She had been so sure he would say Henry Cesky’s name that she was momentarily knocked sideways. And then she laughed. A short, joyless sound.
‘What a wanker,’ she said.‘Rubin was the cut-out Cesky used to get the Rhino and me to Manhattan. He was the guy we were supposed to get the papers for, the deeds to the Sonoma gas field.’
A smile broke out over her face like the first dawn of spring. Pappas was still frowning, but Shah understood. His head bobbed up and down as he folded his arms.
‘The useless bastard has been using the same cover, the same cut-out, to organise his contractors,’ Jules continued. ‘It was probably a good idea at the time. He’s probably using some dead guy as a patsy. Nick, I’m sure if you look into this Samuel Rubin, of the California Bar, or whatever, you’ll find he ceased to exist shortly after morning teatime on 14 March 2003. He’s a black box. Cesky can use him to hide all his bloody villainy, or at least this villainy. There’s probably other stuff he’s done that he’s hidden elsewhere. But Rubin is the contact point for this fucking teddy bear’s picnic. He was our contact for New York, and he was this loser’s contact when New York didn’t work out. It’s London to a fucking brick that if we’d been able to shake down the other hitters they’d have given us the same information: they were working for Samuel Rubin. The name that ties Henry Cesky to our friend Norman, here, by way of the idiots he sent after us in Manhattan.’
Shah remembered now. ‘Mr Cesky sends his regards,’ he quoted. He was nodding like Pappas. But he wasn’t finished.
A raised eyebrow was all it took for the knife to dig into the side of Parmenter’s nose. Blood flowed immediately and the erstwhile contract killer made a desperate gurgling sound as he tried to push himself away from the blade. Shah’s man held him fast.
‘I’m afraid we’re not done yet, Mr Parmenter,’ said the older Gurkha. ‘Am I right to assume you were in charge of this operation locally?’
Parmenter replied with a guttural grunting noise that sounded like assent.
‘And you were supplied with a line of credit and introductions so that you might raise whatever support you would need here in Darwin, is that correct?’
Again the prisoner did his best to agree without moving his head in any way that would cause his nose to end up on the floor. Shah waved his fingers and the knife withdrew. Parmenter wheezed out a ragged sigh.
‘The men you hired for today’s operation,’ said Shah. ‘Where did you find them? Who gave you their names?’
The fear was back in Parmenter’s eyes and he shook his head in short, jerky motions, spraying droplets of bright red blood in a fan in front of him.
‘Come along now, Mr Parmenter. I can understand your being nervous. The men you dealt with were undoubtedly dangerous and unpleasant. But you are here with us now.’
He paused a beat.
‘And we can also be very dangerous and most unpleasant. And, in contrast with your hirelings, who are all now dead, our competence is not in question. So, Mr Parmenter, I ask you again, in this quiet room, where nobody in the world knows you to be, and immediately outside of which the bodies of your accomplices are stacked like cordwood, whom did you go to for your hired help?’
‘Whom?’ asked Pappas, in a jolly tone. ‘Are you sure it’s not “who”?’
‘No,’ said Jules, playing along. ‘Definitely “whom”.’
Parmenter’s face was a mask of blood below the line cut into his forehead. It made it difficult for Julianne to be certain, but she thought he may have lost much of his colouring.
‘You must have heard my friend say we are on rather a tight schedule here this morning,’ Shah went on, his tone conversational. ‘It would be of no moment for us to add one more body to those we have piled up outside. And in a minute, I am afraid, we may have to. Unless you are able to satisfy my curiosity. Who, Mr Parmenter, put you in touch with your subcontractors? You must have had references. You have not long been in Australia. So who is your local contact?’
‘Oh, come on! I thought we’d settled on “whom”,’ joked Pappas.
Parmenter began to shake. The slightest of tremors at first, but building quickly to such an intensity that the chair began to rattle against the floor. Shah held out his hand for the kukri dagger.
‘Sandline, it was Sandline,’ said Parmenter, as though coughing up a furball. ‘I got in three days ago and went straight to Sandline. Rubin made the introductions.’
The name dropped like a cannonball at their feet. Cesky had somehow linked up with one of the biggest private military companies and security contractors working in the Northern Territory.
‘Well, that could be tricky,’ said Pappas. ‘What do you want to do about that?’
Shah smiled. ‘For now, I will do nothing. If one stands by the bank of the river long enough, the severed heads of one’s enemies will float by. So for now, I will stand by the river.’
Pappas checked his watch. ‘Well, time to hit the frog and toad, my friends,’ he said. ‘What do you want to do with this criminal mastermind?’
Parmenter fixed him with an expression of woebegone helplessness. ‘You have to let me go,’ he pleaded, directing his words at Jules. ‘It’s nothing personal, ma’am. Weren’t nothing personal when you killed my guys today. Same thing for me. I just took a job, and believe me, I’m happy to walk away from it. Your friend, Ross, the big guy, I’m sorry about that. I -‘
She took one step forward and swung the base of her pistol grip into his face with as much force as she could, connecting with his cheekbone and shattering it. The dull, wet crack sounded like a tree branch breaking and Parmenter went over with the inevitability of a rotten oak falling to the woodsman’s axe. As he crashed to the ground, Jules drove a kick into his face, smashing his nose flat. None of the men moved to stop her.
‘Who else?’ she shouted. ‘Was there anyone else besides the Rhino and me? Did you have any other contracts from Rubin?’
She didn’t see much point in asking him about Cesky. It would only confuse him.
‘Julianne?’ said Pappas, but she ignored him.
The SIG Sauer was still warm from the rounds she had fired downstairs. It was in her hand, pointing at the man on the floor before even she knew what she was doing. Jules fired one shot and Parmenter’s kneecap exploded in red ruin. He screamed and she stamped down on the joint she had just destroyed.
‘Who else, you manky little cunt? Who else have you killed?’
‘Just the Lebanese guy,’ he wailed. ‘Zood. His stupid fucking name was Zood.’
She almost relaxed at that. Her body, which had tightened itself into a giant fist, almost unclenched.
‘And a Mexican,’ Parmenter hurried on to add, in case she thought he was trying to hide something from her. ‘Just a Mexican. After I did Zood, they said I did good,’ he blabbed, snorkelling air in through a thick soup of mucus and blood. ‘So they sent me to Kansas City. It was just a few days ago, and …’
Julianne felt her blood running cold down to the core. Her entire universe narrowed in on this bloody-nosed, half-scalped bag of pus.
Baran ducked left. It was his only option.
The gun fired three times in quick succession. Every shot into Norman Parmenter’s guts before she pumped a fourth into his sternum. Before she could regret it. And before the others could stop her. Each time the SIG Sauer kicked in her hand, she pulled the trigger again, the report drowning out her own shrieks of rage. Each spent brass casing sailed over her head, tracing a trail of smoke in a lazy arc through the air.
Miguel. Oh, Miguel …
Cesky had killed her friend. And maybe his family. And Cesky had been able to send this worthless shitbag to do that because she’d been so wrapped up in her own problems, she hadn’t made an effort to warn him, after Galveston, after Sydney.