Denouement (2 page)

“Okay.”

Faust and Hodges left my office.

“So what did Faust say?” Hank asked, leaning against the sill of my open office door.

I waved him in.

Hank took a seat across from me. He wore a gray suit with a light-blue dress shirt and a dark-blue patterned tie. The gray that his wife, Karen, had dyed into his temples was replaced by his natural hair color. I assumed they’d done another dye job the previous night.

“Here, look.” I slid over the open file on Iler.

Hank spun it and took a look. “Iler!” He snapped his head back.

“Yeah.”

“What’s in here that so damning?” Hank asked.

I leaned back and ran my hand over my head. “A group of four deposits under the threshold for the tax forms. Then a check written out for a new car.”

“That doesn’t exactly seal his fate,” Hank said.

“The sudden influx of cash and the way it was done is a little questionable, but that’s not what is doing him in.”

“Well, then what is it?” Hank asked.

“Terry mentioned something the other day about how the tracking could have gotten on my phone. He said that it could have gotten there from a phone call.”

“Okay,” Hank said.

“Iler called me a few days before I went up north, asking me about cars.”

“Well, you’re a car guy. Pretty much everyone around here knows that.”

“Right. I didn’t think much about it at the time or since. But look at this…” I handed Hank the sheet I had slid out from the file of phone records and pointed to the time and date that Iler had called.

“Okay, what am I looking at?” Hank asked.

“Look at the number right before that.”

“Sure, it’s a Tampa prefix. So?” Hank asked.

“I ran the number. It belonged to Yury Sokoloff.”

“Yury Sokoloff? The guy you had a run-in with up in Wisconsin?”

“Exactly.”

“So Iler is definitely involved, but to what extent?”

“That’s what we need to find out. He was there the day Ray got away. He took Brewer’s boat back to the marina solo.”

“Do you think Ray got back on the boat somehow?”

“I don’t know. But I bet Iler does.”

“Are we going to scoop him up?”

“I need to talk to the cap first. We may have a little bit of an issue with the feds on that. Faust can’t have anything interfering with whatever they have going on. He thinks Iler may contact Ray. If we bring him in, we need to keep him on ice until the feds wrap up their operation.”

“He’s going to jail if we bring him in. He was a part in an attempt on your life after he helped a murderer flee,” Hank said.

“There’s the problem. If we have him in lockup, he can talk to people. He needs to be tucked away somewhere where he can’t.”

Hank rested his chin on his fist. “Yeah. I see the situation. How long is Bostok going to be in this meeting?”

“I’m not sure.”

“You know the cap is going to want Iler brought in. He won’t give it a second thought as soon as he finds out. He’ll probably be pissed that we even waited to ask him about it.”

I thought about what Hank said for a second. “You’re right. Let’s go find Bostok and get the go-ahead.”

Hank and I left my office and made for the elevators. We got out on the fifth floor and walked down to the board rooms. From outside the glass windows of the last room off the hall, I saw Bostok sitting on one side of the table and four people on the other—the major being one of them. Hank was a couple steps ahead of me. I reached out and grabbed him by the shoulder.

“Hank,” I said. “It looks like he’s doing his oral boards. Let’s wait.”

Hank stopped and turned. As I did the same, I caught Major Danes pointing at us through the glass. I heard the conference room door open at our backs.

“What’s up, guys?” Bostok asked.

I turned back around and faced him. “Sorry, Cap,” I said. “We can wait.”

He waved us toward him. “Nah, no big deal. You’re already here. Whatever you came upstairs for is obviously important, so what’s up?”

We walked to him. “Did we just interrupt your oral boards?” I asked.

“Nah. We were just talking about a few things,” Bostok said.

“Oh, because it looked like—”

Bostok waved away my comment. “It’s fine. What’s going on?”

“Faust dropped off banking and phone records. He said he went through everyone involved the day Azarov somehow got away. It looks like Iler, from our marine unit, was involved. We have questionable bank deposits and phone records of him communicating with an Azarov associate,” I said.

Bostok’s face turned red. He was quiet for a moment. He spoke through a clenched jaw. “Get his ass in here.”

“That’s the thing. If we bring him in, we can’t do anything with him for a couple days. He’ll have to be stashed away somewhere. Faust thinks he may contact Ray and blow the whole thing up.”

“Get him and bring him in. I’ll lock the piece of shit in my bathroom if I have to,” Bostok said.

“Okay,” I said.

“Is he on today?” Bostok asked.

“I’m not sure.”

“Just find his ass. Let me know when you do.”

I nodded and turned, and Hank followed. We stepped into the elevator to go back down to the third floor.

“Call over to the marine unit and see who is on today. Don’t ask for Iler specifically,” I said.

“If he’s out on the water?” Hank asked.

“Just see if he’s there first. I’m going to pull up his home address from my office. I’ll meet you at your desk in a few minutes.”

The elevator doors opened and let us out on the third floor. I walked into my office, sat at my desk, and pulled up Iler’s home address. I jotted down his address in my notepad and went to meet Hank at his desk.

He stood. “Not in today.”

“Let’s go to his house and knock on his door.”

“Where does he live?” Hank asked.

“Just on the outskirts of Carrollwood. I have his address written down.”

Hank and I took an unmarked Charger from the station’s parking structure and headed out. We picked up a tail before we got out of the station’s lot. While Iler’s house was just under ten miles away, with traffic, it took us the better part of a half hour to get there. Hodges, in his government-issued sedan, never strayed too far behind. We pulled up to the curb in front of Iler’s house. A new, black, convertible Mustang sat in the driveway with the top down.

“Looks like someone is here. What’s the plan?” Hank asked.

“Bring him back to the station for questioning.”

“If he doesn’t feel like cooperating?”

I smirked. “Let’s hope he doesn’t feel like cooperating.” I pulled the door handle and stepped out onto the street while Hank exited the passenger side. I looked back down the block and saw Hodges parked at the corner. I shook my head.

“What?” Hank asked.

“FBI babysitter.” I jerked my chin toward Hodges’s car.

“They put someone on watching you?” Hank asked.

“Yeah, a five-foot, hundred-pound bodyguard.”

“Does he need to know what we’re doing?”

I shook my head and pointed up at the house. “Nope.”

We walked up the oil-stained driveway toward the house. The single-story home looked to have been built in the late nineties. The house was beige with a darker-brown trim around the windows, front door, and garage. The grass was mostly dead, the landscaping and shrubbery overgrown.

“It doesn’t look like Iler is one for yard maintenance,” Hank said.

I grunted a response and continued into the covered entry. Hank followed a few feet behind.

I reached out and thumbed the doorbell. The sound of footsteps came from inside. The door’s peephole flashed, letting me know someone inside was looking out. I heard footsteps again, fast that time.

“Shit, he’s running,” I said.

Hank disappeared around the side of the house toward the back. I retreated to the street and pulled my weapon. From the vantage point of the street, I could see the front and both sides of the house. I saw no movement anywhere.

A moment later, Hank’s voice called from the back. He had Iler. I walked up the driveway and along the side of the house toward the backyard. I broke the corner with eyes on the yard as my head went to the left. On the patio, Hank had Iler on the ground with a knee in his back. Hank was clicking cuffs around his wrists.

I walked over.

“What the hell?” Iler asked.

“I caught him trying to run out the back there.” Hank nodded toward the patio door. He looked down at Iler beneath him. “What are you running for, Iler? We just wanted to talk.”

Iler flipped his head to the side but didn’t respond.

Hank pulled him to his feet. The front of Iler’s black T-shirt was covered in sand. The gray basketball shorts he wore were ripped. His knees were bloodied and his round face red.

I stood before Iler. “Nice car out front. Did you spend some of your Azarov money on that?”

Iler shook his head, shedding some dirt from his short blond hair. “I didn’t do anything. This is some kind of a mistake.”

Simmering anger built inside of me. He was lying to my face. I balled up the chest of his shirt in my fist.

“Kane,” Hank said.

I let his shirt go and shook my head in disgust. “You’re going to talk. One way or the other.”

I helped Hank escort him around the house and out to the car. We placed him in the back.

Hodges pulled down the street toward us. He stopped next to our car and dropped his passenger window. “Is that him?”

“Yeah,” I said.

“Remember, no calls and no contact with the outside of any kind,” Hodges said.

I got in our car without responding, and we drove back toward the station.

Ray’s car was parked in the grass on the shoulder of a road, just beyond a stop sign half a block down from a 1920s bungalow. He sat inside, the motor running, the air conditioning turned on high. Ray brought binoculars to his eyes and watched the front door of the house.

“Come on,” Ray said.

He dropped the binoculars to his lap and checked the time on his Rolex—a couple minutes past nine in the morning.

Ray waited. He looked into the rearview mirror, catching his reflection. Pink skin covered one side of his face. Ray swatted at the mirror and bent it toward the roof of the car.

Another ten minutes passed before he saw a little girl prancing from the front of the house toward the minivan parked in the long skinny driveway running alongside the home. Ray brought the binoculars back to his eyes. A brunette in her thirties followed a few steps behind the girl. Ray looked toward the front door. Don Brumfeld stood in the doorway, his long brown hair pulled back in a ponytail, tattoos on his hands. He wore a bathrobe and held a cup of coffee, seeing his family off.

Ray shook his head. “Say goodbye for the last time, asshole. If you only knew what was about to happen,” he said.

He continued watching the woman load the girl into a child seat in the back, buckle her up, and take her place behind the wheel. Ray focused the binoculars back on the front door. Brumfeld gave them a wave and walked back into the house. The front door closed. The car pulled from the driveway and drove the opposite direction up the street.

Ray tossed the binoculars on the passenger seat of his dark four-door Toyota sedan. Ray grabbed the baseball hat from the dash and snugged it down on his head. He reached over to the glove box, grabbed the pair of brass knuckles, and dropped them into the front pockets of his suit jacket. Ray reached inside his jacket for the gold-plated Desert Eagle in his shoulder holster and thumbed the safety off. He pulled the handle on the car door and stepped out. Ray walked along the grass, through the intersection and past the empty lot next to Brumfeld’s house. He glanced left, right, and up the street, looking for any neighbors. The block was free of anyone outside.

Ray made his way up the driveway. Brumfeld’s home was a light shade of yellow with a small porch at the front. Ray glanced down at the flower gardens sitting to the left and right of the L-shaped red-brick sidewalk leading up to the door. He dug his hands into his pockets and slid his fingers into the holes of the brass knuckles. Ray climbed the two stairs up the porch and reached out for the burgundy front door’s knob. He twisted it, pushed the door open, and stepped inside.

“What the hell are you doing in my house!” Brumfeld shouted.

Ray closed the door at his back. His eyes lifted to meet Brumfeld’s, staring at him from the kitchen.

“Oh shit!” Brumfeld said. He dropped the coffee he held and scrambled around the kitchen island.

Ray took five lunging steps through the living room toward Brumfeld and caught him just as he was turning the corner of the hallway. Ray grabbed him by the back of the bathrobe with his left hand and delivered a looping right fist to the back of Brumfeld’s head. Brumfeld fell to the floor.

Ray reached down, turned him over, and delivered another brass-wrapped right fist between Brumfeld’s eyes. The strike rendered Brumfeld unconscious and opened a gaping wound across his face. Ray cracked his neck to one side, grabbed Brumfeld by the arm, and dragged him back to the kitchen. He let the brass knuckles fall from his hands onto the kitchen table.

Ray rummaged the kitchen drawers. He looked under the sink. He looked in the pantry, but found nothing to tie him up with. Ray headed out to the garage and found a pair of jumper cables hanging on a peg on the wall. He pulled them off and walked back to the kitchen. Ray tied Brumfeld to the chair and pulled another chair up in front of him. Ray sat down and slapped Brumfeld.

“Wake up,” Ray said.

Brumfeld didn’t respond.

Ray reached back and slapped him again. Again, Brumfeld didn’t move. Ray stood, walked to the kitchen, and filled a glass with water. He dumped it over Brumfeld’s head.

“Wake up, pig!” Ray shouted. He gave Brumfeld’s face another swat.

Brumfeld groaned and began to come to.

“There we go,” Ray said. He retook the seat in front of Brumfeld. Ray pulled the Desert Eagle from its holster and placed it on the kitchen table next to him. He turned the barrel toward Brumfeld and rested one hand on it. “Nice little family you have there, Agent Brumfeld. I’m thinking now that I should have done this before they left.”