Pipeline, page 14
“And the embalmer we didn’t meet,” Philip said. “Both of whom probably knew too much about delivery and distribution for their safety.”
“So you think Rossiter is right?” I asked. “The French Colonel made some sort of deal with the Mortician to steal the shipment and then killed the two of them when he didn’t need them anymore?”
Philip dismissed the idea with an impatient shake of his head. “I don’t see anyone forcing a hearse off the a public road in broad daylight, shooting the two occupants and then calmly transferring three quarters of a ton of currency to another vehicle.”
“Carmella’s father,” I blurted. It dawned on me how the two of them might have planned to get rich without getting killed by a bunch of Arabs. “He could have faked a hijacking and blamed the French Colonel.”
“Or the law firm scheduled to receive that particular shipment of currency,” Philip offered. “If the partners decided it was worth the risk to go for the whole enchilada rather than a couple of million in fees.”
I wondered if Philip was thinking of his father’s law firm when he said that. And what he might do about it if he was. The scary little French Colonel had opened a can of worms.
Between lunch and our schedules, Philip and I didn’t have much time to talk. I had to skate again at two thirty. Philip had to tee off at one thirty seven for a Saturday session of golf with the customers. Or so he said.
Okay, so it was none of my business what Philip did. So we weren’t meant for each other. So this was the last weekend we would ever spend together. I still cared about the guy. I had the uneasy feeling he was walking into no end of trouble trying to help his father.
LONDON
By Saturday afternoon all the teams remaining in the tournament had skated three grueling bouts. The lighter, faster teams were beginning to show the strain. The heavier teams with a little more endurance were better able to stay the course. Weight-wise we were in the middle. Stamina-wise we still had some gas left in the tank. We didn’t so much out skate the Mean Woman Blues as we outlasted them.
A news chick grabbed Becca for a post bout interview. The rest of us dragged ourselves to the locker room. Becca showed up a few minutes later.
“Hey, Mickey. They’re paging you. You’re wanted in the office.”
I had visions of Philip trying to reach me on my cell when I was on the track. It was a long trudge up to the competition floor. When I got there I heard my name called over the din of skates and the noises of the crowd. The office was at the front of the arena, behind the ticket windows. The door was marked private. No one answered my knock. I went in anyway.
There were a couple of paper strewn desks. A middle-aged woman sat behind one, talking irritably into a telephone headset while she massaged a computer keyboard. The other desk looked to have been temporarily abandoned for someone’s break.
The man pacing the linoleum floor looked like he had just come from modeling for a men’s fashion magazine. He was definitely over dressed for roller derby. His camel hair topcoat looked like the real deal. He wore it as a cape, over his shoulders without putting his arms through the sleeves. The collar was turned up, like a vampire in an old movie. I didn’t keep up with menswear, so I didn’t know whether fedora hats were in or out of style. The dude might have been handsome, if you liked them meaty and Middle-Eastern. His expression was masterful and condescending.
“Ms. Addison?” he inquired, stepping unpleasantly close to me.
I didn’t know what his cologne was called, but it was floral, foreign and overwhelming. He spoke in a clipped voice that sounded vaguely like British men I had heard in Europe. I had the impression English wasn’t his first language.
“And you are?” I asked.
“My name is of no importance,” he informed me.
“It is if you want this conversation to go anywhere.”
His smile could not have been smaller. “I am reliably informed that you are on intimate terms with Mr. Philip Prescott.”
I didn’t know who this dude was or where he got his reliable information, but I wasn’t about to give him any satisfaction.
“Is there a point to this?” I asked. “Or are you just practicing up on your small talk?”
“I would like a few words with you in private. I believe you will find the conversation to your advantage.”
“Sorry. I promised my mother I would never go anywhere with strange men.”
They didn’t come much stranger than this dude.
“I bear you no malice,” he said. “And I assure you I am neither a zealot nor a barbarian. I am in fact a graduate of the London School of Economics.”
My brain slipped into gear. This guy was one of the Arabs Carmella had mentioned. The ones who were sent here to get their money back. One of the bankers Philip said would be killed if they failed.
“Is this about a hearse full of money that didn’t find its way home yesterday morning?” I asked.
Pads of flesh narrowed his eyes to slits.
“That is a separate issue,” he said, “and one which I prefer not to discuss in public.”
He glanced at the woman on the telephone. She was engrossed in her conversation. She didn’t seem to be paying any attention to us. He still didn’t like the idea of witnesses. I wanted as many as I could get.
“Either you get over being shy,” I said, “or this conversation is done.”
“Do you know that I could seize you by the hair and drag you out of here with no repercussions whatever? I am not a citizen of this country. I have full diplomatic immunity. No police can touch me.”
“I was thinking about a loud scream,” I said. “That should bring at least a dozen roller girls. They don’t recognize diplomatic immunity. And they get a serious rush from pounding the crap out of creeps.”
He stared at me in disbelief. He came from a place where men collected four obedient wives apiece. He definitely wasn’t used to dealing with uppity broads.
“So are we done trading threats?” I asked. “Or do you want to go another round?”
Apparently he didn’t. Being seen in public with me was giving him a case of the fidgets.
“The particulars are these,” he said in a low voice. “The father of your Mr. Prescott is a partner in an American law firm. The firm has taken possession of funds under agreements whose terms are no longer satisfactory. The funds must be returned. Both the increment received yesterday and that received some weeks ago. You will enlist your Mr. Prescott to communicate this fact to his father and to prevail upon him to comply with the instructions he and his associates have received. Time is of the essence.”
My instinct was to tell the dude his plan had already flopped. With any luck he might give it up and get lost. For once my head got in the way of my impulse. Rossiter had told me to arrange to stay in contact any of the players who got in touch with me. I could think of only one way to do that.
“Money is of the essence,” I said.
“Excuse me?”
“What is this gig worth to you?”
He was incredulous. “You cannot seriously expect to be compensated.”
“Sure I can. It’s that free market economy thing they told you about in London. You do work, you get paid.”
“Have you thought what could happen to your Mr. Prescott if the funds remain outstanding? You must care something for him. You are presently domiciled in his home.”
This dude’s information wasn’t just reliable. It was recent enough to be scary. There was nothing I could do but blow it off.
“Oh, sure, I like him. He’s cute. He’s got enough to keep me in the style I’d like to be kept. But men come and go. Money isn’t as fickle.”
That was more like it. The guy had some experience with mercenary bimbos. He favored me with a knowing and slightly disgusted smile. I had him hooked.
“We don’t have to cut a deal this minute,” I said. “Talk to the people in charge. Get back to me with a cash offer. I’ll see what I can do for you.”
He gave that some thought, but he couldn’t come up with anything better. At least not on the spur of the moment.
“Prompt results will be expected,” he warned, and then he was gone.
His cologne lingered like trench gas.
The woman was still on the phone. Her fingers were dancing on the keyboard and her eyes were glued to a monitor. She was multi-tasking through another day at work. She didn’t even know I existed. I still turned my back for privacy when I pulled out my cell and hit the speed dial for Rossiter.
“You asked me to call if I was contacted by anyone involved with the shipment,” I said, and gave her a quick summary of my conversation with the London School of Economics.
“Diplomatic immunity?” she asked. “Did he just say that, or did he offer proof?”
“I wouldn’t know what proof of diplomatic immunity looked like. You can probably get some footage of him from the security camera here at the arena.”
“Did he say how much was involved?”
“No numbers. Just that there were two deliveries. It sounded like one from the trial run and one from yesterday.”
A minute of silence. Probably some heavy thinking from Rossiter.
“All right,” she said, “when he contacts you, ask how much is involved. Tell him you want a percentage for helping him. Get back to me as soon as you have the numbers.”
Nothing about stay safe, or we’ve got your back. Best guess: The Feds were negotiating with Philip’s father and his law partners to surrender their piece of the action. They wanted to make sure they got it all.
“I’ll do what I can,” I said.
A perfunctory, “thank you,” and she was gone. I hit the speed dial for Philip’s cell.
“Where are you?” I asked.
“We just hit off on eighteen,” he said, and added, “almost done,” when he remembered I didn’t know squat about golf.
“Pick me up as soon as you can. We need to talk.”
“Forty five minutes,” he said.
That gave me time for a shower. I was standing in front of the arena with my gift box under my arm when he pulled up. Some girls got flowers and chocolate and the occasional diamond. Yours truly got body armor.
“Fort Prescott,” I said as soon as I had piled into the passenger seat.
We made one stop at a supermarket. I loaded up on meat, potatoes and veggies. Philip rounded up the fixings for what turned out to be a Shrimp Creole. How he stayed in the condition he did eating as little as he did I couldn’t fathom. I filled him in on my encounter with the London School of Economics and my call with Rossiter while we made our separate dinners.
“You’re probably right about the Strike Force negotiating with the old man and his partners to recover the money,” he said when we sat down to eat.
“Why don’t the Feds just bust them?”
“The Strike Force has no evidence. That’s the whole point of the pipeline. The currency being moved is untraceable. Unless the Strike Force can intercept it in transit, they can’t prove where it came from.”
“You mean the once the law firms get it, they can just keep it?”
“In order to get the money from the Arabs, the law firms had to arrange to deliver it to some big financial players in the U.S. If they fail, for whatever reason, those players will never deal with them again. The law firms have bet their futures on their ability to deliver. They can’t afford to renege on their commitments, even if they have to tell the Government and a bunch of angry Arabs to go to hell.”
“That’s pretty risky, isn’t it? Couldn’t they go to prison?”
“They know the right people. They’ve contributed to the right political campaigns. They know which closets have skeletons. Worst case scenario, they’ll turn over the money and their part in this will be hushed up.”
He made it sound like business as usual. For all I knew he was right. That wasn’t what really bothered me.
“How did London know I was staying here? Only you, me and Rossiter knew that.”
“This morning only the three of us knew,” he corrected. “The Strike Force must have contacted my father if they have opened negotiations to recover the currency. Who knows what leaked out there. Dad and his law partners are in contact with the Arabs. Both groups may also be in contact with Carmella’s father. Trouble could come from anywhere. That’s what the armor is for.”
I had gone from Mickey the goldfish to Mickey the clay pigeon. Okay. Fine. I still had to skate again at eight thirty, and I needed to be there early to talk strategy with the team. Time to clear the table and change.
The armored t-shirt wasn’t as clunky as I thought it might be, although I had no intention of skating in it. My over shirt and jacket did a pretty good job of hiding the bulk. I still didn’t like wearing it. It made me feel like I was hiding from trouble instead of facing it.
Philip’s armor had disappeared under a crew neck sweater and a corduroy jacket. A plaid snap-brim cap completed the look of an English country gentleman. I couldn’t tell if he was carrying a gun. I didn’t like the idea, but I didn’t say anything. If he was, it would be for his protection, not mine. He wasn’t stupid. It must have occurred to him that if a gang of cut throat Arabs wanted something from his father, he would make a much better hostage than I would.
ONLY THE PARANOID
SURVIVE
The Saturday evening crowd was big and rowdy. The arena was rocking when we put our wheels down. At times like those roller derby escalated from a contact sport to a collision sport. Both teams fed on the frenzy and everyone skated on adrenaline. Knowing Philip was watching gave me an extra jolt. I didn’t care who I hit, how fast or how hard. I wasn’t backing down from anything.
Not that either team needed the rush. We didn’t like the Roller Rats and they didn’t like us. It was a fight hard and fight dirty for every point. We came off the track drained and dragging. It took a minute to sink in that we had won. We had just punched our ticket to the quarter finals. We had never come that far in a major tournament before. Giddy didn’t begin to describe the feeling.
I didn’t spend any more time than I had to in the locker room. The rest of the night was mine. A chance to kick back with Philip. He was waiting when I got up to the arena floor. Another bout was underway. Neither of us could hear what the other was trying to say, so we headed out the front door.
Just outside was a pick-up and drop-off lane. The snarl of a high-performance engine startled me. A motorcycle whipped up and stopped in front of us. I recognized the rider’s helmet. She was Skin and Bones; fashion model, outlaw biker and school marm.
“Hop on,” she said. “Mel needs to talk to you.”
Philip snapped a quick, “No!”
“Hop on,” Skin and Bones repeated. “You’ll be killed if you stay with him.’
I never saw the second motorcycle, but Philip must have. He grabbed my jacket and yanked me off balance. I went down hard on the sidewalk. Skin and Bones’ Ducati snarled to life and she accelerated away.
The automatic gunfire came in distinct bursts. Quick, ear-punishing spurts of terror. It was over just that fast. The night was empty. The loudest sound was the receding exhaust noise of two motorcycles.
“Are you all right?” Philip asked.
“Y-yeah.” I realized I was shivering.
“Can you stand?”
I got as far as my knees and Philip helped me the rest of the way. The world seemed oddly normal. Cars were coming and going in the parking lot. Noise blasted out from the arena. Only the wail of an approaching siren suggested anyone had noticed anything unusual. I collected what was left of my wits, dug out my cell phone and hit the speed dial for Rossiter.
“I’m at the arena, main entrance,” I told her. “Someone just tried to kill Philip and me.”
“Are you in a safe location?”
“The police are just pulling into the parking lot.”
“Remain where you are.”
Like I wasn’t having a hard enough time just remaining vertical. I put the phone away and looked Philip over. I had to brush a little dirt off his coat and straighten his gentleman’s plaid cap, but otherwise he seemed none the worse for our experience.
“Did you see what happened?” I asked.
“I think your friend on the Ducati was waiting for us. Another motorcycle was waiting in the parking lot. Driver and a passenger. I don’t think Miss Ducati knew they were there. As soon as she pulled up to us, the other motorcycle accelerated out of the lot. The passenger had a machine pistol. He gave you and me one burst apiece, and Miss Ducati another.”
Skin and Bones was gone. I hoped she had gotten away.
Cop cars were streaming into the lot, sirens howling and strobes turning everything an eerie red and blue. Give them credit. They had no way to know the shooters had taken off. It took some time for them to get organized, make sure everything was secure and start stringing yellow crime scene tape all over the landscape.
A uniformed Latina wearing sergeant’s stripes came over and asked Philip and me for identification. She had some kind of interview form on her tablet. She typed our names, addresses and driver’s license numbers. While she was taking her time doing that, I saw Rossiter duck under the tape.
The FBI field uniform was gone. Her civvies were upscale and strictly business. Best guess: The Strike Force had held one or more formal meetings during the day. That suggested they weren’t having a lot of luck tracking down the money.
The sergeant wasn’t bothered by any guesses. “Ma’am, you can’t be here. I’ll have to ask you to step behind the tape.”
“Police, FBI.” Rossiter showed her credentials. “I need to speak to these two people. Could you excuse us, please?”
