“Which leaves us where?” Bear asked.
“It sounds to me like we’ve got one Russian spy trying to kill another Russian spy. We have to figure out why.”
Bear huffed. “And people say Kansas City is a boring town.”
Chapter Forty-Nine
They talked for a good hour more, running through different scenarios and plans of attack. It was slim pickings because they didn’t have a ton of hard evidence to go on. Foster would check on Snell at the hospital before digging into the FBI databases and files for anything related to Sokolov or Connelly. Bear would work his contacts with the Kansas City Police Department and, despite his grumbling, would liaise with Cat and pass along any pertinent information. Stone volunteered to work on Hart and determine if they could extract anything useful out of him, including the back-door-program Blackbird. If they could figure out what door the code would keep open, they could reverse engineer the process to figure out what Sokolov wanted and why Connelly wanted to kill him for it.
“I have a couple of contacts at MedFire,” Stone said. “Maybe we can get a products-and-services list. I’m sure they’ve done some kind of vulnerability analysis which might give us somewhere to begin. And we better hope they can give us a direction, because without it, it’d be like trying to find a certain drop of water inside an Olympic swimming pool. I’ll keep Hart locked in that interrogation room until he spills something useful.”
Foster asked, “What’s your plan, Jake?”
Dread formed a weighted ball in the pit of his stomach. “Can I trade with any one of you?”
Bear’s bushy brows shot to the moon. “Keats? You’re going to see Keats? Are you out of your mind?”
“I must be. But outside of finding Sokolov or Connelly, he’s the one guy who can bust this thing wide open.”
Bear grabbed the edge of the table like he wanted to flip it over. “And you think he’s just going to spill his guts, you dumb son of a bitch.”
Jake flashed his palms. “He won’t hurt me. Relax.”
“What makes you think that? You’re going to go in there and say, ‘Sorry to bother you, Mr. Keats, but can you give us the location of Sokolov and spill your crooked guts?’ How do you think he’s going to react?”
Jake pursed his lips. “I plan on being a little subtler.”
Foster stepped in. “Bear’s right. It’s a crazy plan. Keats won’t tell you anything, and you’ll show our cards.”
“We don’t have that many cards.”
“My point exactly. If we’re going to build a case on these guys, we must be deliberate and thoughtful.”
Jake groaned. “Who gives a shit about building a case against them? Whatever it is these guys are up to, I can guarantee it’s nothing good for anyone other than them. Since they’ve already killed a handful of people over it, we better figure out what it is and stop it. Now. Not weeks or months down the road so we have enough time to dot the i’s and cross the t’s on your case file. We can’t leave Christopher out there hanging that long.”
“What if he doesn’t give you anything?” Foster asked.
“Then we’re no worse than we are right now. But, if he does reveal something to help us track Sokolov or Connelly, it was worth the trip.”
“And what if he blows your stupid head off your big, dumb shoulders?” Bear asked.
“Like I said, he won’t. Trust me.”
“Jesus Christ.” Bear threw open the door and stormed from the room with Foster on his heels.
Stone tossed the dry erase marker in the air and caught it with an upward quirk of the mouth. “You’re a brave man, Caldwell. I’ll give you that. I’ve never met Keats but heard enough to make my balls ascend into my body.”
Jake blew out a voluminous breath. “Well, I do know him, and I gotta say my nuts are already making the climb.”
* * *
Jake spent the next hour driving around the potential places Keats could be. Though an extreme creature of habit, Keats varied the nights he went to his usual haunts so his enemies couldn’t get too good of a bead on him. Jake knew his most likely spots, especially given the dinner hour. He started with Keats’s house and office, then wheeled through downtown to Lydia’s at Union Station. He next rolled to Southwest Boulevard to the many Mexican restaurants lining the street and on to the Plaza. Nothing.
He could call him and set a meeting, but it would be on Keats’s terms, and Jake wanted something a little less intimate. Bear had every right to be worried. Keats liked Jake, and he’d been a loyal and faithful servant to his crown, but as Keats often said, “Business is business. I may like you, but I’ll still kill you.” Jake knew you could stick your head in the lion’s mouth only so many times before he bites.
As he drove, he called Maggie and checked in as fat raindrops splattered on the windshield. She asked how long it would be until he wrapped this deal up. Jake guessed a couple more days at least but told her they made some good progress to finding Connelly and the Blackbird. He left out his hunt for Keats. By the time he disconnected, they exchanged “I love you’s” and the brief rain shower ended.
As the dash clock clicked to nine and the city lights launched a hazy glow on the rain-dampened streets, Jake rolled down the windows and sucked in the sweet, musky smell brought on by the rain—one of his favorite odors in the world besides Maggie’s perfume. It also served as a wind to wipe away the anchors pulling down at his eyelids. It had been a long couple of days without much sleep. Seconds from giving up and heading back to the FBI to find Bear, the deck of cards in his middle island tray caught his eye. Cards. One more place to check.
Chapter Fifty
Jake strode past the security guard at Harrah’s Casino and through the fog of smoke by the slot machines hugging the wall until the poker room appeared on his right. There were five tables going, and Keats occupied the nine seat at the corner of the back table. Jake pulled five folded hundred-dollar bills from his emergency slot in his wallet and cradled a rack of thick, red clay chips. The poker room manager gave him the go ahead, and he settled into a chair next to Keats who was involved in a three-way pot with a grizzled old man in a cowboy hat and a young punk with a shaved head wearing sunglasses. Keats cast a wary gaze at Jake before turning back to his cards, throwing out four green chips worth a hundred bucks into a pot with four hundred in it. The old man folded, and the kid raised Keats another four hundred.
“What the hell do you want?” Keats asked, checking his two, facedown cards. In front of the dealer lay a jack, ten, and a deuce, two of them spades, the other a heart. Jake watched how the kid raised and read the look on his face. Keats studied the pot for a minute, and Jake could almost hear his brain calculating the pot odds. Jake guessed Keats was on a draw.
“I thought I’d play a little poker tonight while you and I had a conversation.”
“We already had our conversation.” Keats riffled his chips, contemplating either a call or raise. “Don’t think we have much more to discuss given what you’re digging into.”
“We still need to have it.”
“Fuck off,” Keats growled. “I’m playing cards.”
“Not well, judging from your stack size. Tell you what, I’ll tell you exactly what cards you and kid poker have. If I’m right, you let me buy you a drink and we talk. If I’m wrong, I’m out of here and I won’t bother you again.”
Keats studied the board while the other players at the table waited with anticipation. “Fine. I fold. Make your call.”
Jake took another peek at the cards on the board and played what little he’d seen of the hand through his head. Keats acted first before the flop and probably raised first, which meant he held decent cards. But he didn’t like the connected and double suited board. The kid oozed confidence despite how much he tried to hide it.
“You have king queen suited, but not spades,” Jake said to Keats. “The kid has a set of jacks and raised in case you were on a flush or straight draw.”
Keats looked to the o
ther end of the table. “What’d you have, kid?”
“You gotta pay to see ’em, man.” The kid was clueless as to the identity of the man asking the question. Several of the table patrons cringed.
Jake held twenty dollars in chips, dangling them above the pile. The kid’s head bobbed in agreement, Jake dropped the chips and the kid flipped up two jacks. Keats grunted and turned over a king and queen of clubs.
“Damn. Wish I knew how you did that.” Keats told the dealer he’d be back and led the duo outside the poker room. He made his way to an empty table in the corner of the bar while Jake fetched Keats two fingers of their best Scotch and a beer for himself.
“Do you remember Kenny McCutcheon?” Jake asked.
“Unfortunately.” Keats sipped his drink. “Ran his trap all the time and got knifed by a kid hopped up on PCP.”
Jake ran his finger through the excessive head on his beer, watching the foam dissipate. “Kenny the Mouth you called him. Did you know the Feds dug their claws into him a year before he died?”
Keats drew back. “Bullshit.”
“No, it’s the truth. Remember how he was supposed to go with me to Colorado and we couldn’t find him? You stuck me with that asshole Turlington instead. We couldn’t find Kenny because he sat in an FBI interrogation room getting grilled by three agents.”
“How the hell do you know this?”
“Because he told me.” Jake took a long pull from his glass. “He wanted my advice because he knew if you found out he’d be deader than fried chicken.”
“What did he tell them?”
“Nothing much. He knew he couldn’t stonewall them, because they’d drag it out for days and you’d find out. He fed them a few truths so they could get some minor accolades, but nothing that could hurt you or the organization.”
Keats swirled the Scotch and probed Jake with his insightful eyes. “What’s your point, Jake? I’m assuming you have one for this trip down memory lane.”
Jake glanced about to ensure they were alone. “My point is there’s a noose closing around your neck, and you don’t even know it.”
Keats’s temple throbbed from his grinding teeth. “What the fuck are you talking about?”
“The FBI and CIA know you bought the debt of a network guy for Trajor and got him working a back door into some system. They’re close to tying you to Sokolov and his little Blackbird plot. Whatever get-rich-quick scheme you’re cooking is going to send your ass to the slammer.”
“You wired right now?” Keats asked.
“Jason, please. You know me better than that.”
“You sure?”
Jake held his arms to the sides. “You want to strip search me? Your two goons over there pretending to play the penny slots can do the honors. I wouldn’t do that to you.”
Keats shoved the glass away. “First of all, I have no idea what you’re talking about with buying up debt of some Trajor guy or anything about working a back door into any system.”
“Come on. We know—”
“You don’t know shit. In all the years you’ve worked for me, have I ever bought up anyone’s debt?”
Jake thought for a moment. “No.”
“No, and do you know why? Because it’s a bad investment. It’s like giving a heroin addict money to go get something to eat. You know me and my money are not easily parted, so why would I do that?”
“Leverage on the guy.”
“Leverage for what? What the fuck would I need leverage over some piss-ant Trajor employee for?”
“For the Blackbird program.”
“Which I have no involvement in.”
“But you know what it does. Even if you’re telling me the truth, the Feds got enough of that noose around your neck to make you dangle.”
Keats wiped the table with a bar napkin while he thought. “Why’re you telling me this?”
“Because I’m trying to do the right thing. Whatever angle you’re working, I want you to take a good hard look at the cost and ask yourself if it’s worth it. People are getting killed, good people. A little kid’s missing. And that’s not counting the victims of whatever is going on with Sokolov and the Blackbird.”
“What do you want?”
“I want to know what’s going on. What’s the Blackbird and what’s Sokolov planning? Who’s killing the people in his ring?”
“And you expect me to spill my guts to you,” Keats said with a dubious squint.
“No. Pretend you’re Kenny the Mouth and I’m the FBI. Give me a taste. Something I can use to stop this but not burn your house to the ground.”
“Sounds like it’s already burned.”
Jake shook his head. “No, it’s not. Everything they have is based off Jerry Hart, and all they think is you bought his debt. The lines they’re drawing are faint, but they’re real. We crack this thing and those lines can get easily erased. Give me something.”
Keats regarded him from across the table, much like the time in Keats’s office when Jake revealed the echoes of snapping bones haunted him were turning him into his father, and he wanted out of the life of violence Keats offered. This time, however, Jake was the one offering his old boss a way out.
“Whatever I tell you doesn’t get back to me,” Keats said.
“It won’t.”
Keats jabbed a finger at Jake. “I’m fucking serious, Caldwell. You burn me with this, and you and your little family will die horribly. You got me?”
The threats to his family shot blood to his cheeks, but he needed Keats to talk. He’d figure out the rest later. “Got it.”
“I can’t give you Sokolov,” Keats said. “He knows too much and would sell me down the river in a goddamn heartbeat.”
“But he is up to something? Who is he?”
“Just like I told you. Ex-KGB, now an officer with the SVR working here in the States to do what he can to undermine our way of life. They hate everything we stand for; it radiates off them like a furnace. Anyway, he came to me a year ago asking for some help.”
“What help?”
“At first it was guns through Andre Fisher to protect his network. He said if I helped him on the computer side with a programmer, he’d move Fisher out of the way. It’d give me pretty much sole distributorship of weapons in the Midwest.”
“That’d be worth a chunk of change.”
“Yeah, but if he would’ve told me what he was going to use the programmer for…this Blackbird…I never would’ve done it.”
“Who was the programmer? Mack at MedFire?”
Keats took a drink, drawing his lips tight against his teeth. “Yeah. But he’s permanently off the radar. Someone found his broken body in his storage unit yesterday, along with the kid that worked there. I’d be surprised if there was a solid bone left in Mack’s body.”
“What about Hart at Trajor?”
“Mack was the key with the medical system software. The medical system has security features that shut down the feed to it when it detects an anomaly. Hart could lock open the network feeding it.”
“What for?”
“To crash it,” Keats said. “Well, he said it was to threaten to crash it. MedFire’s medical software system is ingrained in how hospitals operate. He figured out a way to be able to control it, the ability to crash it. Not just here in Kansas City, but in cities across the country. Thousands of people would die if he did it.”
“Jesus Christ.” Jake fell back into his seat. “And you went along with this?”
“I didn’t think he’d actually do it. He wanted out and needed a lot of cash to do it. He said he’d maybe do a couple of test cases to be able to show he could and then ransom the program. With the ransom money he’d collect, he could disappear, and I’d control the gun network.”
“And he has the programming to pull it off?”
Keats tipped his head back and forth. “You saw the news. Three dead at Quinley Medical Center. Sure as shit sounded like Blackbird to me. But something went wrong because once M
ack disappeared, he called me for another programmer. I told him I was done and didn’t want any part of it. Fuck the gun distribution. I don’t know if he found another programmer or not. I imagine he’s running around for his life right now.”
“Who’s doing the killing?”
“A man called the Wolf. Probably the one man Sokolov should fear.”
“The Wolf sounds like a villain from a James Bond movie. Who is he?”
“A spy from the old Soviet Union. Hardcore KGB and deadly.”
Jake scowled. “But if they’re both working for Russia, why are this Wolf and Sokolov going after each other?”
“Good Lord, Jake. Russia may try to interfere with our elections and steal our secrets, but how well do you think our current administration would take them crashing a major medical network and killing thousands of Americans? It would be an act of war, and despite the political dick waving and finger pointing, nobody wants that. The Wolf is trying to stop Sokolov. Plus, Sokolov made it extremely personal.”
“Personal how?”
“The Wolf killed Marta in the Westport alley and, in retaliation, Sokolov killed the Wolf’s wife. Shot her in the head. In a cabin. In Warsaw.”
The blood drained from Jake’s face; his hands tingled. “You mean…”
Keats climbed to his feet and tossed a twenty on the table. “Yeah, the Wolf is Andrew Connelly. Now you have to make the decision on who you want to stop.”
Chapter Fifty-One
Waves of light flashed through the cab of Jake’s truck as he drove toward downtown along Armour Boulevard, an east-west thoroughfare stretching from The Paseo to Broadway. Despite the news from Keats, sleep pulled at his eyelids, and the one thing sounding better than the bed in his apartment was a naked Maggie in the bed. The thought of Bear and his chainsaw snoring crushing the fluff from his couch cushions scattered away any fantasies of romance.
Jake Caldwell Thrillers Page 71
