“Maybe.”
“Yeah, I know,” Marc said with a resigned sigh. “Maybe. We’ll wait and see.”
“The longer they’re out it’s probably the better for you. I have work to do. You can take me to dinner later. Did you get paid?”
“No, not everything and I can’t get McElhenney, the guy from Prentiss’ firm to return my calls. He said he would pay my bill,” Marc said as he stood up to leave. “Hey, want to bounce around on the couch again?”
“That’s really tempting,” Margaret answered laughing. “But I’ll pass this time.”
“We can leave the door open. Maybe attract an audience?”
“Will you stop?” she laughed again.
“If you get bored, I’m going across the street to Peterson’s and get some coffee.”
“I’m trying to get through this stack of files so I can take off at noon tomorrow,” she said. “I’ll probably be late tonight.” She winked at him and said, “How about spending the weekend at my place. If you’re a good boy you might get lucky.”
“Deal,” he answered her wiggling his eyebrows. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
Marc spent the next morning, Friday, in the office catching up on his neglected files. He updated his billing on the Prentiss case and swallowed hard at the amount he was still owed. He placed a call to Carter McElhenney to talk to him about the bill McElhenney had guaranteed. Not surprisingly, being a Friday during the summer, McElhenney was gone for the weekend. Marc prepared the bill for mailing and placed it in the outgoing mail on Carolyn’s desk.
A few minutes later he received a call from Judge Rios’ clerk. The jury had a question for the judge and did Marc want to be there?
He arrived at the already full courtroom just before 11:00 A.M., greeted Steve Gondeck and took a seat at the defense table. Prentiss had been brought up and was waiting for him when he sat down.
The jury came out and Judge Rios read aloud the question they had. They wanted to hear the definition of premeditated as it relates to the first charge.
While Rios patiently went over it for them, Marc was thinking they were having problems with one of the first-degree murder charges, but they weren’t buying into the suicide story.
The jury went back to their deliberations and the courtroom emptied. Marc tried to reassure Prentiss that the jury’s question didn’t necessarily mean anything but Prentiss had been on the bench long enough to know better.
While the deputy escorted his client back to jail, Marc went to Margaret’s courtroom again. She was in chambers on a conference call so he waited in the hallway next to her clerk’s desk. When she finished her call, her clerk, Lois, called her to let her know Marc was waiting. A minute later, Margaret came out visibly annoyed.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“Lawyers! Don’t talk to me. You’re one of them,” she steamed.
“Now what?” he said, stifling a laugh.
She stuck an index finger in his face and said, “Don’t you dare laugh at me. Men, lawyers, you’re all the same. Worthless,” she continued as she walked down the hallway to the doors by the elevators.
Marc had raised his hands in surrender and stood in the hallway as she walked away. He maintained this position as she stomped angrily toward the doors. She was almost there, still muttering about lawyers, when she finally noticed he wasn’t with her. She turned around and saw him standing where she left, both arms still raised.
“Hey! Get your ass over here,” she said. “Remember, I’m a judge. I can put you in jail anytime I want.”
As he walked up to her, he quietly asked, “Okay, what’s wrong?”
“I have an emergency hearing this afternoon. I was trying to get out of here early today and now this. That’s what the phone call was about. These two dipshits in a civil case are doing a deposition and they’re arguing about it. They’ll be here at 2:00 to have me resolve it for them. They’re like a couple of kids on the playground squabbling just so they can bill more time. Because you’re one of them you can buy me lunch and maybe that will make me feel better.”
After they had lunch, Margaret went back to her courtroom for her hearing and Marc went to check in with Rios to see if anything was going on. He went in and saw several people still hanging around from the morning. He went back to the hallway where the judge’s chambers were located just as a deputy was exiting the door to the judge’s clerk’s desk. The deputy saw Marc and said, “They’re in.”
A half hour later, the jury and all of the participants had returned. The judge took a couple of minutes to admonish everyone about decorum and behavior. She then took the jury forms from the deputy. Rios read them over then handed them back to the deputy who gave them to the forewoman. Prentiss and Marc stood up and faced the jury.
The forewoman, Dorothy Burk, stood up and in a clear and strong voice went over each charge.
“To the charge of murder in the first-degree with premeditation, we find the defendant not guilty.
“To the charge of murder in the first-degree arising from domestic abuse; we find the defendant guilty.
“To the charge of murder in the second degree; we find the-defendant guilty and to the charge of manslaughter in the first-degree we find the defendant not guilty.”
When Prentiss heard the not guilty to the first charge, his hopes began to soar. The two guilty verdicts had brought him crashing back to reality, but he managed to maintain his composure despite the hollowness in his stomach.
Judge Rios polled the jurors as a group. Having received no dissent, she thanked them for their service and dismissed them. The judge then set a date for sentencing for one month from that day and gaveled the case closed. Since Minnesota called for a mandatory life sentence for the first-degree murder conviction, the only question would be how much additional time Rios would give him for the second-degree conviction and if they would run concurrently. Either way, Prentiss was looking at a minimum of thirty years.
Gabriella Shriqui stared into the camera outside the government center and solemnly informed Melinda’s audience what the verdict was. Melinda was practically giddy at the news that Gordon Prentiss was going to likely spend the rest of his life in prison. While Melinda prattled on about how justice had finally been served on the former judge, Gabriella found herself thinking how lucky Melinda was that he had been convicted. Otherwise, he could have sued her, the TV station and maybe even Gabriella for the things Melinda had said during the trial.
EIGHTY-EIGHT
Vivian Donahue walked out of the mansion through the front door and went quickly down the front steps to the waiting car. The man from her security detail was holding the driver’s door for her as she slipped into the driver’s seat of the small Buick SUV.
Before he closed the door, the man said, “Mrs. Donahue, this is a really bad idea. You shouldn’t leave without us and you certainly shouldn’t go somewhere without telling us where you’re going.”
“I know, Jerry,” she said. “We’ve been over this. Chalk it up to me being a head strong, old lady. Now, please close the door and step back.”
He did as she asked and watched as the taillights receded into the night. Before he retrieved the car for her she had insisted he not call anyone to tell them she was doing this. She simply said she had someplace to go and it would be all right.
When he could no longer see the car’s lights, he quietly said to himself, “I don’t care if it gets me fired, I’m calling Carvelli.”
Within a minute the security guard had Tony Carvelli on the phone. Tony was obviously extremely displeased but not with the bodyguard. He was furious with Vivian Donahue.
“It’s okay, Jerry. I think I know where she’s going. You stay put and I’ll get back to you.”
The day before, Saturday afternoon, she had received an envelope delivered by FEDEX. In it was a letter from Dante Ferraro bringing her up-to-date on the Leo Balkus situation. It was now almost midnight on Sunday night and Vivian’s curiosity had gotten t
he better of her. Or, more likely, having been the one to set this chain of events in motion, she was determined to see it through to its conclusion.
Dante’s letter had informed her that the Russians had put a recon team in place two days prior to her receipt of the letter. They had found Leo and the decision was made to move in on him at his restaurant on Sunday night. The place closed early, midnight, and there would be minimal concern of interference.
Vivian drove the car into the parking lot of a small office building behind the restaurant. She parked in the back with an unobstructed view of the back door leading into Leo’s office. She shut off the car’s engine, removed the small field glasses from her purse and waited to see what might transpire.
Unknown to Vivian, Tony had guessed right about where she might be headed. He had arrived about two minutes before her and was parked on the same street behind The Blue Lady. After she passed him, he waited while she drove to where she had parked. Tony was now standing less than fifty feet from her behind a large maple tree. He watched and stood guard while she stared at the back of the restaurant.
For the past few days, since Ike’s body had been so gruesomely delivered, Leo had taken extra precautions. Even though he had Nathan Tollman wire the rest of the hit money to Charlie, Leo was still being very cautious. The hired assassin was not someone to trust or assume would simply go away happy. Normally, either Ike or Johnny Czernak would serve as a bodyguard. With Charlie possibly still out there and Johnny’s arm still in a sling, Leo had brought in three more men to help out.
Leo was seated at his desk at closing time. The restaurant should be empty and he was getting impatient to leave. He got up from the desk to check up front to find his men, went to the office door, opened it and received the shock of his life. Kneeling on the floor, their hands flex cuffed behind them and black hoods over their heads, were all four bodyguards. Standing over them, holding an automatic pistol was a very attractive woman, the female partner of the Russian recon team. Holding a Makarov semi-automatic handgun six inches from Leo’s face, was the male member.
“Please,” the man said in perfect English, “we will use your office.” He quickly frisked Leo for weapons then pointed the handgun at the chair Leo had been sitting in. Leo silently went back to his desk and sat down.
While he did this, the woman began tapping each of Leo’s goons on the shoulder saying, “Up, up,” and pushed them into the office. Once there, she kicked each of them behind the knee, dropping all four of them kneeling on the floor.
“What do you want?” Leo asked with more calm than he felt.
Without answering, the man secured Leo’s arms to the arms of the chair with flex cuffs, shoved a towel in his mouth and indicated he should be quiet. While he did this, the woman unlocked the back door and four more men all dressed identically in black, unidentifiable clothing, quickly entered from a large delivery truck that was parked at the door.
One of the newcomers removed an electronic device that looked like a large iPhone. He used it to get a good, clean set of Leo’s fingerprints from both hands and quickly transmitted them for verification. While they waited, two of the men went out into the restaurant to be sure it was secure and empty and a third one began working on the locks to Leo’s file cabinets.
While this was taking place, it had sunk into Leo’s brain who these people likely were and he was looking them over with terror in his eyes. One of the four men from the truck, obviously the leader, sat down on the edge of Leo’s desk and silently stared at him. In less than ten minutes his phone beeped and he looked at the text message. It was in a simple code, but the meaning was clear. The identification had come back 100% positive.
He replaced the phone in his pocket, leaned over the desk almost nose-to-nose with Leo and spoke for the first time. In Russian he said, “Hello, Grigory. I am very happy to see you again. You don’t remember me, but I remember you.” By this point, Leo was thrashing about trying to break the flex cuffs and yelling muffled obscenities into the towel in his mouth.
“I must tell you how impressed I am at the job your plastic surgeon did to disguise you for your American friends. But fingerprints don’t lie.”
The man waved a finger at two of the men and said, “Get the box. We have what we came for.” He turned back to Leo and said, “I am told to tell you, President Markoff is very anxious to see you again. He is looking forward to personally welcoming you back to the Motherland.”
At that moment the woman leaned over Leo, wiped his neck with an alcohol swab while holding a syringe in her other hand. Leo, a terrified look on his face, shook his head back and forth to avoid the needle. The leader grabbed him by the chin and said, “Relax. It is a sedative. You’ll have a nice, peaceful flight. Then tomorrow you will wake up among old friends back in Moscow.” He nodded his head at the woman who expertly plunged the needle into Leo’s jugular. Within seconds he began to nod off and in less than a minute the soon-to-be former gangster was out cold.
The men who had left came back in carrying a large wooden box with several holes drilled into the sides. They set it on the floor and took off the lid revealing a nicely padded interior. The cuffs were removed from Leo and he was gently laid down in the box. The lid was replaced and secured and one of the men placed several official looking stickers over the edges. These proclaimed the contents to be official property of the Russian federation and as such, not subject to customs inspection. Leo was going home in a diplomatic pouch.
At that point, the man who had been picking the file cabinet locks got the last one open. While the woman watched over the bodyguards, the lock picker began throwing the file cabinet contents onto the floor.
The other four men loaded the box with Leo in it into the truck and each came back carrying two, five-gallon gasoline containers. Each had a fifty-fifty mixture of gas and diesel fuel. The men took the containers into the bar and restaurant and poured the contents of seven of them around the building.
They went back into Leo’s office and got the bodyguards to their feet. The leader began pouring the fuel onto the contents of Leo’s file cabinets and said to the woman, “Get them out of here,” indicating the bodyguards. “Take them into the field behind us and leave them.”
She raised her eyebrows to the man as the bodyguards stood up. The leader said, “No, do not hurt them. We are not monsters. We got what we came for. Cuff their ankles together and leave them. They should be all right.”
When they were all set to go, the leader held up the towel from Leo’s mouth and having soaked it in the gas mix, lit it with a lighter and threw it into Leo’s office. He jumped in the truck and as they drove off, the flames had spread through the entire building. Within minutes, Leo’s pride and joy would be an unsalvageable inferno. By morning, when the fire had been put out, it would be little more than charred rubble.
EIGHTY-NINE
Vivian had watched in horror as the woman and one of the men guided the hooded bodyguards to the empty field adjacent to the restaurant’s back parking lot. She knew they would be armed and her worst fears were about to come true. She believed she was going to witness the cold-blooded murder of four people right before her eyes. When the four men had been forced to kneel she stopped breathing and her mind went blank, not knowing what she could do to stop it. Then one of the Russians, the man, knelt down and looked to be doing something to their feet and ankles. He pushed each one face first down on the ground and when he was finished, the two of them simply turned and ran back to the truck. Much to her relief, it appeared they were not going to murder the four men. She turned her attention back to the back door of the restaurant and a couple of minutes later she saw the sixth one come out, light a rag on fire and toss it into Leo’s office.
Vivian knew exactly where the truck was headed so she waited a couple of minutes before leaving. Then realizing the fire would be reported, she quickly fled from her vantage point and drove toward her destination. During her brief trip through downtown St Paul, she notic
ed the headlights in her mirror and with a feeling of relief, smiled to herself.
It was almost 2:00 A.M. when she pulled the small SUV off to the side of the road along Eaton Street at the downtown St. Paul airport. There was very little traffic on the street or in the airport. Apparently, the Russians had called ahead because their plane was ready to go as soon as they arrived. Vivian got out of the vehicle and stood alongside it. It was a cool, wet, misty night with wisps of fog hanging in the air. She took out her glasses, held them to her eyes and watched through the fence as the box containing Leo Balkus was loaded up the lowered tail ramp of the small cargo plane.
A few minutes later, she watched it taxi toward the runway and heard the footsteps behind her. As they got closer, without turning her head, she said, “Hello Anthony. I’m very happy to see you.”
Tony stepped up to her and she slipped her arm through his and gave him a quick peck on the cheek. “It reminds me of the last scene from Casablanca. When the plane takes off in the fog,” he said.
“It does, doesn’t it?” she answered as she put the glasses on the SUV’s hood and clutched her coat closed in the chilly night air.
“So, who was he, anyway?”
Vivian didn’t answer at first. She thought it over as she watched the plane take off. Finally, she relented and said, “I guess you deserve to know.” As they stood together huddled against the damp night air, she told him what she had found out about the notorious Leo Balkus.
His real name was Grigory Kuznetsov and he had been born into Russian communist royalty in the midst of the cold war. His father was a lieutenant general in the KGB. His mother was the daughter of a prominent member of the Politburo. His father, Mikhail Kuznetsov was a legendary brute, a reputation solidified upon the Afghan people during the Russian war in Afghanistan through the 1980’s.
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