"Van Lustbader, Eric - Dark Homecoming(eng)" - читать интересную книгу автора (Van Lustbader Eric)

"It is true."
Croaker continued on relentlessly. "If you have sufficient evidence, you or your client should go to the police."
Majeur sighed. "Mr. Croaker, in the best of all possible worlds that would already have happened. Juan Garcia Barbacena would already be incarcerated." That pause again; Croaker was getting to know this man's persuasive style. "But this is not the best of all possible worlds. It is reality. And the reality of this situation is that no matter Juan Garcia's ..evil, no matter his culpability in this crime, he will never be charged, let alone arraigned."
Majeur's fingers curled around the smooth granite headstone of Theresa Marquesa Barbacena, as if by that gesture he could somehow gentle her restless spirit. "This man is protected, even from the direct force of my client. There is a wall around him none can penetrate." He held up a finger. "Almost none."
A slow creeping had begun along Croaker's spine, as premonition began inexorably to align itself with reality.
In a voice that raised the hairs on Croaker's forearms, Majeur concluded his summation: "You, sir, can get to him. My client is convinced of it. Here, in a nutshell, is his proposal: in return for the kidney that will save Rachel's life, you will penetrate Juan Garcia Barbacena's defenses and you will kill him."
2
I'm not going to kill," Croaker said, "for you or anyone else."
Majeur's offer wasn't a gift from God, he thought. It was a deal with the Devil.
"I see." Majeur put his hand on the front fender of the turquoise Mustang with the same force of feeling he might fondle a naked thigh. They were standing outside the gates to the cemetery, which the attorney had relocked. From this vantage point they could just make out the bright spray of color of the fresh flowers laid at the grave of Theresa Marquesa Barbacena. "That sentiment will come as a shock to the family of Ajucar Martinez."
With a tremor of achy recognition, Croaker's mind flew back a decade. "Martinez was a monster. He'd killed five hookers by the time I caught up to him. Slashed their foreheads and cheeks, cut off their breasts before he slit their throats."
"You shot him dead," Majeur said coolly.
"Yes, I did." Croaker was no longer surprised at the depth of information Majeur had unearthed about him, even though much of it was classified and so extremely difficult to obtain. Majeur's first contact with Croaker was part of a major operation. These people were clearly not fooling around. "He came after me with his straight razor."
"Blew his face right off."
"I shot him in the knee first," Croaker said. "It wasn't enough."
Majeur threw the dome-lidded lunch box into the Mustang's backseat. "Then there was Dunston McGriff."
"Another psycho," Croaker recalled. "Raped his stepsister after he had ripped out her heart and ate it. Then he went on a killing spree. Four dead, six injured. Thirty-ought-eight shotgun was his weapon of choice."
Majeur settled himself against the fender of the Mustang. Sunlight spun dizzyingly off its highly polished surface. "One bullet through the temple, another through his neck. A crack marksman's kill. You iced him clean."
"Had to. He was about to take out my partner."
Majeur folded his arms across his chest, closed his eyes, and put his face up into the sun. "And now we come to Rodrigo Impremata."
Croaker looked at Majeur. The attorney had been ever so successful in resurrecting the old days. Events that Croaker had buried deep in his psyche strode through his conscious mind like a host, jackbooted and bristling with the weaponry of war. "What is this, a laundry list?"
"An accounting of the dead," Majeur said. "If my sources are correct, Don Rodrigo ran the coke cartel in New York's Barrio for many years. Also, it seems, he ordered your father killed. Any discrepancies so far?"
"None that I know of." Croaker waited for the other shoe to drop: surely Majeur must know about his freelance career with the feds.
Majeur nodded. "In this age of prevarication and shifting culpability I appreciate your candor, sir, surely I do," He tilted his face more fully into the sunshine. "The Don was the worst kind of egomaniac, wasn't he? As he amassed power, he brought reckless danger to everyone around him. Even his colleagues wished him dead. But the Don was too clever for them; he kept them weak and warring among themselves." Majeur's eyes snapped open, catching sight of Croaker staring at him. "Which is where you came in. Some bright spark who knew-or suspected-that the Don had had your father wiped, leaked you some key information-a hole in the Don's formidable defenses through which a man of your abilities and determination could slip." Majeur cocked his head to one side. "How am I doing?"
Croaker shrugged noncommittally, but inside he was roiling. He thought he was over the bitter feelings the Don had awakened in him. He thought he had come out the other side of that particular maelstrom.
"That's sort of the semiofficial story." Majeur's gaze drifted off through the iron bars to Theresa's grave. "On the other hand, there are those-and I must confess to belonging to this camp-who believe you already knew who had your father whacked. I mean to say you certainly did enough investigating on your own time."
Majeur's gaze snapped back to Croaker. He was looking for confirmation. When he got none, he went on. "Anyway, as this version goes, it was you who went to the Don's bitterest rival and cut a deal: he rolls over on the Don and you take the sonuvabitch out. Neat, clean, everybody's interests are served."
Now Croaker could see that Majeur had done so much more than resurrect his past. He had evoked not merely remote events pressed into the pages of a scrapbook, he had also managed to conjure up the emotions Croaker had painstakingly interred in the dark recesses of his mind. Croaker was reliving the red rage of revenge that had gripped him like a hurricane-driven tide. He would have done anything to bring his father's killer to justice-and had.
Majeur levered himself off the car. "Tell me, how old were you when this incident occurred?"
"Twenty," Croaker said. "If it happened like you said."
"Oh, it happened just as I related it." Majeur opened the Mustang's door. "You know it and I know it." He gave Croaker a thin smile. "So let's save ourselves some time here. You have the essential qualities: you are both skilled and resourceful."
"Hey, tell you what, when I need a job reference, I'll call you."
Majeur gave him a wry look. He was still in summation; no sarcastic bit of business was going to derail him from his appointed task. "You know what they say about killing a human being-either you can do it or you can't. Period. I believe you have amply demonstrated that you know how to kill a man. In fact, one could say that you are an expert at it."
"My abilities are not at issue," Croaker said. "If I killed in the past there were damn good reasons for it. A, those perps deserved it. And, two, I had no other choice."
"With Martinez and McGriff, you may have a point," Majeur said. "But not with the Don."
"There you're wrong," Croaker told him. "We never could get anything on the Don. No matter how hard we tried he kept slipping through our fingers like an eel, as if he knew what we were up to before we knew ourselves." He nodded. "And you're right. I did a shitload of detective work on the Don. He had my father killed, no doubt of it. But the people who spoke to me were too scared to go to the cops and testify. And even if I had the proof, the Don would walk. He was wired into the NYPD all the way downtown. He was an untouchable. And in the meantime kids were dying from the shit he was selling. There was no other way."
Majeur stood very close to him. In the growing heat of the morning, the smells of masculine cologne and sweat were suddenly rife. "There was no other way. He was an untouchable." Majeur whispered the echo. "In other words, he was protected on all sides."
And in just that way, Croaker felt the trap snap shut on him. He looked into Majeur's coffee brown eyes and felt the full brunt of the attorney's intensity.
"Just like Juan Garcia Barbacena is an untouchable, protected on all sides." Majeur's hands lifted and fell. "Madre de Dios, the filthy pig killed his wife in cold blood in the full flower of her life. You think he didn't know just what he was doing, you don't know Juan Garcia Barbacena worth a shit. He is Don Rodrigo Impremata all over again."
Blood had risen into Majeur's face, darkening his skin to the color of stained mahogany. Whether or not Barbacena committed the crime, Croaker saw quite clearly that Majeur believed he was guilty. Maybe Croaker had gained an insight into the attorney. Maybe he wasn't just a cold and clever mercenary, working the anatomy of the bigger buck. He wasn't perfect, either. He hadn't uttered one word about Croaker's ties to the ACTF. This had to mean he didn't know.
"I have only your say-so for that," Croaker said. He was aware how with each exchange Majeur was leading him deeper and deeper down this particular path. But he didn't see that he had much choice. Rachel had to have that kidney. And if Majeur was telling him the truth about Barbacena... Treading morally suspect ground was new to him, despite Majeur's magical mystery tour of his NYPD past. On one point Croaker was clear: he had been justified in each homicide he had committed. This situation with Juan Garcia Barbacena was another matter altogether. He needed some time to check things out and to think. But time was the one commodity he couldn't afford. Rachel's condition wouldn't wait for every i to be dotted, every t to be crossed.
"Some things one must take on good faith," Majeur said. "Believe me, sir, we have not lost sight of your niece's welfare."
"I need some time, talk to Dr. Marsh, let her check out your documentation.''
"You have twenty-four hours," Majeur said. "At that time, we trust you will be prepared to move forward."
"Dr. Marsh will want to be sure this organ exists."
Majeur smiled. "Can and will be done." He nodded. "On the back of my business card you will find a handwritten number. You may reach me anytime, anywhere, within the next twenty-four hours. That is a guarantee, sir. A tangible example of our good faith."
Majeur gave Croaker a stern look. "Twenty-four hours, this is all the grace period my client is prepared to give you."
This piqued the detective in Croaker. "In something of a rush, isn't he?"
"As is your Rachel." Majeur shrugged. "As it happens, my client does have a most pressing deadline." He stepped closer to Croaker and lowered his voice, though who he was afraid could hear him but the dead souls and the seagulls that guarded them was anyone's guess. "At midnight tomorrow, Juan Garcia Barbacena arrives in Miami under a massive security blackout. He stays for twelve hours only while he holds high-level business meetings. When and where are closely held secrets. It is during this period you must terminate him."
Croaker felt the sweat break out along his spine. "You're giving me next-to-impossible odds. I wouldn't have nearly enough time-"