Storm Front

Another man might have been angry to learn this. That was not Whitely Cracker’s nature. He was mostly just bewildered.

“But Teddy… Teddy, how could you? After all we’ve done together? I’ve… I’ve treated you like family. I’ve given you extra bonuses, extra vacations. You’re my baby girl’s godfather, for goodness’ sakes. We started out together….”

The elevator had arrived. Sniff and his escorts were getting on board.

“I’d appreciate if you gentlemen could wait here,” the burly man said. “It’s actually quite helpful to have you here. We’re just not quite ready for you yet.”

Whitely was only dimly hearing the man. He was busy beseeching some reaction — any reaction — out of the man who until moments ago had been his trusted right hand.

“Just… talk to me, Teddy. I don’t… I don’t understand. How could you do this to me, Teddy? What did I ever do to you, Teddy?”

Finally, Sniff turned to his boss, brought his chin up, and said in a deadly serious voice: “Don’t call me Teddy. I hate that name. I’ve always hated that name. My name is Theodore. Understand, motherfucker?”

After the elevator doors closed, Storm and Cracker were shunted over to the bench. It suited Storm well. He needed time to think anyway, to fill in with meat and skin the skeleton of the plan he had made.

Cracker mostly paced. He had a lot to think about, too.

“So,” he said at one point, “all those bugs in my house. Was that all the FBI?”

“Actually, that was the CIA,” Storm said. “They… they were looking to protect the assets of one of your more strategically important foreign clients.”

“Ah, yes. Prince Hashem.”

“You got it.”

They lapsed back into contemplation. About a half hour later, an agent came down and said Agent Colston — the burly guy with the goatee, apparently — was grateful for their patience, but he needed a little more time to interrogate the defendant.

Sniff wasn’t the suspect anymore. He was now the defendant.

An hour later, Storm received a text message from Kevin Bryan’s cell phone. “A truck has departed Volkov’s Bayonne location. Will advise of further movement. You safe?”

Storm thought about his current location and texted back: “Couldn’t be safer.”

The reply: “Good. Stay that way.”

Storm hadn’t expected Volkov to remain in Bayonne. He was a predator. Predators stay on the move. It’s a fact in the animal kingdom that carnivores tend to have much larger home ranges than herbivores. The equivalent could be said about the human world. Storm was just trying to think about how to use that fact against Volkov.

He wished he could somehow harness the Bureau’s considerable muscle, but he knew too much about how they operated. They had laws to follow, jurisdiction to respect, procedure to which they adhered. Most of all, this wasn’t their investigation. They had no evidence that would justify action against Volkov. The say-so of one private investigator wouldn’t begin to do the trick.

He was back to thinking about what he would be able to accomplish on his own, when an agent came back downstairs, invited them into the elevator, and led them to a conference room on the second floor.

There, Agent Colston received them.

“Thank you for staying, Mr. Cracker,” Colston said, then turned to Storm. “I don’t believe we’ve met.”

“Derrick Storm.”

A smile crept across Colston’s face for a brief moment before he tamped it down. “What a coincidence. I was just chatting with a man named Carl Storm earlier this morning. Is he a relative, perhaps?”

“Perhaps,” Storm said.

“And what is your interest in this matter?”

“I’m a private investigator,” Storm said, presenting his Storm Investigations business card. “Mr. Cracker has me on retainer.”

“Fair enough,” Colston said. He pivoted his attention away from Storm. “Mr. Cracker, I have to say, it’s a little unusual to have the victim of a crime waiting in our lobby when I come in with the man we’re accusing of defrauding him. But I suppose it’s also convenient.”

“Saves you a trip to Manhattan,” Cracker said amiably.

“Well, yes.” Colston paused, folded his hands, unfolded them. “I guess we should start at the beginning. I’ll spare you some of the details, but I can give you a rough outline of our investigation. We got a tip that there were some financial irregularities at Prime Resource Investment Group that were worth investigating.”

“A tip? From whom?”

Colston again wrestled with how much to say. But, ultimately, Cracker would probably learn it anyway.

“Actually, it was your wife.”

“Melissa?” Cracker said, as if he had more than one wife and her identity needed to be clarified.

“That’s right.”

“But how did she…” he started, then he shook his head. “And to think people don’t believe me when I say she’s smarter than me.”