Lineup (26 page)
ZIV
sensed that something was coming, but he didn’t know what. Meshulam dragged him by the shirt from the tiny room where they’d been holding him captive and put him in a car waiting outside. A man he’d never seen before was behind the wheel.
They drove at high speed, hitting every pothole in the bumpy road. Each time the car bounced, Ziv felt a sharp pain in his ribs. They’d thrown him onto the passenger seat with Meshulam in the back, just like the time they snatched him after he was released from jail. No one said a word. Outside, the countryside was dark and deserted. They could kill me here and nobody would ever know, he thought.
Locked up in that room, he’d debated endlessly whether to play his last card: the letter he’d placed in Merav’s hands. He’d never tell them he’d left it with her. He’d say he sent it to some lawyer and refuse to give his name. But the more he thought about it, the more he decided against it. He regretted giving it to Merav in the first place. What if it put her in even greater danger? What if they figured out she had it?
“Pull over for a second. I need to take a leak,” he heard Meshulam say from the rear.
Ziv took a deep breath. They were going to do it now. They’d pull him out of the car and kill him right here in the West Bank, in the middle of nowhere. He wondered if he should say something, but what could he say that would do any good? The order to take him out probably came directly from Faro. There was nothing he could do to change their minds.
The car came to a stop and the rear door opened. His time had come. He’d prayed with all his heart that they’d leave him be, let him go back to Merav and Gili and start a new chapter in his life. But he knew when he called Noam and placed himself in their hands that things might not go the way he hoped.
He heard Meshulam get out of the car. His heart was pounding. He had to keep it together.
Meshulam rapped loudly on the window. A tremor passed through Ziv’s body. He kept his eyes fixed straight ahead, not wanting to turn his head and see the finger gesturing for him to get out. And maybe the gun that was going to go off very soon too.
“You wanna piss?” Meshulam asked.
He gazed at him in surprise. What was going on? Since when did Meshulam care what he wanted?
Without thinking, he shook his head slowly.
Meshulam stood there motionless, staring at him.
“Get a move on, Meshulam, we haven’t got all night. Do what you gotta do and get back in,” the driver said. Meshulam moved away from the car.
RATTLED,
Galit Lavie left the courthouse and walked rapidly toward her office. What was wrong with her? How could she blow up like that? It wasn’t the first time she’d been hounded by reporters when she stepped out of a courtroom. She’d grown accustomed to it over the years, even when they sometimes crossed the line. But despite her distaste, she’d learned to keep her cool. It was part of the job description, both hers and theirs.
But this time she’d snapped when Dori Engel approached her after the judge rendered his sentence in the case of the convenience store gang. Maybe it was because once again they’d gotten off lightly and she was mad at all the judges who were afraid to take a stand. Or maybe it was because his questions about Ziv Nevo touched a nerve. Or it could simply have been the way he did it, blocking her path, announcing imperially that he was the editor of the local paper himself, invading her space, acting as if he was entitled, as if it was her duty to stand at attention and answer his questions.
ONCE,
a long time ago in one of her first murder trials, she’d given in and spoken to a reporter about the case. The next day she found herself misquoted in the paper and, even worse, the defense attorney had used what she’d supposedly said to complain to the court that the prosecutor was trying his client in the press. Ever since, she’d promised herself never to talk to reporters. She knew some of her colleagues took advantage of the media to get their message out, to influence public opinion and counter the slanderous comments of the defense and the accused, or even—no, make that mainly—to make a name for themselves. But she’d resisted the temptation since that incident early on. It takes a certain talent to manipulate the press, and she didn’t have it. Besides, like her father used to say when she was little, “If you burn your fingers, you watch your toes.”
“You’ll have to address your questions to the Justice Ministry’s press liaison,” she’d said to Engel, using the standard formula, but her words had no effect. He continued to follow her down the hall, calling out that she ought to be ashamed of herself, that because of her an innocent man had been convicted, that in any other civilized country she would’ve been kicked out on her ass by now.
She kept walking rapidly, ignoring his provocations, but it didn’t do any good. He ran after her, accusing and embarrassing her, not letting up. When she felt she couldn’t take any more, she turned around and yelled at him to fuck off and leave her alone.
Everybody in the courthouse corridor turned to look at them with concern. Even Engel seemed taken aback by her outburst and shut his mouth.
As usual, as soon as it happened, she was sorry she’d lost it. She wasn’t a drama queen by nature. But before she had a chance to apologize, he came up to her and hissed warningly, “You’re gonna regret you did that. When the story comes out on Friday, you’ll be sorry you weren’t nicer to me, Madame Prosecutor.”
MESHULAM
had to fight hard to hold back the tears. The man who never wept, who had nothing but contempt for crybabies, felt his eyes welling up.
On the way here he’d tried to persuade himself that things would work out in the end, that fate would smile on him. But the moment he saw the expression on Faro’s face or, more precisely, the lack of expression the boss adopted when he was deliberately ignoring someone, he knew it was all over for him. He’d willed Faro to look at him, maybe even forgive him. He’d be satisfied with any reaction, a word or two. But nothing. Faro said only, “I guess this is the day of the walking wounded.” Meshulam didn’t understand.
He asked for five minutes of his time. He needed to apologize, to explain why he did it, to convince him that his intentions had been good despite what it looked like, that he did it for him because he thought it was what he wanted. But Faro ignored him completely, as if he were invisible.
It was Nevo who was now getting the warm reception, the hand on the shoulder, the avuncular “How’re you doing?” He’d made a last desperate attempt to get rid of Nevo on the road. If he’d just gotten out of the car, he could’ve shot him and claimed he was trying to make a run for it. But that didn’t go his way either. The motherfucker had more luck than sense. Meshulam sat in the backseat and saw Nevo’s fear slowly evaporate. When he first dragged him out of the house in Shufa and threw him into the car, he was scared and nervous, probably expecting to be dead soon. But the idiot eventually got the picture when he saw they weren’t taking him deeper into the West Bank but back across the Green Line, and they weren’t driving on back roads either but on the main highway. When they pulled into Faro’s driveway, he could see something close to a smile on Nevo’s face. He finally realized he was safe, that if anything was going to happen to him, it would’ve happened by now.
“Why did you call Noam?” Faro asked Nevo when the three of them were in his study.
The whole story came spilling out of Nevo’s mouth. He told Faro about the bomb, about the police interrogation, about Meir’s threat—everything.
Meshulam sat in silence, his face going pale. Every word out of Nevo’s mouth was another nail in his coffin. He tried several times to catch Faro’s eye, but it was useless. The boss sat there in silence, listening closely to Nevo’s story.
Whatever Faro decided, he’d take it like a man. Even if he ordered him killed. When it came down to it, that might be for the best. His life would be worth nothing without Faro. What else did he have in this fucking world? There was a time he thought he could turn his life around, that even though his mother was a junkie and a whore, he’d make something of himself. Faro would save him. But you can’t screw with fate. He was destined to be a loser. He was his mother’s son. The man who had pulled him out of the garbage was about to throw him back in.
Faro rose and held out his hand to Nevo. Pulling himself out of the chair with effort, Nevo extended a trembling hand.
“I wish you a happy life. Give your wife and kid my regards,” Faro said with the hint of a smile.
Nevo remained standing there like a statue, uncertain what to do. He’d spent the past weeks fleeing, eluding his pursuers, hiding from Faro and the cops, and now all of a sudden he could stop running.
Faro gestured for Yaki, who’d been standing in the back of the room the whole time, to take him away.
“Look out for yourself,” he said as he sat down again. Yaki escorted Nevo out.
WHEN
the door closed behind them, Faro turned his eyes to Meshulam for the first time.
“David, David, David. What am I going to do with you?” He sighed.
NACHUM
listened in a mixture of boredom and anger as Amit Giladi apologized, again blaming his editor for everything. His mind wandered back to what he’d done earlier that day. Although Faro didn’t promise him anything—he hadn’t expected him to—he’d left feeling more confident. If Faro had Nevo, he believed there was a good chance he’d let him go. If not, he’d carry out his threat. He didn’t care how many doors he’d have to bang on or how many people tried to get in his way, in the end he’d force the cops to take action.
He’d driven around for a while instead of going straight home. He considered heading to north Tel Aviv and questioning the residents, the job he’d assigned to Giladi, but changed his mind. He didn’t have a badge or the authority to question anyone. If he wanted people to talk to him, he had to gain their trust and make himself likable, but the limp and the bruises on his face were more apt to scare them off.
In the end, he found himself sitting on a bench facing the ocean, watching the waves lapping at the shore. Like every day lately, he was putting off the time he’d have to go home and look in the faces of the people he’d let down, the people who’d relied on him and no longer could.
When he finally went home, he found Giladi waiting for him. The reporter came up to him as he was parking the car. His immediate instinct was to brush him off, like the last time. But he held back. Not so fast, he thought. He’d wait at least until he’d heard what the kid had to say. After the meeting with Faro, he felt he had the wind at his back, that he still had the power to make things happen. Besides, the main reason he’d approached Giladi in the first place still held: he needed someone to be his legman, to do what he couldn’t do himself.
Giladi didn’t stop talking. He didn’t want to cover the rape, especially not that way. It was all his editor. Dori Engel was a snake in the grass. He’d pushed, manipulated, made all the calls. It was Dori’s fault Amit had waited outside for Adi Regev to come out of her house and been yelled at for harassing her, his fault he’d gone to the hospital to talk to Dana Aronov’s parents and been slapped in the face by her mother, and his fault he’d said all those malicious things about Nachum in the paper.
Nachum watched him, not saying anything, listening with only half an ear to his excuses and pleas for forgiveness. The truth was, he almost felt sorry for the kid. He wanted desperately to be a man and didn’t know how.
The only question was whether he could still be of use to him. He was no genius. And as it turned out, he was also irresponsible. Despite how mad Nachum had been when he read the interview in the paper, he’d at least taken comfort in the fact that Giladi hadn’t revealed the information he’d given him about the rings. But he now learned that the omission wasn’t the result of the reporter’s urge to further the investigation, of his understanding that certain details had to be kept secret from the public. It was simply because his editor didn’t fancy the label “Ring Rapist” that he suggested.
He couldn’t send him back to the Zodiac Café. Giladi told him about his altercation with the owner, how he’d thrown him out when he learned which paper he worked for and who his editor was.
Nachum leaned his head back and drummed his fingers on his knee. What should he do? What
could
he do now that so many avenues for his investigation were closed to him because of this stupid kid?
Most perps got caught because they made mistakes. Real life wasn’t like the movies where the crooks were super-clever and solving a crime took a brilliant mind and a spark of genius. Nachum knew the value of persistent, painstaking work, but he also knew that a little luck never hurt. He remembered his old commander, Amnon Mizrachi, who liked to paraphrase Napoleon. “Get me lucky detectives,” he’d always say.
If he were a betting man, he’d say the rapist had already made a mistake. It was his job to find out what it was and examine it under the light. And as always, as soon as he found it he’d wonder why he hadn’t seen it before.
Ziv Nevo’s name had come up too many times in relation to the rapes. He didn’t do it, Nachum was positive. But maybe it was someone connected to him, someone he knew or had dealings with.
AMIT
forced himself to remain quiet. Nachum’s eyes were closed. He hoped his invitation to come upstairs meant the detective was willing to give him a second chance, but meanwhile he seemed to have other things on his mind. Amit wasn’t even sure he’d been listening to him outside. And he’d been very aware of the look of contempt that came over him when he told about his recent unpleasant encounters. “You’ve taken a lot of abuse,” Nachum had said sarcastically.
He shouldn’t have whined so much about Dori. Nachum must think he was a little kid who couldn’t cope.
“Is there anything I can do?” he asked to be sure Nachum hadn’t dozed off.
Nachum promptly opened his eyes, gazed at Giladi, and pulled himself up straight in his chair.
“You have any pictures of other people on the paper, other reporters?” he asked.
“What?” The question took Amit by surprise.
“Facebook, e-mail. I want to see pictures of the people you work with. I’ve got an idea,” Nachum repeated, not taking his eyes off the reporter.
“What do you want them for?”
“Do you or don’t you?” Nachum admonished him impatiently.
“I don’t know. Why would I?” He knew very well where he could get the pictures, but he was hoping that by pretending ignorance he could get Nachum to tell him what he was looking for.
The detective stood up abruptly.
“I don’t have time for games, Giladi,” he said menacingly, closing the distance between them.
“I can get you Facebook pictures from an employee outing to a water park. Will that do?” he said, recoiling. Under ordinary circumstances, he’d demand to know exactly what Nachum wanted them for, but in view of his past behavior, he didn’t dare. He had to cooperate if he didn’t want Nachum to throw him out and slam the door behind him. Besides, the old guy was a little intimidating.
Nachum smiled, and Amit realized he’d never seen him smile before.
“Come with me,” he ordered.
Nachum led the reporter into a small study crammed with books. A computer sat on the desk in the middle of the room.
“Sit down and log on to Facebook,” he commanded sharply.
“Can you tell me what I’m doing this for?” Amit couldn’t resist asking.
“Soon. First let’s see if you’ve got anything to show me.”
Amit clicked on his Facebook account and opened the file with the photos from the water park. “Here you go . . . pictures . . . Now can you tell me?” He looked up at Nachum, but the detective ignored the question, gesturing for him to get up so he could sit down at the computer.
He looked over Nachum’s shoulder as he quickly scanned the photos on the screen.
“That’s your editor?” he asked, pointing to a picture of him with Dori and Tzila on the way to a water slide.
“Yes,” he said, nodding, remembering how Dori had announced the day before that they’d each have to pay for their own ticket, and when Stav said the employer usually pays, he’d shrieked at her that if she didn’t like it she could find herself another job. No way he was going back to the paper, whatever happened, he thought as he watched Nachum. What the hell was he looking for?
Suddenly Nachum stood up and turned around to face him. “I want to talk to your boss,” he said.
Now it was Amit’s turn to offer no response. He was tired of Nachum’s games, of the orders he kept firing at him. If he wanted to be someone’s whipping boy, he’d stay at the paper.
“Well? What’re you waiting for?”
“I want to know why first,” Amit said firmly.
Nachum walked out of the room without answering. Amit followed him reluctantly. When they reached the living room, Nachum handed him the cell phone he’d left on the coffee table. He got it: he was being thrown out. Nachum was onto something and he wasn’t going to tell him what it was.
“Call him and see if he’s home,” the detective ordered.
“Why?” Amit insisted. The last thing he wanted to do was talk to Dori after ignoring his calls all day.
“Just make the call. I’ll explain soon enough,” Nachum said impatiently.
“I’m not really comfortable . . . ,” Amit stammered, starting to tell him how Dori had told him to go to the courthouse and interview Galit Lavie.
“What’s Galit Lavie got to do with it?” Nachum interrupted.
