Last to Fold (16 page)

“Lachko has a couple of guys camped out in Ratko’s lobby. You know that. He was asking questions about Ratko yesterday that suggest Ratko has dropped out of sight. And since you’ll undoubtedly ask, no, I don’t know where he is.”

Technically and spiritually true, if factually dubious. Two out of three ain’t bad.

“Your powers of deduction knock me over. You know who Risly is?”

“No.”

“Why would he want to drop out of sight?”

“Never met the guy. Have you?”

The jade flashed again. “Why did you go to see him?”

“Had something to talk about.”

“Something involving Barsukov or Mulholland—or both?”

“I hope you won’t hold it against me if I don’t answer that. Maybe if you tell me why you’re interested in Risly, I could help.”

“Just my luck—a socialist with scruples. I’ll ask again—what do you want with Risly?”

“I think this is where I came in.”

“I can make life difficult.”

“You mentioned that earlier. First thing you said. Kind of got us off on the wrong foot. I’ll take my chances on whether the different agencies in the federal government have actually started talking to each other.”

“You really do think you’re clever, don’t you? Is Mulholland your client?”

“Suppose I gave you my word that whatever my business, as you put it, with Mulholland, it has nothing to do with predatory lending or anything else at FirstTrustBank.”

She doodled on her notepad while she considered that. “Don’t take offense, but what’s the word of a socialist spook worth?” she asked with a smile.

“Former socialist spook. Now I’m just another small businessman, backbone of the American economy.”

“Don’t give yourself airs. What about Barsukov and Risly?”

“Straight up—I have no business with Barsukov. He and I had a falling-out back in the eighties. Big one. Yesterday was the first time I’d seen him in more than twenty years. I hope it’s the last. He does, too.”

“How do you know that?”

“He told me.”

“How sick is he?”

“I’m not an oncologist, but he’s my age and used to be my size and weight. He looks like he’s eighty and weighs one-twenty. He’s got cancer and he’s still chain-smoking. I wouldn’t bet on him being around this time next year. On the other hand, I was recently reminded of a saying we have. He who’s destined to hang won’t drown.”

“Not before I nail his ass. And Risly?”

I shook my head with a grin. “I’ll tell you this. I very much doubt that my business with Risly, again as you put it, has anything to do with whatever you’re interested in.”

“What makes you say that?”

“He was trying a very stupid shakedown. It didn’t work.”

“What kind of shakedown?”

“Amateur effort. Not even worth talking about.”

“That’s your opinion.”

I shrugged.

“Who was he shaking, Mulholland?”

I shrugged again.

“Somebody phished Mulholland.”

“Yeah, I understand Ratko’s got quite a rep in those circles. I don’t know anything about that.”

“Your word as an ex-socialist spook turned law-abiding small businessman?”

“That’s right.”

“The phisher used a forged letter from my office. That pisses me off. I also infer the phisher knows more about my business than he should. Bernie tells me you know your way around technology crime.”

“I met Mulholland for the first time Tuesday morning. I’d hardly heard of him before then. My word as an ex-socialist spook.”

She made another note. No jade flash this time.

“All right, Mr. Vlost. Thanks for your time. If you learn anything about Risly, I’d like to know.”

“You’re counting on a lot of ex-socialist goodwill.”

“Very funny. Bernie said you could be a real pain in the ass.”

“I’m really very friendly and engaging. Let me buy you dinner.”

The green eyes gave me an I-can’t-believe-you-just-said-that look over the top of the glasses.

“I think we’ll get along better on a strictly business basis.”

“That’s been a real treat so far.”

One more flash. Sooner or later I was bound to get burned, if I got the chance. She closed the file in front of her and stood.

“Good day, Mr. Vlost. If you ask him, Bernie will tell you I can be a pain in the ass, too. He’ll also confirm my reputation for periodically crushing neighboring anatomical appendages. Maybe everything you say is true and this has all been one big coincidence. If so, nice meeting you. But feminine intuition and the statistics course I took back in college say bull to that.”

“Sometimes, an inside straight fills.”

“Maybe. Whatever you’re up to, y’all’d be well advised to stay the hell out of my way. If I find out you are fuckin’ around in my cases—or if you’ve been less than one hundred percent straight—I’ll make sure you do time in a good old American jail for obstruction, and that’s before I get your ass deported. Do I make myself clear?”

The twang was back. She worked hard to cover it, but it came out when she got angry. I found it charming. I was finding everything about her charming.

Before I could say more than “Very clear,” a clock chimed 9:00 and the end of the first round. Coyle and Sawicki were nowhere to be seen as I showed myself out of the building. A young man in a white linen suit with black curly hair and an eye patch gave me a quick once-over as I passed through the reception area. He didn’t look American, more European, and could’ve been Russian. I almost spoke to him, to test my hypothesis, but prudence knocked on my skull and said I’d already used up the day’s quota of luck.

CHAPTER 17

The heat sucked the energy off the street. Traffic—vehicular and pedestrian—moved a beat slow, and the mood was morose.
BEARS RULE
—
DOW DROPS 610
, the
Post
cried from a newsstand. I’d lost track of the market gyrations. Maybe I could train Pig Pen to broaden his horizons and provide updates on the Dow Jones.

No cabs in sight. I walked slowly back downtown, replaying the conversation with Victoria as I went. Coyle seeing me at Mulholland’s was a coincidence—or bad luck, depending on your point of view—but she had people watching Barsukov’s palace and Ratko’s building. She didn’t know about Greene Street, at least not yet. Lucky for me, or I wouldn’t be walking around. Why did she bring me in to show her hand? Maybe Bernie’s word was good enough for her. More likely, she didn’t have much, so she was reaching for something.

I stopped at the deli and ordered black coffee and a toasted bagel, one half with butter and jam. I chewed that on the way to the office.

“Hello, Russky,” Pig Pen said, his eyes fixed on the brown paper bag. “Pizza?” A mix of eternal hope and here-and-now resignation in his voice.

“Good morning, Pig Pen. Bagel,” I said, removing his half.

“Cream cheese?”

“No cream cheese for parrots.”

“Cream cheese?” he tried again, but he saw the fix was in.

“Cream cheese means cholesterol, and cholesterol makes Pig Pen an ex-parrot.” I have no idea how a parrot’s cardiovascular system works, but it seemed a reasonable assumption. Besides, Pig Pen thinks he’s human like the rest of us.

“Python,” he said, his head bobbing up and down. He’s a fan of the dead parrot skit, along with everyone else, even if his ancestry is the butt of the joke. I handed over the bagel. He pulled off a piece.

“Onion!” Things were looking up.

“Happy now?”

“Muchas gracias…”

“You’re welcome.”

“… cheapskate.”

The neck feathers ruffled. Maybe I’m mistaken, and twelve is still adolescence in parrot years.

“Where’s the boss?”

“Pancakes.” Breakfast.

“Pig Pen, what do you know about Wall Street?”

“BQE?”

“No, not traffic. Stock market. Dow Jones. NASDAQ.”

“Cross Bronx. Accident cleared.”

“Is your life’s ambition to be a cab driver?”

“Triborough—two lanes closed.”

He went back to the bagel. Morning rush hour was the wrong time for this conversation.

“Tell Foos I said thanks for the hard drive.”

“Drive-by.”

“Not drive-by, hard drive. Computer.”

He nodded as he chewed, but I think he was just pacifying me.

*   *   *

Bernie’s secretary confirmed he was in the office. I got the hundred grand from the safe and walked down to Hayes & Franklin. Shirt wrinkled and tie loosened, he was bent over a thick stack of papers. He barely looked up when I dropped the bag on his desk.

“You want to count it?”

He shook his head.

“Do I need a receipt?”

Another shake.

“Who should I talk to about my fee, you or Mulholland?”

He held up the papers he was reading. Bloodshot eyes, exhaustion written all over his face.

“Bankruptcy petition, Turbo. Mulholland’s busted.”

“Come on, Bernie, this is America. People like Mulholland don’t go broke.”

“Remember how you told me he was buying FTB? You didn’t know the half of it. He was buying on margin—as the stock fell. Best we can figure, he paid north of nine hundred million for shares now worth three.” He looked at his computer screen. “Less. Market opened down again.”

“Surely he’s got other assets.”

“Yeah, but looks like he’s pledged those, too. We’re trying to get a full picture. It’s a mess.”

“I’m sorry,”

He took off his glasses and wiped them on his tie. “He’s not such a bad guy when you get to know him. Rory and I … We met at college, Yale, two scholarship kids in a pool of privilege. He was a poor mick from the wrong Boston ’burbs, me a Jew from Brooklyn. We formed a bond of sorts, us against the rest. Went our separate ways afterward but stayed in touch—holiday cards, reunions, that sort of thing. When I started here, he called me up, said he needed a lawyer he could trust. FTB was already a pretty big bank then, and he sealed the deal here for me. I owe him. He’s human like the rest of us, he’s got his flaws, but…”

“I won’t argue with you, not today.”

“Don’t worry about your fee. We’ll get it, one way or another.”

“I’m not worried,” I said, mainly to be polite. “How’s the girl?”

He shook his head. “Touch and go. Docs say she was on Rohypnol. Borderline overdose. Still in the ICU.”

“The date rape drug?”

“Yeah, but some kids take it recreationally. Roofie, they call it. Amnesiac—she probably won’t remember a thing.” He shook his head again. “She’s been through rehab a couple times already. Didn’t take. This stuff with Rory won’t help.”

“Maybe. Everybody needs a wake-up call. Something that makes you realize it’s not all about you—unless you want to piss your life away. In which case, that is all it’s about.”

“Once more, Turbo, you’ve found just the right way to cheer me up.”

“I met your former partner this morning.”

“The piranha?”

“She hauled me in for a talk. Kind of intimated you sold me out.”

“No way. You must be getting rusty. She knew who you were, where you’d been, who you’d been with. All she asked for was a character reference, which I’m guessing is why you’re not in jail. How’d you make out?”

“All right, under the circumstances. She tried to push me over, I pushed back. No blood spilled.”

“Sounds like Victoria. She likes to intimidate first thing out of the box. Thinks she needs even footing with the boys. I’ve always thought she’d do better using her feminine assets, but who am I to argue? She’s done more than all right her way.”

“How well do you know her?”

“Like I said, she came here about eight years ago, with that Atlanta firm. She’s got brains to match her looks, and she’s tenacious as hell. Every guy in the office hit on her with the same result. No soap. Used to be lots of rumors—lesbian, S&M, frigid, you name it. If her time sheets were any indication, not much social life of any kind. She was at the top of billable hours every year she was here.

“We were all surprised by the U.S. attorney appointment, but she networks a lot, she’s active in the Bar Association, she’s got a great rep in white-collar crime. After all the Wall Street scandals, that’s probably what the Justice Department thought they needed. She may be a little out of her depth—organized crime, drugs, and terrorism haven’t been her thing—but I bet she figures it out.”

“She’s trying. Not sure she’s there yet.”

“Only been a couple of months.”

“Okay. I’ll get out of your hair.”

Bernie went around his desk and closed the door. “How bad was it, when you found Eva last night?”

“Bad as could be. You really want specifics?”

He shook his head. “Why’d you cover? Why not call the cops?”

“Multiple reasons. Eva’d be in jail now, looking at lots worse than a possible drug rap. There was a dead guy in that loft who’s tied up with the Russian mob. He ran the kidnap scheme, I’m pretty sure, but no question Eva was in on it. She was walking around the streets of SoHo yesterday afternoon.”

“So?”

“This whole thing’s screwy, has been since the beginning. Like your former partner pointed out an hour ago, Tuesday, I meet Mulholland, who thinks his daughter’s been kidnapped. Then he gets arrested. He’s worried about his wife, but he doesn’t know who she really is. I go looking for the supposed kidnapper—Rad Rislyakov, a.k.a. Ratko Risly, big-time identity thief, screwing around with a small-time shakedown. Next thing I know, Lachko Barsukov—that’s right, that Lachko Barsukov—whom I haven’t seen in twenty-plus years, tells me to stay away from Ratko and applies some heavy pressure. But he doesn’t know about his ex-wife, now married to Mulholland, or his daughter, who’s screwing around with Rislyakov. Then I find Eva in Ratko’s hideaway, blotto, along with a corpse that’s probably Ratko. I also find Lachko’s father—right again, Iakov Barsukov—who has no reason to be there, except he says it’s Cheka business. I also find a computer that may tell me what Lachko is worried about and Victoria is looking for. Haven’t had a chance to check yet. So maybe I’m in a position to solve the mystery, help Eva, make a deal with Lachko, and possibly help Victoria, although I don’t know at the time I want to do that—but not if I call the cops. Make sense now?”