“You told the woman your name?” Hollis said.
We were sitting in the aft cabin of his boat, waiting for Corcoran to return from taking his wounded BMW into the body shop. Sitting, not relaxing. Since the stakeout to confront the hunters—huntress, maybe, I should call the woman in charge—none of us had felt restful.
“No choice,” I said. “I had to tell her I knew about the safe, and the gold. If I didn’t give her my name up front, she might have tortured it out of O’Hasson.”
“And he’s kept your involvement a secret so far, hasn’t he? Tough little bugger.”
O’Hasson was. Tough enough to last another few days, I hoped.
“You’re risking a hell of a lot,” Hollis said. “Four million or no. Mick O’Hasson’s life or no.”
“If I could see a different play, I’d make it.”
Hollis frowned. We watched the Sound beyond the breakwater, where the growing wind was shoving and slicing the waves into chop. Gray clouds moved with purpose over the far horizon. We were in for another rain, unless the gale pushed the threatening front right on past us.
“Hell with it,” Hollis said finally. “The deal’s made. We’ll see it through, if you can find this fellow she’s so obsessed with.”
“Obsessed is the right word. The woman didn’t mention the Slatterys, and neither did I. She didn’t look much like a drug lord, either, but I’m guessing that April Slattery and Fekkete double-crossed her on some deal. This vendetta against Fekkete is personal to her.”
“Just to her.”
“Her men might be fed up,” I agreed. All except Boule. He seemed ready to follow his mistress to the gates of Hades.
“Well, I’ve checked what I can on Fekkete. He’s a phantom. No criminal record or even a credit history. It’s a fake name, no question about it. Fekkete may be the whip hand at the gym, but on paper the place is owned by a club fighter named Bernardo. He’s probably the fellow you call Bomba.”
I nodded. “If Fekkete were easy to find, the woman wouldn’t need me. They don’t know about his connection to Sledge City. That’s my edge.” Roddy had drunkenly declared that he expected Fekkete back in Seattle. I’d have to try to pick up his trail at the gym tonight.
Hollis got up and went into the cabin without saying more. His usual buoyant mood was tamped down by doubts he wasn’t voicing. Either because he couldn’t offer me any alternative plans, or because he thought I didn’t share his uncertainty. He was wrong about that.
I called Calvin Lorenzo, then remembered that he preferred video. Hollis was right. To hell with it. If a murderous drug dealer knew my name, it wouldn’t matter if an old reporter saw my face. I switched the call to video. Three rings and Lorenzo’s shopworn face appeared on the screen, the background a blur as he sat down.
“Got your phone fixed, huh?” he said.
“Seems to be.”
“I figured your ears were burning. I was gonna call you later about Gar Slattery.”
“His release date?”
“It’ll be next week. Maybe early, maybe late, depending on the paperwork. But the gears of correctional bureaucracy are already turning.”
Next week. And the woman had given me three days to deliver Fekkete. Were the two related? Did she already know Gar was getting out?
“If he’s coming to Seattle, you won’t have long to wait,” Lorenzo said, as if reading my thoughts.
I smiled. Maybe my first honest smile of the day. “How’d you know I was in Seattle?”
“Come on. Give me some credit.”
“Don’t suppose we can count on Gar honoring the terms of his parole and staying in California.”
“I wouldn’t suppose that either. So why’d you call?”
I held up the picture of Tamas Fekkete. “You know this guy?”
“Put it closer.” He squinted at the camera, his crow’s-feet reaching out to touch thin hair on either temple.
“Maybe forty-five years old,” I said. “I got a name for him, but it’s fake.”
“Ah, yeah,” Lorenzo said. “He lost his hair. If I hadn’t been making withdrawals from my memory bank lately about the Slatterys and that whole mob, I wouldn’t have placed him.”
“Who is he?”
“Szabo or Szano or something like that. Hungarian national, I think. He was lined up as a key witness in a RICO case, about the time I was retiring. The Times covered the case. Karl Ekby’s trial.”
Ekby. The heavy hitter that Gar Slattery had mentioned to O’Hasson, when Slattery was spinning his tales of hoarded gold.
“Karl Ekby was in business with the Slatterys?” I said over the sound of Lorenzo typing.
“It would have been the other way round. Ekby was big-time. The Slatterys were tough, but if they shipped dope for Karl, there’s no question who was in charge.”
“And the witness, Szabo? Where did he fit?”
“He was mid-level. Importing the junk for Ekby, most likely. Everything old becomes new again, given enough time. ’Cept people. Heart disease got to Ekby before the jury could.”
“So the witness never testified.”
“Nope. They probably deported him, but since you’re showing me a picture of the jackass, he obviously found his way back to the land of opportunity.”
So Szabo had become Fekkete, running the same kind of operation in Seattle. Alongside April Slattery, who had also given herself a new name for the old game.
Then another idea came to me. Like the sun catching a solitary and invisible strand of a spider’s web, revealing it to the world.
“Who would have inherited from Ekby?” I said.
“His drug biz? Or his money?”
“Both.”
“Nature abhors a power vacuum. I expect the Mexican gangs tore each other apart over the territory. They’ve got most everything now that the Armenians don’t.” Lorenzo made a humming sound. “Ekby’s personal dough, I’m not sure about. He was rich as Croesus. If the Feds couldn’t seize his assets, they probably went to family like usual.”
“Ekby’s family include a daughter, or a niece? Mid-thirties now, brown over blue, body like Scarlett Johansson’s taller sister?”
Lorenzo’s chin rose. “You are full o’ surprises, aren’t you? Hang on.” The next minute was filled with a torrent of typing.
“My turn for show and tell,” he said.
The phone beeped and I opened up his message to find a link. It took me to a watermarked Getty Images photograph on their website. The photo was captioned Ingrid Ekby, daughter of Karl Ekby, enters Superior Court of Los Angeles on the day of her father’s indictment by federal prosecutors. It showed the twenty-something woman in full stride, with long chestnut hair and wearing a white silk blouse and gray skirt tailored to tastefully show off a curved figure. Even at her younger age, her sunglasses couldn’t hide her haughty brand of beauty.
“Thought I remembered old Karl’s family showing up at court,” Lorenzo said. “I’m still on the subscriber list to a few of the photo services. The freelancers made damn sure to take a lot of pictures of Ingrid. I woulda said she was built like Brigitte Bardot, but that’s my generation.”
“That’s her,” I said.
“For a week or two you saw photos of Lady Ingrid from every local outlet. I figured she would try to make something out of her minor celebrity, hit reality shows or some shit, but after Karl died she stayed out of the spotlight.”
She had other goals. Personal enough that she might be willing to give up four million in found gold just for a chance to realize them.
“So you saw Ingrid? In Seattle?” Lorenzo said.
“Yeah. And that’s all I can tell you. You promised me a week.”
“I promised you a week before I started looking into April Slattery. Which is nearly up.”
“So start the same clock on Ingrid. One week from today.”
“Goddamn it.”
“The full story from me. One or two names excluded,” I said.
“You can’t take the Fifth unless you’re actually in court, wiseass.” Lorenzo sighed. “Fine. A week. Then I want everything, or I’ll call in every favor I’ve got, just to scratch this itch.”
“Thanks,” I said.
“Keep me in the loop.” He hung up.
It had occurred to me, if not Lorenzo, that I would have to be alive at the end of the week to tell him anything.
I had a name for the huntress now, and a motive. Ingrid Ekby was after the man who’d aimed to testify against her dear daddy. And she was apparently willing to kill April Slattery just to get to him. The woman carried one monster of a grudge, considering Karl’s case never made it to trial.
Ingrid’s intent confirmed what I already suspected. I’d made a deal for O’Hasson’s life that would require, almost certainly, leading another man to his death. Fekkete was a drug dealer and probably worse. He’d sent men to kidnap Cyndra, and he might try for her again given the chance. He would have likely killed O’Hasson, once the little burglar had retrieved the gold from the safe.
None of that made the idea sit well with me. A lesser evil was still an evil.
And evil or not, I’d see it through.
I had to get Fekkete and the gold in the same place. Ingrid Ekby wanted Fekkete. Fekkete wanted his gold back from Ingrid. Each one was bait for the other.
All I needed was a few minutes of Fekkete’s time, alone. To convince him that I was the only man in the world who could make O’Hasson and his gold magically reappear.
I was sure I could do that. I had an ace in the hole.
I had Cyndra.