The barber, Lesko was betting, would look first to his left when he returned to his post, if only for a second or two. He would scan the street starting at the end where cars would come from. Lesko would only need that second. He waited, pressed tight against the building near the frame of the storefront door.
The barber never knew what killed him. His last sensations were the chill of winter on his face, the sight of the empty street outside, and then a flash of light and a loud popping sound, and suddenly he was drowning in a warm red sea. He felt no pain. Only a certain breathlessness as his shattered larynx filled with blood and the swelling blocked his trachea. He was drowning and yet he was floating. He felt weightless. And tired. If he could only stop floating he could sleep.
Lesko stopped him from falling. He took the man's weight under one arm and dragged him the length of the barbershop to a wooden inner door. Once there, Lesko propped him soundlessly against a wall as he stripped the cut-down shotgun from its sling and counted its load. It was a Remington automatic. Double-0 shot. Six shells. Four more in the barber's pocket. Good.
Now he studied the door. It seemed old and brittle. One kick should do if it isn't dead-bolted on the other side. If it is, he would kick out a panel and then shoot through it at anything that moved.
The barber made a gurgling sound and sighed. Lesko looked at his torso. He was not a big man, but big enough. Lesko eased him off the wall and turned him so his back was against Lesko's chest and his own chest faced the door. The shotgun was now in Lesko's left hand and the automatic in his right. Both hands were extended under the barber's armpits. He took a breath, balanced himself, and smashed the door with a single sideways kick. Lesko and his shield stepped through.
A large back room, a big table, a suitcase on it, two men near the suitcase, facing him, a woman sitting, her back to him. The man to his right had light skin, dark suit; well dressed. He danced to one side and dropped to a crouch as Lesko entered, his hand darting to a weapon on his belt. The sight of the barber, dangling like a puppet off the chest of a huge man, well armed, made him hesitate. Lesko shot him. Twice. The man staggered backward until he struck a wall. He died standing there, a look of disbelief on a young and handsome face, and then what almost seemed an embarrassed smile. Lesko was no longer watching as this man slid to the floor.
The shotgun had pinioned the second man. He too had dropped into a reflexive crouch but had frozen in that position. His only motion was the sway of a gold crucifix through a shirt unbuttoned halfway down. This one was also young, middle twenties, but homely. Dish-faced, oily skin, crooked teeth. Mixed blood, Lesko knew, mostly Indian. A mestizo. Slowly, he raised his hands, palms outward in a calming gesture toward Lesko. Lesko let the barber fall.
"Be cool now, man." The mestizo forced the words from a mouth without moisture. "It wasn't us hit that cop. You kiddin', man? You think we want da' kind of trouble?"
Lesko slowly lowered the shotgun until its maw pointed at the floor by his side. Relief washed over the man's face. He released his breath and began to straighten. Lesko swung the automatic and fired low. The man’s eyes blinked then went wide. His body snapped into a crouch deeper than before but somehow he kept his feet. Transfixed, he lowered both hands to his groin and felt for the place where the bullet had entered. Finding it, feeling the blood ooze out between his fingers, he raised one dripping hand to his face and then held it out to Lesko as if in hope that Lesko would be satisfied.
"Don't ... don't shoot no more," he managed. "We work this out. We still work this out."
Lesko's automatic remained leveled at this man's chest but his eyes had turned to the woman. She was seated in a chair, her back to him, facing the paint-stained table where the open suitcase sat. He knew that the suitcase contained cash or drugs. Perhaps both. Lesko could see no part of the woman's face, only her streaked blond hair, which seemed expensively styled though even the hair was largely hidden by the upturned collar of a thick mink coat. She had not moved since he entered, save for a violent hitch of her shoulders as each shot was fired. Lesko was sure he knew why.
He'd walked in shooting. No words. So the woman had to know this was no police raid. She'd know it was a hit. If the shooter wanted her as well, she knew she was dead meat anyway. But she had two chances. One was more like a prayer that whoever was behind her would not kill a woman. Her much better chance was that the shooter might be satisfied with the two Bolivians and the suitcase, as long as it was understood that she didn't see his face.
It might have worked that way. Lesko was there to bury two men, boom boom, in and out, the same way they got Katz. Plus one behind the ear of the barber if he wasn't dead already. The problem now was that the woman was a witness, as hard as she was trying not to be. The grease ball holding his guts in had as good as given Lesko's name when he said they didn't hit "that cop." Who the hell else could he be? The Lone Ranger? It was decision time.
Lesko was not at all sure that he could execute a woman. Maybe it depends on who she is. If she's just some bimbo who had the bad luck to be here with her boyfriend, the answer is probably no. But she's not just some bimbo, is she? She came alone and she came last, as if the others were waiting for her. And she's got a cool head. Very controlled. How many people could sit still like that?
"You awake, lady?" he heard himself ask.
A small shudder moved across her shoulders. Then she nodded slowly, still not turning. The wounded man groaned. He was looking at her now, looking hard. His glazed eyes seemed to be begging for help. But she had withdrawn from him. She kept her own eyes on the floor near her feet. No, Lesko decided. This woman was definitely no bimbo. She was part of this. Maybe even the biggest part.
"Nice try, lady." Lesko whispered the words hoarsely. The woman stiffened as she heard them. In his voice she heard reluctance and a certain sorrow. But she also knew that he had made a decision. The woman raised one gloved hand.
"Give me one more minute of life," came a voice softly accented, surprisingly calm, "and I will try to reach an accommodation with you." She paused, then added, "There will be no lies."
Lesko said nothing.
"My name is Elena. Does it have meaning to you?"
It did. On any chart Lesko had ever seen of the South American cocaine hierarchy, the name Elena was near the top. But there was always a question mark next to it, or a box of dotted lines around it, because so far nobody had come up with proof that she even existed.
"And you are Detective Raymond Lesko. You are here to avenge Detective David Katz." A gentle voice. Polite. Respectful. Sympathetic. "Although it may be hard for you to believe, I applaud that. I applaud loyalty even as I insist upon fair play in all affairs. Do you believe in fair play, Mr. Lesko?"
Lesko blinked.
What the hell is this? Now I'm going to talk ethics with coke dealers and killers?
"'Turn around slow," he said.
She ignored the order.
"If your late partner had come to make an arrest, Mr. Lesko, that would have been fair enough. We live by our wits and we accept the risks."
It was an educated voice. The accent as much European ... maybe German ... as it was Latin. And there was a tremor in it. Fear but not panic.
"But your partner came to steal," she continued.
If he had stolen once, perhaps twice, we would have over- looked it in the interest of peace. But he came to the well once too often, Mr. Lesko. He forced us to protect ourselves."
"Who ordered the hit?"
She cocked her head toward the dead man in the black suit. "My late associate chose the time and place. He shot Detective Katz. This other man assisted him." At that the wounded man gave a deep sigh of despair, and dropped to his knees.
“Naturally," Lesko curled his lip. "The dead guy did it." The hell with this, he thought. Lesko swung the automatic and dropped its front sight onto the middle of the mink collar.
"Of course," she added quickly, "I gave the order." Lesko wavered.
Shi
t.
"Okay, what's going on here, lady? Are you asking me to shoot you or not shoot you or what?"
"My hope is that you will not." The shoulders trembled and the voice quivered a bit but still, that reasonable tone. "You are, I think, satisfied that Detective Katz was a thief. The fact that he stole from trafficantes makes that no less true. I felt the need to protect myself against him and I have done so. You felt the need to avenge him and you have done so. We have both done what was expected of us. I consider that our accounts are even. To save my life, however, I am prepared to. make an additional accommodation."
Lesko could only stare. The woman raised one hand and pointed to the table she was facing.
"May I reach into that suitcase?" she asked. When no, immediate answer came, she rose from her chair and walked to the table. She was smaller than she seemed while seated. Taking care not to block Lesko's view, she reached past the open lid and extracted two plastic bags filled with white powder. These she placed on the table's edge nearest Lesko. Still, she kept her face from him.
"Cocaine," she pointed. "A less evil substance than some, I think. Mind you, Mr. Lesko, I do not speak of the derivative you call crack. That is a development we deplore for many reasons. But cocaine, in its proper form, creates no armies of addicted street criminals. It is an entertainment for young men who drive BMW's and young ladies who go to discotheques. It allows frightened little people to feel that they are lions."
"Turn around, lady. I mean it."
"I would prefer that you do not see my ......
"Turn around. Now."
The woman called Elena took a Iong breath. Her shoulders rose, then fell, and she turned to face him. Lesko studied her. She was, he guessed, in her early forties. A handsome woman, finely boned, deep-set eyes that were oddly gentle. Her skin was tanned. Not naturally dark, but tanned. If she was Bolivian she showed no sign of native blood, unlike the mestizo with the crucifix. Lesko could see now that she was much more frightened than she'd seemed. She was holding her jaw tight to keep it from quivering. And the fingers of one gloved hand were dug into the other.
"You were saying, lady?"
Her eyes fell upon the automatic pistol now aimed between her breasts, and then to the shotgun trained on the other man who was now loudly hyperventilating., She seemed afraid of guns. Not just being shot by them. Guns themselves. Lesko gestured toward the two plastic bags.
"By any chance, are you about to offer me that shit?"
She hugged herself as if for warmth. "They are worth approximately two hundred thousand dollars. It is the accommodation I mentioned. It is a fine that I impose upon myself."
"And you figure that'll make us even."
"It is my hope."
"Lady, you're out of your fucking mind, you know that? Why don't I just blow you apart and take it all?" Her chin came up.
"Because there would be no honor in that, Mr. Lesko. My offer was a fair one."
"I don't believe this."
"It is a serious proposal all the same. You will please consider it."
"What if I should just shoot you and then turn this stuff in?" Would there be honor in that?"
"Certainly not. Your duty requires that you arrest me. If Mr. Katz had done his duty he would still be alive."
"You had him killed at his house in front of his family. Why?"
"I did not expect that. Specific instructions were given that his family was not to be harmed. These people can be pigs. They have been known to murder babies and to mutilate wives and mothers as an object lesson. I do not permit such things. These two took it upon themselves to make his death terrible in the memory of those who would be left with the money he stole."
"An object lesson." Lesko showed his teeth.
She nodded weakly.
"So is this." The shotgun thundered. By the time he reloaded, Lesko was shooting through a cloud.
Almost two years. Newspaper headlines, a departmental investigation, another one by the Drug Enforcement Administration, microphones stuck in his face everywhere he went, even a segment on 60 Minutes in which Lesko declined to participate.
Even Hollywood got interested. Some producer showed up along with a retired detective Lesko knew fairly well, one of the French Connection cops who was now an actor, but Lesko didn't want to listen. Then there must have been a hundred working cops who wanted to buy him drinks no matter how much he insisted he was home fixing his toilet at the time of the shootings. Lesko said thanks, but no. Just leave him alone. There were times, though, when he'd like to have heard from Harriet Katz. But what was she going to say to him? I feel much better now, thank you? I don't wake up scared and crying anymore during my own four o'clock-in-the-morning? I no longer need half a fifth of vodka to get through an evening because I know justice has been done?
Lesko didn't even feel that way himself. He did what he did for his own peace of mind as much as he did it for Katz. He couldn't be a cop if he had left those people walking around, but as it turned out he couldn't be a cop afterward, either. It wasn't that he had to retire. Not even after he told them to take their polygraph and stick it up their asses. He could have hung in for maybe another five, no matter how hot the brass made it for him. But for every cop who thought what he did was terrific, there was another cop who was afraid of him for it. And cops, like everyone else, have a way of hating people who make them afraid. It got lonely. Lesko turned in his papers.
For the first couple of months there was hardly a day when he didn't replay that barbershop scene in his mind. What he did, what he should have done. What he did to the phony barber, and to the black suit who moved for a gun, that was okay. Shooting the second guy was a little less okay. What would have been better was if the one with the crucifix had been reaching, too. But what the hell. This wasn't a cowboy movie. What would have been best of all was if Lesko had shot to kill right off. First the two spics and then one in the back of the woman's head before he could think it over. Instead, he gets into a goddamned conversation with her. Instead, he ends up executing the guy who's now on his knees and then emptying that shotgun into maybe a million bucks' worth of nose candy. And there's the woman, Elena, just standing there with her fur coat turning white like she's in a snowstorm. Every blast makes her wince but she stays standing straight and her chin is high. She's scared to death but there's also this look of amazement that anyone would blow away all that money. That alone tells her that she's finished. This man who will not take her accommodation is saving his last load to spray her head all over that table. An object lesson.
Lesko came within a hair of doing it. The thing about shootings is that once they start you just keep shooting until you're on empty, even after everybody's down and dead. It works the same with street fights. You just keep hitting.
But there was something about that lady. She had tried to deal and if it didn't work she was ready to take what came. She could have begged. She could have said she just stopped in for a haircut. She could have said the two Bolivians acted on their own but she promised she wouldn't lie and she didn't.
He left her standing there.
Two years.
Too many four-in-the-mornings.
Lesko tightened the belt of his terry bathrobe and began feeling his way through the darkness to the bathroom. He paused, involuntarily, at the spot where Katz had stood, then he caught himself and moved on. It seemed he was dreaming a lot lately. Including about Katz, whom he hadn't dreamed about in months. In fact the only time he dreamed about Katz, night after night, especially in the beginning, seemed to be when something was wrong. When something bad was happening.
Lesko flicked on the bathroom light.
Hold it, he said to himself. Don't start that. Don't start looking for dreams to mean anything. Nothing's wrong. You got a terrific daughter, a few friends, a pretty good pension, and a few extra bucks in the bank from the Beckwith Hotels thing. If Elena's friends were going to do anything, especially to Susan, they would have done it a long time ago. Katz
is an asshole but he's a dead asshole. Don't let him make you crazy.
Lesko saw himself in the bathroom mirror. Ugly.
World-class ugly.
That's what Katz had called him. Katz said he had been lucky Donna stayed with him as long as she did, waking up every morning to a face like that.
Lesko looked at his face. He had to bend his knees to see it in the mirror. They must make bathroom mirrors for women. Not for men who weigh two hundred forty pounds and look like bouncers and would be better off not looking in mirrors too much, anyway.
He ran one hand across his hair to smooth it down. It was more gray than brown now. But at least he still had it. Except he also had creases. He used both hands to pull back the flesh in an effort to soften his features. Maybe, now that he can lay his hands on -a couple of grand when he needs it, he could go to one of those plastic surgeons who advertise on television. But what good would it do? They could take away ten years' worth of lines but not ten years' worth of ugly. It still wouldn't be the kind of face you could take to a singles' club cocktail party. But it had been a good face for a cop. For a cop, sometimes it was a very good face.
The Bannerman Solution (The Bannerman Series) Page 2