Full Ratchet: A Silas Cade Thriller Hardcover (22 page)

“Like it?”

“You damn well better stay under the speed limit—that thing will draw police attention from every jurisdiction in the state.”

“After you shot my car, I decided, no more fucking around.”

“Is it armored?”

“Well, no.” She shook her head. “Some people I know, they lent it to me. I’d have preferred something more discreet, but this is what they had.”

People? “The M1 Abrams was already checked out?”

“I had some work in Youngstown a while ago.” Harmony tapped a keypad on the door and beeped the monster open. “Squared away a problem, totally unrelated, but it solved some issues for a guy here. You know, interstate commerce stuff.”

“Sure.” Presumably the kind of commerce that federal task forces were established to combat, but whatever.

“So he thinks he owes me a favor, and I’m collecting.”

I looked over her shoulder as she climbed in. In the driver’s seat her head was a good foot higher than mine. “He didn’t offer anything else, did he? An antitank gun? Maybe a rocket launcher?”

“No, but the tank was full.”

“Which is probably, like, five hundred dollars worth of gas.” I stepped back. “Keep your phone on.”

“If we have an encounter, you draw their fire, and I’ll do mop-up.”

“Sure.”

The afternoon was still clear and bright. Driving northwest, glare quickly became a problem. I found some sunglasses on the dash—not too scratched, so I left them on.

We didn’t have to coordinate the driving patterns. Harmony knew what she was doing. Once on the highway, twenty-five miles of open road, we slowed and sped up, switched off point and pace, drifted farther apart and closer together. A good team with several cars could have stayed with us, but it seemed unlikely.

Of course, they could also just wait. We weren’t exactly under the radar—Harmony’s absurd penis mobile drew even more attention than the Charger.

My phone rang. The incoming number didn’t mean anything. At this point I was in front, so I glanced in the rearview and saw the Escalade’s massive grille five cars back. No obvious problem.

“Yeah?”

It was Johnny. “I’ll keep it quick. Just wanted to let you know we’ve got confirmation on Sweetwater.”

“Wow.” I still hadn’t quite believed Wilbur Markson could be in. “How much?”

“They own fifty-one percent of Dagger Light, which is buying Clay Micro.”

“You told me that. Who’s got the forty-nine?”

“Rockwire Industries. They’re a gas industry supplier—pipe, drills, vehicles. All kinds of equipment. Not exactly consistent with Markson’s pledge never to invest in nonrenewable energy.”

“How big?”

“Midsize. And they’re local—not far from Pittsburgh. Clay Micro’s practically a neighbor.”

Now
that
was interesting.

“But that’s not the interesting thing,” Johnny continued.

The Escalade switched lanes, came up on my left, passed and dropped into place a hundred yards ahead. Traffic slowed, thickening as we neared the I-376 junction.

“What?”

“Somebody bought Rockwire. Last year. More offshore-entity bullshit, but they seem to be coming out of Cyprus.”

“Russians, all right.”

“Looks that way.”

Ever since the chaotic nineties, Cyprus had been a favorite destination for Russian flight capital—to the point, now, of so dominating the island’s economy it might be considered a fully held subsidiary of Putin’s oligarchs.

“And Markson is mixed up in this.”

“Controlling interest on both sides of the table. You think the Russians know?”

“Shit.”

“That’s sure what it feels like.”

“How public is this?”

“Not very. And not provable. Any lawyer could throw up a blizzard of objections and counterarguments. But it’s good enough for me.”

Me too, if Johnny said so. “Why do you think he’s in?”

“Markson?”

“It totally undercuts his entire image. Thirty years of financial probity and ethical investing! Why would he even
talk
to mafiya money?”

“I don’t know.” Johnny paused. “But I’ll tell you this—I’ve just started building a short position on Sweetwater.”

“Whoa.” I thought about that. “You think Markson’s in trouble?”

“It’s one explanation. You said it yourself—thirty years. Most fund managers haven’t been
alive
that long, let alone beating the S&P every damn year. What if the long glorious run’s finally ending?”

It made sense. Markson was almost sixty and had more money than God. At this point he was playing for his immortal reputation—and if results started to slip? He’d lose the aura.

“This could get Clara a Pulitzer,” I said.

“Let’s wait awhile.”

Meaning he hadn’t been able to lay down a big enough bet yet.

“Okay.” I needed to extricate myself first anyway. “But give her the background. You can trust her not to publish until it’s safe.”

“I know.”

“Let me know if you find out more.”

“And you,” said Johnny. “Like, if you happen to find yourself pointing a gun at the man himself—you absolutely must call me before you pull the trigger.”

It’d be the inside trade of a lifetime. “That’s not going to happen, and even if it did, remember all those subpoenas you just got?”

He made a dismissive snorting noise. “Yeah, yeah.”

Some debris in the road—it looked like a tire had blown, leaving scraps of rubber and some long skid marks. I swerved to avoid the biggest, and the truck shuddered. For a moment it felt like it was going out of control, but I held the wheel and got back into the lane. Harmony drifted back during the few seconds this took, let me pass her on the left. I glanced over, saw her frowning at me, but I gestured with the phone and she nodded.

“That’s great work, Johnny,” I said.

R
ankin Avenue Hardware was a shabby building on a commercial strip in one of the hollowed-out zones around Pittsburgh, the kind of neighborhood with more buildings boarded up than occupied. At five
P.M.
a couple of contractors’ trucks were parked out front, one sagging under a bed full of old junk—probably a trash-out. Harmony drove past slowly, nodded at me through the windshield and kept going around the block.

I couldn’t interpret the nod, but I didn’t want to be anywhere near her rolling arrest-me-now billboard, so I pulled over across the street and waited. She walked up a minute later and I got out.

Traffic was sporadic in both directions. We could see the front of the hardware store, though its broad windows had stock piled against them inside, blocking the view.

“Before we go in,” I said. “I was just talking to someone.”

“Me too.” She looked at me. “You first.”

“Clay Micro’s buyer is definitely owned half and half by Markson and the Russians. They’ve partnered up.”

“Markson and the mafiya.” She shook her head. “That’s a hard sell.”

“Johnny thinks maybe Markson’s finally hit the skids, and he had to scout the only kind of money that won’t talk about it. He can’t go to a bank or the markets or any kind of legitimate investor—it’d be all over the internet in five minutes. But criminals know how to keep their mouths shut.”

“But why would he sell to himself?”

“Well, he can’t just hand over assets to the Russians. Clayco is a well-known U.S. company. Doing it this way, he can start shifting ownership without people noticing. Remember, he only has half of Dagger Light—the other owners get the rest. The Russians are probably happy to keep it sub rosa for now, too—the government is worried about investment coming in from dubious regimes abroad.”

“Okay . . .” She sounded doubtful.

“And it’s just Markson’s bad luck that Clay Micro turned out to be one big septic tank.”

“Why would the Russians be hooked up with Brinker, though?”

“I don’t know. But Brinker probably met them early on—he’d have had to, even if the deal was totally nonpublic. Nabors, the Clay Micro CFO, knew about it, right? So I’d guess that Brinker and the Russian team met and sized each other up, and each realized they’d found a soul mate.” I shook my head. “Brinker’s just as bad as them, certainly.”

A woman pushing a jogging stroller went past on the sidewalk, a toddler dozing in the seat. There was a can in the cupholder on the stroller’s handle, and the green band on the aluminum looked familiar—Dave’s favorite beer.

Harmony put her hand on my arm.

“It’s a good thing we’re on the same side,” she said.

I couldn’t look away from her eyes. “Uh, yeah. A real . . . good thing. Good.”

“I’m not sure anyone else could have figured this out.”

“No, it’s—I mean, ah. Never mind.” I cast around for a reciprocal compliment. “You’re one hell of a shooter.”

She took her hand away. “Uh-huh.”

Shit, wrong thing to say. “Because, you know, I’ve seen a lot of gunnery, and . . .” I gave up, and the moment slipped away. Harmony sighed and crossed her arms.

I looked at the hardware store, then up the street. A long pause.

I was pretty sure Dave wouldn’t have screwed that up.

“How about you?” I said, finally.

“What?”

“Your call?”

“Oh.” Harmony nodded, and we were back to business. “The guy who hired me. And fired me, for that matter. He seemed upset I hadn’t left town yet.”

“How did he know?”

“Yeah, that’s a good question, isn’t it?”

Watching the airport. Visiting her home in LA. Having observers here in Clabbton who’d seen her. None of the obvious answers would make her feel better.

“It’s all speculation,” I said. “There’s no proof for any of this—Markson, the Russians, whatever.”

“It’s good enough for me.”

She wasn’t flustered, but her hair seemed looser, her hands a little more in motion. The vest hung open, obviously to keep free access to whatever cannon she had holstered in the small of her back. Another button seemed to have come undone at the top of the white shirt.

“What?” she said again.

“Huh?”

“You’re staring.”

“Oh.” Nothing to do but brazen it out. “What kind of holster do you use?”

“Sam Andrews. You?”

“Nothing that fancy.” A custom Andrews could cost three hundred dollars. “Sometimes I just push it into my belt.”

She shook her head. “Not worried about shooting your willy off, huh?”

“Nice.” If casual razzing was all that was on offer, I’d just have to be happy with that.

A van pulled up next to the hardware store, and the panel door slid open. Four men emerged—dirty, cement dust on their jeans and hair. They gestured brief goodbyes, and the van drove off.

All were short and dark-skinned. Their voices were inaudible from this far, but I’d have bet they were speaking Spanish. Day labor, earning their forty or fifty dollars.

Not so much difference, me and them.

“Come on,” I said. “Let’s go conduct an investigation.”

—

“I remember them.”

The woman behind the counter was at least fifty or sixty, gray haired and short. She started to read the receipt, but when I said “duct tape” that was all it took.

“Two of them, and didn’t they have trouble? Wandering around the aisles for ten minutes and never asked for help.”

The store wasn’t large—twenty feet this way, thirty that, every shelf and pegboard crammed. Heavy plastic bags of grass seed were piled at the front in what passed for a seasonal display with some hand trowels and spading forks by the register. At the end of the store, directly down the aisle from the door, a rack of color chips sat on a short bench over a paint-mixing machine. A wall of screws and bolts, a narrow trash can holding rakes and shovels upside down, sacks of charcoal.

“I thought they might be thinking about robbing the place.” She didn’t seem fazed by the possibility. “It’s happened before. Not that I ever have much cash in the drawer. Everyone uses plastic nowadays.”

“You’ve gotten held up?” Harmony looked interested.

“Once. And my husband one time—that was after closing, at eight o’clock. They pointed a gun right through the glass in the door.”

“I’m sorry to hear it.”

“No one hurt, thank God. It was kids both times. Drugs, I imagine. Not much younger than you two.”

A man in overalls had been finishing his purchase when we came in, taking a plastic bag and a coil of hose. The door’s spring was broken, and he had to stop to push it shut behind him, its bell jingling. We seemed to be the only other customers.

“What’s your interest?” the woman said.

“Um.” Maybe we should have thought about that
before
hand.

“Someone broke into my car,” said Harmony, picking up the slack. “Smashed the passenger window and stole all the change from the pockets. Broad daylight, can you believe it? Like no one would notice them or care.”

She was subtly imitating the woman’s gestures and voice—a little broader, a little louder, a little more inflection. I moved back a half step, happy to cede the limelight.

“So of course the police are like, how much did they take? And when I told them maybe ten dollars, they wouldn’t take a report. Even for the insurance on the window. Now it’s true I have a glass rider, but still.”

The woman nodded. “There’s plenty worse crimes they need to deal with, sorry to say.”

“Well, I guess that’s true. All the same. So we looked around, and this paper bag was sitting on the ground right next to my car. Like maybe they dropped it.”

“Duct tape,” the woman said. “Some candy and a Maglite. I remember.”

“We found the duct tape. I saw on TV once, someone’s breaking into a house, they put tape over the window so when they break the glass, it doesn’t fall and make noise. Maybe that’s what they were thinking.”

“Was there tape on
your
car?” She leaned forward, keen.

“No. So maybe not. But we thought we’d follow up because it was only about a mile from here.”

“I can’t tell you anything about them, really.” She straightened up. “Two men. Large. About your size.” She nodded to me. “Dark hair? I don’t know. Customers come and go all day.”

“But you remember these two,” said Harmony.

“Because they wandered around for so long. I was starting to wonder. But then they found their duct tape and flashlight, and one picked the bag of candy, and that was that.” She gestured to a small display of candy on the counter. “Paid up and left.”

What they looked like didn’t matter so much—we’d seen them ourselves. Or some of them. For that matter, these particular two might even be dead. There’d been substantial attrition among the Russians at the mill.

“They didn’t happen to say where they were going?” asked Harmony. “Or maybe where they were from?”

“No, they did not.”

A few more questions, and no more information. Harmony glanced at me, offering the floor, but I couldn’t think of anything to add.

“I guess we
should
just let it go,” she said. “Maybe the police are right. Insurance covers the window, like I said.”

“Not worth it,” the woman agreed.

But on the way out, just as I’d pushed open the door, she called over the jingling of the bell, “Oh, one thing.”

We stopped and looked back. “Yes?” Harmony said.

“They weren’t driving.”

“Driving?”

“They didn’t have a car.” The woman had a thought. “Maybe that’s what they were really after. You’re lucky—they could have been trying to steal yours!”

“How do you know?”

“After they left, I had to close the door. The mat had gotten wedged again—you saw the problem when you came in. But when I straightened it out, I happened to look up the street, and they were walking off.” She pointed. “Down that way.”

“Perhaps they parked over there.”

“On this block? I don’t know why—there are plenty of spaces much closer to us all day. Even at the busiest, on Saturday, you wouldn’t have to go far. No.” She shook her head. “The more I think on it, the more I think they were on foot.”

“We should go back to the police,” I suggested, feeling I ought to put in at least a few words. “Maybe a different car was stolen near ours.”

“Yes!” But her excitement faded. “Not that it would matter. They’ve got too much else to do than worry about a couple of joyriders. And that’s what they’ll call it, you know—just kids.”

Outside I started to cross toward the truck, a little surprised to find Harmony right beside me.

“You should go get your car,” I said. “She’s probably watching us. We shouldn’t hang around.”

“All the more reason.” Harmony checked the street in both directions. “What would she think if we split up?”

“Ah, right.”

“We’ll go around the block. You can drop me at mine.”

But once I started up and pulled into the street, we decided to drive around a little. Dusk was falling, streetlights flickering on—every other one, I noticed—leaving the streets more shadowy than lit. Budget cuts, probably.

“How far would they walk?” Harmony said, eyes scanning every building we passed. “A hundred yards? A quarter mile? Unless they have good reason, even Russians would probably drive. Like the woman said, parking is certainly not a problem.”

“And in this direction. You want to check a map online?”

“There’s no guarantee every hotel would be listed. Or they might be in a regular house, or maybe they’re not staying here at all—just happened to be in the neighborhood.” Harmony shook her head. “Makes more sense to look and see. All the internet ever does is put your imagination in a box.”

“A big box.” But I agreed.

The district was older, with some run-down apartments and houses on the smaller streets, businesses and commercial property on the avenue. We passed a muffler shop and I thought of Brendt. Some kids—real kids, like twelve-year-olds—were standing in front of a taqueria. Next door was a freestanding hair salon in an ancient bungalow, with a huge window hacked into the front wall and the lawn paved into a parking lot.

“Over there.” Harmony pointed to the right, as we came up on the Sleep Tite Motel. A few cars in the lot, none that I recognized.

“Maybe,” I said. “Who knows?”

We slowed. No Russians loitering outside, cleaning their rifles and practicing Systema. Like all of Pittsburgh, the scene felt empty of people, almost postapocalyptic, but that was probably just me missing Manhattan.

“Keep going,” Harmony said.

She seemed fully engaged in the mission. Her hands were nowhere near her weapons and her head was turned away from me. I could easily have seized physical advantage, especially because I’d shifted the Sig around to the front of my belt, at most a two-second draw. But she didn’t seem to care.

It felt like we’d crossed a threshold, however modest.

Around the corner we passed a used-car lot, then a blocky two-story building with a faded, barely readable sign:
BLANKENSHIP AUTO BODY.

“There!” Harmony pointed again. “The panel van.”

She was right.