Fatal Demand: A Jess Kimball Thriller
Page 21
“Show me.”
The notes were wrapped in bundles. Mike lifted out a handful. Ten thousand euros. Maybe twenty.
Enzo waved a flashlight over them. A black light. Plenty of ultraviolet energy to excite photons, and reveal invisible marks. These notes kept their muted colors. The subtle blues and reds and greens that thwarted casual counterfeiters. But he wasn’t worried about counterfeits. Mike wasn’t quite that skilled, or clever. The black light assuaged a different concern. The notes were not marked for tracing.
Mike had followed instructions, as expected.
“Close it,” Enzo said.
Mike complied. He held out the briefcase.
Glass crunched.
Enzo spun toward the noise. The wife lay dead as before.
Mike dived for Enzo. “Run!”
Enzo leapt sideways, pointing the Beretta and squeezing the trigger at the same time.
The gun seemed to boom louder than before in the silent house.
Mike twitched and jerked. His legs gave out from under him. His arms flailed.
He tumbled past Enzo. Head first onto the carpet and into his own rapidly pooling blood, which flowed steadily while his heart continued to pump.
Enzo glimpsed a thin figure in the kitchen. The daughter. A teenager. Over-indulged, to be sure. Seventeen now.
She had been the one who answered Enzo’s original email containing fake pleas for help. She’d responded to the sleazy pitch asking for money to save young girls her age from human trafficking. Of course, seventeen-year-olds had no money. But through her, he’d reached her parents’ bank account.
He shook his head. Parents would do almost anything for their children. Even when the children were the cause of their troubles.
Tears marked her cheeks. Her eyes wide. Standing by the rear door.
Enzo ran to the kitchen.
She backed away from the door. He leveled his gun on her. Her eyes darted to one side. Behind him. The briefest glimpse, like the recognition of movement.
He spun, training the Beretta to the living room doorway. The space was empty. Blood had also pooled around the woman. She hadn’t moved. Nor would she. Her husband was not so lucky.
Mike rolled on the floor holding his stomach. Still alive. For a few moments more.
Enzo spun back to the girl but she had vanished.
He pressed his face against the kitchen window, scanning the moonlit garden.
He heard a click to his right. Another door.
He raced to twist the handle. Locked.
He leaned his shoulder into the door. It was solid.
He stepped back and fired at the lock twice. The wood splintered and danced.
He swung his boot up, kicking hard. The door snapped open, slamming back against the wall.
A laundry room. A washer and dryer along one wall. Washing powders and laundry stacked on a work surface along the other. A closed window at the far end. No girl. And no way out.
He glanced behind the door. Nothing.
He eased down, peering into the glass of the washing machine. It seemed impossible to think she could have squeezed into such a close space, but he’d seen fear motivate people to remarkable feats.
The washer was empty.
He moved into the crowded room. His back to the work surface. He passed the washer. Passed the gap between the washer and dryer.
The dryer’s large door was metal. No doubt with a firm spring latch. He would have heard it open and close.
He adjusted his grip on the gun and moved past the dryer, to the space between its white metal side and the end of the room.
A narrow space. Long and thin. Like the girl.
She had contorted her body. Knees, shoulders, legs. Twisted. Cramped. Painful. Her head angled sideways. Her eyes staring. He leveled his gun on her. She had been brave and quick. With her dash to hide when she first saw him from the kitchen, she might even have had a bright future in front of her. In another world. Not the one in which she lived.
He took a deep breath. At another time, he might even feel he should recruit her. But not here. Not now. She had seen his face. She knew who he was. He lived not far from this very home.
He had no choice. He’d known that weeks ago. Her foolish parents should have known it, too.
Her breathing was ragged. Hard work for her lungs in such confines. He turned his face away, fired twice, and spared her lungs the work.
He didn’t look back. He closed the laundry room door behind him. It drifted open again, the lock gone. He stepped over the woman’s body, and into the living room.
Mike had dragged himself up against a chair. He struggled to dial the old-fashioned phone.
Enzo fired twice more. He placed the shots together. Quick succession. Center of Mike’s forehead. His lifeless torso slumped sideways. The phone tumbled to the floor.
Enzo jerked the phone from the wall. He returned the money to the briefcase, and closed the latches.
The meeting had not gone as smoothly as he’d planned. Such conditions meant unacceptable levels of evidence.
He returned to the kitchen, placed the sugar bowl in the microwave, and set it for ten minutes. As the microwave hummed, he turned the four gas burners to full open positions. He tucked the case under his arm and left, closing the door behind him.
He returned to his spot in the trees at the bottom of the garden to wait. The minutes ticked by.
Before the microwave timer finished, the sugar caught fire. Flames escaped the microwave and the gas ignited. Not with Hollywood flamboyance, but a smooth, relentless whoosh. Here, in the countryside, with neighbors miles away, no one would find the fire until it had run its course.
The fuel burned easily in the oxygen-rich mixture. Fingers of fire reached through the doors and windows.
The dog he’d heard barking earlier ran from the rear door. Small legs. Leaping more than running. Wisps of smoke trailed from its fur. It ran to the woods, and rolled in the grass.
The fire grew to the second floor. First, a yellow glow in the windows then roaring flames that spilled out of window frames and lapped upward.
The dog trotted to sit beside him.
Enzo watched the fire until flames burst through the roof. The dog stared at him expectantly, and barked.
His brother, Luigi, was returning today from New York. One last ransom to collect in Rome this afternoon. One last family to terminate tonight. After that, vacation. He’d promised his wife and his children. He’d been working too much. Luigi, too.
Enzo picked up the case, and left the dog alone and lonely in the dark.
CHAPTER TWO
Tuscany, Italy
May 12
A few hours later, Enzo Ficarra sipped his espresso as dawn crept over the horizon behind him. A cheap cell phone lay on his patio table. The battery was fully charged, the shrill buzzer was set to its loudest volume, and the display showed five bars. But none of those things mattered. The one person who knew the number had not called. His brother, Luigi.
He stood the phone upright, and tapped his fingers on the table while the rising sun shortened long shadows. The phone kept its silence.
A gull’s caw drew his attention eastwards, across the deep green lawn, down the rocks that led to the shore, and out over the sea. A trawler sailed by, heading for port in the next town, gulls diving in its wake to pick off the scraps.
He sipped his third espresso.
Scraps.
He took a deep breath.
Not for him.
He had a good business. It worked well. People were basically honest. They wanted to believe that of other people, too. It was a useful trait. Gullibility was how he manipulated them. And the older they were, the more they believed, and the easier they were to manipulate.
He finished his drink.
Like any business, contracts were contracts. Agreements had to be honored. He never failed his responsibilities, and he expected his clients to do the same. But when they did not, the rules
had to be enforced.
He rolled the still warm demitasse cup between his palms, and watched the dregs of golden foam run around the bottom of the cup.
Enzo placed the white china cup securely on its saucer. The cup was a trophy of sorts, he supposed. He’d collected the set from Marek’s club in Montreal, Les Canard. What a miserable day that had been. Wet, cold. Betrayal by an old friend, which was the worst kind. He shuddered.
Marek caused an unfortunate disruption to their profitable business. Contracts had been broken, agreements breached, a lapse in confidence. The enterprise was shut down and loose ends were wrapped up.
A petty incident that demanded the utmost care to bring about the final, successful conclusion. So his brother, Luigi, had travelled to Florida to collect the last payment, a quarter of a million dollars. The Italian economy being what it was, a quarter of a million American dollars would fatten their ailing bottom line nicely.
Luigi was fast, strong, and an excellent shot. More than once, he had worked for days on the most meager of sleep. He had escaped situations that would have overwhelmed ordinary men, and returned to tell the tale.
Forcing the old couple to bring their life savings to Rome to exchange it for their son’s life should have been a simple matter for his brother.
Boarding a plane was a tedious process. Check-in lines. Security guards on minimum wages. Jet bridges with passenger lines wide and long. Sniveling children, frightened mothers, bored pilots prone to error.
He tamped down his annoyance. His brother would have been patient. He would have stood in line. He would have had his ticket ready, his passport in hand. He would have smiled at the check-in attendant, and complied with security nonsense without complaint. He would have answered questions with a smile. A model passenger. Accepting. Accommodating. Anonymous.
And before he departed for Rome, he would have called.
Enzo turned the phone over in his hands. Flight 12 had left New York hours ago. His brother was either on it, or he was not. Plain and simple. But with no phone call he assumed the worst.
He mashed the garish purple phone’s off button, and pulled the battery from its compartment. He walked slowly into his villa, dropped the pieces into the waste disposal, and ran the motor until any proof they ever existed was gone.
Enzo pulled a second phone from his pocket. A different model, a different carrier, a standard black color, purchased with cash from a different corner store.
He pressed the on button, and began making the calls required by the circumstances. He would make arrangements to meet the plane, then he would handle the disappearance of his brother.
Those who had been involved in Luigi’s disappearance had made an error. A fatal one.
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ABOUT THE AUTHORS
DIANE CAPRI
Diane Capri is a recovering lawyer and world-wide bestselling author. She’s a snowbird who divides her time between Florida and Michigan. An active member of Mystery Writers of America, Author’s Guild, International Thriller Writers, and Sisters in Crime, she loves to hear from readers and is hard at work on her next novel.
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NIGEL BLACKWELL
Nigel Blackwell was born in rural Oxfordshire, England. He has a love of books, a Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry, and a black belt in pointing out the obvious. He’s been lucky enough to travel across much of Europe, North America, Japan, and the Middle East, and hasn’t been anywhere that doesn’t have the potential for a story.
He lives in Texas with his wife and daughter, where they enjoy the sunshine and listen to the coyotes howl at night.
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Also by DIANE CAPRI
(Click each title to buy or download a sample)
CLICK HERE for an up-to-date list of Diane Capri Books
The Jess Kimball Thrillers Series:
Fatal Error
Fatal Demand
Fatal Distraction
Fatal Enemy
The Hunt for Jack Reacher Series:
Jack and Joe
Jack in the Green
Get Back Jack
Don’t Know Jack
Jack in a Box
Jack and Kill
The Hunt for Justice Series:
Cold Justice
Wasted Justice
Secret Justice
Twisted Justice
Due Justice
False Truth (Serial)
Mistaken Justice
Raw Justice
Also by NIGEL BLACKWELL
Paris Love Match
Fatal Demand: A Jess Kimball Thriller is a work of fiction, expanded from the Jess Kimball Flight 12 novella. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2014, 2015 by Diane Capri and Nigel Blackwell
Excerpt Fatal Error © 2016 Diane Capri and Nigel Blackwell
All rights reserved as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior permission of the publisher.
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First eBook Edition: 2015
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Table of Contents
Reviews
Dedication
Dear Friends
Cast of Primary Characters
FATAL DEMAND
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
>
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Excerpt from FATAL ERROR