“I appreciate your grit, Ms. Wilde.” Leaning over, he handed her a cup and saucer, then took a sip of his espresso.
Suddenly impatient, Naomi said, “Your friend Mr. Carson has pulled one of his many strings. I now report to him.”
“Ah. Well then.” Gunn sighed and, leaning back, stared up at the ceiling. “Hank called me about six years ago, maybe seven. He was unhappy with his then wife’s behavior.”
“She was cheating on him.”
“Sadly for her, as it turned out.”
Naomi put aside her macchiato and scribbled on her pad. “I didn’t think Fortress did PI work.”
“We don’t,” Gunn said. “Normally.”
“But Mr. Carson wanted a level of discretion only you could provide.”
He clapped his hands. “I couldn’t have said it better myself.”
“And nothing after that incident until he hired you to guard Alli Carson.”
He took another sip, a deeper one this time, savoring the espresso in his mouth before swallowing. “That’s right.”
Naomi glanced up again. “Did Mr. Carson request specific personnel?”
Gunn lowered his cup and stared fixedly at her. “Hank doesn’t know my personnel.”
“Correct me if I’m wrong, Mr. Gunn, but I hardly think Mr. Carson would allow men to guard his niece without personally signing off on their dossiers.”
“Hank trusts me.”
The phone rang again, more insistently this time. Then the intercom buzzed.
“Excuse me a moment,” Gunn said.
He rose, went behind his desk, and picked up the phone. He spoke for several minutes in a tone so low Naomi could not hear a word. While he was occupied, she took a look around the office. It was spacious, but not the vast, palatial room she had been expecting. But then nothing about Andrew Gunn was what she had expected. He didn’t have the typical chip-on-the-shoulder attitude of his compatriots, the burning desire to bilk the federal government out of every possible dollar. Why not? After all, the Mint just printed up more greenbacks to pay the security firms’ exorbitant fees. No, Gunn was erudite, urbane, and charming, even while being secretive as hell. Though she had been expecting to dislike him, she found it impossible to do so. Still, while she had a moment she continued the deep drilling on the Web investigation she had begun while at the crime scene behind Henry Carson’s house.
When Gunn returned, sitting in precisely the same spot he had vacated, he smiled at her benignly. “Where were we?”
“I wonder,” Naomi said, putting aside her phone and taking up her cup, “whether Mr. Carson’s trust in you stems from the fact that you’re a major investor in his primary company, InterPublic Bancorp?”
* * *
MCKINSEY FOLLOWED Naomi all the way into the building housing Fortress Securities. He watched her step into the elevator, watched the numbers flicker until they stopped at Fortress’s floor. Then he entered the next car and took it up to the fourth floor. Turning left, he walked down the hallway, knocked on the fifth door on his right, even though there was a clearly marked button. Then he walked to the next door down, arriving just as a buzzer opened the door.
He entered a small, grubby anteroom stacked with cartons, some opened, some not. A cheap desk stood to the left. On it was a multiline corded telephone, a Rolodex, and a cup full of pencils. No one sat in the chair behind the desk, and, McKinsey knew, no one ever had.
Passing the desk, he went down a bare, narrow corridor that stank of wet shoes, burnt coffee, and stale sweat. There were all of three rooms, including a windowless kitchenette, where the burnt coffee stink was so palpable it became an entity unto itself. Crossing the threshold of the cubicle opposite, he came upon Willowicz sitting behind a green metal desk that looked like a castoff, and probably was. He was leaning back in an adjustable office chair, his brogue-shod feet, crossed at the ankles, up on the desk. Both shoes were severely run-down at the heel. Willowicz was talking on his cell phone.
“I don’t care what it takes,” he said. “Get it done and get it done now.”
He grinned at McKinsey, beckoning him in. “Laws? What laws?” he said into the phone. “I don’t give a shit about laws. If you do, you’re in the wrong business. If you like, I’ll bring in … No, I thought not.”
He severed the connection, said, “It’s the same all over, good help is scarcer than a toad with balls.” His grin widened. “How goes it on the inside?”
“Fine and dandy,” McKinsey said.
There was nothing at all on the dented metal of the desktop, save a small plaque in the center of which was a bronze bas relief of a Greek warrior’s helmet.
ELEVEN
GUNN REGARDED Naomi with a vaguely ironic smile. “It’s public knowledge that I’m an investor in InterPublic.”
Naomi didn’t like that smile. “A major investor.”
“What can I say? I have a facility for making money.”
“Uh-huh. And what other things have you and Mr. Carson cooked up?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Naomi shrugged. “Maybe InterPublic isn’t the extent of your dealings together. Maybe there are deals that aren’t public knowledge.”
Gunn sat looking at her for a moment. “I do believe you’re trying to piss me off.”
“Not at all.”
“For what reason I cannot imagine.”
Now that they were talking at cross-purposes, it was time for Naomi to go. But before she did, there was one item left remaining on her agenda. She rose and headed for the door, before turning back.
“I’d appreciate the dossiers on the three men who were assigned to guard Alli Carter.”
Gunn appeared unfazed. “Bennett will hand them to you on the way out.”
She smiled. “A pleasure, Mr. Gunn.” Her smile widened. “That macchiato was so good I promise I’ll be back.”
* * *
“THE IZMAYLOVSKAYA recruit,” Thatë said when Jack had finished explaining his storied past. “Their representatives go far afield—Albania, Romania, all of Eastern Europe, so I’m told.” He looked down at his hands, their long fingers laced together. “That’s how they found me.” He looked up. “Why should I say no? They offered me a home, training, a steady job, security—none of the things I had. It was everything I wanted—and needed.”
“I thought the grupperovka were all Russian nationals.”
“Once, maybe.” Thatë rose, got them two more beers, and sat back down. “But these days the families are under a shitload of pressure from the Kremlin. They gotta expand beyond Russia in order to survive.” He shrugged as he snapped off the bottle cap. “They don’t like it, but what the fuck else can they do. The fucking writing’s on the wall.”
The day had wasted itself in gray rain and intermittent spurts of sleet that rattled on the concrete sidewalks. Now, exhausted, day had given way to night, a darkness muffled in low clouds and swirls of icy rain. Far above, the sky was dully phosphorescent with the lights of the far-off prosperous sections of the city, but the glow did little here. Streetlights worked only intermittently; illumination was at a premium, which was just how the roving gangs liked it.
Jack checked his watch. “It’s almost showtime.”
“Time to go, no?” Thatë glanced over his shoulder. “The girl’s awake.”
Jack turned. Alli was standing in the doorway, dried blood all over her. She looked even smaller than usual, almost like a child.
“Jack…” All at once, tears rolled down her cheeks.
He rose and went to her, held her while she shook and sobbed. “It’s always worst the first time.”
He felt her freeze, almost as if her breathing had come to a halt. “He’s dead?”
“Yes.”
“I … I didn’t mean to, but he wouldn’t stop coming after me.”
“What happened?” Jack said gently.
After a shuddering breath, Alli described everything that had happened in her uncle’s study. How
Rudy had waited until Uncle Hank and Harrison Jenkins had driven away before coming in and threatening her with the fire poker, how she had managed to get away and what had happened when she encountered the other two guards, how in her flight she had come across the cook lying on the floor of the kitchen, and how Rudy had followed her out of the house.
“There’s no doubt in your mind that his intent was to kill you?”
She shook her head. “When he came for me, he said, ‘There’s a fine spot for them to find you, curled in the fireplace with the soot and the ash.’”
“Was it just him, do you think, or were they all in on it?”
Alli, thinking back to how Conlon and the third guard had acted, said, “They were all in it together. I just think Rudy was the crew chief.”
The tears had dried on her cheeks, making tracks in the dirt. He could see that she had regained a good deal of her self-control. Just the fact that she could make these observations about her attackers was proof that she was heading for the right line of work at Fearington.
“It’s okay. You’ve done remarkably well.” He hugged her and gave her a gentle shove in the direction of the bathroom. “Now go wash up.”
He turned to see Thatë staring intently at him. “What?”
The kid lowered his head, stared at the floor between his feet. “Nothing.”
Jack sat down across from him and took a swig of his beer, which was now close to room temperature. “Spill it.”
Thatë gave a little laugh. He sounded like a hyena nervously cackling in the bush.
“How d’you get her to listen to you?” the kid asked. “You threaten her, or what?”
Jack considered the source of these questions. “I didn’t get her to do anything. Alli takes my advice.”
“So how you make her respectful?”
Jack tried not to show the alarm that sprang up inside him. “Thatë, she trusts me.”
“She trusts you?”
Behind the closed bathroom door, the water had begun to run in the shower.
Thatë frowned. “I don’t get it.”
“Why don’t you ask her?”
As the kid jumped up, Jack, laughing, reached over and pulled him back down.
“Not now.”
“Why not now?”
“Because she’d find a way to obliterate your nuts.”
Thatë looked at him askance. “You’re fucking with me, right?”
Jack shook his head. “She killed a man today—a professional bodyguard—and maimed two others.” He let the kid go. “You still want to try?”
Thatë shook his head. “Man, I still don’t know about you.”
At that moment, the bathroom door opened a crack, and, through a small cloud of steam, Alli said, “I need clean clothes.”
Jack looked at the kid, who inadvertently gave a classic double-take before making for the bedroom. Jack heard some drawers being pulled out. He and Alli exchanged looks, but he was uncertain of either her mood or what she was thinking until she breathed: “Emma…”
“What is it?” he whispered back.
Alli gave a tiny, violent shiver. “I feel her.”
Thatë reappeared with a stack of clothes: a pair of black stovepipe jeans, a black-and-white T-shirt with WIG-OUT emblazoned across the chest, a hoodie, and a pair of sweat socks.
Alli sniffed at them.
“They’re just washed,” the kid said. “I know how to take care of myself.” He led with his chin. “Couldn’t do anything ’bout underwear.”
“No problem,” Alli said, taking the pile from him. “I’ll go commando.”
* * *
NAOMI STOOD just to one side of the entrance to the Fortress Securities building, between two columns, hidden from anyone who came and went. She was scanning the dossiers of the three guards, hoping to find some link, some anomaly that might make something click. It was chilly, the evening clanking onto the city streets like a spent shell. Lights sent smears of illumination across the sidewalk. Headlights rolled toward her, then away slowly in the mounting rush hour traffic.
She had done her best to rattle Gunn’s cage. If there was something to what she had intimated she wanted to know about it. She’d made a shot in the dark, to be sure, but she was waiting for Gunn to emerge. If he had become alarmed by what she had said he would go see Henry Holt Carson in person; he was too good at his job to risk a phone conversation.
But it had been over an hour since she had left the Fortress offices and still no sign of him. She went back to the dossiers, her eyes anxiously scanning the text while part of her attention was secured in the periphery of her vision, waiting for Gunn. There was nothing, nothing, nothing, so she returned to the beginning and started all over again.
Halfway through she caught herself wondering how Pete was faring. Digging out her phone, she punched in his speed-dial number. He answered at once. Nothing to report.
“I got the Fortress dossiers,” she said. “If you’re free, we ought to go over them together.”
“Right. Two pairs of eyes are better than one,” he said. “Meet you in twenty at the office.”
She severed the connection, read a little more, continuing to spin her wheels, and sighed. Still no sign of Gunn. She checked her watch. Shit, maybe she had been wrong about him. All at once, her attention shifted. She looked forward to meeting with Pete, hopeful he’d spot something she had missed. Besides, she hadn’t eaten a thing all day.
She was about to pack up the dossiers in preparation for heading back to the office when a familiar figure pushed through the doors of the building and came briskly down the stairs.
Pete McKinsey passed not ten feet from where she stood, frozen in dismay.
* * *
THATË POINTED with his chin. “What else is on your iPod?”
He held the iPod out and the kid took it, plugged Jack’s Monster earbuds in, and scrolled down.
“Don’t know any of this shit,” he said a little too loudly, as people will when they’re listening to music in their ears. Then, apparently finding a song he liked, he turned up the volume. His head began to nod rhythmically.
Jack watched him for a moment. He had to remind himself that the kid was only seventeen. He spoke American street slang almost perfectly; a first-rate mimic. He turned from this thought as Alli came out of the bathroom. She looked fairly comical with the bottoms of Thatë’s jeans turned up in oversized cuffs. The hoodie came down almost to her knees.
“Don’t laugh,” she warned.
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Jack said.
She came and brought a chair over to sit beside him. Thatë’s eyes tracked her but he was too deep in the music to pay much attention.
“What’s with the Lost Boy?” she said.
“We’re in trouble, Alli. The Virginia State Police have a warrant out for your arrest and I have no doubt your uncle wants to get his hands on us as well. Thatë provided a safe haven where no one would think to look for us.”
“Any port in a storm.”
“This is more than a storm,” Jack said seriously.
Alli hitched her chair closer to him and lowered her voice even though it was impossible for Thatë to overhear them. “I don’t understand. Uncle Hank hired those men to guard me. Instead, they tried to kill me. I mean, what the fuck?”
“My thought exactly. That’s why I spirited you away, that’s why I don’t want you to turn yourself in. Nothing about this situation rings true and until I can understand what’s happening I don’t trust anyone, and that includes your Uncle Hank.”
“You don’t think he would—”
“At this point, I don’t know what to think. But the fact is I trust this young criminal-in-waiting more than I do anyone else.”
“Then we really are in trouble.”
Jack nodded.
“On the other hand, we can’t stay here forever.”
“I don’t plan to,” Jack said. He brought her up to date. He told her about the killings at Twiligh
t, how he’d found physical evidence linking them to Billy Warren’s death. He showed her the octagonal badge and Thatë’s identical pendant.
“The writing on them is Albanian, the icon of an underground club whose business makes even Thatë nervous,” he concluded. “That’s where I’m hoping we’ll find some answers about who really killed Billy, and why.”
Thatë chose that moment to come out of his music-induced trance. “Very cool shit,” he said as he pulled out the earbuds. “Old-school roots, man. People put ’em down, but not me. The blues is where hip-hop came from, you know?” Then he grinned at Alli. “So, vajzë e bukur, how you doin’?”
Alli glanced at Jack, who said, “He thinks you’re beautiful.”
She bared her teeth at the kid.
* * *
ACCORDING TO Thatë, the Stem was located in Chinatown.
“Best cover in the city,” he said when he saw the look on his companions’ faces. “Tons of tourists, no one looks out of place, hey?”
The moment they turned onto H Street NW, Alli felt an odd thrill of déjà vu. As they passed Fifth Street, heading toward Fourth, she saw the big square sign of the restaurant toward which Thatë was leading them, and she gasped.
“What is it?” Jack said, bringing the three of them up short.
Alli shook her head. “I saw a take-out menu from this restaurant, First Won Ton, in Uncle Hank’s study.”
“His house is a long way from Chinatown,” Jack said.
Alli nodded. “I thought it curious myself.”
Jack turned to the kid. “The Stem?”
“In the basement, below the restaurant.”
Turning back to Alli, Jack said, “How well do you remember the menu? Was there anything written on it, anything circled, the way people do when they order?”
Alli concentrated. One of the things she’d been training toward at Fearington was full-memory recall of conversations and crime scenes. Clearly, her uncle’s study fit into neither category, but the item was so odd, so out of place that she had spent a moment staring at it. In fact, there was something that was circled.
“Spicy fragrant duck with cherries.”
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