Devil's Move

by Leslie Wolfe

  “Brilliant, and reassuring, I guess...But we still don’t know who the UNSUB leader is,” Alex insisted. “Clarence, Blake Bernard’s AML analyst, said he might be Russian. The lower level associations around the known names and locations indicate a Russian connection, but it’s someone different almost every time. We might never find out who that Russian is. To me, that only means one thing: he’ll try again, who knows where and how, and we’ll be clueless, sitting ducks. That can’t happen, simply can’t. What do we do? What can we do? If we call the feds, all of us here go straight to jail. That hasn’t changed.”

  No one had a clear answer to that question, regardless of how many sleepless nights they had spent thinking about it.

  “Sometimes these things aren’t as clear cut as we want them to be,” Sam said. “Sometimes it takes years to get one of these people off the grid. This is not corporate, where you walk in at the end of the case and fire the bad guys, ’cause they’re all right there, with social security numbers on file, addresses, and everything. This is intelligence work, and it could take years before we can really close this case.”

  “Yeah, I know, we’ll all just keep searching,” Alex answered her own question. “Mossad will do the same, and someday soon, we’ll nail that bastard. I just don’t know how we’ll be able to feel safe until that happens.”

  “We won’t,” Tom confirmed grimly. “We just won’t.”

  ...Chapter 96: Tears

  ...Monday, October 17, 8:14PM Local Time (UTC+2:00 hours)

  ...Letiště Praha-Kbely Airport—Air Traffic Control, Prague East

  ...Prague, The Czech Republic

  Jaro’s shift had ended some fifteen minutes before, but he didn’t budge. His favorite plane, the Piaggio, was scheduled to depart in just a little while. Jaro watched through binoculars how the pilots and Mr. Shah were loading some crates, getting ready for departure. He focused entirely on the plane’s beautiful shape, its flickering lights in the dark twilight, and the sweet sound of its idling engines, completely missing the man standing on the side of the tarmac, watching closely the very same aircraft.

  A little while later, he saw the Piaggio taxi for a minute, then take off elegantly, quickly disappearing into the dark sky, strobes marking its ascending path. A minute later, it exploded in a blaze of fire, sending pieces of burning debris in all directions, like fireworks.

  The man on the side of the tarmac took a couple of pictures, then disappeared, unseen and unheard. Jaro’s eyes were not seeing clearly, blurred by tears.

  ...Chapter 97: Early Dinner

  ...Monday October 17, 5:08PM Local Time (UTC+2:00 hours)

  ...Hotel Arts Barcelona—Espiritu del Mar Restaurant

  ...Barcelona, Spain

  She watched discreetly as the waiter, dressed in black pants, a white shirt, vest, and white gloves, brought the appetizer tray and started placing the small plates in front of his guest, a few tables in front of her own. The luminous atmosphere of the restaurant, its white furniture complementing the sparkling table linens, brought forward by an entire wall of glass letting in the gentle October light, made Espiritu del Mar a dining place of choice for the hotel’s guests. The doors to the patio were open, letting in a gentle breeze, bringing in salty Mediterranean air to spice up the smell of white truffle sauce and raviolis de langosta.

  “Will there be anything else, sir?” The waiter chose to phrase his question in English. His guest, one of only two at that early dinnertime, was definitely not Spanish. His dark blue turban suggested he was an Indian Sikh.

  “No, I am fine for the moment,” the guest responded.

  “How about something to drink? Iced tea, sparkling water? A glass of wine?”

  “Pellegrino is fine, thank you.”

  “Right away, sir.”

  The waiter brought the bottled water and a chilled glass. He opened the bottle in front of his guest and filled his glass three quarters.

  “Thank you,” the guest said.

  The waiter bowed his head in acknowledgment and stepped away, leaving the Indian to enjoy his food. He didn’t go far though, moving to attend to her, the only other dinner guest for the early hour.

  She was a stunning young woman, very aware of the effect she had on men. She had waves of undulating, shiny, ash brown hair, and she struggled to keep strands away from her beautiful face. Her delicate fingers tucked rebel strands behind her left ear, and she tilted her head slightly every time she did that.

  She was dressed in an evening gown, shimmering burgundy silk falling heavy and enhancing every curve of her body. The gown generously revealed her perfect back and showed impressive cleavage, the plunging neckline stopped only an inch above her waistline. Expensive jewelry completed her attire, and her diamond-encrusted envelope purse matched the dark burgundy shade of her dress and the leather of her high-heeled Louboutins.

  She didn’t need the waiter’s services; she waved him away. He disappeared behind the kitchen door, but she didn’t pay much attention to that. Instead, she focused on the turban-wearing man having dinner a few tables away, seated with his back toward her.

  She checked her surroundings quickly; there was no one else in the cozy dining room. She stood, and the generous thigh slit of her gown revealed her perfect leg, exposed within millimeters of where her panty line should have been. She grabbed her purse and cell and walked toward the ladies room, choosing to pass right by the Indian’s table. She texted as she walked, apparently paying little attention to her surroundings.

  She bumped into the Indian’s right shoulder, causing him to drop his fork on the floor, as her cell took the same route.

  “Oh, I am so sorry,” she apologized, touching the man’s shoulder with feather-light fingers and slightly flexing her left knee. The thigh slit in her gown opened a little, revealing more.

  “It’s OK,” the man said, the flashes of anger sparkling in his eyes disappearing as he took in the beauty of the woman in front of him.

  He pushed his chair from the table and leaned down to pick her phone up off the floor. As he started leaning, the woman flexed her knee a little more, right when the man’s eyes were inches away from her skin.

  He took his time leaning down and grabbing the phone, absorbed by the view. Time enough for her to drop a minuscule pill into his Pellegrino water. The pill dissolved almost instantly.

  Phone back in her hand, she gave him a grateful smile, apologized again, and continued her trip to the ladies room. On her way back to her table, she stopped briefly near the Indian, whose head hung, chin against his chest. She snapped a quick picture with her phone’s camera. The picture showed Mastaan Singh’s face contorted in pain and frozen in death.

  ...Chapter 98: Conversation

  ...Tuesday October 18, 10:23AM Local Time (UTC-4:00 hours)

  ...Bahamas Territorial Waters

  ...Bahamas

  The Sea Ray moved slowly at no wake speed, leaving the Harbour Bay Marina and heading toward the open waters. It had just passed under the Atlantis Bridge, leaving the marina behind and Paradise Island to the right. Then it turned the corner around Paradise Beach and headed north, gently increasing speed. When it was about a mile away from the shore, the Sea Ray stopped and started drifting in the calm currents.

  Daniel Krumholz left the steering wheel of the Sea Ray and went below deck. The boat’s owner, Muhammad Sadiq, grunted unhappily when he saw Daniel, his grunts barely audible under the duct tape covering his mouth. His hands and feet were tied with white plastic cable ties. He was trying to worm his way toward the door, moving awkwardly without much success.

  Daniel kicked him in the shin.

  “Stay there,” he said. Sadiq fell silent and stopped moving, watching Daniel with fearful eyes.

  Daniel opened a small pouch attached to his belt and extracted a short-bladed scalpel. He held it close to Sadiq’s face.

  “I have a few questions, and you will answer them. If I’m not happy with your answers, I will cut you.”

&nb
sp; Sadiq nodded. Sweat was beading on his face, and he breathed with difficulty.

  “What’s with all this money?” Daniel asked, ripping the duct tape off Sadiq’s mouth with a quick move and pointing at an open beer cooler loaded to the brim with hundred-dollar bills.

  Sadiq didn’t answer. He was panting, struggling to catch his breath.

  Swiftly, Daniel ran his blade against Sadiq’s left arm, leaving a bleeding gash right above the cable ties immobilizing his hands. Sadiq yelped.

  “The money? Where’s it coming from?”

  “Bahamas bank,” Sadiq articulated.

  “Whose is it?” Daniel asked calmly.

  “Mine...all mine,” he whispered between shattered breaths. “I am rich...I can make you rich...just say how much,” he continued, and then suddenly screamed. Another gash opened right above the first one. He watched with terror in his eyes while his blood flowed freely and dripped into a pool on the floor.

  “Whose is it?” Daniel asked again, using the same calm tone of voice.

  Sadiq gasped for air a couple of times.

  “The council...we all contribute, raise the money.”

  “Where do you meet?”

  “I...I...” Sadiq stuttered, breathing heavily.

  Another cut came immediately.

  “Aarghh...Greece,” he managed to articulate, “we meet in Greece.”

  “Where in Greece?”

  “I don’t know...No! Don’t! I really don’t know; he picks us up by chopper,” Sadiq said, not taking his eyes off the scalpel in Daniel’s hand.

  “Who? Who leads the council?”

  “I...I don’t know,” Sadiq whispered. He screamed again, a long wailing sound of pain and desperation, as Daniel’s blade cut deep into his thigh, right above his left knee.

  “Who leads the council?” Daniel repeated. He was starting to lose his temper; this was taking too long, especially for a frail man in his seventies.

  “V...” the man tried to articulate, gasping for air and choking. “Vi...” he tried again, taking his tied hands to his chest and grasping at the collar of his shirt, as if it were choking him. He gasped one more time, a hoarse, gurgling noise, as his eyes glossed over. His head fell to his chest, and he didn’t move anymore.

  Daniel checked for the man’s pulse. He was dead, gone, taking his secrets with him.

  “Fakakta drek,” he swore in his native language, taking a picture with his cell.

  He climbed above deck wearing swim trunks and splashed into the clear waters, executing a nice dive from the Sea Ray’s rear platform. He swam all the way back to shore, coming out of the water right next to the Nassau Harbour lighthouse.

  A scooter waited for him there. He took a towel out of the scooter’s small trunk and wiped his face and hands with it. Reaching inside the trunk again, he found a flip phone and speed-dialed a number without looking. His eyes were on the horizon line, where the Sea Ray’s silhouette was barely visible against the hazy sky.

  The yacht exploded as Daniel watched. Satisfied, he hopped on the scooter and started toward the city.

  Only scattered debris and hundred-dollar bills remained on the water where the Sea Ray had floated, dispersing slowly on the wavy ocean surface.

  ...Chapter 99: Dangerous Slopes

  ...Tuesday October 18, 2:41PM Local Time (UTC+2:00 hours)

  ...Brunni-Alpthal Ski Resort

  ...Zurich, Switzerland

  Ahmad Javadi was not willing to accept age as a reality of life. In fact, he used every opportunity to defy it, to battle it at all cost, hoping to stay and feel young for as long as possible. Although fifty-seven, he had recently rediscovered his long-forgotten passion for skiing. In his youth, he had been addicted to the buzz of high-speed descents on the slopes of Dizin and Alvarez, in his native Iran. With his current business interests placing him in Switzerland for a while, he was making the most of his stay on the slopes, spending at least one day a week taking ski lifts up to the peaks of Dietikon, Genossenschaft Steig-Baretswil, or Brunni, and then gliding on the sparkling snow all the way down to the base.

  On a beautiful day for skiing, with clear blue skies bringing pale violet shades to the fresh fallen snow on the peaks and valleys of the Alps, Javadi was already enjoying his third ski lift ride. Flushed from the exertion and adrenaline, fresh air, and chilly temperatures, Javadi hopped off the ski lift chair and headed straight to the slope. He wanted one more run before having to head back to the city, and he didn’t have much time left. He went for the long Brunni slope, not the short one, adding a couple hundred meters to the eleven-hundred meters straight Brunni had. He enjoyed taking the side slope: the landscape to his right completely undisturbed, virgin, just mountain ravines and fir trees covered in snow. The difficulty of the slope was also satisfying for the experienced skier, giving him the opportunity for high-speed turns and a little more excitement.

  Javadi started his descent without delay, pushing hard into his poles to gain momentum fast. He soon left the crowds behind as he took to the right, leaving the main slope and taking the side one. Behind him, unseen and unheard, another skier was catching up fast. The skier, dressed in a white ski suit, was very hard to see against the fresh snow.

  Once close enough to Javadi, the skier controlled his speed of descent, giving Javadi the time to get near the curve of the slope, where the descending ski trail came within a foot of the deep ravine. This risky portion of descent was the reason why the long Brunni was marked a triple black diamond, the highest difficulty rating for ski slopes. The three diamonds meant the slope was narrow at times, fast descending, and presented hazardous challenges. The long Brunni challenged its daring skiers with trees, side winds, and the deep crevasse Javadi was preparing to approach. His turn had to be perfect, or else he’d run into a tree on his left, or dive into the chasm opening at his right.

  Focused on calculating his turn, Javadi didn’t notice the other skier catching up with him on the inside. When almost parallel with him, the skier shoved Javadi toward the crevasse with a quick push against his upper arm. Javadi flailed, tried to recover his lost balance, and then went over the edge screaming. The mountains generously returned his screams in echoes, multiplied, amplified, screeching against the serene silence only disturbed by the wind whooshing against majestic fir trees.

  The skier in white stopped and looked down into the chasm opening next to him. Splayed at the bottom, Javadi was not moving, and a pool of blood stained the snow near his head, spreading rapidly. The skier took a picture with his phone and then resumed his rapid descent. If he hurried, he could still make the 6:15PM flight back home.

  ...Chapter 100: A Snake

  ...Wednesday, October 19, 8:51AM Local Time (UTC+5:30 hours)

  ...Jeevan Ramachandran’s Residence

  ...New Delhi, India

  Jeevan Ramachandran was running late. It was one of those mornings where he couldn’t find anything he looked for. He wasted a few more minutes trying to find his car keys, then finally left his house, slamming the door behind him. He was running twenty or so minutes later than he had intended, although he was rarely pressed for time. As CEO of ERamSys, he could very well come and go as he pleased, but the signing of a software outsourcing contract worth millions with a new American client was one of the very few occasions that demanded timeliness.

  He climbed behind the wheel of his black Cadillac Escalade, parked right outside his house. He started the engine without wasting any more time, and shortly he was driving on the freeway, heading for the office. He pushed the pedal to the metal, trying to compensate for the delay in his departure, honking and swerving constantly around slower traffic.

  Concentrated on his demanding maneuvers, he didn’t hear anything. He only felt a slight tickle on his right ankle, and when he looked down to see what it was, the sight froze the blood in his veins. A large king cobra slithered on the car floor around his legs, holding its terrifying head slightly elevated.

  He didn’t think; he just r
eacted. He slammed on the brakes, but the large snake interpreted his sudden move as a sign of aggression. The cobra elevated its head farther, expanded its hood, and attacked, sinking its teeth deep into Ramachandran’s right thigh. He screamed, swerved erratically, and came to a full stop after hitting a pole.

  The pain he felt in his thigh spread quickly as the neurotoxin in the snake’s venom made its way through his blood stream. Soon he was paralyzed, in agonizing pain yet without being able to move or make a sound.

  A man on a motorcycle slowed as he drove by, taking a good couple of seconds to look at the victim through the car’s window. He took a picture and then accelerated and disappeared into the heavy morning traffic.

  ...Chapter 101: Unfinished

  ...Friday, October 28, 6:09PM PDT (UTC-7:00 hours)

  ...Tom Isaac’s Residence

  ...Laguna Beach, California

  They ate quietly, the only noises being the clinking of cutlery on plates, the occasional request to pass the salt, or the filling of a glass.

  “We’re awfully quiet today,” Alex stated the obvious. “Normally I’d blame it on the excellent food, but this time it feels different.”

  “Oh, are you saying the food is not that great?” Tom asked.

  “Oh, no, quite the opposite,” Alex reassured him. “It just feels different. When we get together to celebrate the end of a case we’re more lively than this,” she explained, turning toward Robert Wilton and Sam, both attending such dinner celebrations for the first time.

  “I think this is great,” Robert commented, pointing at his half-emptied plate.