Текст книги "Among thieves"

Автор книги: John Clarkson

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Текущая страница: 15 (всего у книги 30 страниц)

“Anyhow, I just cradled my hand in the crook of my arm. I knew the little finger was broken. It was jutting out at a crazy angle. I was crying. People helped me up, asked me if I was okay. I couldn’t talk. Somebody told me to get to a hospital. Somebody hailed a cab for me. Next thing I was in the emergency room at Lenox Hill.

“They gave me a shot. The pain started to ebb. I just went with it. Whatever they said, I did. Sit here. Go there. I was drained. The time didn’t matter. It took a while to get everything done, but once the X-rays came back and the surgeon set my fingers, it felt more normal. The pain shots kept it all numb. He was a very confident guy. He told me I might not need surgery.

“About the time they started to put the cast on and the pain settled, I began thinking about what had happened. I started to get furious. That fucking Alan Crane. The years I put in. His arrogance. His stupidity. His … his recklessness. And the fucking nerve to threaten me like that.”

She paused to look at Beck. He sat motionless, no expression, listening. She had to get through it now. Get the rest of it out.

“Fuck.” She shook her head. “I was still afraid. From what Crane did. But I started wondering if Milstein had turned against me. If he had tipped off Crane. I was sure Crane meant what he said. The hate in him.

“I called Milstein from the hospital. I left a message on his voice mail. I figured for sure he’d call me back. He never did.”

Olivia paused, remembering it. She looked directly at Beck. “That’s when I decided to fight back. Sitting in that emergency room. I called the police. I started to build a case. I knew Crane would deny it. I didn’t care. I was going on the offensive. They weren’t going to get away with it. I waited for the police to come to the hospital. And waited. After a while I just couldn’t wait any longer and I went home.

“On the cab ride home, that’s when I decided to go to Manny. I think I would have gone to him whether I’d broken my hand or not. I was convinced I had to have some protection. The accident just made everything more real. Like a slap in the face to wake me up and show me where I was at.”

Olivia shrugged. Held up her hand again.

“It cost me enough pain. I figured I had every right to use it.” She paused. “I guess I didn’t think the whole thing through with Manny. I knew about you in a very vague way. Manny never talked to me about his life. When I told him a man at work had attacked me, had broken my hand, it seemed totally real to me. I swear I didn’t know it was going to get this far. I was just determined to fight back. To survive.”

She paused, wiped away the tears as if they were annoying her.

“That’s the truth. That’s what I did.” She stopped. Beck waited. “It’s my fault Manny is involved. That you’re involved. I never … I didn’t know. I’m sorry.”

Olivia leaned back against the headboard. Relieved. Drained. Showing a terrible vulnerability that actually made Beck want to comfort her.

Finally, Beck said, “I believe you.”

“Thank you.”

Beck nodded.

Olivia got up and walked to the foot of the bed. She sat on the bed, close enough to Beck so that she could reach out and touch his knee.

“What can I do? What should I do? How do I make this right?”

36

After he finished talking to Stepanovich, Markov began working every angle. He pestered Milstein until he received an e-mail with most of the information he demanded on Olivia.

Next, he reached out to Kolenka.

Markov had to leave messages and wait nearly a half hour for the old gangster to call him back. When he answered his phone he heard Kolenka’s raspy voice growl out one word.

“Yes?”

“Ivan, I need your help.”

Kolenka muttered one word. “Beck.”

“Yes.”

“I warned you.”

“You did. And now I’m taking steps. I want someone kidnapped.”

“Who?”

“The woman who started all these problems.”

“You have people, why call me?”

“Because your people are better.”

Markov heard Kolenka cough, the phlegm-filled hack of an inveterate chain-smoker. He pictured Kolenka hunched over, sipping strong Turkish coffee, smoking an unending chain of unfiltered Lucky Strikes in one of the shabby, barely furnished apartments that Kolenka used randomly.

Markov pushed. “Ivan, are you thinking of refusing me?”

“You want to take the woman because you think that will draw out Beck.”

“Yes.”

“Maybe. You understand this man is someone you must be careful with.”

“Maybe I can persuade her to call him off.”

“He won’t listen.”

“Then I will make sure they are both dead.”

“There are people who will try to avenge Beck.”

“They won’t find me. Or maybe we take care of them, too.”

Kolenka’s silence told Markov he was thinking everything through. Markov listened to Kolenka breathing on the other end of the phone. A raspy, labored sound. Breathing and thinking.

Finally, Kolenka asked, “How will you find her?”

“My friends in Washington.”

“Ah. They push buttons and see everything.”

“Exactly.”

Another pause. Finally, Kolenka spoke. “One condition. Everything works through your end. I will give you two of my best men. You find her. They will help capture her, and deliver the woman wherever you say. After that, we have nothing more to do with it.”

“Fine.”

“Do not take Beck lightly.” Kolenka hung up without another word.

Markov felt the sharks circling him. Coming after him and his money. But now he would strike. Capture the woman. She would either tell him where to find Beck, or Beck would come after her. He would be ready this time. And then, once he had his money safe, teach those idiots Milstein and Crane a lesson for allowing this mess to happen.

37

Olivia continued talking to Beck, sitting at the end of the bed, leaning toward him.

“I’ll do whatever I can to make this right, James. I’ll tell Manny the truth about my hand. I’ll do whatever you say.”

Beck shook his head. “No. Do not do that. I wouldn’t be able to guarantee you would survive it.”

Olivia shook her head. “I don’t believe that.”

“I know you don’t. But don’t do it. And don’t argue with me about it.”

She frowned, looking confused, but agreed. “Fine, whatever you say. What can I do?”

“You sure you’ve told me everything you know about Markov.”

“Everything I know.”

“Do you know anything about who his customers are?”

“Just what I told you before. My impression is that Markov does a lot of shipments for this country.”

“Arms?”

“Yes. Obviously, the U.S. does a lot of stuff that’s covert. Someone has to do it. Markov is one of those someones. That’s how Milstein rationalizes handling his account. He says Markov doesn’t do anything the U.S. doesn’t want him to do.”

“Do you know which agency?”

“No.”

“How did Markov get a legitimate brokerage to handle his money?”

“What do you mean?”

“I wouldn’t imagine someone can just hand over a hundred million dollars to you guys without triggering an inquiry.”

“Yes, you’re right. It’s worse than ever since the Patriot Act. But Crane and Markov have worked through it. That’s one of the things Crane is good at. I suspect most of it never entered the U.S. banking system.”

“It’s hidden offshore?”

Olivia shrugged. “All money is hidden to a certain extent. I’m sure Markov and Crane make sure nobody knows where his funds are: competitors, creditors, anybody he doesn’t want knowing his business. It’s only illegal if you’re hiding money to avoid taxes. It’s offshore because it was never onshore. Never earned here.”

“But how does he buy investments in U.S. markets?”

“Tons of ways. And who’s to say it’s all in U.S. markets? I’m sure Crane is trading in markets all over the world. That’s part of how guys like Crane earn their commissions.”

“How’s it work?”

“Same way hundreds of U.S. companies do it. They bundle money in various entities. Keep the assets of that entity or corporation in an offshore bank or brokerage. Invest those assets however they want. And don’t forget, money that goes into those entities is legally earned. Or in ways that look legal. Markov followed the rules enough so he can invest in whatever Crane wants to invest in.”

“The rules. Whose rules?”

“The ones written for people like Markov. And they still bend them as much as they can. Why do you think guys like Crane exist? Why are you asking me all this?”

Beck ignored the question.

“So, beyond Markov, do you know anything about the people Markov is associated with?”

“No.”

“Crane has no clue either? Or Milstein?”

“I imagine Crane knows more than Milstein, but I don’t know that either of them knows as much about them as you seem to. How’d you find out about the war crimes stuff?”

Again, Beck ignored the question.

“Well, I guess you know about criminal types from your time in prison. What was it like?”

“Prison?”

“Yes.”

“That’s not exactly the right question. More to the point would be what was it like going from a fairly normal civilized life out in the world into being locked up, incarcerated. There was no break-in period for me. No reform school, or minimum-security lockup. There was normal life, and then maximum-security hell.”

It was Beck’s turn to gaze out through the flimsy drapes.

“Eight years I breathed that stink. Listened to the din of constant yelling and screaming and carrying on twenty-four-hours a day. Crazy, insane bullshit. The most primitive, inhuman survival behavior imaginable. Trapped in a world of constant maneuvering and conning and conniving. Surrounded by men with pathetic attention spans and zero impulse control, and stupid, dangerous rationalizations.”

Olivia listened to Beck’s speech, perched in front of him at the end of the bed.

“Imagine living with people ready to kill or hurt or maim anybody at any time. Anybody.” Beck snapped his fingers. “Without warning.”

“I can’t imagine that.”

Beck leaned forward in his chair, moving closer to Olivia’s so she couldn’t avoid hearing what he was about to say.

“But those people I’m talking about in prison? They’re run-of-the-mill criminals who live in that world. Sure, they can go off at any moment. They’ll stab you, shoot you, hit you, doesn’t matter. They’ll end up dead or in prison, and either way, it’s pretty much okay with them.

“But these guys Markov is with—they are in a whole other category. They went after whole towns and villages. Women, children, old people. They tried to wipe out entire categories of people.

“And the Russians I was telling you about? My God, they live by a code so ancient and fucked up they don’t even know how to be half-human.”

Beck trailed off for a moment.

Olivia watched him shake his head and sit back in his chair.

“Why are you…?”

Beck interrupted her. “Why am I what?”

“Telling me all this.”

“So you understand how dangerous this is for you. And us. For all of us.”

“If you’re trying to terrify me, you have.”

“Good.”

“Why?”

“So you understand.”

“You already told me I can’t.”

“I want you to try.”

Olivia fairly shouted, “Try? I can hardly fucking breathe I’m so scared. What am I supposed to do?”

Beck leaned forward again, sitting on the edge of his chair again, speaking low and fast and hard as he stared into her eyes.

“You know what you have to do. What we have to do.”

“What?”

“We do exactly what Markov fears we will. We steal his fucking money. The only way we survive this is to take control of that money. The only edge we have is to make him choose between us and his money.”

Olivia stared at Beck. “How?”

“We’ll figure out how.”

“No, how is that going to stop him? That will make Markov want to kill us all the more.”

“No. He kills us, he loses the money.”

“You think if we make some sort of deal he’ll agree? Walk away?”

“You leave that up to me. Right now, the thing you have to do is help us get control of Markov’s money. Can you do that? Can you help us?”

Olivia answered without hesitation. “Of course I’ll help you. I’ll tell you whatever I know. I’ll do anything I can.”

Back sat back in his chair, nodding. “Good.”

Suddenly, Olivia slid off the end of the bed and sat down on her folded legs in front of Beck. She wrapped her arms around his legs, holding on to him tightly. Beck felt her breasts pushing into his knees. Her face was nearly level with his. Less than six inches separating them.

He could smell that feminine soapy scent she had. He thought about her bare skin under her crisp white shirt. He stared into her gold-flecked brown eyes. They seemed luminous. Her closeness, her completely unchecked, uninhibited hold on him made the moment feel incredibly erotic.

“You have to help me. You have to, James. I won’t survive this without you.”

“I know.”

38

The clock next to Walter Pearce’s computer said 11:52 p.m. The caller ID on his ringing cell phone said MILSTEIN.

“It’s me. What have you been doing all day? Have you found Beck for God’s sake? I need results, Walter.”

Walter had no intention of telling Milstein what he had spent most of his day doing.

After he had dropped off the material on Beck and Baldassare, Walter had intended to catch up on his sleep. But he thought of a way he might find Beck, so he’d sat in Milstein’s lobby using information from Beck’s trial records to locate Beck’s law firm, which turned out to be a mostly one-man operation run by a lawyer named Phineas P. Dunleavy. He called the office, explained to the woman that answered that he had urgent correspondence for one of the firm’s clients, James Beck.

The woman told him all correspondence for Mr. Beck came through their office. Pearce told her he needed to get an envelope to James Beck by end of day.

The secretary responded that their messenger service could guarantee delivery by end of day for a $150 express-delivery fee, if Pearce could get the envelope to her by three o’clock.

That confirmed that Beck was somewhere in the Tri-state area. Pearce agreed to the price of delivery and said he would have the material in Dunleavy’s office in time. It was just after 2 p.m.

Pearce walked over to the Staples on Lexington and prepared an envelope. He picked one that was a distinctive color, green, and big enough to spot from a distance, ten-by-fourteen inches. He filled it with meaningless papers, drove to Dunleavy’s office in Lower Manhattan, and parked at a hydrant across the street.

He was up to Dunleavy’s office and back in his car before anyone had time to ticket him. He waited behind the wheel of his nondescript Toyota Camry. A half-hour later, a messenger entered Dunleavy’s office building. He came out carrying the green envelope.

The messenger jumped in a cab, and Walter fell in behind it, tailing as closely as he could. The stop-and-go traffic made it easy to follow the cab.

What Pearce didn’t know was that as the cab pulled away, Phineas P. Dunleavy stood at the window of his office watching Pearce’s Camry slip behind the messenger’s cab. Despite being just past sixty years old, Dunleavy had excellent eyesight. From the second floor he was able to see the license plate on the Toyota, noting it down on a yellow legal pad, wondering what fool was trying to find James Beck with one of the oldest tricks in the book.

Dunleavy frowned at the departing car. He had given the messenger an address in the opposite direction of Beck’s location, a restaurant on City Island up in the Bronx.

Dunleavy was a sturdy man with a head of thick white hair and a booming voice made pleasant by the hint of an Irish brogue. He was well practiced at playing the role of a friendly scoundrel who loved his Irish whiskey. But underneath the hale-fellow-well-met act, Dunleavy was a shrewd, tireless, implacable advocate for his clients.

Watching the clumsy ruse set against Beck made Dunleavy more than slightly angry. Angry because one of his clients appeared to be in some sort of danger. But even more angry because whoever was behind this thought Dunleavy was stupid.

The lawyer set about finding out who owned that car. He didn’t intend to take long doing it, or in letting Beck know what was afoot.

Nor did it take Walter Pearce much time to realize after following the messenger for nearly an hour that James Beck had no connection whatsoever with a City Island lobster restaurant shut down for the winter.

Beck had already made him feel incompetent and ashamed. Being sent on a wild-goose chase had only added to the sting. It made him more determined than ever to find James Beck. The minute he got home, Pearce immediately got on his computer and his phone searching for James Beck, only stopping when his phone rang.

Milstein’s rude insistence only increased Walter’s anger. There was no way Walter was going to tell him that he’d wasted most of a day on a wild-goose chase. Instead he answered, “I spent most of the day following a lead that went nowhere. I’ve been working nonstop. I’ll call you when I find something.”

“No. You pick me up at seven tomorrow, first thing in the morning. I want a full report on everything you’ve done. I have to make some decisions. Fast.”

Walter didn’t have time to protest or answer before Milstein hung up on him.

*   *   *

Pearce’s failure stood in contrast to Redmond’s success. Within two hours after Markov’s request to find Olivia Sanchez, he called Markov’s secure cell phone line.

“We’ve located the individual. We have her credit card charged for two nights at the Four Seasons Hotel in New York, starting tonight. I went ahead and found out her room for you. Four-zero-zero-one.”

“Wonderful. Thank you. I knew I could rely on you.”

“You also e-mailed me that you want to contract a team with black-ops capabilities.”

“Yes.”

“I’m sending you encrypted information on that. I suspect you want a standard team of three?”

“Yes.”

“Don’t tell me what it’s for. Discuss it with their representative. I’m sending you information on one source. The best. The man you call will go over backgrounds and capabilities. These men are very, very serious. Don’t compromise them. Don’t renege on your agreement in any way. Don’t fail to pay them in full. Any misrepresentations or failure on your part will reflect badly on me, and result in serious consequences. Do you understand?”

“Yes.”

“I hope so.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“It means I know you. Pay the price they ask. Don’t try to bargain. And don’t ask them to do anything more than you agree on.”

“All right. Of course. How soon can I get them?”

“If you need someone who can be at your location quickly, make that a requirement.”

“Right.”

“Is there anything else?” asked Redmond.

“Yes. Your shipment is leaving in seven hours. Arrival at the agreed-on place approximately fifteen hours from now. Have your people in place for transit to wherever you want the shipment to go.”

“They already are.”

Redmond cut the call without further conversation.

Markov checked his watch. Nearly ten-thirty.

So, first the woman. She was smart to hide in a hotel. But not smart enough. He would call Gregor, tell him to take one of his men and meet Kolenka’s men outside the hotel.

By this time tomorrow his shipment for Redmond would be completed. Beck and the woman would be history. Which would certainly help motivate Crane.

Markov heard his computer sound a tone that signaled an e-mail had arrived. A series of letters, numbers, and symbols appeared when he opened the e-mail.

He used the encryption code Redmond had given him and a single phone number emerged with a name. Wilson.

He checked his watch again. First, get Gregor and Kolenka’s men going. Gregor plus one of his, and Kolenka’s two. That should be more than enough for one woman. Then hire the contract team.

They were usually ex–Special Forces, of some country or other. He knew he would have to carefully plan the negotiation for the black-ops team. What exactly did he want? Foremost above anything, he needed protection for Crane. Gregor would not agree to watch Crane. He probably preferred beating Crane to death after what had happened to his two men. Gregor was now completely focused on eliminating Beck and the woman. Good. But if something happened to Crane, none of it would matter.

Markov also knew that at some point there was going to be a war. There might be a way to use their military skills, at least at the planning stage. But Markov had to be careful. He knew hiring such men would be very costly. He knew he couldn’t involve them in anything that would cause trouble for Redmond and jeopardize that relationship.

But mostly, he had to get them on board quickly.

Markov dialed the phone number of Wilson.

A recorded message started abruptly, stating, “Please leave a clear recording stating the following: number of personnel, time and dates of employment, place of employment, skills required. Also, leave a secure contact number. If we can fill the requirements, you will receive a callback within thirty minutes, confirming personnel and price. Thank you.”

Markov had been jotting notes. When the electronic tone beeped, he cleared his throat and recited the information in order, “I need three men, starting as soon as they can arrive in New York City, until approximately 4 p.m. Friday. I need experts in surveillance and personal security.”

Markov gave his cell phone number, hoping he hadn’t been too vague. If they wanted more details, he would just emphasize they would be guarding one man who was working for him. He couldn’t think much beyond that.

He had completely sweated through even his underwear. His empty stomach grumbled. He reached for his attaché case laying on the bed and removed a gram of cocaine from the lining. He snorted a small pile into each nostril from his thumbnail. He sniffed at the sting in his nose and the back of his throat and blinked away the tears that filled his eyes.

The cocaine picked him up considerably, but it would be wearing off soon. He rummaged around in the side pocket of his attaché case, looking for his Adderall. He would be working for a few hours more, at least.