Read Online Dead and Gone by Andrew Vachss - Free Book Online Page B

neighborhood was before the Russians took over. They’d get more eyeballing than a porno movie. But a woman in a nurse’s outfit … Just think about it for a minute.”
    “I …”
    “Oh, wait here. I’ll be back,” she snapped.
    We had almost three more hours to keep planning before Michelle returned. Only now she was a blonde, with skin tanned so deeply she looked like a Puerto Rican in a wig. Her heart-shaped face was roundish now, her full lips were much thinner. And her eyes were a bright, fake blue. “Who’s going to recognize me now?” she demanded.
    The Prof looked her over appreciatively. “You don’t loosen up on that skirt, they gonna follow you home anyway,” he said.
    “Fine!” Michelle snapped back, in no mood to play. “I’ll be in a nurse’s uniform, remember?”
    “I know a better way,” I said.
    “Y ou are sure of this?” the Israeli asked me.
    “Are you asking if I’m guessing, or if I’m lying?”
    “If you are guessing, you are a fool. And we will not work with fools. If you are lying …”
    “He is not lying,” the Mole said quietly.
    The Mossad man turned to face me, his dark eyes trying to hold mine. But his eyes were a normal person’s, working as one. So he had to settle for only one of mine at a time, and it threw him off. “Dmitri is going to sell SAMs to Nazis, that is what you are telling us?”
    “Not German Nazis. Not some remnants from World War II. American Nazis. A few assorted freaks with Master Race fantasies.”
    “So? Such people are no threat to us.”
    “That’s right,” I told him truthfully. “But Dmitri’s a merchant. If he’ll sell to Nazis, he’ll sell to Arabs.”
    “All Arabs are not our enemy. That is what you Americans believe, perhaps, but it is wrong. Only a tiny minority thwart the possibility of peace between us.”
    “A tiny minority’s enough, today. Arab extremists in America aren’t any different from our home-grown Nazis. They both like to blow things up. The World Trade Center, Oklahoma City … what difference? You know how it works. They may hate each other, but when it comes to Jews, they’re all of one mind.”
    “You are saying … what?”
    “It’s what you said. Dmitri was in Spetsnaz, so he was military. Elite military. And there’s no doubt that tons of heavy weapons were left over when the U.S.S.R. came apart. It’s out there, and it’s for sale. Hell, I’ve even heard talk about plutonium.…”
    I let my voice trail away, watching his eyes. He was good, but I caught the spark, used it to jump-start the rest of my pitch: “But what Dmitri’s outfit’s running here isn’t military supply,” I told him. “It’s just straight crime product: drugs, whores, gambling, loan-sharking, extortion. When I wanted to work that shipment of guns to the Albanians, I dealt with Dmitri personally, not his crew. The ordnance part is all his … his own separate piece. You understand what I’m saying?”
    “That is why you wanted to know who Dmitri’s successor would be, yes?”
    “Yes,” I lied.
    “It would be nobody from Spetsnaz. He was a rogue even within his own unit, in Russia. Whoever replaces him will be a gangster, not a soldier.”
    “Without access to the military stuff, then? Without the contacts?”
    “Yes. Of course. Dmitri would never share such …”
    As his voice faded, he finally found my good eye. And held it this time.
    I shaved carefully—no picnic with my distorted depth perception. Spent some time looking at my face in the mirror. My new face. A nerve jumped in my right cheek, the bullet scar at the center of the tic. I pressed against the spot and the tic died.
    T he ambulette was a converted Chrysler minivan, painted a dull beige, with red crosses on both sides and the back. It cruised the Brooklyn block slowly, searching for an opening. Finding none, it double-parked right in front of Dmitri’s joint. The light-bar on its roof went into action, indicating pickup or