“Nothin’ new about that in Southern California,” said Riverside County’s Sheriff Fields in his gunslinger drawl. “Deal with that almost every damned day. ’Bout one out of every eight or ten of the accidents on I-15 through our county is staged. Not a damned thing new.”

Chief Investigator Sydney Olson nodded in agreement. “Except for the fact that in the last few months there’s been some sort of turf battle for control of organized insurance fraud.”

“Groups?” said Sheriff Fields, squinting suspiciously.

Deputy DA Weid spoke. “In Dade County, Florida, they discovered that it was largely the Colombians—the former drug runners—who were organizing the insurance fraud. We’re running into the same thing with some of the organized Mexican or Mexican-American gangs in East L.A. and elsewhere.”

“Figures,” grumbled Sheriff Fields.

Captain Sutton of the CHP shook his head. “The majority of staged crashes isn’t being headed up by our Latino gangs,” he said quietly. “They tried to get into the action and got their butts kicked. Quite a few top hommes in body bags.”

Sheriff Schultz from Orange County cleared her throat. “We’ve seen the same thing with organized Vietnamese crime. They want to dominate, but someone is muscling them out.”

Special Agent Warren said, “And whoever it is that’s been most successful in this turf war is bringing in Russian and Chechnyan mafia enforcers…all along the West Coast, but especially down here.”

All eyes turned back toward Dar and those seated near him.

Lawrence made a coughing noise that usually preceded a longer statement from him. “Our company’s hired Dar…Mr. Minor…Dr. Minor…to reconstruct several accidents that were obviously staged. He’s been an expert witness in half a dozen cases and so have I.”

Trudy was shaking her head. “But we haven’t seen any sign of a highly organized ring in these fraudulent claims,” she said. “It’s just the usual assortment of losers and second-or third-generation insurance-claim parasites. They depend on it the way welfare addicts used to depend on their checks.”

Deputy DA Weid looked at Dar. “There’s no doubt that these two men in the Mercedes were not only Russian mafia imported as part of this turf battle, but that they were tasked to kill you, Mr. Minor.”

Dar winced slightly at the use of the noun task as a verb. Aloud he said, “Why would they want to kill me?”

Sydney Olson turned sideways in her chair and looked Dar in the eye. “That’s what we hoped you’d tell us. What happened yesterday represents the best lead we’ve had in several months of investigation.”

Dar could only shake his head. “I don’t even know how they could have found me. The whole day was crazy…” He quickly and concisely told of his 4:00 A.M. JATO-unit wakeup call, the meeting with Larry, and the interview with Henry at the Shady Rest Senior Mobile Home Park. “I mean…none of that day was planned. No one could have known that I’d be coming south on I-15 at that time of day.”

Captain Sutton of the CHP said, “We found a cell-phone frequency scanner in the wreck of their Mercedes. They must have monitored your calls.”

Dar shook his head again. “I didn’t make or receive any cell phone calls after my meeting with Larry.”

Trudy said, “Lawrence called in after he’d gotten the photographs of the stolen-car ring to say that you were covering the mobile home park interview.”

Dar shook his head again. “Are you suggesting that the stupid JATO thing or the seventy-eight-year-old man falling from his Pard is part of a massive insurance-fraud conspiracy? And that someone would import Russians to kill me over it?”

Again Captain Sutton of the CHP spoke. For such a big man—he was at least six five—his voice was very soft. “The JATO thing, we cleared. The human remains in the wreckage—teeth—were ID’d as nineteen-year-old Purvis Nelson from Borrego Springs, who lives with his uncle Leroy. Leroy buys metal in job lots from the Air Force. Evidently someone at the Air Force base didn’t notice that those two JATO units hadn’t been used. Purvis did, though. He left his uncle a note…”

“A suicide note?” someone asked.

The Highway Patrol captain shook his head. “Just a note dated eleven P.M. that night saying that he was going to break the land speed record and that he’d see his uncle at breakfast.”

“In other words, a suicide note,” muttered San Diego County’s Sheriff McCall. The sheriff looked at Lawrence. “The deposition mentions that when you and Mr. Minor met just before the shooting, you were on your way to document a stolen-vehicle transaction. A car-theft ring targeting Avis vehicles. Could this have been the cause of the attack on Mr. Minor?”

Lawrence laughed softly. “Sorry, Sheriff, but the Avis-theft thing was a strictly hillbilly family operation. You know, one of those good-old-boy Southern families where the family tree doesn’t have any branches?”

None of the sheriffs, police captains, nor the FBI man smiled.

Lawrence cleared his throat. “Anyway, no, this bunch I was following wouldn’t have any dealings with the Russian mafia. They probably don’t even know Russia has a mafia. It was an inside job. Brother Billy Joe worked at Avis and, as part of the usual checkout procedure, got the address where the car renters were staying locally. Then brother Chuckie would take one of the agency’s duplicate keys out and steal the vehicle—they liked sport utilities—that night. They’d meet in the desert with cousin Floyd, cleverly repaint the vehicle at a shop they had out there, and Floyd would drive it up to Oregon as soon as it was dry and resell it at a lot they legally owned up there. They’d change the license tags, but not the registration numbers on the vehicles. They were morons. I turned the photographs and notes over to Avis yesterday and they’ve given the info to local and Oregon police authorities.”

Chief Investigator Olson raised her voice slightly to bring the conversation back on track. “Which means that none of yesterday’s incidents were connected to the attempt on your life, Dr. Minor.”

“Call me Dar,” muttered Dar.

“Dar,” Sydney Olson said, and made eye contact again.

Dar was struck again by how she blended professional seriousness with that hint of amusement. Is it the sparkle in her eyes, or in the way she moves her mouth? he wondered, and then shook his head to clear it. He had not slept well the night before.

“You’ve done something, Dar,” she continued, “that’s convinced the Alliance that you’re on to them.”

“Alliance?” said Dar.

Chief Investigator Olson nodded. “It’s what we’ve been calling this fraud ring. It seems to be very extensive and well connected.”

Sheriff Fields pushed back from the table and flexed his cheek and jaw muscles as if he were looking for a spittoon. “Extensive fraud ring. Operation Clean Sweep. Missy, you’ve got a bunch of the usual losers out there on the highway deliberately fender-bending other people’s cars and then screaming whiplash. Nothing new. All this task force stuff is a waste of the taxpayers’ money.”

Chief Investigator Olson’s face reddened slightly. She gave the old would-be gunslinger a stare that might have come from Bat Masterson. “The existence of the Alliance is a reality, Sheriff. Those two dead Russians in the Mercedes—ruthless mafia members who, according to Interpol, killed at least a dozen hapless Russian bankers and businessmen in Moscow and probably one overconfident American entrepreneur over there—those two dead Russians are real. The Mac-10 slugs in Dr. Minor’s automobile are real. The ten billion or so extra dollars that fraud tacks on to the cost of California insurance…that’s real, Sheriff.”

The old man’s gaze broke away from Sydney Olson’s and his Adam’s apple worked as if he were swallowing rather than spitting his chaw. “Yeah, no argument. But we all got pressing things to get back to. Where does this…Project Clean Sweep…go from here?”