The Negotiator: A Novel of Suspense Read online

  “Did I say you were dangerous?”

  “You were in my bathroom, pointing a weapon at me. That’s a pretty good indication of what you were thinking. Plus you were waiting for me there, behind the shower curtain, because if I’m in the bathroom, I’m going to be vulnerable. I’m going to be taking a shower or using the toilet, which gives you a clear advantage. Which meant you planned to come in here by yourself, without backup. So who the hell are you?”

  “I’m FBI.”

  “Oh, please.”

  “My ID’s upstairs, in my slacks, hanging over a shower rod.”

  “All right, then. I will admit you’re skilled.” I leaned over my center kitchen counter. “You got in here without me noticing any of my telltales being disturbed. Not bad.”

  “It was pretty simple,” she said. “I got in through the front door.”

  “Your lock picking skills are pretty good,” I said. “That particular lock was designed by a locksmith who said it was nearly unpickable.”

  “And my research into you and the locksmith you used four years back are even better,” she said. “It’s amazing what information and what keys will be made when certain pressures are applied, especially if you’ve invited the IRS to join in the fun.”

  That got my attention. I hadn’t thought about that happening, and I don’t like being surprised.

  “I try not to be cynical, but ma’am, you are doing your part to keep me cynical,” I said. “Now. Care to tell me your name, even without showing me your ID?”

  “Carla Pope,” she said.

  “Nice to meet you.”

  “Hunh,” she said. “Care to tell me your name?”

  “Why should we get into that? You’ve obviously done your research.”

  “True,” she said. “Which means you’ve slid through life using a half dozen or so different names. Impressive.”

  “Thanks, Carla. Or should I say Special Agent Pope?”

  “Call me anything you like, but answer my damn question. Where is Clarence Briggs?”

  “And where’s your warrant?”

  “Somewhere.”

  “I return to my earlier bullshit artist observation. You’re off the reservation for some reason. No warrant, acting on your own, not even letting the local police forces in on your little break-in. So what’s going on?”

  “I’m looking for Clarence Briggs. Do you know where he is?”

  “No.”

  “When was the last time you saw him?”

  That made me pause for a moment. What kind of game was she playing? I wasn’t sure, but I knew I was currently playing a deadly game out there with George, the partner of the now-dead Beth.

  Maybe it was time to expand the playing field.

  “Three days ago, in Chester, Vermont.”

  She perked up at that.

  “What were the two of you doing there?”

  “My job.”

  “Yeah, your job. You’re some sort of go-between, or negotiator, or some sort of slimy slug that helps people get rid of stolen goods.”

  “Fair enough,” I said.

  “And how did the job go there, in Chester?”

  “Lousy,” I said.

  “Why?”

  “Because it ended up getting Clarence Briggs shot and killed.”

  Carla froze after I said that.

  Something worked in her face, and she sighed. “Tell me again your lunch options?” the FBI woman said.

  Six

  She ended up going with the soup. I microwaved the container and as it was heating up, I took out a frozen French baguette, tossed that on top of the closed soup container, and got that defrosted as well. I offered her a nice five-year-old Bordeaux and I was surprised when she took me up on the offer. In about fifteen minutes or so we were eating the soup from thick ceramic bowls, with sliced warm pieces of bread smeared with butter, and some slices of Cabot cheddar cheese. Cabot offers a variety of cheddar cheeses, and I always purchase the Seriously Sharp, which has a nice checked pattern on its wrapper. If you’re not used to it, it can make your eyeballs sweat and your lips pucker up like you’re chewing on a lemon.

  Carla halfheartedly took a sip from the soup, and then took another one, and another, and she looked up after the third spoonful. “This soup … it’s great. What’s it called? Tomato vegetable?”

  “No, it’s not,” I said. “It’s got chicken pieces and broth inside it as well, plus some pastas. My French-Canadian neighbors call it ‘Mimi soup.’ I guess Mimi was their grandmother and the soup was a family recipe.”

  We didn’t say much after that, and I was surprised again when Carla took a second glass of Bordeaux. When lunch was done, I said, “Look, while I admire you doing your job while sitting in that robe, why don’t you go upstairs, retrieve your clothing, and if it’s fit for a dryer, I’ll toss it in and we can continue whatever it is we’re doing here.”

  A quick nod. “All right. But just so there’s no misunderstanding … I’m sitting here, in your bathrobe and nothing else. But I’m armed. And if you try to fuck with me or fuck me, I’ll shoot you dead.”

  “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

  So a few minutes passed, when she went upstairs and came back with her wet clothing, all of it was suitable to be dried at low heat, and I went to my dryer downstairs and came back and she was sitting on my living room couch. I didn’t want her to be threatened at all, so I sat across from her and said, “What now?”

  “Now I try to find out who killed Clarence Briggs.”

  “Funny, that’s what I’ve been doing, too.”

  “Do you know who did it?”

  “A man who told me his name was George. And he was assisted by a woman who called herself Beth.”

  “And how did you come to visit them?”

  I sipped from my wineglass. From this vantage point, Carla Pope had a smooth set of long legs. “Please. Am I going to see a warrant?”

  “Apparently not.”

  “Identification?”

  From the bathrobe pocket that wasn’t holding a 9mm Glock, she took out a thin leather wallet. She walked over, flashed it open to me. I saw the badge and her photo and her name, and nodded with satisfaction. She returned to the couch, but she walked backward slowly, making sure she hadn’t turned her back on me.

  “How did you meet up with that couple in Vermont?”

  “Trade secret,” I said.

  “Oh, come on….”

  “No, it’s true,” I said. “Trade secret. Through my own ingenuity and other technical means, a way is available where one party seeks out another party, and in turn, they contact me.”

  “What was being sold three days ago?”

  I gave her a steady, pleasant yet unyielding glance. “Special Agent Pope,” I finally said, “before I proceed, you and I are going to need to come to some sort of an arrangement regarding any and all information I pass on.”

  “Like immunity?”

  “That’s a thought.”

  “Sorry,” she said. “I don’t have time or interest to scurry to the US Attorney in Concord and spent a week hammering out some sort of immunity deal with you. Not going to happen.”

  “Then why should I continue?”

  “Because we both are seeking the killer of Clarence Briggs. Right?”

  I thought about that. “All right. How about this? You give me your word that I won’t be investigated, prosecuted, or otherwise bothered by the full force and fury of law enforcement for anything I let loose from this point forward.”

  “That’s unenforceable.”

  “Of course it is,” I said. “But you are one hundred percent correct—I want to find out who killed Clarence. So I agree to cooperate. And that’s binding on you, and nobody else.”

  Her pretty eyes narrowed at what I said. �
��That’s a pretty big damn blank check you’ve just sent my way. You know I can’t make any guarantees.”

  “Ah, but I hope you’ll make an unofficial guarantee. That you’d do your best to help me if your supervisors come knocking on my door, ready to express some serious unpleasantness.”

  She sipped from her wine, crossed and recrossed her legs—not sure if that’s an FBI training move but I was definitely distracted—and Carla said, “Deal. Whatever you say or show to me won’t be used against you, to the best of my ability.”

  “Agreed.”

  Then, instead of basking in the afterglow of our hard-negotiated deal, Carla went right to it: “What was being sold in Chester?”

  “One of the stolen paintings from the Isabelle Stewart Gardner Museum.”

  Her pretty eyes narrowed so much it was like they were hard slits. “Which one?”

  “The nautical Rembrandt. ‘Storm on the Sea of Galilee.’ ”

  “Impossible,” she said. “We have a pretty good idea that all of the Isabelle Stewart Gardner paintings are in the Philadelphia area. Not Vermont.”

  “Well, I saw it in Vermont.”

  “You sure it wasn’t a fake?”

  “Positive.”

  “Why? You have a degree in art history or something?”

  “Or something,” I said crossly, finishing off my wine. “I have a degree in the worldwide university of travel, experience, and hard knocks. You show me your jewelry, I can appraise it within a hundred dollars. The same with those shoes of yours, now drying off. Or if you cared to show me what kind of government-issued vehicle you used to come here and bother me.”

  Carla didn’t say anything. I added, “I gave it a thorough exam, using the best tools possible, which were my eyes, brain, and hands. The look of the paint, the canvas, the frame and its condition and cracking all led me to believe that it was the real deal. Then something else happened that confirmed it.”

  “Which is what?”

  “Once I said it was for real, the man called George took out a pistol and shot Clarence. I don’t think he would have done that if he were playing games with a fake Rembrandt.”

  “But what about the other customer?”

  “There was no other customer. The whole setup was a lie. That man and his companion wanted me to verify that the painting was for real, was worth millions. When my job was completed was when the pistol came out and the shooting started. That was the job. Verification. Not negotiation.”

  Her eyes closed for a second. “Where was he shot?”

  “Twice,” I said. “Once in the throat, once in the head. It was … fairly instant.”

  “And you? What did you do?”

  “I returned fire and got the hell out.”

  “Why weren’t you stopped by the woman … Beth, right?”

  “That was her supposed name, correct,” I said. “After Clarence was shot, I wasn’t sure who else might be in the house. I fired back twice and George ducked behind his desk. I threw a chair through the window and defenestrated myself from the second floor.”

  “Fancy word,” she said.

  “Sometimes I’m a fancy guy. I hit some juniper bushes, got up, and started running. The woman called Beth came out with a semi-auto Heckler & Koch, and I put three into her chest. She was wearing a Kevlar vest so she just fell back, and then I got into Clarence’s vehicle and drove away.”

  “You didn’t go back to help? Or to check on him?”

  “He was dead.”

  “How could you be sure?”

  The questions were beginning to bug me, but I tried to let that pass. She was from the government, after all, and I knew I had to take that into consideration. “I saw him take a bullet to the throat and one to the head. When I had a moment to clean myself, his blood and brains were on my right arm and shoulder. Going back to the house would have been a suicide mission, and would have doubled my stupidity quotient for the day.”

  “What happened to Beth after you shot her?”

  “She’s dead.”

  “Did you kill her?”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  That seemed to confuse matters so I told her about my return trip to Chester, about going through the house, tracking down the bakery and then the motel, and then finding Beth’s body. Being somewhat of a gentleman, I left out details of most of the time I spent with the lovely and talented Tracy Zahn. I felt by then we had both entered the “don’t ask, don’t tell” zone.

  “All right,” she said. “You located Beth, found her dead. Did you call the cops then?”

  “Yes. Anonymously, of course.” I checked my watch. “It’s been over a day. If you contact whichever law enforcement agency that responded to the Chester Motel yesterday, you might get a lead on who this Beth was and who she was working with, along with anything else that might come up.”

  A frown traveled about her face and she said, “Yeah, well, I’ll give it a try. Turf battles, you probably know how it is.”

  Now, this was probably not the right thing to do, but I was getting into the spirit of cooperating with the federal government, so I said, “I can offer you some help there, if you’d like.”

  “Which is what?”

  “I’ve got fingerprints,” I said. “Just before I left the motel room, I took a fresh water glass and put her fingers on it.”

  “That’s pretty … imaginative of you.”

  “The room had been swept clean, save for the body. I didn’t want her to go to waste.”

  “Where’s the glass now?”

  “Upstairs.”

  She nodded. “I’ll take it when I leave. Now. Do you know who the other party supposedly was?”

  “A concern that I once did business with, three years ago, in Tokyo. That’s in Japan, you know.”

  “Their name?”

  I shook my head. “No. You’re not getting that. Client confidentiality, don’t you know.”

  “Don’t fuck with me.”

  “And don’t try to intimidate me with your potty mouth. The name has nothing to do with it. My best guess is that George did some impressive research, determined my connection with this Japanese interest, and then used the name as bait for me. Plus … ”

  I hesitated. I so dislike being made to look like a fool, especially in front of a stranger, especially in front of a Federal stranger.

  “Go on,” Carla said.

  “Plus I was stupid,” I said crossly. “It was bait, but it was stupid bait. I should have known better. The thing is, with stolen paintings like the ones from the Gardner, they’re incredibly valuable, and incredibly hot. Where can you sell such a thing? So stories start, rumors get passed, that some of this multimillion dollar artwork ends up in the hands of some rich collector, either from Japan or Saudi Arabia. That’s the only real market available … but those stories are nonsense. They never pan out. It’s like a James Bond movie, about some secret organization or Doctor Evil who pulls strings to get things done. It’s pure fiction.”

  “But the Japanese name got your attention.”

  “It sure did.”

  “Why not a Saudi name?”

  “I don’t do business with the Saudis.”

  “Why? Their money is just as green as anybody else’s.”

  I said, “Because I don’t like their driving laws.”

  “Oh,” Carla said. “Is that supposed to make me feel better? That you’re standing up for women? The oppressed sisterhood?”

  “You didn’t look so oppressed back there, pointing that pistol at me.”

  Carla said, “I’ve learned a lot.”

  She emptied her wineglass, ran a finger around the edge. I was going to offer her another glass, but thought I was pushing things by having her drink two, especially since she was still armed and in a foul mood.

  “All right,�
� she said. “Let’s go back to the painting. You’re sure it was real?”

  “As real as it gets.”

  “So George … or somebody who was paying George … gets you and your muscle up to Chester. They say they want you to broker a deal between him and a nonexistent buyer. And after you verify that yes, the painting is genuine, they try to kill you both. Pretty fair assessment?”

  “Very fair assessment,” I said. “They taught you well at Quantico.”

  “Gee, I’m so grateful to hear that,” she said, but her tone of voice was saying something else. “But why kill you both? Why not drag some guy in from a local Japanese restaurant to pretend to be Mister Moto or whatever?”

  “Because they didn’t want to pay me, that’s why.”

  “Oh,” she said. “That makes sense. So what’s the going rate for creeps who help criminals move stolen goods?”

  “I have no idea, but my rate is five percent of the object’s value, that payment coming from the buyer.”

  “Mmm,” she said. “So if the painting was worth, say, a hundred million dollars, that’s one hell of a payday coming your way. But not if you were breathing long enough to receive it. But still … pretty dangerous, taking over a house like that, setting up a buy that was going to go wrong from the start. All because they want a stolen painting verified. That make sense to you?”

  No, it didn’t, for a number of reasons, but I wasn’t going to give her that piece of information today.

  “Only if the owners were desperate,” I said. “What kind of info do you have on how that painting might have gotten up to Vermont?”

  “What makes you think I know anything about the painting?”

  “You’re FBI.”

  “Oh, so I’m tied into everything, then?”

  “It was a thought,” I said.

  “Let me make this plain once more,” she said. “I know nothing of the stolen painting, how it got here, or your involvement in this whole mess. I was looking for the whereabouts of Clarence Briggs.”

  “Why?”

  She leaned forward slightly. “For reasons of national security.”

  “You’re kidding.”