Total pages in book: 49
Estimated words: 47606 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 238(@200wpm)___ 190(@250wpm)___ 159(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 47606 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 238(@200wpm)___ 190(@250wpm)___ 159(@300wpm)
I hung up then. Exactly twenty-seven minutes later, he walked in, hands in his pockets, followed by a well-dressed tall Black man in a navy suit and two other men, one in a terrible, ill-fitting gray one and another in a Hugo Boss that fit him like a glove.
“You stay back,” I instructed Erast. “I only want to talk to him.”
The man strode forward, the confidence and an almost regal air rolling off him. He took a seat beside me, then pulled his credentials from his breast pocket at the same time so I could see the badge and the ID with his picture.
“I’m Special Agent in Charge Mike Lattimer,” he said, offering me his hand.
I took it and was amazed at how warm his grip was.
“You’re freezing,” he told me, replacing the badge, his brows furrowed. “You look a bit pale as well.”
No big surprise there. “I don’t want to stay,” I said flatly. “Promise me I don’t have to.”
“You don’t have to stay, Mr. Walsh, and from what Erast said, it doesn’t sound like I can even call you as a witness. You’ve had no access to Mr. Antonov’s business dealings. Isn’t that right?”
I nodded.
“You’re a victim who finally fought back. It’s impressive.”
“It was cowardly, but it’s done,” I said, unzipping my backpack. I passed him the hard drive. That must have caused Erast to move, because both agents ordered him to stay still.
“What is this?” Lattimer asked me, holding it in his hand.
“I have no idea. Erast probably does. There might be pictures or video of me being assaulted on there, as well as the others. If it’s just full of people like me being hurt, please use it as you see fit. I suspect, though, that there might be some actual murders on there, and maybe even some blackmail material.”
His face scrunched up a bit—probably because the idea of me and others being violated was painful for him to consider. I didn’t know, but I felt like it was a safe assumption.
“Since I’m being truthful here, full disclosure, alongside that drive,” I continued, “there was a hundred thousand dollars in cash in the safe. There were also lots of passports, which I put in a bag for you.” I passed it to him.
He pulled one out, examined it, then his focus was back on me.
“I hope those will be helpful.”
“I’m sure they will be.”
“I’m gonna go stand in line now to get through security. I know you can find me if you want, but like you said, I’m no use to you. But if you could keep Genrikh Antonov poor so he can’t send someone to kill me, that’d be great.”
He nodded. “I will be sure to seize everything once I get back to my office.”
“Also, at his club, in the office, there’s a safe behind the safe. So make sure whoever goes in there finds the second one as well.”
Slowly, he looked over at Erast, who, as he was out of earshot, stared worriedly back.
“He didn’t tell you, did he?”
“No.”
“He’s a weasel, so watch yourself,” I warned him.
“I certainly will.”
“You’re a dead man, Pax,” Erast yelled over to scare me.
Lattimer took hold of my arm, but when I caught my breath, he let go quickly. “I promise you, you are not a dead man, Paxton Walsh.”
“Thanks,” I said and stood up.
“What about the diamonds?” Erast snarled, charging over to me, but he was once again stopped by the agents. “What happened to those?”
“What diamonds?”
“There was three million dollars in cut diamonds in that safe, all about two carats each.”
“I already told you what was in the safe. There was nothing else there.”
“That’s fine. We’ll all see. Gen has every room in that mansion under surveillance.”
“Which makes sense,” Lattimer chimed in. “What I don’t understand is, why no guards?”
“The house was normally filled with men,” I clarified for Lattimer. “But today, Gen sent everyone out on a job as you probably know from Erast here.”
“Yes,” Lattimer concurred. “I just thought, there had to be more than those that we swept up in our raid.”
“He locked all the others in their rooms but me, and once he was out cold, I released them. And about the camera system,” I said, glaring at Erast, “yes, it works perfectly as long as no one disabled the cloud backup.”
“You fuckin’ little faggot,” he barked at me.
“Sticks and stones, man,” I said with a shrug, and enjoyed the FBI agents walking him out of the terminal. He had no more power over me. Neither did Gen.
It all started with cleaning out the safe. Once I opened it and stopped supporting Gen, allowing him to drop like a rock to the floor, I had run to his office, powered off every camera, turned off the link to the cloud, and then unplugged the computer. I then disconnected the hard drive, took it to the kitchen, and tenderized it with the heavy-duty meat mallet. Once that was done, I swept it all off the counter into a soup pot and carried it to the deep end of the pool. I then emptied the broken bits, made certain that most of them were settled well at the bottom—some were floating—and then replaced the pot in the drawer where it went. All my life I’d been thorough. I never left anything to chance. That was the easiest way to get hurt.