by Marvin Kaye
Parella leaned back in his chair and sighed. “What is it?”
I opened the manila folder and slid one of the photos of the Stevens girl over to him.
“Who’s this?”
“Her name is Suzie Stevens. Her mother is Andorra Stevens and her father is Armstrong Stevens the Third.”
Parella shrugged. “So he’s got three sticks at the end of his name. I’m supposed to be impressed?”
“A good friend of the Mayor. A very good friend.”
He arched his eyebrows.
“The girl is missing and I’m supposed to find her.”
“Sounds like a job for Missing Persons or the FBI.” His eyebrows were still arched.
“The Mayor and Stevens want this kept unofficial, out of the press.”
“So they picked you?”
“You think I can’t handle it?”
Parella grinned. “Oh, I know you can handle it, I just don’t know whether to believe you.”
“Would I kid you?”
He turned his head and tugged at an ear lobe. The eagle on his forearm was quivering again. He turned back and picked up the phone and punched in a number. “Hello, this is Lieutenant Parella of Brooklyn North Auto Crimes. Is the Mayor’s secretary around? . . . Oh, this is she. I’m trying to get a hold of Armstrong Stevens, is he with the Mayor right now?” Parella cupped his hand over the receiver and listened and nodded. “Lunch on Friday, you say. Thank you.”
Parella hung up the phone and smiled at me. “Doherty, you just may have picked a winner here.”
“Why do I feel otherwise, then?” I said. “This seems an impossible task.”
“Of course it is. Nobody could expect you to do the work of the Department or the FBI. Just go all out and turn in the best report you can. If the girl’s still missing, her father will have to go to the authorities.”
I wasn’t so sure but I said, “So you’ll help me, then?”
“Tell me what you need?”
I gave him the description of Andorra Stevens’s Lexus and the license plate number. “Can you run this through the Department computer and see if there are any traffic violations or accident reports and check with the Parking Violations Bureau about tickets—and where and when?—Also, can you run a credit check on her?”
“You know this is a serious breach of Department policy, don’t you?
“Lou, if I get the girl back, Stevens and the Mayor will know that it was with your help.”
Parella laughed. “Yeah, that and two bucks will get me on the subway.” He stood and offered me his hand. The eagle on his forearm was calm now. “I’ll ask Ike to help out. Just make sure this stays between the three of us.” He smiled a tired smile. “I guess it’s not too much for a friend of the Department.”
I smiled back and headed for the door. As I turned the knob, I stopped. “Do you still scuba?”
“Every chance I get. Which is not too often these days.”
“When this is over with, we’ll do a trip—on Stevens’s money.”
Parella waved me goodbye with a flick of his hand.
3
As I walked towards my car I was glad Lou Parella was willing to help, but I still felt uneasy. This case sure didn’t seem like a winner despite Lou’s pep talk. I couldn’t put my finger on it, couldn’t pin it down, but an ugly feeling had been lurking in my gut, right from the start, and when I drove away it was still with me. Whatever it was.
By the time I reached home I had stopped trying to figure it out but as I eased the Boxster into a parking space across the street from my apartment, Parella’s words were whispering in my ears. No one expects you to do what the Department and the FBI can do. I knew he was right and that bothered me, too, made me wonder if Stevens was more concerned about bad publicity than his little girl’s safety.
I was chewing this nasty thought over as I fumbled for the key to the building’s front door. I was about to insert it into the lock when a large hand rested on my shoulder and a voice said, “Here, let me help you.”
“No thanks,” I said as I pivoted and launched a solid right towards the middle of whoever was behind me. My fist landed with a hard thud. That was it, nothing else. I stared up into the dull brown eyes of a large square face about four inches higher than mine and connected to a body maybe fifty pounds heavier. All muscle.
“That wasn’t very nice, Mr. Doherty,” the voice said.
I was about to send another right to his midsection when the door opened behind me and someone wrapped a hairy forearm around my throat and the odor of Sen Sen flooded into my nostrils. Suddenly, I was being dragged inside as the tall man followed.
“Let’s go upstairs to your place, Mr. Doherty. Nice and easy so no one gets hurt.”
I tried to reach for the tall man but the hairy arm tightened around my neck, cutting the blood flow. Red spots formed in front of my eyes and I twisted left, then right, trying to loosen the hold before the circulation cut off caused me to lose consciousness.
“Easy, Chiefy,” the tall man said. “He’s no good to us dead.”
I felt myself being dragged further back inside towards the elevator. I was going under, smelling Sen Sen and watching the dancing red balls in front of me when suddenly the pressure eased.
“Are you going to give us any more trouble, Mr. Doherty?” the tall man asked.
I shook my head no.
Inside the elevator, they faced me towards the corner, Chiefy’s forearm still wrapped across my throat. While the car rose, the tall man took the house keys out of my hand and patted me down.
“He’s clean, you can ease up.”
Chiefy spun me around to face the tall man.
“We’re going into your apartment and have a little talk,” the tall man said. “A friendly little talk. No one gets hurt as long as long as you cooperate. And you are going to cooperate, aren’t you?”
I nodded my head.
When we reached my floor, Chiefy walked me to the end of the hall, his arm on my shoulder, real friendly like, the tall man with the square face following behind us. He handed the keys to Chiefy and said, “Open it and check the place out.” Inside, the foyer was dark and Chiefy groped for the light switch. Suddenly he screamed and hopped on one leg. I rammed a shoulder into him, turned and kicked the tall man in the groin. He gasped but didn’t fall, started to shake the pain off when I ducked inside and slammed the door.
Chiefy was still jiggling his leg and screaming when I punched him in the throat. He collapsed like a sack of rocks and lay on his side, gurgling. I took the keys out of his hand and frisked him quickly. The tall man was tapping gently on the door.
“It’s okay, Mr. Doherty, we’re not going to hurt you.”
I ignored him and continued going through Chiefy’s pockets. When I figured he was clean, I reached down and picked up Momma Sweet who was rubbing against my legs.
“Good girl,” I said, petting the top of her head. “You scared the hell out of Chiefy here.”
“Open the door, Mr. Doherty.”
“No thanks, I’m not in the mood for company.”
“Let Chiefy go then, we don’t want trouble any more than you do.”
“I like trouble. It breaks up the day.”
“Don’t be a wise guy, Mr. Doherty.”
I set Momma Sweet down. “I’m calling the cops,” I said.
“Don’t be that way, we just want to talk.”
I flipped on the foyer light. Chiefy was holding his throat, trying to sit up. Momma Sweet was hissing at him. I kicked Chiefy in the head and he keeled back over onto the floor. Momma Sweet seemed to like that.
“Talk about what?” I said through the door.
“Just let me in and I’ll take Chiefy and leave.”
“I’m calling the cops now.”
“Let me in.”
I didn’t answer, just looked at Chiefy curled up on the parquet wood, out cold.
“Mr. Doherty?”
I stayed quiet, not moving.
“Let me speak to Chiefy,” the tall man said.
“I’m afraid he’s indisposed.” I looked at the ugly purple welt on the unconscious man’s forehead.
After a long moment. “Okay, I’m leaving but you’re going to lose out on a big pay day.”
“Pay day for what?” Despite my better sense, I had to ask.
“We want you to find someone. It’s worth ten large. Five thousand in cash now, the rest on delivery.” The tall man’s voice was almost a whisper through the metal door.
“Who?”
“Andorra Stevens, the woman you’re already looking for. But when you find her, you tell us instead of her husband.”
“Why so much money?”
“Whaddya care? Don’t be smart and ask too many questions. Just take the money and find the Stevens woman.”
“I’m not looking for her; I’m looking for her daughter.”
“Same thing. Find one, find the other,” he said.
“Give me a number. I’ll think about it and call you.”
“I don’t think so. I’m leaving an envelope with fifty c-notes outside your door. If you want the job, take the money. Otherwise, put it in Chiefy’s pocket.”
I didn’t answer him.
After another long moment, he said, “I’m going now. Be smart and take the deal.”
I waited fifteen minutes, then I cracked open the door and peered out. The hallway was deserted, only a lone fly was buzzing on a window pane. It was a helluva of an effort getting Chiefy downstairs and out of the building. I was exhausted but I managed to prop him up in a sitting position against the wall of the movie theatre on the corner, figuring a radio motor patrol from the eight-four would come by and toss him in the drunk tank.
By the time I parked the Boxster across the street from the Brooklyn North Auto Crimes office, I had calmed back down. In the police parking lot was the shiny black Chevy Tahoe. I couldn’t see through the tinted windows so I had no idea whether it was occupied. But it didn’t take me long to find out.
Lou Parella handed me a cup of coffee and led me back toward his office. It was completely different than just a few hours ago. The a/c unit was humming silently, pushing drafts of cold air towards me. Parella’s desk was clean of paperwork, only a new blotter and the phone bank rested on its polished surface. Gone were the stacks of case folders on his couch and in their place sat a sandy-haired man in a dark suit. Lounging in a leather chair next to him was another man, sporting a shaved head and goatee, in a similar dark suit. His skull gleamed like Kojak’s but his physique would put a professional wrestler to shame. He was the older of the two but he looked over at his sandy-haired companion, as if to take his cues from him.
It wouldn’t be unusual for Parella to have a couple of detectives in his office to discuss ongoing cases, after all it was his job to supervise. But I knew that this pair, with their nondescript black suits and nondescript navy blue ties, were not NYPD.
“Ray Littlefield and Jim Bowman,” Parella nodded at the man on the couch, then at the one in the leather chair. “They’re with the Treasury Department.”
“So this is the formal introduction?” I said. “It seems like we’ve already become friends, sort of.”
Littlefield gave a short laugh. “I figured you would make our tail. I told Jim he should have let me drive; he likes to cowboy a bit too much. Hey, no harm done; actually we’re glad to meet you face to face.”
I sipped some of Parella’s lousy coffee. “Why is that?”
“So we can tell you to stop looking for Andorra Stevens, you’re interfering with a government investigation.”
“You know where she is?”
“We have a pretty good idea.” This came from Bowman. Littlefield threw him an annoyed look, then said, “We really would like you to back off.”
“What if I don’t?”
“That would be a very foolish decision on your part,” he said. “There’s a lot at stake here, much more than the penny ante fee you’re earning. We don’t need you stumbling around and screwing everything up.”
I sat on the corner of Parella’s desk and stared at Littlefield. “I’ve done a lot of very foolish things in my life, why should I stop now?”
“Because the nation’s security may be at risk,” Bowman said.
Littlefield shot him another annoying look.
“So tell me about it,” I said.
Littlefield rubbed his chin. “Doherty, you keep this up, you’re going to find yourself in serious trouble.”
“What I’m finding is a cloud of smoke you’re trying to blow up me.” I turned to Parella. “Lou, did you bring these guys here to give me the okie-doke?”
He raised his hands palms up. “Not my doing. They just invited themselves in.” He looked at Littlefield. “Doherty has always been a friend of the Department, he’s not a troublemaker.”
“Could have fooled me,” Bowman said.
Littlefield rubbed his chin again and took a deep breath. “This is a classified matter but I can tell you this much, Armstrong Stevens owns a large hedge fund. Omega Global.”
“I knew that.”
He ignored my interjection and continued. “They invest in gold, copper, foreign currencies.”
“I know that, too.”
“Did you know that they also invest in strategic metals like titanium, molybdenum and uranium ore?”
I didn’t know that, so I sipped my coffee and decided to keep my smart mouth shut.
“Stevens also owns a shipping company. Omega Global Freight Line and he’s able to make off the radar bulk deliveries around the world.”
I didn’t know that, either, and it must have showed on my face.
Littlefield took a deep breath. “That’s right. Most of his trading is away from the commercial exchanges and there’s much room to disguise the transactions and hide income from taxation. Lots of income.”
“What’s this got to do with his wife and little girl?” I asked.
Littlefield took another deep breath and let it out slowly as if he was unsure how to continue. “We believe Andorra Stevens can give us information about her husband’s hidden assets.”
It was my turn to take a deep breath. “What makes you think that?”
“We’ve spoken to her about it.”
I eased myself off the desk and stood in front of Littlefield. “When? Where is she? Is her daughter with her?”
“Easy, pard,” Littlefield said. “We briefly interviewed her a few weeks ago. Then she took a powder.”
“But you said you know where she is.” I leaned towards his face.
“I said that we have a pretty good idea. If we had our hands on her, we wouldn’t be talking to you. Now, back off.”
I sat back on the edge of the desk and drank the rest of my coffee, grimacing at its sour taste and the even more sour news Littlefield was giving me.
“That bad, huh?” Bowman said.
“That bad.”
“Hey, don’t insult my coffee, it’s free. You can always go to Starbucks.”
“Sorry, Lou,” I said. Turning back to Littlefield, “I was retained to work a case and that is to bring a little girl back to her father. I know where the mother isn’t and you know where she might be, so why don’t we join forces?”
Littlefield shook his head. “It’s not that simple. Stevens has powerful friends in Washington. It would be bad enough if they learned we were investigating him, but that we somehow co-opted an attorney he retained on a legal matter …” his voice t
railed off, yet I caught his drift.
Bowman leaned forward. “We’d like to get the little girl as much as you do,” he said.
Again, Littlefield shot him a glaring look. And I had figured out why. If the feds had little Suzie in their custody, they could secure Andorra Stevens’ cooperation. What a great bunch.
“Is that why you sent those two goons to my apartment, to buy my assistance and to threaten me?”
“What goons?” Littlefield said.
“Yeah, Doherty, what goons?” Parella chimed in.
I ran down the story to them, how I was yoked in my doorway and forced upstairs by the tall man and Chiefy, and the struggle and the ten thousand dollar offer to find Andorra Stevens.
While I spoke, Bowman scribbled some notes and when I was done, Littlefield leaned back and spread his arms out along the couch. “You see what we mean, Doherty? It’s a big league game and there are a lot of players. A broken down valise like you doesn’t stand a chance on this trip.”
“I seem to have done okay,” I said.
“That’s because those two jamokes had orders to talk to you, not clip you.”
Littlefield had a point, I could see that. I looked at Parella. “Those two guys familiar to you?” I asked him.
He rubbed his eyes. “I’m afraid so.” He let out a sigh. “A couple of small-time hoods from Brighton Beach, connected with Mo Vinogradov. I had them in here last year for questioning about an auto junkyard murder. Nothing on them, though. I can have my boys pick them up on attempted robbery charges if you want?”
“What? And help these guys out?” I jerked my thumb at Bowman. “Like the man said, they’re a lot of players in the game, someone’s bound to get lucky and find the Stevens woman.”
“So you won’t back off?” Littlefield said.