Ogrodnik

  “It looks like we have a lead on the killers, but we have no idea why they would have done this. I wouldn’t be surprised if they’re related somehow to Biovonix given the events of the past couple of days, but why would Biovonix want my father dead?” he asked.

  “That’s a good question.”

  “We’ll find out more when we get the plates back from Stella.”

  “Okay. How did your meeting go with Alex Banik?”

  “It was interesting. Banik is a first class ego maniac, and he has lots of secrets.”

  “Well, don’t stop there. Keep talking.”

  “He admitted meeting with Dad and told me Dad went there to ask him about ‘irregularities in the manner that Isotin was being tested.’”

  “What did Banik say?”

  “He denied everything, of course, but his corpus lingua told me otherwise.”

  “Body language?”

  “Yes, when Banik had told me that ‘Biovonix has nothing to hide,’ his head was actually moving slightly from side to side as if his shaking head was saying no despite what his words were telling me, a classic incongruence reaction that indicates lying. After that he said that ‘my own clinical trials manager found the rumors were baseless,’ and then he gave me a big smile. The response came out much too quickly for me to believe it unrehearsed. And the smile was a mouth only smile, definitely rehearsed. A real smile crinkles the eyes. Banik was lying. But why? And about what?”

  “The plates came back to a Paul Kulas,” Rivka said after hanging up the phone. “His address is in Montreal North on L’Archeveque Avenue. He has no criminal record, has never filed for income tax and doesn’t have a credit rating. Aside from his address and his driver’s license, this guy doesn’t exist.”

  “Interesting, do you want to check out that address with me?”

  “Sure, I drive, and you navigate.”

  “Not likely lead foot. I want to get there in one piece.”

  “Whatever, just as long as you don’t grill me anymore about my personal life.”

  “No promises,” he replied.

  The route over to Kulas’s house took them up to the Metropolitan Avenue and then east across the top of the city until they turned north on Lacordaire, all the way up to Gouin Boulevard and then onto L’Archeveque.

  “This looks like the place,” said Elliot as they cruised by a dilapidated bungalow that had three vehicles in the driveway, only one with wheels.

  “There’s the white van, but we can’t exactly walk up and knock on the front door. We’d likely be greeted with the business end of a gun if he is home,” said Rivka.

  “Agreed on that. We don’t have time to sit on the house, so we need someone to tail him. Do you think Frank Girard is available?”

  “Let me call him.”

  On the drive home, Elliot listened while Rivka dialed a number from her contact list.

  “Franko, Rivka here.” He heard a muted response from the cell phone.

  “Why do I always call you?” Rivka answered. “We’ve got a job,” again, a short, unintelligible response.

  “Wish I could tell you different, but that’s it. We have a line on the guy who offed Elliot’s father, and we need someone to sit on him.”

  Elliot didn’t like to hear the word offed used in reference to his father’s murder but didn’t say anything as he continued listening to the one-sided conversation.

  “It’s a long story, and the case is still pretty thin, so we can’t get the cops involved. Can we meet at the Ouiseau?”

  “Okay, twenty minutes it is.”

  Rivka put her phone away and turned to Elliot.

  “He’ll do it. Drop me off at the Ouiseau Café. I’ll walk back to the office from there."

  “Okay, I’ve got a few errands to run. I’ll meet you back at the office.”

  “Frank,” she said as she extended her hand.

  “Always a pleasure. So whatya got, kiddo?“ he said as he flagged down a passing waitress for a coffee.

  Frank was a man of medium height and build but had let himself go in the past few years since retiring from the force. He had a ruddy tone to his face that gave him the appearance of someone who spent a lot of time outdoors. Rivka knew that was not true; he just had a ruddy colored face.

  He squeezed his ample midriff between the bench and table and proceeded to pour sugar from the dispenser into a teaspoon that he held above his coffee. The spoon acted as a break for the pouring sugar, and every few seconds, he’d flip the spoon over as if he were actually measuring something.

  “As I mentioned on the phone, we think we’ve found the guy who murdered Elliot’s father. The trouble is, he has no jacket and doesn’t seem to exist except for a driver’s license. I’m thinking he’s an import who had someone create a Canadian identity for him.”

  “That takes some serious juice. You gotta know people with access to create a folder in the system.”

  “We think this guy may be backed by a pharmaceutical company, which means there’d be no shortage of funds.”

  “That would do it. What else you got?”

  Rivka retold events surrounding the murder, the police investigation, and then JFK’s investigation.

  “It sounds like those cops are either crooked or incompetent.”

  “I think it’s a bit of both, so watch your ass on this one. Trust no one. We’re looking for someone to sit on this guy today and tonight and follow him if he leaves home. We need to know where he works and with whom he meets, so bring your surveillance kit.”

  “I can start this afternoon and stay with him until the morning. Who’s going to relieve me?”

  “Send me a text in the morning at 6:00ish, and I’ll take over.”

  “Okay. Did you want updates as they occur?”

  “Yeah, text both Elliot and I when he leaves and where he stops.”

  “Will do. Send me his address, the car, and the plate.” And with that, Frank got up and left without paying for his coffee, as usual.

  Three suits turned up into the stairs leading up to JFK. They knew the office was empty and therefore did not bother to knock or ring. The shortest of the three men pulled a packet from his inside jacket pocket and chose the torsion bar and a rake. He teased the keyhole using the rake with a practiced motion, and twenty seconds later they were in.

  The two foot soldiers went in first followed by Yilmaz, who stood off to the side while the other two rifled the office.

  “There’s a docking station but no laptop,” shouted the mustached mercenary who was working the desk.

  Yilmaz flicked his eyes over to the file cabinet for his next instructions when the door flew open and Sammy stepped in.

  “What the fuck do you think you assholes are doing?” the cook barked as he waved an enormous cleaver. “I’ll give you three seconds to get the fuck outta Dodge before I go all butcher on you.”

  The two underlings looked at the cook and then over at Yilmaz. All it took was a Yilmaz nod, and the two soldiers advanced on the overweight cook. The brush cuts were trained fighting men, and they instinctively separated in order to gain strategic advantage. The ensuing fight should have been one sided: two trained fighters against an overweight fry cook, but it was anything but. In an open area with no weapons, the brush cuts would have made quick work of the fat man, but in the closed environment of an office, the fat man stood his ground. Thirty years of standing all day and wielding a cleaver had molded a body that was ideal for close quarters office combat. His pear shaped physique provided a low center of gravity, and the brush cuts quickly found that knocking him off balance was like tipping a pyramid. The cook stood his ground among the furniture and kept the soldiers at bay. When one of them got too close, he was greeted with a hard slap in the head from the flat side of the cleaver.

  The cook’s defense was valiant but was ultimately destined to fail. His reluctance to use the sharp edge of the blade sealed his fate. It was just a matter of time before the soldiers would
get inside his swing zone and bring him down: a tiring cleaver arm, a misjudged swing, a well-timed feint. He never even saw the hard right from the big man’s brass-knuckled fist. The punch's true intention was not realized, but it still caught enough of Sammy’s neck and shoulder to send him reeling. The big guy with the thick neck moved in without hesitation and landed the next blow just behind Sammy’s ear. The room tilted and threatened to go black, but Sammy brought himself back enough to roll for cover behind the throne. However, the fight was now all but gone from the cook.

  It took both men to drag Sammy into the center of the room and flip him over onto his stomach, each of them pinning an arm to the floor. Knuckles mouthed something at Sammy, but all he heard was the dull roar of blood rushing in his left ear. The initial stun from the punch was receding, but the side of his head still throbbed like a hammered thumb and promised to settle in for a good long while. Sammy felt the sticky warmth of his own blood as it found a channel across the back of his neck and onto the floor beneath him. He made an effort to speak, “Fack yu,” he croaked.

  By now Yilmaz was standing by his side. He bent down to pick up the dropped cleaver. “Didn’t your momma tell you to mind your own business when you were a child? You should have listened to her. It is not too late for you; I will give you something to remember this lesson by. From now on, every time you flip a burger, you will think of this day and the lesson you’ve learned.”

  With that Yilmaz looked at the two soldiers and then down at Sammy’s right arm. Mustache pulled the arm away from the cook’s body and splayed the hand out flat on the floor with little difficulty.

  Yilmaz didn’t hesitate and sunk the business edge of the cleaver deep into the wooden floor. On one side of the embedded cleaver was Sammy’s right hand, on the other, his severed thumb.

  “Banik”

  “Yes?”

  “We’re finished at the office. There was no computer, and we didn’t find anything in the file cabinets.”

  “You know what to do next,” said Banik.

  “We had trouble.”

  “What was it?”

  “While we were in the office, the cook from downstairs came in and tried to scare us off.”

  “Tell me you didn’t kill him.”

  “He's still alive. He’s probably on his way to the hospital as we speak.”

  “I’ll let Doyle know.”

  Frank parked about a half block up the street facing in the direction of the house and settled in for an uneventful afternoon. He knew what a stakeout was like. Fifty-nine minutes of absolute boredom and then one minute of hyper alertness when the target showed his face. He’d learned long ago not to get too excited when the target moved nor to let himself get too relaxed when nothing was happening. His mode of operation was to put the radio on low, preferably on talk radio, and let his mind wander. Years of stakeouts had taught him to go through a constant progression of watching the target area and then checking every mirror. He’d focus in on anything that moved until he was satisfied it was no threat to him.

  Frank looked over at his backpack and took out a bottle of water. He would have preferred a coffee; it would be a long afternoon and an even longer night, and coffee would help keep him alert. Experience also told him that drinking coffee would make him relieve himself more frequently. Taking a pee break while alone on a stakeout could be a deal breaker. Many a stakeout was botched because the surveillor took a piss and was either made or ended up losing the target.

  The dark of night would give him options that daytime surveillance did not offer, like the rubber hose and empty bottle he kept in his backpack. He’d heard of guys in his line of work that used diapers. Frank would never use diapers.

  Four hours into the stakeout, the target was on the move. Frank watched as Kulas left the house and pulled the van into the street travelling away from Frank’s stakeout position. He texted Rivka and Elliot to say he was on the move.

  Kulas drove south on Boulevard Lacordaire and then west on Highway 40. The traffic was moderate, perfect for tailing someone without being seen. Girard kept about a half a kilometer back and followed him as he turned south onto the Decarie Expressway. Driving on the Decarie always brought a smile to Girard’s face. When his son Mikey was just a young lad, they would occasionally go for a drive that led them down the Decarie Expressway. The manner in which the Decarie was recessed in a channel well below street level reminded Mikey of Star Wars and how Luke navigated through the trench in the final Death Star scene. Mikey would sit as far forward as his belt allowed and make believe he was Skywalker. After anointing a nearby black truck or car as Vader’s fighter, he’d spur on his father to escape. Frank would pretend to ignore him until the last possible minute and then speed ahead to Mikey’s squealing delight.

  Kulas emptied out of the Decarie Expressway into the Turcot Interchange. The Turcot Interchange was the end result of three major highways converging at a major train yard. The outcome was a convoluted labyrinth of high-speed motorways and ramps all elevated 60 feet above the old west end train yards. The white van turned east in the Exchange and took the Ville Marie that headed toward downtown Montreal. Girard started making up ground between the two vehicles because losing the van would be easy in the network of underground exits that fanned out from the Ville Marie.

  Girard saw the turn indicator flash on the white van up ahead as it shifted over to the Atwater Street exit. He stayed as far back from the van as he could while still maintaining visual contact. They surfaced from the expressway onto upper Atwater Street, drove past the Atwater Market and through the Atwater tunnel. The canal they had passed under was considered a boundary of sorts. In years past, this canal was the border that separated the blue collar neighborhood of Pointe St Charles from the rest of Montreal. The Pointe is the source of some of Montreal’s most colorful history and home to a large contingent of ethnicities.

  At one time, the Pointe promised and delivered the Canadian version of the American dream. Post war optimism was soaring, and the economy was booming. The Pointe offered a slice of the dream to tens of thousands. The enormous manufacturing centers attracted unskilled labor from every corner of the country as well as immigrants from Ireland, Scotland, and Poland.

  In the '70s and '80s as the economy evolved away from manufacturing, the large industrial facilities that dominated the Pointe were abandoned, and have since fallen into disrepair. The streets no longer swelled with factory workers at shift change. The many diners and bars that serviced the workers no longer existed save for one diner on the corner of Bridge Street: the lone survivor. The neon on its rusted signage, long since broken away, was now superseded by a cheap sign in the window blinking "Ouverte."

  Girard followed the van down St Patrick and watched as the van turned right onto Bridge Street. After turning the corner at Bridge, he could see no trace of the van. It had turned in somewhere. Girard slowly drove down Bridge Street looking into the parking lots of the various industrial buildings along the way; it wasn’t until he turned around and came back up the street that he spotted the van.

  There was an old building on the right side of a large gravel lot. It looked like it might be a truck depot. To the left of the gravel lot was a two-story building with the white van parked in front. Frank turned into a lot on the opposite side of the street and backed his car into a spot that was bounded by a trailer van on one side and a flatbed on the other. It wasn’t ideal because his vehicle was partially exposed, but his car would stick out like a blackened eye if he parked on the empty street. On the upside, the vantage point allowed him a clear view of the van and building. There was an unobtrusive sign on the fence across the street that said, “Eastern Security.”

  He texted the name of the company and the address to Rivka and Elliot and settled down into stakeout mode.

  “Banik. Yilmaz here.”

  “What’s up?”

  “We have an issue. The son and his bitch sidekick found Kulas.”

  “Da
mn.”

  “They’re having him tailed as we speak.”

  “How do you know?”

  “From the second-floor window at the compound, I have a view of his vehicle. I sent the plate number to Duval. The guy’s an ex-cop named Frank Girard who does part-time duty for the son’s company. He’s a fat bastard, but he supposedly knows what he’s doing.”

  The voice paused for a minute and then came back. “We need to put an end to this. I’ll call Ogrodnik.”

  “Let me handle this. I’d rather not have anything to do with that freak.”

  “No, it’s better this way. Just stay out of his way. Tell Kulas to take the van out to the old warehouse on the canal in Griffintown and wait there. He’ll know where it is.”

  “Ogrodnik?”

  “This is he,” an adolescent pitched voice responded.

  “I have a job for you. It needs your immediate attention.”

  “That will affect the price. Tell me about it.”

  “The son found Kulas and is having him tailed."

  “Is it the son, or the son’s partner, who is doing the surveilling?” Ogrodnik asked with uncharacteristic enthusiasm.

  “Neither, it’s an ex-cop named Frank Girard. We need to make an example of him. Within the hour, the ex-cop will be following Kulas to the old warehouse on the canal in Griffintown. I think you know the place.”

  “I do. What about the son?”

  “Stay away from the son and his partner. If something happens to them, the press will make the connection with the father, and then not even Doyle will be able to contain it.”

  “And Kulas? Now that he’s been found, he’s a liability.”

  “Don’t worry about Kulas. I have a plan for him.”

  “I’ll dispatch the cop as you require but will charge double my usual fee. And Banik, this is my last job. Thus, there will be no need for us to speak again. After today this phone number will no longer be active.”

  “Understood.”