The Wolf (25 page)

“So he pretends to do a flip?” Big Mike said.

“I’m not saying that’s what it is,” I said. “All I’m saying is that is what it could be.”

“Which is why we wait,” Big Mike said.

“Exactly,” I said. “If I’m going to have to dust Jimmy, I have to be sure that he’s a traitor instead of somebody who’s looking out for me and the family.”

“Which of those two you really think it is?” Big Mike asked.

“I wish to hell I knew,” I said.

Chapter 40

Vatican City, Italy

“This is the room where the cardinals gather when they need to choose a new Pope,” Raza said, gazing up at Michelangelo’s massive and stunning work,
The Last Judgment.
“The smoke they show on television? It goes through a tube in the rear of the room. If it’s brown, they have yet to decide. If it’s white, there’s a new man in charge.”

“The guidebook says they sit in these wooden chairs along the walls and discuss the possible choices,” Avrim said. “Hard for me to believe it’s all done in such a civil way.”

“That’s because it isn’t,” Raza said. “It’s all corruption and deal-making and back door agreements. Religion plays no role in the selection of a Pope. It’s a business like any other.”

“It is an impressive room,” Avrim said, staring now at the massive ceiling filled with the beauty of Michelangelo’s
Creation.
“I’ve been here on five, maybe six occasions and it never fails to move me.”

“The artist has little to do with the religion,” Raza said. “In his own way, Michelangelo was a rebel. They all were—Raphael, Da Vinci, Caravaggio.”

“Yet, look at the work,” Avrim said. “It’s as spiritual as any I’ve seen. They must have had some degree of faith to agree to such undertakings.”

“They had faith in their talents,” Raza said. “Their true beliefs rested in their skills. They ignored all who dared question the work and had contempt for the mildest of criticism. They wanted nothing from their patrons other than the funds needed to complete their work. In many ways, they were no different than the two of us in league with the Russian. I don’t value his opinion. I don’t seek his counsel. All that concerns me is that the money keeps flowing in and he helps keep as many of our men safe as possible until our mission is complete.”

The enormous Sistine Chapel was packed wall-to-wall with tourists, as it is most days of the year. Vatican guards walked among the crowd asking for silence and looking to prevent photos being taken with flash lighting. The art in the chapel, originally commissioned by Pope Julius II in the late thirteenth century and rebuilt under the orders of Sixtus IV, took up every inch of the three levels of the room.

Avrim stared at each of the frescoes that lined the walls along the second tier, overcome by the sheer majesty of the work. “I know you don’t want to hear this, but I feel I must say it,” he said to Raza.

Raza looked away from
The Last Judgment
and gazed over at him. “I’m listening,” he said.

“I wish you had chosen other targets,” Avrim said, hesitant even to speak the words. “A government building, perhaps, or a bridge, a tunnel, a harbor. It seems wrong to destroy something that comes this close to perfection.”

“I know,” Raza said, “and that’s why they are perfect choices. Their destruction will be an emotional blow of epic proportions. Look at these people, lost in wonder and useless prayer, gazing at the work as if the figures on the walls were real and could walk among them. To have such an effect on so many speaks to the power of a great artist. And that’s exactly what I will be doing, only in reverse. I will strip them of this perfection, tear away their dream, rip apart their beliefs. After this mission is completed and the sites are brought to ruin, people will be left with nothing but memories. And when they think of Michelangelo or even mention his name, they will have to think of me and mention mine. For I will be forever linked with the Divine One.”

“You once thought yourself an artist,” Avrim said, uncertain if he should push the conversation further. “You had the talent to be one.”

“I
am
an artist, Avrim,” Raza said.

“We are on a path of destruction,” Avrim said, speaking freely now, no longer concerned with the consequences that could result from such an act of defiance. “We do not create anything other than bombs fools like me strap on because of their belief in people like you. We go out and destroy and are hated for it.”

“You do not yet understand the importance of our task,” Raza said. “And perhaps you will die never knowing. That would be a shame, since what we do is not for glory or gold. We ask only to be allowed to live our lives on our own soil and worship in our own fashion. We have never declared war on anyone. But war is always declared on us. And you are correct when you say we are hated because of the destruction we caused. But we are also feared, and I would much rather people tremble in my presence than find comfort in it.”

“If these missions prove successful, we will be more than hated,” Avrim said. “We will be despised until the end of days.”

“All the more reason to pray for their success,” Raza said, smiling. “For if I am to be judged, let it be by my enemies.”

Avrim lowered his head. Then he looked up and stared at the work, relishing each second of pleasure.

Chapter 41

New York City

Big Mike Paleokrassas, the fisherman’s grandson who grew up to be one of the brightest stars in the criminal universe, got behind the wheel of a remodeled and refurbished 1967 Black Mustang, eight cylinders of pure power, built for speed and comfort, and laid his head back against the plush headrest. He had wanted such a car since he first saw the movie
Bullitt
with Steve McQueen on his tenth birthday, a VHS gift from his father who handed down his love of fast cars to his son. He had to wait eleven years until he found the one he wanted. It was beaten down, engine run to the ground, body ruined by weather and age, but Big Mike knew it was the one, and he took the time and the money needed to restore it to its full glory. As he rose through the ranks of the Greek syndicate, he collected a number of other cars, all copies of those he had seen on a movie screen. These were Big Mike’s real loves—cars and movies.

“If I had a chance to do it over again,” he once told me over the course of a long dinner at his summer home outside Athens, “I would get on a plane and head straight for Los Angeles. Work in the movie business, and not from our end of it—shakedowns, budget shuffles, blackmail, protection—I mean just make movies.”

“Why didn’t you?” I asked. “I doubt your father would have stopped you. I never got the sense from him he was that keen on you going into the family business. You could have made the move.”

“I was thinking about it,” Big Mike said. “Then he got sick and it seemed like every Greek I ever met wanted a piece of his action, and he wasn’t even dead yet. He had built it all from nothing, Vincent. I couldn’t walk away and let it fall into the hands of people who had no business running his business.”

“Any regrets?”

“Everybody has regrets,” Big Mike said. “Part of life, I suppose. I may not have lived out my dream but I kept my father’s dream alive. We’re not a big outfit, can’t even compare us to your crew, the Yakuza, the Triads, and forget about the Russians. But we’ve earned our seat at the table and nobody makes any moves on our turf. We’re never under anybody’s scope and that’s a good thing, a very good thing for a criminal organization. I don’t have the pressure on me that you do on a day-to-day. I can’t imagine this is how you pictured your life turning out.”

“If my parents had lived, the results would have been different,” I said. “My father, especially. Now, he loved my Uncle Carlo, looked up to him and respected him, but truth is he hated what he did for a living. My dad was a hard worker who put in long hours every day for not a lot of money. Guys like that don’t care much for gangsters.”

“I figured you for law school,” Big Mike said. “You got the head for it and the mind-set. I would have hired you.”

I smiled and shook my head. “I don’t think so,” I said, “though I wouldn’t mind the billing hours. And they call us thieves. No, medicine would have been the way for me. I was always interested in it, even more so after my mom got sick.”

“Dr. Wolf,” Big Mike said, laughing. “Has a nice ring to it.”

“Who the hell are we kidding?” I said. “We were born to be gangsters. I would have sucked as a doctor and you would have made those movies that go right to DVD without sniffing the inside of a movie theater, and we would both have been miserable.”

Big Mike was on the top floor of a midtown park and lock garage. He looked out at the opening between two thick concrete beams and could see a hard rain begin to fall. He also noticed a second car parked in the large space, big enough to fit eighty to a floor. He didn’t need to look long to catch the make and model of the sedan and see it for what it was, a car on his tail. The windows were up and tinted, so he couldn’t tell how many were in the car, though he figured it to be a driver and three shooters.

The car hadn’t been there when he had parked his Mustang two hours earlier, prior to his meeting with John Loo and members of his surveillance team, who were getting an update on Raza’s whereabouts and the killing of Santos. He rubbed his eyes, reached for a pack of gum in the glove compartment and rolled three slices of peppermint Wrigley’s into his mouth. He then slipped on a pair of thin black leather gloves and checked his rear- and sideview mirrors. He turned the ignition key and smiled when he heard the eight-cylinder 427 cubics of power he had installed kick over, the inside of the car doing a slow tremble. He turned and saw the driver of the sedan start the late model Mercedes and let it idle, thin puffs of white smoke coming out of the rear dual exhaust. Big Mike figured he could outdrive the shooters, the swerving incline out of the seven-story structure working more to his favor. He knew, however, he couldn’t outgun them. “Well, Bessie,” Big Mike said, addressing the car by the nickname his father had given it when he first saw the then-damaged wreck his son craved, “I always knew you were better than any Benz. Time to prove it.”

Big Mike released the brake and shifted the car into reverse, its front end now facing the Mercedes. He shifted into first and drove toward the winding incline leading out of the seventh floor, the sedan following him out. As he neared the incline, he switched into second, hit the gas heavy and gripped the steering wheel tighter, moving fast down the thin concrete passageway, careful to avoid the double iron railings on one side and the solid cement wall on the other. The sedan was fast behind him, tinted windows now rolled down, three of the passengers tucking their arms out of the car, semiautomatic guns in hand.

The left rear bumper of Big Mike’s Mustang bounced against an iron rail as he swerved onto the sixth-floor curve heading down to the next flight. One of the gunmen’s bullets shattered a taillight and a second knocked loose the passenger side mirror. Big Mike shifted from second to first as his front end scraped against the cement wall, leaving a stream of sparks in its wake. The sedan was closing in, its tires squealing against the pull of the curves, the driver choosing to lurch closer to the wall and avoid contact with the railings.

Big Mike’s Mustang jumped off the landing onto the fifth floor and he swerved it away from the next incline and maneuvered around forty cars parked throughout the space. He checked his mirror and saw the sedan was on his trail, the gunmen hailing bullets his way at a faster, steadier clip. One bullet shattered his back window while another volley tore through the leather upholstery, shredding the seats open as if sliced by a knife.

One bullet found its intended target.

Big Mike looked down and saw blood oozing out of a small smoking hole on the left side of his stomach and dripping onto the black mat by his feet. His left leg was turning numb and the burn from the wound caused his eyes to sting. He swung the car around the back end of a white van with out-of-state plates and then slammed on the brakes and carefully guided the Mustang as it did a 180-degree turn to face the oncoming Mercedes, a fuselage of bullets slamming in his direction. Four of the shots cracked the front end, causing a stream of dark smoke to snake its way through the hood.

Big Mike shifted easily into third gear, feeling the power of the engine come to life, less than twenty feet from the advancing sedan. He knew that if he lost the chicken game and crashed into the Mercedes, he would not survive the hit. He had no driver air bags and had not even bothered to put on his seat belt. His only chance would be if the driver of the sedan blinked and backed off.

Through the pain in his side and the smoke limiting his vision, he caught the eye of the driver behind the wheel of the Mercedes and smiled. “He’s scared of you, Bessie,” Big Mike said, “as fucking well he should be.”

The Mercedes hit the brakes and swung away from the Mustang inches before a crash could occur. The sedan skidded to a stop against the open side of the fifth floor, a two-foot concrete embankment the only separation. One of the gunmen jumped out of the car, a gun in each hand, and poured bullets into the Mustang. One of the slugs clipped Big Mike in the left shoulder and a second nicked his right elbow. He ignored the blood and the pain, jammed the gear shaft into fourth and slammed his foot down on the gas pedal, heading straight for the center of the sedan.

The crash was sudden and loud, killing the crouching gunman instantly, his body wedged between squealing tires and crushed steel. The blow from the Mustang toppled the Mercedes over the concrete barrier, floating it out into the heavy rain as it crashed into the alley below, landing hood first, tires popping, gas tank imploding, smoke engulfing the front and rear, flames emerging out of the engine.

The three men inside dead.

Big Mike’s Mustang was left dangling, the front half hanging over the edge of the barrier, the rear still on solid ground. The car was smashed and riddled with bullet holes, the rubber on its tires down to bare thread, smoke pouring out of the engine, the top of the Mustang torn off and resting against the far side of a wall.