Dying For LA by Ian Jones (top fiction books of all time .txt) 📕

worked out for sure and it sure as hell better be good. But he’ll serve his time, retire and never have to lift a finger again,’ Turner replied.

‘Mind you, I guess that isn’t so certain now. Morgan is up on serious charges, and he may not want to take the fall alone,’ Mathews added.

‘But the worst thing for me is that Hayter and his wife both ended up dead as a result of it. Yeah, Deanna was recruited we know that, but she didn’t know the half of it. All she wanted was the forty thousand. And Madeline only wanted her daughter back. They really didn’t deserve what they got. Hayter was just the dumb schmuck who needed the cash too,’ Reed pondered sorrowfully.

‘And what about Pinsky? And the general in Moscow?’ asked John.

‘Well, Pinsky is some kind of superman. He’s had some real serious wounds over the years, but still keeps going and the word is he will walk from this. I guess it was no surprise he’s gonna get disappeared, no way was he ever going to stand trial over here. We know that for damn sure. It’s just like what we know about Colonel Carter, for Congress, this is all about damage limitation. Whatever gets said publicly, they are not going head to head with Moscow over one bad guy. Even after we lost a major, a CIA agent and three cops plus five members of the public. And there was no linking Pinsky to either the Metro attack or major Hayter’s murder. The Russian army are denying he has any attachment, they say they lost all track of him. They released some information, which is how we found out about his previous injuries but nothing up to date. And the general, Rostov? Claims to know nothing, doesn’t even remember the summit let alone General Morgan, and says he never heard of Pinsky neither. So our word against theirs, the only satisfaction we get is they spent a fortune and got nothing in return.’

‘Pinsky got played by Deanna, and Madeline probably,’ John commented.

‘Yeah, that’s for sure. She did get forty grand, I bet she probably only gave Hayter a couple to get married, and she only did that to get Pinsky off her back. And Hayter would have taken it, he just wanted the cash to stay at the tables, he had no credit left anymore at Indigo. I get the feeling he would have done anything to keep going to Vegas. But I got no idea what Pinsky thought Deanna was gonna do to get the plans, it ain’t what I’d call pillow talk. He must have thought Hayter had them in his room or something. Maybe he got the idea they were gonna play happy families in Vegas. I don’t know. The deaths at the Metro still make no sense, somebody must have decided she was carrying them I guess, maybe she even told Pinsky or someone she did have them just to keep them sweet,’ Turner said soberly.

‘Maybe it was that guy Voorhees. It sounds like he wasn’t delivering,’ Reed said.

‘Could be. It looks like Pinsky didn’t waste any time getting rid of him. Perez has been saying he was told it would be at most a month and then more than four later and still they’d done nothing. He says the Metro attack was planned in two days. Voorhees must have been feeling the pressure.’

‘Two days? How did they know Deanna would be there?’ John asked.

‘Again, Perez and Rodriguez can’t answer that. My guess is she was set up to go. Maybe promised as attorney or something to do with Madeline’s daughter,’ Turner pondered.

‘It is unbelievable. All this for a game.’ Reed shook his head.

‘You got that right. Morgan should never have been at that summit in the first place. That guy makes nothing but bad decisions. You always said he was an asshole,’ Turner looked at Reed with a grin.

‘Yeah, I did. I probably shouldn’t have but there you go.’

Turner sat back with a rueful smile.

‘You know I got a call this morning. I was told that the state department made contact with Grand Marshal Yin, in Beijing. I guess that was an awkward conversation but he did confirm Morgan’s story about how it all started, although his version is that General Rostov put him up to it. Make Morgan look stupid is how he put it. But one thing he did say was, he enjoyed it. And what’s interesting about that is we got some intel that the Russians believe that China have got hold of information on a new fighter jet. So I wonder how they got that?’

‘I have to ask, but I guess I’m not gonna like the answer. What is anyone doing about these 1-Too assholes? They seem like they need wiping off the face of the earth to me,’ Mathews asked, serious for the first time.

Everyone looked at John, who shrugged.

‘I don’t really know how to answer that. Look, they have been chased around by law agencies all over the world for more than ten years. They came out of nowhere. They’re organised, and if anyone ever does get taken nobody really knows the setup so there is never any useable information. Just like we got with Perez and Rodriguez; they don’t know a damn thing. Keane doesn’t either, and we can’t speak to Pinsky. Maybe we could have got something out of Voorhees, who knows. You can be sure the CIA, Interpol, MI6 and many others will continue trying to track them down and hopefully there will be a breakthrough.’

‘But who the hell are they?’

‘Well, it is now believed they originated in Beirut, but again, nobody really knows. All anyone is sure of is they are a big organisation, and rich, a lot of power. Morgan paid a great deal of money and Rostov is likely to have shelled out the same.’

‘Didn’t work out for them this time,’ Reed commented.

‘No, they lost here. For all the