by A. C. Fuller
Warren studied his eyes, which stared blankly through the windshield. He wanted the man to break. Needed him to break. “You can still stop this. Save at least four lives. Las Vegas. Tokyo. San Francisco. Los Angeles.”
Dorian’s eyes dropped. He opened his mouth to speak.
Lights flashed through the rear windshield.
Police lights.
They both glanced back at the same moment. But Dorian grabbed Warren’s “gun” as he turned, pushing it up into Warren’s chest. Then he looked down at it. A smile appeared as he realized it wasn’t a gun.
Warren grabbed for his jacket just as Dorian lunged at him, striking him in the cheek with a violent forearm. A second later, Dorian leapt out of the van.
Warren jumped out the passenger side and raced after him. He heard shouts from behind and, looking back, saw two officers getting out of the police car.
9
Cole tried calling the French police again, hoping to reach someone different, someone who would promise action. Instead, she was transferred to the same person, a detective who spoke broken English and didn’t seem to understand the significance of the fact that Ibo Kane was in Paris.
Next, she called Fires again. The call went straight to voicemail.
She hadn’t heard from Warren since his text twenty minutes ago. She considered heading out to Gregor Tower, but something stopped her. Warren told her to call the police. Not to head down there. He had to have a reason for that. What good could she do, anyway? It’s not like she could stroll up to Kane and ask for an on-the-record interview. Still, she was going nuts waiting.
She paced the room for a few minutes, then took the elevator to the lobby and got coffee.
Back in the room, she paced nervously, trying to figure out how Warren had learned about the cleaner and about Kane being in Paris. She ran a series of searches, but there was nothing on Kane being in France.
Out of options, she returned to the follow-up article she was writing for The Barker. Watergate, she told herself, wasn’t one big story. It was a trickle of dozens of stories over two years. She needed to get something fresh out there and hoped other reporters and law enforcement officials would use her work as a starting point to investigate further.
Her new article tied Ibo Kane’s business interests to the death of David Fontes. It wasn’t hard. Turned out, Fontes had been working in opposition to a deal that would allow U.S. and European tech companies a freer path into Chinese markets. Markets Kane desperately wanted to reach. Next, she tried to answer one simple question: Who’s Next?
As she had in Miami, she tried to put herself in the mind of the killers: what sort of people would they want to kill? Now the range of victims was narrower. Not only did they need to be appealing targets to the extremists carrying out the murders, their deaths also had to benefit Ibo Kane. Running a series of searches, she created a list of potential targets in Las Vegas, Tokyo, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.
From there, she narrowed her list to the five most-likely victims from each city, writing one paragraph for each. She hoped the article would move the public’s consciousness to a new place. Even though her piece on Kane made a big splash, most still believed the extremist political motives espoused in the manifesto were the real reason for the killings. In this article, she wanted to show how any of these twenty targets could fit into the motives of the manifesto. More importantly, she wanted to show how the death of any of these twenty leaders would serve Ibo Kane’s personal interests.
When she finished, she emailed the story to Alex Vane at The Barker, along with a note.
Alex,
My gut feeling is that the next victim will be in Tokyo. Fei Mingkang is there right now, and only for forty-eight hours. If you want to make a splash, edit the piece a little to make it more of a prediction. The right headline will make it go viral—JANE COLE PREDICTS NEXT KILLING IN NINE MURDERS PLOT—something flashy. You all know how to sell it.
Any chance you can get expedited media visas for Robert Warren and me? We don’t have our passports, but we’re working on it.
-Jane
As written, the article didn’t come right out with the prediction that Fei Mingkang would be next. Cole’s journalistic instinct was to be conservative with predictions. But she knew how Alex would respond. Mingkang was the Deputy Governor of the People’s Bank of China, in Tokyo for a long-planned meeting of Asian banking leaders. For years, she’d blocked Kane’s efforts to establish a foothold in the Chinese financial system. If Cole was right, he’d love to see her go so he could persuade her successor to be more accommodating.
Closing her laptop, she texted Warren again.
Cole: Where R U?
10
The shouts of the officers faded as Warren turned the corner. He was fifty yards behind Dorian, but gaining.
Dorian took a left, then a right, and disappeared down an alley. When Warren skidded into the alley, Dorian was halfway up a fire escape ladder. The ladder was attached to a four-story brick building. With his upper body strength, Warren could take the rungs three at a time.
The metal was cold on his hands, but he gained on Dorian as they ascended.
Dorian reached the top of the ladder and disappeared onto the roof. Seconds later, Warren fell onto the snowy roof, breathing heavily. If he was breathing heavily, Dorian must be gasping for air.
He stood too quickly and slipped in the snow, falling backwards and smashing his hip on the curved handle at the top of the ladder. His cell phone fell from his jacket pocket and dropped into the alley below. The two officers had turned the corner. They’d seen him, but as he turned back to Dorian, he doubted they’d catch him.
Dorian leapt from one rooftop to another. Warren followed, running as fast as he could without slipping. He easily cleared the two-foot gap between buildings, despite a tentative takeoff. He chased Dorian across another roof, then another, and another.
Dorian slowed and paused, now only twenty yards ahead.
He’d reached the end of the block. The cross street meant a sixty-foot gap between roofs. He had nowhere to go.
Dorian turned to Warren and smiled, then turned back to the empty space at the edge of the roof and jumped. Warren heard a faint thud. Oh no. His mind flashed on Michael Wragg, who’d chosen to kill himself instead of being taken alive.
He skidded to a stop at the edge of the roof and glanced down. At first, he saw nothing. An awkwardly angled floodlight blinded him. The sidewalk below was under construction.
He blinked rapidly, then saw Dorian on the ground rolling, then standing. He’d landed on something. A pile of dirt or gravel? Somehow he’d survived the four-story drop.
Eyes adjusting, he saw what it was. Dorian had landed on a bank of large plastic garbage cans. Three of the cans had toppled when he hit them, but there were still four more upright.
Without a thought, Warren jumped. The cold air rushed past, stinging his face as he fell. He flailed his arms to keep himself upright, but overestimated how his body would rotate in the air, so instead of landing on his butt, he landed on his knees and toppled to the ground. His left shoulder slammed into a block of concrete. He cried out, then leapt to his feet. Leaning to the left and hugging his injured arm close to his body, he continued the pursuit.
Dorian was a hundred yards away and Warren was slowed by the pain in his shoulder. His prosthetic had come loose, too, so he had to favor it to keep it from coming off. He couldn’t take the time to re-adjust. At the next corner, Dorian turned onto a main road, then slowed to a walk and ducked into a building.
The building was a high rise, roughly twenty stories, with a large canopied entrance.
Warren slowed. Was this a trap? Why had he gone inside?
Then everything clicked. It was the Gregor Tower in Champs-Elysées. Dorian had led Warren straight to the spot where he’d agreed to meet Ibo Kane.
Warren sighed, relieved. He didn’t need to catch the guy. Cole had made the call and the police would be there w
aiting. At least he hoped so.
He jogged to the entrance, shoving past two valets and a group of women on their way out of the building. In the two-story marble lobby, he stopped. No police. He looked left, down a long hallway. Straight ahead, a concierge spoke on a black phone behind a desk. To his right… there he was.
Dorian stood before a gold elevator door, his head tilted toward the digital numbers. The elevator was on its way down. Nine. Eight. Seven. Dorian looked over his shoulder at Warren. He held his gaze for only a second, then smiled and inched toward the elevator door.
Six. Five. Four.
Warren didn’t need to hurry. He had him. If the police weren’t there, he’d follow him into the elevator. He approached, stopping two feet behind Dorian. If it came down to a fight, the guy stood no chance.
Three. Two.
An elderly couple joined the line for the elevator.
One.
“Monsieur, quel est votre numéro de chambre?”
Warren turned. The uniformed concierge who’d been talking on the phone now stood beside him. Warren shrugged and locked his eyes on the back of Dorian’s head.
Ding.
The concierge put two fingers on Warren’s forearm. “Monsieur, quel est… erm… I’m sorry, sir, what is your room number?”
A group of people exited the elevator.
“I…I…” He pointed. “That man is part of the assassination of David Fontes. He is here to meet Ibo Kane, who—”
A man pressed in on Warren’s other side. He didn’t carry a gun, but he was Warren’s size and wore a scowl across his face. He didn’t say a word. The concierge said, “Monsieur, if you are not a resident or the guest of a resident, you will have to leave.”
Dorian walked into the elevator, followed by the elderly couple.
Two security guards came up behind Warren, each touching one of his elbows lightly. They didn’t speak, but the message was clear.
The concierge said, “Sir, turn and leave this building right away or we will be forced to call the police.”
Warren stepped forward. The men at his sides gripped his biceps, but didn’t pull him backwards. It was a show of dominance. They were telling Warren, Don’t move another inch, or we will throw you to the ground. Just go quietly. They didn’t want to make a scene in the lobby.
Dorian winked at Warren as the gold door slid closed.
Warren shook his arms loose and walked out.
11
She texted Warren one more time, then opened her fake Facebook profile on her laptop and messaged Lopez.
Cole: You around? Just got home. Bored.
Lopez: Chilling. Leave for a quick trip tonight.
Cole: Where to?
Lopez: Hauling a truck of salsa. Houston to El Paso. You know they make it in a factory outside Houston, then ship it to El Paso to put the labels on. No idea why.
Cole: Weird. Been meaning to ask you, you served in Afghanistan, right? Ever end up near Ghazni Province?
Lopez: Sure did, why? Your husband was there?
Cole: No, not that. Another military wife I know. Husband was a Marine. Died there.
A minute passed without a reply from Lopez, and she wondered if she’d gone too far. She was tired of waiting, tired of laying a trap. She was going all in. Finally, his response came in.
Lopez: Lotta brothers and sisters died there.
Cole: Maybe you knew him. Matthew Cole?
She pressed “Enter,” holding her breath as the words appeared in the chat. She half-expected the chat to end immediately, but his reply popped up right away.
Lopez: Didn’t know him. Lotta Marines went through there. Sorry your friend’s husband passed away.
She’d expected a denial. That’s why she’d called Frankie for help. She dragged a photo from her desktop and pressed “Enter.” It appeared in their chat.
Cole: That’s crazy because she sent me this photo and, totally random, I thought the dude in the picture with Matt Cole looked like you.
The photo showed Frankie next to her husband and four or five Marines she didn’t recognize. They stood in front of a mountain range with bright white clouds dotting a picturesque blue sky. On the far edge of the photo was Lopez.
Again, she expected him to end the chat. She didn’t think her story was believable, even as she spun it. After thirty seconds, his reply appeared.
Lopez: Oh, Matty Cole. Yeah now I remember. His unit got folded into ours for a week or something. Didn’t know him well, but we met.
Cole: Sure you didn’t know him better?
Lopez: Like I said, met a lot of people over there.
This was the moment of truth.
Cole: According to your partner Chris Morgan, you pulled the trigger on the gun that killed him. Julio, I know you want to shut your phone off and delete the app right now, but don’t. I’m with the FBI. We will initiate a video call in thirty seconds. Answer it, and you might be able to stay out of jail. We have cars on each end of your block and a helicopter on the way. Ignore the call and we’ll have no choice but to believe Chris Morgan’s story.
She let out a long, slow breath and sat with her back to the wall. She adjusted the camera on her laptop so it captured her face perfectly. Earlier, she’d purchased a black business suit in the boutique in the hotel lobby. Lopez would only see her upper half, so she’d thrown the skirt in the trash and now wore the white collared shirt and black blazer. Her hair was loose at her shoulders. She looked professional. No one smart would believe she was an FBI agent, or that an FBI agent would engage a suspect on Facebook Messenger. But Lopez wasn’t smart.
She started the call.
Lopez’s face appeared on screen, slightly pixelated. His expression was blank. “Sandy?” he asked weakly.
Cole held her ID up to the camera for a second, but not long enough for him to read it. “Gretchen Blacker, FBI field office in San Antonio.”
“Oh, shit.”
“That’s right, Julio. Oh. Shit.” She paused, shaking her head like a disappointed mother. “My colleagues are down in San Diego, questioning your pal Chris Morgan right now. He’s already told us everything, said it was your idea from the start and that you pulled the trigger.”
“He’s lying, he—”
“Hold on, Julio, just calm down. I don’t want you to say anything to incriminate yourself. You have the right to speak to a lawyer, and I suggest you do so. But I want to tell you the situation and instruct you on how you might stay out of jail. You have a young daughter, right?”
He nodded.
“I don’t like seeing fathers separated from their daughters. I don’t want to see that. So, here’s the thing. Chris Morgan is in a locked room in our San Diego office trying to pin this on you. What he doesn’t know is that we know he was the alpha in your racket. We know about the drugs. We know about China. He was the mastermind. We know you were a follower. I’d like to believe you were an unwitting follower and—”
“I was, I was, I—”
“Please be quiet and let me finish. We asked Mr. Morgan to give up his contacts and he tried to push it all onto you. Made you out to be a real drug kingpin. A criminal mastermind like Lady Chicharron or El Chapo. You’re not a drug kingpin, are you, Julio?”
“No ma’am.”
“Didn’t think so. I will ask you one time and one time only, before we run with Mr. Morgan’s version of events: Who pulled the trigger on Matthew Cole?”
“Chris.”
“And it was because Mr. Cole learned of an operation—run by Marines—to export heroin from Afghanistan to China?”
“Yes, except…”
“What?”
“It wasn’t run by Marines. We were only security… hired help. We offered safe passage to a crew of Chinese drug runners. They traveled to Ghazni Province to pick up product. We made sure no one messed with them when they did. That’s it, I swear.”
“Who was in the Chinese crew? Who led it?”
“Don’t know.”
“C’mon, Julio. Morgan is telling us it was your operation and you’re telling us it was a magical Chinese drug-running crew with no names?”
“I swear, I…”
“A name, Julio. Give me a name.”
He looked down, shaking his head. “William Wei. Tall dude. Rail thin. We called him Dubya Slim. Spoke perfect English, but looked Chinese. I think he was from Texas because he pronounced the Dubya with an accent, like the former president, ya know?”
“George W. Bush, you mean?”
“Yeah, ya know? Dub-ya.”
“Was William Wei the mastermind?”
“No, he answered to someone. Don’t know who, but he called him The Boss. Made it clear we ‘Shouldn’t disappoint The Boss,’ or ‘The Boss was pleased.’ Ya gotta believe me, Chris made me do this. I told him we shouldn’t.”
“I believe you, Julio. How’d you get paid? What was your end?”
When Lopez looked up, he had tears in his eyes. He looked left, then right, then down again. The call went black.
Cole glanced around the room. She could barely believe it.
She grabbed her phone and ended the recording she’d made of the conversation. She saved the MP3 and emailed it to herself as a backup.
12
After being escorted out by security, Warren stood on the curb, listening for the sound of a helicopter.
Rich-looking men and women in fancy coats strolled by, some carrying Christmas packages, others swaying drunkenly back and forth. Two teenage girls shared a pair of earbuds and sang in French, the white wire swaying between them as they walked arm in arm.
