The Wreckage - Michael Robotham [156]
“Call me Vincent, please. And you are…?”
“I don’t think that’s important.”
“No need to be so formal—I know all about Brendan and that office of yours. No listed telephone numbers or company tax returns.”
“We’re a communications company,” says Chalcott.
“Not the CIA then?”
Chalcott is trying hard to look relaxed and sound perfectly natural. He doesn’t like being embarrassed.
“Perhaps we could talk about this somewhere more private?”
“This is a private dining room.”
“Just you and me.”
“I’m happy if you want to invite Yahya. We can bring Ibrahim along. We can play twenty questions.”
Ruiz slides his hand into his pocket again. This time he produces a small black notebook.
“That bribe was very clumsy. I thought you guys had moved beyond trying to buy people off with beads and trinkets. This is what you wanted: Richard North’s notebook. Is this why you killed Zac Osborne?”
“We were not complicit in the murder of Zac Osborne,” says Sobel.
“Complicit: such an old-fashioned term. What about Richard North and Colin Hackett?”
“Please keep your voice down, Mr. Ruiz.”
“Explain it to me.”
“You are not owed an explanation.”
Ruiz taps the notebook against his cheek. “You have broken into my house, you have gate-crashed my daughter’s wedding, bugged my phones, hounded my friends… I’m owed for that.”
“You must think this is feeding time at the zoo,” says Chalcott, who has folded his serviette and placed it neatly on the side of his plate. “I won’t say that it’s been a pleasure.”
“I thought the CIA might be investigating a money-laundering operation,” says Ruiz. “Or trying to track down a wanted terrorist. But then I saw Mr. Maluk arrive. You’ve known all along about the cash being laundered through Mersey Fidelity. The ghost accounts. Iraqi money. Reconstruction funds. Drug profits… Which begs the question—why would the CIA allow something like that to happen?”
“That is a question too far, Mr. Ruiz, but you are right about one thing—you are jeopardizing a major security operation.”
“Oh, I see. There’s a bigger plan. So what is Mohammed Ibrahim doing in London? Perhaps you organized his release from prison. Is he your monster?”
“Be careful, Mr. Ruiz.”
“You know what they say about lying down with dogs?… You wake up with a career in the movies. No, that’s not it. Fleas. You wake up with fleas.”
Chalcott’s eyes behind rimless glasses seem to be concentrated on burning a hole through Ruiz’s forehead. “You do us a disservice, sir. You come in here, treating us like the Bumstead crowd, making outrageous allegations, getting in my face in a public place—that’s not very intelligent behavior. We can go somewhere now and talk about this, or I can find you later.”
It is a threat. Chalcott doesn’t look like a dangerous man, but an unlined face can hide a myriad of sins. His thick brown hair is ruffled slightly by the currents from the air conditioner. Joe O’Loughlin has taught Ruiz that true narcissists become intensely angry if anyone suggests they are not perfect. They seek to destroy the messenger rather than admit their flawless image might be blemished.
“I thought you were a clever man,” says Chalcott. “Clearly, I was misinformed. You come in here looking like you fell out of a laundry bag, making threats and baseless allegations, thinking you can rattle me. You think I give a fuck what some pissant, washed-up former detective is going to do?”
Ruiz looks at his hands and feet. He was wrong to come here; foolish to think they would tell him anything. By confronting them, by humiliating them publicly, by peeling away the carefully constructed façade of their work, Ruiz has inserted broken glass into the brains of dangerous men.
The manager has arrived. He is standing three feet away, his tongue wetting his lips.
“Perhaps you gentlemen could lower your voices.”
Chalcott’s eyes are filled with a black light. “Why don’t you fuck off?”
The manager takes a step back.
“It’s all right,” says Ruiz. “I’ll be leaving in a moment.”
“Nice to hear it,” says Sobel.
The driver leans down to whisper something in Ruiz’s ear but