Condemned (54 page)

“If there are rogue Agents—I'm sure the entire United States isn't in on this, Bob,” said Sandro, “they would have the capability to gather enough information to figure out, just as Red was able to figure out, that you and Leslie live sufficiently close to where they were keeping Red, to come here to check out this house.”

“No doubt,” said Red.

“If which case, the only way to be safe is to surrender you into the custody of the F.B.I., as soon as possible,” said Sandro.

“How do you plan to pull that off?” asked Red. “If there's an all-points bulletin out, they'll eat me alive on sight. You've got to be with me.”

“I'll be with you. I know a couple of people at the F.B.I. in New York. I can call them, and have them arrange for us to meet F.B.I. agents from near here.”

“Red should go to a doctor or a hospital about his shoulder,” said Leslie.

Sandro shook his head. “We have to turn Red in as soon as possible. We've got to nip this before too big a head of steam is worked up looking for him. The Government can take care of the shoulder after he's back inside. Can you handle that, Red?”

“Whatever you say,” said Red. “Besides all that, I don't want anyone coming here, making trouble for Leslie and Bob.”

“It's hard for me to imagine that the D.E.A. or anyone connected with them could be involved with foreigners in some grand plot—” Reaves stopped in mid-sentence as the dog in the backyard began to bark.

Leslie went toward the front window. “Get away from the window,” said Red, slipping his hand under the shade of the lamp next to the couch. He turned off the light. It was twilight outside. The room became semi-dark.

“This is ridiculous,” said Reaves. He stood and walked toward the front window. “Hhmmm. There's a car parked in front of the next house,” he said, less surely. He continued to peek out through an edge of the curtains. “There are two men looking around.”

“You have any weapons?” said Sandro.

“What???”

“You have—”

“There's a shotgun upstairs,” said Leslie. “I'll get it.”

“Are you preposterous,” said Reaves. “You planning a shoot-out? In my house?”

“Hell no,” said Red, straining to stand. “I'm just planning to stay alive.”

“There's another car now. Two more men,” Reaves whispered urgently. “Oh, my God.”

Leslie dashed up the stairs.

“Tatiana. Bob. It's probably better if you go back into the kitchen,” said Sandro.

Red sat on the floor. Sandro walked carefully along a side wall toward the front window. Leslie's footsteps could be heard upstairs. The dog was still barking.

“I'm going to call the police,” said Reaves, rushing toward the back of the house. He turned on the light in the kitchen.

“Shut the light!” commanded Red.

“Who the hell are you bossing around? This is my house.”

The barking stopped as the dog yelped.

“If you don't want someone shooting through the windows of your house, I'd suggest you shut the goddamn light.”

“All right,” said Reaves, “but I'm calling the police.”

“There are only two in front now,” said Sandro. “I don't know where the other two went.”

“Christ! The phone's dead,” said Reaves.

“Maybe you'll believe what I'm telling you isn't a fairy tale,” said Red. “Good guys don't cut telephone wires.”

“Christ—”

“The other two are probably in the back,” said Sandro.

“Why isn't the dog barking?” asked Reaves.

“He might not be able to,” said Red.

“If he …? You think? Jesus Christ! My dog?” Reaves ran to the back window of the kitchen.

Leslie came down the stairs in a rush. “Here. It's all we have,” she said to Red.

“A bird gun?”

“That's all we have,” she said. “Red, I don't think this is a good idea.”

“I don't think so, either. But neither do I want to be a duck in a barrel.”

“What are you going to do?” Reaves whispered hoarsely. “Don't start shooting with Leslie and me, and this girl in here,” he said, pointing to Tatiana.

“I'm not going to start anything, believe me,” said Red. “And I'm not going to get you people involved in a shooting. Shells?”

“A box. Here.” She handed something to Red in the semi-dark.

“This is a very serious situation,” said Reaves. “You shouldn't have come here.”

“You're right about that, Bob,” said Red. “What do you think we should do, Sandro?”

“Maybe we can cause a diversion up front,” said Sandro, “then you can slip out the back, into the woods. When they realize you're not here, they'll go looking for you some place else. I'll get to my car—I have a mobile phone in it. I can call the F.B.I., pick you up on the other side of the woods, and surrender you.”

“First I have to make it to the woods,” said Red.

“Do you have lights in the front of the house?” Sandro asked Reaves.

“Outside? There's a switch by the front door What are you going to do?” he asked, looking at Sandro, then Red.

“Go to the front, all of you, carefully,” said Sandro. “We're going to turn on all the lights in the front of the house. The lights in the living room too. We'll all walk out—except Red—making as much noise as we can, shout, yell, so they'll know we're coming.”

“I'm not so sure about this,” said Reeves.

“They're not interested in any of us. We'll let them see us; go right up to them. Ask them what's going on. That's when you make a dash for the woods, Red.”

“Red, you can't. There may be people in the back, too.” Leslie's eyes welled up.

“If what you say is so, you're playing right into their hands,” said Reaves.

“The noise will bring anyone in the back up to the front,” said Sandro.

“It's the only way to get these people away from you,” Red said to Leslie. “When they're all in the front, I'll go out the back. They'll come after me when they realize I'm not with you up front.”

“You have a broken shoulder,” said Leslie.

“Better than a broken head and everything else.”

“You can't—”

“They'll come right into the house if he doesn't,” said Sandro. “They'll come in and wreck your whole house.”

“I don't want any of you to get hurt for me,” said Red. “Get going. Go ahead. Go up front. like Sandro said. Go. Take your wife,” he directed Reaves.

“Let's put on all the lights in front,” said Sandro. “Before we go out, start calling, ‘we're coming out', raise your hands over your head, let them see and hear us really well. You ready?” he said to Red.

“I'm going,” said Red, glancing at Bob, then Tatiana. He winked at Sandro. Then he looked deep into Leslie's eyes. “It was a good run, darling, real good.”

Leslie ran to Red and embraced him, hugging him tightly. “Don't do this,” she said urgently, looking into his face.

“What the Feds want to do to me, even if I get away from here alive, is not the way I want to spend the rest of my life, anyway, darlin'… You make noise when you go out. That'll lead them away from the back. When I'm clear of the house, I'll make noise. That'll lead them away from you. They'll come after me. You get the car, Sandro. I'll meet you down on the other side of the woods.”

“I'll go to the neighbors,” said Reaves. “I'll call the police from there.”

“Don't do this, Red,” said Leslie.

“These people are serious,” said Red. “It'll be much safer for everybody once I'm out of here. You got a nice life here, a nice house—just what you wanted, honey. I can't mess that up for you again.”

“You didn't mess anything up, Red. Don't do it.”

“We haven't got time,” said Sandro.

“Come on. I might just change my mind if we don't get to it. Now. They must be getting itchy out there.”

Sandro walked carefully to the front door. He glanced toward the back. Red had disappeared into the darkness of the kitchen. “Everybody, get ready to go. Bob, on three, turn on the living room lamp.” Bob nodded, walking to the lamp. Sandro nodded twice. “Three!” he said, flipping on the outside light switch. Bob turned on the lamp. The room and the front of the house were illuminated. “Follow me,” said Sandro, pushing Tatiana behind him. “Hey, hey,” he shouted. “Here we are. Here we are. We're coming out. Just us. Just us. We're coming out. Hey, hey—”

Leslie hesitated at the door, turning. “Red!”

“Outside, Leslie,” said Bob. He pulled her out through the door.

“Red—”

“Here we are, here we are, we're coming out,” Sandro continued to shout. “We're coming out. Here we are.”

Someone said something harsh in a foreign language. A shadowy figure wearing a ski mask approached them as they stood on the lawn. Two other figures came up from the back of the house. They were all wearing ski masks. One of the men, tall man, said something to the others as he pushed Bob back against the wall, studying him ominously from head to foot.

“They're Russian,” Tatiana said in English. She said something in Russian to the tall one. He stopped short, turning to Tatiana, staring. He said something to the others.

“What did you say to him?” said Bob.

“I told them to leave you alone. You are not the man they are looking for. You have nothing to do with this.”

The Russians spoke among themselves as they studied the people from the house. A shotgun blast sounded from somewhere behind the house. The Russians stopped talking, stared, then dashed toward the rear shouting.

“What are they saying?” Sandro asked Tatiana.

“They said, he's back there, back there, hurry. He cannot be far.”

“Red,” Leslie shouted, turning to run toward the rear of the house.

“Are you crazy?” shouted Bob, lunging forward, grabbing Leslie by her wrist. She struggled to pull free.

“Everyone stay here,” said Sandro as he moved stealthily along the side of the house toward the back. He ducked low as he reached the chain link fence that surrounded the rear yard. When he was at the edge of the fence, he could see the men in ski masks running toward the woods, about fifty yards to the left of the house. Past them, he could see the receding figure of Red who was still in reddish sunlight, just reaching the dark edge of the surrounding woods. One of the Russians stopped running, and sighted carefully down the barrel of his rifle.

Twisted together in one instant that seemed carved out of time in slow motion, Sandro shouted loudly, “No!” at the same instant that a rifle shot rang out. Almost simultaneously, in the distance, Red's body spun, his arms flying open and upward as the shot gun he was carrying flew into the air. Red disappeared, falling to the ground.

“Jesus!” exclaimed Sandro as his mouth and eyes closed tightly, fighting hot, burning tears. He heard the Russians shout jubilantly. Sandro sobbed, glancing up. He saw the men in the ski masks running toward the spot where Red had fallen. There was another rifle shot. Sandro's gaze fell to the ground where he crouched. As insect, small, dark, was crawling near his foot. In his abject sorrow, suffused with anger, hatred, a feeling of helplessness, disgust with himself for not having done, doing, something, he moved his foot to crush the insect.
No
! he thought, resisting the impulse. It was not the insect that had to be crushed.

Harlem : August 15, 1996 : 11:15 A.M.

Supervisor Becker sat in the front passenger seat of the ‘Fix and Mix' van, turned toward the rear, watching Geraghty wire a shirtless Awgust Nichols with a small body recorder and a transmitter. The recorder would record any conversation Nichols might have; the transmitter would send a live signal to the Agents in the van so they could monitor the encounter as it happened.

“There we go,” said Geraghty, finished. “Say something.”

“What'll I say?” said Nichols.

“Anything. We want to see if we pick you up, if the level is right,” said Geraghty, nodding to Castoro in the driver's seat. Castoro activated a receiver/recorder on the floor next to the driver's seat, which recorded signals picked up from the transmitter.

“It's okay over the speaker.” Castoro rewound the recorder and played the tape. “Tape's okay, too. It should be okay.”

“Remember, try to sit still when you talk,” said Becker. “Otherwise, we'll pick up a lot of rustling of your clothes, and won't be able to hear what's being said.”

“I'll sit as still as a mouse,” said Awgust.

“Not too still,” said Becker. “You have to be natural, not stiff. You don't want Uri or Sascha to be suspicious.”

“Yeah, right.”

“Put your shirt back on,” said Becker.

Nichols had an appointment to meet with Uri and Sascha in approximately an hour at the Flash Inn, to receive and divide the proceeds from the sales of the first two kilos of heroin that Sascha had picked up in Romania, and to arrange for another courier to take a ride to Romania to pick up another two kilos.

“If this session inside goes well,” Supervisor Becker began.

“It will,” said Nichols.

“Then Marty can rush the tapes down to the Grand Jury, which is sitting as we speak, listening to all the other evidence we've gathered so far. Dineen has already drafted a Bare Bones Indictment. We have arrest teams ready to swoop these guys, and another special character I have particularly in mind, in custody first thing in the morning.”

Becker had been keeping his entire squad and Dineen in the U.S. Attorney's office hopping with activity for the last two weeks. He was determined to eradicate every vestige of the renegade Russian drug-ring as quickly as possible. Part of Becker's head-long determination was fueled by his desire to personally arrest Tony Balls—that revolting and insulting piece of trash. Becker's stomach turned every time he thought about the interview he had with Tony Balls a few days ago. Becker's eagerness was further heightened by the headlines he envisioned: ‘Sally Cantalupo and Tony Balls, arrested'; ‘Uri Mojolevsky and Sascha Ulanov arrested';' the Russian mob and the Italian mob crushed in one fell swoop'. What a story! What publicity! Ed Barquette at The Post had his reporters at the ready, waiting for word that the arrests had been effectuated so he could splash the story all over the next edition.