An Accidental Murder: An Avram Cohen Mystery (28 page)

“Get a license number?”

Shvilli pulled a folded piece of paper from his shirt pocket and read out the number. Cohen reached into his windbreaker jacket, which he had taken off in the surprising Tel Aviv heat of winter, when there are no clouds and the sun has time to warm the city. He pulled out his little yellow notebook and thumbed through it until he asked, “What’s the number again?”

Shvilli gave it to him.

“That’s one of Witkoff’s cars,” Cohen said with a tone of satisfaction. Finally, something logical was happening.

“You think Zagorksy’s with them?”

“Could be.”

“With the girl?”

“He takes her everywhere.”

“What more do you know about Yosef and Gregory?” Cohen asked.

“Gregory was in the Russian army. Some kind of paratrooper unit. Yosef was a boxer. And I only heard that because of some gossip. Neither is much of a talker.”

“Paratrooper. That means he knows demolitions.”

“You think he had something to do with the bombs?” “Maybe,” he said. But he doubted that either of the bodyguards would have had a reason to kill Suspect. “The girl?” he asked Shvilli. “She’s very sexy?”

“Absolutely.”

“Is she smart?”

“I don’t know.”

“What kind of sexy? Hot? Cold? Does she flirt? Hard to get? What?

“Well, she never flirted with me,” Shvilli said.

“You sound disappointed.”

“You would be, too. I watched her. She could make sure that any man who she talked to wondered if she wanted to do it with him.”

“Did she have any power over Yosef and Gregory?”

“They were Yuhewitz’s boys. He had the power, not her.”

“But could she have used them? Influenced them?”

“I told you, she could wrap a man around her finger.”

“Get back to Yudelstein. See if you can find out where Yuhewitz would meet Witkoff in Tel Aviv.” “You just told me to stay away from them, get out.” “Yes,” Cohen admitted, realizing that once again he had cornered himself into an untenable position, letting Shvilli make the decision. “But we need to know.”

Shvilli looked at his watch. “I need a drink,” he suddenly said, waving to the waiter behind the glass windows overlooking the patio. They waited in silence for the waiter to return with a shot of frozen vodka for Shvilli, a balloon of cognac for Cohen.

“To Nissim,” Shvilli said grimly, then tossed the drink down in one gulp. Cohen took a first sip to prepare his throat for the long swallow of the liquid heat, then tilted back his head for the rest.

It was Cohen who broke the silence. “It’s up to you.”

“We need to know what happened,” Shvilli admitted.

“For Nissim’s sake.”

“It’s not for Nissim. It’s for us. To get the system to confront them, once and for all.”

“They’ll never do it. The politicians will never let them go after them. There’s too much money involved.”

“If there’s evidence, the police will have to act. You know that.”

“Only if it’s hard evidence,” Shvilli said, knocking on the surface of the little table, as if to prove what’s hard.

“Yuhewitz is careful. Witkoff much more so. What about your Zagorksy?” “Is protected,” Cohen admitted, without explaining why. “Yuhewitz is the weakest link. Witkoff must be furious. I would be. The muscle were Yuhewitz’s responsibility.

His soldiers. And they screwed up. Witkoff knows that.” Once again, Witkoff became a key. Cohen picked up his cellular phone, beginning to enjoy its immediacy. He punched in Ephraim Laskoff’s number, then got up and went to the railing to look down on the beach, not needing Shvilli to hear the conversation.

Rose answered. Laskoff had just come in.

“Avram,” Laskoff began, “I think I can close the house deal today.”

“Forget the house, that’s not why I’m calling. I need to know what you have on those names I gave you. Alexander Witkoff … “

“The banker. Or at least wants to own a bank. There’s no way he’s going to get one, not after what I heard this morning.”

“What? What?”

“That the Russian police want to question him about the top three officers at the bank he owns in Moscow getting murdered just before he arrived here as a new immigrant.”

“When did you hear that?” “You asked me to ask around. I did.”

“Why is he a suspect?”

“According to my sources, he wanted to cover his money trail. The managers knew the truth. He didn’t want the truth known.”

“I hear he makes contributions. Lots of contributions.”

“He can afford it. According to my sources, he’s sitting on at least half a billion dollars in his own investments.

Not counting money he’s raised for his finance company.

Can you believe it? They wouldn’t give him a license to open a bank, but they let him open a financing house. For foreign investors.”

“What does that mean?”

“That he can take foreign currency, invest it locally, and pay out in foreign currency. No questions asked.”

“That’s what you do.”

“No, officially I’m a consultant. Remember, you signed powers of attorney. But I don’t guarantee you interest from an account. I just make professional decisions for you to keep your money. He guarantees interest and can lend, as well as invest.”

“So he can run a laundry.”

“Yes.”

“What about Yuhewitz?”

“Now there’s something interesting.”

“What?”

“Three weeks ago, bids were opened for a coastland project just south of the Eilat port. Bids ranged from seven to fourteen million. Yuhewitz was signed to a twenty-five million bid. They had to accept. Says he’s planning a hotel and entertainment center. The Tourism minister’s in love with the man. We’re talking about a hundred-million-dollar investment on his part. God knows how much the ministry will shovel him in subsidies.”

“South of the port?”

“Just north of the border.”

“You’re sure?”

“Avram? Have I ever told you anything about which I was not certain?”

For the first time that morning, Cohen smiled, barely.

“Thanks, Ephraim.”

“No, wait, wait a minute. What did you mean, ‘ about the house’? What are you talking about?”

“Before that, what about Zagorsky?”

“Nothing on him. Nothing. Nobody heard of him.

Nobody in the city. He’s neither a buyer nor a seller. Not here, at least. Not through the banks here.”

“Makes sense,” Cohen muttered to himself.

“What? What did you say?”

“Nothing.”

“Are we done on these names?” “Yes,” Cohen said.

“Good. Now, tell me about what you meant.”

Cohen took a deep breath, knowing what would follow.

“I changed my mind,” he said.

There was a long pause, then Laskoff said, “You’re joking, no?”

“Ephraim? Have you ever known me to make jokes?”

“Why? Why? After all we went through on this?”

“I changed my mind. People change. Places change. Life changes.” Cohen stated it bluntly, in a matter-of-fact tone.

“There’s nothing wrong with that. Nothing that can be done about it.”

“Just a few weeks ago, you were ready to pay a fortune —”

“You need an explanation?” Cohen demanded, almost angrily. But he trusted Laskoff and valued the man’s friendship, so he quickly added, “I promise I’ll explain. But not now. There are some things I have to take care of. Next week maybe,” he promised. “Lunch.”

“What do I tell the heirs?” Laskoff moaned.

“That they taught me something about greed,” said Cohen with the same simplicity that he used earlier. “And I appreciated the lesson.”

Laskoff knew Cohen well enough not to be astounded, but he had to ask, “That’s all?”

“What else do I have to tell them?”

“They might sue. We signed some memorandums of understanding.”

“Settle it.”

“How do I know you won’t change your mind again?”

“You’ll have to trust me,” said Cohen. He turned to look at Shvilli, who was finishing his own phone call. “I have to go. I’ll be in touch.”

“That’s what you always say. And whenever you get in touch, it’s a crisis,” Laskoff complained.

But Cohen knew that Laskoff loved the occasional excitement that he brought into the private banker’s life.

“Goodbye, Ephraim,” he said gently, cutting off the conversation and closing the phone. Shvilli was doing the same. Cohen went back to the table.

“You still think that bombing in Frankfurt, and what happened this morning, are connected to what happened to Nissim?” asked the undercover man.

Cohen pulled at an earlobe. “No, and yes.”

“Usually it’s yes and no.” “It’s an unusual situation,” admitted Cohen.

“You haven’t explained it to me.”

“I’m not certain myself.” “You have to trust me,” said Shvilli.

“I do trust you.”

“You’re not telling me something.”

Cohen nodded, almost sadly. “It has nothing to do with Nissim, or you. And I’m not even sure if it’s true. It’s my gut talking to me, not my mind. And you know how much I hate that.”

“Yes.”

Again silence fell between them.

“You were right,” said Shvilli. “I talked to Yudelstein again. He says that Witkoff went crazy when he heard that Yuhewitz’s boys did Nissim.”

“Did he tell you where we can find them?”

Shvilli’s smile grew until the row of gold teeth on his lower left jaw twinkled in the sun.

“They’re at Witkoff V he said.

They weren’t surprised to find a pair of black Mercedes parked in the beating sunlight outside the tall apartment building, the two drivers doubling as guards in the shade of the building’s entrance. Cohen rolled slowly past the building. “You know them?” he asked Shvilli, then quickly added, “more important, do they know you?”

Shvilli shook his head. “No. Who are they?”

“Zagorksy’s drivers.”

“So he’s here, too.”

Cohen nodded.

“How are we going to do this?” Shvilli asked, as Cohen parked.

Cohen thought. “Casually and cautiously,” he finally said. “Pass me the cane on the floor in the back,” he instructed Shvilli.

“What’s this for?” asked the Georgian.

“I twisted my ankle a couple of months ago, needed it for a few days,” said Cohen, taking the short staff. “You’re accompanying me to the orthopedic surgeon’s, for a consultation,” he told Shvilli.

Cohen hobbled up the path to the building, leaning heavily on the cane. Shvilli walked slowly beside him. As they approached the guards, Cohen said in a whining voice to Shvilli, “The doctor better give me some better painkillers.”

Shvilli just nodded.

One of the guards flicked away a cigarette and watched the old man on the cane approaching. He said something in Russian to the other guard and neither challenged Cohen and Shvilli.

With the elevator doors closed, Cohen dropped the cane and pulled out his Beretta, pulling back the barrel to cock it. Shvilli did the same with his Desert Eagle .457, a much larger gun than Cohen’s, which the undercover man kept in an armpit holster under his brown suede leather jacket.

They rode silently, as if they had done so hundreds of times before, though only once many years before had Cohen and Shvilli been together so close to the edge. But just before the elevator doors opened, Shvilli smiled and said, “You know what that asshole downstairs said?”

“No.”

“That he pitied me for having such a whining father.”

Cohen grimaced, and then the elevator started to slow down at the sixteenth floor. They stood facing the elevator doors, waiting for the ride to end and the doors to slide open, their guns already pointed toward whatever lay beyond those doors.

The elevator stopped. Cohen’s finger moved from the trigger guard to the trigger. Shvilli did the same. The door slid open. A guard was waiting, but stupidly, too casually for his profession, his mini-Uzi was slung over his shoulder, not pointing back at them.

Cohen’s gun, already drawn waist high as the doors opened, moved quickly upward to aim between the guard’s eyes as he stepped into the landing area, shoving the guard backward up against the wall. Shvilli unslung the Uzi, held his own gun barrel to pursed lips and hissed “Shh … “

Nothing else was spoken, but it was clear what the guard was thinking. How far did his loyalty to his boss go?

Cohen’s eyes asked the guard the same question as he pointed with his free hand to the penthouse door, his Beretta rock-still and aimed at the guard’s face, his smile more menacing than ever.

For a flicker of a second, the guard’s eyes seemed to calculate his chances. Cohen shook his head, still silent, still smiling, still pointing with his left hand at the apartment door, still keeping his eyes locked on the guard’s.

Shvilli added a jab with the Uzi into the guard’s kidneys.

It made the guard stand straighter for a second of pain, but then like air let out of a balloon whatever remained of his self-confidence drained away. His shoulders slumped.

Keeping his gun trained on the hair ridge over the guard’s nose, Cohen backed the guard toward the apartment door.

Just then, the muffled sounds of a voice rising into a shout could be heard behind the brass and fake-wood door. The guard looked back with worry at Cohen, who just nodded his command. Shvilli rang the bell, but not before he had the Uzi slung over his shoulder, his finger on the trigger, the safety set to automatic.

The three-tone melody instantly silenced the shouting inside. An instant later the door opened, held by yet another broad-muscled guard, the angry question on his face turning into surprise at the sight of the old man wielding the Beretta and Shvilli with the Uzi.

A man’s voice from inside the apartment called out something in Russian.

“He wants to know who we are,” Shvilli whispered to Cohen.

For a moment, riding up the elevator, Cohen had thought they could both die when the elevator doors opened. The thought flashed through his mind without fear or regret, but merely a recognition of the odds that should have been against him except for one thing and one thing alone. The very self-confidence and sense of immunity with which the bodyguards and their bosses exuded their control prevented them from imagining a threat from an old man, indeed from anyone other than their known competitors. It was his gamble, and luck, as he knew so well, could only be created by taking chances, controlling time itself.