Greed: A Detective John Lynch Thriller

by Dan O'Shea

  “How about a time stamp?” Lynch asked.

  “Sure,” the guy said.

  Lynch looked at Bernstein. Might be enough.

  CHAPTER 75

  Lynch called the cab company, gave them the time and location of the pick-up and they tracked down the driver. Guy named Jackson. Dispatch told him he was on his way in from O’Hare, headed for the Drake. Lynch and Bernstein drove over, met him out front.

  Lynch showed Jackson al Din’s picture. “You picked this guy up a couple days back. Recognize him?”

  Jackson shrugged, scrunched his face up. “Man, you got any idea how many fares I pick up each day?”

  “Day before yesterday, 5.17pm, Congress and Michigan. That help?”

  Jackson took a look at the picture again. “Yeah, OK, maybe a little. I got stuck on a lot of short hops up and down Michigan for a bit there. I mean daytime, you know? You get the MILFs in from the North Shore, don’t wanna walk three blocks, so they flag you down just to take ’em from the 900 shops up to Water Tower. And then they tip you like nothing. Couple of them got in, wanted the Art Institute, some kind of after-hours charity deal, so I drop them and I see this guy in a suit, nice hat, carrying a bag. I’m thinking maybe an airport run. Then the son of a bitch asks me to drop him at Union Station. Dickhead can’t walk half a mile? I dropped the guy, ran his card. Got stuck with another local jump from there.”

  “He paid with a card?” Bernstein said.

  “Yeah,” Jackson said. “Don’t go asking me the name or nothing, though, OK? But that time of day, from the Art Institute to Union, figure maybe five, ten minutes? Call dispatch, they can patch you through to whoever keeps up with that shit. You got my cab number, you got the time, shouldn’t be hard to run down a receipt.”

  “Thanks,” Lynch said. “That’s major. That’s a real help.”

  “So, you guys you take me out of circulation here, you cost me my spot in the cab queue. Do I get something for my time? Some kind of solid citizen reward?”

  Lynch gave him a twenty and his card, wrote his cell on the back. “You get pulled over on some bullshit, you have the uniform call me. I’m not talking a DUI or anything, but you get nailed for ten over on the way out to the airport, hanging in one of the bike lanes or something, I’ll get you some rhythm.”

  Jackson gave him a big smile. “You an OK dude, for a police. That’s fucking gold to me, baby.”

  Jackson got back in his cab. Lynch held up his badge, yelled up to the guy in the monkey suit that was calling the cabs up. “This guy’s next.” Monkey suit guy waved Jackson up, bumping him ahead of half a dozen waiting taxis. Driver at the head of the line leaned out his window, yelling at monkey suit in an Indian accent. Monkey suit just pointed back at Lynch.

  As Lynch and Bernstein climbed into their Crown Vic, the Indian cabbie held his arm out the window, flipping them the bird.

  “Another Angry Bird,” Bernstein said.

  The cab company accounting guy ran down the charge receipt, turned up an American Express card belonging to Ricardo Orendain, guy had been at the Fairmont for a few days, but he’d checked out yesterday afternoon, then used the same card a couple hours later when he dropped a rental back at the Hertz lot at O’Hare.

  Lynch and Bernstein drove to the airport. A skinny white kid with bad skin was on the Hertz lot, checking cars in. Manager said he would have been the one on duty when al Din brought the car back. Lynch showed him al Din’s picture.

  “I don’t look at anybody, you know?” the kid said. “I mean I scan the code on the car, take a quick look, make sure there’s no dents or anything, check the gas, then I print out their bill, they sign for it, and they grab the shuttle over to the terminal.”

  “So you don’t remember this guy?”

  Kid just shook his head. “It says I checked him in, then I checked him in.”

  Lynch turned to Bernstein. “What’s al Din’s play here? He’s been pretty mobile, so he needs a car. Unless he’s blowing town.”

  “Yeah,” said Bernstein. “But he rented this car the day of that Downers Grove thing. And we know he’s been in town longer than that. So he’s switched rides before. Just being careful. Maybe something spooked him.”

  Lynch turned to the kid. “How do you get to the other rental places?”

  Kid shrugged. “We got the bus that takes you back to the terminal. Avis, all the rest of them, they got their own buses, too. You get back to the terminal, you could hop a bus to any of the rental lots.”

  “Thanks,” Lynch said. He and Bernstein headed for their car.

  “If al Din’s at the terminal playing musical buses, what do you want to bet we’ve got all that on video?” Bernstein said.

  “Now that I can do,” said the tech guy. Lynch had called in, given him the time the car was dropped off and asked him to run their good al Din shot through the system, see if they could pick him up on the shuttles. “Give me maybe thirty minutes.”

  Lynch and Bernstein drove to the terminal, grabbed a bite. Lynch’s cell buzzed.

  “Got him,” the IT guy said. “Al Din grabs the bus at the Hertz lot at 7.43pm, gets dropped at Terminal 1 at 7.51. He walks over to Terminal 3, hops the Alamo bus at 8.17, gets dropped off at Alamo at 8.26. Drives off the lot in a black Hyundai at 8.41. License SO6 1290. We’ll be watching for the plate. It turns up, I’ll ping you straight off.”

  Lynch hung up, told Bernstein.

  “Son of a bitch,” Bernstein said. “We may actually get this fucker.”

  CHAPTER 76

  “You have the cash pulled together?” Late that night, Hardin on the phone with Lafitpour.

  “I do.”

  “Be ready. Tomorrow morning early.”

  “And where shall we meet?” Lafitpour asked.

  “Think I’m teeing my ass up for you again? Tomorrow,” Hardin said. “You get the location then. Just be ready to move. Make sure your Bentley’s gassed up.”

  “Might I have some idea how long this will take so I can plan the rest of my day?” Lafitpour asked.

  “I’d clear your calendar, sport,” Hardin said. “How long it takes is going to depend on how much you fuck with me.”

  Hardin hung up. Lafitpour called Munroe.

  “Hardin called. He wants to deal tomorrow. He said early.”

  “Did he say where?” Munroe asked.

  “No, but he did tell me to fuel up my car.”

  “OK,” Munroe said. “I’ll tell Hickman.”

  It fit with what Munroe had. After the hit on Hardin at the park in Aurora, Munroe had put the full-court press on him. Hardin had popped up in a handful of other places, all in the western suburbs. Security camera at a driving range and go-cart track joint on Route 47 just west of Aurora, cornfields in all directions. Parking lot camera at Pottawatomie Park in St Charles, maybe a dozen miles up the Fox River. Cantigny, some kind of park and museum complex near Wheaton. Looked like he was playing al Din’s game. He’d figured he was going to be on camera, so he got on a lot of them. If Hardin was shopping for a meet site, all the locations would work – all public, all with some good, defensible spots. Hardin had to figure they might make another try for him, so he was spreading them out, giving them so many spots to cover they couldn’t get set up solid at any of them.

  But it looked like it was going to be the western burbs. Hardin and Wilson had both grown up out there, wanted to play on their home turf. Gonna have to hog some bandwidth and assets in the morning, have real-time eyes on all the sites Hardin had scoped out. With a little luck, Munroe could still get a shooter in place for the meet. If he couldn’t get them there, he should at least be able to keep eyes on them after, bag them on the road. A chopper would help. Munroe got on the phone, arranged for one. He’d meet it at the Aurora airport. Civilian bird, or it would look like one anyway. But if you slid the door out of the way, there’d be a swing-out mount for a minigun. And somebody riding shotgun who knew how to use it.

  Munroe started matching up assets with g
eography, deciding who he wanted where.

  You plan for what you can. So he gets them at the meet, takes them on the road and, if he couldn’t, then Munroe would just have to play ball with them until he could.

  World just wasn’t that big anymore.

  CHAPTER 77

  Lynch’s cell buzzed. He woke up, checked the clock. Coming up on two. He picked it up, checked the screen. Liz.

  “Jesus Liz, you’re still in New York, right? Almost three there.”

  “I know John, I’m sorry. Couldn’t sleep.”

  “You OK?”

  “No.” Silence for a long while. “It’s not going to work, is it?”

  “You mean us?”

  “Yeah.”

  Lynch took a breath let it out. “No, probably not. Not much longer anyway.”

  “I can’t give this up,” she said. “I know you want someone who can be with you, and I’d love to be with you. But I can’t give this up.”

  “I know. I’m not asking you to.”

  “And you’re never going to leave Chicago.”

  “No, I guess not.”

  No one said anything for a long time. Lynch could hear her breathing on the other end.

  “You OK?” he asked.

  “No,” she said.

  “Me neither.”

  More silence.

  “I don’t want to hang up,” she said.

  “Me neither.”

  Lynch heard the line go dead.

  CHAPTER 78

  Just after 6am, Lynch toweling off after his shower when his cell rang. Bernstein.

  “Got a call from Northwestern. Fenn’s awake.”

  “Lucid awake?” Lynch asked.

  “Way better than they expected,” Bernstein said. “Pretty much a full recovery.”

  “Meet me there in thirty,” said Lynch.

  Fenn was sitting up when they walked in, the back of the bed cranked up about sixty degrees.

  “Look better than the last time I saw you,” Lynch said. “Last time you were down in the ER with all these tubes coming out of you. You remember us?”

  Fenn nodded.

  “Got anything you want to talk about?”

  “Detective, I told you everything I know last time we spoke.”

  “And then you went back to your hotel and OD’d?”

  Fenn shrugged a little. “I don’t remember anything about that. I remember getting back to my room. I remember dinner. That’s it.”

  “We got you on possession. You understand that, right?”

  Fenn shrugged. “I’ll have my lawyer call you.”

  “And you aren’t worried about anything? Doesn’t strike you as weird, you talk to me in the afternoon, and that night you end up tooting some virgin powder that just about puts your lights out?”

  “As I’ve said, Detective, I have no memory. And I believe I would like to have an attorney present for any future discussions.”

  Lynch nodded. “Just so we’re clear, I’ll be talking to the DA on the drug side of things, so enjoy the hospital food while you can. Stuff in County sucks.”

  “You really think you’ll be able to hold me on some possession charge?”

  “We’ll see what happens,” Lynch said.

  CHAPTER 79

  Tommy Porcini ran Tony Corsco’s juice loan racket for the northwest suburbs. He was having breakfast out in Elgin, fueling up for a long morning of running down deadbeats. Porcini’s phone buzzed, he looked at the screen. That puke Pilsen, guy that was supposed to meet up with him this morning and get current.

  Porcini opened the phone. “You’re late,” he snapped. Flipped open his notebook, ran his finger down to Pilsen’s name. Guy was into them for seven and a half Gs.

  Porcini could hear the background noise. No other place in the world sounds like the inside of a casino. The dumb fuck was probably down at the Victoria, the riverboat here in Elgin. Juice loan pukes would do that when they knew Porcini was making the rounds, hide out on the boats, cause they knew that was one place Porcini couldn’t show his face. Part of that whole keep gambling clean in Illinois sack of shit the politicos sold to the voters, swearing up and down the mob wouldn’t get a foothold in gambling in Illinois. Casino security had all of Corsco’s guys’ pictures. None of them were allowed on the boats. It was all bullshit of course. Didn’t mean Tony wasn’t getting his rake. Just meant he was getting it through the unions and the politicians now, not skimming it out of the cash rooms.

  “I know, Tommy. That’s why I’m calling. I’m gonna have it all for you man. Not just the juice, but the whole shebang. You wouldn’t fuckin’ believe it, man, but I am on the prime roll. I gotta be up like fifty right now, easy. Lady luck, she’s giving me a tongue bath. I can’t walk on that. Gotta ride it out.”

  Porcini thought a second. “You say you’re up fifty?”

  “Not counting my money at the table, Tommy. Bad luck. But gotta be fifty. Gotta be.”

  “Do yourself a favor, Pilsen. Do a little counting. Count out eight right now and put that in your pocket. You make sure you leave with eight.”

  “Eight? Man, I thought I owed like seventy-five hundred.”

  “You did. Then you decided to stand me up, which means you’re gonna be late by the time you hang up the phone, and the juice on late puts you at seventy-seven fifty.”

  “That still ain’t eight.”

  “Banks got fees, right? Me too. I got a fee for when I gotta drive out to fuckin’ Elgin, eat some crappy diner breakfast and get stood up by some hump. So it’s eight. Today. Or else the Victoria may not be the only thing floating in the river come nightfall.”

  Big noise on the phone, some kind of whoopee sound out of Pilsen. “No problem Tommy. Just cleaned up on a double-down. Eight it is. I’ll call you.”

  Porcini hung up, took a second to admire the ass on the chick paying her bill up at the register, then took a longer second to eyeball her and the guy she was with. Son of a bitch. It was that Hardin dude. Corsco’s put the word out on him what, like a week back? Sent his picture around.

  Porcini pulled his out his money clip. Shit. Smallest he had was a twenty. He wasn’t much of a tipper by habit, but he didn’t want to waste time at the register. He threw the twenty down on top of his $9.73 check and grabbed his coat.

  Porcini got in his Buick, adjusted the mirror, watched the chick back out a black Honda, shook his head. What kind of man lets the woman drive? Porcini eased out behind them, hanging two cars back at the light. The Honda hopped on Randall, heading south, staying in the left lane, put its blinker on for the eastbound 90 exit. Tommy got out his phone and hit one on the speed dial.

  “Put the boss on,” he said to the voice on the other end. Waited a bit, following the Honda down the ramp, tucking in a few cars back and a lane over.

  “What do you need, Tommy?” said Tony Corsco.

  “I’m out in Elgin. You still looking for that Hardin fuck? I’m on his ass right now.”

  CHAPTER 80

  “You have had time, I assume, to check on Heinz and consider my offer?” 6.30am, al Din on the phone, talking with Munroe.

  “Yeah,” Munroe answered.

  “And?”

  “I can go the $15 million, but that only works if you put Tehran in the middle of this. And you’re going to have to have some proof to back it up.”

  “I have been accumulating evidence on my MOIS handler,” al Din said. “I have been saving decrypted emails, I even taped my last in person meeting with him. You will be quite pleased. He is local and well placed.”

  “OK, good. I’m gonna need to eyeball that stuff before we get in bed.”

  “Of course.”

  “Plus you’re going to get the debrief treatment, you know that, right? Once you come in, it’s going to get official. Langley’s gonna lock you up in one of their B&Bs for a while. It’ll be a nice joint, probably some horse farm in Virginia, but they’re gonna wring you out. They’ll want your whole history.”

  “Naturally.
”

  “And I’m going to be adding a tune to your hymnal. Little piece of your history you might have forgotten. You and I need to go over the music.”

  Al Din smiled to himself, remembering the strange news stories he’d been hearing about a tie between the Mexican drug cartels and Islamic terrorism. “This new song; is it a mariachi number perhaps?” al Din asked. “A little something about drug cartels and terrorists?”

  Al Din was sharp, Munroe knew that. Not that he had to be a rocket scientist to piece that together, not with the crap that had already hit the media.

  “Yeah, a nice little narcocoriddos tune. I’ll have all the lyrics for you.”

  “I’ll brush up on my Spanish,” said al Din.

  “Then you can look forward to a very comfortable retirement in the West…” Just the slightest pause, just enough to let al Din know that the conversation was about to take an uncomfortable turn. Munroe was about to give him the bad news. “That is if you can help me ensure this diamond mess turns out right.”

  And now a pause on al Din’s end, to let Munroe know he was not happy. “Help you how?”

  “Hardin’s still running around loose with the stones. And now he’s got company. DEA agent named Wilson. Old girlfriend, it turns out. I don’t need a couple of free radicals running around waiting to piss on my narrative. And, since you’re cast for a major role in this production now, you don’t need that either.”

  “So?”

  “So you’ve been hunting Hardin since you hit town, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Keep hunting. I’m working Hardin from my end. You keep working him from yours. Until he’s off the board, we can’t finalize our deal.”

  Al Din let a little dead air build, let Munroe know he wasn’t holding all the cards yet. “I have been hunting Hardin for Tehran. But I get paid to hunt. The $15 million we’ve agreed on, that’s to tie Tehran to Heinz and to turn in the nasty little surprise they bought from him. If I get Hardin, what am I paid for that?”