David Duffy - In for a Ruble

Actually, I could make a pretty good guess, but I wasn’t about to say so. I leaned in and tried to look sympathetic.

“You’re a fraud. Don’t pretend you’re not enjoying this. I can see it all over your face.” She shoved me away, but smiled as she did so.

We were on my couch, enjoying a predinner drink, red wine for her, vodka for me. I had a pork roast in the oven, coated with rosemary, sage, garlic, and olive oil. Victoria licked her lips as soon as she walked in the door, but the rest of her body language indicated she’d had a bad day.

The rest of mine hadn’t been overly productive either. After Batkin left, I’d replayed mentally the conversation with Andras’s mother. I couldn’t see anything that caused her panic or fear, both of which came out of nowhere. I went back over the Basilisk’s records, and they showed nothing more than a wealthy divorced woman teaching at a small Minnesota college, enjoying regular visits from her son and periodic vacations at health spas and ski resorts, one of which she’d just returned from. I worked the data on Andras and Irina without any more success. Despite what his mother said, Andras was still trying to reach his uncle. He’d called twice yesterday and once this morning without connecting. Walter Coryell gave every indication of having gone incommunicado. Irina, however, was still buying pizza at Crestview Pizza and soda at Mike’s Grocery. I called Gina and got her voicemail. She called back just after Victoria walked in.

“Sorry, Turbo! Back to back seminars. What’s up? Not Newburgh again, I hope.”

“Maybe worse, from your point of view. Crestview, Massachusetts—Hicksville to you. Probably a four-hour drive from New York. How soon can you get up there?”

“You paying? Tonight.”

“Tomorrow will be fine. Get the Valdez out of the lot. I’ll set it up.”

“This another hot-sheets joint?”

“Crestview Pizza and Mike’s Grocery, both on Main Street.”

“What about them?”

“They’re favorite spots of the kid you tracked in Newburgh, Andras Leitz. Also his girlfriend, a tall, blond Russian named Irina Lishina. Sorry I can’t be more specific on the description. Watch your step with her, she’s a tough customer.”

“Sure. What’s the deal?”

“Andras and the girl are students at a fancy private school in the next town, Gibbet. I think they’re up to something in Crestview. They hit that pizza joint several nights a week—when they should be studying or in bed. Pick them up there, follow them, let me know where they go.”

“Okay, but…”

“What?”

“Do I have to drive the Valdez? That car’s the most uncool thing on the road.”

“Ford—bedrock of the American economy.”

“You’re showing your age, Turbo. Google’s the bedrock of the American economy these days.”

“Try taking a date to a drive-in in a search engine.”

“Drive-in? Turbo, there hasn’t been a drive-in… You’re crazy.”

“Did I tell you I’m leaving you that car in my will?”

“Just my luck. A car I hate to drive and won’t be able to sell.”

I hung up.

“I’m glad to see you treat all your lady friends with the same gentle and affectionate touch,” Victoria said.

I fixed our drinks and asked Victoria about her day, and that’s when she said, “I wouldn’t ask if I had any choice, but I don’t. I need help.”

“ Socialist help?”

“Don’t start.”

I couldn’t resist. “Assistance from a one-time foot soldier in the army of the Evil Empire?”

“I’m warning you, goddammit…”

“Or are you looking for some old-fashioned KGB tradecraft?”

“If you don’t… Shit. I knew this wouldn’t be easy. And before your ego inhales any more of its own manure, I only need you to get him to let me use the Basilisk.”

“Ahhh, the painful truth will out. Here I am, ready to rush to the aid of the beautiful damsel in distress, capitalist temptress though she may be, and I discover, in the nick of time, that I’m only being used, in typical vixen fashion, as a poor means to an ignoble end. I think I’ll go fall on my carving knife.”

“Did anyone ever tell you, without a doubt, you are the biggest pain in the ass ever to come out of Mother Russia?”

“It was a favorite theme of my ex-wife, although she was a lot more histrionic about it.”

“And how long did that marriage last?”

“Eight years, but it seemed longer.”

“An eternity to her, I’ll bet. Look, I’m prepared to pay. Sexual favors. Dinner at Trastevere. A case of that rotgut vodka you drink. Name your price.”

“Who says I can be bought?”

“You’re going to make me beg, aren’t you?”

“The thought crossed my mind, but I’m really just trying to find out what I’m signing on for.”

“You can be a real bastard.”

“Probably not your best sales pitch.”

I took her glass to the kitchen and refilled it along with my own. “We’ve got half an hour until the pork’s ready. Tell me your troubles.”

I think she started to call me another name, then thought better of it.

“It’s this case I came back for. Not mine—I didn’t start it—but I inherited it, and if it goes south, it’s on my watch.”

“It’s headed south?”

“Yes, dammit. That’s what I’m trying to tell you. I thought we were headed for indictment. The reason I came back when I did.”

“ I thought it was me .”

“Sorry. Don’t play games. I told you that.”

“You did,” I admitted. “What then?”

“DoJ’s like any other big organization. Nobody wants to give the boss bad news. So all the e-mails I got while I was away…”

“Overstated the case?”

“One way of putting it. Blew smoke up my skirt is another.”

“Sounds just like the Cheka.”

“Don’t start that. You can’t compare—”

“You just said, like any other big organization. What’s so different?”

“Never mind. You want to hear my story or not?”

“I’m all ears.”

She didn’t look like she believed me, but she said, “All right. We’ve been working with a handful of big city police departments—New York, L.A., Chicago, Houston, Atlanta. They have technology that allows them to monitor file-sharing sites on the Internet—in this case, child pornography. We got search warrants and taps on the guys swapping the porn so we could see who they were doing business with. That led us to a credit-card payment processing company. Same process we followed six or seven years ago, which led to the bust of a pretty big ring. But we didn’t have this kind of technology then, so this time, we’re swimming in a much bigger pond.”

“How many people we talking?”

“Not sure yet. Last time it was ninety thousand.”

“How much money?”

“Not sure about that either. Some of these guys spend ten, twelve thousand a year online—or more.”

“Ninety thousand at ten grand is pushing a billion.”

“Right and that billion, if that’s what it is, is disappearing—right here. The trick for these guys is getting the money out of the country and into their accounts overseas. In this case, Belarus, we think. It gets pretty murky over there.”

“Baltic Enterprise Commission?”

Green flash. “How do you know that?”

“BEC’s the market leader for that kind of service. I could’ve told you that two days ago, when I asked about the case.”

“I have institutional constraints, remember?”

“I remember. As someone on the outside looking in…”

“You are the biggest goddamned son of a bitch…”

“Just making a point—in the only son of a bitch fashion I know.”