"Please," I answered. The Eel. A slimy fucking eel. Things were starting to add up. "Where would I start to look, Yuri?"
The Russian paused, scrolling farther down the file. "Perhaps with your own State Department, Inspector. Judging from what I see, they may be better help than us."
The State Department, our State Department. "Why is that?"
"Remlikov's last-known whereabouts. He is thought to be in Israel, Inspector."
Chapter 87
FINALLY I WAS ONTO something. The bearded face now had a name, and a history. Remlikov's prints came in over the fax a short time later, but my eyes had started to close.
I dozed off until nine. Then I shaved and showered, and called a colleague I had worked with at the FBI. I asked if I could meet him around ten.
Senil Chumra was a plump, likable Indian whose office wasn't in the Bureau's official place downtown. He was in a nondescript warehouse building up on Eighteenth and Tenth, overlooking the river. Chumra headed up a specialized area of the department we called CAF. Computer Assisted Forensics.
These were the guys who could trace e-mails, hack into computers, worm their way through coded passwords, track the complicated movements of cash overseas. I had last worked with him tracking the flow of Cavello's union paybacks to the Cayman Islands. Senil's other talent was manipulating digital images.
"Hello, Nick." The techie lit up as I walked through the door of his lab. The technical guys always liked it when one of the so-called glamour boys showed up. "Haven't seen you in a while. What have you been up to?"
"I'm good, Chummie," I lied. "Busy." These technical whizzes worked in their own little specialized cocoon up here. No reason he'd know what I was up to-- or in this case, wasn't. "You got that e-mail I sent over?"
"I got it." The Indian wheeled over to a Mac screen down the line, maybe a little disappointed. "Got it uploaded right here."
Senil touched a mouse, and the image of Cavello's bearded accomplice jumped onto the screen. "Okay, Nick, tell me--what is it you want me to do?"
"I want to change around the image, Chummie. See if it matches someone I know."
He nodded, hunching over the screen and cracking his knuckles. He clicked the mouse again. A grid appeared over the image. "Shoot."
"First, I want to lose the beard."
"Easy." Senil typed in a few coordinates, and the image immediately narrowed in to just a square of the suspect's face. Then, using a cursor, he outlined the area of the beard. Gently, he moved his cursor back and forth, as if he was airbrushing.
"What are you onto these days?" he asked while he worked, his fingers guiding the cursor like a surgeon's. "Things have to be pretty hot up there for you C-10 boys, what with Cavello and all. What're you thinking, he changed his face on you?"
"Sort of," I said, not picking up on his inquisitiveness. "Just a hunch."
"A hunch." He sighed, dropping the conversation. "This process is called grafting and displacement," he said, continuing to carve away the facial hair, tracing it around the chin. "Essentially, we eliminate a field: skin tone, a scar, in this case, a beard." In a moment the facial area was blank, and Senil retrieved a section of skin from another part of the image and filled in the space. "Then we just graft onto it." He smoothed out the facial lines. "Cut and paste."
"That's good," I said, leaning over his shoulder. "Now what do you say we try and alter the hair. Make it short and close to the skull. A little darker."
"You mean like this?" He pressed an icon, and a file of various hairstyles came up. Then he chose one fitting my description and basically transplanted it over the newly configured face.
"Now set the hairline back a bit. Around the sides."
Chummie started playing around with the cursor again.
"Yes, like that. Now, can we ditch the eyeglasses?"
"Faster than Lasik." He grinned. "Cheaper, too." It took about a minute of more grafting and displacement.
The man's dark glasses disappeared.
"Fucking A!" I exclaimed. The image on the screen almost knocked me on the floor.
"Anything else, Nick? If you're not satisfied, give me the word. I'll make him look like anyone you like."
"No, Chummie." I patted his shoulder. "I think we're done."
I pulled out the file of Kolya Remlikov that Yuri Plakhov had faxed me. I put Remlikov's face side by side against the altered image of Cavello's accomplice.
"Bingo," Senil Chumra said.
We were staring at the same man.
Chapter 88
THIRTEEN YEARS OF working my way up through one of the most bureaucratic law enforcement agencies in the world told me to go straight to the Javits Building and drop what I had right on ADIC Cioffi's desk.
There wasn't much doubt that Kolya Remlikov was the man who had sprung Cavello.
I got as far as hailing a cab on the corner. Then something made me hold back. I wasn't sure exactly what.
Maybe it was the thought of handing Remlikov over to the very people who had let him escape. Or the sudden realization of just how difficult this could prove to be-- getting through channels, interrogating him. Which agencies would be involved? Would I be involved? One leak and Remlikov could disappear. And with him, Cavello. Then where would we be?
I'd spent so many years doing the right thing. Suddenly the right thing didn't seem so right anymore.
I waved the taxi on.
I just went back and leaned against the building for a while, holding the photos, trying to decide what the right thing was. When it hit me, I told myself, For a professor of criminal ethics, Nick, you're about to do one very stupid thing.
I looked up a number in my BlackBerry and placed a call. I asked Steve Bushnagel if he had plans for lunch. Steve was a partner in a private law firm now, but he used to advise the FBI. He was an expert on matters of extradition and international law.
"Lunch? Where?" Bushnagel asked.
"Cheap and fast," I said. "I'm buying."
"How fast?" the lawyer asked.
"Hop into the elevator. I'll be right outside."
When he stepped out of the lobby of the big glass tower on Sixth Avenue
, I was leaning on a parked car, holding out a couple of hot dogs. "Ketchup or mustard?"
"Not to be particularly lawyerly about it-- but how 'bout both."
We sat on a ledge on the busy corner, the lunch-hour crowds streaming by. "Steve, I've got someone I want to get to who's fled to Israel."
"Get to?"
"I need to get him back."
Bushnagel took a bite. "Are we talking fugitive or citizen, here?"
"Citizen, I suspect. He's been there awhile."
"And what you want him for, these are crimes committed in the United States, not Israel, right?"
"We're just talking, right, Steve?"
He waved his dog at me. "I assure you, you're not paying me enough for anything more specific."
I grinned. "Okay. Then we might be talking some other things in Russia and France as well."
"Hmmph." Bushnagel grunted. "The Israelis are cooperative-- to a degree. You remember Jonathan Pollard? We arrested him for espionage in 1985-- in the Israelis' eyes, unjustly. They've been trying to get him back unsuccessfully for twenty years. And that electronics guy who fled there? 'Crazy Eddie' Antar? Look at how long it took to get him back. Of course, it all depends on what we're really talking here."
"Talking?"
"In the post-9/11 world." The lawyer shrugged. "Do the Israelis want something from us? Are the other governments involved? Look, Nick, I didn't become a complete dummy when I left the government. I know we're not chasing tax cheats here.
"If the evidence is solid, you could definitely get the guy held for questioning. But what kind of access you'd have, and how long that would take, that's all up for grabs. How time sensitive is this?"
"The highest." I shrugged glumly. "Off the charts."
"Always is. Well, factor into this the matters of state, too.
Does this have any rhythm for the Israelis? Do they want to make a deal with us? Do they want to make a deal with the Russians or the French before they turn him over? It's delicate, Nick-- and I don't think that's a word that sits particularly well with you."
I nodded.
"Look, you'd get him held. You get a lot of people involved. But what happens next is anybody's guess. Then there's always the chance they drag their feet, the guy slips away, and you never hear from him again."
"I can't take that risk," I said, shaking my head.
"I understand." Bushnagel nodded. "Problem is, though, it's still the only game in town."
"In the real world, yes." I nodded. I balled up my wrapper.
I knew Steve was wondering why I had come to him. He had left the government long ago. There were plenty of lawyers on staff who could handle this kind of matter. "Just for the record, Nick" --he looked closely at me-- "is there any other?"
Chapter 89
I TRACED THE EDGE of my fingernail along the slope of Andie's back.
"Don't." She stirred, snuggling up to me.
I'd been thinking all night. Since I left Steve Bushnagel. In the real world, I knew, I would have Remlikov arrested. I would lead the interrogation. He would give up Cavello, and I would go get him. That was my job. It was just that the "real world" had gotten a lot more complicated lately.
I ran my fingers along Andie's spine again. This time she turned and faced me, resting on her arm. She saw something was serious. "What is it?"
"I may have a line," I said, "on the man who blew up the bus."
Andie sat up, the sleep already gone from her eyes. "What are you talking about, Nick?"
"I'll show you."
I reached over and opened a manila envelope I had on the night table. In a long row on the bed I spread several black-and-white glossies: Homeland Security photos of Kolya Remlikov and the ones Yuri Plakhov had sent me.
"His name is Remlikov," I said. "He's Russian. He's a killer for hire. And a particularly good one. He's got a very bloody résumé. I think Cavello may have gotten him through the Russian mob. I think he's in Israel."
Andie's eyes widened at the photos. I put down the one Chummie had doctored in his lab, showing the man in the elevator without his disguise. They stretched wider. She picked it up and stared at the angular, dark-featured face a long time.
"Why do you think he was the one who blew up the bus?"
"This." I removed two final photographs. The first was one I had given Senil. This photo I had found myself, from hours and hours of plugging through the courthouse security cameras. Not from the day of the escape. But from earlier.
From Cavello's first trial.
"Take away the sideburns and the dark glasses." I put a cleaned-up image next to it.
"Oh my God!" She picked it up, jaw tightening, gazing at the face with a hurt, stunned expression. Then her eyes filled with tears.
"Why did you keep this from me?" she asked, her back to me.
"I didn't. I only got these photos today."
"So what happens now? You give this to your people?" she said excitedly. "They go and get him? Tell me that's the way it goes."
"I don't know. It may not be that easy. The Israelis will have to be contacted. It involves governments. Procedures. This sort of evidence is highly speculative. Photos can always be doctored. You never know what will happen."
"What do you mean, you don't know? This man killed federal marshals, and he helped Cavello escape. He blew up the loaded juror bus, Nick. He killed my little boy."
"I know. But it's complicated, Andie. Remlikov is a foreign citizen. There may be other governments involved. Other law enforcement agencies. Then the Israelis have to agree to give him up."
"What are you saying, Nick?" Alarm rose up in her eyes. "They can go get this guy. You know where he is. These are your people, Nick. What does the Bureau think?"
I shook my head. Waited a second. Then I spoke again. "I didn't take it to the Bureau, Andie."
She blinked like a fighter trying to clear his head after a stunning punch. She kept looking at me, trying to read my face. "What are you saying, Nick?"
"I'm saying a man like this would disappear the second he knew people were onto him. And the instant Cavello finds out we're onto them, he takes off, too." I looked at her, eyes clear. "We've lost Cavello twice. We're not losing him again."
I think, at that moment, she knew what I was proposing. The angry flush on her face was swept away, and it was replaced by a look of clarity. When she looked at me again, I think she understood what kind of man I was.
"I told you I was going to get him, Andie."
She nodded. "I'm not even going to ask, Nick. I just want you to know, whatever it takes, I'm with you. Do you hear me? Do you understand?"
"Not on this," I said. "This is something I have to do alone. You don't want to be involved."
"No." Andie smiled thinly. "That's where you're wrong. I know exactly what you have to do, Nick. And I'm already involved."
"Not like this." What I had to do was in another country-- and was way, way outside the law.
"Yes, like this, Nick. Like everything." She picked up Remlikov's photo. "I lost my son. I want Cavello, too."
"You know what's going to happen over there? You know what we're talking about, Andie?"
She nodded. "Yes." She leaned her head against my chest. "I know what's going to happen, Nick. I'm praying that it does."
"We're leaving in two days," I said.
Chapter 90
THE REEDY MAN in tortoiseshell glasses leaned back against the park bench and looked at me. "These prints you sent me-- where did you get them from?"
Charlie Harpering and I were old friends. We were sitting in a tiny park across from the courthouse: the historical Five Points in Gangs of New York. Charlie had spent many years at the FBI. Now he worked for Homeland Security. It was he who had procured all the files for me.
"Never mind how I got them. What I need to know is if there was a match."
Harpering studied me long and hard. What I was asking him to do-- to go around all normal channels and procedures, to give me information that he might not pass on to his boss--was a lot to ask, even of a friend.
"You know, I could screw up a well-earned pension over this."
"Trust me." I gave him a big smile. "Retirement's way overrated. This is important, Charlie. Was there a match?"
The Homeland Security man let out a breath. Then he opened his briefcase and set a file on his lap. He nodded. "Yeah. There was a match."
He opened a plain manila file. Facing me was a blowup of the fingerprints Yuri Plakhov had faxed me.
"They belong to an Estonian," Harpering said. "Stephan Kollich. He came in through JFK on a commercial visa, April twelfth."
April 12. Cavello was sprung from the courthouse six days later.
A wave of validation surged up inside me. Remlikov had been here.
"You'll see he left seven days later." Harpering pointed farther down. A day after the escape!" Back to London. Out of DC."
"And on to anywhere else?" I asked.
"All she wrote, I'm afraid." The Homeland Security man shrugged. "At least, under that name."
"Thank you, Charles," I said, tapping him on the chest. "Here." I slid over a shopping bag containing the bound Homeland Security files. "I won't be needing these anymore."
He tucked the bag between his legs. "What the hell are you up to, Nick? You know I did this out of friendship. Anyone else, we'd be in a federal office right now. Who is this guy?"
"Let's call it a career move. We'll try and figure out later if it's up or down."
Harpering sniffed, agreeing. "I see what you mean about retirement. Then I might as well take you the distance, Nick--whichever the hell way it goes."
"What do you mean?"
He took two additional sheets out of his case and slid them into the file. "Kollich's visa application. For old times. And just for the record, it d
idn't come via Tallinn, Nick. Estonia. It came from Tel Aviv."
I blinked. "Jesus."
"Gets even better." Harpering dropped the file on my lap. "Assuming you're trying to find him, of course. Good luck, Nick." Harpering stood up. "Give the sonovabitch a shot in the balls for me."
I looked down at the new file. There was an address on the visa application: 225 Yehudi Road
.
Haifa.
Chapter 91
RICHARD NORDESHENKO WAS contemplating a chess move with his son on the terrace when the doorbell rang.
"Get that for me, Pavel." Mira was out shopping. The boy went to answer the front door.
Nordeshenko was enjoying his new life. He had tossed his cell phone into the sea and let the one or two contacts he still trusted know he was out of business. For good.
Every day he went swimming in the Mediterranean. He picked up his son after school and drove him to chess. At night he took Mira to the fancy shops and cafés in Carmel Center. He tried to put to the back of his mind that just a few weeks before he had gotten away with a crime covering the front page of every newspaper.
"Father! There's a man."
Nordeshenko pushed himself slowly out of his chair and went into the living room. It might as well have been a squadron of Mossad he saw standing there.
"Hello, Remi."
"What are you doing here?" Nordeshenko gasped. Reichardt. His face went slack and ashen.
"Just a little traveling, Remi. Some sightseeing. Throwing myself on the hospitality of old friends."
He turned to Pavel. "Go and look at the board, son. I moved."
The boy hesitated.
"Go and look at the board, I said." His voice was much harsher.
Pavel swallowed. "Yes, Father."
The boy left, and Nordeshenko turned back to the man at the door, feeling his every nerve grow tight. "Are you insane? Come in, quickly," he said. He looked past Reichardt and up the street. "Are you certain there was no tail?"
"Relax, Remi," the South African said. "I've come through three countries. I've been doing this as long as you. You've got a nice-looking boy."