Final Target

CHAPTER 49

G age called Alex Z into his office after driving in from Stymie’s.

“What’s up, boss?” Alex Z said as he dropped into a chair.

Gage got up from behind his desk and walked to an easel, marker in hand.

“I need your help thinking this through.”

He started a fresh charting of the players, drawing arrows showing the known relationships.

“We know how everybody connects together except for Matson, Alla, and Gravilov,” Gage said, then stepped back from the chart.

“Three people can all meet each other in six different sequences,” Alex Z said, shaking his head. “And when you factor in all of the rest, you spin off into infinity.”

“That’s exactly the problem,” Gage said. “Too many moving parts.”

Alex Z made a show of looking around the office. At the bookcases lined with files, the fireproof safes anchored to the floor, and a network server containing millions of scanned documents. “I thought those were the only kinds of cases you did.”

“But this one we need to simplify before it gets away from us.”

Gage crossed his arms across his chest. “Let’s start at the beginning. Who introduced whom?” He glanced at Alex Z’s SatTek chronology hanging from the wall, then back at the chart. “Matson travels to London just before the IPO, he hooks up with Alla…or she hooks up with him…Why? Was she looking to snag him? Or maybe they meet by chance…In any case, he brags. He says ‘I’ve got an IPO coming up,’ and she calls Budapest to tell her gangster daddy.” Gage pointed at the lines connecting Matson, Alla, and Gravilov. “What did Granger say?… Sometimes children grow up and do things you never expected in your wildest imagination…Gage looked at Alex Z. “What does Granger do when he figures it out-whatever it was? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. He’s unhappy, maybe about not getting a cut, but he has to keep his mouth shut. He can’t snitch off Matson without snitching off himself.”

“You think Matson has told the government about Gravilov?” Alex Z asked.

Gage repeated the question aloud, then shook his head and smiled. “That’s it. That’s exactly what Granger had to trade. And what shocked the hell out of him was that Matson had the balls to deal directly with a gangster at Gravilov’s level.” He looked again at the Granger circle, now transfixed. “Wait a second…Wait a second.”

Alex Z’s eyes followed Gage as if he was a high-wire artist balancing over a canyon.

Gage flipped the marker back and forth between his hands a few times, then stopped and looked at Alex Z. “If Granger had lived long enough to tell Peterson that Matson and Gravilov were working together, then Matson would’ve been no good to the government. It would’ve busted Matson’s plea deal because he got caught lying. Peterson couldn’t use him. A jury would never believe a word he said.”

“Then Peterson gives Granger a chance to work off some time.”

“Exactly. Granger could give up everybody Matson could. And he’s untainted. He steps in and pushes Matson out of the way. Matson does the hard time and Granger gets no more than a couple of years.”

“So Matson kills Granger?”

Gage shook his head. “I don’t see a runt like him killing anybody. He’s got somebody protecting him, maybe somebody sent by Gravilov…And whoever is behind the murder of Granger is also behind the murders of the Fitzhughs and the attempt on Jack and the burglary at his office.”

“But why Mr. Burch?”

“He knows something. Fitzhugh and Matson asked him to set up TAMS Limited, the company that owns the London flat. Maybe Matson used Tarasova-Alla-Matson-Stuart Limited for whatever deal he had with Gravilov. Him and Alla working together…”

Gage paused as a shudder passed through his body, an image of Burch, weak and vulnerable, appeared in his mind. “It could be a lot worse. Jack may know something he doesn’t realize he knows.”

Gage tossed the marking pen onto his desk and surveyed the chart and the chronology hanging next to it.

“I have a feeling that regardless of whether this all started with Alla meeting Matson by chance or with her targeting him,” Gage finally said, “it’ll end up at the same place.”

“Where’s that?”

“I don’t know yet. But we’ve got to get there before they do.”