It was in a Washington, DC parking garage in 1972 that a source who would come to be known as Deep Throat, but was in reality FBI associate director Mark Felt, spoke the three most useful words in the history of investigation: ‘Follow the money.’
Follow. The. Money.
Qui bono? Who benefits?
My WhatsApp dinged.
Me: Yeah?
Not Me: Your boy K. has account at Bank of Cyprus. CC: Amex and Visa. Monthly mortgage payment: $1,200. Car payment on Hyundai: $125. Total debt: $3,297 excl: mortg. Credit rating: 744.
Me: And?
Not Me: And fuck all. Groceries and shit. Kids clothing. Meals. Car repair. Normal shit. Googled him, rooted around dark web. Nothing but newspaper clips.
Me: Shoot me some links.
He did. I spent some time going over the history of Cyril Kiriakou, reading news articles awkwardly translated by Google. He’d busted a couple of local drug rings. He’d solved an extortion case. Seven years ago, he’d solved the murder of a sex worker. Four years ago, he’d arrested an art forger on an Interpol warrant.
All this proved only that Kiriakou was a cop. If he was a bent cop, he was being damn prudent about hiding his money. He was too chubby to be a serious drug addict. Gambling? He didn’t read as a gambler to me, not jumpy enough. So. Had Joumanou lied? Made up a name? Settled a score with a cop? Was Father Fotos confused? Was Theo talking rot? Had Kiriakou’s interest in me been innocent?
I had followed the money for Kiriakou and it had led me nowhere. But this was still all about money, had to be. My credit bureau source did not have access to Kiriakou’s income records, just his credit card expenditures. If Kiriakou was on the take, the cash had to go somewhere, and by somewhere I did not mean a Cypriot bank. The AZX Bank, perhaps? And if I assumed the source of Kiriakou’s presumptive bentedness was Russian, the Russian bank might lead back to him. Ditto Panagopolous and ExMil.
Were the streams crossing? I sighed.
Deep, deep sigh, because if I wanted to connect dollar-denominated dots, I needed to get into the AZX Bank’s computers. It was a fishing expedition, but with two specific targets, Kiriakou and Panagopolous and who knew, maybe the gods would favor me and hand me a nice, neat connection between the two.
I would be Delia’s hero. And then, having solved both of her cases, she would jet off to Rome and I would consider where to run next. Bangkok? Rio? Amsterdam? Each had stunning women, but Amsterdam had better restaurants. I’d had an amazing dinner with superb wine pairings at Vermeer in Amsterdam.
Which was not relevant, really.
I drove to Limassol, an actual city of 175,000, with tallish buildings and traffic jams and street beggars. It faces southeast from the bottom of Cyprus, and were you in one of the waterfront office buildings you could look out over the B1, the wide main drag which has a Greek name involving too many syllables, across the promenade, the boulder beach, the water, and if you had exceptional eyesight and perfect weather, you might see Lebanon.
The AZX Bank was deeper toward the center of town. I drove around until I found street parking – paid parking creates evidence in the form of tickets, credit-card receipts and the memories of attendants. And I might need my car in a hurry.
I had scoped the area out ahead of time online and had identified three local places that might be useful watering holes. Two were distinctly Greek. One had a more sophisticated look and a name meant to separate it from the herd: Matryoshka. Not a Greek name, that. And according to TripAdvisor it was more expensive but had an excellent selection of vodkas. The guy I was looking for would want sophisticated, not working class, and he’d want vodka. Presumably.
I considered a walk-through at the bank, but my only readily-available disguise was a stocking cap and banks are not friendly toward men in stocking caps when the temperature outside is August in Alabama. So, I did the prudent and easy thing and installed myself in a dark side-table in Matryoshka and ordered a glass of Fikardos Shiraz and a bottle of sparkling water. I tasted the wine – quite good – but drank the water. The night promised physical exertion, likely including some fleeing, and wine wasn’t going to help.
Cypriot banks close at 2:30. I figured an hour, hour and a half past that, and sure enough around four p.m., the quick-one-before-I-head-home crowd had started to come in. A gratifying number of them were wearing suits and carrying briefcases.
I was looking for a Russian speaker with followers, because when the Big Deal goes for a drink he’s generally got at least two toadies in tow. But that was a thin reed, and the potential for error was ridiculous. If I found my Big Deal Russian he might not be from the bank down the block, he might work for Aeroflot or be a vodka salesman, so I had to give close consideration to details of style. Good, expensive tailoring, but nothing flashy. He’d wear a watch, a TAG Heuer maybe, something that said to bank customers, ‘money’ but not ‘your money.’ A white guy. Broad face, distinct cheekbones, and an expression of sullen discontent. Nice suit, expensive watch and shoes, air of resentment. Not exactly a photograph, that, but it gave me the parameters of what to look for.
My first target sat with three men in the table next to mine, where I could overhear and not understand, a conversation in Greek.
My second guess looked the part until I followed him into the restroom and discovered that he was circumcised. (The things I do …) Muslims, Jews and most Americans are circumcised, but not Russians.
And then someone did come in trailing not two but three toadies and had, yes, the broad face, the cheekbones, the slightly slanted eyes, the good tailoring and pricey shoes. Pricey high-heeled shoes.
She was perhaps forty with blonde hair pulled back into a graceful shape like a conch shell. She wore a designer knock-off gray wool suit with a knee-length skirt. And yes, she did look sullenly discontented, as did the three younger men who trailed her. Each of the three had an identical briefcase; one was carrying an extra briefcase, a finer model, Versace no less. The woman carried nothing but herself, and she did a pretty fair job of it.
There are times for planning, and there are times for instinct. I stood up, plastered on a big ol’ American grin and walked right up to her to say ‘Howdy.’
‘Hi! Are you Tatiana?’
She stopped dead. Did a double-take, and shook her head. ‘No. I am not.’
‘Oh! Damn. The description matches … are you with Alexander the Great Trucking?’ Before she could answer, I took a step back, looked her up and down and snapped my fingers. ‘No. Of course not, you are way too classy for a trucking company. What am I thinking? You must be like …’ I paused. And she let me pause because she sort of wanted to know what she looked like. ‘I’d say … architect? No, wait. Are you in fashion?’
‘Fashion?’ She did not smile. That alone did not make her Russian, but the way she pronounced ‘feshyon?’ hinted at it. Her acolytes stood back, none venturing to play the protective male role, none responding as if she was their territory. All three slightly troubled by my effrontery.
‘Well, I didn’t mean fashion model, though you could be that, too. I was thinking more of someone who owned a fashion company. I’m sorry.’ I made a self-deprecating face and shrugged. ‘I’m really sorry, I amuse myself trying to guess what people do. I should have known right away you weren’t Tatiana, or from a trucking company, my God. I mean …’ I looked appreciative and admiring.
‘I am not your Tatiana,’ she said. ‘I am a banker.’
‘Ah,’ I said, drawing the syllable out like I was being shown a glimpse of a sacred scroll. ‘Again: so sorry.’
I went back to my table and made a show of checking the time. Then scrolling through text messages. Then did a ‘dammit’ face and went to the bar. ‘I’m in the wrong place. Is there a bar called Sousami near here?’
I settled my tab, went outside and found a convenient lurking spot. One of the advantages of smoking cigars – or cigarettes, I suppose, though those things will kill you – is that you can lurk outside any building without looking suspicious so long as you exhale smoke.
An hour later, my banker friend emerged, minus two subordinates. Her remaining helper walked her to the AZX Bank building, carrying her Versace briefcase. At the entrance he gave her back said briefcase. She entered the glass doors, walked to the elevator, punched the ‘down’ button, and as the doors closed on her I saw she was fishing car keys from her bag.
I raced to my car and drove the block back to the bank arriving just seconds after a green Lexus emerged from underground parking.
I followed on a twenty-minute drive up into the hills. I hung back as we left the A6 and motored down surface roads to an upscale development of cookie-cutter villas crammed cheek by jowl. I looked up the name of the development and yes it was tied to a major Russian developer. Russians are hot to buy property in Cyprus, preferably property that adds up to more than two million euros because then you can get Cypriot citizenship and full access to the EU in just six months. It’s like the first-class line at the airport: working folks wait, rich folks jump ahead.
But this was not a two-million-euro property, this was a mere, oh, three-hundred-grand villa nestled in an enclave of same. I turned around and drove some distance away before parking near an apartment block and returning on foot.
It was not hard to find the green Lexus.
I walked slowly past, running scenarios in my head. Getting in should be no problem. She might not even lock her doors. If she did, she still might not lock her windows. And if she locked her ground-floor windows she might not lock the second-floor windows. I did not want to use a crowbar, that would raise all kinds of alarm. Nor did I want to spend long minutes exposed as I squatted before Tatiana’s front door fiddling with a lock pick.
She might take a long, hot bath. She might not. She might cook herself a meal. She might not. She might be changing for a night on the town. Or not.
I had used up my innocent strolling time and if I hung around any longer we’d be into ‘casing the target’ time. For that I would have to wait for full dark.
I walked back to my car, considered driving off, but decided to leave the car and find a restaurant on foot. Yet another First Rule of Sophisticated Burglary: don’t leave your car near the target. Why? Because your jobs as a burglar are: 1) Don’t get caught, 2) Don’t escalate, 3) Make enough profit to justify the risk and, 4) Don’t help the cops by providing evidence. Cars have make, model, color, a license plate and a VIN. They are the second most dangerous piece of technology you can own after a smart phone. Make sure any car traceable to you stays outside the likely police canvas zone.
I’ve thought of putting my accumulated criminal tradecraft in a book, but the people who’d read it would probably steal it and there’s no profit in that. Also most burglars are not big readers. Also a low-rent burglar is probably carrying a big-screen TV away, and in that case you don’t want a twenty-minute walk to your car.
I had a simple dinner of grilled fish, refused the wine and finished with a coffee, using it to wash down two anticipatory ibuprofen because this was likely to be painful. It was dark when I got back to Tatiana’s place, dark but with an annoyingly bright moon.
A narrow pathway separated Tatiana’s house from her nearest neighbor. Family sounds were coming from the neighbor, and light spilled from their windows, so I hunched over and scuttled fast, praying no one had a dog.
The neighbors did have a dog and it raised a row only to be angrily hushed by ungrateful humans. Around the back of Tatiana’s house, I hugged the wall, inching toward sliding glass doors that opened onto a yard with a small kidney-bean-shaped pool. I leaned out from the wall just enough to allow my left eye to look into sheer curtains. The gauze-obscured living room beyond was dimly lit, just a single low-wattage bulb. Was it enough to counter my moon shadow against the curtains?
This thought had the unfortunate side effect of causing the Cat Stevens song ‘Moonshadow’ to start playing on a loop in my head. Any lyric including the phrase, ‘I’m being followed …’ is not helpful when you’re committing a felony.
I crept forward and tested the sliding door. Locked. And not one of the cheap locks you can get past with a simple shim.
Above was the overhang of a balcony with a cast-iron railing, facing the sea over the roof line of the next block. Five rubles said she left the balcony door open so that when the wind was right she could hear the waves. I had to climb, and do it with multiple injuries, while remaining silent. With extraordinary care I moved a small patio table to beside the privacy wall. It was nine feet from the ground to the bottom horizontal on the railing above. The table gave me maybe eighteen inches. I added an unused planter. Perched precariously with my arms up I could just reach the iron bar that supported the railing.
You’re going to pop your stitches and bleed all over.
I cursed under my breath. Then I reversed course, walking all the way back to my car to retrieve my short crowbar and a roll of duct tape. I sat behind the wheel taping the crowbar to my injured arm, with the crowbar hook extending four inches past my fist. I pulled off a sock and slid it over the hook. To call it jury-rigged would be an insult to juries and their riggers. It might give me half my normal lift.
I walked back – which was getting tiring, frankly – and crept back down the pathway, and again the neighbor’s dog barked and was again told to knock it off.
I stood atop the table and planter assembly and ever-so-carefully placed my sock-muffled hook over the horizontal railing bar. Then I grabbed said rail with my good hand and, relying as much as I could on the strong side, pulled. In a movie, I’d have simply yanked myself up and over in one swift, graceful move. Not being the Dread Pirate Roberts, I placed my feet on the wall and did my own version of the 1960s’ Batman TV show, pulling, wall-walking, gasping and slipping until my head rose above the balcony floor.
What followed was even less graceful, as I hauled myself up and over. The crowbar, lubricated by the blood now seeping from my bandage, caused the duct tape to slip and I very nearly fell. But at last I was on the balcony.
I squatted there trying not to weep from the pain of reopened wounds on my hand and my armpit, and trying not to focus on the blood I was leaving behind for even the most careless policeman to find.
The balcony slider was not open but it was unlocked, hallelujah. The room, a bedroom, was lit and empty. I pushed the slider open an inch and listened. A toilet flushed and I went through the door in a hurry, clutching my crowbar-tape-and-bandage hand against my shirt in hopes it would keep blood from falling into the carpet. That sort of thing might be noticed.
I swiftly crossed the bedroom to the door, went into the hallway beyond, and spotted a man coming up the stairs.
She’s married?
She had definitely not worn a wedding ring, I notice things like that.
I ducked into what I hoped was an unoccupied guest room and listened till the footsteps receded. I breathed.
The guest room had an en suite and I used it by iPhone light to rinse off some of the blood and unwrap the crowbar, which I hung from my belt. I appropriated a guest towel – powder blue – and wrapped it around my hand.
Then I hid under the bed until I heard no more sounds. It’s times like this, staring up at wooden slats and a muslin dust cover half an inch from the tip of my nose, that I begin to have some doubts about my choices in life.
It was past midnight when I crawled out, stretched, popping my joints, and eased my way out into the hallway. Everything was dark, but my eyes had long-since adjusted. I made my way down the stairs to the living room. No one. And nothing to see.
Off the living room a formal dining room had been repurposed as a home office and there, on a glass-topped table, was an open MacBook. An open MacBook with a Cyrillic keyboard. An open MacBook with Cyrillic keyboard and a password prompt.
I wanted to cry.
So much trouble and pain and bleeding, all for nothing?
Then I spotted the pad of yellow Post-It notes. People with Post-It notes use them to write down passwords. A twenty-minute search of her table and briefcase turned up nothing, but she had left her purse by the front door, and in her wallet, folded away where she thought no one would ever find it: a yellow Post-It with five Cyrillic letters, two numbers and an asterisk. A good, solid, hard-to-break password. Unless someone wrote it down for you on a Post-It note.
I logged in, went to Tatiana’s history and found the AZX Bank interface. This, too, was password protected but bless Tatiana’s laziness she used the same password. I was in! I had penetrated the AZX Bank’s computer system. Not exactly using super-hacker methodology, but it worked. Aside from the fact that tabs and files were all labeled in Russian.
I sighed, opened a translation app and settled in. It was almost dawn by the time I let myself out through the front door, holding a thumb drive loaded with a terabyte of documents I did not remotely understand.