Middlemen, page 31
Across Cootes, the geese were back on the move, paddling furiously to gain airspeed and altitude, leaving behind their silver wakes.
“‘Come live with me and be my love, and we will some new pleasures prove, of golden sands and crystal brooks, with silken lines and silver hooks.’”
You were such a tender oddity to recite John Donne to me.
“Cops don’t do that, you mean.”
I’d never fallen in love with a cop before . . . but I doubt very much that many think Donne’s the way to a girl’s heart.
“Let’s just say I did my research.”
Your own words would have taken you there . . .
“Kate, I shouldn’t have said you were safe. I’m sorry . . .”
You’re wrong. I was safe in your arms while I was dying.
[87]
Like the geese, MacNeice was ready to get back on the move. He started the car, and his cell rang. “Tell me, Ryan.”
“Abbey’s plant — where the local outlets take their cleaning — is in Secord. I’ve got addresses for the Niagara Falls and Montreal plants, but I haven’t located the owner’s house.”
“Give me Secord.”
“124 Cascade Street — north of Barton, near the QEW. Do you want the phone number?”
“Not now . . .” MacNeice switched on the flashing grille lights and sped away from Princess Point. “I’ll be at Division in seven minutes; meet me in the parking lot and I’ll pass over a usb key. On it, I’m interested in the footage of the second vehicle — sharpen the image as best you can.”
“Understood, sir.”
“The Slater interview’s still going?”
“Oh yeah . . . And it probably got more interesting; I just dropped off the latest from Forensics.”
“Topline that for me.”
“The stripping bath scum dna is Dr. Evan Moore’s. There are three more unidentified samples, but his was already in the system.”
“Is that it?”
“No, sir. I’m quoting from photo captions . . . Engineer’s iron ring, discovered under incinerator cowling. Engraving inside, reads E.M. QNS – 1969.”
“Call Bill Moore; ask him if Evan graduated from Queen’s Engineering in 1969.”
Pulling into the division parking lot seven minutes later, MacNeice followed the inside lane to where Ryan was waiting with an open hand. MacNeice slowed down and handed him the usb. “Confirmed, sir. Evan Moore, Queen’s Engineering, ’69. Oh, and Jack says hello.”
Driving east on Main, he turned his thoughts to Cascade Street. However confident and insulated Gregor Abatstvo felt about his family’s enterprise, he had to be twitchy with the news of Arnold Garrick’s rescue.
When he finally crossed Barton on Lake Avenue, MacNeice killed the grille lights. Turning left on Cascade, he eased the Chevy toward number 124, a long, low brick building set back from the street. The facility was surrounded by a high security fence. Intermittently across its expanse were small metal signs warning that it was electrified. A dry-cleaning Fort Knox.
Three truck bays on the building’s west side were sheltered behind large rolling doors, each distinguished by a large white numeral. An unremarkable three-storey office block anchored the far end of the complex, while the entrance off Cascade Street resembled a dispatcher’s office — small and efficient — its windows covered with opaque film. Three large black vans were parked against the west side of the lot, the most visible of which had Abbey printed in white on the doors.
MacNeice drove to the end of Cascade and swung about. As he approached the building from the west, the security fence slid open. Feeling his heart quicken, he slowed to a stop. Two men, both wearing black suits and white T-shirts, stood waiting by the front office, arms crossed.
Moments later, a leviathan he thought was long extinct slid menacingly into view. MacNeice’s jaw dropped; he eased the Chevy to the side of the road and got out. Switching his cell to camera mode, he made his way across the street and stepped enthusiastically onto the driveway. One of the men watched him warily.
“Well, well . . . well. Sorry, I really had to stop. Tell me I’m right — a 1960 Lincoln Continental Mark V?”
“Yes,” the slimmer of the two men said as he walked around the vehicle and prepared to get in the front passenger seat.
“But it’s beefed up, no? The original had a 429.9-cubic-inch V8, but looking at the size of those wheels, you’re pulling more, no?”
The two men glanced at each other but neither spoke. The shorter, stockier man climbed into the back seat and closed the door. The slim one waited, eyeing MacNeice as he continued hyper-enthusing about the car.
“My uncle had one — but his was a Mark IV. He’d bring American entertainers from places like Tonawanda and Cheektowaga; I love that word — Cheek-tah-waga — don’t you? And he’d chauffeur them around in his Mark IV.”
Slim shook his head as if MacNeice was speaking an unknown dialect, but he didn’t get into the vehicle either. He was clearly waiting — not for MacNeice, but for another passenger.
MacNeice showed him the phone and started taking pictures. “Hope you don’t mind — it’s just that I’ve never seen a Mark V. Anyway, Uncle Jock would bring jazz stars — Duke and Basie, Eartha Kitt and Ella. Yeah . . . Ella slipped him a two-hundred-dollar tip; be about a thousand in today’s money. They’d come up to visit a jazz pal who lived in Dundurn. It’s true.”
A man in his early sixties, trim and elegant in a silver-grey one-button suit, stepped into the camera frame — click click click — as MacNeice continued. “Those days, you didn’t need a passport to cross the border . . .”
The new arrival skirted the car and moved, head down to avoid the camera, toward MacNeice. Click click. Slim was approaching too. MacNeice dropped the phone to his side. “Hey, mister. Sorry if I’m keeping you guys . . . It’s just, I’ve never seen an M-five in the flesh.”
Both men were closing on him and the guy who’d climbed into the back seat was now out of the car again and advancing. The older man stopped so close that MacNeice caught a whiff of his cologne. He stood there for a moment, apparently studying MacNeice’s shoes, before looking up.
His head was shaped like an upside-down teardrop. He turned his icy blues on MacNeice and asked, in a clipped accent, “Where’s your car?” He tilted forward for MacNeice’s response as if he was hard of hearing. When he didn’t get an answer, he looked around. “That Chevrolet over there . . . that your car?”
“Yeah . . . Well, it’s a fleet car. What we call a company car.”
“Yeah? So’s mine.” The man glanced over his shoulder and smiled at Slim. “Mine’s prettier.” He looked MacNeice squarely in the face, like he was recording his features for future reference. When he turned away, he nodded ever so slightly to Slim and walked back to the Mark V. The second black suit opened the door.
Slim stepped forward. “Goodbye. You go now, yes?”
“Sure . . . Hey, sorry, I was just —”
“Go now, yeah?”
MacNeice waved awkwardly, jogged back to his car, took several deep breaths, and then pulled away. Turning south on Lake Avenue, he checked his rear-view mirror. Seconds later, the Mark V swung left on the south service road, back toward the city or the Queen Elizabeth Highway.
MacNeice punched the radiophone: “Dispatch, this is DS MacNeice.”
“Detective Superintendent.”
“There’s a white 1960 four-door Lincoln Continental, three occupants, proceeding west on the south service road from Lake Avenue, in Secord. Notify all units. I want it tracked from a distance — ideally with an unmarked car and the aerial unit.”
The dispatcher repeated the message. “Any instructions regarding its occupants, sir?”
“Yes. Do not engage.”
[88]
Back at Division One, MacNeice stopped by the cubicle to hand his phone to Ryan. “Enhance and print all the images that show a large white car with some men. I’m particularly interested in the older man. I’ll be in the interview room, but not for long.”
“I didn’t get a lot from that security footage, sir, but when I overlapped it with the Escalade, it’s much smaller, like a compact . . .”
“Colour?”
“It could be any mid-range colour.” MacNeice turned to leave, and Ryan added, “One more thing, sir — Abbey’s Montreal and Niagara Falls plants are run by Gregor Abatstvo’s sons.”
As MacNeice slipped into the interview room, Aziz announced, “For the record, Detective Superintendent MacNeice has joined the interview.”
“How is this going for you, Mr. Slater?” MacNeice asked.
Ronald Slater shook his head. “How would I know?” He looked at Vertesi. “How’s this going for me?”
“We could be doing better,” Vertesi said coolly. “I’ve suggested several times that Ronnie should have counsel present, but he continues to decline. Correct?”
“There’s no use . . . I need to make a deal. I want to be with my family and mourn my brother.”
“Will you sit in, sir?” Vertesi asked.
“No . . . but I do have a few questions.”
“Fire away.” Attempting a brave face, Slater couldn’t keep a small short-circuit twitch from the corner of his mouth.
“Do you have any recollection of restoring or rebuilding a 1960 Lincoln Continental Mark V?” MacNeice asked the question as if he was only mildly interested in an answer.
To cover his discomfort, Slater rubbed his eyes before studying the tabletop like a man trying to remember something.
“White inside and out. Big wheels; not spec, not even close.” Slater did his best not to respond, so MacNeice added, “If you like, we can ask the men who work on your cars instead — though that won’t help you.”
Slater pushed himself off the table and crossed his arms. “Can I have a coffee?”
Vertesi also leaned back in his seat, suggesting that weariness or frustration was contagious. “I’ll make it.”
MacNeice put a hand on Vertesi’s shoulder. “No, I’ll make it; it’ll take less than five minutes. In that time, Ronald, I want you to consider what other questions I might have for you.” He smiled and walked to the door. “Sugar? Milk?”
“Black,” Slater said, eyes focused on the tape recorder’s tiny red light.
“DI Aziz, please step out with me . . .”
Aziz put down her pen. “DI Aziz and DS MacNeice leaving the interview.”
While they waited at the espresso machine, MacNeice asked, “Were you able to reach Eugene Blow?”
“It’s all set up — he’ll view the body tomorrow.”
“Good. And how did Slater react to the forensics report naming Evan Moore?”
“Shocked . . . confused . . . nervous . . .” Aziz smiled. “And then he implicated Blow and his brother.”
“Meaning they had access to the building but he didn’t know what they were doing?”
“Close. Jeremy said he didn’t know anything until after the fact; seems Blow went rogue.”
Espresso in hand, MacNeice said he would join Aziz in the interview room shortly. “I’ve given Ryan some photos I took outside Abbey Laundry and Dry Cleaning, including images of Gregor Abatstvo and two of his men. That Lincoln Continental I just asked Slater about is Gregor’s.”
The lightness in Aziz’s face drained when she realized what he was saying. “Mac, for God’s sake, please tell me you weren’t seen.”
“I was . . . we spoke, briefly. About cars.”
“You’re joking. You must be.” Frustrated, she ran a hand through her hair.
“I was overzealous and car crazy.”
“Mac, you were bullshitting a killer.” She shook her head in disbelief. “You were driving an unmarked car! You think he didn’t spot that?” Aziz dropped her head for a moment; she was furious when she looked up. “Give me something else to focus on, before I say something I can’t take back.”
MacNeice studied the crema dissolving in his cup. “Call Detective Girone again. Request that he show those photos to the maître d’ at Cheval Fou.”
“Yes, sir. Anything else?”
“Start a conversation with him about all three cities coordinating; if Garrick’s right and Abbey’s a front for gambling, we might pursue parallel investigations . . .”
“A three-city raid?”
“Yes.” He poured the espresso down the drain and started over. “Fiza, I don’t want this to —”
“To what? To interrupt our investigation? It won’t. Unless, of course, Gregor’s men hunt you down at your cottage. Hell, Mac — half the bloody city knows you live out there alone, surrounded by — by foxes, coyotes, rabbits, fireflies and . . . ghosts.” She shook her head. “I apologize for the last one — make that birds.” Exasperated, she turned and walked away.
Vertesi sensed something was wrong when MacNeice returned to the interview room alone, but he simply noted MacNeice’s return for the recording. “Sir, you had some more questions?”
MacNeice slid the cup across the table. “I do, but first, the Mark V?”
“Yeah, that’s my work . . .” Slater downed the coffee. “Here’s what I know: The owner, Gregor Abatstvo accepted that vehicle in return for an American client’s bad debt. It’s heavy ’cause it was built for an ambassador. Thing has bulletproof glass, armour-plated door panels, and dense, bulletproof rubber tires. Paintjob was black, but Gregor’s got this thing about cleanliness — so we did a complete makeover in Polaris White.”
“Does it have any weaknesses?”
Slater nodded the way someone does when they alone know a secret. “Only one. Look, that thing’s a beast, but even a beast needs to breathe, and it breathes through its grille.”
“Interesting . . . How were you paid?”
Slater’s long sigh suggested the oxygen was running out of his defence. “I was plugged into Gregor . . . I didn’t know anything about Garrick. I did that car free of charge to clear my own debt.”
“A debt for what service, and how much?”
“Gambling. Three hundred and seventy-five thousand.”
“The two men with Clarence Blow — are they Gregor’s men?”
“No . . . Blow was in over his head with some local talent. When that didn’t work out, Jeremy asked if I could find him some professionals. I couldn’t, but we both knew who could.”
“Gregor. But your brother could have asked him directly.”
“Jer didn’t like getting his hands dirty; he managed Abatstvo’s investments.” Slater smiled as if that fact was of no consequence. “I thought he’d give us one or two of his guys — they’re Russian or Ukrainian ex-military. Gregor laughed that idea off. For two hundred grand he’d deliver two professionals.”
“Wright and Daintry.”
“I don’t know their names; ask Blow.”
“That’ll be difficult. I’m asking you.”
“I never met them . . . Did they kill Jeremy?”
“We don’t know.” MacNeice wasn’t finished. “You never met them and yet they borrowed your Econoline van, a Lincoln, and an Escalade, is that correct?”
“Jeremy called me, asked me to leave the keys for the Lincoln in the dropbox — I didn’t know anything about the van. I gave him the dropbox combination, but that was it. The Lincoln was dropped off the night they came for the Caddy — same deal with the keys — and I haven’t seen the Caddy since.”
“You’re very trusting, lending luxury automobiles to strangers. What was in it for you?”
“Triple the rental fee.” Slater couldn’t help smiling to suggest that he wasn’t stupid. “In cash from Jeremy.”
“How closely associated were you with your brother? What did you know of his involvement with Abatstvo?”
“Only that he and some guy in Montreal did investment management for the Abatstvo family. Jeremy’s not a gambler. Neither am I — except that one time.”
“By investment management you mean money laundering?”
“Maybe . . . Laundry is in Abatstvo’s company name.”
“Solely from betting . . .” MacNeice said.
“Not solely . . .”
“Meaning?”
“Jeremy said Abatstvo has a very diversified portfolio.”
“Be specific, Ronald.”
Slater sat back, crossed his arms, and shook his head like he was having an internal debate about how much he’d already said and whether maybe it was time to shut up.
“Is this a crisis of conscience, or are you just scared to death?” MacNeice asked.
Slater tucked in his chin. “No shit — both. I’ve already given you a lot . . . enough. Agreed?” He looked for confirmation from Vertesi, who shrugged unenthusiastically in Slater’s favour. “Come on, I’ve given you a lot . . . What’s that word when cancer spreads?”
“Metastasis.”
“That’s it. You figure it out; do the math. Dad here, a son in Montreal, another son in Niagara Falls. You can’t hit the old man and ignore those two.” Slater was exasperated. “Obviously, I’m talking about self-interest; you’d do the same in my shoes. Straight up, you arrest the father in Dundurn — one or the other son will find me.”
“Makes a good point, boss,” Vertesi said, dropping his pen for emphasis.
“Then help us take down all three,” MacNeice said with an air of indifference. “Gambling, money laundering . . . What else — drug money, human trafficking?”
“I don’t know anything about that . . . Look, I know they offer yacht bunnies as a side service. I’ve seen ’em do it.”
“Prostitutes?” Vertesi was a stickler for clarification; he pointed to the interview recorder.
Slater shook his head dismissively. “Yacht bunnies are young girls and boys. His right-hand guy called them that . . .”
