Cold City (Repairman Jack - the Early Years Trilogy) (31 page)

“Some guys don’t straighten out so easy.  Some
never
do.  That
hijo de puta
is one of those.  But he ain’t outa reach.  He may think so, but he ain’t.”

Jack wanted to keep him out of reach of Julio’s bat – for Julio’s sake. 

“How does this work again?” Jack said. 

Julio shrugged.  “Don’t ’xactly know.  Like the man say, ‘proprietary information’ and all that.  He told her he convinces the marks to take money out of their bank accounts and give it to him.  How he do that, I dunno.”

“Tell me what you
do
know.”

“Okay.  First thing the
hijo de puta
do is he find himself a lonely old person.  Some guy who lose his wife, some lady who lose her husband.  Like I said, he prefer the ladies ’cause he so fucking charming.  That how my Rosa fall for him.  But he swing both ways as long as they got enough money.”

Jack couldn’t help making a face.  “This doesn’t involve sex, does it?”

Julio laughed.  “Doubt it, meng, but nothin’ too low for that–”

“–
hijo de puta
, right.  But where’s this ‘civic duty’ come in?”

“Don’t know.  He showed Rosa some kinda badge once, said he pretends to fight fraud.  Ain’t that somethin’?  The
hijo de puta
con man pretends he’s fighting fraud.”

“Well, if I wanted to rob somebody who had a burglar alarm, I’d pretend to be a burglar-alarm repairman.” 

When Julio didn’t respond, he looked over and found him staring.

“What?”

“You been planning to rob a place with a burglar alarm?  Or that just pop off the top of your head?  ’Cause either way it’s kinda scary.”

Jack didn’t think so.  Just seemed logical.

“So somehow he gets them to help him fight fraud by giving him money?  Doesn’t make sense.  He makes a living out of this?”

Julio nodded.  “Six figures.”

“Yow.  Doesn’t anyone report him?”

“Who knows?  All I know is he don’t get caught.  At least not yet.  He did tell Rosa he make a point of not cleaning them out.  He sting them and move on.  They poorer and he’s richer.”

Jack thought about someone doing that to his grandmother when she was alive.  Or old Mrs. Clevenger from town.  He frowned.  Why had he thought of her?  She hadn’t seemed like the type to fall for a scam.  He shrugged it off.  Didn’t matter.  

Either way, it would have pissed him off.

The next leg of the trip was short.  They followed the Dodge a few blocks to the local Chemical Bank branch.  Again Zalesky did the chauffeur thing by opening the rear door for the mark.  She stepped out carrying a small black briefcase and went inside. 

“What’s this?” Jack said.

“Only thing I can see happening in there is she’s gonna fill that thing with cash.”

Jack shook his head.  “Does not compute.  If I’m a bank teller and I see a little old lady coming in to withdraw a large amount of cash, I’m suspicious.  I’m wondering if maybe this lady is being coerced – you know, someone’s holding a gun to the head of her grandson or her cat until she comes up with the money.”

“I dunno, meng.”

Less than ten minutes later she emerged and reentered the car.

“That was quick,” Jack said.  “Gotta be something else going down.”

They followed the Dodge a short distance until it parked.  Julio found a space for their car where they could sit and watch it idle.

“What the hell?” Jack said.

This was weird.  If Jack hadn’t been told this was a con, he might have expected Zalesky – sorry, the
hijo de puta
– to clock her, kick her out of the car, and run off with the money.  But that would change it from a con to a mugging.  He would have paid a princely sum to know what was being said in that car. 

Suddenly the driver door opened and Zalesky stepped out with what looked like the same briefcase.  Only this one had two pieces of bright yellow tape stretched across the top, one over each lock.  He placed it in the trunk and returned to the driver seat.

Jack was baffled.  He glanced at Julio.  “Does any of this make
any
sense to you?  Ring any bells from what Rosa told you?”

Julio shook his head.  “No.  Nothing.”

After a twenty-minute wait, Zalesky retrieved a taped briefcase from the trunk and returned to the car.

“Okay,” Jack said.  “He had two identical briefcases in the trunk.  He puts in the one with the cash and takes out the duplicate filled with – what?  Newspapers?  But no mark is
that
stupid.  Anyone with half a brain is going to open that briefcase to make sure the money’s still there.”

The Dodge started moving again, straight back to the row house where Zalesky opened the rear door for the lady who emerged with the briefcase – sans tape.  He walked her to her door and, after a brief hug, hurried back to the car and sped off.

“A hug?” Jack said, totally bewildered.  “He gets a hug?  What’s going down here?”

“Told you the
culo
was smooth.”

Yeah, but this was beyond smooth.  This was supernatural.

As Jack watched him drive off, he wondered if there was anything here he could turn against Zalesky.  He didn’t see it.  He didn’t know enough.  At least not now.

But letting him drive away with that old lady’s money didn’t sit well either.

“Keep on him,” Jack said.

5

Zalesky drove straight back to Pelham Bay, found a parking spot on the same street as before, and reentered his front door carrying the briefcase.

“Gotta go,” Julio said.  “Gotta open up.  Gotta keep the place open as many hours as possible.”

“Keeping that baseball bat behind the bar wouldn’t hurt either.”

Julio smiled.  “I hear you, meng.”

“Go ahead,” Jack said.  “Take the car.  I’ll train home.”  During their cruising around he’d noticed elevated tracks a couple of blocks away.  The subway wasn’t sub this far up in the Bronx.

Jack let Julio roar off and returned to the bookstore where he pretended to browse but kept his eye on Zalesky's door.

He didn't have to browse long.  Zalesky popped back out a few minutes later – in casual clothes and with no briefcase – and headed in the opposite direction with the stride of a man who knew where he was going.

Jack followed, but not before passing close enough to Zalesky's door to see what kind of lock it had.  A Schlage.  Good.  He knew Schlages inside and out. 

Jack closed in on Zalesky and checked him out.  He’d changed into jeans and a sweatshirt.  Did he have the old lady’s cash on him?  Probably not.  Didn’t make sense to carry heavy cash.  Which meant he’d left it in his apartment.  Did he stash all his dough there as Jack did, or did he have a safe deposit box somewhere?  He was a real citizen with a real-person identity, and a box would make better sense than a cash cache or a bank account.  An account would track deposits and withdrawals; if he ever was investigated for anything, the IRS might want to know the source of those deposits and why taxes hadn’t been paid on them.

So Jack figured it was a relatively safe bet that Zalesky’s latest haul was sitting somewhere in his apartment, at least for the remainder of the weekend.

He followed the man to a bar-restaurant called The Main Event.  Jack passed the place, walking on for about half a block, then doubled back.  He strolled in and took a seat at the bar.  In the mirror he saw Zalesky standing by a table where three other guys of varying ages were seated.  All were grinning.  Then he turned and headed Jack’s way.

“Yo, Neil,” the bartender said.

Jack tensed as Zalesky leaned on the bar not a foot away.  But Jack might as well have been invisible.

“Hey, Joe.”

“’Sup?”

“Lemme have a Bud Light and a round for the guys.  Put it on my tab.”

“You got it.”

He returned to the table and seemed in a great mood. 

Well, he should be, Jack thought.  He’d just ripped off somebody’s grandma.  Buy
two
rounds, Neil-baby.  You’re one helluva guy.

“So you’re really Joe the bartender,” Jack said, chatting him up.  “
The
Joe the Bartender?”

Joe smiled.  “The original.  When Sinatra sings ‘Set ’em up, Joe,’ he’s talking about me.”

“Can you set me up with a Bud Light draft, Joe?”

He ordered a Bud because that was what Neil and company were drinking and Jack wanted to fit in. 

“Need to see some proof.”

Jack showed him the Lonnie Buechner license Bertel had supplied. 

“North Carolina, huh?” Joe handed it back.  “You’re a long way from home.”

“Just checking in on my grandmother,” he said, thinking of the old lady Zalesky had scammed.

The bartender filled a glass and Jack sipped it slowly.  It tasted like cold piss cut with seltzer, which fit his mood just fine.

“Bad day?” Joe said.

Jack looked up.  The bartender was staring at him.

“Me?”

“You look ready to punch someone.”

Jack blinked. 
Exactly
how he felt.  Did it show so clearly?  He needed to work on an everything’s-cool face. 

“Outa work,” he said. 

Joe nodded.  “I hear ya. A lot of that going around.  Wish I could help but things are tight all over.”

“Thanks anyway.”

The bartender wandered away, leaving Jack to watch the
hijo de puta
in the mirror and ponder his next move.

6

Roman Trejador glanced at the bowl of curried shrimp that room service had just delivered, then looked up at Nasser.  His eyes seemed wary.

“So, the only witnesses we have are a frightened Palestinian who was hiding most of the time, and a driver whose prospects are best served by telling us what we want to hear.”

That’s quite a negative spin, Nasser thought, but pretty much on target.

“We also have the name of the other driver, who got a look at the thieves.”

“Whom we are
told
got a good look.  Do you believe we can trust this – what was his name?”

“The driver we have is named Reggie–”

“So he says.”

Nasser knew a good actuator survived by being suspicious of everything and everyone.

“He also says the other driver’s name is Lonnie.”

“Just…Lonnie?  That’s almost as bad as having no name.”

“Reggie says he knows how to find him.”

“I think you should strangle this Reggie for being a liar.  Or shoot him in the knees to see if he’s telling the truth.”

“His knees are already broken.”

Trejador smiled briefly.  “Touché.”

“And he thinks Lonnie broke them, so we can assume he’s motivated to find him.”

The actuator poked at his shrimp.  He didn’t seem to have an appetite.

Nasser was about to ask a very important question when a door opened and a woman wearing only a black teddy stepped through.  He recognized her as the young prostitute from last month.  In midafternoon? 

She looked surprised when she saw Nasser. 

“Oops, sorry, I didn’t – oh, it’s you again.”  She smiled at Trejador.  “You didn’t tell me this would be a threesome.”

“It’s not, Danaë.”

She pouted.  “But I
like
threesomes.”

“I’m sure you do.  Why don’t you go take a bubble bath in that ridiculously huge tub while I talk to my associate here.”

“You’ll scrub my back?”

“Of course.  Now shoo.”

As she turned and closed the door behind her, her teddy lifted to reveal a delightful pair of bare buttocks.  Nasser felt a stirring in his pelvis that almost made him forget his question.  But not quite.

“How did the High Council take the news?”

Another poke at the shrimp.  “About as expected.”

“They needn’t worry.  We will get the money back.”

“It’s not the money; you know that.”

Nasser did.  The Order was richer than the Vatican, and far older.  Even so, three million US was hardly a negligible sum.  But the amount didn’t matter.  The principle mattered.  Someone had stolen something that belonged to the Order.  No members of the Order had been hurt or killed in the process – the only bright spot in this cesspool – but the fact remained that someone had stolen from the Order, and that could not stand.

Which brought up the most important question.  ”Did… did they say anything about me?”

Trejador nodded.  “Very disappointed.”

Nasser swallowed.  “What does that mean?”

“They said ‘adjustments will be made.’”

Nasser didn’t like the sound of that.  “ ‘Adjustments’?  What does that mean?”

“I’m not sure they knew at the time.  We’ll find out when they decide.”

For an instant Nasser wished he were back home in Qatar, but then, the Order had a presence in Qatar.  The Order was everywhere.

He looked at Trejador.  “Do you want to speak to him?  The driver?”

“Why would I want to do that?”

“Maybe you can get more information out of him.”

“I sincerely doubt that.  I have more pressing matters.”

Like what? Nasser thought.  A soak with your whore?

But he said, “Anything I can help with?”

Trejador paused, then said, “Yes, I believe you can.”  He reached behind him and produced a floppy computer disk.  He held it out to Nasser.  “Before giving you the money I had the serial numbers recorded.”

Nasser took the five-inch disk and stared at it.  “You suspected?”

“No, but I prepare for the worst.  Distribute copies to our brothers in the banking industry.  Many of the bills have consecutive runs.  Have them alert their people to be on the lookout for those numbers.”

“This is brilliant!”

“No, it’s a long shot.  No bank can afford to check every bill that comes through, but they can keep their eye on large cash deposits or large cash transactions.”  He shrugged.  “Who knows?  We may get lucky.”

Nasser’s spirits lifted at this ray of hope.  “What about the driver – Reggie?”

He sighed.  “Get his knees repaired and put him to work.”

Nasser hurried off with the disk, leaving the actuator with his cold shrimp and the very hot Danaë.

7

He watched Zalesky’s door.