My mind scanned for more connection the way a radio scans for reception, a lot of momentary lighting on this or that until the notion of consignment locked on and its signal became strong. I followed it. The consignment auto-theft industry thrived in Houston. I had tripped over a link in that chain on a prior case, and its efficiency never ceased to impress. Thieves would go out shopping for makes and models for which they already had paying customers overseas. No waste of time or product. Could such an efficient model be at work here?
I liked the overseas markets component of it. Perhaps Reznikov’s foreignness gave the idea legs. By his own admission, he was a man without a country, and he was not a little smug about successfully maintaining his status of being off the grid, the grid being pursue-ability. Could the grid also be viewed as the proverbial radar from which he insulated himself with the notion of things foreign, overseas, constant movement, invisibility, the floating orchestration of aligning people…parts…places?
He liked runaways. He liked the undocumented. He liked those who would never be looked for, or missed. Nothing was served by saying no to such imagining at this point. It gathered on itself. My favorite kind of forward momentum, accretion.
So, then, like the thriving auto-theft business, Reznikov could be matching clients in need of transplantable organs with a stable of potential donors who, in turn, were not an expense to the operation by way of warehousing product. His was a working and profitable inventory, kept constantly on the clock until the meat was needed, which is to say, an organ. His challenge was to keep the meat clean.
Rhonda had said that the Russian could clean up a lot of things, but he could not erase the reality of HIV infection. That would mean Reznikov needed access to medical knowledge and testing for the purposes of organ matching, and for any necessary cleansing of sexually transmitted boo-boos.
I liked this train of thought so much that I had to rein in my enthusiasm for it and remind myself that I was on the lookout for a vehicle that would pop out of the moving landscape simply because it was familiar. What my mission lacked in precision, it made up for in proactive what-if? My mentor and former boss, Harry Templeton, used to say that a supple mind could be made nimble with the power of imagination, the key to any kind of problem-solving.
A silver Cadillac passed through my field of vision headed north on Main. Simple familiarity had worked again. Sometimes you win. I pulled away from the curb, around the pickup, and was able to turn north several vehicles behind the Caddy. It went right on McKinney, as did I, but when I eased up behind it, it cruised through a yellow light at Travis. I caught the red and had the impulse to speed up, but thought better of it, as it looked like the Caddy was going to have to wait on its own red light at Fannin.
The traffic signals thwarted his clumsy use of downtown cruise control―hit green on one, maintain a magic trolling speed, and you could make most of the others. Again, I prided myself on being one of the few who got a controlled glide across town anymore. Actually, I think I chose to remember only those times when it had succeeded. Luck being my default strategy, it’s quite likely I simply didn’t acknowledge the many times it did not work.
The Caddy parallel parked mid-block on Austin. I could not make out the driver from that far behind, and as I passed it, I dared not look for fear that the he might be looking back. At this point, I was focusing on the vehicle, not the person behind the wheel. He would be dealt with later if things panned out. I continued down two blocks and turned right where there was plenty of space at the curb. I did not want to be anywhere near the Caddy if Reznikov’s van were going to appear.
What I concluded from this was that the individual to be picked up was the one who controlled the point of contact, and that control was contingent upon available parking. So, if the driver was on his cell phone when he spotted a space in a pre-arranged quadrant of town, Reznikov was likely hovering close-by, prepared to descend upon the exact location within moments.
I had to clear the area and get back to the Cadillac on foot to verify that I had successfully picked up the trail. I waited in my car for several minutes to give the interception time to have occurred. And if last time’s execution were going to maintain, I figured I’d have a safe twenty minutes to follow up, hoping, that was, my luck held.
I approached the Caddy from behind embedded in dense pedestrian traffic. It allowed me to verify from a good distance that the vehicle was empty so that upon reaching it, I had a few dedicated moments to discover something useful. The same leather interior and rosewood detailing on the dash. The passenger side floor was empty where I would have hoped to have seen the zippered portfolio binder to consolidate what I had seen before. Not to be discouraged, I allowed as how the thermos mug nestled in the console holder would be sufficient to keep my momentum. I got myself back to the Chrysler and got it positioned just off Main south enough of the Cadillac on an opposing side street such that I could stay in visual contact with it for an expected drop-off of the driver from Reznikov’s slowed-but-not-stopped van.
The wait lasted a half hour, enough to breed doubt, but not enough to defeat resolve. Reznikov’s E150 eased alongside the Caddy, hesitated, and continued north. Having jumped down out of the van, the returning driver pressed himself against the Cadillac’s door and faced south to monitor oncoming traffic in order to choose his moment to actually open the door and slide in behind the wheel. He was a square man, on the short side, with tight, curly hair. Narrow at the shoulders and thick through the hips and legs―likely a sedentary man more used to engaging his mind than his body when it came to heavy lifting. His eyes were large, dark, round, and clear of bags and cloaked lids; thus, probably young yet. Hispanic, Mediterranean, or even Middle Eastern.
I decided to let that float as I turned onto Main Street and held in a bus zone until he pulled out and we both continued north. The field of play was about to expand since the individual I followed did not strike me as consistent with those I’d observed up until now. It felt like another piece of the puzzle was about to be fitted into place. The sensation grew stronger as we wound our way south of downtown onto Old Spanish Trail and into the empty parking lot of Bayou Urgent Care, a walk-in medical clinic designed to look like a an adobe hacienda. It looked new, yet unexpectedly isolated. Abandoned came to mind. Something smelled fishy.
Unlike regulated police procedure, I was able to move with less restriction, which is why I never failed to appreciate being a private investigator instead of a public one. Those bound by cumbersome regulation would never say so, but I had the feeling they considered me a kind of point man, even as they belly-ached about my treading on their courtroom-endgame-terrain. This freedom was one of the few advantages I held at a time when forensic science trumped everything else. What bugged me as I sat in the vacant parking lot of the Bayou Urgent Care Clinic was my presumption that such an establishment in such a part of a city the size of Houston should be a high-volume enterprise.
Was someone or some group of investors taking a beating here? Or, maybe that was the point―intentional loss. Sounded doctor-ish to me. I had been reading and hearing about the proliferation of these clinics in the media just then, backed by physician investment partnerships intended to alleviate emergency room abuses, a dividend of which were engineered losses for tax purposes. Recent city and state regulation, however, had forced walk-in urgent care clinics to remain open at all hours regardless of their location or volume of business. Thus, losses engineered to maximize allowable limits on a tax form were one thing; whereas, a black hole of uncontrolled loss was quite another.
The worm turned.
These doctors, if they be doctors, might have been broadsided to the point of having been bushwhacked and, now, bleeding. No telling what they might resort to in an effort to silence their self-inflicted hemorrhaging.
I had passed the clinic, having observed the Cadillac pull up to the front door, where the driver got out and headed inside, carrying the thermos cup and the zippered portfolio I ha
d not seen earlier. Neither had I seen it when he had been dropped by Reznikov’s van and was pressed against the door waiting on the oncoming traffic. So, then, it had been left in the car again, just not in plain sight. Maybe it wasn’t that important. Still, it was just the sort of thing about which I liked to take note of, a possible archaic paper trail, not intended to be shared with Reznikov, nor exposed to hack-able computerized storage files. It followed, then, that the first time I had seen it on the passenger floor of the Caddy would mean it must have been an egregious bit of negligence on his part, if he were dancing with treason in keeping secrets from the Tsar. I liked it.
I turned into the crowded parking lot of an insurance building just beyond a vacant lot of scrub which, if left vacant another five minutes, would likely be filled by a stand of spontaneously-appearing townhouses. I stayed there for over an hour in which the continued lack of mid-day patronage at the clinic accrued more meaning along the lines I had laid out to myself earlier.
I now had my medical connection.
Juggernaut? No.
More forward momentum? Maybe.
What I had encountered in pursuit of this case up to now was all about constant movement such that its cessation in the banal observation of this Cadillac sitting alone in the empty parking lot of the Bayou Urgent Care Clinic, gathered about itself conspicuous weight. It was not to be ignored.
When the driver came out at the end of the afternoon, with portfolio in hand, I followed him at goodly distance to a palatial Italianate home behind ivy-covered fence on Sunset not far from Rice University on the edge of Hospital Row below the Museum District. His home? That of a potential client in need of an organ? Tenuous, to be sure, but it was more medical community connection to support my suspicions, even if only via proximity. Where what is wants to unify and cohere, I tend to find direction.
Twelve
If someone were inside my loft at the Hogg Palace, they would no doubt be attentive to the sound of my inserting my key and my discovering that the door was already unlocked. Having announced myself, I saw no point in hesitating to wait and see what would happen. I pulled the .38 off my hip, opened the door, and went in prepared to greet the uninvited company.
Because my home celebrated the spare, it was easy to survey most of the open space quickly. I listened with acuity. Nothing. The kitchen was empty. I circled the mission oak dining table and made my way down the wall of windows toward the bedroom at the other end of the space. Had there been mass or movement on or near the bed, it would have been refracted through the glass brick separating the bedroom from everything else. The more window I eased past along the wall, the more bedroom space became visible until I stood openly next to the bed, firearm poised, foot falls having been executed with flawless silence. Again, nothing.
The bathroom door was open as was its normal state when that room was not in use. I slid into the corner and then hooked around an antique, marble-topped, wash commode. With my back against the wall, I could see between the hinges through the slender vertical between door and jam that no one was lurking in that part of the bathroom. I could also see via the beveled mirror on the far wall over the sink that the corner on the other side of the wall against which I stood was also clear.
That left the claw footed tub capable of being enclosed by shower drapery hung from a stainless steel oval rod. I pivoted across the doorway and pressed my back once more against the wall, this time next to a bureau that had miniature, pineapple pulls. A body was in the tub.
Her professional name in life had been Flame. I recognized her as one of those who had attended Allison’s graveside service. The young woman I spoke with, Rain, had seemed alarmed about the possibility of Flame, Bumper, and the others observing that I had offered my card. Flame’s forehead was visible above the rim of the tub. She was without color and the tub was absent of blood despite the two gaping surgical incisions above her pelvis. Naked and placed in repose unencumbered by any sign of distress over the renting that had brought about her end, her eyes were closed and her arms lay without constriction along her sides.
I had dabbled in a cursory internet search regarding the mechanics of kidney harvesting and was surprised at the wealth of detailed video that showed how non-invasive such procedures can be in the most opportune situations. That is, in the rarified theater of highly equipped hospital operating rooms with state of the art orthoscopic equipment. I saw surgeries conducted via no more than three puncture holes, a camera, and robotic extension equipment. The kidneys were snipped with a scissor-like extension scalpel that also cauterized as it cut; the kidneys were bagged inside the body and pulled out through one of the puncture incisions that expanded to allow for such egress. The patients suffered little and were on their feet in no time. Allison, Bumper, and Flame had certainly suffered under cruder, less exacting circumstances.
I had already contaminated the forensic field in making my way through the loft, and certainly as I stood there on the loop-piled mat on the floor by the tub. I did not touch or examine the body beyond looking at it with my own arms straight down by my sides, the .38 still a part of my right hand. Culpability descended hard and fast accompanied by the realization that a line had been crossed somewhere behind me, promising that even if I were to cease and desist at this point, other bled-out bodies were going to follow upon Flame’s. The ironic inclination of the moment was to forge ahead quickly in hopes of a swift resolution rather than to drag my feet in an effort to try and husband the collateral damage.
I could have reported the discovery to whomever was on duty at the Houston Police Department. Instead, in keeping with my resolve to get the lead out, I backed out of the bathroom and placed a call directly to Ebbersole and Taggart. I had removed my shoes just inside the loft and was standing out in the hall in my socks when they arrived with an investigation team. I waited under the uber vigilant eye of a young officer while the team donned disposable foot protection and went in to establish authority over the crime scene.
A short while later, after describing my stealth through the loft and my discovery of Flame’s body, I was driven by that same officer to Police Headquarters on Fannin. I waited for Ebbersole and Taggart to arrive after consolidating sovereignty over the case and leaving the forensic team to do what they knew how to do without need of direction. And certainly not from them.
The interview room began to close in.
“You knew the victim,” said Ebbersole.
“I had seen her on one occasion,” I said.
She added, “You knew her name.”
“I knew the name assigned to her by her controller,” I said.
Ebbersole said, “Flame.”
“Yes,” I said.
“Bumper,” said Taggart. “Flame. The young woman known as Juice─”
I said, “Allison.”
“Allison,” he said.
I had already lost track of how many times we’d been over this. I recalled again my having offered Rain my card and her snatching it out of my hand before leaving the cemetery. I was afraid for her. And then, curiously, I wondered if instead of afraid for her, was I afraid of her? The worm turned and produced surety that Rain needed no one’s concern, that she was capable of more than she had presented.
“Interesting,” said Ebbersole, “that we did not receive a telephone call this time.”
“Excuse me,” I said, “I do believe I called you.”
“To report,” she said, “not to tip us off.”
“Makes perfect sense to me,” I said.
Her scrutiny grew dull with waiting for me to follow up with an unprompted explanation. I made sure to wait for a prompt. Taggart grinned with everything but his mouth. “Can’t wait to hear it,” he said. The lifeline he threw down indicated to me that he was not without appreciation of my exposed position. That Mulcahy had interceded on my behalf in our last exchange propelled Ebbersole into demonstrating she was in possession of the larger set of cajones in this one. Taggart’s facilitation delayed o
ur moment of proof.
“No telling how long it would have taken,” I said, “to discover Bumper’s body in the trunk of the rental car without a tip-off. It was assumed I would report Flame’s corpse in my bathtub the moment I discovered it.”
She said, “Assumed by who?”
I said, “Whomever might have otherwise called to tip you off.”
“Convenient,” said Ebbersole.
“More like well-played,” I said. “Here I am in the hot seat.”
“Again,” she said.
“Yes, “I said. “Again.”
“Any idea,” she said, “how many more young people we are going to have find without essential organs in the wake of your ill-advised and sloppy pursuit of this Russian individual?”
The table turned in her favor as the string she plucked in me, despite my best effort to the contrary, became visceral, which she had to have seen. An acceptable loss was a foreign concept to me. That the military had algorithms to calculate such expendability was anathema. I was effectively silenced.
“Any idea how they got in?” said Taggart.
“No,” I said.
“Would have needed a code for the door on the street,” he said.
“Or a bogus buzz up to another resident,” said Ebbersole. “Or a blanket buzz up to all of them.”
“That’ll have to be pursued,” I said, “but I’m betting not.”
Ebbersole asked, “Why not?”
“Invisibility cloak,” I said. “This enterprise is so transparent you’d think they operated from an alternate dimension in plain sight.”
“You going all Harry Potter on us now?” she said.
“I believe I stipulated you’d think,” I said.
Spare Parts: A Ted Mitchell Detective Novel (Ted Mitchell Detective Novels Book 4) Page 8