The Take

by Christopher Reich

  Nikki cut short her foolish plotting and returned to her seat.

  It was over.

  Fini.

  Strangely, she felt worst for letting down Riske.

  Just then, a detective signaled to Frank Mazot, holding up a phone, an old-fashioned landline. Nikki watched as Mazot took the call, his eyes shifting toward her. He put down the phone and came over to the interrogation room.

  “Call for you,” he said, poking his head inside the door. “Commissaire Dumont. Warning: he’s pissed.”

  Nikki left the interrogation room and picked up the phone. “You found me.”

  “I never lost you,” said Simon Riske. “Just nod and say yes, and make sure you wipe any silly look off your face right now.”

  “Yes,” said Nikki.

  “I called your phone fifteen minutes ago. Some guy answered, wouldn’t give his name. I thought you might be in trouble. Am I right?”

  “Yes, Commissaire, you are. Frank Mazot and his friend Colonel Duvivier, formerly of the DGSE, have me under lock and key until their friend arrives. Mr. Neill from the CIA.”

  “Neill’s down here already? You’ve got to get out.”

  “I was thinking the same thing,” she said. Then quietly, “Hey, I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be. The information you gave me came in handy. Coluzzi’s in town. I’ve got the address of his place over in Aubagne. There’s more. I’ll tell you when I see you.”

  “It might be a while.”

  “I’m parked out front. I’m in the red car. Can’t miss me.”

  “Red, seriously? What kind?”

  “Don’t ask.”

  “Oh Christ. You didn’t?”

  “Can you get out?”

  “That’s a tough one.”

  “They really got you under lock and key?”

  Nikki said yes. Mazot was shooting the breeze with another detective, keeping one eye on her. Across the room, Duvivier guarded the door like a watchdog, arms crossed, staring at her as if she’d murdered his wife and children.

  “Where are you? First floor? Squad room?”

  “Yep. You know it?”

  “Know it? I was practically raised there. Tell me one thing. Is there still a broken window in one corner, just above the water pipes? Big crack going right down the middle shaped like a lightning bolt.”

  “It’s been almost twenty years,” said Nikki dismissively, surveying the room all the same. “No way it’s still—”

  “Well?”

  She’d spotted the window and the lightning-bolt-shaped crack. It wasn’t easy. The glass was so thick with grime no sunlight had penetrated it for…“It’s there.”

  “Then we’re safe to assume not much else has changed.”

  Mazot had stopped talking and was giving her the evil eye. She gave him a weak smile and mouthed, “Coffee? Please.” He considered this, then approached, grabbing the phone out of her hands.

  “Hello, Dumont? Frank Mazot. Your girl’s gotten herself into a heap of trouble. I’m looking out for her the best I can, but there’s only so much I can do.”

  Nikki couldn’t hear what Simon was saying. Mazot’s features grew darker. His eyes studied Nikki more closely. He nodded, then shook his head, then laughed, then looked back at Nikki, as if he knew something really bad that she didn’t. Finally, he said, “Will do. Thanks.” He handed the phone back to Nikki. “Coffee, right?”

  “No sugar.” Nikki put the phone to her ear as Mazot headed to the break room. “What was that about?”

  “Tell you later. Is he gone?”

  “Getting me coffee.”

  “Okay, then. There’s another way out of the squad room. There’s a door at the opposite corner from the cracked window. It looks like a closet. It’s not. It connects to a back stairway that was used by workers to deliver coal way back when.”

  “What if it’s locked?”

  “There’s no lock on the door. Just give it a good pull.”

  Nikki looked over her shoulder at the door. Two desks were placed in front of it, but there was plenty of room to scoot through. One of the desks was manned, the other empty.

  “I’ll be waiting by the exit,” said Simon. “What do you think?”

  Frank Mazot returned and set her coffee on the table. He smiled to show they were still buddies, then sat down. Duvivier and his two colleagues were still at the main door, looking none too pleased she was using the phone.

  “I think I don’t have much of a choice.”

  As she was speaking, Frank Mazot’s cellphone rang. The detective answered, his eyes immediately turning to Nikki. “Put down the phone,” he said.

  “Excuse me?”

  “Put…it…down.”

  “I’m still talking to Dumont.”

  “No, you’re not,” said Mazot. “Now, do as I say, Nikki.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You can’t be talking to Marc Dumont,” continued Mazot. “Because I am.”

  Nikki glanced over her shoulder. A clutch of detectives were blocking the door Simon had mentioned. She looked back to the main entrance. Duvivier and his crew had his eyes on her, but there were only three of them. Once past them, it was a straight shot into the hall, then down the stairs.

  “Keep the engine running,” she said to Simon. “I’m coming out the front. Screw it.”

  She dropped the phone, picked up Mazot’s coffee off the desk, and flung it at his chest.

  “What the—?” Mazot cried out in pain and alarm, recoiling from her, wiping the hot liquid from his shirt.

  The other cops in the room were either busy on their own calls or hadn’t put together what exactly was going on. Only Martin Duvivier took action, moving quickly and decisively in her direction.

  Nikki took off toward the door, making straight for the gray-haired man, dropping her shoulder and striking him squarely in the chest. Duvivier flailed at her with open arms as he fell backward onto his rear. His two colleagues were too stunned to do anything.

  Nikki jumped over him, then bolted into the hall, running to her left toward the stairs. A glance over her shoulder confirmed that Mazot was in pursuit. She bounded down the stairs two at a time as Mazot hollered for her to stop. “Dammit, Nikki, are you out of your mind?,” his raspy voice echoing in the stairwell.

  The ground floor was an oasis of calm. Nikki landed on the polished stone floor, her feet slipping from under her. She threw out her hand and wrenched her wrist to keep from falling. Suddenly Mazot was on her, hands taking her by the shoulders. She knocked them off, bristling with violence.

  “Give me ten seconds,” she said. “Please.”

  Mazot lifted his hands to grab her, then dropped them. He glanced over his shoulder toward the stairwell. No one was following. He looked back at her. She said nothing. “Okay,” he said. “But only ten. Go.”

  “I owe you.”

  Nikki ran through the grand doors and down the broad stairs to the street. The afternoon sun was punishing and she threw a hand to her eyes, shielding them, looking everywhere for Simon.

  Across the street stood the Cathédrale la Major. Its bells began to toll the four o’clock hour. The pavement was crowded with tourists and cops, cars whipping past in both directions. She hurried to the curb. She looked left and spotted a flash of red. An arm was thrust out of the driver’s window and held high. Simon’s head appeared. He waved, shouting something she couldn’t quite hear.

  Nikki ran to the car. The passenger door was open. Simon accelerated as she hit the seat. She pulled the door closed and spun to look out the rear window.

  “Anyone?” he asked.

  “Clear,” she said.

  It was then that Nikki looked around her and took in the dashboard and the steering wheel and the bucket leather seats. “Really?” she said. “What happened to hiding out?”

  “That part of the story is over.”

  Simon slammed the car into third and drove down the hill.

  Behind them, not fifty meters a
way, a silver Audi sedan was stopped in traffic opposite the entrance to the police headquarters.

  “Still want to go in?” asked the driver, a compact, muscled man with a pockmarked face and sandy hair. His name was Makepeace.

  Seated next to him, Barnaby Neill had witnessed Nikki Perez’s flight down the stairs and into a red sports car idling just ahead. Sometimes the gods sent you messages that you were following the proper course, thought Neill. The messages could be subtle or they could be obvious. Coming upon Simon Riske, the very man he was looking for, at the very time he needed to find him, qualified as the latter.

  “No,” said Neill. “I want you to follow that red car.”

  “The Dino?”

  “That’s the one.”

  Makepeace put the car into gear. “No problemo.”

  Chapter 61

  Tino Coluzzi had no illusions. He was distrustful by nature, suspicious by profession, and one backward glance from being paranoid. When shaking a man’s hand, he made a practice of checking afterward that he still had all five fingers. And so it was that he dismissed as preposterous the notion that Vassily Borodin would politely hand over ten million euros in exchange for the letter and go on his merry way. Coluzzi had only to remember the first thought that had crossed his mind when he’d grasped the letter’s import.

  No man should be in possession of this letter.

  He was in a precarious position.

  Equally troubling was the involvement of Alexei Ren. Though Coluzzi knew next to nothing about Ren’s past, there was no mistaking the fire in his eye whenever Borodin’s name was mentioned, the tactile enmity that juiced him up like a live current. Then, of course, there was the matter of Ren’s tattoos. Coluzzi was no expert on Russian prison art, but he’d been in the company of enough vory v zakone to know that each symbol represented a past act and that most of them had to do with robbery, murder, and other accomplishments even he didn’t want to imagine.

  For a man like Ren, revenge wasn’t a question of choice. It was a moral imperative. When he’d casually asked where and when Coluzzi would hand over the letter to Vassily Borodin, it was more than idle curiosity.

  If that weren’t enough, there was the lurking and unexplained presence of Simon Ledoux to consider. No question, Coluzzi had his hands fuller than he might have liked.

  All of which explained why at 4:30 in the afternoon he was driving through an industrial district in the hills west of the city searching for a dented blue iron gate. Behind the gate was a parking depot used to house broken-down municipal buses, dump trucks and cement mixers idled by a stagnant economy, discarded postal vans, and lastly—and of primary interest to him—a host of armored cars either out of service or in need of repair.

  Turning onto the Rue Gambon, he spotted the entry gate, a battered piece of iron one story high and ten meters long. A concrete wall topped by barbed wire ran to either side and circled the block. Coluzzi left the car running and pressed the entry button. A screen lit up, showing his face. “Open up,” he said.

  A buzzer sounded. The gate rolled back on its track, rattling loud enough to wake the dead. Coluzzi punched the gas and entered the yard, parking adjacent to the office. An unshaven man in dark coveralls was waiting outside, hands in his pockets. With a nod, he motioned Coluzzi inside.

  “Didn’t give me much time,” he said, dropping into a chair on the business side of the desk.

  “Well?”

  The man opened a drawer and tossed a set of keys across the desk. “Brink’s. Brought in yesterday for an oil change, new brake pads.”

  “Gas?”

  “Full.”

  Coluzzi placed a neatly folded wad of bills on the desk. “One thousand.”

  “I need it back by midnight. All the armored cars have beacons so the head office can keep track of where they are at all times. There’s an electronic inventory check performed automatically at shift change.”

  “At midnight?”

  The man nodded.

  “I’ll have it back to you by ten.”

  The man stood, coming around the desk. “Need any help? Someone to ride point?”

  “I’m good.”

  “You’re sure? No one drives an armored car alone. What are you after, anyway?”

  Coluzzi took the man’s face in his hands, fingers clamping his jaw and cheeks. “I’m fine by myself, thank you very much,” he said, holding him in his grip for a while longer, then shoving the man away.

  “Just asking. I wasn’t trying to upset you.”

  “You didn’t,” said Coluzzi. “If you’d upset me, you wouldn’t still be standing.”

  The man gathered himself. “Still have your uniform? After what happened in Nice, police are checking drivers.”

  “Thanks for the info. I’ll keep it in mind.” Coluzzi patted the man’s cheek. “I’ll be back to get the truck at seven.”

  Leaving the lot, Tino Coluzzi skirted the northern boundaries of the city in an effort to avoid the worst of the traffic before joining the highway and continuing to his home in Aubagne. So far he’d managed to keep away from his local haunts—Jojo’s notwithstanding. He’d known that sooner or later he would have to stop by the old place. It wasn’t just the uniform he needed. If he wasn’t going to take a crew with him, he was at least going to make sure that he himself was well protected. His pistol and stiletto weren’t going to cut it in case anything went south. He was going in heavy. Just like the old days.

  He reached Aubagne a little past five. He drove leisurely through the town, eyes darting here and there, looking for anything out of place. He’d bought the home ten years earlier. Tile roof, two bedrooms, two baths, a quiet garden with a birdbath that attracted every hummingbird in the area. He knew his neighbors. He knew which cars belonged and which didn’t.

  Coluzzi’s home was on a small, leafy road a ways outside town. He turned down the lane and slowed, windows lowered, eyes and ears open. A year had passed since his last visit. He was pleased to see the Clercs’ motorboat in their driveway, as much dirt covering the tarpaulin as ever. Their cat, a very large tabby, sat nearby. The Guillo family had not taken in their trash barrels yet. One day late. Shame, shame. The Guillos were Basque and loved their wine. He recognized their Simca parked in the drive.

  He dropped the speed further as his home came into view. The shades were down. The driveway was clear of leaves and pine needles, and the lawn was neatly mowed. He paid a gardener to come twice a month to keep things neat and tidy. A check in the rearview revealed nothing of interest, other than the Clercs’ tabby, which was following him down the street. He wished he’d had men as brave on some of the jobs he’d pulled.

  Coluzzi opened the electric garage door and parked his car, closing the door behind him immediately. The last thing he needed was a chat with his neighbors. He went to the window cut high in the door and peered out. You could never be too safe.

  Satisfied that he had not been followed and that he had no reason for concern, he unlocked the door and entered his home. He went immediately to the bathroom and turned on the shower. The tank was old and needed five minutes to get lukewarm. He took off his jacket and shirt and laid them on the bed, along with his pistol and stiletto. He left the master bedroom and went down the hall to the guest room. Inside was a single bed and an imposing chestnut armoire that had belonged to his grandfather. He opened the armoire and rummaged through the clothing hung inside until he found what he was looking for. Pale gray short-sleeved shirt. Black trousers with an officer’s stripe running down the outer leg. His Brink’s uniform. He tried on the trousers and shirt and was pleased that they both still fit.

  He needed one more thing. Something every bit as important as the uniform. He opened a door to a small closet at the back corner of the room. Inside was a large black safe, half the size of a refrigerator. It was his gun safe. He spun the combination—right, left, then right again—and the door eased open. He didn’t intend on meeting Vassily Borodin empty-handed. He had a Russian fri
end of his own to bring to the party. His cherished Kalashnikov, which he’d owned for as long as he could remember.

  He kneeled and looked inside.

  His stomach turned, worry overcoming him.

  The safe was empty.

  He activated his phone’s flashlight and peered inside.

  Nothing.

  And then he knew.

  Coluzzi stood, turning around slowly, raising his hands in the air. “Ledoux,” he said. “You really are alive.”

  Chapter 62

  You never changed the combination.”

  “You remembered it,” said Coluzzi.

  “One, twenty-three, forty-five.” Simon recited the digits one at a time. “And put your hands down. Or I will shoot you.”

  “You were always the smart one,” said Coluzzi.

  “Not smart enough. I didn’t figure you to be a snitch.”

  Simon studied his old friend. What else to call him? Traitor? Murderer? Since taking the assignment, he’d imagined this moment countless times. All the scenarios involved a spate of heated recriminations followed by some form of violent retribution and lots and lots of blood—Coluzzi’s, not his. Now here he was looking at Tino Coluzzi, face-to-face with the man who’d done his best to kill him…and had, in fact, to his own mind, succeeded. Yet somehow he couldn’t summon those long-simmering reserves of anger. It would be easy enough to shoot him and be done with it. And then? What would be solved? He wouldn’t even have retrieved the letter.

  In the end, he always came back to how it was between them before everything went south.

  “I can’t believe I’m looking at you,” said Coluzzi.

  “Not bad for a dead man.”

  “A little less hair, a few more pounds, but otherwise…” Coluzzi craned his neck to have a look at the scar on Simon’s forehead. “I knew I was holding back. Just a little harder.” He made a motion as if he were hitting Simon again, bringing down the iron bar, putting his weight into it. “Bam.”