Conviction (2009) Read online

  Overhead spread a rumble of thunder, followed moments later by a flash of lightning to the south. A soft rain began to fall, pattering on the leaves around him. He pulled up his hood and kept watching.

  SHORTLY before 1:00 A.M., Doucet's rust-on-white, hubcapless Citroen Relay van pulled into the driveway alongside the warehouse and followed it to the circular turnaround behind the loading dock. With a soft squealing of brakes, the Relay pulled to a stop twenty feet from where Fisher crouched. From inside, there came laughter and shouting. No female voices, as far as Fisher could tell. The Relay's side door slid open, and the Doucet gang came tumbling out, each of them barely negotiating the step down to the tarmac. This, Fisher thought, was going to be disappointingly easy. In his weeklong surveillance of the gang, he'd seen no guns but plenty of knives and truncheons. The two acts of violence he'd witnessed--group beatings administered to passersby for some slight, real or imagined--had confirmed what Fisher had already guessed: Doucet and his gang were bullies, but they were also good street fighters. No matter. Tonight good wasn't going to be good enough, and he had no intention of letting it descend into a fight--at least not a fair one. No such thing in this business.

  Doucet emerged from the van. Despite the chilling rain, he wore red nylon Nike track pants and a tight white T-shirt that accentuated his muscles.

  "Hey, Andre, get the damned door open, huh!" he yelled.

  Andre hurried up the loading-dock steps to the door. He looked up, noted the dimmed light fixture Fisher had disabled earlier, and gave it a tap with his finger. The light stayed dark. Another tap. Still dark.

  "Andre!" Doucet drunkenly stumbled toward the steps. "Forget that!"

  Andre got the door opened, and Doucet stepped through, followed by the rest.

  FISHER gave them ten minutes to settle in, grab a fresh round of beers, and start whatever kung fu movie was on the night's playbill; then he shed his rucksack and retrieved the pair of two-by-fours he'd stashed under a pile of leaves earlier that day. He walked down the driveway to the front of the building and braced the first two-by-four under the front door's knob, then returned to the rear and did the same to the loading-dock door. He returned to the trees and retrieved his rucksack.

  At the top of the loading ramp, he boosted himself onto the railing, then, with one hand braced on the wall, leaned forward until he could reach the defunct, car-sized air-conditioning unit affixed to the warehouse's back wall. Once he had a good grip on the unit, he stepped off the rail with his left foot and placed it on a flange jutting from the AC unit. He followed with his other hand and foot, then boosted himself atop the unit. From there it was a short climb up the utility ladder to the roof. Walking catfooted, he crossed the corrugated sheet metal until he reached the skylight; this, too, he'd already surveyed. He'd found it unlocked, but the hinges were squeaky, so he'd fixed them with a few squirts of silicone grease from a flip-top travel bottle. He lowered himself flat, pressed his ear to the sheet metal, and listened: laughter and, in the background, melodramatic martial-arts shouting and tinny movie music. Fisher lifted the skylight hatch until it rested against the roof, then slipped his legs through, feeling around until his right foot found a ladder rung. He climbed down a few feet, reached up, and closed the skylight, then climbed down to the floor. He was in a closet adjoining the bathroom. The previous owner had turned the warehouse's raised office area, which occupied the rear third of the space, into an open apartment that now overlooked the Doucet gang's social club--a collection of tattered recliners and couches clustered around a fifty-inch LCD TV.

  Fisher pressed his ear to the door. He heard no one in the bathroom. He opened the door, took a moment to grease the hinges, then stepped past the toilet and sink on the right and eased open the exterior door; this one made no noise.

  Directly ahead of him, spanning the width of the loft apartment and ending at a set of steps along the opposite wall, was a waist-high steel railing. To his right were a small kitchen, a breakfast nook, and a laundry area, each separated by a hanging mustard yellow bedsheet. The loft's width was divided every ten feet by load-bearing stanchions.

  Clink. A dish. Fisher froze.

  As he watched, one of Doucet's men--Pierre, it looked like--appeared, moving from right to left. He trotted down the stairs and out of sight. Fisher eased forward along the short wall until he could see over the railing. The gang was all there, still drunk and clearly entranced by the movie, occasionally shouting curses at characters and standing up to mimic a particularly pleasing kick or punch.

  Fisher returned to the closet, retrieved what he needed from his rucksack, then shut the door, leaving it cracked open. Now he would let nature do its work.

  THE wait was short. Ten minutes later he heard the clunk of feet coming up the steps. Ten seconds later the bathroom door swung open. Through the gap between the closet door and the jamb, Fisher saw the one known as Louis walk in. Fisher let the man position himself before the toilet, then swung open the door, stepped out, and tapped him hard behind the ear with a lead-and-leather sap. Louis dropped straight down. Fisher caught him by the collar and lowered him noiselessly to the floor. He quickly secured Louis's feet and hands with plastic flex-cuffs, then flushed the toilet, ran the faucet for a few seconds, and moved into the kitchen.

  He opened the door under the sink, knelt down, stuck his head in the cabinet, and then called in guttural French, "Hey, Pierre!"

  No response.

  "Hey, Pierre!"

  "What?"

  "Gimme a hand here. Something's wrong with the sink!"

  Footsteps thumped up the stairs, then across the floor into the kitchen. Head still inside the cabinet, Fisher stuck his hand out and waved Pierre forward. He knelt down to join him, and as his head slid inside, Fisher brought his seven-inch Gerber Guardian dagger up and laid the edge under Pierre's jawline.

  "Not a word," Fisher whispered, "or I'll open your throat for you. Nod if you understand."

  Pierre nodded.

  "No matter what happens, your friends won't be quick enough to save you. Understand?"

  Another nod.

  "We're going to stand up and move to the bathroom. Nice and quiet now . . ."

  Fisher got Pierre on his feet and herded him into the bathroom. When Pierre saw Louis's prostate form, he stiffened and started to turn around, but Fisher was ready with his sap. With a groan, Pierre dropped in a heap atop his friend. He bound them together, flex-cuffed hands and ankles interlocked.

  Two down. Three to go.

  Had this been a Third Echelon-sanctioned mission, his standard operating procedure would have been anonymity above all: no muss, no fuss, no footprints. In this case, however, disruption was everything. Romain Doucet was about to experience, in a dramatic way, the law of cause and effect.

  FISHER made no attempt to hide himself coming down the stairs. Even so, he'd nearly reached the bottom before Doucet noticed him. "Who the hell are you?"

  "Meter reader."

  "What?"

  "Census taker."

  Now Doucet and the other three--Georges, Avent, and Andre--were on their feet.

  "How did you get in here?" This from Avent. The top of his right ear was missing; the crescent shape suggested he'd been Mike Tysoned.

  Fisher circled the group, keeping them on his right with a couch between them. He kept his eyes fixed on Doucet. No one would move without a sign from him.

  "I said, how did you get in here?"

  "Pierre and Louis let me in," Fisher said. "You can ask them yourselves when they wake up."

  Four pairs of eyes darted up to the loft, then back at Fisher. The fact that Doucet was still talking rather than attacking told Fisher the Frenchman dealt poorly with uncertainty. This brazen stranger in his house had upset the order of things. Had interrupted his Saturday night.

  "This is a mistake, asshole," Doucet growled. "Do you know who I am?"

  "You mean aside from a general dirtbag? No, I can't think of a thing."

  "You
're dead, mister! Georges, call the others and get them over here. We're going to need help burying this guy."

  Georges pulled the cell phone from his pocket and dialed. He stared at the screen, then frowned. "No signal."

  Fisher pulled a cigarette-pack-sized black box from his jacket pocket and held it up for them to see. "GSM signal jammer. Range is about thirty feet. You might have better luck outside."

  At Doucet's nod, Georges headed for the door. It didn't budge.

  "Almost forgot," Fisher said. "I locked us in."

  "Locked us in?" Doucet repeated with a smirk. "Why the hell would you want to do that?"

  "I don't want any interruptions."

  Georges had returned to Doucet's side. The four of them glared at Fisher. Doucet said, "You've got five seconds to get out of here alive."

  Fisher let the half smile he'd been wearing fall from his face. "Stop running your mouth, Lurch, and let's get to it."

  Fisher barely got the words out before Doucet stepped forward, grabbed the arm of the couch, and tossed it aside as though it were a plastic chaise lounge. Fisher heard the distinctive snick of a switchblade opening a split second before Avent charged. The man was fast, but predictable, telegraphing his moves with his shoulders. He slashed wide at Fisher, who stepped back far enough to feel the blade's passage under his chin but close enough that a quick step forward brought him inside Avent's circle. He grabbed the knife arm at the wrist and the elbow, then dropped his own hips and twisted, putting all his weight into the torque. Avent's arm shattered at the elbow. From the corner of his eye, Fisher saw movement--two smaller figures, Georges and Andre--so he spun again, levering the screaming Avent's arm until he came around into their path. Fisher kicked Avent in the back of the knee, dropping him, then shoved him into Georges's legs. Georges stumbled forward. Fisher met him, sidestepping left to keep Georges between himself and Doucet. As he drew even with Georges's head, Fisher lashed out with a side fist that landed on the point of his jawbone, just below the ear. There was a muffled crack as the bone shattered. Georges gasped and went down, writhing. Seeing his two comrades down, Andre hesitated, but only for a moment before he, too, charged in, arms flailing in windmill punches. Fisher took a step back, waited until Andre's weight was on his lead foot, then toe-kicked him in the kneecap, shattering it. As he pitched forward, Fisher rammed his knee forward, catching him on the point of the chin. His head snapped back and he slumped backward, unconscious.

  For a long ten seconds Doucet stared at Fisher, his chest heaving, the veins in his beefy neck pulsing. He glanced around, gave Fisher a sneering grin, and then walked over to one of the recliners. Beside it lay a cricket bat. Doucet hefted the thirty-eight-inch, three-pound length of white willow and squared off with Fisher again.

  "Want to run now, asshole?" Doucet asked.

  "No, thanks. In fact, that bat will suit my needs perfectly. I'm going to take it away and use it on you."

  "How do you figure?"

  Fisher let the smile drop from his face. "You're still running your mouth."

  Doucet charged. He hadn't taken two steps before Fisher's Gerber was out of its sheath. Doucet's left leg was just coming forward when the dagger slammed, hilt deep, into his thigh. The left foot came down and immediately slipped from under the Frenchman as though he'd stepped onto an ice rink. He went down, knife hilt first, into the concrete. Then came the screaming.

  IT took ten minutes to get Pierre, Louis, Georges, Andre, and Avent cuffed and arranged on the couch. Doucet, who'd received a sedating tap from Fisher's sap, was barely conscious, moaning gibberish as Fisher secured him to the sturdy oak coffee table, wrists and ankles cuffed to the legs.

  Fisher made himself a cup of tea, sat down in one of the recliners, and waited until the others regained consciousness. Doucet was the last to come around. Fisher had bound the thigh wound using a sweatshirt he'd found stuffed between the couch cushions. Fisher's aim had been true: The Gerber had struck no arteries, just muscle.

  Pierre was the first to speak. "What the--"

  "We're done with questions, gentlemen. Now's the time for answers. You run a thriving identity-theft business. I want to know where you keep your stock."

  Louis said, "We don't have--"

  Fisher silenced him with a raised hand. He picked up the cricket bat from beside his chair, then stood up and walked over to Doucet, who gaped at him. "I'm going to start hurting your boss," Fisher said. "How badly is up to you. The quicker you give me what I want, the less pissed off he's going to be at you." Fisher brought the cricket bat level with his waist, extended his arm, let the bat hover over Doucet's kneecap for a moment, then let it drop.

  Crack!

  Doucet screamed. Fisher let him get it out of his system, then said, "That's not even broken, guys. Next time I'm going to put a little heart into it."

  "Tell him," Doucet said.

  No one spoke. They looked everywhere but at their boss.

  "Tell him, or God help me!"

  Louis said, "Behind the dryer. There's a satchel."

  "Don't go anywhere," Fisher said, then went upstairs, retrieved the valise, and came back down. "One more piece of business. Romain, you've been misbehaving--"

  "I didn't--"

  "Shut up. You've been misbehaving and now it's time to atone. I'm going to do some things to you, and it's going to involve a lot of pain, but you'll survive. While you're recuperating, I want you to remember this night. If you so much as litter or steal a magazine or curse at an old woman, I'll come back here and kill you." Fisher looked at the others, staring at each face in turn. "All of you. And I'll take my time doing it, too. Understood?" Six heads nodded.

  Doucet said, "Hey, hey, you don't have to do this. I can give you--"

  "There's nothing you can give me, and there's nothing you can say. You're a bully. Bullies' brains are wired differently. To truly get it, you need an unforgettable lesson."

  "Please, don't--"

  "Too late for that," Fisher said. He hefted the cricket bat, tested its weight, then walked closer to Doucet, who was openly sobbing now. "Don't worry," Fisher said. "You'll pass out quickly."

  2

  AT eleven the next morning, Fisher's taxi pulled onto rue de Vesles. Fisher let it go another hundred yards before asking the driver to stop. He paid the fare and climbed out. The block was lined with boutique clothing and shoe shops. Fisher crossed the street and walked another hundred yards, past the intersection of rue Marx Dormoy, then back across again. No sign of watchers. Once on the opposite sidewalk he reversed course again, past Marx Dormoy, and then into a tunneled alley called passage Saint-Jacques. Once through the alley he found himself in a warren of tree-lined courtyards and tall wrought-iron fences.

  He found the right house number and pressed the buzzer. A moment later a wheezy voice replied, "Yes?"

  "It's Francois Dayreis."

  The door buzzed and Fisher pushed into the alcove, then down a short hall to a stairwell. He took it down one flight to the basement apartment and knocked. Fisher heard the shuffling of feet on carpet. Down the hall a ceiling fixture flickered, went dark, then flickered back to life. Abelard Boutin opened the door and gestured for him to enter. Boutin was as close to a human gnome as Fisher had ever met. In his late fifties, he was five feet, four inches tall and stoop shouldered, with only a few wisps of greasy gray hair to cover a skull so dented it reminded Fisher of a golf ball. Boutin's black-rimmed Coke-bottle glasses completed the look. Boutin cared little for appearances, Fisher had learned, at least those in the "realm of the animated," as Boutin called it. The Frenchman had only one interest: forgery. Like a mathematical savant who lived his life immersed in numbers, Abelard Boutin lived his life for the perfection of falsification. There were plenty of forgers in France but only a handful of Boutin's caliber.

  It was that and one other trait of Boutin's that had brought Fisher here. Boutin could be trusted to do whatever it took to keep his beloved world intact. Clients who threatened that integrity
were culled from the herd.

  "How can I help you today?" Boutin asked wheezily. Clearly he was a fan of Gitanes: His apartment stunk of them. He shuffled Fisher into the apartment's sitting/ TV/work room. The center of the space was dominated by a ten-by-five-foot maple workbench equipped with all the tools of Boutin's trade. A perpetually burning electric brazier at each end of the workbench ensured that unexpected police guests would find no documents, only the tools of an avid fly-fishing-lure maker: swing-arm halogen magnifier lamps; miniature, multiarmed clamp vices; delicate pens and paintbrushes; a high-end copier-printer; and a laminating machine--for making weather-resistant shipping labels, Boutin had explained to Fisher on their first meeting. The forgery-specific tools and supplies Boutin likely kept in a well-concealed safe.

  "I need these altered," Fisher replied, dropping the driver's licenses for the Doucet gang down on the table.

  Boutin waddled over, snatched up the licenses, studied each in turn, then shrugged. "Easy enough. You have pictures?"

  Fisher handed him the strip he'd taken in a do-it-yourself photo booth.

  "The usual names?" Boutin asked.

  "No, these." Fisher handed him a typewritten list.

  "How soon?"

  "How much?"

  "Depends on how soon."

  "Later this afternoon."

  "Sixteen hundred for all."

  "Eight hundred."

  "Out of the question. Fourteen."

  "One thousand, and let's be done with it. I'm sure you don't want me here any longer than is absolutely necessary."

  This did the trick. Boutin waggled his head from side to side, thinking, then nodded. "Come back at five."

  Fisher walked the half mile toward the city center, to a Sixt rental car agency on Aristide Briand, rented a white Ford Fiesta, then drove north out of the city on the D931. He reached Verdun just after noon. One of the handful of forgers on par with Boutin lived in an apartment near the quai de Londres on the Meuse River.