“What is it?” she asked anyway.
“Can you meet me?”
CHAPTER
40
SHE MET HIM at a bench on the boardwalk, the November day cold and gray, the wind wet, but not so strong that they couldn’t eat their sandwiches.
He grimaced when he saw the fading bruises along her temple and cheek.
“Fuck, Kendra,” he said. “I swear I didn’t know that was going to happen. You know I had nothing to do with this, right? They told me they’d sell you the coke.” He shook his head. “Fuckers. I can’t believe they did that to you.” Emphasis on the you.
He looked shaken, thinner, older, his corned beef on pumpernickel untouched on his lap. The tattoo winding above his wedding band rippled as he tapped his fingers. It was the names of his wife and son in an elegant spiral. For a confused moment Laney felt envious of his wife. Theo would never have gotten her name tattooed anywhere on his person, least of all his hands.
She glared at him. “Why are you surprised? That they did this to a woman?” She snorted. “They’re criminals, Owen. As are you. As am I. What kind of code of honor do you expect? Exactly? Hmmm?” She regretted her words immediately. She was stronger than that, she was her father’s daughter, not a princess, not a delicate flower. Why take it out on Hopper? She believed him (mostly) when he said he had no clue she’d been jumped. Things happen. You can’t control every situation, no matter how hard you prepare.
She picked at her meatball hero. Perhaps she snapped at him because she didn’t feel like herself. Her whole body still hurt, her face ached, and life had grown increasingly weird at home—Theo quiet and remote, Alfie clingier than ever. Also, that burn spot in the studio bugged her. She didn’t buy Theo’s bullshit about spilled paint and she couldn’t get a proper answer from Alfie. Their evasive silence worried her. Without acknowledging she’d been wrestling with a decision, her mind had announced its verdict that morning. She’d quit her undercover gig and transition to straightforward detective work. Maybe go to a squad. She had options. Yes, she loved her job, but Theo was right. She couldn’t keep placing herself in danger. She had to put her family first.
“I might be a criminal,” Hopper said, “but that doesn’t mean I’m not a gentleman.”
“Okay, so you always hold the door for a lady and you always pick up the check.” She tore a piece of bread off her hero, kneaded it into a tiny ball. “Could be that’s your problem.”
He frowned. Wrapped his uneaten lunch and shoved it back into its bag.
She said, “You know. We’ve talked about this stuff. You dress your family nice. You feed them nice. You take them nice places. Nicer than you can afford on your salary.” She should stop talking, but something had gotten a grip on her. “Maybe if you weren’t such a gentleman, you wouldn’t have to be a criminal.”
The line between his brows deepened, and he held her stare. “Why did you become a criminal, Kendra?” Cool voice, not angry, but sharp, irritated. “I mean, if we’re playing the how-we-got-to-this-moment-in-time game. What’s your story? Why are you hundreds of miles from your husband, buying for him, nearly getting yourself killed? Hmm? What’s he holding over you?” He squinted at her. “No, he’s not holding anything, is he? You just love him. And you’d do anything for him.” He turned away, shrugged. “I don’t know why you think you’re so different from me.”
Her face warmed at this, and she bit into her sandwich to hide her emotion because she’d allowed the conversation to get personal. His words were truer than he could possibly guess. No, she was definitely not herself today.
When she didn’t answer, he said, “One good thing came of that mess. That’s what I needed to talk to you about. Listen, Viktor trusts you now. He knows you were arrested along with Djugashvili.” He glanced again at her fading bruises, then slid his eyes to his lap with a wince, as if trying to erase what he saw.
For the next few minutes they sat in silence, her cheeks slowly cooling to their usual paleness, his knee jiggling up and down.
Then he said, “Orlov agreed to see you. He has a kilo of coke he needs to unload fast. He’ll meet with you tomorrow. You have to get that message to the cops. Today.”
And despite her soreness of body and mind, her frustration, at his words her heart thumped harder. She was off the case, and she’d need permission to go ahead. She might not be allowed. But as she busied herself with disposing the rest of her lunch, she entertained a moment of hope.
Let it happen, she said to herself. Let it come through, let me succeed. This last time, let me win, let me get the bad guy and I’ll quit. I’ll sit at a desk for the rest of my career.
As for the disquiet squeezing her chest, wasn’t it simply indigestion, bad food swallowed quickly?
CHAPTER
41
THE MEETING WITH Orlov took place in a restaurant called Baikal, amid the clatter of serving dishes, Eurodance thumping out of speakers, and extravagantly dressed diners shouting over the din.
She wasn’t supposed to be there. Had been explicitly told to leave it alone, no one trusted Hopper’s information anymore. The captain said no, the sergeant said no, Harry said no, and Kyle the newbie said, “How about I go?”
And then, just before she left for the day, Harry brought her a bag of shashliks wrapped in pita and took her aside. Wire up tomorrow, he said, keeping his voice low, his face neutral. It’s our last chance. I’ll be just outside, we can’t let this one go. Mike is behind us on this if anybody asks. Let’s get Orlov. I know you can.
She could have kissed him, she was so relieved. She’d get her one last chance to make this right.
Orlov sat with his back against the leather of a padded booth, which itself was at the far end of the restaurant, giving him an almost 180 view of the establishment. He wore a white shirt, no tie, top four buttons undone and exposing a whorl of tattoo on his chest, a gray suit, and Adidas Sambas. Laney noted the Rolex and the thin gold chain around his throat. A graying crew cut and sea-glass-blue eyes completed the Russian mobster look. She’d have known him for what he was even without the photographs hanging up at the station.
If she succeeded, Viktor Orlov was looking at ten to life, and the rest of his family would fall into her waiting lap like ripe plums.
She’d never worked a buy this big before; the stakes had never been this high. The thrill had kept her sleepless, and she’d risen that morning jumpy, glowing, laughing at something Alfie said without remembering it the next moment, giving Theo a deep, hungry kiss before throwing her Kendra clothes into a duffel and driving off to work.
A leather gym bag stuffed with twenty thousand dollars rested on a chair next to her. She hadn’t asked Harry what lie he’d concocted to get her here. And she sure as hell was not going to question him why he needed the secrecy. She didn’t care how she took Orlov down. She just wanted to be the one to do it.
She needed to negotiate the buy, needed Orlov to sell her a kilo of coke, or as near as he would be willing for the cash. If he asked her to go somewhere else, somewhere private for the transaction, she’d go. If asked to count the money, she’d give him the bag. The conversation would be recorded through the wire she wore under her red vinyl dress, and as soon as Harry felt they had enough evidence, he’d barrel in and make the arrest.
She sipped the sweet, red wine Orlov ordered for her and smiled. A heap of platters hid the round table between them—rosy beet salads, pickles, eggs deviled with caviar, buttered and peppered pelmeni, grilled kabobs tossed with glistening tomato slices, thick slabs of dark and white bread—and neither one of them had touched a crumb. Orlov had emptied half a liter of vodka and showed no sign of it, his posture as pugilistic and tense as when they first sat down.
“Mr. Orlov,” she said.
“Viktor, please.”
“Viktor.” Another smile, a not-especially-discreet glance at her phone. “I need to be somewhere in about a half hour. So maybe we can conclude our business?”
He grinn
ed and drank another mouthful of vodka. He’d been like this all afternoon—taciturn but friendly, avoiding any direct reference to the reason for their meeting. She’d been ready for danger, for a physical assault, subterfuge, trickery, but this sly discretion was driving her batty. Fine, she would walk away. See if he would go after her then. Twenty thousand in cash wasn’t big money, but it wasn’t nickels and dimes either. It would keep him and his cousins in Adidas footwear for at least a year.
She slid her phone into her purse, stood, and hefted the leather gym bag onto her shoulder.
“Viktor, I believe we have misunderstood each other.” She turned to leave. “You know how to get in touch with me if you decide to work with me.”
“Kendra,” he said, and she stopped. “Please sit down.”
She pretended to vacillate, then sat.
“You haven’t eaten anything,” he said. “This caviar is like the food of the gods. Ambrosia. Have some.”
She laughed. “Viktor, I gotta go.” Time to switch tactics. She leaned forward, pointed a bejeweled index finger at him. “Shit or get off the pot, as my pop used to say. Do you have coke for me or not? Tell me how much you want for it. I’ll give you twenty thou for a kilo.” He’d been sliding away from her innuendos for over an hour, and she was growing desperate.
Whether due to her inexperience, bad chemistry, or plain evil luck, Viktor Orlov glinted his blue eyes at her, finished the vodka in his glass, and said, “You mistake me for someone else. I am aware that illegal sales go on in our neighborhood, but I know absolutely nothing about them. I am deeply offended by your assumptions.” He rose to his feet, placed his cloth napkin on the table. “I wanted to treat you to true Russian hospitality. I did not expect this ridiculous slander.” And with that, he walked away, leaving her at a table laden with uneaten food and a bag glutted with unspent cash.
“Fucking Hopper,” she said, stunned, as she climbed into Harry’s car. “Did he lie to me? What just happened? Did someone tip Viktor off?”
“Like who?”
She tsked in irritation and said, “Harry, he knew exactly what was happening. He knew I was recording him, or why the ridiculous speech? Who was he talking to?”
Harry scowled, then nodded. “Someone tipped him off all right. He knew you were bugged.”
They drove in silence, stopped at a red light. She said, “You think Hopper is playing games?”
“I wouldn’t be surprised,” Harry murmured.
She believed the failed buy her fault for a long time. She hadn’t put Orlov at ease enough, or she didn’t see the lies in Hopper’s face. She heard what she wanted and ignored all else. The only thing she managed to get that day was Orlov’s straight-faced denials. On tape.
By the time she understood that was the entire reason for the dinner invitation, she had no choice but keep her mouth shut.
CHAPTER
42
IT TOOK LANEY nearly three hours to drive home from Brooklyn to Long Island after that absurd dinner with Orlov. Three accidents, one after another, snarled the BQE, bedeviled the LIE, closed lanes. She crawled forward, a few feet at a time, all the while replaying in her mind the fruitless strategies she’d attempted with the mobster sitting across that loaded-down table.
Everyone fails, and she had failed plenty in the past—that time her cover had blown in the Bronx and she had to move to another command or risk deadly violence. Or the time she had accidentally gotten into a random guy’s car after a buy because the car was exactly the color and make of her ghost’s. She still cringed (and laughed) at the driver’s shocked expression when suddenly presented with a disheveled crackhead in his passenger seat.
But for the most part, she’d been good. Good as a rookie, walking a post in midtown. Good when she joined the Street Narcotics Unit. Ultimately very good as an undercover. The failure with Orlov’s case didn’t sit well with her. She’d done everything right, more than right. She’d put extra hours, mounds of effort into catching this family, and nothing had come of it.
She inched forward, exhausted in body and mind, longing for her little house and its painterly odors, its quiet. She wanted to share a bottle of wine with Theo, do a puzzle with Alfie. She wanted to stuff all thoughts of Owen Hopper and Orlov and Harry into a trunk, close the lid, shove it under the bed. Or better yet, off a bridge.
By the time she arrived home, dinner time had long since passed, and Alfie, showered and pajamaed, was sprawled on the couch with a graphic novel, Theo sketching in the armchair by the standing lamp.
“Let’s go to the beach for the weekend!” she said. The day had been the last of her shifts for the week, and she could probably take an extra personal day. She’d do whatever she had to in order to spend time with her husband and son. Real time, not an hour here, an hour there. And away from the house, so that they could all be together, properly—no chores, no painting.
Theo looked up. God, he was beautiful. The creamy light contoured his cheekbone, flicked over his sculpted chin and nose, played with his tousled hair.
“It’s November,” he said.
“Indoor water park resort,” she said. “There’s one just outside Philly. Let’s do it.”
Alfie put his book down. “Water park?” he asked, tripping slightly on the p but finishing the word.
She smiled, the thought gripping her now. “Yes, come on. I’ll see if they have rooms. Okay?”
Alfie clapped his hands. “Yes!”
Theo turned back to his sketch pad. “If that’s what you want,” he said.
Fate smiled on Laney that night, whether as compensation for the previous weeks or as a last handout of happiness before the shitstorm to come. She booked three nights at CoCo Key Water Resort in Pennsylvania and spent the next couple of hours folding towels, bathing suits, snorkel masks, and beach shoes into duffel bags.
The following days were infused with humid, chlorine-scented languor, evenings at the resort’s bar while Alfie slept in their room. They rested, ate, watched their child play. She wanted to tell Theo about the case, no reason why she shouldn’t. But every time she started, he’d look somewhere to the side of her left ear and hold his body stiff, as if waiting for her to stop talking.
And even then she didn’t guess. She thought he was mulling over the latest technique he’d been trying out—something with beeswax that made the house smell strange, a combination of varnish and sweet resin. It wasn’t working the way he expected and he’d been staying up nights, the only time he had to himself, he said, to get it right. He always longed for his brushes and paints when they went away. She understood that.
Nothing seemed to draw Theo out of his moodiness, and Alfie was Alfie—silent, watchful, even in an inner tube, floating down an indoor river.
Still, the getaway helped. The distance from work gave her much-needed clarity. It wasn’t her place to save the world. It wasn’t up to her to apprehend every murderer and drug peddler. The job was the job, and life was life. She’d known too many cops who fused the two and lost everything bright in their existence. Cops who could only get through their off-duty hours by drinking themselves numb, who worked thirty, thirty-five years until even the NYPD didn’t want them anymore, then died a week after retirement.
She returned from the long weekend restored, having forgiven herself, mostly, for her failure. There’d always be more cases; she’d solve some and blunder others, and she was okay with this. She had to be. Anything else was vanity.
The next day, her son off to school without complaint for a change, her talented husband busy on a new canvas, she left for work with a light heart.
She signed in and headed to the locker room when the captain passed her, stopped, turned, placed his hand on her shoulder.
“Good work, Elaine,” he said. “You did good.”
She smiled, uncertain, but ready to take the compliment. “Sure,” she said.
Mike wasn’t at his desk, and neither was Harry.
She powered up the computer she shar
ed with the night-shift detective and turned to the sergeant on duty. “Hey,” she said, “what are you still doing here? Pulling a double?”
The sergeant looked like he was easily doing a triple, his eyes reddened and the skin under them bruised.
“Yeah,” he said. “What happened to you? You weren’t at the raid?”
“What raid?”
He sipped from an enormous mug of coffee with a baby’s footprint decal over blue text—My dad might be a cop, but I walk all over him.
He said, “That pharmacy you’ve been working. Your guys raided it. Raided the CI’s apartment too.” He whistled. “He’s going away for a loooong time.”
Adrenaline surged through her body before her mind fully processed what she just heard. Why hadn’t Harry told her? Even if he was above her in rank and maybe didn’t need to, still, they were friends.
“Did they get Orlov?” she asked, too loud.
He blinked, startled. “No,” he said. “Just the pharmacist.”
Her fingers tripping and missing keys, she logged into the system. No messages from Harry. Nothing on her phone.
What the hell, Harry? she texted, watched as the text was delivered, watched the three dots as Harry began an answer, watched the three dots disappear as he stopped without answering.
Mike Stegner didn’t answer her text either.
This didn’t make any sense. She pulled up the arrest paperwork and sat back in stunned frustration. Harry had arrested Hopper for prescription drug fraud, illegal possession of controlled substances with intent to sell, the sale of controlled substances, and then got a search warrant and found heaps of contraband at Hopper’s apartment—backpacks full of cocaine, over a hundred thousand in cash, suitcases stuffed with firearms.
She knew none of it was Hopper’s. He was absolutely manic about keeping his family out of his dealing. Even if he’d lied to her about his level of involvement, he would have never, ever put his wife and son in the kind of danger that comes from storing suitcases full of firearms. She was sure of it. And if it wasn’t Hopper’s and Harry knew it too (he must have) and arrested him anyway, then why? Whose contraband was it?
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