Chapter 34 #2
“She loves him, Mam.” Kate turns to her father, who is sucking on his cigar as he flips cards in an old-fashioned Rolodex. He looks like he’s hunting for a winning lottery ticket. “There’s no need to call the bishop, Da. Just let Breagha marry Nate.”
“You ignorant twat,” Orla says.
Kate doesn’t react to the insult; it’s clearly worn soft from years of use. Instead, she asks her mother, “Where’s Tarasov?”
Orla says, “That doesn’t matter to you.”
Kate turns to her father. “Where’s Tarasov, Da?”
Orla’s eyes spark fireworks. She’s not accustomed to being ignored. But Barry answers between puffs of tobacco: “He drove over to St. Basil’s, on Butchers Hill. He’ll see to it the Orthodox church is more flexible than that Dulaney eejit.”
Orla turns to me with the laser precision of a nuclear weapon.
“This is what we need, Cole. You must break into Nate Cohen’s records.
Give him a past, the type that will get him locked up as soon as the police can serve a warrant.
” She rolls her lips over her teeth, stretching her spidery white scar.
“Murder should work,” she muses. “Or maybe just rape.”
“Just rape, Mam?” Kate’s temper is sparking. I can hear it in her voice, see it in the tiny tremor of her hands. “Why don’t you turn him into an international spy? Set him up to be executed for treason?”
“Excellent idea,” Orla says, tapping the table as she plots her next steps.
“And if he’s a spy, then whatever he’s doing at Johns Hopkins is suspect.
You can get in there too, can’t you Cole?
Rework his course grades, make him fail out.
Delete whatever he’s turned in for his dissertation.
You can do that for us, can’t you? Cole? ”
She’s a monster—as evil as Shannon, but with her Canton Crew status to spread poison further.
“No,” I say.
“No?” She looks confused, as if she’s never heard the word before. “What do you mean, no?”
“I won’t do it.”
She blinks, and I watch the gears grind together inside what passes for her brain. She’s paging through a deck of possible personas—grieving mother, seductive lover, wounded bird—deciding which one will win me over.
Before she can choose an approach, though, Barry hauls himself to his feet behind his desk. “You work for me!” he thunders, pointing his cigar at my chest.
“I’ve been meaning to speak with you about that,” I say. “I’m terminating our contract.”
“Terminating!” His face darkens from scarlet to crimson. “You can’t terminate. You know too much. The Canton Crew will never let you leave.”
“I’ll take my chances.”
“Chances!” He rears back like a dying lion. “Here’s your fucking ch—”
He chokes on the word before he can get it out.
His eyes bulge as if they’re trying to escape the furnace of his face.
His cigar falls from fingers that have suddenly twisted into a claw.
He flails back with his other hand, trying to find his chair, but half his body refuses to obey.
The left side of his face droops like he’s a badly carved ice sculpture at a summer wedding.
“Barry?” Orla asks, her voice trembling.
He stares at her, panic widening his eyes. “Ograku,” he says with a great deal of effort.
“Barry,” she repeats. “You’re scaring me.”
“Ograku,” he says again, followed by a stream of gibberish.
Kate grabs for the landline on his desk, but Orla slaps her hand away. “He needs help!” Kate shouts at her mother.
“Let’s wait and see.” Orla clutches the handset to her chest.
Barry is slouched in his chair now, breath coming in short, sharp gasps. He’s groaning and pawing at his head like he’s trying to dislodge an icepick.
“Call an ambulance!” Kate hollers.
“Don’t you dare tell me what to do in my own house.” Orla shouts. Barry mutters something that doesn’t sound like any human language in history.
A couple of runners burst through the office door. Orla leaps between Kate and Barry, spreading her arms wide as if she’s trying to protect her stricken husband. “If word gets out about what you’ve done,” she snaps at Kate. “I won’t be able to stop the Crew.”
The accusation springs from nowhere. The runners freeze, trying to parse the threat to their captain. Kate takes a step forward, asking, “What I’ve done?”
But Orla shouts, “Katie! Not one step closer!”
She’s painted a bright red target across her daughter’s chest. The men by the door respond like well-trained hounds, turning on Kate.
I grab her wrist before she can say another word. “We need to get out of here.” Barry moans. I pull Kate toward the door. “Now,” I insist.
Orla spreads her arms even wider, keeping anyone from getting close enough to help the stricken man.
“I can’t—” Kate argues.
One of the men goes for his shoulder holster.
“Let’s go,” I say, with more urgency than before.
“Mam,” Kate tries one more time, fighting to drag me across the room. Orla screeches as if we’ve doused her in boiling water.
“Goddammit, Kate!” I swear, and this time, she lets me pull her to the door. We take the stairs almost faster than my bruised body can manage. I clutch my side as we tumble down the last few steps. I have the front door open before Kate tugs hard, lurching toward the back of the house.
“Breagha,” she says. “I have to get her out of the basement.”
“We don’t have time.”
The goons have made it out of Barry’s office. They’re scrambling down the stairs as I push Kate toward the Range Rover.
“Let me go!” Kate screams.
“We’ll get her. I promise.” The pain in my gut is sharp enough to make me groan as I shove Kate into her seat. She’s cursing in Irish, snarling like a half-drowned cat, but she lets me close her door.
We clear the gates just as armed men boil out of the house.