Hard Way (A Jon Reznick Thriller Book 4) Read online

  “Precisely. Smart boy. This asset has links. And we very much need to protect him so he isn’t caught up in this. We need to be alive to the possibility, remote I grant you, that our asset might be compromised as the FBI puts out a dragnet, trying to get their colleague back.”

  “What do you want me to do?”

  “I’ve been giving that very question some thought. I want you to reach out to the CIA’s guy in the Hoover Building. I think his name is Curt.”

  Schofield nodded. He knew the operative very well. “We go way back.”

  “I know you do. He wears his redneck tendencies as a badge of honor, but he’s pretty solid. So it might be worth checking in with Curt—try to get an inside track on the FBI team who are trying to find their assistant director. Do you know what I’m saying?”

  “I believe I do. Leave it with me, sir. I know how to play this. Are the FBI close to retrieving their AD?”

  Charles leaned forward. “The FBI has wasted twenty-four hours investigating the wrong people, thanks to our good friends at the Cosa Nostra. But now the Feds think they know who’s behind it.”

  “And do they?”

  “Not as well as they think. And it’s our job to keep it like that.”

  Ten

  It was mid-afternoon and Reznick was crouched alone in the back of a surveillance vehicle on a cobblestone street in Soho, a block from the office of Dimitri Merkov’s lawyer, Adam Chapman. He was glad he didn’t have to accompany Stamper on the visit to the penitentiary in upstate New York. He thought it would be a waste of time. Besides, from the moment he saw the picture of Chapman and found out he was the only person in physical contact with Dimitri Merkov, he’d been certain this had to be the guy passing on messages to the rest of the crew.

  He hunkered down. Minutes turned into hours. The fucker must still be working.

  Reznick had learned from Stamper’s team that Chapman had visited Dimitri Merkov the previous day and returned to his home in Tribeca that night.

  He stretched a few muscles to avoid getting stiff. Slowly, outside the van, shadows appeared as the November light faded. He watched a couple head into a bar. The woman looked not too dissimilar to his late wife. The same skin tone, the same look in her eyes, happy in the company of her partner. His mood began to darken. His wife, Elisabeth, had died in the World Trade Center attack, only about a mile from where he was now. She had been high up when the first plane hit. She’d been trapped. And then, when the towers collapsed, she’d been pulverized to dust. Reznick had visited the site many times since. He had watched a new skyline being born from the ashes but felt conflicted. He wished for the whole site to be left alone.

  Reznick pushed those thoughts aside as he again contemplated the audacious abduction of FBI Assistant Director Martha Meyerstein. He wondered if the kidnappers had been following her from the Hoover Building. It began to dawn on him that he had never heard of such a senior FBI agent being taken in such circumstances on American soil. It would have required planning. Extensive planning. He imagined such an experienced official would regularly vary her route.

  He began to wonder if there was more to it. Was it possible that the Russian mob would do such a crazy thing? They had to know the fallout.

  But there was something else bugging him.

  Her route. Her address.

  How would they have known in advance that she was leaving? How would they have known she’d be taking that particular route? He knew the FBI would have instructed their staff in countersurveillance. Meyerstein would have been well versed in changing routes and times of travel to avoid predictable behavior. Then again, perhaps the kidnappers had pinpointed a particular part of her route that she had to use every day.

  The questions were already mounting up.

  Reznick tried to think of Meyerstein at that moment. He pictured her being held out of sight. In a basement, perhaps. He could only imagine the fear she was experiencing. He’d seen firsthand the impact her sudden disappearance had had on her ex-husband. He thought of her parents trying to explain to their grandchildren. The terrible, aching emptiness when what you loved was taken from you. He’d felt that when his own child was taken.

  A cab driver pulled up and started haranguing a cyclist, snapping Reznick out of his reverie. He wondered if Chapman would ever leave his office.

  He was starting to doubt the guy was even still inside when a figure emerged onto the sidewalk.

  The lawyer was wearing a fedora and overcoat, collar up.

  Reznick watched as Chapman headed down the street. He waited a few moments before he got out of the van. He spotted the lawyer farther down the street and saw him catch a cab. It was headed uptown.

  He memorized the license plate. A few seconds later, another taxi appeared and Reznick jumped in. “Stay with the cab two cars in front.”

  “Sure thing. Uptown?”

  “Yeah. Don’t lose them.”

  The cab crawled through the streets. For a couple of minutes, they lost sight of the taxi with the lawyer in it. Then Reznick spotted the other vehicle again.

  “So what’s with you and this cab? You following your wife?”

  “Friend of mine left his cell phone at my place,” Reznick lied.

  “I see.”

  Twenty minutes later, Adam Chapman’s cab pulled in near Grand Central in Midtown and he got out.

  “Here’s fine.” Reznick handed the driver a twenty-dollar bill before exiting the vehicle onto a bustling Madison Avenue. He jogged for nearly a block as he tried to keep track of the Fedora-wearing lawyer in the dark.

  Reznick turned onto Vanderbilt Avenue, on the corner of 42nd Street. He saw an entrance for Grand Central Station.

  Up ahead, the lawyer disappeared inside an imposing building with a blue awning.

  Reznick approached and saw he was outside the Yale Club. He crossed over and headed to a coffee shop that gave him a line of sight to the entrance of the private club. He ordered an espresso and a blueberry muffin. A couple of hours later, the lawyer emerged and jumped into a taxi again.

  Reznick passed on the details to a backup surveillance team the FBI had arranged. Then his call was transferred through to Stamper.

  “Any luck with the governor?”

  “Not much. Dimitri Merkov spoke through the glass with his lawyer yesterday.”

  “About what?”

  “Drawing up a new will, apparently.”

  “Nothing else?”

  “They were very careful.”

  “Yeah, but that wouldn’t stop these fucks using code words, right?”

  “I get that, but the governor and his team are alive to that kind of thing, and they seemed to think it was just a routine visit.”

  Reznick sighed.

  “Listen to me, Jon, we’re monitoring this guy electronically. Whatever he says will be picked up either through Chapman’s cell phone or his email. But we have to play by the rules.”

  “That isn’t going to help you find Martha. Do you know where he is right now?”

  “I have people keeping track of him.”

  “Can you get me a list of every member of the Yale Club?”

  A silence opened up. “You’re not giving the orders around here, Jon.”

  “I never said I was. I’m just asking you a civil question.”

  “Why on earth do you want that? Do you think Merkov is a member of the Yale Club?”

  Reznick bristled at Stamper’s tone.

  “That’s where our lawyer friend went after leaving his office.”

  “He might have gone for a meal. Perhaps a drink. It happens, Jon.”

  “Maybe. Maybe not. I’d like a list.”

  “Anything else?” Stamper’s voice was dripping with sarcasm.

  “Yeah, cut the fucking attitude. And pull up any surveillance footage inside the club from the moment Chapman walked in.”

  Eleven

  Around midnight, Reznick was in the FBI’s office on Federal Plaza in Lower Manhattan, half a do
zen blocks from Adam Chapman’s home. Just as he was being handed a black coffee by a young Fed, Stamper walked in.

  “Roy, what the hell are you doing here?”

  “Jon, I owe you an apology.”

  “For what?”

  “My attitude. I had no right to give you such a hard time. I know Martha thinks the world of you. It’s just . . . this whole thing is getting under my skin. I hope you understand.”

  “Happens to the best of us. Forget it.” Reznick thought Stamper looked ashen. Eyes bloodshot, clearly not sleeping.

  Stamper signaled for him to move into a conference room, shutting the door quietly behind them.

  “Thought you’d be returning to DC,” Reznick said.

  “Makes sense to be based here. The lawyer is here. And Merkov junior is upstate.”

  Reznick nodded. “Tell me, what’s the latest?”

  “We’re doing absolutely everything and we have nothing. I swear, the team is working every angle on the Russian mob—and Merkov and his associates—but we’re nowhere.”

  Reznick took a sip of his coffee. He pulled up a seat and slumped down. “They’re tight. They wouldn’t divulge anything willingly. Let’s go over the prison visit one more time.”

  “Governor was a pain in the ass, wanting to know why the visit from the FBI . . .”

  “Hope you told him it was none of his goddamn business.”

  “Not in so many words, but yes.”

  “What did he say?”

  “Made it known that he expected better cooperation, and that he’d be taking this up with the Director personally.”

  “Whatever. Anyway, did you get the Yale list?”

  Stamper nodded. “Was just emailed through to me. We’ve run them through face recognition. Hedge fund types, lawyers obviously, a scattering of politicians, but every one of them is clean.”

  “Lawyers? Clean? Gimme a break.”

  “Jon, this is not the time for jokes.”

  “Did you get the surveillance camera footage from within the Yale Club?”

  “The tech guys have a fifty-seven-minute stretch of video showing Chapman inside.”

  “Can I have a look at it?”

  “Absolutely. As soon as they’ve finished editing, be my guest.”

  Reznick nodded. “There’s a possibility Chapman is taking not only coded messages from Dimitri Merkov, but communicating instructions.”

  Stamper looked pensive, the strain of the investigation etched into the lines of his face. “So far as leads go, the lawyer is the only one we have. Let’s hope he gives us the breakthrough we need.”

  Twelve

  It was after midnight when Brent Schofield got off the F train and walked along East Broadway to an all-night diner on the edge of Chinatown. Inside, a man sat alone reading a copy of the New York Times. Schofield ordered two lattes and a couple of chocolate muffins, and set them on the table where his old Agency colleague was sitting.

  Curt looked over the top of the paper, then folded it and put it down. “Man, you gotta be kidding me.”

  Schofield smiled and took a sip of his coffee. “Oh yeah . . . in the flesh.”

  Curt shook his head. “How you doing?”

  “I’m doing good.”

  “Is that right?” Curt leaned forward, elbows on the table. “How long you been in New York?”

  “Couple years.”

  “How you finding it, man?”

  “It’s OK . . . once you find your way around.”

  Curt grimaced. “Gimme Nebraska any day.” He lowered his voice. “Fucking wall-to-wall liberals here.”

  Schofield grinned. He knew Curt had been like this since the first day they met at the Farm, when they were being trained up by the CIA. “It’s New York, not Nebraska. It’s always changing. That’s what gives it the vitality. That’s what they say, right?”

  Curt grimaced. “You sound like you’ve been hanging out with a bunch of commies. Vitality? Gimme a fucking break, man.”

  Schofield fought the urge to burst out laughing. “You haven’t changed.”

  “Damn straight.”

  “Look . . . I appreciate you meeting me at short notice. You busy?”

  “Big time. Got a meeting in half an hour, if you can believe that. Feds are going crazy. Everyone’s working their nuts off on this. Nearly a hundred extra agents in the New York field office.”

  That was all the confirmation Schofield needed. He got down to business.

  “I’ve had a request from Mr. Charles.”

  “Charles? I’d heard he retired.”

  “He’s still hanging around. I met up with him earlier. Here in New York.”

  Curt sipped his coffee. “Here in New York? Interesting. What did he want to know?”

  “He wants me to open up a back channel link with someone in or around the investigation you’ve been assigned to . . . but more importantly, he needs someone who understands the nature of our business.”

  “You want me to be that back channel, is that it?”

  Schofield bit off a mouthful of muffin. “We need to be kept abreast of any developments.”

  “You mind me asking why?”

  “Your investigation may spill over into . . . shining a light on an asset of ours. A very precious asset whose identity can’t be compromised.”

  “All right. What else?”

  Schofield dabbed his mouth with a napkin. “We need to know exactly how much the FBI knows. I believe there’s someone called Jon Reznick involved with this team in some capacity.”

  Curt nodded. “That guy is interesting.”

  “Was he the one that took down the Quds operatives a couple years back? At least that’s what I heard.”

  “You heard right. Reznick’s ex-Delta buddy was suicided in a car accident by Quds. Reznick went after them all. And he was the one that got the Feds involved.”

  Schofield nodded. The story was that Reznick had done off-the-books jobs for the Agency over the years. But now he was pretty much a freelance contractor.

  “Killed the leader of the Iranian cell in a tunnel as he was headed to Mexico.”

  “So we’ve got to assume that Reznick is going to do the unexpected.”

  “He’s dangerous,” said Curt. “He’s got them changing direction already and onto the Russian mob. His kind is relentless.”

  “That’s a concern. From what I hear he’s not known for doing dot-to-dot investigations.”

  “He’ll do whatever he’s hired to do. But this one seems personal. I don’t think the bosses are entirely happy to have him there. We’re both reporting to Stamper.”

  Schofield sipped his hot coffee, appreciating the rich taste and caffeine fix. “Is that right? Good to know.” He paused as a waitress walked past. “Mr. Charles wants to be kept fully abreast of developments.”

  Curt nodded.

  “But you’ve got to be very, very careful. This is important stuff. Don’t ask questions. I want you to listen. Soak up what you hear. The direction of the investigation . . .”

  Curt looked around as if concerned someone was listening in. He lowered his voice. “You know what we’re investigating?”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “This is heavy-duty shit. And they’re pulling out every stop to find her.”

  Schofield leaned in close. “That investigation is small fry compared to protecting the national interest. There’s something coming up and—” He broke off, enjoying the look of alarm on Curt’s face.

  “What exactly?”

  “You know what we do. There’s always one plot or another that needs to be stopped. We can’t jeopardize our line of intel, or compromise the asset.”

  “I understand what you’re saying.”

  “I’ve got to level with you, Curt. My concern is that someone like Reznick is going to be operating—sooner, rather than later—outside the direct control of the FBI.”

  “He kinda is already. By all accounts he’s a de facto lone wolf on this.”

&nbs
p; “That’s why we need to keep him on a tight leash.”

  Thirteen

  It was the dead of night and Reznick was sitting alone in the conference room at the FBI’s New York field office. He was still waiting for the tech guys to copy him in on the surveillance footage of Dimitri Merkov’s lawyer in the Yale Club.

  He ran things through in his head, thinking again of Meyerstein’s route. Had they been following her for a while? The Feds had recovered tracking information from her car’s on-board computer, which showed that she had driven a different route to the previous two evenings. She’d been doing the right thing. He began to wonder if her cell phone had been compromised—her movements monitored remotely.

  Reznick stared at the picture of Meyerstein that was pinned to the wall. Her steely blue eyes reminded him of Elisabeth. But there was also the quiet determination in how she went about her business.

  The FBI was second only to the NSA for electronic surveillance. But as technology and encryption improved, and as law enforcement agencies became more adept at digital surveillance of an individual or group, sometimes what got overlooked was physical surveillance. He knew from his CIA training at the Farm that the Russians were masters of tradecraft—the old-fashioned way of doing things. Communicating signals. Exchanging messages. Dead drops. Cutouts. And ex-KGB and Spetsnaz operatives were almost certainly well represented in Russian mob life.

  Reznick gulped the dregs of a cold coffee as the phone on the table rang. He picked up. “Yeah?”

  “Jon, footage ready to roll in Briefing Room A. Three analysts are checking it out. You wanna join us?”

  “Appreciate that, thank you.”

  Reznick got up and headed through to the tiny office. There, he found himself looking over the shoulder of a senior analyst, Special Agent Ronnie Thomas, who was scouring the color footage.

  They watched as Adam Chapman approached the Yale Club building. He swiped a card to get in, then the feed switched to an inside camera, which showed him heading into a locker room. He put on a white T-shirt, white shorts, and white Nike running shoes, placing his other clothes in a locker. When he emerged, he headed to Court Two for a game of squash with a middle-aged man with a paunch. Reznick watched Chapman’s sinews stretch, his muscles defined.