The Death Trust

THIRTY-ONE

Alu Radakov.” I dropped the name as we drove down the highway to K-town in a borrowed OSI vehicle. “Ever heard of him?” I pulled the postcard of the Eiffel Tower from my breast pocket and handed it to Masters. She turned it over a couple of times.

“Radakov. No. Should I have?”

“He’s a Latvian who deals in sex slaves.”

“Nice. Friend of yours?”

“He’s the man who owned the girly bar Varvara worked in called The Bump. She mentioned it when we first interviewed her. I think he sold Varvara to General Scott. The postcard’s from her, by the way.”

“Hang on, Varvara was sold? As a sex slave to Abraham Scott?”

“She didn’t say as much, but she insisted she and the general weren’t lovers.”

“With what?”

“Some things she said, and the fact that Scott was investigating the smuggling of sex slaves into Europe.”

“Because of one Internet download? Bit of a stretch, don’t you think?”

“Maybe. It’s my gut speaking.”

Masters gave the postcard a closer inspection. “Back at OSI, you didn’t want to mention this postcard was from her. Why not? Don’t you trust Bishop?”

“Yeah, I trust him, but, as far as the world is concerned, Varvara has disappeared. She kept her end of the bargain. I think we should keep ours.”

“So what’s your gut saying about this people-smuggler, Alu Radakov?”

“That we need to go see him.” I’d been trying to recall the details of the après-sex confessional Varvara and I had shared. If my memory served me correctly, Radakov had another business aside from running a lap-dance bar in Riga, Varvara’s hometown. In his downtime, he slipped into the role of Chechen rebel.

“Uh-huh.” I caught Masters’s tone. She was less than impressed. “Anything else you’d care to tell me? Any other details you’ve failed to mention?”

“No, not that I’m aware of.”

“What about the watch?”

“What about it?”

“Why aren’t you putting it into evidence? There’d be skin, hair fibers we could—”

“Look, the guys that jumped us are military or ex-military. Either way, I’d bet you this watch that there’s no record of those guys ever being born, let alone having a nice, handy DNA signature we could compare that’s lying around in some cyber filing cabinet. Fuck it. Call it a spoil of war.” I was working myself up. Those assholes had tried to kill us. But Masters was right. I should have entered the watch into evidence and run DNA tests, even if for future reference. I had a feeling, though, that the original owner and I would run into each other again some day, and I wanted the pleasure of bringing him down with it on my wrist.

We’d turned off the highway and down the exit ramp to K-town. Masters said, “Those highlighted flights to Riga in the Ramstein ATC logs. My gut’s telling me they’re connected to this.”

I nodded. Masters was pointing out the obvious. They undoubtedly were connected, but we still had no idea why or how. Whatever the answers, the questions were big enough to get Scott, a four-star general, concerned enough to get up and go to Riga personally. A four-star general investigating? That in itself was highly irregular. I made a mental note to ask Bishop to look into the aircrews on those flights. Some of them might still be flying out of Ramstein. The investigation was reaching the point where the same names and places were beginning to turn up, but through new and different connections. A pattern was emerging.

The beginnings of K-town slid past. It was getting close to 1930 hours. We began to pass joggers, military personnel for the most part, identified by their youth and hair buzzed down to the scalp. The Black Forest lay ahead, like a big welcome mat to the blue-gray granite hills beyond. Masters appeared to be deep in thought. She was thinking, most probably, like I was — about how to handle Harmony Scott. We were getting close to the widow’s lair. So far, neither of us had managed to extract anything from her that she didn’t want us to know. “I’ll follow your lead,” Masters said suddenly.

“Sorry?” I said.

“Your lead. You direct the questioning. I’ll look for holes.”

“Just don’t go too hard on the widow, when you see one of them big ol’ holes opening up,” I warned.

Anna Masters replied by giving my leg a friendly punch. I glanced at her to make sure that’s exactly what it was — friendly — and I was rewarded by a smile, and something else I couldn’t quite put my finger on.

I turned into Harmony Scott’s street. It looked the same as the last time I was here — unwelcoming.

“Shit,” said Masters.

“What?”

“That BMW parked out front of her house.”

“What about it?” I said. One Beemer looked like every other Beemer in my book, and they were everywhere in Germany — almost as ubiquitous as Mercedes-Benzes.

“I know who owns it.”

I gave the eagle-and-deer knocker a workout. The front door eased open and a waft of chill air rushed out. I had the image of an old tomb with a curse on it being opened. The air held a complex array of odors, a mix of Harmony Scott: the tang of cigarettes, French perfume, blended whiskey, cosmetics, and something that was familiar in a distant kind of way, like a face you see once in a crowd and then again a month later but in a different, unrelated gathering. The smell was vanilla and pine. I’d noted it before when I’d been here, but I hadn’t nailed it at the time. Now I knew what it was. It was the smell of General von Koeppen. I remembered it from being in his office, a cross between aftershave and trough drops — those things they throw in the bottom of urinals in public toilets.

I wasn’t sure but I think I detected the very slightest surprise in the widow when she opened the door, like maybe she was seeing a ghost. “Yes, can I help you?” she said. The loose skin under her chin quivered as she spoke. She looked up at me with those gray ice-pick eyes of hers; the color of snow clouds and battleships. She was wearing beige slacks and a white cotton shirt. On her feet were sandals; her exposed toenails were painted red. This was a different Harmony Scott from the one I’d previously met. She was almost feminine. The slacks were tight and the shirt was also body-hugging, the top buttons undone, revealing the hint of a white lace pushup bra doing what it could to plump up her small breasts into the rumor of cleavage. Her hair was loose this time. It fell to her shoulders, was newly dyed blond, and tousled rather than pulled tight and wound on top of her head. I noticed that her small figure was well proportioned and, in the right light, her forty-eight years could pass for thirty-eight. But this wasn’t that light. Her face was still expressionless. There was, no doubt, enough toxin injected beneath the skin to tip the hunting arrows of half the tribes of the Amazon Basin.

“Special Agent Cooper and Special Agent Masters,” I said, holding up the badge where she could see it. “We have a few further questions we’d like to ask you about your husband’s death.”

“I know who you are,” she said. “Will it take long?”

“That depends on the answers, ma’am,” I replied.

“But the investigation is closed, Special Agent,” said a man’s voice as a shadow stepped out from a doorway off the hall.

“General von Koeppen,” I said, feigning surprise. “Special Agent Masters and I are just cleaning up a few loose ends, sir. Do you mind if we come in, ma’am?”

Harmony Scott hesitated.

“We could continue this out on your front porch, if you’d rather,” I said. In other words, lady, we can do this in private or we can put on a show for your neighbors. Harmony might not have been prepared to let us know she had company, but Himmler’s presence there required some explanation. I couldn’t wait to hear it.

“Come in,” she said, holding the door open for us. We stepped into the hall and then followed her when she walked past. Von Koeppen brought up the rear.

Harmony led us down the cockroach hallway and then into what I guessed was a sitting room. It held a collection of antique chairs — gold frames with green velour upholstery — and a couple of heavy black leather Chesterfields.

“Are you okay? You both appear to have been in a fight,” she said, glancing at me and then Masters, whose face was also still carrying cuts with stitches.

“Yeah,” I said, “the Special Agent and I have been playing full-contact debating.”

More old farts looked out in judgment from the walls. I wondered whether these were General Scott and Harmony’s paintings or whether they’d just walked in to this furnished museum and plugged their electric toothbrushes into the bathroom’s wall socket. Empty boxes were stacked against one wall. Harmony didn’t appear in any hurry to get them packed. Perhaps she had a good reason to hang around. And I now believed I knew what, or rather who, that reason was.

“Can I offer either of you a drink?” she asked. “You both look like you could use one.”

The offer threw me. A drink? I noticed a quart of Maker’s Mark in her collection of bottles — a worthy stand-in for my usual brands of choice. I believe I actually licked my lips. I’d made a pact with myself after my last hangover that I’d give the booze a miss for a while. It annoyed me that Harmony was the person tempting me to break that agreement. Masters said no, snapping me out of the trance, and I likewise declined. Harmony shrugged and fixed herself a Scotch on the rocks, extracting the ice from a bucket with gold tongs, and then poured von Koeppen a Pernod. Next, she tapped out a cigarette from a packet of Salems lying on the cabinet and lit it with a gold-and-pearl lighter, blowing a mushroom of blue haze toward the ceiling. She took one of the chairs and directed Masters and me to the Chesterfield opposite. Von Koeppen chose to remain standing. “I’ll repeat the question,” said the widow. “How can I help you?”

Beneath the attempt at civility was still the fuck-you superiority that seemed to be her normal disposition. I said, “Mrs. Scott, why didn’t you inform us that Peyton was not your son, but your stepson?”

Without missing a beat she replied, “Because you didn’t ask the question, Special Agent Cooper. If I’m not mistaken, as an investigator the questions are your job. And besides, what difference does it make? Peyton was my son. I’ve known him and loved him since he was three years old. He wasn’t my son genetically speaking, but in every other sense he most certainly was.”

Her answer was perfectly reasonable, and yet I couldn’t help but feel that there was about as much emotion in it as there was in her facial expression. And, of course, there was Ambrose’s assertion that Peyton thought his stepmother was, well, “evil.”

And then Masters pitched in with her own question, the one we’d mulled over when she’d seen von Koeppen’s car parked out front. “General, how long have you and Mrs. Scott been having an affair?” If nothing else, as an attention-getter it was a much better opening than mine. So much for Masters filling in the holes.

“I beg your pardon?” said von Koeppen, his face instantly flushing streetlight red and his carotid artery throbbing. His mouth opened and closed like a fish that suddenly found itself outside the bowl.

“Please answer the question,” I said, backing Masters’s lead. There were any number of other reasons why General Wolfgang von Koeppen might have called in on Harmony Scott, and not one had them banging each other’s lights out. Still, we had nothing to lose by asking, excepting our commissions, of course. I said, “We believe General Scott was murdered — there’s some question about the authenticity of the suicide note. We also believe Peyton was murdered rather than killed in action and that somehow the two killings are connected. Love, lust, call it what you like, is a statistically common motive in homicide.

“Therefore, we need to know how long you two have been seeing each other because, whether you like it or not, your relationship is relevant to the investigation.” I kept my eye on Harmony Scott during this flurry of body punches. I’d just told her that I believed her to be involved in the deaths of her husband and son. Yet Harmony managed to stay utterly calm. She put down her drink and cigarette, and clasped those small, white, bony hands that reminded me of chicken’s feet on her crossed leg. She didn’t swallow, lick her lips, or even blink more than was necessary to keep her icy eyes moistened. I couldn’t help but admire her control. But in that moment I knew for sure she was involved in this case in a deeply disturbing way, for in my experience even a totally innocent person will get jumpy and anxious when wrongly accused. And, of course, there was that suicide note. Where did it come from? How did it miraculously come to appear days after the general’s death?

“That is an outrageous accusation!” Von Koeppen’s face was now the color of a bruised plum. “I will see that you are court-martialed, do you hear me?”

I heard him, as had anyone a block away. He’d reacted exactly as I’d thought he would. No doubt I would be getting an abusive call from Gruyere any moment. But I also knew that Harmony Scott was the only person we had who was anything like a suspect, even though we had not a single shred of evidence to connect her with any crime. Masters and I needed to jerk the cord to see if anything fell out.

Harmony reasserted her control with a squeeze of her lover’s hand and replied with infinite calm, “Who could have forged the note, Special Agent?”

Odd — she’d completely skipped over Peyton. “We’re working on that,” I answered, holding her gaze. There was only one person who had the access, and I was looking at her.

She sipped her drink and the ice cubes shifted noisily. She said, “Wolfgang and I have been seeing each other for six months.” She ran her hand along the top of her leg, and smoothed over the crease pressed into her pants. “Abraham had been involved with his mistress for some time by then. Everyone was doing what he or she wanted to do. The arrangement suited all parties. And now General von Koeppen and I would appreciate your discretion. Just as my husband’s extramarital partnership was kept in the background, so we’ve attempted — and will continue — to do the same.”

Jesus. Without a doubt, she was one cool bitch. She had completely ignored my accusation and had instead weighed up the odds and given Masters and me a little honesty, just enough perhaps to prick the bubble of suspicion. Of course we’ve been fucking each other purple, Major, as were my husband and his squeeze. Everyone knew what was going on. We’re all adults here. “Why didn’t you tell us all this last week, Mrs. Scott?”

“As I said, you’re the investigator.” She shrugged. “Besides, an affair is not the sort of thing one willingly talks about, is it?”

I said, “I don’t seem to recall you having any difficulties informing me of your husband’s infidelity.”

Harmony answered with a tilt of her head and a shrug that together implied her husband was dead and so nothing would hurt him.

Despite von Koeppen’s outrage, I think he was relieved. He’d been let off the hook. His lover had taken on the responsibility of confessing the affair for both of them, so he didn’t have to. It was easy to see who wore the pants in their relationship. The general moved behind Harmony and put his hand on her shoulder. Harmony patted it. I wondered if he knew how much danger he was in.

He said, “So, are you accusing us of murder, Cooper?”

“Special Agent.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“You can call me Special Agent,” I said.

The artery began pulsing in his neck again. Satisfied that I had won the tussle, I said, “No. But I will get a search warrant and have your phone and bank records reviewed.” This was a dangerous game Masters and I were playing. You can ask general officers to address you correctly, but you can’t go around accusing them of killing people. Fuck it, I decided. “And while I’m on the subject, sir, why would Captain Aleveldt, Scott’s gliding pal, be calling you on your direct line at HQ?”

“I talk to many people. I run the base, remember?” he said. The plumbing above his shirt collar was now working overtime. I hoped he wasn’t going to spring a leak.

My partner was quiet. She was thinking, and I knew what about. At first, Masters had found it hard to believe that von Koeppen was having his sausage sauced by Harmony Scott. And that wasn’t necessarily just the resentment of the man’s former girlfriend talking. I remembered his PA, Sergeant Fischer, saying von Koeppen’s interests lay primarily in young skirt. Harmony Scott was a couple of years older than he was. So was there something else in it for Heinrich Himmler? Advancement? Money? Position? I certainly believed him capable of being the gigolo type.

Harmony stood. She walked to the liquor cabinet to freshen her Scotch. “So who do you think killed my husband, Special Agent? And why do you think Peyton was murdered?”

Harmony had changed tack again and the shift was seamless. I wouldn’t have been at all surprised if she shifted once more, became the distraught mother and wife, produced a white hanky, and began dabbing the corners of her eyes. There was just enough concern about the fate of her husband and son to make it believable. Almost. I didn’t believe the show. I considered, again, how different this Harmony Scott was from the woman I’d met on my two previous visits. It wasn’t just that she seemed more relaxed; she’d also sloughed off the ferocity, the aggression. My attitude had changed toward her, too. I realized I was also no longer concerned for her safety.

“We are currently chasing down a number of leads,” I said. “We’d also like to have another look at your husband’s records and his computer.”

Harmony replied, “Certainly. More than happy to help.”

“Good, we’ll secure them first thing in the morning.”

I removed my notebook from a thigh pocket, flipped it open to a blank page, and made out like I had a bunch of questions written down there. “Mrs. Scott,” I said, “do you have any idea why General Scott was so interested in traveling to Riga?”

Harmony began to shake her head and then von Koeppen said, “Latvia is a relatively new member of NATO. I believe he took a personal interest in bringing them into the fold.”

“Yeah, that could be it,” I said, but I doubted it. Why Latvia? Why not Lithuania or Estonia? Or all three? They were all relatively new to the NATO club. What was so special about Latvia that Scott had to get on a plane and go there not once but several times? Was it just because that’s where Varvara lived? No, his interest in her had come along later. “Mrs. Scott? Any ideas?”

“No, none at all.”

I scribbled a bit of nonsense on the page, then said, “Has either of you heard of a man named Alu Radakov?”

“Sounds like a tennis player,” Harmony said.

“He’s a people-smuggler.”

“Oh. And why would we have heard of him?”

Harmony knew all about General Scott’s girlfriend. She even knew he’d put her up in an apartment. Was it possible she didn’t know where Varvara had come from, and under what circumstances? Not likely. “Did General Scott ever talk about people smuggling?” I asked.

Harmony returned a blank stare, but I couldn’t determine how much of it was truly due to the Botox and how much was acting. Von Koeppen was a different matter, however. He was as open as an Amsterdam brothel. He rubbed his chin and said that he didn’t. He was lying.

“Did you know that General Scott’s girlfriend was brought into Germany from Riga, probably on a military aircraft, and with a false passport?”

“No, I most certainly did not!” he said indignantly.

“Mrs. Scott,” I said, “did you ever meet Helen Wakeley, Abraham’s first wife?” I knew the answer I’d get before I asked the question, but I wanted her to know that we were looking way back and maybe digging around in things she would prefer were left alone.

“No. Helen had died long before Abraham and I met.” If I didn’t know better, I’d have sworn I’d caught the widow frowning.

“For the record, where did you meet?”

“At one of those endless D.C. functions.”

“Was it while Abraham was working as military attaché at the Kremlin?”

“Yes. What’s all this got to do with your investigation, Special Agent?”

“Probably nothing,” I said, meaning it. I consulted my notebook again. “Mrs. Scott, after Peyton died, the general took some time off. He went to Iraq for a couple of days to look into the circumstances of his son’s death. We also know he went to Riga for about a week. There is still some time unaccounted for. Do you know where he might have gone?”

Harmony appeared to be giving my question some serious consideration. Finally, she shook her head. “No, no idea. Abraham and I hadn’t talked much for some time. He rarely provided me with an itinerary.”

If she knew, would she tell me? I only had one question remaining. I took a breath and asked it. “Has either of you heard of a group called The Establishment?”

“The establishment…” von Koeppen echoed, scratching his head with two fingers. “No…”

“The establishment? As in established society? The status quo? Of course I have,” said Harmony.

“No, I mean a specific ‘The Establishment,’ Mrs. Scott — a secret quasi-government black-ops organization that kills people, among them possibly your husband and stepson.”

“Absurd,” said von Koeppen.

“Is that where you’ve been going with all this? You’re on the trail of some kind of international plot?” There was derision in Harmony Scott’s voice.

I wanted to tell her that, yes, that’s exactly what I believed. I believed Abraham was killed to protect some secret, and that Peyton was murdered as a warning to his father to keep it. I also believed that this mystery group, The Establishment, was cleaning house, cutting back the numbers on the need-to-know list, killing people father and son might have talked to — desperate to keep its existence secret. I wanted to tell her that I believed she was part of The Establishment, this organization, this club. Whatever, a member. My phone began to vibrate against my leg. I pulled it out and recognized the number on the screen. I excused myself and walked to a corner of the room. “What’s up?” I said. It was Bishop.

“Sir, we’ve managed to crack into the second Dungeon level. One of the programmers contacted us and gave us the key.”

“Great. What’ve you got for us?”

“Sir, you’re not going to believe this if I simply tell you about it. You have to see it.”

It was also, apparently, something we needed to see in a hurry. We concluded the interview without complaint from either Harmony Scott or von Koeppen, though I was certain the general would make one to Gruyere about us at the earliest opportunity. Masters and I made it back to Ramstein in record time.