“It actually is about him,” I said. “Where did you pick this information up?”
“That’s part of the creepy bit,” he said. “I picked it up about a block away from here.”
“From here?” I said.
“Yeah. Parking lot of that church down the street? You know it?”
“Yes,” I said.
“Weird since he could have just dropped it off himself, right?”
“Right,” I said. And then a thought occurred to me. “When did they place the delivery order?”
He flipped through the pages on the clipboard. “Uh, let’s see. Looks like the order came in two days ago.”
“Are you sure?” I asked.
“Yep. Prepaid delivery authorized on Saturday.”
Saturday. I hadn’t even met Big Lumpy yet on Saturday. “What time?”
“Uh, let’s see. Did it online at eight in the morning. Early risers, I guess.”
And with precognitive abilities. Sam and I met with Big Lumpy on Sunday at noon. Which either meant Big Lumpy had the world’s best Ouija board or was well aware of Brent’s situation-and his connection to me-long before we ever met. I had a suspicion that either Brent’s home phone was bugged-likely, really-and that more than likely Big Lumpy had been tracking Brent for a very long time. It made sense if Henry Grayson was in as deep as he appeared to be. I could see Big Lumpy wanting to have a pawn to play with for his money, only to discover something far more interesting and then, as was his wont, taking a few bets on how things might turn out. All an elaborate game for his enjoyment and, perhaps, a little deathbed edification.
“Thanks,” I said. “That’s helpful.”
“No problem,” he said, but then he didn’t go anywhere. “Information, you know, it’s the currency of the future, but you can’t pay your rent with it, if you get my meaning.”
I did.
“Sam,” I said, “tip the man.”
“You should wear more comfortable shoes,” Sam said. “Trust me. You’ll be having back problems soon enough if you’re not careful. You need to start lifting from your legs and then carrying all boxes in what we in the ergonomic profession call the strike zone. So, middle of your thigh to the middle of your chest.” Sam patted the delivery guy on the shoulder in such a way that he actually managed to get him turned around back toward his van. “No need to thank me now. Your sciatica can send me a thank-you note from the old folks’ home.”
We watched the van drive off in silence, both of us contemplating the news we’d learned.
I looked at Sam and tried to imagine him all in white and filled with two file boxes and a laptop computer’s worth of information. He apparently was having the same revelation, since he now looked even more sickened than usual by the early hour.
“Better go inside and ask my mother if you can borrow her reading glasses,” I said to Sam.
“You ever learn that Evelyn Wood Speed Reading technique?” he asked.
“No,” I said, “I always preferred to actually read.”
“They say if you learn something in an altered state, you’ll recall it better in an altered state. So I’m thinking maybe a mimosa is the call here.”
“I’m going to say no,” I said.
“You sure you don’t think Sugar could pull off being Big Lumpy?” he said.
“No.”
“So Big Lumpy knew we were coming,” Sam said.
“Seems like it.”
“I wonder how much more he knew.”
“I’m going to guess quite a bit,” I said. I told him I thought Brent’s place was probably bugged and my ideas about Big Lumpy’s initial reasoning.
“Makes sense,” Sam said. “You really think he’s dead?”
“I’ll call the coroner to find out,” I said, “but I’m going to guess that he killed himself.”
“Why?”
“Because it would be more entertaining for him to watch this from some spectral plane than to actually be in it. And because he was already dead, for the most part. Last night he told me he had three months, but I wouldn’t have placed money on that being true. The man could hardly function. He didn’t even torture Sugar.”
My mom stepped outside then and slammed the door behind her. “He’s an idiot,” she said.
“I know,” I said.
“Are you going to stow him in my garage while you go out saving the world?”
“Not this time,” I said.
“Good,” she said, “because he’s not safe here.”
“I understand,” I said.
“It’s bad enough that he’s an idiot,” she said, “but his self-tanning lotion is giving me a migraine. Someone should tell him that the color orange does not occur in nature.”
“I’ll mention it to him,” Sam said. He put an arm around my mother. She had a soft spot for Sam, probably because Sam had an ability to make anyone like him, and probably because she knew he’d kept me alive on more than one occasion. “Why don’t we go inside and you can help me learn all about the fascinating world of wind, and if Sugar does anything to annoy you, I’ll put him in a sleeper lock. How does that sound?”
Before she could answer, Sam had her turned around and was walking her back into the house. The man could defuse a nuclear bomb with a drink in one hand.
I’d planned on leaving Sugar behind, but circumstances had changed. I hadn’t expected Big Lumpy to die. I hadn’t expected to be the unwitting dupe in some larger game-a position I was absolutely not comfortable with, but which I’d need to react to with suitable force and control. And I hadn’t expected the need to get Sam trained in the fine art of wind technology, the burgeoning echo system of black market bandwidths and, of course, make sure it was all plausible enough to get Yuri to bite on it, so that the rest of the plan could go forward. Getting a man who shot rockets into businesses off the street was a good thing, but the more tangible issue was that otherwise he would kill Brent the first chance he got. And Fiona’s death was a real possibility, too. Yuri Drubich probably considered Fiona’s breaking his wrist as bad form. What I did know, however, was that Yuri wanted to see Brent and Henry, wanted to make them pay for his inconvenience. They probably knew what Brent looked like by now, but they probably had no idea what Henry looked like. They knew enough to blow up his office, but not enough to destroy his home, which told me they were still grasping at straws.
So I needed to find someone who could plausibly pass for Brent’s father.
I needed someone who would do exactly what I said and wouldn’t ask too many questions.
I needed someone who might know how to manage a few million dollars discreetly… and who wouldn’t mind working with Sugar, if need be.
That decreased the pool by a legion.
I opened up the envelope Big Lumpy had left for Brent and read the terms and conditions of his inheritance, such as it was. A good lawyer would help, but the closest thing I had to that was another man good at moving papers around. And, as it happened, the perfect person for the job at hand, too.
“Barry,” I said into my cell phone when my favorite money launderer answered, “I need you.”
12
When you occupy a defensive position, it’s important to find good cover. If good cover isn’t available, a spy will try to conceal himself as best as possible. This can mean that he hides behind a bush or a mustache, in a burned-out car or on a crowded bus. Concealment provides time to reorganize and recalibrate an attack and, if done correctly, might also allow a spy to do a little… spying. Because there’s nothing a spy appreciates more than the opportunity to view and analyze his own information-which is why Sugar and I were sitting on the patio of Odessa sipping tea while we waited for Barry to show up.
None of Yuri’s people knew about me, as far as I could tell, and Sugar had escaped out the back door of Henry’s office before he could be spotted. And since Sugar’s car wasn’t registered in his name, whoever Yuri thought he was intimidating by destroying the car wasn’t actually Sugar.
If we were going to exchange information and money, I’d want to do it in public, but I’d want to do it in a place where Yuri felt comfortable, so I figured visiting his place of business was a nice way of getting the lay of the land.