Adamczuk glowered down at him. "OK, private dick, where's your cuffs."
Maus wheezed, coughing and spitting blood. He brought his hand to his chest and patted his coat where his inside pocket was.
Adamczuk looked at Arshavin.
He put his knife into his jacket and leaned over and dipped David Maus’s pocket, drawing a pair of black steel handcuffs from his jacket. The handcuffs David Maus had intended to slap on Arabella Fox.
Arshavin grabbed David Maus's left wrist and rolled him over onto his stomach, yanking his left arm around his back. Then, he did the same with his right wrist and slapped the cuffs over them. Left first, then right.
Seeing him face down and practically hog tied, Zurawski darted forward and planted another hard punt into his ribs.
Maus yelled in pain and jolted to his left side, where Zurawski's steel toe-capped boot had smashed against his body.
"Get him up," Adamczuk said.
Arshavin and Salenko obliged. They stepped forward and slung their hands under David Maus's armpits and hauled him to his feet.
David Maus spat a mouthful of blood and teeth out onto the snowy road. His head was spinning, his ribs and abdomen screaming, and pain was shooting up through his arms. The cuffs felt cold and hard on his skin. And tight around his wrists. Too tight. His hands had already gone numb.
"Take him to the back of the car," Adamczuk ordered.
Salenko looked him a question.
"Impala," he answered. "I don't want him bleeding all over my Subaru."
Salenko nodded. He and Arshavin dragged the poor guy, beaten and bound, to the back of the car as Zurawski sneered at him and gestured his demise with a threatening series of throat slashes.
Arshavin opened the trunk and Salenko tried to shove Maus inside. But he was too heavy. He flopped forward over the back, his head and chest inside and his legs hanging out.
Zurawski planted a final hard left hook into his gut, then grabbed his flapping legs along with Salenko and shoved them in.
Arshavin slammed the trunk shut.
Adamczuk, then, drew his cell phone from his pocket and sent Vladimir Polanski a message. It said, 'We got him.'
TWENTY-FIVE
Jim McGrath stepped out of Vladimir Polanski's limousine a quivering shell of a man. His confidence had been crushed and his faith in humanity had been shattered. All because of a simple family photograph and a diabolical threat.
Polanski watched him shuffle off across the snowy building site in a stunned daze, his hard yellow hat in his hands and his tail between his legs. He watched McGrath disappear into the white portacabin, leaving the door open to the cold behind him. He smirked and turned to Trudeaux. "That went well, don't you think?"
Trudeaux smiled. "Work to continue around the clock with the final club to be open early, shortly before Christmas, just like the others. Except, with this one, you won't be paying his men a dime extra."
Polanski nodded, now grinning, malevolently. "Yeah. They'll all have to work longer and harder for no extra money. All for the sake of his family's welfare."
Trudeaux nodded his agreement and took a sip of champagne. "Your methods are clearly very...persuasive."
“They can be,” Polanski replied. “Why do you think I’ve got to where I have?”
Trudeaux said nothing. He nodded and raised his flute and drank some more alcohol.
Polanski sat back in his chair and sighed, satisfied. Then, looked straight ahead into the middle distance, thinking. "Just think of all the money we'll be able to run through them all. And only in about three week's time," he said and grinned. There were dollar signs in his eyes.
"Indeed," Trudeaux replied. "But, remember, we have to be sensible about it."
Polanski nodded and glanced down at his watch. A custom made black TAG Hueur with a light pink face. It was twelve-thirty and Trudeaux had other work to do. “Now the club situation is handled, I want you to go and take care of the car wash deal and make the final preparations for tonight with the new entry fee.”
Trudeaux sat forward on his seat and finished what was left of his champagne. "Yes, Boss.”
“And keep me posted. I want to know when the deal is done and everything is set.”
Trudeaux nodded his understanding, then stepped out the door.
Polanski grimaced, feeling the cold, Arctic-like air whip in across his face. He sipped some champagne and willed Trudeaux to close it, breathing a relieved sigh when he did. He watched Trudeaux climb into his car, a black Nissan GT-R. A slick sports car that complimented Trudeaux’s flashy appearance. He not only knew how the money got made, but also how it got spent. It was a trait Polanski could relate to. He smiled.
His iPhone vibrated on the seat beside him as he watched Trudeaux’s GT-R leave the site and disappear down the street. The cell phone shook from side to side on the leather to the sound of a buzzing hum. He lifted it and glanced at the screen. It was a message from Adamczuk.
‘We got him.'
Polanski smiled a wolfish grin and unlocked his phone and sent him a reply that said, 'Take him to Amaranth, to the interrogation room.'
Adamczuk messaged back, instantly, confirming his understanding. His message said, 'On the way.'
Polanski lifted his flute of champagne and took another delightful sip, imaging what they were going to do with the guy. What we did to Tim Heaton will be nothing, he thought, a snarling expression on his face.
That was when his iPhone vibrated, again. This time with an incoming call from Malenko. He placed his flute of champagne down on the black marble bar and answered the call.
"What have you got?"
"The locations of the two people, just like you wanted," Malenko answered.
"Good. Give them to me."
"OK. This Naomi Hefter, she's first. She was easy. I dug up her address and that gave me everything I needed to check with the cell company. I told them she was a suspect and had them pull her cell records and usage logs and ping her cell to get her location."
"I don’t need to know how. Just where?"
"The Ambassador Inn," Malenko answered. "Room twenty-one."
"They even know to the room number? It's that specific?"
"Not exactly. The cell provider can track the location to the nearest cell tower. In this case, it was on Twentieth Street. But it was in her usage logs, all her calls, messages and searches, that I found the room number. She sent a text message to another phone, telling whoever it belongs to where she was: Room twenty-one at the motel."
"It'll be the guard," Polanski said, nodding.
"The guard?"
"Yeah. The guy I had you pulling the list of private detectives and security enforcers for. But he's no longer a problem. Four of my men have already found him. In fact, he's with them right now."
"So, you don't need me to look into it and pull his location, too?"
"No. Now, the boy. Tell me about him."
"Well, that was what took so long. He was a nightmare to find. There were no official birth records of anybody named Josh Hefter anywhere in Michigan around that date. So, whoever he is, technically, he doesn’t exist. So, I figured she must have given him away. Maybe after she gave birth?"
Polanski nodded into the phone, listening intently, awaiting the location.
Malenko continued. "I looked into adoption records and got a hit. Somebody, a kid, by that name, date of birth a match to what you said."
"And?"
"He was put up for adoption about a month after he was born, just as I had thought. He was taken in by a family from Chicago, Illinois."
"So, he's in Chicago?"
"Not exactly. According to county records, the foster father is a lumberjack. Which means he moves around a lot, going from job to job. And his most recent employer looks to be a Christmas tree farm up in Lansing."
"They're in Michigan?" Polanski asked, smiling and with a sudden sinister delight in his voice.
"Yeah," Malenko answered. "They’re in Michigan
. We got them down as living in a trailer park north of Lansing. Place called Rotunda, off Meadowlawn Avenue."
Polanski’s smile turned into a wicked grin. "Tell me you have the trailer number."
"I do," Malenko answered and gave it to him.
Polanski closed his eyes and exhaled. It was like he had just been told the winning Powerball numbers before the next draw. He took a divine sip of champagne and thanked Malenko for his efforts and ended the call. For the next fifteen to thirty seconds, he felt like he was on top of the world. The four new nightclubs were being fast tracked. He had Naomi Hefter's location, given up by her very own admission. And he also had her son's location, as a fallback alternative. His men had the security guard, and his other men may even already have Naomi's sister. Everything was falling into place and it was time to flex his organization's muscles and show the damn woman exactly what happens when you don't pay up. He brought up his contact list and tapped on Kanchelskis’s name and dialled his number.
Kanchelskis answered on the second ring.
"Have you got the sister?" Polanski asked him.
"No, Boss," Kanchelskis answered. "We went to the house on Vaughan Crossing and Kuznetsov knocked on the door, like you said, but there was no answer. There was nobody home. They had drawn the blinds about a half-inch and locked the doors and took off. It was like they left in a hurry. I went around back and cased the place. I could see a dirty plate sitting on a dining table and a coffee mug on the kitchen counter. But there were no other signs of life. No televisions or radios switched on. No shadows moving around inside. And no sounds of a shower running or a toilet flushing or anything else upstairs."
Polanski shook his head, a sort of frank and almost admirable smirk on his face, thinking. Naomi Hefter had obviously warned her.
Kanchelskis continued. "We're sitting in the car watching the place at the moment, waiting in case they come back."
"Leave them," Polanski said.
"Leave them? Boss, but you said?"
"I know. But the plan's changed. It's the hairdresser who owes me the money. She's the one I want. And I have her location."
"Tell us where, Boss," Kanchelskis said. "Kuznetsov and I will go get her."
"Room twenty-one at the Ambassador Inn."
"Copy that," Kanchelskis said and started the car's engine.
Polanski heard it rumble to life on the phone. "Be rough," he said. "And call me when you have her. If she's there, bring her to Amaranth. I'll be there waiting for her. If she's not, be ready for another trip."
"Consider it done, Boss," Kanchelskis replied and hung up the phone.
Polanski put his iPhone down and took another sip of champagne, then looked up at the partition between the back and the front of the limousine. He flicked the button on the control switch on the right hand door and the partition's privacy barrier zipped down.
His driver, the older guy with white gloves on his hands, his hands on the wheel, and the black peaked cap resting on his head, glanced up at Polanski's reflection in the rear view mirror and looked him the question.
"Take me to Amaranth," he ordered. "And put on a Beethoven symphony."
The driver obliged.
TWENTY-SIX
Naomi awoke in her motel room shortly after one-thirty in the afternoon. The room was light. Daylight shone in through the white net curtains that hung across the window. She had been out of it a couple of hours. She glanced around. She could hear the low hum of traffic from cars going past outside in the distance. She felt good. Her head was crystal clear and the nauseous feeling was gone. Then, suddenly, she felt something vibrating against the back of her hand.
It was a bursting, energetic pulse. The vibrations shook all the way up the back of her arm. She cocked her head and looked over, wondering what it was. Her eyes widened with fear. She caught her breath, like she was looking at something unexpected. It was her cell phone. It was on. And it was prompting her to input her PIN to unlock its screen after a reset.
She stared at it for a long, anxious moment, her mouth dry, her lungs short of breath. She thought it was supposed to have been off. She had switched it off, as far as she remembered. But, somehow, it was on. Which caused a big problem. And she knew it.
Feeling a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach, she gulped and leaned over and scooped it up. Then, sat upright on the edge of the bed, leaning forward with the soles of her feet pressed firmly into the carpet, cradling the phone in the palm of her hand. She put in her PIN and unlocked its screen. It flashed up with all of her application icons. Some social media notifications popped up, first. They were followed by some text message alerts for messages from her friends and, then, some pictures from a group chat on WhatsApp. After those, her Google Maps app popped up with a request suggesting she review the Ambassador Inn, because her location services were on and her phone was sending signals to the network.
Her eyes widened. She sucked a few light repeated breaths. A long moment went by before she realized what to do. Ignoring all of the alerts, she went into her messages and tapped the message she had sent to Joe Beck with her location and room number. It opened up. She flicked her eyes up to the 'details' link and tapped it. His cell number appeared on screen alongside a white telephone icon to the right of it. She pressed the icon to make a phone call.
His cell phone rang.
He answered after three rings, surprise in his voice.
"Naomi? What the hell are you doing? Your cell phone is supposed to be off. Why did you turn it on?"
"I didn't."
"You didn't? Naomi, you must've. Phones don't just switch on by themselves."
She hesitated.
"Naomi?"
"I don't think it ever actually went off."
"What do you mean you don't think it ever actually went off?"
"When I got the motel, I felt dizzy and my head was banging. I messaged you and lay down. I pressed the button to switch it off. But I passed out. When I woke up, it was on. Like it had just reset rather than gone off."
"Jesus,” Beck replied. “How long were you out for?"
She blew out her cheeks. "I don't know. Two, maybe three hours. I think?"
"And your cell phone's been on all that time?"
She said nothing. The silence answered for her.
Beck sighed down the phone. "Do you have any idea how dangerous this is?"
She swallowed, hard.
"They could have traced your location. They could have come and grabbed you.”
“Well, hardly, since I’m still here.”
“But that's not to say they've not already done it. They could be on their way to you right now."
"What?"
"Do you see anyone around? Is there anyone loitering outside?"
"What? I don't know."
"Go take a look."
She stood up and padded over to the window. Peeled back the net curtain and looked outside to the parking lot. "No. The parking lot's empty. There's nobody here."
"Well, consider yourself lucky. Maybe they've not done it yet. But they will. That's how these people work."
She grimaced and let go of the curtain and walked back over to the bed and sat down. "I'm scared, Joe."
"You should be."
"Where are you?"
"In the car. On the way to Auburn Hills to speak to somebody who knows Darius Adamczuk."
She could hear the sounds of the road in the background. Tires crunching over the snow, the hum of cars and whizzing air outside his car window, snow pelting the windshield, the sound of his Camaro's engine roaring as he pushed his foot through the floor.
"Can you come back here?"
"No."
"But I don't know what to do. I need your help."
"There's nothing else I can do right now. What you need to do is, get the hell out of there. Now. We don't know whether or not they've got your location. But we have to assume that they do. And we have to assume that they're on their way. That's the only way you'll stay
out of danger, out of harm's way. You need to go. Now."
"Go where?"
"Anywhere but there. Another motel would be best. Just do the same thing as you did last time. Quickly find one online and go. Grab your things and get out of there. Don't even bother checking out. Just go. Pay in cash when you get there. And, this time, make sure you switch off your damn cell phone. Right after this call. And keep it off."
"But how will you know where I am?"
He fell silent for a beat while he thought about it.
"You still have my card?"
"Yeah."
"Which means you still have my number."
"Yeah."
"Well, when you get to the next motel, find a payphone nearby. Use it. Call me and tell me where you are."
"OK."
"If I don't answer, I'm probably caught up. Just leave me a message. Now, don't waste any time. Go. And, Naomi, don't make any other contact with anyone else," Beck said and ended the call.
The line went dead.
Naomi leaned over and grabbed her handbag and plastic bag of items. Then, glanced at her iPhone and nodded and did as he said. She searched for motels nearby and settled on one on the other side of town, picking it out from the search results list rather than clicking through to its website. Then, she quickly used the bathroom and switched off her cell phone and left the motel room, making sure, this time, that it didn't come back on.
TWENTY-SEVEN
Vladimir Polanski's limousine drew up outside the entrance to Amaranth. Its tires crunched over the compacted snow covering the empty parking lot as it eased to a halt. There were only two other cars parked up nearby. Both were black. A Chevy Impala and a Subaru Impreza. The snowfall lashed their roofs and windows and whipped their bodies as the Arctic blizzard came back on with a vengeance. The snow was coming down fast. The snowflakes were bunched together, falling in an icy white sheet.
Polanski's driver killed the limousine's engine and stepped out of the car. Its heat shield crackled in the cold as he put up a black umbrella over his head and hurried toward the back door. Then, opened it for his employer.
Easy Money Page 20