Surprise Ending

by Jeffery Deaver

  Finally, it appeared that the terms of the betrayal were reached—a reduced sentence, probably, if he played along to give them a chance to subdue Ramos. After the cuffs were removed, Boston stuck out a hand. Reynolds scoffed and pointed him to his marks, like an actor. Reynolds handed the bag of cash back to him and he sheepishly retreated to the shadows under the awning.

  Nothing happened for a very tense ten minutes.

  Then came Act Two, and it unfolded fast. Angel Ramos pulled up in his black Lexus. The big guy, gut rolling over an invisible belt, climbed out of the car, looked around, and nodded to Boston. It was hard to see for sure but it appeared that Ramos wasn’t the least suspicious. He strode forward, handed the drugs to Boston, took the money, and pitched it into his trunk. He didn’t count it, but Seybold guessed it would be a very stupid criminal who shortchanged Andre Federico.

  Ramos ambled toward the front of the Lexus, his phone in hand. He paused and leaned against the car and typed a number on the mobile. Listened. Then typed more. Presumably giving the good news to Federico via the keypad code. The instant he disconnected, Reynolds, Phan, and the tactical officers charged from the warehouse and swarmed him. Reynolds grabbed the phone and stepped aside, while the others cuffed him. The detective hunched over the mobile and typed; he’d be disabling the screen lock function. He looked to Phan and nodded. Ramos, his fat face red, muttered to the cops. Reynolds laughed and gestured toward the street. The tactical officers took him, the driver, and Boston to the detention center transport vans that had just arrived.

  The boring part of the story, as Seybold thought of it, came next. He called this “shoveling words.” Nothing sexy, nothing exciting, but taking care of the necessary arrangements to make the plot work. Phan was on his phone arranging for the warrant to shut down Federico’s mobile and landline service. He disconnected and nodded to Reynolds; Seybold assumed the warrant had been approved. Reynolds was then going to text Raine with a request to pick up the Lexus. But he’d have to wait to do this until Federico returned home from the pay phone he’d used to communicate with Ramos about the “successful” buy. Stan Walker had said this would take about twenty minutes. Finally, Seybold noticed, Reynolds looked down at Ramos’s phone and typed the text.

  You’d be the MAN . . .

  The author’s palms began to sweat as he waited for Act Three to begin. All of the parts of his plot were important, of course, but this one—getting Raine to agree and then to show up—was vital, because if it didn’t work, Federico would know the whole thing was a sting and grow even more paranoid. This might be their last chance to nail the mob boss.

  Seybold noted the pronoun that he’d just used.

  Well, why not? I’m part of the team now. He gazed back at the street, thinking, Come on, Raine. Help poor Angel out.

  And, sure enough, Federico’s son came through.

  A purple Maserati pulled off the street and eased up to the warehouse, parking beside the white van. A man got out. Raine Federico was tall with a triangular build, broad shoulders tapering to athletic hips and legs. His dark hair was thick and trim and, God bless him, he wore cool-guy shades despite the overcast weather, just like a true Goodfellas made man. Raine walked up to Angel’s Lexus, then paused, staring into the driver’s side.

  Was he suspicious?

  Had Seybold overlooked something?

  But then the young man brushed at his jacket and straightened his tie; the son of a bitch was admiring himself in the reflection. He opened the door. He bent, fished for the keys, and dropped into the front seat.

  The black car pulled into traffic. In three unmarked cars, Reynolds, Phan, and two tactical teams followed at a discreet distance. Seybold also noticed a helicopter, which he hadn’t thought of, but probably should have. In High Wire Steve Cameron took the controls of a police chopper—after the pilot was killed—and pursued the villain through the streets of San Francisco, even though he’d never flown one before. (The critics had thought that a bit of a stretch, but, screw ’em, the fans loved it.)

  Seybold slung the camera over his shoulder and returned to his rental car.

  He started the engine and headed toward the garage exit. At the bottom ramp, just before turning onto the street, he happened to glance into the rearview mirror. He believed he saw a figure looking his way, as he stood—or hid, more likely—between two parked cars. He thought it was the blond guy he’d seen earlier.

  Seybold hit the brake and spun around in the seat, his heart pounding.

  But, as before, Blondie had vanished . . . if he’d been there in the first place.

  Pulling into traffic, he thought: Just my imagination. That’s all. Lord knew he definitely had a ripe one.

  Andre Federico loved his gardens.

  His colonial house in Chevy Chase, Maryland, was modest by some standards, this being the suburb of senior Washington officials, hedge fund managers, and international corporate CEOs. But his large yard was, thanks to his own efforts, spectacular, a work of art. Now, early spring, there wasn’t much to do in his “back forty”—yards, not acres—where he grew the veggies, so he was planting bulbs and flowers in the front yard.

  The elements had been kind this year and already he was seeing swathes of budding yellow black-eyed Susans, columbines, Virginia bluebells, and plenty of violets.

  His favorite flower in the garden—for name, not necessarily appearance—was the pale-purple annual honesty, also called the money plant.

  And, being near D.C., of course, there were a number of cherry trees; the pink snowflake blooms were presently on lush display.

  Federico was wearing gardening garb that was as unstylish as it could be. Baggy peach slacks, a pale-green shirt, and a soiled vest with a dozen pockets that hugged his stocky frame—he loved his meals and spent calories on food, not liquor. On his head was a floppy straw hat.

  He tugged up a few weeds, took another sip of iced tea. His life was good, he reflected. Angel Ramos had confirmed the deal had worked out and the money from the Boston crew would soon be on its way to a “laundry” in Philadelphia.

  Yes, a good life.

  Complicated and hidden, much of it. But that was a comfort. Why, he had only to glance at the barrier trees in his side yards: junipers. This variety’s root systems extended deeper than nearly any other tree’s—more than a hundred feet into the ground, some even deeper. Because of that invisible foundation, they were perhaps the most stable and impregnable plant on the face of the earth.

  Complicated, hidden . . .

  Federico took one more sip of tea as he looked over the small garden in front of him, listening absently to a car approaching.

  He paid little attention at first. There was a fair amount of traffic on the street. But then he noticed the sedan was pulling into his driveway. He gasped, dropping the iced tea. His wife had served it, as he liked, in a proper glass. It shattered into a dozen shards when it hit the flagstone at his feet.

  The car was Angel Ramos’s Lexus.

  The one that he drove to and from various assignments, like killing Billy Frey the other day and the opioid sale to the Boston crew, the deal that had gone down just an hour ago.

  What was he doing here? The man had absolute orders never to drive this vehicle anywhere near Federico’s home or the company’s legitimate office.

  But then he saw through the front windshield that the driver wasn’t Ramos. It was his son.

  Oh, no . . .

  Raine got out of the car and grinned. “Hey, Father. Love the flowers. Are those new?”

  Federico whispered, “Raine, what have you done?”

  The young man’s smile dissolved. “Angel said he wanted me to drive the car over here. I mean . . .” His voice faded. “I tried to call you, to let you know when I’d get here. Your phone was off.”

  Federico fished his mobile from his pocket.

  No Service.

  So. The police had disabled it to make sure the boy didn’t get through.

  He knew t
he money from the deal was in the trunk, if not the drugs, though there would be plenty of residue of meth and opioids that the clever sniffing equipment would pick up. He knew his son’s fingerprints were all over the car. And he knew the police would have been smart. However they’d managed to engineer getting the boy to drive here, they would have been very careful to make sure he hadn’t been entrapped.

  Despairing, Federico knew something else too. Although he couldn’t see them, a number of police cars were speeding here at this very moment.

  “What’d I do, Father?”

  Federico said with a wan smile, “It’ll be all right.”

  And here they were. Sirens chirping, lights flashing. A half dozen officers were climbing out, trotting toward Raine with drawn guns. Pointedly, they ignored Andre Federico himself.

  What an act, he thought, both disgusted and dismayed.

  Raine blinked in shock. “Wait! No! I haven’t done anything wrong!”

  No, he hadn’t. But that wouldn’t stop an ambitious prosecutor from doing everything he could to land a conviction of the boy. And by the time he was acquitted, or the charges were dropped, his reputation and his future would be destroyed.

  “Raine Federico, you’re under arrest for trafficking in controlled substances. Keep your hands where I can see them.”

  The officer issuing this command was Bradley Reynolds, the prime-time cop, as he was called—so photogenic, so handsome. He wore such a beautiful suit, his hair was so carefully coiffed. And here was Federico, in his bulky peach-and-green gardening outfit, looking like hired help. He was ashamed.

  His shoulders angling downward, Federico glanced at the officers and then nodded to Reynolds. The detective nodded back. He called to the tactical trooper about to cuff Raine, “Hold off on the kid.” Then to Federico, “Let’s you and me have a little talk, Andre. What do you say?”

  Alan Seybold was having a beer in a Fell’s Point sports bar and watching the news. It was a sedate place—no games were on at the moment—and the patrons were chatting pleasantly and enjoying their cocktails and baskets of fried clams, chips, and quesadillas.

  As an author, Seybold was quite the voyeur and enjoyed observing people out in public, people who might inspire plotlines or characters. Tonight, though, he was more interested in the TV that hung over the bar, specifically the story that the brunette anchorwoman was reading.

  “Authorities have long suspected that Andre Federico was a kingpin in one of the East Coast’s most dangerous drug and organized crime operations. For years, he eluded capture, but today his luck ran out, and he was caught red-handed with nearly one and a half million dollars—payment for the sale of thirty pounds of opioids that his syndicate had manufactured.”

  The image on the screen changed to a conference room at the Maryland State Police, Baltimore headquarters. Filling the TV was the impressive figure of Bradley Reynolds, towering over his partner, Louis Phan. “This was one of the most challenging cases I’ve ever worked,” Reynolds said.

  I’ve ever worked.

  Love those pronouns.

  “I can’t go into details, but the strategy that resulted in Mr. Federico’s capture, well, you could almost say it was worthy of a bestselling thriller.”

  The detective looked directly into the camera when he said this—almost as if speaking personally to Alan Seybold. The author had mixed reactions. Of course, he appreciated Reynolds’s private nod his way. And naturally his name couldn’t appear in the story, for fear of retribution by the Federico clan.

  Still, he wasn’t accustomed to hiding in the background.

  The news moved on to other topics and Seybold tuned out. He finished the beer. He still had a session at the writers’ conference tonight. But he didn’t need to prepare. The author he was appearing with was even less well-known than Maggie Daye. Seybold could spend most of the time talking about his career and what was coming up—the new Steve Cameron thriller, a work in progress.

  He thought about the true-crime story he was going to write pseudonymously about the Federico arrest. He’d get the proposal for it to his agent as soon as he got back to California. Have the man shop it around to the big publishers. It’d be a challenge. His name couldn’t be used, which would make the project a tough sell for a big advance. But the agent would just have to roll up his sleeves and do it. Earn his commission.

  And get it to the subagent in Hollywood. He could—

  Seybold froze. He had glanced into the mirror behind the bar and seen, in the reflection, a man on the street outside, looking into the place. Looking directly at him.

  It was Blondie, from the parking garage!

  Jesus.

  Of course, the man was an associate of Federico’s.

  I’m dead, he thought—for the second time today.

  Leave. Now. Get the hell out of here and back to San Francisco on the first flight available.

  He rose and pulled his jacket on. He scanned the bar and noted a back door, through the corridor that led to the restrooms. He didn’t know this part of the city very well, but there had to be a parking lot or alley he could escape through. Find a cab a few blocks away.

  He started for the back of the place.

  “Sir?” the bartender asked, an edge to his voice. Seybold stopped. “You going to pay your tab?”

  “Yes,” he stuttered and slapped a twenty on the damp wood. He continued toward the back door.

  “Sir? Don’t you want your change?”

  “No.”

  Then he was sprinting down the corridor and pushing through the back door, which slammed shut behind him. He was in a small alley filled with weeds and trash. At the end, fifty yards away, traffic was streaming past, a few yellow cabs among the cars.

  Go!

  He began to jog. Behind him, he heard the sound of the bar door slamming closed again. He glanced back. Blondie.

  Holding a gun.

  Sprinting all-out, Seybold fished for his phone. He’d called Reynolds recently and the detective’s number was high on the recent call list. Then: The hell am I thinking? 911!

  He burst from the alley, staring at the phone, and slowed before he got to the street, which was filled with speeding traffic. He hit 9. He hit 1.

  And it was then that a speeding bicycle messenger slammed into him full-on. The bicyclist, the bike, and Seybold went sprawling onto the sidewalk in three different directions.

  “Oh, man,” he moaned and rolled over on his back, racked with pain in, well, just about every part of his body.

  He then saw Blondie breaking from the alley in a trot. He stopped, looked right and left, and, spotting the author, strode toward him. Pedestrians screamed and scattered, seeing the gun.

  Seybold realized there was only one thing to do.

  It was foolish, suicidal. But staying here was certain death. Wincing against the pain, he leapt to his feet and lunged directly into the speeding traffic.

  Bradley Reynolds sipped a red wine—a pleasant merlot—and disconnected the call with yet another reporter. Damn, he could talk to them for hours.

  He walked out onto his deck, overlooking ten acres of field and forest in an unincorporated part of Montgomery County, Maryland. The house was an A-frame, a classic country home in the modern style. His wife would have liked something more traditional and closer to the shopping centers, but he preferred being out of the chaos of bigger cities.

  Reynolds enjoyed the attention he’d been receiving lately. A hero’s attention. Oh, he liked it very much. From the reporters, from the public, from state police headquarters . . . and from city hall.

  All of this was good; he had his eyes set on a political career. But someday, not yet. He wasn’t through with his mission of making a name for himself by cleaning up Baltimore. He’d gutted the Federico organization. But some of the man’s crew still remained. And with Federico arrested, Jack Kelley and his gang were going to try to fill the vacuum. Reynolds’s next task was to stop them too. He’d been fishing around for a CI wi
thin that organization, somebody who could help him get inside information the way Stan Walker had breached the Federico crew. So far nothing, but he’d keep at it.

  The detective was startled by a frantic pounding on his front door.

  Frowning, Reynolds strode to the hallway and peered out, hand near his weapon. “The hell’s this?” he whispered. He opened the door and let in a disheveled and bruised Alan Seybold. Blood spattered his sleeve.

  “Jesus. What happened to you?”

  The man didn’t answer, but instead just nodded to his car outside. “Open your garage. I have to get it out of sight.”

  Reynolds tried to make sense of this. “Sure, I guess. But what—”

  “Please. I have to get it hidden now!” He ran back to his car.

  Reynolds watched him with curiosity, then stepped into the garage and hit the opener. The door rose with a grind and Seybold pulled in fast, practically leaving skid marks. He climbed out and gestured toward the door.

  “Close it.”

  The detective did so. He could see Seybold relax, his shoulders softening.

  “How’d you know I was here?” the detective asked.

  “Louis Phan told me. I had to see you.”

  “Take it easy. What’s going on?”

  “Somebody’s after me. Somebody in the Federico crew. A blond guy. Thirties. You know who it could be?”

  Reynolds shrugged. “He’s got dozens in his gang. I don’t know who’s blond and who isn’t. But how would he know about you?”

  Seybold grimaced. “I went to the bust. At the pier.”

  “You did what? I told you not to.”

  “I know, I know. I just wanted to see if my plan was going to work. And snap a few pictures. This guy, he saw me. Please. You’ve got to protect me. I’ve got to get out of town. You have a private plane that’ll get me back to California?”

  “Uhm, no.” Reynolds smiled. “We don’t have private planes.”

  “Well, what about an armored car to the airport? And have somebody drop my rental off for me?”

  “Ditto armored cars, Alan. But I could get you an escort. And, yeah, somebody can handle the rental. Aren’t you being a little paranoid?”