by J. B. Turner
Reznick felt torn again. Should he follow her or sit tight? But there were two coffee mugs on the table. He decided to stay where he was and peered through the binoculars into the interior of Starbucks. A young woman was wiping down the tables.
A couple of minutes later, the Starbucks door opened. A lean white guy in his mid-thirties walked out. He wore faded jeans, cowboy boots and a black T-shirt, long blond hair, thick scar on his face.
It was Chad Magruder.
Reznick felt his flesh crawl.
He watched as Magruder lit a cigarette and walked further down Main Street and then disappeared up a street to the right. Reznick switched on the ignition and headed the same way. A few moments later, he saw Magruder climb into the black SUV – the same one Reznick saw on the surveillance tape at the Monterey Club.
“OK, you bastard,” Reznick said to himself, “where are you going?”
Reznick drove on past at the same time as Magruder was getting into his car. Five hundred yards up ahead, Reznick pulled into a space at the curb outside a deli and switched off his engine and lights. He checked his wing mirror and a minute later Magruder drove on past, oblivious, cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth.
Reznick waited a few moments before he pulled out and followed Magruder’s car. He was about one hundred yards back and it looked like he was heading for the freeway. Five minutes later, he was heading up a ramp and onto I-75S. The traffic was heavy even at that ungodly hour. He was now four cars back.
Reznick crossed lanes for a couple of miles to try and stay out of his rearview mirror. They were headed in the pre-dawn darkness towards the Dolphin Expressway. Then Magruder changed lanes, and slowed down, only two cars ahead, glancing in his rearview mirror.
Counter surveillance move.
Reznick stayed in lane, knowing not to dart off in another direction. He stayed calm as Magruder continued to check his rearview mirror for tails. Then he turned round and stared at the car behind him.
The bastard was cute.
A few minutes later, a sign for Miami and Magruder changed lanes again, took the Miami Avenue Exit 2.
Reznick was about one hundred yards behind and followed Magruder towards the huge skyscrapers of Miami’s business district. All the time, Reznick kept his distance. Glass and steel office towers loomed over Brickell Avenue.
Then Magruder hung a sharp left and headed into an underground parking facility. Reznick drove on by and went round the block twice, before he headed into the basement car park.
Reznick caught sight of Magruder’s car parked in a disabled space right beside the elevators. His left arm was out of the window, cigarette dangling from his fingers, cell phone pressed to his right ear.
Reznick passed within fifty yards and took a ramp to the upper level parking. He drove around the deserted car park for a couple of minutes and then headed down to Magruder’s level.
Cruising past, he stole a quick glance in his rearview mirror. At that moment, Magruder stepped out of his car, dropped his cigarette and crushed it with the heel of his boot. Then he placed his cell in his back pocket and headed towards the steel elevators.
Reznick drove into a space straight ahead beside a massive concrete pillar, engine still running. He looked in the rearview mirror and saw Magruder press an elevator button. He picked up the binoculars and turned to see Magruder get into the elevator. Then he trained the binoculars on the light indicating which floor. It eventually stopped at the forty-second floor.
Reznick switched off the engine and got out of the car. He checked on Luntz who was still out of it, centrally locked the car and then took the elevator to the forty-third floor. From there, he headed down a flight of stairs. A metal sign on an outer door for Norton & Weiss Inc.
He looked around the outer lobby. A camera strafed the entrance with the locked glass doors and metallic password keypad beside the handle. He headed back down to the car park and popped a couple more Dexedrine.
It wasn’t long before Reznick felt wired. He waited, grinding his teeth as the pills kicked in big time and the adrenaline flowed. He no longer felt hungry.
Did Magruder kill Leggett? He pondered on that for a few moments. But he had to have. He was asking for him. Then Leggett is found dead. So it meant someone had hired him? But who?
The more he thought of it, the more Reznick began to realise that someone knew far more about his life that they should have done. They knew about his daughter. They knew about his friendship with Leggett.
But who was that someone? They knew that Reznick would turn to Leggett, a man he had trusted since the day they met at training.
His thoughts switched to Lauren.
He had shielded his daughter all these years from his secret world. He visited her at Brookfield once, maybe twice a year, taking her out for pizza. She didn’t know what he did, content to believe her father was a security consultant for US embassies abroad. Deep in his heart he had believed he had everything under control. But that was then, not now. A government scientist he was supposed to have suicided was lying out of it in the back of a stolen car, while Lauren’s life was in the balance.
What a monumental fuck-up. How the hell had it got so crazy?
Half an hour later, Magruder appeared, running his hands through his hair. Nothing like a vain psycho, Reznick thought. But instead of heading towards the car in the disabled bay, Magruder walked over towards a Suburban with blacked-out windows. Why the change of car? Then he used a key fob to open the driver’s door. Had Magruder just been given a new job? And how did Norton & Weiss fit into it?
Reznick slunk down low and waited until Magruder had left the garage and then he turned on his engine. He caught sight of Magruder driving fast through the dark downtown streets before he headed across the Macarthur Causeway to South Beach.
He needed to hang back and not get too close but nearly lost him not wanting to run a red light on Washington Avenue. Eventually, he caught sight of the Suburban, one hundred yards up ahead, cruising down Lenox Avenue, then onto 19th Street, past the Holocaust Memorial Museum and past the rundown neon-lit Sunset Motel.
Magruder parked one block away, with a clear diagonal line of sight to the motel.
Reznick drove on to Dade Boulevard and double-backed onto Alton Road, before pulling up in West Avenue. He was out of sight, but now less than seventy-five yards from Magruder, whose car was facing the opposite direction.
A panhandler came into view. He was walking the near-empty pre-dawn streets wearing a filthy jacket and Yankees baseball cap and some fancy shades, taking the occasional slug from a bottle of Nightrain.
It was then Reznick had an idea.
NINE
Reznick switched off his engine, got out of the car and walked up to the panhandler who smelled of piss, rancid booze and cigarettes. The old guy’s eyes were wild and bloodshot.
“You wanna make an easy fifty bucks, old man? he asked.
The panhandler gave a nonchalant shrugged as if he was used to getting such offers every day.
“Gimme your jacket, hat, shades and your bottle, and this fifty is yours,” Reznick said, flashing the bill.
The man grinned, exposing nicotine-stained stumps for teeth. “Why would I do that?”
Reznick took another fifty-dollar bill from his pocket and shook his head. “A hundred bucks.”
The panhandler nodded as he took off his jacket, hat and shades, before he handed over his bottle of booze, snatching the money from Reznick’s hand in one movement. “Nice doing business with you, my friend.”
Reznick put on the stinking coat, the hat and the shades. “Get some soup in you, for God’s sake,” he said, but the panhandler was already sauntering down 19th Street, straight for the nearest all-liquor store. Further down the street, Reznick caught sight of the black Suburban parked up.
Magruder’s window was down, phone in his left hand pressed to his ear. His voice was low and raspy from the cigarettes.
Reznick shuffled across the ro
ad and headed slowly in the direction of Magruder. He was within ten yards.
Magruder turned around, phone still pressed to his ear, but ignored the sight of the panhandler approaching.
Reznick ambled up to the Suburban’s open window, hand outstretched, as if for money.
“Get the fuck away from me,” Magruder said.
Reznick punched him hard on the side of the head and Magruder’s eyes rolled back in his head. His cell phone fell out of his hand, but Reznick caught it before it hit the ground. Magruder was out cold.
He leaned over and rifled in Magruder’s waistband where he retrieved a Berretta. Then he patted down his jeans and discovered a serrated hunting knife taped to the back of his left calf.
Leaning into the car, he pulled out the plexicuffs he had in his back pocket and tied up Magruder’s hands and feet before pushing him over on to the floor of the passenger seat.
Reznick dumped the stinking coat, shades and hat at the side of the road before he slid into the driver’s seat and drove off. He headed round the dark South Beach streets for a few minutes, away from the main drags of Ocean Drive and Washington Avenue, looking for the right spot. Past empty parking lots, small art deco hotels with neon-lit signs and dimly lit side streets. Then on down palm-fringed residential streets until he saw a Realtor sign outside a boarded up house on Michigan Avenue between 12th and 13th Street, adjacent to Flamingo Park. It was painted a sickly yellow and looked like an abandoned house.
He looked across and considered if it was suitable. It didn’t look bad at all. A rusty chainlink steel fence with flaking black paint surrounded the property including the padlocked driveway. He waited until a couple of pedestrians walking by were out of sight. Then he reversed back onto the sidewalk until the car was pressed up against the padlocked gates, leaving the engine running. He got out and unpicked the chain, opened the creaking metal gates and got back in the car, reversing back up the driveway. Then Reznick hauled the deadweight of Magruder up the overgrown driveway, before kicking in a wooden panel on the ground floor.
Dragging him inside, he took a few moments for his eyes to adjust to the darkness, only the glow from the street lights filtering in. It looked like a ransacked kitchen and smelled as if an animal had died there.
A pile of rotten blankets lay on top of a mattress. Strewn on the tile floor were cigarette ends, old crack pipes, empty cans of beer and bottles of wine, as if some panhandlers had used it recently as a flophouse.
He placed Magruder onto the mattress and then ripped up the filthy rags. Then he stuffed part of a rags into Magruder’s mouth.
Reznick picked up a half empty bottle of wine, poured out the contents, and went over to the sink and filled it up with water. Fixing a suppressor to his Beretta, he kicked Magruder in the back.
The bastard came to. Eyes crazy. He tried to stand, but the blow to the head and the fact that he was trussed up meant he was immobilised.
Reznick leaned close and pointed the gun at his head. “Time to answer some questions, Magruder.”
“Reznick?” The rag muffled his voice. “What the fuck, man?”
“Shut up.”
“What’ve you got me tied up like a hog for, man?”
Reznick slapped him hard on the face. Blood spilled through the rag from Magruder’s mouth. “I said shut up. Now, listen to me very closely, I want some answers.”
“What’s this all about?”
“Leggett. What did you do to him?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, man.”
Reznick slapped him hard on the other side of the face. More blood spilled from his mouth. “I think you do. Now, you’re gonna tell me, or you’re gonna taste some water, do you know what I mean?”
The fear in Magruder’s eyes was real. Reznick knew from their days training, he had a phobia about water, although he had tried to overcome it.
“Hey look, I don’t know what you’re talking about, man. I swear. Reznick, what’s this all about?”
Reznick pressed his right foot hard down on Magruder’s chest as he writhed on the floor. He tipped the water from the bottle through the rags and into Magruder’s mouth. The water glugged through the cloth and into Magruder’s throat, down into his stomach. Veins in his neck were nearly bursting through his skin, eyes wild with terror. They had both been trained to withstand waterboarding. They knew that it was just a simulated drowning. But he knew Magruder would buckle because of his phobia.
He stopped pouring after ten seconds.
“I want to know what you were up to. Were you ordered to do a job? Were you asked to neutralise Leggett?”
Magruder shook his head furiously, tears streaming down his face.
“What did you do to him?”
He was crying and half choking.
“What about my daughter? Tell me what you know.”
Magruder shook his head and closed his eyes. Reznick poured more water from another wine bottle into Magruder’s throat. He flailed again and thrashed as Reznick pressed his foot into his chest.
He stopped and gave Magruder a few moments to try and recover. This time the terror had become blind panic in his eyes. “I’ll ask again, where is my daughter?”
Magruder shook his head.
Reznick pulled the soaking rag from his mouth as Magruder spluttered and coughed. “Answer, you fuck.”
He coughed up water and retched for nearly a minute before he spoke. “Please, believe me, Reznick, man, I didn’t have a choice. I was told to do Leggett and turn up in Miami today.”
Reznick felt the anger rise inside him. “Turn up for what today?”
Magruder began weeping. “Man, I’m sorry.”
“Tell me what you know or you will die, right here and now. I’ll ask again, who gave you the orders?”
“The guys…”
“What fucking guys? The guys in that tower in downtown Miami?”
Magruder nodded, sniveling and sobbing hard. “It’s a front. Jon, believe me I would never–”
“A front for what?”
“I don’t know. I’ve done various jobs for them. Russian oligarch. An Arab woman. They pay me a lot of money. A lot of money. In cash. I need the money, man. I owe a lot of people.”
“I asked what kind of front is it.”
“The front is that it’s a legal firm.”
“How did you get to hear about them?”
“They approached me in jail about a year ago and said they could get me out, if I went to work for them.”
“Who’s ‘they’?”
Magruder began coughing, hacking up water and phlegm. “I don’t know.”
“You must know. Who is in fucking charge there?”
“All I know is that I get a call, and I head there, and I speak to a guy called Vince. White guy. Real intense. And when I mean intense, I mean real intense, you know what I’m saying?”
“All I need to know is where my daughter is.”
“I know nothing about that.”
Reznick’s mind was racing. “What were you parked on 19th Street for?”
He closed his eyes and shook his head. “They wanted me to acquaint myself with the area, that’s all.”
“Were you told to kill me?”
Magruder closed his eyes, retching and coughing at the same time. “I was just told something was going to go down, get to know the area, that’s all, and then await instructions.”
Reznick stuffed the rag back into his mouth and poured the rest of the water from the second bottle. He stared down. “Where is my daughter?”
Magruder was bug eyed with terror, spluttering. Reznick could see he was close to the edge. He took out the rag as Magruder coughed and brought up water.
“I swear, I don’t know about your daughter.”
“You fucking liar. You piece of shit. You know about her, don’t you? Where is she? Tell me!”
Magruder eyes were turning in his head, nearly unconscious.
Reznick pressed the gun up hard t
o his head. “Last time, what do you know about my daughter?”
Magruder shook his head as he spluttered some more. “Absolutely nothing, I swear, man. I did Leggett. And I was going to be given one hundred thousand dollars cash to kill you.”
Reznick stared down at the former Delta operator. For a split second he felt pity for a man who was tougher than anyone he had ever met. By now Magruder was shaking but saying nothing.
Reznick went over to the sink and filled up a bottle full of water again. Then he stuffed the rag back into Magruder’s mouth. “You want some more?”
Magruder shook his head.
“One last chance, where is my daughter?”
He removed the rag.
“I don’t know your daughter or where she is.”
Reznick rammed the rag back in and poured the rest of the water over Magruder’s mouth.
Magruder’s face scrunched up as if in pain and he clenched his teeth. Then he groaned and moaned, mouth open, before shaking uncontrollably.
“Don’t pull that shit with me, do you hear me?”
There were gargled gasps for air, chest heaving up and down. Time seemed to slow.
Reznick stared down at Magruder for a few moments.
He leaned over and slapped him hard in the face. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”
No breathing. No sound. No movement. Reznick lifted Magruder’s right hand and felt his wrist for a pulse.
He didn’t feel a pulse.
Reznick turned away and kick over a chair. “Goddamn you.” He felt sick to the pit of his stomach. He paced the deserted house, head in hands. He hadn’t meant to kill Magruder, despite him taking down his friend Leggett. He’d just wanted to make him talk. But he’d gone too far. Way too far.
He turned and took one final look at Magruder’s lifeless body, rag stuffed in his mouth.
And he knew that image would be burned into the darkest recesses of his mind forever.
TEN
It was still dark when Lt Col Scott Caan’s alarm clock rang at his rented home near downtown Hagerstown, Maryland. He groaned and leaned over to switch it off after a fitful sleep. He wasn’t a morning person. Never had been. He took a few moments for his brain to adjust to a new day before he got up and headed to the bathroom. He splashed some cold water on his face and looked at it in the mirror. Toned, lean, eyes clear. He felt in the best shape of his life. But he was still waiting to hear from them.
