First Class Killing

Chapter 30

EVEN WITHOUT THE ROBIN’S-EGG-BLUE JACKET, he wouldn’t have been hard to spot. He was twice the width of any two people sitting on the benches around him, and he wore a smartly coordinated tam. Based on the data points I had collected so far, I imagined the Djuro Bulatovic closet to be a tidy repository of pastel, home to a disciplined row of ecru, dusty rose, mint green, and lavender sport jackets, all with muted silk linings, each as big as a sleeping bag.

He read his newspaper and never looked up. He seemed content to wait for my approach. The only problem was, I was having a hard time putting myself within the radius of his lightning-fast reach.

But there were plenty of people around on the street, many of them late-season tourists moving in the direction of the Prudential Center, embarkation point for the ubiquitous duck tours. It was the perfect low-humidity, light jacket day for such an outing.

The first step out to the sidewalk was the hardest. Then I put my head down, jaywalked across the street, and inched up to the man who had terrorized me…and saved me. When I was close enough to read his newspaper, he folded it and put it on his lap.

“Thank you for coming,” he said. “I brought you soup for lunch. Goulash. It’s good. Thick.” He pointed to the two cardboard cartons next to him on the bench. Steam curled up from the holes in the lids.

“You brought me soup?”

“Goulash. Did you want for us to take the tour? I wasn’t sure when you said to meet here. I bought tickets in case that was your intention.”

Goulash and a duck tour. He wasn’t exactly making me cower. The moon-shaped face, thick eyebrows, and sledgehammer forehead-they were all there, but now arranged in an expression that was deferential, almost gentle.

“I’ll skip the duck ride.” In spite of everything that had happened the night before, I had finally gotten a good night’s sleep. I’d spent the morning taking a long hot bath to soothe my aching muscles. I had no desire to go on an open-air, amphibious crawl through the crowded city streets of Boston and up the Charles River. “I don’t know where Monica is.”

“That is not,” he said, “why I wanted to see you.”

“Then what do you want?”

“Only to talk.”

“Why would I talk to you? You almost killed me.”

“No.” He was greatly offended. “I did not. I was asked to send a message in a forceful way. Did you get the message?”

“In the most forceful way. Except you gave it to the wrong person.”

“Yes.” His hands were on his knees and his large head tilted at an attitude of true contrition. “I’m sorry I hurt you. I hope I helped you last night.”

“You did.” I shoved my hands into my pockets. “Thank you for that.”

“Please, sit.”

I did, although it took a few seconds. I was still pretty creaky. “I assume you haven’t found Monica and that’s why you were there last night. You’re still looking for her.”

“Yes. I was watching for her when those two men came.” He dismissed them with a snort. “Amateurs.”

“Are these amateurs still breathing?”

“Of course. We had a discussion.”

“You didn’t happen to get who they worked for?”

“This is not what we discussed. We spoke about what would happen if they bothered you or Monica again. That is how a professional approaches work. Not with a gun.”

I tried to peek under his jacket. I couldn’t see it, but I had to believe he had a weapon of his very own. “This is what you do, then? You-”

“I make sure that debts are paid and agreements are honored.”

“For Arthur Margolies?”

“For many clients. He is one.”

He seemed pretty forthcoming, so I pressed on. “Is Monica blackmailing him with sex tapes? Is that why you’re after her?”

“Yes. She made them with a secret camera and she is trying to sell them back to him. I was asked to intervene.”

I knew it. This had to be Monica’s bright idea. Angel was too smart to cannibalize her own business. “But you don’t know what she looks like? I mean, how could you mix us up?”

He seemed pained to be reminded of his gaffe. “I have never seen the videos. My client deleted them.”

Or so he thought. “Then how were you supposed to find her?”

“I was told to follow a man, that he would lead me to her.”

“Told by your client?”

“Yes.”

“Any idea how he knew which man?”

“No.”

That was curious. Why wouldn’t he have his guy set up on Monica’s hotel? Why the trick’s hotel? Maybe he didn’t know where she would be staying, but somehow did know who her date would be. How would he know that? I was pretty sure the reverend wasn’t in league with Arthur Margolies. Maybe he had inside information. Maybe he got Monica to tell him herself. Maybe she was senior enough to know in advance who her guy was. And maybe there was no way I could answer any of these questions myself.

“I don’t suppose you would hook me up so I could talk to Arthur Margolies?”

“Why?”

“I have questions for him.”

“I cannot let you speak to Mr. Margolies.”

Figured. “Who is he, anyway?”

He shook his head. “It was not his fault. It was a sloppy error on my part, for which you paid the price. Once again, I offer my sincerest apologies.” He picked up one of the cartons. “And soup.”

When he offered it to me, I remembered the glass of water on the night table in Chicago and the neatly made bed in which I had found myself. I accepted his steaming offering of peace.

The carton had some weight to it and felt warm in my hands. I lifted the lid. It smelled absolutely rejuvenating and made me realize how famished I was. When he offered a plastic spoon from his pocket, I snagged it and dug in, proving just how easy it is to win me over.

“Are you from Bosnia?”

He had the kind of face that transformed completely with a smile. “How did you know?”

“You’re reading a paper from Sarajevo, and I can’t pronounce your name.”

“I am from Dubrovnik. You can call me Bo.”

“How do you say your name?”

What he said sounded like “Juro Boolahtovitch.” He seemed pleased that I’d asked. When I finished, he nudged the second carton into my space without even looking at me.

“You’ve paid your debt,” I said.

“It is yours. Please, what else can I do for you?”

This was an opportunity I didn’t want to waste. Not the soup, but the offer of support. “I need to find Monica. I need to talk to her.”

“She is not at work,” he said. “She is not at home, and no one knows where to find her.”

“Do you think…I mean, would your client have done something to her? Or had someone else do something to her?”

“No. He left it to me to handle. He does not want her hurt. Only to understand that what she was doing was not acceptable.”

I watched one of the duck boats, a dark purple one namedBeantown Bettie, chug out of the parking lot and merge into the heavy flow on Boylston. It was fully loaded in October, which spoke to the inexplicable popularity of these cheesy tours.

“Bo?”

“Yes.”

“When did you figure out that I wasn’t Monica?”

“In Chicago. I looked at your driver’s license.”

“After I passed out.”

“Yes.”

“So if your client had wanted me dead, I would be dead?”

He let his gaze drift up to the clouds. “I do not see any point in making hypotheticals. He did not, and you are not.” He looked at my face and then my throat. “I remain in your debt.”

He was clearly a man of high standards-attacking the wrong victim being a definite violation-and proud of his adherence to them. There was something in there worth trusting.

“Does that mean you would be willing to do me a favor?”

“I would need to know one thing,” he said. “Why did you not call the police in Chicago?”

“It was not in my best interest to get the authorities involved.”

“Is it because you do what Monica does?”

“Am I a prostitute?”

“No,” he asked. “Are you a blackmailer? Is that why you want to see Mr. Margolies?”

“No. I’m not a blackmailer, and I’m not a prostitute. I’m looking for Monica because I need to find people she’s working with. I’m trying to break up the prostitution ring.”

“Tell me what you need.”

“Can you get me the e-mails that delivered Monica’s video to your client?”

“I have them. He sent them all to me.”

“Good. Here’s what I’d like for you to do.”

I called Harvey on my way up to New Hampshire. He had left four messages for me. There was only so long I could avoid him, and, given our new spirit of sharing and cooperation, I had to brief him on my night in the North End. He took it remarkably well.

“This man,” he asked, “this Bosnian, he helped you?”

“I told you he wasn’t after me. He’s looking for Monica, one of many people looking for Monica. He’s going to help me find her.”

“Who were the other two men?”

“No idea. My best guess would be that they worked for some other client of hers that she’s trying to extort.”

“My word. Where are you off to now?”

“I’m going up to New Hampshire to meet Angel. She has a cabin up there.”

“You are aware, are you not, that we are almost out of time. This will no doubt be your last chance to see her before the review.”

“I know. I’m going to really push to meet her programmer. If I can’t get her to agree, I’ve got something working with Felix. Beyond that, I’m out of ideas.”

“Be careful,” he said. “Please keep me posted. Let me know you are safe.”

“I will.”

“And thank you for telling me about last night.”

“Sure. Thanks for not yelling at me.” I hung up.

He hadn’t said a word about her, so how come all I could think about was Robin Sevitch?