen me if they had looked.”

Hughes suggested strongly that Roper not discuss what he had seen with his family or friends.

There was a BOLO on the Landrys, but Hughes fully expected the couple to appear at a police station somewhere with their attorneys flanking them. They’d say they’d heard the feds were looking for them. Even though they’d accuse the FBI of harassment, they’d cooperate and answer questions. They might even admit they were in the park, but they’d confess their innocence, and they’d have a couple of witnesses to back them up.

Greg Roper was going to be their downfall… if Hughes could keep him alive long enough to testify.