Levon's Time

by Chuck Dixon

  “Mark Neubauer and Anita Sharpe. This is Treasury Agent Nancy Valdez,” the deputy director said, pulling a chair out for Nancy.

  “We’re hoping you can match these numbers to accounts,” Anita explained, standing to reach across the table with an open folder. All business.

  “Thank you,” Nancy replied. The DD had put a cold bottle of Fiji before her. One of the panels in the wall had revealed a well-stocked fridge. That unlimited, unaudited War on Terror budget was a trip, wasn’t it?

  Anita continued, “We have Swift codes and account numbers without prefixes. There’s also what look like passcodes to those accounts, but we don’t have bank names or country codes. Nothing to allow us to make a match, look into those accounts, or even verify that they’re legitimate.”

  “This relates to a case I worked on?” Nancy asked.

  “It does,” Mark confirmed.

  “Which one? I mean, I assume you’re looking for my insight on this? I can’t help you without more specifics.”

  Mark and Anita turned to Brett Tsukuda, who was standing at the end of the table.

  “Levon Cade,” he stated.

  “Fuck me,” Nancy exclaimed.

  They handed her a file containing copies of her case reports as well as FBI, IRS, and DHS files relating to Corey Blanco going back ten years. So much for the ban on agencies sharing departmental classified material with one another. There were even copies of her handwritten case notes, along with every email and text that related to the subject at hand: Roeder/Brockman/Cade.

  Blanco had been a swindler who preyed on billionaires. He was one of the rare smart ones who got out when the getting was good. He went from a celebrity moneymaker, as well known in Hollywood as on Wall Street, to a shadow figure living off his ill-gotten fortune in mansions placed in countries with no extradition treaties. His past caught up with him when he was finally successfully stalked and tortured to death by a gang of international hoods whose origins remained a mystery. Although they had gotten their man, Blanco had died before he could reveal the location of the Holy Grail, the Big Enchilada of his criminal venture, the key that would unlock all the places he’d hidden his loot.

  That had led the gang on a world tour of Blanco holdings across five continents. The hunt had ended at a mansion on a remote lake in northern Maine, where the irresistible force of the home invaders had run into the unmovable wall of Levon Cade. Cade and his young daughter had fled Maine, leaving every member of the gang dead behind them. That started a multi-state crime spree ending in the hills of Alabama just below the Tennessee border with nearly every local, state, and federal law enforcement agency looking for the father and daughter.

  It had been long theorized that Cade had financed his run with cash funds taken from the vault back at Blanco’s Maine hideaway. It was further conjectured that Cade might have gotten away with the MacGuffin the gang was looking for: the location, account numbers, and passcodes to the hidden Blanco fortune. The sum was estimated in the billions and much desired by many, including Uncle Sam, who wanted his piece. And by “piece,” Uncle Sammy meant the whole damned pie. In whatever form Cade might be holding that list, on a flash drive, disc, or written in blood on parchment, these numbers he had texted were proof of its existence.

  “Cade wants something in exchange for this,” Nancy said. “What is it?”

  “He hasn’t said,” Brett answered.

  “Do you have him in custody?” Nancy asked.

  “No. But we know where he is.”

  “Then you’re in contact.”

  “Not at the moment. We’re working on that,” Brett told her.

  She was able to make fairly educated guesses as to the two accounts the numbers matched. The Swift codes helped narrow down the countries. One was a private bank in Antigua, the other in Taiwan.

  “Try this one first,” Nancy suggested. She slid a written slip of paper across the table. “The Eastern Caribbean Central Bank in Barbuda. It’s one we suspected Blanco of using.”

  “You’re one hundred percent on this?” Anita asked.

  “Not one hundred, but it will let you enter the passcode twice before shutting you down. If you fail there, use the same number and code here.” She tapped a nail next to where she’d written Caribe Banque of Antigua.

  Anita took the slip of paper and folded it.

  “I’m taking this upstairs to run it,” she said, and rose to head for the door.

  “Anita?” Mark called, half-rising from his chair.

  “I’ll bring back lunch,” Anita assured him and was gone.

  “Let me try to work out this second account by the time she gets back,” Nancy said and ran a finger down columns of printout, with Brett hovering over her shoulder.

  “What do you think we’ll find here? In Blanco’s offshores?” Brett asked.

  “It’ll be in the billions, minus what Cade spent.”

  “How many billions? Tens of billions?”

  “Hundreds of billions.” Nancy turned in her chair to look Brett in the eyes. “Corey Blanco was like a dozen Bernie Madoffs. He had ins everywhere. Silicon Valley. Big oil. Big pharma. Hollywood. Eurotech. They all wanted to play with the Magic Man. Now all that’s in the hands of Cade, and he’s using it to bail his ass out of everything from Murder One to felony assault to grand theft, and God knows what else.”

  “And these numbers could be proof that he has the keys to Blanco’s kingdom?”

  “Has it ever occurred to you that Cade might have been in with that gang? He could have been part of the home invasion, then decided to kill the others and keep the loot for himself?”

  “That’s a reach, Valdez. A big one. There’s nothing in your own investigation to indicate that. Cade had been in place in Maine for months, over a year, before this treasure hunt kicked off in Costa Rica. With his daughter. There’s no Venn diagram you can draw that brings him into the orbit of the crew that hit Blanco. And he’d have worked out a better escape plan than shooting his way home.”

  “Maybe he’s just not that smart.”

  “You think Cade is some dumb hick,” Brett stated. “You’re pissed because he’s been two steps ahead of you at every step.”

  “I say you let him stay wherever he is. I say you tell him to go fuck himself.”

  “Time means nothing to Cade. Deprivation and suffering? He’ll stand up to it. And believe me when I tell you, he won’t stay put where he is right now. It’s hard to beat a man with nothing to lose.”

  “You’re telling me he doesn’t care about anything? Not even his daughter?”

  “I read the files. You tried using her as a wedge. How far did that get you? The kid’s as tough as the old man, and he’s as tough as they come.”

  “Just another meathead you brainiacs raised like a veal calf to be a killer for you,” Nancy said and turned her eyes back to the printout.

  Brett took a seat across from her and leaned close. At the far end of the table, Mark pretended to be consumed by the background files he had in front of him.

  “You think he’s some hick who managed to shut you down out of pure orneriness and dumb luck? Cade may talk ’bama, but there’s an intellect there like I’ve never encountered before. If he were ever to consider keeping his ass out of trouble for five minutes, he could be anything he set his mind to. And whether we cut a deal with him or not, he’ll be back in the States for sure, and not real pleased with what’s been going on with his kid all this time. Personally, I’d rather have him back here on a friendly basis. The alternative is Conan the Barbarian, with billions in cash to weaponize.”

  “So, he’s a danger to his country? An enemy of the State?” Nancy’s brows knitted. She didn’t have any patience for cloak-and-dagger elitist black-bag bullshit, all that “I’d love to tell you but then I’d have to kill you” crap she’d been hearing from the alphabet agencies since her first day inside the Beltway. And she was smelling it all over Brett Tsukuda.

  “He might not feel real kindly towar
d some of its citizens. Look, Cade is an asset. Was an asset. Pure and simple. And I know he’s a dangerous man. As recently as two weeks ago, he did a solid for this agency and his country, and do you know why he did that?”

  Nancy waited, unblinking, for an answer.

  “Because of a promise he made to a friend ten years ago. Now, as naïve as this may sound to you, I think we owe it to this guy to wipe the slate clean. He’s paid for that in blood. Now he wants to back it up with cash. And that’s something I can sell to my bosses.”

  “So, find you the money,” Nancy said.

  “Find me the money,” Brett agreed.

  49

  She weighed her options and her challenges as she continued up the slope. She dragged a broken pine bough behind her to make her footprints harder to see. The trick wouldn’t fool someone already on her tail, but it could mask her marks from anyone looking to cross her back trail.

  The snow had stopped falling and the temperature had dropped. There was a half-inch layer over everything. The sun was already down behind the hills to the north. The forest was shadowed in gray gloom. Merry was in layered clothing that was enough for her trip to the barn to clean stalls, but not enough for an overnight stay in woods. The only way to stay warm was to keep moving.

  Her other concern was Esperanza out there in country unknown to her. Bravo would carry her away, but the gelding would eventually give in to habit as he got hungry. He would turn back toward the barn. The men looking for her, some of them or one of them, would be waiting there for her.

  How had they known to come here? She thought back to Esperanza’s words just before they had heard the first gunshots. She’d said that she couldn’t wait to tell her mother about the snow. How would she do that? Something about the way she had said it tickled the back of Merry’s memory. Something that made her think that maybe the girl had spoken to her mother recently. How was that possible? Had she spoken to her mother in Guatemala somehow? That would mean her own mother had betrayed her to the men who were hunting them now.

  Merry came to the fire road that curved along the mountain face and dropped down to cross the watershed. She was five miles above Uncle Fern’s land now. If she could climb higher, she would get a view of the long trail that looped back toward the farm. There was a section to the west that crossed a pocket clearing where the ground formed a shelf above the watershed. The path Bravo had taken off on would take him and Esperanza across it. The horse would follow that trail because it was familiar. Merry would have to find a way to warn them off.

  Backing across the fire road, Merry used the length of pine bough to brush her boot tracks away. The snow looked disturbed, but there were no discernible tread marks.

  The trees gave way to rockier ground above the fire road. There was a shelf that followed the road below as it snaked along, tracking along the natural grade of the slope. The snow turned the roadway into a ribbon of white. As she hiked, or rather, leapt from rock to rock, Merry kept her eyes to the road’s surface as well as the rocks below her. The layer of snow could hide fissures in the massive slabs of stone. It would be easy to miss one and take a bad step that would leave her with a snapped ankle.

  Another mile along, she came to a sharp turn in the road where it made its way around a promontory of boulders with a crown of scrub pine growing about its base. She stepped out onto the big caprock to look down on the curved section of road that was invisible from the shelf above.

  She looked to the west, where the fire road dropped down toward the watershed. The clearing where the long trail looped south was out of sight past the bare branches of the birches that covered the shed land. Squinting to study the road ahead, she could see black marks in the snow. She moved closer over the rounded rock, stepping across a deep fissure in the stone.

  The marks in the snow were from the hooves of a horse. Black against white, as clear as words on a page. The story they told was easy to read, too. The prints came onto the road and followed it west a bit to a place where it looked like Esperanza had reined Bravo in. There was a circle of impressions where she had tried to turn his head, but the gelding wasn’t having it. He knew right where he was from the countless times Merry had ridden him in this same part of the forest. His head would turn toward the long trail where it passed through the sweetgrass clearing. In the end, the larger animal had won, and the hoofprints continued along the road until they were out of sight in the deeper dark.

  There was no hope of catching up to them before full dark. Or before Bravo took them both back to his stall.

  She wished she’d worn warmer clothing. She wished that Clif Bar that had been in her vest pocket yesterday was still there. She wished she could wet her dry mouth with some snow, but she knew the dangers of that. She wished her father was here. She thanked Jesus that her Uncle Fern was not. He’d be as dead as she was sure his beloved hounds were right now.

  Then she shoved all the wishes and prayers and fears down deep to deal with what was happening now. Right now. Right here. That was all that mattered. Not what could not be. She had to think ahead to what might happen when she reached the farm.

  They’d most probably have cut the phone lines. The electric, too. They wouldn’t know where her father had hidden guns and ammo in the house and the barn and up on the eaves of the carport. The feds hadn’t found them, and they’d spent weeks on the farm. And what if those guns were there, and she could reach them? She was no soldier, no hardass Marine like her daddy. She was familiar and comfortable with the rifles and shotguns that were kept handy or hidden around the property. Her daddy had taken her to the shooting range dug out of a hillside at the rear of the farm. The summer before, they’d fired thousands of rounds under her father’s supervision and tutelage. He had told her she had a good eye, but needed to work on her breathing for long-range targets.

  That would mean nothing against the kind of rough men who had come to the farm. These men were killers, and she’d seen their kind before up close. Way too close. She had no cowgirl fantasies that she could take on who-knew-how-many criminals and still be standing when the smoke cleared. This wasn’t Home Alone, and these weren’t the Wet Bandits.

  Merry slid to a lower grouping of stones to make her way down to the road. She had no idea what to do beyond trying to reach the farm before Esperanza, but there was the long run down the mountain, and time to think of something that would save the girl from the men who had come for her.

  She crouched to lower her foot to the next ledge beneath her when she heard the sound. A motor. A car or truck engine, coming from the east, its source still invisible around the turn in the fire road.

  50

  Rolo drove the F-150 at a crawl along the switchback road. The rifle was propped against the dash. His nine mil auto rested atop the console at his side. His eyes scanned the white surface before him, looking for any signs of disturbance. He got out a few times to inspect tracks that he recognized as deer.

  As the sun traversed the peak above and threw the valley into shadow, he switched on his headlights. They helped him to see the road, but blinded him to all other surroundings. His world was reduced to twin cones of light. The white road in front of the truck ran under an arch of ice-rimed tree branches that looked like strands of crystal.

  The road curved and recoiled back on itself as it followed the path of least resistance around the rim of the mountainside. It was seldom a straight run, and then usually less than fifty meters before the next right-hand turn.

  Ahead of him, a great brow of rock jutted off the incline, causing the road to make a sharp hairpin to clear the point. The boulder angled out over the road, with only a few feet of clearance above the truck’s cab on the right-hand side. He steered well clear of it, the twin beams of his brights sweeping through the trees to return to the smooth white surface of the road.

  Something ahead threw shadows across the snow. The crust was broken in spots. Even moving at his snail’s pace, the Ford slewed to a stop. The road surface was turn
ing to ice under the fresh fall. He righted the truck to aim the lights down the road ahead.

  He got out of the cab with the rifle in his hands. Rolo walked down the beams, his shadow stretched before him. The light pulsed with the rhythm of the Ford’s engine. He came to where the snow was disturbed and crouched to take a look. Hoof prints, and recent ones. There was no snow in the prints. The girl on the brown mount had passed this way since the snow stopped falling. He walked farther, past where the U-shaped impressions first appeared.

  The prints continued on down the road as far as he could see. She had come this way and was not far ahead of him. The horse would be blown after racing up the steep grade to this point. He would catch up to her easily. Then she would pay for Jerry, that horrible death. Mauled by an animal. His eyes had pleaded with his hermano, and Rolo had stood by helplessly. He couldn’t kill her—there was no payday in that—but her owners wouldn’t mind if she came back a little soiled.

  Rolo was turning back to the rising glare of the truck when he heard the crunch of tires on frost. At first, he thought he had perhaps left the Ford in gear, and it was rolling on its own. Then the engine gunned with a throaty rumble, and the lights grew bigger and brighter. Someone was at the wheel. He turned to run from the road, slick soles slipping on the pebbly surface of the hardened snow.

  The right front fender struck him hard in the side and he was airborne, tumbling into the icy blades of the ferns that sprouted along the roadside. He kept hold of the rifle even as he rolled to a stop, the wind driven from him. The truck slid to a halt, angled across the road. The twin orbs of the reverse lights flashed on, and the wheels of the Ford spun in the crust with a rasping sound.

  Rolo tried to rise so he could hobble into the trees, but he couldn’t. Pain lanced up from where the ball joint at the top of his left leg had become dislocated, a hairline fracture across the neck of the joint. He sucked in air, but one of his lungs would not fill, and the pain made him cry out. He fell back into the ferns, with only enough strength to raise the Marlin with one hand for a wild shot. One final act of defiance as the truck roared up on him and over his legs. The double back tires crushed his shin bones under their grinding weight. He dropped back to the ground, not enough air in his lungs to scream.