The Betrayer (37 page)

Cat kept her eyes always out the back window, looking for any sign of that sedan or any other vehicle. Watch cars often worked in pairs.

But no one was behind them.

When she believed they were in the clear, she asked if Fiermonte had any idea who those men were.

He shook his head. “No. But we can probably guess.”

“Could they have followed you to the hotel?”

“Maybe.”

“We aren’t far from my place,” Cat said. “We could go there.”

“Not safe enough.”

“Where, then?”

“There’s a place where we keep witnesses. We could go there.”

“How far away is it?”

“Forty-five minutes.”

Cat thought about that. “Yeah, okay.” She nodded toward Fiermonte’s cell phone, which was resting in his lap. “Anything yet?”

Fiermonte looked down at the display. “Nothing.”

Cat turned to Haley in the back. “Do you want to try calling Johnny?”

Haley shook her head. “That’s not part of the plan.”

“What plan?” Fiermonte asked. His eyes went to the rearview mirror so he could see her.

“He’ll contact me when he can,” Haley said.

“And if he can’t?”

She glanced at Cat for a moment, then turned her head and looked out the window.

“He will,” she said.

The Jeep was turning into a driveway.

Outside was darkness. There were trees, Johnny noted. Lots of trees. Once the Jeep came to a stop, everyone but Johnny, Richter, and the driver scrambled out to the rear of the vehicle.

Three men pulled Jeremy, still unconscious, from the back compartment and carried him toward a large, stone house.

The kind of house that might belong to a doctor, Johnny thought.

Dickey owned lots of men, men of all kinds and from all trades, men who may one day prove useful to him.

What Dickey could buy initially, Richter could eventually lure away from him, no?

“So what do we do now?” Johnny said.

“We wait,” Richter answered.

“For what?”

Richter said nothing. He didn’t need to; another vehicle was turning into the driveway.

A black BMW sedan.

Richter got out of the Jeep, stepped to the back door, and waited there for Johnny.

No weapon drawn.

“C’mon,” he said.

Johnny got out.

Richter told the driver to ditch the Jeep, then led Johnny to the waiting BMW. He opened the back door. Johnny looked at Richter, then he got in. Richter climbed in beside him, then told the driver to go.

As he drove back toward the road, the driver handed them two large towels. Richter took them, told the driver to crank the heat, then laid the towels on Johnny’s lap.

“Don’t want you catching cold,” Richter said.

Johnny picked up one of the towels and dried his face. When he was done he noticed that Richter was looking out the window. Johnny knew the guy well enough to know that something was bothering him.

“What’s going on?” Johnny said.

“No idea. I’m just supposed to bring you someplace.”

“Where?”

“An address in Yonkers. That’s all I know.” He paused, then said, “Rest up, Johnny. It looks like your night has just begun.”

They pulled into another driveway, this one leading to a two-story house, all but its upper windows dark.

Beyond the house was the Hudson River.

The BMW came to a stop. There was only one other vehicle present, a black Mercedes SUV with tinted windows.

Someone was crossing the wide driveway, heading toward them.

Despite the darkness, the rain, and the problems with his vision, Johnny knew this man was Big Dickey McVicker.

“This is as far as I go,” Richter said.

The driver handed a shopping bag back to Richter. Richter took it and placed it on Johnny’s lap. Johnny looked inside the bag. It contained a change of clothes — jeans, T-shirt, light rain jacket, socks, even underwear.

Then Richter placed Johnny’s KA-BAR knife on top of the bag.

Johnny looked at Richter. He didn’t understand.

“I’ll dispose of the gun for you,” Richter said. “I’ll wipe off the prints, then strip it down and toss the pieces into the Hudson.”

Johnny still wasn’t following. Richter placed Johnny’s cell phone next to the knife.

“He’ll explain everything.” Richter nodded toward the door.

Johnny looked at the driver, then back at Richter. Finally, he opened the door and stepped back out into the rain.

The BMW made a wide U-turn, followed the driveway back to the two-lane road. It turned right and was gone.

Johnny watched as Dickey approached him.

No men behind him, no men anywhere.

No weapon in his hands.

Was that why Richter had given me the knife? To kill his father for him?

“You should have listened to me,” Dickey said. He was still a few feet from Johnny and waited till they were face-to-face before he spoke again. “What was the last thing I told you?”

Johnny honestly couldn’t remember. He took the knife and placed it into his back pocket.

“Don’t trust anyone. Except me. Always me.” Dickey smiled the same smile he had offered when he’d originally spoken those words.

Johnny had no patience for this. “Is Jeremy okay?”

“He’s being operated on.”

“By whom?”

“A friend of your father’s. They served together in Vietnam, actually. He went on to be a surgeon — a successful one, as you could see. I won’t lie to you, Johnny. Jeremy’s femoral artery was nicked, and he lost a lot of blood. Everything that can be done is being done, but we won’t know anything till after the surgery. The good news is, he’s strong. Of the three of you, he was always the strongest. The natural athlete. And it helps, of course, that he’s young.”

“We’re the same blood type,” Johnny said.

Dickey nodded. “We know.”

We? Johnny thought. But he ignored it.

“So why am I here instead of with him?”

“I’ll explain inside.”

He turned to lead the way, but Johnny didn’t move.

“C’mon, Johnny,” Dickey said. “We don’t have a lot of time. And there’s a lot we need to do.”

Cat opened her eyes and saw out her window that they were traveling along a dark parkway.

“Where are we?”

“We’re almost there.”

“I fell asleep,” she said.

“Yeah. You should take another pain pill, Cat.”

She shook her head. “I’m okay.” She glanced back at Haley, who was looking out the window to her left.

In silent thought, cell phone in hand.

Waiting.

“Yeah, I know,” Fiermonte said. “You’re a Coyle, as tough as they come. Take a damn pill anyway, Cat.”

She ignored the teasing and said, “Anything?”

He glanced down at the cell phone on his lap, then looked up again, his eyes on the road. “No.”

She took a breath, let it out. “So how much farther?”

“Ten minutes.”

It was more like fifteen minutes when Fiermonte exited the parkway. Cat hadn’t bothered to look at any of the road signs that they passed; she was too tired to care where they were. What mattered was that they were out of the city — that Haley was out of the city.

Fiermonte made several turns — too many for Cat to keep track of — then followed a two-lane road that was lined on both sides with dark woods. Cat got the sense that they were skirting the edge of a state forest.

A few minutes later, Fiermonte turned the sedan onto a side road, which led straight into the surrounding woods. A minute or so after that he turned again and proceeded up a long, dirt driveway. Rutted, pocked with puddles, some deep.

The woods eventually gave way to a small clearing, at the far end of which stood an old farmhouse. The driveway ended fifty feet from the house, and a worn pathway led at a slight incline to the front door.

The windows were all dark, and, behind the house, the thick woods resumed.

Fiermonte parked, killed the lights and the engine, left the keys in the ignition. He reached under the front seat, grabbed an umbrella, handed it to Cat.

“What about you?” she asked.

He picked up a folded newspaper. “I’m good. C’mon. I’ll run ahead and open up.”

He climbed out, held the newspaper above his head, and hurried toward the house. The rain was so heavy, the area so dark, that every trace of him all but disappeared after just a few steps.

Cat looked back at Haley, who was staring through the windshield at the house. There was no mistaking the expression of concern on her face.

“What’s wrong?” Cat said.

“What is this place?”

“Donnie’s office sometimes needs to stash witnesses somewhere safe before they can testify.”

“I understand that,” Haley said. “I thought they used motels by airports, that kind of thing.”

“Not always. Through the RICO Act, property belonging to criminals can be seized by authorities and either sold or used—”

“I know what the RICO Act is,” Haley said.

She was obviously still reluctant to exit the vehicle.

“C’mon,” Cat assured her. “It’s fine.”

It took a moment, but Haley finally nodded.

They both got out and shared the umbrella as they walked the inclining path to the house. As Cat got closer, she could see that the house was in serious disrepair — broken shutters, paint blistered and peeling, roof shingles missing here and there.

A fixer-upper at best, and an abandoned homestead at worst.

Either way, it looked like hell.

Fiermonte was waiting for them at the door.

Once inside, he flipped a wall switch, but the room remained dark.

“It’s okay,” he said. “The main breakers were switched off. I’ll be right back.”

He picked up a Maglite flashlight that had been left by the front door and crossed the dark living room to a doorway. There he paused to adjust a thermostat. Somewhere downstairs, a monster of a furnace came on.

Opening the door, he headed down creaking steps to the basement.

Haley immediately began to look around the still-unlit living room. “We shouldn’t be here,” she whispered.

“What’s wrong?”

“This just doesn’t feel right.”

“What do you mean?”

Haley didn’t answer immediately. Opening her cell phone, she used the light from its display to see by, quickly spotting something on the other side of the room and hurrying to it. Cat saw that it was an old-style desk with a roll top.

Haley went through its drawers, opening and closing them as quietly as she could.

“What are you doing?” Cat whispered.

Haley found something in one of the drawers — an envelope. She held her cell phone to it so she could read what was written on it. Whatever she saw was important, because she suddenly brought the envelope to Cat in a hurry.

“If the cops got this place through the RICO Act, it would belong to the State of New York, right?” Haley said.

Cat nodded. “Yeah.”

Haley handed her the envelope. “So why is the electric bill in his name?”

She angled the cell phone so Cat could see for herself.

It was in fact an electric bill that Cat was holding.

And the addressee was Donald Fiermonte.

“Would the state attorney hide witnesses in a house owned by one of his assistant prosecutors?”

Cat, dumbfounded, shook her head. “No.”

“I’ve been tricked like this once already,” Haley announced, her voice full. “I won’t be tricked a second time.”

“Tricked how?”

Before Haley could respond, an overhead ceiling light came on.

Cat looked at Haley as they listened to Fiermonte cross the basement and start up the stairs.

Haley lowered her voice again. It was even lower than it had been a moment before — the hushed but urgent whisper of someone in mortal danger.

“Can you tell me you really trust him one hundred percent, Cat? Trust him enough for us to stay out in the middle of nowhere with him? Alone?”

Cat wondered if Haley knew what had happened at Fiermonte’s apartment earlier today.

But how could she?

Still, the fact that Cat’s mind went there right away meant something — a number of things, actually.

It was too late for either to say anything more; Fiermonte was near the top of the stairs.

Cat had a choice, and she made it.

She dropped the envelope, withdrawing her Sig with her left hand and putting Haley behind her with her right, doing so just as Fiermonte moved through the door and reentered the living room.

He started to approach Cat and Haley, then saw Cat’s weapon — not aimed at him, but held close to her thigh, pointing at the floor.

Discreet, yet alert.

Ready.

Fiermonte stopped and smiled tentatively, as if this were some kind of joke he’d yet to be let in on.

“What’s going on?”

“This place,” Cat said, “it belongs to you, doesn’t it?”

His eyes shifted to the envelope on the floor, then rose again. He nodded. “Yes.”

He stepped to the nearby wall, placed the Maglite on the floor, then moved back to the center of the room.

“Why did you say it’s where you kept witnesses? ‘You,’ meaning your office.”

“Put the gun away, Cat. Please.”

“Answer the question.”

“My ex doesn’t know about it, that’s why.”

“I thought you were paying two rents. How could you afford this?”

“It was a foreclosure; I got it cheap. A place for my retirement, something to fix up. I should have told you the truth, but I need to keep it a secret for a while longer, at least. Till things are finalized. I’m sorry.”

“The utilities are in your name, Donnie. How much of a secret can it be?”

“What was I going to do, create a false identity just to get the lights turned on? Luckily for me, my ex’s lawyer isn’t very good.”

“Why did you bring us here?”

“I thought it would be more comfortable than the motels we normally use.” He paused and looked around the disheveled room — faded wallpaper, broken moldings, bare furnishings — then said, “Well, maybe not more comfortable. But more private. And safer.”

He eyed the gun again, then said, “You look like you’re about to fall over, Cat. Why don’t you put that away?”

Cat held steady.

“Was what you told Johnny about the prosecutor in Westchester a lie, Donnie?”

Fiermonte was clearly confused. “What are you talking about?”

“No one went to the address listed on Haley’s passport application,” Cat said.

He shrugged. “I’m not sure what you want me to say here, Cat.”

“Were you lying?”

“You’re overtired, Cat. And painkillers can screw with a person’s thinking, you know that.” He paused, waiting for Cat to say something. When she didn’t, he said, “There are dozens of reasons why no one knocked on her father’s door, and you know them all. I’m not the enemy here, Cat. I’m pretty much the only friend you have left. Dickey’s cleaning house again, just like he did three years ago. That’s what’s going on here. That’s why Jeremy was let go this morning.”

“What do you mean?”

“Jeremy wasn’t a threat, he’s just a punk kid with no access whatsoever to Dickey. Johnny’s a different story, though. He has skills Jeremy doesn’t, and he could get close to Dickey anytime he wanted. Johnny had no reason to go after Dickey, but all that changed when Jeremy got his memories back. And what he remembered was reason enough for Johnny to want to kill Dickey. To
have
to kill him.”

“But how would he have known that?” Cat said. “How would Dickey have known that Johnny and Jeremy had talked?”

“The men in the watch car outside had to have been Dickey’s men. And they had to have been listening to us. In Dickey’s world, there is no such thing as a son who wouldn’t go after the man who killed his father. It’s that mob bullshit, you know. As old as the Bible. Remember, Dickey got his hands on the recordings a week ago, when Jeremy’s therapist was murdered. He’s known since then what was on them. He knew when the four of us met in his warehouse yesterday. What he didn’t know, and needed to, was if and when Johnny knew. If Dickey could avoid killing Johnny, he would. Johnny’s his favorite, always has been. And Johnny had the potential to be an asset to Dickey someday. College educated, elite military, and as loyal to him as his own son. How could Dickey not want him in his crew? But the minute Jeremy told Johnny everything, Dickey had no choice. And when Johnny took off after Jeremy, Dickey saw his chance to kill them both.”

“How would they have known where Jeremy was headed?” Cat said.

“You came back to the room and told me. Remember? Dickey’s men were still listening. That left plenty of time for Dickey to make a call and send Richter and his crew down there.”

“How do you know it was Richter?”

“Morris was able to tell me that much. Apparently, Gregorian and his team came from one direction, and Richter and his crew came from another. It was an ambush.” Fiermonte paused, looked at Haley, then back at Cat. “Look, if you want to go somewhere else, we’ll go somewhere else. I’ll just close up and we’ll leave.”

“It’s been over an hour,” Cat said. “Why haven’t you heard anything more?”

“I can only assume Morris is busy. I mean, it sounded like it was a fucking war zone down there. But I think we need to brace ourselves for the worst. If Johnny and Jeremy are…gone, then we’re the only ones left who know the truth. Johnny was a threat, but you’re an even greater one, Cat. The daughter of a murdered man can be just as dangerous as the son. Especially when that daughter is you.”

Cat understood what he meant.

Dickey would be coming for her.

Everyone with reason to kill him — and the skills to do so — would be dead.

Cat thought then of Johnny’s last words to her, as he was getting into the cab.

Haley will know what to do. Keep her safe till she can do it.

How could Cat fail to do that now?

How safe could Haley really be in the company of the two remaining people Big Dickey McVicker feared?

Yes, Cat thought, it was time to hide, but not here.

Here felt like a trap.

She wanted to be somewhere farther away — somewhere she could let Haley go and know she would have a fighting chance, a clear route to wherever it was she would be going.

Cat was about to take Fiermonte up on his offer to leave this place when he said to Haley, “That cell phone in your pocket, it’s the only way you and Johnny can communicate, right?”

Haley didn’t reply.

“You said calling him wasn’t part of the plan. What did you mean by that?”

Haley remained silent.

Fiermonte glanced at his watch, then took a step forward. He seemed suddenly conscious of the time — pressed for it, even.

“I’m trying to help you,” he said. “There’s the chance that Johnny’s still alive. If he is, maybe we can find him.”

“How?” Cat said.

“We can use his cell phone to determine his location.”

“These phones don’t have GPS,” Haley said. “Johnny said never to use phones equipped with GPS.”

“We don’t need GPS. You just have to call the number, and we’ll know where he is by the last cell tower the call gets handed to.”

Cat was shaking her head. “It won’t be specific. It’ll be an area, not an address.”

“It’d be a place to start. And Dickey only has certain locations to choose from.”

“But we don’t have the equipment to do that,” Cat said.

“I’m sure we can find someone who does. Get him out here, or go to him, whichever would be faster.”

Fiermonte was speaking quickly now, urgently, which, Cat thought, was unlike him.

Cat looked at him for a moment, then said, “There’s something you’re not telling us, Donnie.”

“I’m just trying to
do
something, Cat. You want the man who killed your father, don’t you? Because I do. I’ve been waiting three years to get Dickey, and we might not get another chance, not like this.” He said to Haley, “You want Johnny to end up like his father? Hacked to pieces in some warehouse? Because that’s where he is right now, I promise you. And that’s what’s going to happen. Dickey’s got all kinds of crazy motherfuckers whose job is to hurt and kill, and if one of these monsters doesn’t have Johnny right now, he will very soon. But you can stop it. You can save Johnny. You have the means right there in your pocket.”