Page 33 of The Allure of Ruins

FIVE

Zane Calhoun was the Special Agent in Charge in Chicago, IL, and he was horrified to learn that Veda Walker and Gabe Hall had left the office without backup. The whole “we thought they were with us” didn’t fly with him.

Once we were in the conference room with bottles of water, both of us having shed our outerwear, we sat across from Walker and Hall. When SAC Calhoun joined us, Walker repeated what she’d said in the van, adding more information.

“So due to some inconsistencies with evidence, DNA, and what a judge deemed improper testimony, the California Courts of Appeal concluded that a lower court admitted into evidence biased testimony, as Gen and others, like Erast, testified to charges not included in the indictment.”

“They gave too much damning information,” Colton said, “going beyond the scope of the investigation. Right?”

“Yes.”

“And because of that,” Colton continued, “the trial needs to be redone without a jury hearing all that.”

“Correct.”

“What does this have to do with Pax?”

“So Csokas is still in jail, held for the next trial, and we made a deal with one of the inmates, a guy everyone knew could procure things, and for a reduction in his sentence, put him in contact with Csokas.”

“And of course you don’t even care what this procurer did, right?”

“He moved a lot of drugs, but no,” Walker told Colton. “Getting his twenty years down to fifteen is not keeping me up at night.”

Colton nodded.

“Once our guy talked to Csokas, of course all he wanted was a phone. We got to hear everything when he talked to Rokov, who lives in Miami at the moment, when he spelled out that Gen would have to return to court to give testimony against him a second time, and would Rokov please eliminate him before he could do that.”

“None of which explains what we’re doing here.”

“I agree,” Calhoun affirmed, sounding a bit bored.

“Rokov advised him not to worry. Well, because the office in Miami has Rokov under a microscope, when we found out he wanted to get in touch with Gen, we had the marshals release him into our custody, and let Csokas know we had Antonov and we’ll be ready for his second trial.”

“Which is not at all how any of that works, and Csokas should know better, and if not, at least his lawyer would,” Colton said, his voice dripping with derision.

“You’re right, and his lawyer apprised him not to do anything, but of course, he called Rokov to give him this news, and no more than two hours later, as soon as we had confirmation he made contact, we had Gen call Rokov.”

“So Gen called Rokov, and the big man said what to him?” Colton demanded, his furrowed brows and clenched fists on the table letting me know how tense he was.

I leaned into his side, crowding him, and he quickly exhaled.

“Rokov notified Gen that if he could retrieve the diamonds he’d been holding for Csokas, who in turn had been holding them for Rokov, then Gen would be a free man. Rokov would take him off his kill list.”

“And Csokas just rots in prison?”

“Yeah,” Walker told him. “Rokov doesn’t give a crap about his loyal man. He only wants his diamonds.”

“And Gen?” Colton asked.

“We suspect that if Gen gets the diamonds, he will take them and disappear. I mean, really, the chances that he gets out of this alive are slim. And once we played Csokas the conversation between his boss and Gen, he rolled on Rokov, which renders Gen⁠—”

“Irrelevant,” Colton concluded. “You have a bigger fish, so you can ditch Antonov.”

“That’s right.”

“What I don’t understand,” Colton began, “is why doesn’t Rokov send guys after Pax?”

“Because no one knows about Pax except us and Gen. He didn’t give Pax’s name to anyone and claimed a rival organization in LA hit his house.”