Dead at First Sight

113 Friday 12 October

It was a fine, almost cloudless day in Jersey and the bright, low sun was shining straight into Steve Barrey’s eyes. Sorokin, with his back to the window, could see, to his pleasure, that his guest was clearly uncomfortable. That was exactly the reason he had requested this window table, and he’d made sure he got there early, ahead of his guest, to secure the seat he wanted.

The former New York detective had been told that because of Barrey’s facial disfigurement, he preferred corner tables and low lighting levels, to be away from gawkers. Where the man sat now, bang in front of the window, in plain view, and with the dazzling light on him, he was like an actor placed centre-stage. The Stetson he had tilted low and his dark glasses completed the theatrical image.

Barrey was dressed in a loud suit, a tieless shirt buttoned to the neck and bling Louboutin brogues with silver toecaps. Sorokin found it hard to look at his ravaged and scarred face, framed by wisps of hair from his blond wig, but equally hard to look away.

‘I can see you’re wondering whether it’s polite to look or not, Mr Sorokin — or rather, Detective Sorokin, aren’t you?’ Without waiting for an answer, he said, ‘Feel free, look away, I know I’m not a pretty sight, am I? My friends all call me Crispy.’ He smiled with a decent set of teeth that looked strange against the tiny slivers of pink that were what remained of his lips. Then he jabbed a finger downwards. ‘But the good news is, all’s OK from the waist down!’

‘Glad to hear it,’ Sorokin said. He was conscious of the occasional glances from other diners — whether it was curiosity at Barrey’s disfigurement or the man’s local reputation as a crime overlord, he didn’t know.

Barrey was struggling against the glare, despite his dark glasses. ‘Great view, isn’t it?’ Sorokin said. And it was a very fine view down across the yacht basin and the ocean beyond. The Quayside was a smart restaurant, too, all glass and modern furniture, elegant staff. Situated close to the banking and financial services district of the island’s capital, St Helier, the busy lunchtime crowd were well dressed, talking quietly and earnestly. ‘I thought I’d let you have the view.’

‘You’re the visitor,’ Barrey said. ‘You should have the view.’ He shook his head. ‘You didn’t tell them it was me coming when you booked, like I told you to — they know me here, they always put me in a corner table at the back where we can’t be overheard.’ He looked around him and signalled to a waitress. ‘Drop that blind, would you?’

As she moved towards it, Sorokin put up an arm, halting her. ‘I’m enjoying the sun on my back, leave it, it’s fine.’

Barrey bristled, but said nothing. From what this guy had told him over the phone, with his background in the Mafia-busting team of the NYPD, his organized crime connections in the US could be of real value to him, both for money laundering and for expanding his internet romance fraud business into that country. Yet there was something about Sorokin that didn’t sit quite right. The guy was cocky and arrogant, as if he knew he held a full hand of the cards he wanted.

A waiter appeared with menus. ‘Will you be having wine, gentlemen?’ he asked.

Sorokin gestured to his guest. ‘A glass of wine?’

‘I think we should have a bottle of champagne to celebrate — on me,’ Barrey said expansively. ‘Bottle of Bolly,’ he instructed the waiter, but signalled him not to go away. He turned back to Sorokin. ‘You like oysters?’

‘Uh-huh.’

‘Bring us a dozen each, grilled,’ he said to the waiter. ‘Then we’ll look at the menu.’

As the waiter went off, Barrey said, ‘Their grilled oysters are to die for.’

‘OK.’

Barrey glanced around, as if desperately seeking another table, out of the sun, more out of earshot, but the place was full. He checked out the diners on either side. On the left was a table for two, with a couple of lovers canoodling over lobster thermidors. On the right were four businessmen having a lunch meeting. He leaned forward and lowered his voice. ‘So, OK, you have a proposition for me, I’m all ears. What’s left of them anyway,’ he added with a strange little laugh.

‘I kind of left it a little late in life to go into business but I thought, you know, hey, too late is when you’re dead! Maybe I still have time to cash in on my experiences — and in particular the contacts that I’ve made over my years in law enforcement.’

‘As you told me over the phone. And you know, don’t you, that Colonel Sanders didn’t start his fried chicken business until he was in his seventies. You look like you’ve got a few years on him, yet.’

‘Know that old gardening joke?’ Sorokin replied. ‘A guy asks a landscaping expert when’s the best time to plant a tree. The expert replies, “Twenty years ago.”’

Barrey gave him a meagre apology for a smile, shelling it out like he was dropping a coin into a homeless person’s cap. They were distracted as the champagne arrived and they waited until it was poured before resuming. This time Sorokin’s voice was quieter.

‘A former golfing buddy in the US got badly rinsed by a lady he met on an internet dating agency. Six hundred and fifty thousand bucks.’ He watched Barrey’s face but it was impossible, with his eyes behind the dark lenses, to read it. ‘He asked me to use my police connections to look into the world of internet romance scammers and I found they’re mostly out of Ghana and Eastern Europe. To my surprise, I found there are few real players in the US. That’s when the idea first popped for me. I realized with all the organized crime connections I’d made over the years that there was a real business opportunity, both to set up a scamming business myself and, hand in hand with it, a money-laundering channel.’

He could still read nothing in Barrey’s face.

‘Then your name came up on an FBI list of persons of interest in the cybercrime fraud world.’

Barrey still gave no visible reaction at all.

‘So, I’m here to offer you the opportunity to expand your empire into the United States, if that’s of interest?’

‘How do I know I can trust you?’

‘I guess I should ask you the same question, Mr Barrey.’

‘The future in internet romance is vast, Mr Sorokin. There’s a limitless supply of mostly older people desperate for love. We’re talking a market worth billions. If you opened up the US for me, we could be making more money than either of us could ever spend.’

‘And how do we stay out of jail?’

‘By being untraceable of course — as I am.’

‘Really? If you are so untraceable, how come I found you so easily?’

‘You might have found me, Mr Sorokin, but have you found any evidence that I’ve committed any crime?’ Barrey looked at him intently and triumphantly. ‘Well?’

‘Clearly you’ve hidden your activities very cleverly.’

Two large dishes with hot oysters grilled in their shells in a cream sauce arrived. Barrey tucked his napkin into the top of his shirt, all focus, momentarily, on his food. ‘You like turbot?’ he asked Sorokin.

‘Sure.’

He told the waiter to bring them both turbot and a bowl of Jersey Royal potatoes. As the waiter moved away, he addressed Sorokin again.

‘As you know, I operate through a network of nominee companies around the world, all springing from my bases in Ghana and Nigeria. The internet fraud and the money laundering run in parallel. I’ve a string of legitimate financial services companies that everything’s fronted through.’

‘So is PerfectPartners.net one of your targets?’

After a moment’s hesitation, Barrey said, ‘One of. Why do you ask about that one in particular — is that the one that your buddy got caught on? Maybe if we do business, I can find a way to get your buddy paid back — how much was it?’

‘Six hundred and fifty thousand bucks, give or take.’

‘No big deal.’

‘It is to him. It’s everything he has — or had — in the world.’

Barrey’s phone made a soft, staccato noise. Raising an apologetic hand, he answered the call. ‘Yeah? What? That’s... that’s... is he just having a laugh on me?’ His voice was becoming increasingly loud. ‘Jesus H — Christ, I don’t believe this. Sort it!’ He killed the call, shoving his phone back in his pocket, looking furious.

‘Bad news?’ Sorokin asked.

‘What’s that got to do with you?’

‘Quite a lot, actually.’

Barrey stared at him. ‘Huh?’

‘You see, Mr Barrey, it wasn’t just my pal who got screwed out of money on your website scam, it was me, also.’ Sorokin looked at him levelly. ‘Ninety-seven thousand and sixty-three bucks and forty-two cents, to be precise. Are you going to give that back to me, too?’

Barrey’s whole demeanour suddenly changed, his lips forming an ugly snarl. His body shifted and Sorokin saw his arm, with his hand concealed by his napkin, drop below the table. ‘Just what is your game, Mr Sorokin?’

‘I’ve come here to get even with you, you fat bastard. To level the score.’

‘Is that so?’

‘Yep, that’s about the size of it.’

For an instant, Barrey’s confidence evaporated and he looked wracked with uncertainty. ‘You’ve not invited me here to discuss a business deal at all, have you?’

‘You’re catching on, fatso. I’ve come here to nail you and see you brought to justice.’

‘And how exactly do you intend doing that?’

‘Quite simply. Down in the street below, this place is surrounded by Jersey States Police officers.’ Sorokin pulled open his suit jacket to reveal his wiretap.

Barrey stared at him in disbelief and rising anger. ‘You’ve fucking tricked me, you sack of shit.’

‘That’s pretty rich, coming from you, Barrey. How many hundreds of people have you tricked out of their savings?’

‘I’ll tell you something you don’t know, Mr Smartass former New York cop. There’s no law in Jersey preventing ownership of handguns — just like in your country. I have one under the table now, pointed at your crotch. Call off the cops this second or I’ll blow your nuts off.’ Looking panic-stricken, he turned and signalled to a table where two large men were seated.

They rose and began walking over.

Sorokin seized the opportunity and upended the table into Barrey’s lap, at the same time lunging forward, putting his arm round the back of Barrey’s head and pulling his face into a bowl of scalding oysters, hearing the crunch of breaking glasses and shells.

Barrey twisted away, more agilely than Sorokin had anticipated, and rolled into the table of the two lovers, sending their lobsters and wine glasses flying.

As Sorokin lunged after him he saw the two henchmen closing on him. He spun, headbutting one and kicking the other, hard, shattering his knee. Barrey clambered to his feet, stumbled and crashed into a table, sending a seafood tower flying. As the former detective reached him, oblivious to the shocked faces of diners and waiters, Barrey grabbed a bottle from an ice bucket and swung it at him. Sorokin ducked. Barrey swung it again, this time catching him a glancing blow in the face with it, dazing him and propelling him reeling into yet another table, sending more glasses and dishes to the floor.

As he crawled back onto his hands and knees, half blinded with pain, he saw Barrey, minus his Stetson, wig askew, lumbering towards the exit. He reached it several seconds after Barrey had vanished through it, determined, totally determined, the bastard wasn’t getting away. As he ran down the first flight of stairs he heard a voice below him yell, ‘Stop, police! Put your gun down. Put your gun down or we shoot! Drop your gun and put your hands in the air where we can see them.’

Turning a corner in the stairwell he saw Barrey below him drop his gun, and it clattered down the steps.

Directly below were four police officers in body armour, helmets and vizors, two aiming automatic rifles, two pointing handguns.

Barrey raised his arms in the air.

Sorokin stood still for a moment. Then, he couldn’t resist it, he carried on down until he was right behind Barrey, leaned forward and spoke quietly into his ear. ‘Guess I’m never going to see my money back now. But I tell you what — this moment, it’s worth every damned cent just to see this. And if you want the really bad news, I’m told they don’t serve grilled oysters in British jails, so eat the one that’s still stuck to your forehead and savour the taste — you’re gonna have to make that last a while.’