by R. J. Jagger
“Yoan Foca—”
“Right. Yoan Foca.”
“Why?”
“He has henchmen out here in San Francisco that are a heartbeat away from killing someone. I’d like to figure out who those henchmen are.”
He hung up and said to Del Rey, “I’m not a huge fan of Rail’s style but I have to agree with him that Dandan is playing at an end-game that’s about to take her down.”
“So what do we do?”
“We find her and knock some sense into her.”
95
Day Ten
July 17
Thursday Morning
An hour passed and nothing good happened. Dandan hadn’t shown up at the Green Dragon, the kimono girl had no new information and Teffinger had no idea where to look next. Then Sydney called and said, “Get a pencil, here’s the address of where that cell phone connected.”
Teffinger’s blood raced as he wrote it down.
“It didn’t come easy,” Sydney said. “I officially owe two blowjobs. Plus—”
“Syd, I got to cut you short, I’m sorry, I’ll explain later. Good work. No, not good work, great work. I’ll call you later today.”
He hung up.
The address was in Chinatown, two blocks from the Green Dragon, and belonged to a small shop that sold pastries and tea and coffee. Dandan wasn’t there. The customers were few. Teffinger smiled at the woman behind the counter and said, “I’m looking for Dandan. Do you know her?”
“No Dandan.”
“Does that mean she’s not here or you don’t know her?”
“Know no Dandan.”
Teffinger’s shoulders went limp.
“Okay, thanks.”
Outside a stiff wind blew.
Teffinger called the woman’s cell phone again. Like every time before, he got nothing. She had destroyed the phone just like she said she would.
“Now what?” Del Rey said.
Teffinger surveyed the street.
There was buzz, cold buzz, cold buzz that wouldn’t help him.
Then he looked up.
Above the shop were two stories, both living quarters judging by the window coverings and the balconies.
“She’s staying in one of those,” he said. “That’s where she was when my call connected.”
“How do you know?”
“Because it’s time for something in my life to work out the way it’s supposed to.”
The entrance was a plain wooden door to the right of the shop labeled Private, invisible unless you were looking for it. They quietly climbed narrow wooden stairs to the second level and listened at the door. No sounds came from inside. They continued up and listed at the top door. From inside came the sounds of kids speaking in Chinese and the occasional muttering of a woman who wasn’t Dandan.
They went back to the second floor.
No sounds came from behind the door.
Teffinger tried the knob.
It was locked.
He knocked.
No one answered.
“Come on,” Teffinger said.
They headed down onto the street and then found an alley that led to the back of the building. As suspected, a fire escape ran up the side, a beautiful, beautiful fire escape. Teffinger scouted up and down the alley. A few eyes were around but none were paying attention.
They headed up to the second floor landing.
A window was open.
It had no screen.
A fan was blowing.
Teffinger poked his head in just in time to see the backside of a woman darting out the front door.
It was Dandan.
“Dandan! Hold on!”
She didn’t even slow enough to slam the door behind her.
Her footsteps pounded down the stairs.
Teffinger wedged through the window, twisting and struggling a lot more than he expected. Then he was across the room and down the stairs.
At street level he looked to the right.
She wasn’t in sight.
He looked to the left.
She wasn’t that way either.
He checked both directions again, got nothing, and then raced to the right with a fifty-fifty chance.
96
Day Ten
July 17
Thursday Morning
Teffinger’s sprint to the right turned out to be a bad, bad, very bad choice. Dandan didn’t appear ahead of him, not in fifty steps, not in half a block and not in a full block, at which point he gave up. Del Rey wasn’t at street level when he got back to the apartment. He found her inside with the door closed.
In front of her, on a small kitchen table, was an aluminum case.
It was open.
The Van Gogh was inside.
“This was under the bed,” she said. “Is this it?”
He nodded.
“Yeah, that’s it.”
“It’s okay,” she said. “But to be honest, I don’t know if I’d hang it on a wall.”
“You’re in luck then because you’ll never have to.”
She smiled and closed it up.
“Let’s go.”
He considered it and then surprised himself by sitting down.
“We’ll wait for Dandan to come back,” he said.
“What for? We don’t need her anymore—”
That was true.
“It’s her life on the line,” he said. “She deserves a say in what happens.”
Del Rey tilted her head.
“I thought we already concluded that the painting would kill her if she tried to hang onto it. I thought getting it away from her was her only chance at living.”
He nodded.
“It is.”
“So what’s the issue?”
“The issue is it’s her life,” he said. “She deserves a say in it.”
“Yeah, but if she says anything other than get rid of the damn thing, she’ll be dead. There is no other right answer, none, not now, not tomorrow, not next year. If she gave any other answer, all that would mean is that she’s not thinking clearly enough to save herself. She’s too drunk with the money, which will never come. Plus, don’t forget about Susan Smith.”
“I haven’t.”
“Personally I think Rail’s lying through his lips when he says she’s still alive, but you never know. The only way to find out for sure is to give him the painting.”
Half a pot of coffee was on the counter.
Teffinger found a cup, splashed a little milk in and topped it off from the pot.
It was hot.
It was good.
“We’ll wait for Dandan,” he said.
Del Rey shook her head.
“I can’t believe you’re doing this.”
He took a careful slurp.
“They might kill her even if we turn the painting over,” he said.
“Well, that’s a risk she took when she stole it,” Del Rey said. “We didn’t get her into this mess. She got herself into it. So, yeah, they might kill her on general principles even if we turn it over. But they’ll definitely kill her if we don’t.”
Teffinger nodded.
That was true.
“I want her to turn it over voluntarily,” he said. “I think that will bode better for her. Rail was going to give her a million for it. Maybe we’ll go back to that arrangement. Then at least she’ll have some money to help her disappear.”
His phone rang.
It was Leigh, the profiler.
Teffinger took a sip of coffee and said, “What do you got?”
“Did I just hear coffee?”
“Yeah, sorry.”
“You’re drinking coffee?”
“Yes.”
“While you’re driving somewhere?”
“No, I’m sitting at a table.”
“You’re sitting at a table drinking coffee?”
“Yes.”
“How come I’m busting my butt on your case—repeat, your case, not mine—while you’re s
itting at a table drinking coffee?”
“Because you’re a better person than me.”
“This is wrong, Teffinger, this is wrong on so many levels that I don’t even know where to begin.”
He took another sip, a noisy one.
“Ah, good. Don’t worry,” he said. “I’m going to do some work tomorrow, or the day after for sure. Now, tell me what you got. This is about my little Havana friend, Yoan Foca, right?”
It was.
It was indeed.
What she had to say about the man wasn’t pretty.
He was a mean, powerful bastard.
He was a mean, powerful bastard who rode the riches of drugs, weapons, human trafficking, extortion, computer crimes, political rigging, and all the filthy little things in between.
He was the uncontrolled and uncontrollable King Kong of Cuba, rich beyond numbers, although that wasn’t his defining mark. No, that honor went to his power. Inside the country he had a network of lawyers, judges and politicians slithering up to his feet with puckered lips whenever they were summoned. Outside Cuba he was networked into the deepest depths of filth and violence.
The smart thing was to never become his enemy.
He could reach you no matter where you were in the world.
His arms were long and stretched across oceans.
His primary areas of operation were Mexico, the Middle East, the Bahamas and Europe. All of it was orchestrated from his compound outside of Havana, which he never, ever left.
Because of his size and the ripple effect into the United States of what he did in Mexico, the CIA kept him in its peripheral vision. To date, though, as far as they knew, he’d been smart enough to stay outside the borders. There was no current operation in progress to take him down in whole or part.
The compound sat on a hundred barbwire-encased acres, meticulously monitored with weapons, dogs and cameras. Inside were three mansions, each more opulent than the other, each with ready access to a labyrinth of tunnels and secret escapes.
He liked women, young women, young women of all races and designs, and maintained a well-stocked supply.
Teffinger hung up, grabbed the Van Gogh and said, “Let’s go.”
“I thought we were waiting for Dandan.”
He hesitated, then scribbled a note, “Call me,” followed by his cell phone number, and set it on the counter.
“There’s only one right answer,” he said. “We need to get the painting back to this Yoan Boca guy. Otherwise Dandan is dead a hundred times over.”
“I thought you were going to give her a say—”
“I was but now I’m at the point where it doesn’t matter what she says,” he said. “She works at an ad agency. This other world that she’s strayed into is just words and blurred images to her. I don’t think she appreciates just how real it is.”
Del Rey headed for the door.
“Okay, your call,” she said. “But I don’t like putting the target around your neck instead of hers. Call me selfish but that’s the way I feel.”
“Our neck,” he said. “Not my neck.”
“Yeah, thanks for that, by the way.”
“It’s only temporary. Hopefully this will all be wrapped up by the end of the day.”
Del Rey shifted her feet.
“Do you think it’s smart to leave your number? What if Boca’s men show up and find it?”
“That’s fine. That will give me a chance to tell them Dandan doesn’t have the painting any more.”
97
Day Ten
July 17
Thursday Afternoon
Ten minutes, that’s how short a time it took for Dandan to call Teffinger after he left. “Damn you to hell,” she said. “I told you about that painting in trust. I trusted you, you son-of-a-bitch.”
“Savina Bandini got murdered last night,” he said.
“Bullshit.”
“It’s true,” Teffinger said. “Rail told me and then I verified it on the web. You’re next.”
Silence.
“Who killed her?”
“Who do you think? When you stole the painting you didn’t steal it from Rail, you stole it from his client, who’s a Cuban guy named Yoan Foca.”
“I never heard of him.”
“Good because you don’t want to.”
“Is he the one who killed Savina?”
“Yes, his men, technically, but yes.”
The woman exhaled.
“I don’t have time for this stuff. I have to deliver that painting at three o’clock.”
“That’s not going to happen.”
“It’s already been bought,” she said. “Do you know who bought it?”
“No,” Teffinger said. “I’ve actually been wondering about that.”
“Mun Yin. He operates out of Hong Kong,” she said. “Everything nasty that happens in that part of the world, he’s got his hands in. I don’t know who your little Cuban friend is, but there’s one thing I know. I’m not going to screw around with Mun Yin.”
Teffinger exhaled.
“Has he actually paid for the painting?”
“He’s paid ten million of it,” she said. “That was wired to a Cayman account Savina has.”
“How about you? Did she send any to you yet?”
“No.”
“So you don’t have any money in hand to give back to the guy—Mun Yin?”
“No, plus you don’t understand, that’s not the way this works,” she said. “He bought the painting. He’s already paid half. He’s entitled to the painting.” A beat then, “After I deliver it I can tell him what happened to Savina. I’ll have him pay the balance directly to me.”
“He’ll blow you off.”
“I don’t think so.”
“So you’re still looking for money, even after all this—”
“I’m looking to complete a deal that’s already half done,” she said. “He’s not going to be too happy with this Cuban guy who killed Savina. That guy better watch out. I want the painting back and I want it back now. If you don’t give it to me then I’m going to show up at three o’clock and tell them who took it. Then you better watch out.”
Teffinger cocked his head.
“Call me back in an hour,” he said.
Then he hung up.
In the 4Runner heading east on Market with the Van Gogh in the back, he called Leigh Sandt to see if she could get him a read on Mun Yin. Twenty minutes later she got back to him with pretty much what he expected.
Mun Yin was an even deadlier dog than Yoan Foca.
It was almost noon.
He looked at Del Rey and said, “Are you hungry?”
“Starved.”
“Keep your eyes out for a drive-thru. I don’t want to leave the painting alone.”
She put a hand on his shoulder.
“You can’t save Dandan,” she said.
“So what would you do if you were me?”
“I’d just give her back the painting and let her decide which is the lesser of the two evils. She seems to think it’s the Cuban guy. I tend to agree with her. If she carries through with the Mun Yin sale, maybe he’ll actually pay the balance directly to her. That way at least she’d have a good chunk of cash to help her disappear. Plus, maybe Mun Yin will kill the Cuban guy for killing Savina and trying to hijack the deal. If that happens then Dandan will have the problem solved at both ends.”
He spotted a McDonalds and swung in.
“I can already taste the fries,” he said.
Fifteen minutes later, back on the road with a cheeseburger in his left hand and fries wedged in the console, Teffinger got the call from Dandan, exactly one hour from when they last spoke.
“You can have the painting back,” he said.
“I can?”
“Yes. Go up to Twin Peaks and pull into the viewing area,” he said. “I’ll be in a white 4Runner. Don’t look at me and don’t park next to me. Get out of your car, take a look at the view for a few
minutes, then get back in your car and pull away. Call me while you’re driving. I’ll follow you. When I’m sure no one’s on your tail, I’ll let you know to pull over and you can have the painting.”
“Fine. When?”
“I’ll be up there in half an hour. Tell me something first. We found a porno DVD at your apartment.”
“With Kelly Nine—”
“Right. Where’d you get it?”
“Someone came across it on the Internet,” she said. “He knew Kelly and thought it was her but he wasn’t sure. He downloaded part of it onto a DVD and sent it to me to get my opinion, which was that it was definitely her.”
“You never told me about it,” Teffinger said.
“She was dead,” Dandan said. “I didn’t see a need to tarnish her reputation.”
“It has something to do with why she got marked for murder.”
“Then you know more than me.”
Teffinger exhaled.
“Who’s going to help you deliver the painting this afternoon?”
“No one.”
“Think about whether you want me to come along.”
He hung up.
Del Rey wasn’t impressed.
“You’re a homicide detective, not a stolen arts dealer.”
“True, but I’m also all she has.”
“Nick, listen to yourself. She’s a criminal at this point. Homicide detectives aren’t supposed to spend their days helping criminals commit their crimes. We came here to catch Rail, remember? Why? Because he killed that investigator back in Denver.”
“And he took Susan Smith.”
“Right. So why aren’t we focused on Rail?”
He shoved a fry in his mouth.
“Remember when we were at your house and it was storming out with all the lightning and you danced for me all sexy and everything?”
“Yes.”
“That was nice,” he said.
98
Day Ten
July 17
Thursday Afternoon
At the top of Twin Peaks, Dandan pulled the Targa into one of the few empty parking spaces unclaimed by tourists, which happened to be four down from Teffinger’s 4Runner. There she got out, slipped on sunglasses and walked to the guardrail to take in the panoramic view of the relentless congestion that stretched in all directions until it got slapped to a stop by water.