All The Big Ones Are Dead

by Christopher A. Gray

  The observer was experienced enough to know when to shut up, so he relayed the pause to Rector.

  “Are you reading the scene right?” Linders asked urgently. “Do we know for sure that Coppola and Kwok are both down?”

  “Diane,” Gauss answered, a slight quaver in his voice. “I was right there. Trask walked up—”

  “Trask?” Diane gritted. “David Trask? The one Bishop is tracking?”

  “Yes,” Gauss replied, “disguised as a halting old man. No tension, no urgency in him at all. No alarm bells for us. Just another senior citizen having a slow walk in the park.”

  “Did anybody get a positive ID? Are you sure it's Trask?”

  “Look,” Gauss replied, his voice straining against control, “it fits. Based on your team briefing this morning, it just felt like it had to be Trask. Nothing unusual I could spot. Kwok spotted something, though. We’ll probably never know what. I watched the man move. He was fast, vicious, and he had a limp. Favoring his left leg. In the briefing, you said that Bishop tagged him. Left thigh. It has to be him. No hesitation, no sound. Used what looks like a military-issue combat knife. Nothing fancy. No serrations, narrow, six or eight-inch long blade. A little wider than a dagger. Left it embedded in Logan’s forearm. Coppola, Kwok—they never had a chance, Diane. You can’t stop what you can’t see.”

  “What the hell happened to situational awareness?” Diane shouted, then got herself under control again. “Kwok had just arrived on scene, yet she was the only one who tweaked to the approach by, by Trask?”

  “Diane,” Gauss replied. “Please. You were here earlier. Trask in disguise looked exactly like the several dozen other seniors that we saw in the park. I just told you that I don’t know what tweaked Kwok. But it didn’t alert me or Turner, or anybody else, and it might not have alerted you, either. I do know that when the killer took off, he moved fast even with the limp. The estimate of height and weight fit the current details Bishop filed.”

  “Kwok…,” Diane said quietly. “I can’t believe it.” She gathered her wits about her and straightened up out of a fatigued slouch as she stood in the room. “Look, I can’t leave here. I’ll call DeCourcey and start sorting this out. Are you handling the scene there?”

  “Affirmative. Turner is helping to sort out local assets. NYPD detectives and at least eight patrol cars, two ambulances and assorted security personnel are on scene now. We’ve given NYPD an ID on Trask, I mean on Trask in disguise. They’re treating Kwok, at least, as one of their own. We’ll get cooperation and plenty of it. Someone senior from CBP is on the way too.”

  “We can’t let them get to Trask before us.”

  “I know it. But he’s already dumped his disguise. He’ll be invisible.”

  Diane was thinking about her next moves.

  “So what do you propose? You got something in mind?” Max asked

  Diane paused another moment before answering.

  “Bishop.”

  “What?” Max exclaimed. “No. No way. DeCourcey will never permit it. Neither will the Agency, or NYPD. Bishop loose again, in Manhattan or anywhere else in the five boroughs? Are you kidding? After the café shootup in Brooklyn just yesterday? After Cameroon?”

  “Yes. Absolutely. I will bet my next ten paychecks that we’ll both be surprised at what various agencies will agree to after we tell them that David Trask is roaming free, after what he’s done. I’m on this.”

  “I’ve got control here. Logan is being treated in one of the ambulances, NYPD is waiting for the coroner to get on scene, NYPD forensics is in transit and should be here in a few moments.”

  Diane’s phone blipped with a second incoming call. It was DeCourcey.

  “It’s Richard,” she said tensely. “Proceed as you have to. I’ll be back to you in five or ten.”

  ***

  “Can you guarantee their safety?” Back in the interrogation room, Jorge asked a direct question of Bishop. “My parents,” Jorge repeated. “Can you guarantee their safety?”

  “It is guaranteed,” Bishop said to Tudor.

  “I want it in writing.”

  “Of course. Others are listening. They know how this works. The appropriate document is being prepared.”

  “When do I get to see it?”

  “Shortly after you begin answering my questions.”

  “So,” Jorge sighed, defeated. “Quid pro quo.”

  “Quid pro quo,” Bishop repeated the words. “Nothing for nothing. Something for something, or in your situation something for everything.”

  “The man I work for,” Tudor said after a moment, “is named Marc Dominican. I have his contacts, I have clean, sharp and unedited high-res digital video of his direct hand on illegal activities, and I have his direct connection to arm’s length funding of enemies of the state. I also have information about his main political contact. Clean video of him too.”

  “What I want to hear about, first,” Bishop replied, “are the shipping and Customs pre-clearance documents.”

  “So you’ve said. Repeatedly. I don’t know why. They’re easy. That’s not where the magic is.”

  “Cooperation,” Bishop said, looking directly into Jorge’s eyes, “is the essence of the moment. That means you answer my question.” He paused for a moment. Tudor capitulated.

  “The access comes through a database hack. Very high-level programming and intrusion. Dominican has the programmer in his back pocket. The programmer is brilliant. Word I have through one of my, uh, security people is that the programmer’s father was also tight with Dominican’s political contact in DC. The contact in DC is, um, rumored to be a four or five-termer who has connections deep into Customs & Border Protection through a senior administrator in CBP. The connection was, or is, also on several committees including DHS oversight among others. Anyway, one of the politico’s connections in CBP supposedly walked the hack right into a data center. On a USB stick. Something like that.”

  Bishop kept his fixed and unblinking on Tudor.

  “Jorge,” he said after replaying everything the man had just said, “a political contact? Dominican’s programmer? A deep connection in CBP? A rumored politician? I’m not hearing any names and locations.”

  “Uh-huh,” Jorge said, staring down at his hands, “and you won’t get any, or any other information, until I see a signed amnesty, witness protection and relocation agreement. I’ll give you everything. Every gritty detail. But I want to see a fully executed agreement. The people I’m about to give up have deep, broad and powerful connections. They could make me disappear so thoroughly that not even you could ever find my remains. And they’ll kill my parents just for sport. I want a completely new identity, relocation to France—preferably Paris—the freedom to travel on my new identity between the U.S. and France, and startup capital for a new, honest business. If I live through this, I mean.”

  “The witness protection I described earlier can be modified to accommodate your request,” Bishop replied.

  “What about my parents?”

  “Protection team in place before twenty-two hundred tonight,” Rector said in Bishop’s ear, “not later than that. Linders has friends and she’s getting positive responses.”

  “A team will be in place before ten tonight. A very good team.”

  “What is the time, please?” Tudor asked.

  “Seventeen oh five,” Bishop replied after a glance at his wristwatch. “Five after five pm.”

  “I have a buyers’ meeting. A show & tell at eight pm, Fifth Avenue address, in the east sixties. The buyers want to verify the goods before they’re processed.”

  Before Tudor had a chance to say anything else, Bishop looked up toward one of the corner cameras.

  “Inspector,” he said, “please join us.” It was directed at Linders. The observer looked up, walked over to the door and spoke to the security operator outside.

  “She’s wanted in the room.”

  The operator let Diane into the room. Bishop stood up so that she
could take his place, but Diane shook her head very slightly and out of Tudor’s line of sight. She motioned for Bishop to exit the room. He looked back at Tudor.

  “Don’t go anywhere,” he said over his shoulder to Tudor as he walked through the door being held by the security operator.

  Diane was silent, standing in the dimly lit access hallway. Bishop was looking her over and what he saw didn’t please him.

  “What’s up?” he asked quietly. “You do not look happy.”

  Diane cleared her throat, then looked up at him.

  “My security and protection team was attacked by David Trask.”

  That got all of Bishop’s attention.

  “Trask did not get my asset. Trask killed my asset’s colleague, a key player, maybe even complicit in the Columbia intrusion and sabotage mess. We also lost one of our own in the same event.”

  Bishop tried to remember anything he’d been told about Diane’s team, but there really wasn’t much. It wasn’t on his plate and he didn’t need to know. He just looked the question at Diane.

  “It was Kwok. The bastard killed Kwok. Medium length, narrow combat blade between the fifth and sixth ribs. Up and in, through the lung and into the heart. So the paramedic said. One thrust. A single thrust. Best guess is that she was shocked out instantly and died in less than a minute. Probably never even understood what had happened.”

  Bishop stood his ground without wavering or in any way showing that he was suddenly very sad. He wasn’t in the midst of combat. He wasn’t in a running firefight. He wasn’t hunting poachers in Cameroon. He was just Agent Michael Bishop getting bad news about someone he’d worked with. He had time to think.

  He knew what would happen. He’d been through this too many times before to misunderstand how one part of his mind worked. It took a half-minute for one part of his brain to digest the news. Then another part of his brain kicked in.

  “Trask is not in custody?”

  “No.”

  “What is being done about Trask?”

  “That’s why I interrupted your session.”

  “Go on.”

  “I’m to take over the interrogation of Tudor. You’ve done the hard work. DeCourcey is live in my ear right now and he’s already talked to your people and to the FBI. Tudor will get his deal. A draft will be here shortly. Not more than half an hour.”

  “And?”

  “And,” she hesitated before telling him what he wanted to hear, “you’re to pick up Trask’s trail any way you can. Track him. Detain him in any way you see fit. Interrogate him and, and—. I’m not sure how to say the rest of this.”

  Bishop had no doubt that a kill mission was way above Diane’s experience and an ocean away from her pay grade.

  “I was told to tell you that Director Savitch will be in contact himself.”

  “That will help,” Bishop said. He turned around in the narrow hall, nodded at the operator standing there to open the door to the interrogation room. He said nothing to Diane. He walked over the table.

  “The agent that was in here a moment ago,” he said, his vision somewhat unfocused, “will record all your information. She’s expecting your deal in an hour or so. Maybe less. She’s senior, from Interpol, and she’s very good at what she does. Provide the information, location of digital CCTV and other surveillance files. All pertinent information.”

  He turned to fully face Tudor.

  “And Jorge,” Bishop said, calling the man by his given name for the first time, “after the deal arrives, be full and complete. Incomplete data, incomplete information and partial truth will be deemed non-cooperation. Just remember how much you’re giving up for your parents and what a pathetic waste it would be for all this to fall apart because you held back some detail.”

  “I understand,” Tudor said quietly. He had thought, while Bishop was out of the room, that even in his dire straits he could find something to turn to his advantage. With each word, each action, each intention and each assurance though, the interrogator had become larger than life to Tudor. The interrogator appeared to control everything and know everything. Most important, he seemed to be completely truthful. The assurance of his parents’ safety was utterly sincere. The agreement to his witness protection demands had been unequivocal. Jorge believe with all his heart and experience dealing with a lifetime of liars and cheats that he was reading Bishop perfectly.

  “Do you understand?”

  Tudor looked up, directly into Bishop’s eyes and said, “Yes. But I don’t… I, uh—” Bishop leaned back in his chair, frowning at Tudor’s sudden fumbling.

  “Do we still have a problem, Jorge?” he asked.

  “I am, uh, only representing myself, uh, here,” Tudor said, his voice growing faint. “Me. Alone. I, uh, I don’t actually have any CCTV or any other surveillance files. Marc Dominican uses his own security people to ensure that none of the communications or interaction I ever had with him were recorded on my end. In any relationship with Dominican, he’s the only one with recordings.”

  “Jorge,” Bishop said, sighing and shaking his head, “there will be an army of FBI agents turning over every one of your operations, examining every hard drive and ripping apart every file, visible or invisible. The FBI is very good at that.”

  “They can do what they want,” Jorge said, almost laughing out loud, “but there’s just nothing to find. I’m not bluffing. I may be caught, but I’m not stupid enough to think that a basic, uh, a basic denial by me is going to magically make my troubles disappear.”

  “Don’t go anywhere,” Bishop said as he got up and left the interrogation room. In the observation room, Linders was fuming and even the observer was showing some uncharacteristic tension.

  “After all this?” she grated. “After Cameroon, after Marseille, everything you’ve done in New York and in this room? After Kwok’s death? After all that, we’re really nowhere? Tudor is just a toothless shark?”

  Bishop was assessing Diane at the same time as he was calculating his next move.

  “Looks that way, for now,” he said, “but then there’s David Trask. He’s a surveillance specialist, among other things. It’s not believable that he wouldn’t have extensive get-out-of-jail-free evidence in the form of digital surveillance files.”

  “Tudor was shaping up to be our trump card, the thing we needed to turn everyone at his meeting tonight.”

  “That may have to wait,” Bishop said shaking his head, “or it may have to proceed as scheduled without our attendance.”

  “So what good is Tudor!” Diane almost shouted. “Sorry,” she said immediately. “I can’t get Kwok out of my head.”

  “Me either,” Bishop replied, “and that is why I have to run down Trask as quickly as possible. We can’t hesitate now, Diane. We put a lot of hope into Tudor. That he’s mostly toothless shouldn’t strictly be a surprise given how this cat Dominican is shaping up.”

  Diane was a professional and she was well respected. But Bishop was getting on with the job in much better shape than she was. He’d paused at the news of Kwok, but he hadn’t missed a step. She could do no less, especially if it meant that doing so would shortly put Bishop next to Kwok’s killer. The loss of her team member was a growing pain in her heart. It was slowing her down, when what she needed most was to keep a clear head and speed up. Come on, girl. Two lives have just been scrubbed out. The situation is tragic. That also means there’s far more at stake that your own pain.

  “So you believe Tudor,” Diane asked, trying to focus. “You believe that he’s operating without a net?”

  “I do,” Bishop replied.

  “Why do you believe him? He’s not a model citizen. He’s a smuggler. A thief and a liar by trade”

  “I believe him because of the timing of his admission,” Bishop said, looking through the one-way glass at Tudor. “He could have made his deal, signed, sealed and delivered. But the rendition operators scared him so badly that he really feared for his life. He thinks—believes—we’re cove
rt torturers and assassins held at bay only because he cooperated at the last possible moment. He believes that too, because I was about to hand off the finishing touches to you. I think he knows his best shot is to be honest now, because he’s terrified that if we only found out later that he’s not holding evidence we’d kill him on the spot and leave his parents to the wolves. To Dominican.”

  “That’s your gut talking,” Diane said, hands on her hips and clearly not convinced.

  “Yes, it is,” Bishop said, “and it’s our best bet right now. “We thought we had hit the mother lode.” He stopped and turned to look at Diane. “This operation started out with an agreement that I would follow the money. We all agreed. Follow the money. Nobody had been able to do it before or get this far. I’m holding the few cards we’ve got left, and I’m betting Trask is the next obvious choice.”

  Diane stared back frankly at Bishop for a long time. They stood there, silent, the observer just as still, waiting for one or the other to relent. Finally, Diane nodded.

  “I’ll let Richard know what we’ve run into,” she said. “He’ll pass it on up the line as he sees fit. It’s likely they’ll retract the, uh, the kill order.”

  Bishop listened to her calmly and dispassionately. She was unused to language and actions that he found commonplace. Their mutual interest in the operation did not alter the fact that they came from very different worlds.

  Bishop nodded, then left to re-enter the interrogation room.

  “The sun still shines on you, Jorge,” Bishop said cheerfully as he walked to the chair and sat down.

  Jorge had been sitting tensely upright, his back rigidly straight, his jaw clenched. At Bishop’s words he visibly relaxed and closed his eyes for a couple of seconds.

  “I have a concern about David Trask,” Tudor said.

  “So do I,” Bishop replied. “We’re looking for him. Any idea where he roosts?”

  “He’s an ex-military,” Jorge said quickly, “ex-spook. He covers his tracks well. I don’t know anything his personal habits. He is Marc Dominican’s head of security and he doesn’t expose his movements to anyone. Trask is an attack dog. I think he is, or he was, uh, one of you? I personally think, I mean, I know that he’s a psychopath. He’s also an assassin. He’s—” Tudor trailed off as Bishop raised a hand for silence.