KILLING PLATO (A Jack Shepherd crime thriller) (12 page)

PARKER AND YORK
watched as I followed CW to the back of the bar, but neither said anything. A tall girl with bad skin had brought our drinks and then drifted away out of earshot.

“We got to get serious here,” CW said.

“I can hardly wait.”

“It’s my job to see that Plato Karsarkis is returned to the US.”

“That’s got nothing to do with me.”

“Yeah, it does.”

I gave CW a look, but I didn’t say anything.

“Look, Jack, I need your help here.”

“I thought you told me you were just waiting for the Thai government to approve Karsarkis’ extradition.”

“Well…” CW appeared to think for a moment. “It’s a little bit more complicated than that.”

I waited.

“Look, Jack, I’m not really allowed to give you the whole thing—”

“Wait a minute.” I held up my hand like a traffic cop. “Are you telling me the Thais aren’t going to support extradition.”

“Not exactly.”

“Not exactly?”

“Well…not at all, really.”

“I see.”

“I doubt that.”

I recalled Anita’s prediction and shook my head a little at the memory of it.

Damn
.
How could she always be so dead on about stuff like this?

“So you and your little elves over there are here to kidnap the poor bastard and drag him back to the US no matter what the Thais have to say about it. Is that about the size of it, CW?”

“This is an evil man, Jack. He’s a criminal. He has people killed. He’s a traitor to his country.”

“What movie is that speech from?” I asked, raising my eyebrows. “I forget.”

“Then tell me what you think we should do about Plato Karsarkis, Jack. Just forget about him? Just forget about everything he’s done and leave him alone to live out his life on the beautiful tropical island of Phuket?”

“Look, this isn’t my problem.”

“Well, shit,” CW leaned toward me, “then maybe I’ll just
make
it your problem.”

I took a pull from my drink, trying to take the edge off my anger before I said anything I might regret. It didn’t work.

“Well, fuck you, too, Marshal Asshole.”

“Look, Jack—”

“Who the hell do you think you are? Do you threaten everybody, or am I something special to you?”

“I’m sorry,” CW said and he did seem genuinely discomfited. “I was way out of line there and I apologize.”

The man sounded so completely contrite I wasn’t sure what to say, so I didn’t say anything.

“Look, Jack. I really
am
sorry. I had no right to say that. I need your help here. Hell, I’m begging for your help.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I need intelligence on Karsarkis. How he lives, what his house is like inside, how many guards he has, stuff like that. You’ve been in there. You can tell me all those things.”

I raised my glass in a silent toast to Anita.

“What does that met d can tean?” CW asked me.

“Never mind,” I said. “Forget it.”

CW looked puzzled, but he let it go. “So. Can you help me pop Karsarkis or not?”

“I could, probably. But I’m not.”

“Plato Karsarkis is a fugitive from the United States, Jack. You don’t mean to tell me you’re unwilling to help the United States Marshals Service apprehend a dangerous fugitive, do you?” CW tilted his head and widened his eyes in a gesture so corny and theatrical I almost laughed out loud. “I thought you lawyers were supposed to be officers of the court, supporters of the law. That’s right, isn’t it, Jack?”

“Let me see if I understand this, CW. You’re planning to kidnap a man who I gather is legally in Thailand and smuggle him out of the country and back to the United States. Do I have that right?”

“We’re going to do what we have to do to—”

“You’re running a kidnapping operation in violation of both local and international law and you’re lecturing
me
about being an officer of the court?” I just shook my head. “Man, now I’ve heard it all.”

“You’re still an American, Jack. Have you forgotten where your loyalties lie?”

“No, CW, I think I’ve got all my loyalties in pretty good order, and fuck you for asking. By the way, you’re not on my list.”

“Then you’re not going to help?”

“I will not be a party to a kidnapping in Thailand or anywhere else. Not by you, not by the fucking President of the fucking United States. Is that clear enough for you?”

CW tapped on his glass with his forefinger and let the silence run for a while before he spoke again.

“You’re making a big mistake here, Slick.”

“And exactly why is that?”

“Well…” CW sighed and shifted his weight on the barstool. “You saw those photographs. We could—”

“Whoa,” I said, raising both hands, palms out. “Is it time for the part of the program where you threaten me? Because, if it is, you need to understand this: I don’t deal with threats very well. Particularly threats from cops and other government types. I start thinking about testifying to Congressional committees about government corruption. Just can’t help it.”

“Hear me good, Slick. I’m going to take Plato Karsarkis down. If you get in the way, I’m going to take you down, too. I’m telling you that as a favor, not as a threat.”

“I’m not part of this, CW”

“Well, Slick, you ever heard that line that goes, ‘If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem?’“

“Listen very carefully to me. I am only going to say this one time. I am not part of your problem. I am not part of your solution. I have a nice life here in Thailand and I am not going to screw it up. Not for Plato Karsarkis, not for you, not for anyone.”

“You really think it’s going to be that easy? You think you can just walk away from all this and that will be the end of it?”

“Yep, I do. From now on, just think of me as Switzerland.”

“You’ve been a cop too long, CW. You smell shit everywhere.”

“He’s settin’ you up, boy.”

“Look, this may come as a real shock to you, pal, but I’m a grown man and I make all my own choices these days. Only people who’re greedy or stupid get set up, and I’m neither.”

“Whatever you say, Slick,” CW shook his head slowly again. “Whatever you say.”

There wasn’t much more of any consequence left to talk about after that and CW seemed to lose interest in me once I had made it clear I wasn’t going to be any part of whatever he was planning. York and Parker had left while CW and I were trading insults in the back of the bar and it wasn’t very long before I wished CW a nice life and left, too.

I walked out of the Blue Lotus and back to the Holiday Inn, then I drove all the way to the hotel with the top of the jeep down. A breeze had come up from somewhere and I thought the wet night air slapping against my face might clear my head by the time I got back, but it didn’
t even make a decent start. I parked the jeep in the hotel lot and walked down the hillside toward our cabin.

About the time I passed the swimming pool, still and empty in the darkness, I started wondering if maybe CW did have a point after all. There might be something sticking to my shoe that wasn’t going to be nearly as easy to scrape off as I thought.

Perhaps Switzerland was a little too much to hope for.

Bangkok

“Living in a foreign country
is like being on a football team without a home field.
You’re always playing away.”

—Desmond O’Grady,
Journalist

IT WAS MONDAY
afternoon and Anita and I had been back in Bangkok for less than a week. If there was ever a vacation glow at all, it was already pretty much gone. Something was clearly out of rhythm with Anita. I had no idea at all what it might be and I couldn’t imagine that just flat out asking her would get me very far toward finding out. Still, I had students to see and courses to teach so I wasn’t worrying a lot about it. Instead I was smoking an afternoon Montecristo in my office, feet on my desk, reviewing my notes for the next day’s lecture in my tax havens course.

The subject of tax havens was surprisingly popular with the kids. I have always thought it was probably because the sorts of places we talked about absolutely reeked with international intrigue and distant romance: places like the Cayman Islands, Liechtenstein, Hong Kong, Luxembourg, and Monte Carlo. Any discussion of tax havens immediately conjures up riveting stories of a world awash with drug barons tucking away narco money, terrorists laundering arms money, and third-world ministers hiding bribe money. And the idea of all those naughty people whooping it up in Monte Carlo while giving the rest of us the finger is absolute catnip to a room full of business students casting about for the quickest possible road to undreamed-of riches.

In spite of the strange vibrations Anita udehad been emitting ever since we got back, on the whole I felt pretty good. A few days of hanging out at the beach had left me with a nice tan and a clear head. Best of all, I had successfully evaded all further conversation with Anita about buying a vacation house in Phuket. I figured I just might be on a roll.

At least I figured that until about six when my telephone rang. Bun, my secretary, had already gone home for the evening so I answered it myself. Looking back, I should have let it ring.

“Hello.”

“Professor Shepherd?”

“Yes.”

“This is Sanilee Dare.”

The woman’s voice was on the breathy side, but pleasant. She spoke American-sounding English and, like her name, her accent struck me as about halfway between Thai and American. Still, I had no idea at all who she was.

“I’m sorry, but are you a student?”

The woman laughed and it was a nice laugh.

“I showed you and your wife a house in Phuket last week. I’m Nok, remember?”

She laughed again before I could say anything. “I’m devastated. Thank God most men remember me a lot better than you do.”

I apologized to the woman for not recognizing her name, but I finessed her flirty approach to reminding me who she was. That could go nowhere good.

“I have some really good news for you, Jack.”

Nok may have been Thai, but she had apparently embraced the annoying American habit of jumping right into addressing everyone by their first name at the earliest possible opportunity. I guess it didn’t really matter one way or another, but I’d always hated that and it put me in the wrong frame of mind to hear the rest of whatever she had to say.

“I’m calling about that house you and your wife were interested in,” she said. “Remember?”

Somehow I didn’t recall expressing the slightest interest in the house Nok had shown us, but I didn’t say anything. She was a real estate agent and it wouldn’t really matter to her whether I did or not.

“Well, someone called from BankThai this morning,” she continued, “and guess what? They’re willing to drop the price to fifteen million baht.”

For a moment I wasn’t sure I had heard her correctly.

“To what?” I asked. “Fifty million baht?”

“No,
fifteen
.”

From eight-five million baht, nearly three million dollars, to fifteen million baht, more like four hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Jeez, I was a hell of a negotiator, wasn’t I? God only knows how low the price might have gone if I’d actually opened my mouth.

“That doesn’t make any sense to me,” I said.

“Well…” Nok hesitated. “Actually, it doesn’t to me either. I never talked to anyone over there. I don’t even know how they knew you had looked at the house. A man from BankThai just called me this morning and said he had been told you were interested in the property and his instructions were to reduce the price for you. He even said the bank would be willing to loan you the full amount if you wished.”

“Did he?”

“Oh, yes. He said the bank had thunt if absolutely the highest regard for you and he wanted to do anything he could to help you acquire the property. I had no idea you were such an important man.”

“Neither did I.”

There was a long silence. Nok apparently expected me to fill it. I didn’t.

“Ah…” Nok sounded tentative. Under the circumstances, I could hardly blame her. “Shall I tell them you’re interested?”

“No.”

“But your wife…” Nok abruptly stopped talking and slid into an uncertain silence.

“What about her?” I asked.

“When I called her she said you would definitely be interested and that was why she gave me your number. She asked me to call you.”

“Well, she was wrong. Please tell BankThai we are not going to buy that house at any price. Thank you for calling.”

I hung up before Nok could say anything else and tilted back in my chair, folding my arms over my chest.

This was turning into a fine mess, wasn’t it? The last thing I needed was to have my name bandied about in connection with an offer by a Thai bank of an under-the-table deal to buy an expensive vacation house in Phuket. The implications were legion, and none of them were good.

After stewing over Nok’s call for a while longer, I picked the telephone up again and dialed Anita at home. She answered on the third ring and I skipped right past the usual pleasantries.

“What do you know about this house business, Anita?”

“Well, hello, darling. And thank you for calling. I love you, too.”

“I’m sorry to be so abrupt, Anita, but I’m working up a real mad-on here. Did you talk to BankThai about that house in Phuket without telling me?”

“No, Jack, I didn’t.”

Anita’s tone had turned icy, which I probably deserved, but I plowed ahead anyway.

“You talked to no one at that bank?”

“No one.”

“Did you talk to anyone else?”

“No.”

“Then why in Christ’s name would someone at BankThai suddenly call this real estate agent and…”

I trailed off, turning the woman’s story around in my mind looking for some kind of an explanation.

“Look, Jack. Sometimes nice things do—”