Sphere Of Influence (23 page)

"Hey, fuck you."

"You're a hell of an investigator, Mark. Maybe the best ever, who knows? But I'm speaking nothing but the truth here and you know it."

Beamon considered bending down and trying to salvage the smashed cigarette, but decided he hadn't sunk quite that low. Soon, probably, but not yet. Instead he just turned and started walking toward his car.

"Mark? What are you going to do?"

He honestly wasn't sure. Did he really care about his job and his reputation anymore? Could he just stick his head i
n
the sand while the FBI prostituted itself for a little good press?

"Mark!"

Beamon stopped. "When does the Director want Gasta?"

"Now. Tonight. Tomorrow at the latest. They want a full breach. SWAT, press, the works. It's got to be big or we won't be able to get it on TV." Reynolds paused for a moment. "When we get him, we'll put the screws to him over the Afghans. You have my word."

Beamon shook his head slowly. "Don't you think I've already done that, Scott? Gasta wants my help to rip them off; I guarantee you he's told me more than he's going to tell you, and it's nothing. He doesn't know who they are, who they work for, where they are, or who they associate with. Nothing. We take Gasta out before the buy and they're gone."

"Then they're gone. Look, Mark, as far as I'm concerned, you're in the right here. But it doesn't matter." Beamon knew that he was finished at the FBI one way or another. Even if his inspection report were to disappear into thin air, there was the fact that someone would have to be blamed for what happened to Chet. And if he'd learned anything during his long career at the FBI, it was that there always had to be someone to blame.

Chapter
29

DESPITE pretty much cleaning the hotel room's bar out of liquor, Beamon couldn't sleep. Those puny little bottles didn't do shit. He closed his eyes, trading the blank white of the ceiling for empty darkness, trying again to clear his mind. And once again he failed. There were too many things swirling around in his head: Chet, the Director, Laura, Gasta, the Afghans, the rocket launcher, Carrie, his future. What the hell was he going to do? How far was he willing to go? And if he decided to throw away what was left of his career, what was his motivation? He hoped it was something more than revenge and self-pity.

He was still wide-awake at three A
. M
. when the phone rang.

"Yeah?"

"What the hell are you doing, Mark?"

"Hello, Laura."

"Scott called me. He said he delivered the Director's orders and you said 'I'll think about it'? Did you really say that?"

"I don't know if I used those exact words, but that was the gist."

"Jesus, Mark. This isn't a game. The Director's made a decision--and he didn't make it alone. I don't like it any better than you, but there's nothing we can do about it." She didn't sound completely convinced.

"Have you heard what he wants to do, Laura? He wants to grab Gasta and immediately plaster it all over the TV. You can kiss your Afghans good-bye."

"I know, Mark, I was in the meeting. He isn't going to budge on this--I already tried. I did everything but choke the son of a bitch with his tie."

"Maybe you should have."

"It wouldn't have done any good. I can't make the Director believe in the connection between the launcher and Gasta's heroin dealers."

Beamon sighed quietly. "I guess the silver lining here is that we're holding some pretty good cards where Gasta's concerned. He'll have no choice but to spill everything he knows about his boss."

There was a long silence over the phone.

"Laura? Are you still there?"

"I . . . I wouldn't count on that, Mark. I don't think tracking down the man behind Gasta is going to be a priority." "What are you talking about?"

"They're going to go for the people under him, Mark. They want--they need--him to look like the top man. Trying to get him to roll over on some shadowy figure pulling his strings makes getting Gasta look like a failure, not a success. And I'll tell you right now, they're going to want the death penalty. That's a bargaining chip they aren't going to let us use."

Beamon sat up on the bed. "What are you talking about?"

"I'm sorry, Mark. This is my fault. If I was getting somewhere on finding this launcher . . . But I'm not, and the press is starting to come after us. The fact is, the FBI needs some good publicity."

"Jesus Christ, Laura, Gasta's a nobody!" Beamon realized he was starting to sound like a broken record.

"You and I know that, but the public doesn't. To the man on the street he's the personification of organized crime--the mastermind behind the Mob. This is going to be a big coup and it's going to take some of the heat off us."

Beamon rummaged through the tiny bottles on the floor, looking for one he hadn't completely drained. "Until a rocket goes off. After that, no one's even going to remember Carlo Gasta's name. Then Chet's death is going to be nothing more than a failed publicity stunt."

"Then, call Tom at the White House--get him to intervene."

"No, he was willing to help us squeeze the CIA, but he isn't going to countermand a decision by FBI management. The White House's whole shtick is getting the politics out of the agencies and letting the experts do their jobs. Besides, Tom doesn't do anything without knowing every angle. We don't have the time."

"So, what are you going to do, Mark?"

That was a good question. One he needed some time to think about.

"I don't know where Gasta is," Beamon lied. "But I can probably find him. Tell the Director I need a day to track him down and set him up. If we have to do this, I'd like to do it in a way that doesn't get any of our SWAT guys shot. We'll make it look smooth and professional for the cameras."

There was a confused silence over the line for a moment. "That's it?"

"I'm sorry to disappoint you, Laura. But I'm getting too old to tilt at windmills."

He hung up the phone and closed his eyes again, though he knew he wouldn't sleep.

Chapter
30

THE random mix of tiny liquor bottles the night before, while creating no particular effect at the time, had left Beamon with a surprisingly durable hangover. That, in combination with the fact that he once again found himself in the empty desert--this time in the full heat of a cloudless afternoon--was putting him in danger of throwing up at any moment. Not really the image he was looking to project. He scooted his lawn chair back a few inches to escape the blazing sun that was beginning to sneak around the beach umbrella overhead and reached into the cooler next to him for a beer. "Come on, guys, we don't have all goddamn day!"

Three overweight middle-aged Italian men simultaneously stopped what they were doing and glared as threateningly as they could under the circumstances.

"You heard the man! Get your fat asses in gear!" Carlo Gasta was sitting next to Beamon on an uncomfortable-looking rock. He seemed afraid to encroach on the shade the umbrella provided and was already starting to redden in the sun.

Beamon popped the top off his beer and let some of the icy liquid slide down his throat. Pressing the cold bottle against his sweating forehead, he once again examined the dead, rolling landscape. Except for the poorly defined dirt road fifteen feet in front of him, there was no sign of civilization at all. Of course, that was an illusion. If taken west for about a mile, the sandy path dead-ended into a moderately traveled highway bordering the sprawl tha
t
surrounded L
. A
. And if taken east an equal distance, it dead-ended into the natural amphitheater where Carlo Gasta was to meet his Afghan suppliers three days from now.

Beamon closed his eyes for a moment and constructed a map of the area in his mind: the confusing jumble of interconnecting highways, secondary roads, and off-ramps that made a previously impassable desert into just another gateway to suburbia.

"How hot you figure it is, Carlo?" he said, opening his eyes again and watching Gasta's men attacking the sandy road with shovels.

"It's gotta be over a hundred."

One of the men suddenly jerked upright and began rubbing his arm. Sensing a heart attack in process, Beamon leaned forward and watched with ghoulish anticipation. "Mikey! Get back to work!" Gasta shouted.

"I think I pulled something in my arm, Carlo."

Beamon fell back into his lawn chair. False alarm. "I don't give a shit about your arm. Get it in gear!"

Beamon took another sip of his beer and watched the man start digging again, favoring his injured limb. They were almost finished, and with the exception of sunburns that would undoubtedly blister before tomorrow, none looked much worse for the wear. It must have been the goddamn breeze.

Beamon pushed the bag of ice off his ankle and stood, limping slightly as he hobbled up to the deep ditch that bordered the south side of the road, and jumped painfully over it. Fortunately, the landing was soft.

"Hey! We just did that part," Tony whined. "You're packing it down!"

Beamon ignored him, admiring the work that had been completed. Gasta's men had dug down a good foot and a half in the road, carefully sifting the dirt and then gently replacing it, creating a thirty-foot-long sand bog.

This particular spot was perfect. On one side of the road was the ditch Beamon had just crossed, and on the other was a low but steep berm. The Afghans' van, heavy with men and product, would make its way up the road towar
d
the amphitheater and become hopelessly stuck in this unavoidable trap.

Beamon rolled his beer across his forehead again, wondering for the hundredth time what the hell he was doing. He'd told Laura, and she'd told the Director, that he was going to find Gasta and set him up for the FBI today. Instead he was standing in the desert, supervising the groundwork for the plan he'd come up with to get Gasta his heroin.

His new cell phone was turned off so he wouldn't receive the desperate calls that were undoubtedly being placed to it. He honestly wouldn't know what to say.

"All right. I think that's enough," Beamon said.

The three men stopped working and leaned on their shovels for support.

"Now we're going to run through this. Is everybody clear on what they're supposed to be doing?"

Gasta jumped over the ditch and joined his men, who were nodding with what little energy they had left. "Okay, put your masks on."

They all looked at one another and then at their boss, who was staring at his feet.

"We've been talking about this," Gasta started hesitantly. "We don't see the reason for the masks. These guys are going to know who we are."

It was a perceptive observation. The reason for the masks was simply to intensify the heat and to see if he could make one of these sons of bitches die of heatstroke. It had taken no small effort for Beamon to find four wool ski masks--in the appropriate sun-absorbing black--during the dead of the L
. A
. summer.

"Look, Carlo, we've already talked about this. If you want to go it alone . . ."

Gasta shook his head and pulled a mask from his back pocket. His men reluctantly followed his lead.

"Okay, are we ready?" Beamon said when their heads and faces were properly covered.

More nodding.

"And no shooting, right?"

"You know . . . that's another thing we wanted to talk t
o
you about," Gasta said, his voice sounding a little muffled through the small hole in the wool. "Why don't we just kill these guys? It doesn't make sense to leave them alive." Beamon let out a bored sigh. "We're a mile from the highway. We don't need anyone hearing gunfire and calling the cops--or worse, some soccer mom catching a stray through her window. Besides, you said you wanted to send a message. Well, this is a clear message that you're not even afraid of these guys enough to bother to kill them. It also leaves you with some options. You can pay them after you've sold the stuff if you want--teach them that a deal is a deal and that you won't be fucked with."

Beamon had devised that speech over two hours the night before. The logic was a little strained, but Gasta was as dumb as a box of rocks. And, more importantly, he was afraid of Nicolai.

"Okay, okay," the gangster said. "Fine. We'll do it your way."

Beamon stared directly into the man's eyes. "You understand that I expect people to live up to their agreements. No screwing around."

"I said okay. What the fuck do you want from me?" Beamon didn't answer, instead strolling down the road toward a panel van parked fifty yards away. He'd rented it earlier that afternoon and had one of Gasta's men fill it with debris from a construction site to weigh it down. He slid behind the wheel and started it, turning the AC up to full. When he looked up through the windshield again, Gasta and his men had already scurried to their designated hiding places.

"I hope you know what you're doing," he said quietly to himself as he released the emergency brake.

He figured that the plan he'd hatched had about a thirty percent chance of working--assuming he actually had the guts to go through with it. Gasta would steal the van full of heroin and Beamon could have the local FBI pick up the Afghans while they were walking home. Then, when he made contact with Gasta again, the Director could have his testosterone-drenched SWAT maneuvers under the television lights. Everybody won.