Dave Zeltserman - Outsourced

“Who helped you from inside the bank?”

Shrini gave Petrenko a confused look.

“Don’t act dumb now. Someone inside the bank helped you.”

Shrini shook his head.

“No? Then how did you find out which safety deposit boxes I owned?”

“My friend hacked-”

Petrenko tapped him on the ankle with the golf club.

“Names!” he demanded.

“Dan Wilson hacked into the bank’s database,” Shrini said, grimacing as tears welled up in his eyes.

“And the security system?”

“He rigged the software so it would be disabled during the robbery.”

“This bank manager, Craig Brown, wasn’t involved?” Petrenko asked with some disappointment.

“No.”

Petrenko stroked his chin, considering what was said. He had to admire the execution of the bank robbery. This Dan Wilson could be useful and for a moment he thought about forcing Wilson to work for him, but decided against it. The man had tried once to steal from him; he couldn’t be trusted. More importantly, a message had to be sent. Wilson and his family had to be taken care of and it would have to be bloody. First, though, he would retrieve his belongings and take care of this zhid up in New Hampshire. After that, he’d take his time with Wilson and his family.

He told Shrini that he was going to go on a ride with them. “If you make any noise or do anything to upset me I will leave pieces of you along the highway.”

Shrini nodded weakly.

The handcuffs were taken off and Shrini was thrown on to his stomach and hogtied. Yuri Tolkov started to push a soiled rag into his mouth, but Petrenko stopped him. In Russian he told Yuri that he didn’t want to risk Shrini choking to death during the ride. “He might be useful for now. Later we’ll dispose of him.”

Two of the Russians carried Shrini to a blue BMW sedan that had been stolen hours earlier and dumped him into the trunk.

The two detectives were in his basement. Resnick had already taken down several of the ceiling tiles so he could look in the space above them. Now he was walking around the room tapping on the wood paneling. The younger detective was sweating heavily as he searched through boxes that had been stacked in a corner.

Dan told Resnick that there were no hidden compartments. “If that’s what you’re looking for,” he added.

Resnick didn’t bother acknowledging him; he simply kept up with his tapping.

Dan checked his watch. It was two thirty-five. They’d been searching the house for almost three hours now and still had the garage and shed to go through. So far he’d been lucky – both Carol and the kids were out – but how much longer was his luck going to hold?

With that thought, a car pulled into the driveway. He knew it had to be Carol. Without saying a word, he went up the basement steps and reached the front door at the same time as his wife.

“You have someone over?” she asked.

“Let’s talk outside.”

As he led her outside, her face grew pale and drawn. She didn’t bother looking at him, instead she stared at Resnick’s Buick and the way it was parked so it had Dan’s car blocked in.

“The police are here, aren’t they?” she asked.

“This is nothing to worry about-”

“They think you were involved in that robbery,” she said. The look she gave him stung worse than if she had slapped him. “They’re searching the house right now.”

“It doesn’t mean anything-”

“What do you mean it doesn’t mean anything? They’ve been going through my dresser drawers, going through everything I own! I’m going to have to wash all my clothes.”

She stopped. Her face scrunched up as if she were about to start bawling. “Have our children been home?” she asked.

Dan shook his head.

“What if they had been?”

“They haven’t, okay? Look, this will all be over soon.” He tried to meet her eyes, but had to lower his gaze. “They’re only doing this because I worked on the security system.”

“You have to tell me the truth,” she said, her voice dropping so it was barely above a whisper. “Look at me.”

He forced himself to meet her eyes.

“Were you and Gordon involved in the robbery?”

“This is ridiculous. How could you even ask me that?”

“For the sake of our children you have to tell me the truth. Dan, please, tell me the truth!”

“I’ve already told you the truth. How many times do I have to say it? Jesus Christ. I’m a software engineer, not a criminal. This is all just nuts.”

Her mouth started to move, but she swallowed back whatever she was going to say. Nodding slightly, she looked away from him and went inside.

“Where are they now?” she asked.

He indicated towards the basement. As if on cue, rustling noises came from there. She turned towards the basement door, took a few steps and stopped. As she stood frozen her body seemed to shrink inward. She looked so frail and tired that it brought a lump to Dan’s throat. Almost as if she were moving in molasses, she started again. Dan followed her down the stairs.

Resnick gave her a short nod when he saw her. The other detective tried to say something innocuous and turned away when he saw the look Carol gave him, his voice trailing off into an unintelligible mumble. Carol stood silently with her arms folded tightly across her chest. Dan stood off to the side and watched.

When they were done in the basement, they next searched Dan’s workroom, then the garage and finally the shed. When they were done, Resnick walked the backyard searching for any possible hiding places.

“Are you satisfied yet?” Dan asked.

“No, not yet,” Resnick said. “Do you rent any storage space?”

Carol’s reaction gave the answer away. “Go ahead,” Dan told her. “It doesn’t matter. Tell them about our storage locker.”

She bit her lip as she looked at Resnick. “Two years ago we rented storage space in Andover,” she said.

“What for?”

“To hold some extra furniture. At the time we were thinking of buying a bigger house.”

“Why didn’t you?”

“Because the company I was working for shut their doors,” Dan said. “We thought we were going to make millions. We didn’t.”

Resnick gave Dan a hard look. “I’d like to see that locker.”

“No problem, I’ll take you there.”

Dan reached over to squeeze Carol’s hand. She pulled away and turned her head so she wouldn’t have to look at him.

Maguire moved alongside Dan. “You can’t blame her,” he said.

When they got to their cars, Resnick suggested Dan ride with them. “In case we find something, your wife won’t have to pay to have your car towed back.”

“Very thoughtful of you,” Dan said, “but I think I’ll take my chances.”

Dan got in his car and waited until Resnick pulled his Buick out.

A blue BMW drove past Joel Kasner’s house. It continued another hundred yards before pulling over to the side of the road. Petrenko got out of the front passenger seat, stretched, looked around and was satisfied with the location. Nobody was going to hear the gunshots. Still, this would have to be quick – ten minutes at the most. No matter how isolated the location appeared he didn’t want to risk a local cop stumbling upon them. If that happened, the cop would have to be taken care of and he’d just as soon make this as clean a job as possible.

He cracked open the magazine of his 9mm Beretta, checked that it was loaded and slid the magazine back in place. Yuri got out from the driver’s side while two other Russians emerged from the back. Yuri moved past them and took a bolt-action ten-round rifle from the backseat. The other two Russians carried sub-compact snub-nosed pistols.