The Take(65)

Simon turned his chair so it faced her. “Not bad. I’d have come to the same conclusion.”

“But?”

“You’re mistaken.”

“Stop lying. There is no letter. You’re here for the money. Fess up.”

“Okay,” said Simon, admiring her restraint, knowing he’d be going through the roof if someone had yanked his chain as badly as he’d yanked hers. “Enough bullshit. You saved my life. You earned the truth. But it stays between you and me.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You don’t tell Marc Dumont.”

“But he has to—”

“Hear me out.” Simon stood, hands lifted in conciliation. “I am here about the robbery, and, yes, that’s why I’m staying at the hotel. I needed to see how things work around here. But I’m not here for the money. I don’t work for Prince Abdul Aziz. There really is a letter. I can only tell you the rest if you promise not to go to your bosses.”

“I can’t do that. Just because I broke some of the rules doesn’t mean I’m disloyal or a bad cop.”

“I’m not asking you to be disloyal and I think you’re a great cop. I’m asking you to be patient.”

Nikki sat down on the bed. “I’m listening.”

“Tino Coluzzi is the man you’re after. The man everyone is after. He’s the one who hijacked the prince’s motorcade.”

“How do you know that?”

Simon sat down beside her. “It’s like this,” he said, and for ten minutes gave her the identical briefing Neill had given him two days before, leaving nothing out. “So that’s it. Neill believes that Coluzzi found the letter, realized its significance, and is sitting on it until he can decide how to use it. It’s my job to get it back before he does.”

“Must be some letter.”

“Must be.”

Nikki considered this. She reclined on the bed, resting on an elbow. “What about you? How did you ever join La Brise when you were just eighteen? Are you American or are you French? And what the hell happened to you? I can’t tell if you got hit by a hand grenade, fell into a tree shredder, or took a swim with a school of piranhas.”

Simon shifted, looking at her directly. “I’m American. My parents divorced early. When my father died, I was sent to live with my mother in Marseille. I wasn’t a welcome addition. I made my way on the streets. I jacked cars for a few years, then moved up the ladder to taking down banks and armored cars. Coluzzi was part of my crew. I did not fall into a tree shredder or swim with a bunch of piranhas. I got caught. I took a couple of bullets because I was too high and too dumb to give up. I did four years in Les Baumettes. And this scar up here, the one you were asking about”—Simon touched his forehead, feeling his blood boil, his vision narrow—“courtesy of Tino Coluzzi.”

Simon drew a breath, shutting out the memories, letting the fury go. “Sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to get worked up.”

“It’s okay.” Nikki put her hand on his arm, rubbing it soothingly. She pointed to the laptop. “That thing done yet?”

“Still downloading.”

“Your expense account cover breakfast?”

“Go ahead. Order me oatmeal with sliced bananas and another orange juice.”

“Freshly squeezed, I imagine.”

“Better be for what they’re charging.”

Nikki called room service as Simon studied the monitor. The StingRay was programmed to extract a maximum amount of information from the intercepted calls: the caller’s and responder’s names, addresses, and other personal information associated with the handset, as well as everything stored on each phone’s SIM card—emails, texts, apps, photos, and, finally, a list of the phone’s GPS locations at the time the past thousand calls were made or received.

“What time did you get to the bar last night?” he asked over his shoulder.

“I watched you go in at ten thirty. You came out with your buddies after midnight.”

“You were there at ten thirty?”

“Surprised you didn’t spot me?” she asked with more than a hint of pride.

“Embarrassed. I try to keep a sharp eye.”

Simon turned back to the laptop. According to the StingRay, six calls had been placed between midnight and three from within twenty meters of the bar. Nikki pulled up a chair in order to look. A list of phone numbers belonging to callers along with the handset owners’ names filled one box. The same information for the numbers they called filled an adjacent box.

Simon scrolled down the first list. “Got it,” he said, pointing to the screen. “Twelve sixteen. Outgoing call from a handset registered to Luca J. Falconi to an unregistered phone lasting two minutes.”

“You think it’s Coluzzi?”

“I don’t think he was calling his mother.” Simon plugged the GPS coordinates of the recipient’s phone into Google Maps. A circle the size of a pencil eraser appeared near the city of Marseille. “Darn.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Whoever Falconi was calling was using a burner.”

“How can you tell?”

“The handset only gives its location to within ten kilometers. Typical of cheap throwaways. The better the chip, the more accurate it is. Even so, that’s him. That’s Coluzzi.”