Джеймс Паттерсон - The Red Book

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she asks.

Because I wanted to find these assholes myself. Because maybe I’m not interested in bringing these slimeballs to justice in the traditional way, with arrests and indictments and prison sentences.

None of that sounds so good.

I say this instead: “Like you said, it’s a heater case. The solve prevented a riot. Before I reopened the case officially, I wanted to be sure.”

“Yeah, but you could’ve told me . You should’ve told me.”

A smirk plays on her face.

“You didn’t trust me,” she says.

I didn’t trust anybody. But now she knows. I have no choice.

“Let’s bring in the Bureau,” she says. “Clara Foster, the agent working on human trafficking on that joint task force. She seemed okay.”

“The FBI? No,” I say.

“Why not? Evie’s from Romania, right? Or looks like, at least? This is an international human-trafficking ring, Harney. The Bureau could give us all sorts of resources we don’t have.”

Yeah, more people who will stop me from handling things my way.

“We don’t need Fuck Buddies Incorporated taking this over and cutting us out,” I say. “This is our case. If we made a mistake, we’ll correct it.”

She doesn’t like it, but at least she doesn’t question my motives. I’m parroting what most cops would say in my position. Nobody in the department trusts the feds, and the feeling is mutual.

“Fine,” she says. “Then we do this, just the two of us.”

Chapter 76

THE AIRPORT is just outside Plainfield. Disco needs GPS to find it.

The jet has already arrived, a sleek, metallic blue, sitting alone out on the runway, gleaming in the late afternoon sun.

“He’s here already,” Disco says into the phone.

“He didn’t say why?” asks Augustina.

No, he didn’t say why. He just told Disco to come alone.

Disco parks his car and walks over to the tarmac.

The door opens. A staircase lowers. His heartbeat ratchets up.

He doesn’t have a piece with him. Thought about it, but they’d take it off him anyway.

He did wear his best suit, though.

Inside the jet, General Kostyantin Boholyubov sits in a plush leather seat, legs crossed. Dressed in a silver double-breasted suit, crimson tie knotted perfectly, silver cufflinks, Ferragamo loafers shining like mirrors.

Disco stands at attention and salutes. “General.”

“At ease, Colonel.” The general looks away, as if embarrassed by the show of military display. It’s been over for ten years now. The hardheaded general is the same person, with the same tactics, but now he’s immaculately coiffed.

If Disco hadn’t saluted, though, the general would’ve been furious.

Behind the general are three members of his private security. Two of them, whom Disco doesn’t recognize, are armed with Kalashnikov rifles slung over their shoulders. The third, Milton, was Boho’s deputy when the general ran the Berkut, the secret police.

Another man stands at attention by the pilot’s door, bigger than any of the other men, wide and tall, a neck like a tree stump, a shock of red hair on top with the sides buzzed. To face the general, Disco has to turn his back on this redheaded thug.

Three in front, one behind.

“I have a question for you, Colonel,” says Boho. “But first, I’d like you to do something for me.”

“Anything, General.”

“I want you to strip off your clothes.”

A shudder runs through Disco. “My…clothes.”

“Yes.” The general raises the glass from his armchair, takes a sip of his single-malt Scotch. Always was a big fan of single malt.

“General—”

“Your clothes are still on, Colonel. Perhaps I wasn’t clear.”

Two of the thugs behind Boho stand. That makes three of them standing, if you count the redhead behind him.

Disco loosens his tie. Unbuttons his shirt. “General, if I have done something wrong…” Trying to avoid a tremble in his voice.

Boho smiles at him, holds eye contact. Doesn’t move an inch.

Disco removes his jacket, tie, shirt, undershirt.

“Everything,” says Milton, his deputy, his coal-black eyes gleaming.

Disco strips to his underwear. Doesn’t make eye contact with Milton, but Milton says it anyway, once more: “Everything.”

Disco looks to the general for relief, for mercy, but Boho stares back at him with that stony expression, his blue eyes shiny.

Disco wiggles out of his underwear.

Maybe they just wanted to see if he was wearing a wire. Now that they can see he isn’t, they’ll let him put his clothes back on.

The general turns toward the men behind him, a curt nod. One of them reaches down to his seat and produces a set of hedge shears—long, sharp blades with black-and-orange leather handles.

“General, please .” Disco feels himself shrink, his hands over his privates, his heartbeat violent against his chest.

“I haven’t asked my question yet, Colonel. Do you want to hear my question?”

“Yes, sir,” he whispers, bent over. “Yes, General.”

“My question,” says Boho, “is why, two days ago, my cousin—the one who operates the orphanage in Timisoara—received a phone call from a Chicago police officer, trying to determine the identity of a dead girl. A girl who had been shot to death in Chicago.” The general opens his hands. “Why would this happen?”

“General, I…” His throat closes up involuntarily. Sweat stings his eyes.

“Now,” Boho goes on, “I am trying to decide if an answer such as ‘I don’t know’ is better than ‘I do know, General, but I forgot to mention this problem to you.’ I am truly unsure of which answer would upset me more.”

“General—”

“Because if you do not know of something going on with one of our girls, from one of our orphanages, then I have to wonder why. Why are things happening without your knowledge? I have to wonder whether you are the right person to be running this operation in Chicago.”

“I—”

“But on the other hand, Colonel, if you know of a specific problem but failed to mention it to me, I would have to wonder why you did not bring this problem to my attention.” The general holds out his glass. One of the men refreshes it from a decanter of Scotch.

“General, I can explain.”

“Ah, he can explain,” he says to Milton. “So explain, Colonel.”

“I did not…did not want to bother you with a problem I can…take care of myself.”

“You wanted to show…what is the American word?…initiative. Yes, that is it. You wanted to show initiative, Colonel, is that correct?”

“Yes, General. I wanted to take care of it without troubling you, sir.”

“And yet I am troubled. I am receiving calls from Romanian orphanages. Chicago police officers are sending photographs of a dead girl to an orphanage. Do you not think that causes me trouble?”

“I am…sorry, General.”

“Do you know why these police are interested in this girl?”

“We…had to kill her, sir. She es—” The throat closure again. This one isn’t going to be easy to say.

Boho’s eyes bulge in mock curiosity. “She es—she escaped ? Is that it?”

Disco nods, trying to keep himself from collapsing to the carpet.

“You allowed a girl to escape, and you had to kill her. Yes?”

“Yes.”

“But you did not dispose of the body?”

“We couldn’t, sir.”

“You did not dispose of the body! You left her to be found by the police. And now they are calling one of our best orphanages!” He rises from his chair. “You let all this happen, Colonel.”

“Sir, I—”

An arm comes around his neck, lifts him off his feet, arching backward. The two thugs by Boho rush forward, each grabbing a leg. No matter how Disco kicks and rears, it takes them no time whatsoever to hold him still, in midair, spread-eagled.