by Reece Hirsch
Screw it, Will thought, I’m going in. He needed to know who at the firm had set him up, and Katya was the only person that he could ask. He knew that it was dangerous to walk into Boka’s headquarters, but there was some security in knowing that the feds were watching. Boka and his men would certainly be aware of that, too.
When Will entered the restaurant, his eyes took a moment to adjust to the gloom. Then he saw Katya sitting at a corner table, already observing him. As usual, he couldn’t quite tell if she was smiling. In the past, the trait had lent her an appealing aura of mystery. Now it just annoyed him.
Will approached Katya’s table. “I thought you’d be a little more surprised to see me.”
“I am surprised that you would come here,” she said. “Not a very good idea.”
“Why is that?”
“This is Boka’s place. You should be running away from Boka.”
The waitress materialized at their table, waiting for their order with her customary pained expression.
“Vodkas,” Katya said. “He’ll have a double.” After the waitress departed, she added, “I don’t expect you to believe me, but it is kind of nice to see you again.”
“But you didn’t think you would, did you? You thought Nikolai and Yuri would have killed me by now.”
Katya shrugged noncommittally, then stood up from the table and motioned for Will to stand. “I am willing to have this conversation with you, but first . . .”
Katya patted him down for a wire, and when she was satisfied, they sat down again at the table. “Okay, ask your questions. Maybe I can even answer a few of them.”
“First, how can I trust anything you say?”
“There’s no need to be insulting,” she said. “You know you can’t trust me. I think we established that. But you don’t have anyone else to ask, do you?”
“What is your role here, anyway? Were you sleeping with Yuri?”
“Yuri and I had known each other for a long time. We were together sometimes, on and off. We understood each other.”
“So what exactly is your connection with Boka?”
“He looks after me.”
“But what is it that you actually do?”
“What they ask. Sometimes it’s as simple as working as a receptionist in one of their fake businesses. Sometimes they need me to be nice to someone like you.”
“You know there’s another word for that.”
She smiled, as if she couldn’t begrudge Will his opinion of her. “Someday, Boka is going to finance my restaurant, and then I’ll be on my own.”
“If you think that someone like Boka will ever give you anything, then you’re not as smart as I thought.”
“Who are you to say? You don’t know Boka, do you?”
“No, but am I wrong about him?”
Katya didn’t answer, turning to the waitress, who had brought the vodkas. The waitress lingered for a moment, probably trying to decide if they posed a threat to the glasses or crockery. Katya said something to her in Russian, and she returned to the kitchen, appeased.
“You and your friends knew about the Jupiter deal, and you knew right away that I had been assigned to take over from Ben. That tells me that you are working with someone else at the firm. I need to know who that is.”
“We do have a mutual acquaintance. I was going to say a friend, but I guess that is not the right word.”
“Who is it?”
“I can’t say. I probably shouldn’t have said that much.”
“I thought it was strange that you knew about the company.”
Katya smiled. “I could have known that. And, like I said, I do read the Chronicle. Okay, maybe I exaggerated about the Wall Street Journal.”
“How did you know I would be at that club?”
“We followed you from your office. Simple.”
“You knew they were going to torture me, maybe kill me.”
“I knew that Yuri had a lot riding on the deal. He was just doing what he thought was necessary. As he used to say, ‘It’s not personal, just business.’”
“Yeah, that sounds like Yuri, all right.” Even from the grave, Yuri continued to pay homage to Coppola.
Will continued, “This isn’t just business. Did you know that they threatened my mother—my mother who’s in a nursing home?”
“I am sorry about that, Will—really. But that’s not my part of the job. You can try to make me feel guilty if you want to, but that’s not a very good use of our time, is it?”
“I need to know who has Ben Fisher’s cell phone.”
“I really don’t know, Will. And I couldn’t tell you if I did.”
Will tossed back his vodka and stood up. “Is there anything else that you can tell me about the person who gave you my name?”
“It’s someone you wouldn’t expect.”
“That doesn’t exactly help, does it?”
“If I say anything more, I’ll have to answer to Boka. You’re really not so dumb. You’ll figure it out.”
Searching for a cigarette, Katya rifled through her purse just as she had when she first caught his attention in the Whiskey Bar.
With a small look of triumph, Katya produced a cigarette from her purse, then looked up to meet his gaze. He stared back at her with contempt.
Seemingly reading his thoughts, she stood up and stepped in close, as she had that first night in her apartment on Pacific Street. Then she leaned upward on her toes and kissed him, but the kiss was nothing like their first. Their teeth struck as she pressed her lips hard against his in a kiss that would have been the perfect complement to angry sex. Will found himself returning the kiss in the spirit in which it was given. Finally, she broke away, biting his lip and giving him a shove in the chest.
Will touched his finger to his lip. When he drew it away, it was smeared with blood.
Like a fighter breaking from a clinch, Katya stepped back from him. Her face was flushed as she stood watching him, waiting for him to leave, adjusting her skirt. There was absolutely nothing left to say.
As if on cue, a door at the rear of the restaurant opened. It was the same door that Valter had left through the night that Nikolai and Yuri had brought him there. Two men emerged, wearing matching Puma tracksuits in chocolate brown and moss green, respectively. One was tall, with short blond hair and a puffy, vaguely misshapen face; he looked like a once-handsome middleweight who hadn’t stopped boxing quite soon enough. He wore the jacket of his tracksuit zipped all the way up like a turtleneck. His companion was stocky, dark, and hirsute, like a cross between a shot-putter and a trained bear cub, with a dense thatch of matted fur exposed above the zipper of his open jacket. A gold medallion nested in the thicket of chest hair.
“Come with us,” the tall man said, taking his arm. “Boka would like to see you.”
“I’m not going in there,” Will said, pulling away. “There are people who know that I came—”
“Now is not the time to plead for your life,” he said. “That comes later.”
TWENTY-EIGHT
The Russian track team forcefully escorted him through the doorway at the rear of the dining room. He was led down a short corridor thick with cigarette smoke into an office. Inside, the tall man patted him down, doing a much more thorough job than Katya had. When he was satisfied, he motioned for Will to take a seat in a chair in front of a large desk.
Behind the desk sat a small, well-groomed man in a three-button, gray Armani suit. The man had a hard, unlined face; he looked like he had been designed in a wind tunnel. The man’s eyes were fixed on some papers before him on the desk.
Will almost smiled. Ignoring the newly arrived guest was a classic method of asserting dominance. Will had first encountered the technique when he was a first-year associate arriving in a partner’s office with his first completed assignment.
While being studiously disregarded by the man behind the desk, Will examined his surroundings. The office was surprisingly well appointed, considering it was loc
ated in the back room of a dive restaurant. The walls were decorated with framed Kandinsky lithographs. On a corner of the mahogany desk sat a large amber paperweight with a spindly primordial insect imprisoned inside.
After a few protracted moments, the man looked up and trained his deep-set, pale gray eyes on Will.
“Will Connelly.” He had a heavy Russian accent and a voice that glided from one note to another like an oboe.
“Yes.”
“My name’s Boris. My friends call me Boka. Do you know who I am?”
“The boss?” Will ventured.
This drew an approximation of a smile. “Yes. Exactly so.” The smile hung frozen on his face like a theatrical scrim, concealing as much as it displayed.
“You’ve got balls showing up here like this,” Boka said. “But it is not good for either of us. It reflects poor judgment. Makes me wonder who the fuck I am dealing with.”
“I got tired of waiting for something to happen.”
“He wants something to happen,” Boka said to the tracksuits, amused. Then, to Will, “You pull shit like this, something is going to happen, but I don’t think you are going to like it very much.” One of them snorted appreciatively.
“But you are clearly an impatient man,” Boka said, “so I will get to the point. You have cost me a lot of fucking money. The only reason you’re not dead right now is because it was not your idea.”
“I never told them to put money in Jupiter stock.”
“Yes,” Boka said. “I believe that’s what I just said.” He paused, then resumed in a calmer, didactic tone. “Do you know how many imbeciles I deal with in the course of a day?”
Will decided that the question was rhetorical.
“Fear makes people stupid. And when someone is sitting where you are sitting right now, they are usually afraid. I try to reassure them, calm them down, but it is no use. So all day long I find myself dealing with idiots, people who are so focused on their own fears, their own needs, that they have lost the ability to listen.” He gently tapped his forehead once with the flat of his palm. “Their eyes never stop moving. They are unable to concentrate, unable to help themselves. It can be quite frustrating. I’m sure you encounter this in your profession.”
“Yes.”
“Okay. I am going to try to forget about the many foolish things that you have done and assume that you are a person of intelligence. I will speak to you directly, with respect. And I will expect the same in return.”
Will nodded.
“Okay. You have spoken to the federal agents. What have you told them about us?”
“Nothing. I’ve said nothing to them about any of you.” Will decided that this answer, in addition to being true, was probably the least dangerous.
“But surely you must have said something to them about Nikolai or Yuri?”
“No.”
“What about Valter . . . and Katya?”
“No.”
“So you have not explained to them how you got involved in that ugly scene at the parade? It is only natural to want to explain yourself.”
“I just listened to what they had to say, then I asked for my lawyer.”
“You cannot make this stop by asking for a lawyer, though, can you?”
Boka picked up a stick of rock sugar from a saucer and swirled it in a cup of tea that sat on his desk. He sipped the tea and, unsatisfied, stuck the rock sugar in his mouth like a lollipop. In the silence of the room, Will could hear the crystals click against his teeth.
“You know that we could be taking a more . . . rigorous . . . approach.” Boka uttered the word with the clinical but freighted intonation of a doctor describing a radical therapy.
“Yes.”
“Methods that would make that blade that Nikolai and Yuri used on you seem gentle by comparison.”
“Yes, I appreciate that.”
Boka gave a small, dry laugh that sounded more like a clearing of the throat. “Now when you say that, I believe it.” He waved his hand. “Please, keep talking. Tell me more about your conversation with the agents.”
“If I told them what I know about Nikolai and Yuri and the rest, then they would know that I was guilty of securities fraud. It was in my own best interest to keep quiet and let my lawyer handle things. If I incriminate myself, I’ll never practice law again.”
“Is it that important to you? Practicing law?”
“It’s what I do.”
“I see. But how do we know that your lawyer is not simply getting you the best deal in exchange for what you know about us? Maybe they are telling you that you can still salvage your career if you testify.”
“Because we don’t think they have a case against me that will stand up.”
Boka started to nod. “And why is that?”
“With Nikolai and Yuri dead, there is nothing to directly link me to the trading in Jupiter stock. It’s not enough for a criminal prosecution.”
“No smoking gun, as you say.”
“Right. So there’s no need for me to make a deal.”
“I hope you aren’t tempted to give them information just because you think we are bad men who belong in jail.”
“I really don’t know anything about you.”
“I hope you know enough to be scared. You should also know that we have this.” Boka reached into his desk drawer and held up a cell phone. “This is Ben Fisher’s phone, with the video implicating you in his murder. I think Detective Kovach would find this very interesting. And then, of course, there’s your mother—and the girl, Claire.”
“Clearly, you’ve got me. So what do you want from me?”
“I want two things. The first is your silence. But I don’t want you to just say it. I must know that it is true. You know, in many ways, it would be simpler just to kill you. But the Department of Justice is already watching us, and they know that we may be connected to this matter. If we killed a potential witness, they would be swarming around here like gnats for the next year. That kind of attention adds to the cost of doing business. For now, they are focused on Yuri and Nikolai, who were outsiders, for all their ambitions. And that’s how it will stay.”
“You can trust me to remain silent.” Will’s eyes wandered to a plaque on the wall behind Boka’s desk. Inlaid in lacquered oak and brass was a photo of a girls’ soccer team. The players looked to be about eleven years old. Standing in the center of the picture and beaming with pride was Boka. He was wearing a soccer jersey and a chrome-plated whistle hung from his neck.
Boka noticed Will looking at the picture. He picked up the amber paperweight and rolled it from one hand to the other. “We are not afraid of Justice or the FBI. They’ve been trying to make a case against us for years. But if they can’t put you in jail, then they think they have to at least harass you to justify their miserable fucking existences. You see, if we kill you, then I’m going to have to explain to my daughter Natalya why there are men sitting in the stands at her soccer match taking pictures of me, making their rude and unfunny jokes. And I would rather not have to do that. Besides, my girls are going to be defending their league championship this season. They need to focus.”
“If you let me walk out of here, I swear you will never hear from me again.”
“I appreciate the sentiment, but if I have you shot and buried in a construction site, I won’t hear from you again, either.”
“What do you want me to say? I won’t talk. I don’t really know anything, anyway.”
Boka studied him for a bit. “Then I’m going to ask you another question,” he said.
“Yes?”
“I want to know if you have the encryption keys for what they call the Clipper Chip. You know what I’m talking about, don’t you?”
“Yes, but I don’t have them.”
“You should answer me truthfully, Will.”
“Yuri and Nikolai wanted me to get them, but I didn’t know how. Jupiter uses every high-tech security measure imaginable to protect those encryption keys.”<
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“I was wondering why Nikolai and Yuri would chase you like that at the parade.”
“I really don’t know—I thought they just wanted to kill me. They didn’t have a chance to say anything to me before they died.”
Once more, Boka studied him. Will was certain that his face revealed just how addled by fear he was.
“I’m glad that you came here,” Boka said. “It gives me a chance to see if you seem clever enough to know what is best for you. Some decisions must be based on personal observation.”
Finally, Will asked the question that he knew could be his last: “So, what have you decided?”
“I think I will let you live—let you carry on with your fucked-up life. Aren’t you going to say thank you?”
“Thanks.”
“You know, Will, we don’t like civilian casualties. We’ve already had one in this matter. Besides, you did not seek us out. We came to you. If you were some fool who had borrowed money from us, or came to us with his fucked-up business, that would be another story. Then I would have to kill you—as a matter of principle. Also, you are lucky that Nikolai and Yuri were freelancers. If you had been responsible for the deaths of men who really worked for me then, again, I would have had to kill you.”
“I’m grateful. But can I ask you a question?”
“Okay.”
“I believe that you were working with someone at the law firm. Someone other than Ben Fisher. I would like to know who that is. In exchange for my silence.”
“I am letting you live in exchange for your silence. Isn’t that enough?” Boka paused. “Did Katya say something to you?”
“No, it just seems logical.”
“You are pressing your luck, Will Connelly.”
“You think I’ve been lucky?”
“You are the luckiest son of a bitch alive on the planet,” Boka said, casting a meaningful look at the two men in tracksuits.
Will recognized with a queasy shock that Boka’s look was meant to convey irony. He was making a joke that he thought Will was too stupid and distracted to appreciate. Will was anything but lucky, because Boka did intend to have him killed after all. He just wasn’t going to do it in the restaurant, which was his base of operations. The FBI and DOJ probably had the place under surveillance. Boka was simply taking advantage of the opportunity that Will had provided to question him about his conversations with the federal agents and try to determine whether Will had the encryption keys. Because Will had apparently convinced Boka that he’d been unable to obtain the keys, Boka saw no further reason to let him live.