by Ward Larsen
The mission’s instigator was also busy. By midnight Slaton had procured a car and twice driven past the home of Marc Vandenburg, Esq., in a quiet neighborhood not far from the German border. It was a modest residence on the fringe of a much more exclusive enclave, an apt metaphor for the lawyer’s career trajectory, at least to that point in his life. He was likely asleep at that hour, dreaming of the heavy fees he would lock down tomorrow. A few years of such commissions would add up nicely, allowing him to move a half mile south where the moneyed partners of more storied firms resided in their mansions.
Even before he began reconnoitering Vandenburg’s house, Slaton had learned much about him. He knew the lawyer was thirty-one years old, single, and had nearly lost his license to practice law last year—he’d been let go by a large firm in a dust-up over laundered money seized from a shady Russian oligarch. The firm had painted Vandenburg as a rogue agent, while he claimed he’d been scapegoated. In the end, no charges were filed and quiet settlements made. The Russian began banking in Cyprus, while the firm concentrated on its deep queue of more reputable clients. And one young lawyer, with a lasting stain on his résumé, began searching for new employment.
For Slaton, all good to know.
After studying the layout around Vandenburg’s home, he did the same for his office, a small suite in a minor office complex on the edge of the Old City, spurring off Rue Chimay. The area was deserted at that time of night, and Slaton took the liberty of exiting his car for a closer look. He circled the tiny office building, noting windows and doors, and studied the geometry and shadows of the surrounding buildings. He contemplated the angle of the sun for tomorrow afternoon, and estimated where pedestrian traffic would be heaviest.
Content with his survey, he climbed back into the car and set out for yet another safe house.
24
Marc Vandenburg didn’t stir until well after sunup the next morning. He considered rolling over and going back to sleep, but guilt got the better of him. He’d been putting off going to the gym for over a week, and twenty minutes on the treadmill would do him some good. He’d been gaining weight lately as he gradually lost the advantage of a young man’s metabolism.
He torqued sideways to put his feet on the floor, but paused there, a minor hangover reminding him of last night. He’d gone out to dinner with friends from law school and the schnapps had started flowing. Now he regretted it, but at least he’d gotten home at a reasonable hour.
He checked the clock: 9:05.
Christ.
He had taken to rising late since leaving Kerr & Dorfman, but it was getting out of hand. He had only one meeting today, but it was an important one—there were files he needed to review. It was a far cry from his days at the big firm. They had expected him to be behind his desk before seven every morning, and twelve-hour days were the norm. Altogether, it was a vampire’s existence, never outside his professional tomb in the light of day. Half a workday on Saturday was standard, and anyone aspiring to advance stayed longer.
His new private practice was the other extreme. If he had no client meetings, he often took the day off, or if he did go in, he wore jeans and a sweatshirt. His receptionist, an officious fifty-something frau who had come with the buyout, didn’t approve. Vandenburg didn’t give a shit—a perk of being the boss. There were, however, two glaring downsides to his new career path. First was that he got no regular paycheck, only scattershot retainers and commissions. The second problem reflected the first. The practice he’d acquired had always kept a thin client list, and unfortunately a few had dropped him in the transition. The handful he’d met so far were a veritable gallery of rogues. Still, if he could hold onto the bigger fish, dredge up a few more, the potential remained for a lucrative little practice.
He went to the bathroom, relieved his bladder, and when he tried to flush the toilet, the handle fell off—it had been giving him trouble for weeks. Not being mechanically inclined, he thought, Going to have to call someone in. He paused for a cautious look in the mirror. He looked better than he felt, and sucking in his gut he decided he could put off the gym for another day. A shave and a shower would put things right, he decided, then maybe lunch at Antonio’s. His mood brightened at the thought of a heaping plate of pasta. Vandenburg turned back toward the bedroom but froze at the threshold.
A man had appeared out of nowhere. He just stood there casually in the middle of the room, looking at him and smiling. He could have been a maître d’ about to welcome guests to a gastro pub. He was roughly Vandenburg’s own height, a bit slimmer, with unusual gray eyes that regarded him thoughtfully. There was no trace of threat in his posture or expression. On the other hand, he wasn’t here to fix the toilet.
“Who the hell are you?” Vandenburg asked in his native Luxembourgish.
“English?” the man suggested.
“Who the hell are you?”
“Not relevant.”
“I’ll show you what is relevant.” At that point Vandenburg made his first mistake in what was about to become the worst day of his life. He hauled back and took a wild roundhouse swing at the intruder.
* * *
When Vandenburg awoke for the second time that day, his head felt far worse. There was an intense throbbing, and he could hear his heartbeat pulsing in his ears. He vaguely remembered taking a swing at the stranger, not connecting. Then everything went to a blur. Somehow the man had got behind him and levered an arm around his throat. He remembered flailing and kicking, things slowly going gray. Then blackness until … until now.
Before he could blink his eyes open, Vandenburg realized he was in a sitting position and trussed to something solid. His hands were immobilized behind him, and not in a comfortable way—his shoulders were twisted back awkwardly. When he finally managed to focus, he recognized one of his heavy dining room chairs beneath him.
Then he saw the man, still standing in front of him. Same casual expression, same disconcerting eyes.
“Welcome back, Marc.”
Vandenburg sensed movement behind him. He twisted as far as he could against the restraints and saw a second figure over his shoulder. This one, more ominously, was wearing a black ski mask. The second man lashed out and whacked him on the head with what felt like a sock full of stones.
Vandenburg lurched forward, dazed.
“Eyes front, I think, is the message,” the interrogator said.
Vandenburg rattled his head to clear the cobwebs. The peril of his situation was fast becoming clear. “What do you want?” he croaked.
“A bit of cooperation.”
“I don’t keep money in the house.”
A brief half smile. “You misunderstand completely. Let me start at the beginning. We know who you are, what you do. More to the point, we know who your clients are.”
With those words, something clicked in Vandenburg’s head. Confusion and worry went to abject fear. He, too, knew who his clients were.
“We’re aware that your law practice is relatively new, and that you’ve assumed the client list of Dieter Schneider. I’m sure Monsieur Schneider told you he was retiring, but the truth is a bit more complex. His decision wasn’t based on age, but rather … How to put it? Personal safety? Of course, he wouldn’t have disclosed this to a prospective buyer. We both know what kind of services the firm provides, and to whom it provides them. Did it never occur to you that doing business with such individuals might come with complications?”
The lawyer didn’t respond.
“Apparently not. Well, then I should begin by explaining that we know a great deal about you and your prospective clients. Indeed, with regard to the clients, more than you could possibly know.”
Vandenburg listened as the man went into an extended narrative. He covered the half dozen accounts he had expected to be the most lucrative, detailing them as “extensive and ongoing criminal enterprises.” He also detailed Vandenburg’s own background, including his firing from Kerr & Dorfman, and precisely what he’d paid to take o
ver Schneider’s practice.
When he was done, Vandenburg tried desperately to square two conflicting thoughts. One was that these men had a near-encyclopedic knowledge of both him and the dubious characters he was getting into business with. The other was that they had broken into his house, subdued him, and tied him to a chair. The fact that one was wearing a ski mask seemed half exclamation point, half question mark.
With no clear answer resolving in his head, he asked, “Are you police?”
“Let’s say we are the agents of a very concerned government body. What I’ve laid out is merely the tip of the iceberg. For years now, we’ve been watching Dieter Schneider. We’ve built cases against a number of his clients … soon to be your clients. In truth, as distasteful as many of them are, the majority don’t concern us at the moment. Yet one group very much does. The one whose representative you are scheduled to meet this afternoon.”
The name came to Vandenburg’s lips before he could stop it. “Moussa Tayeb?”
The interrogator’s head tilted slightly. “And there is the next thing you should know.” He held out a hand and the second man provided a tablet computer. He turned it toward Vandenburg, and on the screen he saw an online news article from the Luxembourg Journal. It described a shooting at Hotel Le Cristal. “The victim’s name hasn’t yet been released,” the man said, “but I can tell you it was Moussa Tayeb.”
Vandenburg’s world began to spin. He tried to imagine where this was going. “If Moussa is dead, then what do you want from me?”
“We know your meeting today involved not only Moussa, but also his brother Ramzi.”
“I’ve only dealt with Moussa before, and then only one meeting—but yes, Ramzi was going to join us today.”
“Why?”
“We were going to add his name to some documents. Moussa told me his brother wants to become involved in the organization’s business.”
“To say the least,” the interrogator said. “And far more than his brother understood.”
Vandenburg looked at the man questioningly.
“Don’t you see? Ramzi Tayeb has killed his brother. He intends to take complete control of al-Qassam Front. Which is why he will be at that meeting this afternoon.”
Vandenburg’s heart fluttered, and he sensed perspiration beading on his upper lip.
The interrogator leaned in closer. Nothing threatening, but disconcerting all the same. “But with your help, Marc, we can put a stop to the killing … once and for all.”
25
For a man accustomed to creeping through garbage-strewn alleys in Gaza and the hookah lounges of Beirut, the sidewalks of Luxembourg were a surreal experience. Ramzi Tayeb looked around and saw men in fine suits making deals on their phones—more loudly than necessary, as if to validate their importance—and professionally dressed women hurrying to appointments. The sweet smell of vanilla rode the air near an ice cream parlor, and electric cars drove past in virtual silence. Gone were the belching diesel buses, the sizzle-fat aroma of street vendors grilling lamb, the tin-speaker call to prayer from shrapnel-chipped minarets.
It was as if he’d been transported to a different planet.
Ramzi was doing his best to blend in. New off-the-rack suit, haircut still fresh, shoes shining like bullets. This morning he’d shaved for the second time in days. He was, by local standards, presentable. One small wave in a sea of Western greed. Still, it gave cause for reflection. For all the decadence surrounding him—cars that cost more than his martyrs made in the sums of their abbreviated lives—it wasn’t anything he hadn’t seen at home. More prevalent here, yes, more pretentious, but not completely foreign. Even in the ruins of Gaza, the West was winning the culture war.
Oddly, Ramzi almost felt as if he could fit in here. He thought about his brother, Allah have mercy on his soul, and how he had always seemed more at home in Europe than the dysfunctional lands of their ancestors. Moussa had aided the cause unfailingly, funneling money for The Front’s operations. Still, he seemed happier here, mingling with these people, trying to assimilate. There were times Ramzi had thought him a traitor for it. Moussa, in turn, had more than once called him a barbarian. The discord never lasted because brothers they were, bound by blood in every sense.
Ramzi himself was not an educated man, not in any academic sense, yet he sometimes wondered what might have been had their roles been reversed. As a boy he’d been decent in school, yet his gift had always been his commitment. And if he had applied that toward books instead of killing? Would it have been less righteous?
A police car appeared suddenly, rounding the corner ahead. It came in his direction, and he instinctively blended into a crowd waiting for a bus. When the car passed uneventfully, his errant thoughts went with it. Education, a respectable profession. What had any of that done for poor Moussa? No, Ramzi thought. His own lot in life had been cast early, hardened by too much killing, made irrevocable by too many wars. How Moussa had escaped any of it, even if temporarily, he’d never understood—and now never would. Like so much in this unfathomable life, it was simply the will of Allah.
His mood descended, landing in the usual ditch. His thoughts flashed back to last night, the scene outside the police station. The woman he’d shot, the bitch who had killed his brother. She could only have been Mossad—nothing else made sense. Ramzi had waited long enough to see the ambulance come, and he suspected she might have survived. News reports this morning had confirmed it. No matter. He’d extracted some revenge. And killing Bausch? That had been little more than a necessary bit of business; he’d been on Moussa’s payroll too long, learned far too much.
Which left only today. He had no choice but to make arrangements with the new lawyer. Ramzi might not be a businessman, but he considered himself an expert in reading men. If this one fell short, if he demanded too big a cut or appeared careless, he would have to be dealt with as well. There was always another lawyer, another banking haven.
Right on schedule, the building came into sight. He felt a peculiar rush of adrenaline, not unlike what he felt when attacks were carried out. The comparison seemed laughable, however there was no denying the importance, the potential of this meeting. Ramzi had come prepared for any eventuality. The rifle he’d used yesterday was at the bottom of the river, yet the Glock and knife remained in place—his jacket slightly oversized for that reason.
He weighed his surroundings carefully. The small bundle of professional offices stood alone, a single-story brick affair set back from the road behind an evergreen hedge. Almost as if hiding.
As he made the final turn on the sidewalk, Ramzi began going over figures in his head. They were sourced from financial reports Moussa had sent. Ramzi knew where most of the money came from, and where it ended up. The magic was in making that passage happen invisibly, the sleight-of-hand network of transfers and accounts. He had long wanted to learn those machinations, mostly as an insurance policy in case something happened to Moussa. A thought that was now nothing short of a premonition.
As he neared the lobby door, numbers coursed through his head. Sums and denominations that for so long had seemed imaginary now felt strangely within reach. It was all foreign and frenzied, like the city around him.
So distracted, Ramzi made a mistake he would not have made on the dusty lanes of Jabalia or in the warrens of Beirut. He never saw the shadowed figure in an alcove across the street: a man in a heavy overcoat watching him with the gaze of a raptor.
26
There were four suites in the tiny office complex and Ramzi easily picked out the door with a new brass nameplate: Marc Vandenburg Law Firm.
He went through to a small waiting area, a half dozen plush chairs overseen by a receptionist. The woman was in her fifties, a bit stocky, short-cut gray hair framing a round face. A pair of cat’s-eye glasses hung around her neck on a chain. A holdover from the old vulture who’d sold out, he surmised.
She said something in what had to be Luxembourgish.
“I am her
e to see Mr. Vandenburg,” he replied in heavily accented English.
“Of course. Your name?”
Ramzi glanced once at the empty waiting area, held back his annoyance. “Talbot,” he said, keeping to the agreed-upon alias.
She lifted an intercom, had a brief conversation. Then, “Yes, he’s expecting you.”
She got up, opened the mid-suite door, and ushered him inside.
* * *
Ramzi entered an office that was larger than the anteroom suggested. Dark wood dominated, and a pair of deep armchairs stood centrally. On either side, weighty bookcases sagged under encyclopedic rows of legal books. All of it was centered around a broad hardwood desk, and behind that was the lawyer.
He smiled as he stood, although nothing from the heart. Neither the smile nor his expensive suit hid the fact that he was nervous. As he should be, Ramzi thought. The receptionist retreated to her desk, and as soon as she was gone, Ramzi closed the door and subtly depressed the lock on the handle—a learned habit that had saved him more than once.
Vandenburg didn’t seem to notice. He tentatively pushed a hand out across the desk, and said, “Mr. Talbot, good to finally meet you.”
Ramzi took a soft handshake.
“Please, have a seat.”
He sank into a soft chair, worn leather crinkling.
“Your brother speaks highly of you.”
Two days ago, Ramzi would have laughed at the comment. He doubted Moussa had ever spoken well of him to anyone. Under the present circumstances, however, it raised a question. “You have met my brother?”
“Only once in person. We had coffee a few days ago, soon after he arrived in the city. Of course, we’ve been talking extensively on the phone in recent weeks. He’s very enthusiastic about building a relationship to carry forward the work done by Monsieur Schneider.”
