Sympathy For the Devil

  Prohibition

  Slow Burn

  Sympathy For The Devil

  All available from Polis Books

  To Paul Lomax

  Photographer and Friend

  New York City – Present Day

  THE MAN who called himself James Hicks checked his watch when he reached the corner of Forty-second and Lexington. It was just past eleven in the morning; more than an hour before he was scheduled to ruin a man’s life.

  And plenty of time to smoke a cigar.

  He braced against a sharp wind as he crossed Forty-second Street. A cold humidity had settled in over Manhattan and the weather reports had done a great job of whipping everyone into a frenzy over the coming storm. TV stations and websites hawked it as ‘The Big One’ and ‘Snowmageddon’ and the ever popular ‘Snowpacalypse.’ The experts were predicting over two feet of snow with high winds and freezing temperatures for the next few days. It was too early to call it the Storm of the Century, of course, but that didn’t keep the media from building it up that way.

  Based on the data Hicks had been able to draw from the University’s OMNI satellite array, he predicted the snow would be about a foot; with wind and ice being more problematic than the snow itself. He could remember a time not too long ago when New York would barely notice eight inches of snow, but panic was en vogue these days. Welcome to the post-9/11 world where preparation was paramount.

  He understood why meteorologists exaggerated snowfall predictions. They were covering their asses against being wrong. If it was a little more, then they were close enough to claim accuracy. If the snowfall was a little less, at least it wasn’t as bad as everyone had feared. Accountability took a backseat to relief and everyone went on with their lives. Either way, the weather folks had covered their respective asses.

  Hicks hadn’t worried about covering his ass in a long time. He didn’t need to. Because in his line of work, small mistakes were forgotten and big mistakes got you killed. Such harsh, immutable constants brought a certain resignation to Hicks’ life that he found almost peaceful. Danger can be a comfort as long as you know it’s there.

  Hicks headed for the concrete ashtrays placed in the alcove of the Altria Building across from Grand Central Terminal. There were a few cigar stores in the area where he could smoke indoors in warm comfort; maybe stir up some conversation with his fellow smokers on such a cold and blustery day.

  But Hicks didn’t want comfortable and he sure as hell didn’t want conversation. He was working and needed the cold air to keep him sharp, especially before rolling up on a new Asset in less than an hour.

  He stood out of the wind in the alcove of the Altria building and lit his cigar. It wasn’t a cheap cigar, but far from the most expensive stick on the market. There was a time for savoring good tobacco and now wasn’t it. Today, the cigar was merely a tool to help him stay focused and calm while killing time before his appointment. Because although Hicks had flipped hundreds of people from being regular civilians into Assets for the University, he still believed that changing a man’s life forever deserved some pause.

  Most of Hicks’ colleagues didn’t give much thought about the Assets they forced into the University system. They focused their efforts on researching the right prospect to turn; digging deep into the person’s past for that one knife they could hold to their throat to make them comply. Past offenses and indiscretions they didn’t want to see come to light. Current mistakes that could get them fired or ruin their marriage. Hicks’ colleagues ran checks and analyses on a potential Asset’s personality profile to make sure he or she could stand up to the passive pressures of the University’s constant influence in their lives. If they passed all the OMNI simulations, then an Asset was approached, broken, and put to work. If an Asset cracked and killed himself or had to be eliminated, then OMNI was simply directed to change parameters to account for the shortcomings in the analysis model. It was all as simple—and inhumane—as that.

  OMNI was the University’s Optimized Mechanical and Network Integration protocol. The name was a relic of the group’s past and had been around almost since the University’s beginning. It was a term that had long since been outdated, but had managed to remain in use. When new hires asked details on which network, they were told ‘All of them.’ They soon saw the powerful reach of OMNI for themselves.

  But Hicks had been running Assets long enough to know human beings never fit neatly into a computer program, no matter how advanced it was. Turning an Asset was like adopting a stray dog or a blind cat. They were being brought into an established environment and made to go against their own nature for your own benefit. The pet owner expected companionship and affection. The pet was expected to respond in kind or catch a rolled up newspaper in the nose.

  Assets were expected to provide the University with information or access or options it needed at the time, but didn’t have. If the Asset played along and did what was asked of him, he made out well. If he refused or got cute, they got the University’s equivalent of a newspaper in the nose: a bullet in the brain.

  From the shelter of the high alcove, Hicks checked the clock high above the façade of Grand Central across the street. The clock was; flanked by the stone images of a strident Mercury, a sitting Minerva and a lounging Hercules. The gods of speed and industry and commerce all concerned about time. Just like everyone else. Hicks found it a refreshing scene. Not even the gods were free of mortal troubles.

  And in about forty-five minutes, Hicks would attempt to enroll a money man named Vincent Russo into the University system.

  Hicks took a good draw on the cigar and let the smoke slowly escape through his nose. The frigid wind caught it and blew it across Forty-second Street. The streets were empty thanks to the impending storm, so there was no one around to complain about the stray smoke.

  He wondered what Vincent Russo was doing just then. He could’ve pulled out his handheld device and used OMNI to hack the security cameras Russo had installed in his to watch his office, but there was no need. He knew Russo was a creature of habit. At this time of day, he was probably working away as diligently as he always did; verbally glad-handing clients over the phone about the status of their investments; convincing him that the fund he was buying them was a steal at the current price.

  He probably rolled his eyes when he looked at his calendar and saw his twelve o’clock appointment with a prospective client. The new one with the name he didn’t recognize. He might even think about postponing it, but realize it was already too late for that. Then he’d remember the statement that Hicks had sent him; the one detailing five million dollars he was looking to invest with Russo’s firm. Greed would get the better of him as greed tended to do and he’d keep the appointment.

  Greed had made Russo vulnerable to blackmail in the first place. And greed was going to be the reason why Hicks enrolled him in the University.

  Hicks didn’t feel sympathy for people like Russo or for any of the men and women he’d turned into Assets over the years. They’d all done things that had opened themselves to University pressure. Any dirt he had on them was their own fault. He’d sooner have sympathy for the devil himself than for any of his targets.

  Still, becoming an Asset changed ones life and no matter how much they deserved it, the transition deserved at least some commemoration; hence the cigar.

  Hicks was about half way through his smoke when a homeless man trudged into the alcove. He was pushing a creaky shopping cart as he escaped the wind of the coming storm. Given the man’s weathered appearance, Hicks couldn’t tell how old the man was except to see he was black and had a shaggy beard streaked with white and gray. His layers of tattered clothes looked liked they kept him reasonably warm and his c
art was overflowing with plastic bags filled with other people’s garbage. They were the things people discarded, but this man found valuable.

  Hicks could relate to such things. He decided he liked this man already.

  He watched the man push the cart into the far corner of the alcove. Hicks was ready to shake him off if he asked for money or a cigarette, but the man surprised him by saying, “Hey, mister. You trustworthy?”

  Hicks hadn’t been asked such a direct question like that in a very long time. “As far as it goes, I guess. Why?”

  “Because you look like a trustworthy man to me,” the homeless man said. “The kind of man I could leave my things with and find them here when I get back.”

  Hicks looked back at the cart overflowing with garbage, then at the man. “Why? Late for a board meeting?”

  “Nope,” the man said. “Just got to find a bathroom is all, and I need someone who can watch my stuff while I’m busy.” He looked at Hicks’ cigar. “Looks like you’ll be here a while, and I promise I’ll be back way before you’re done smoking that thing.”

  Hicks admitted he was curious. “Why so particular? I mean, why don’t you just…”

  “Just find a doorway somewhere to piss in?” The homeless man shook his head. “Because it’s against the law and breaking the law just ain’t my style, mister. Besides, just because you are a certain way doesn’t mean you have to act the way people expect.”

  Hicks liked the man’s attitude and felt bad about the board meeting crack. “You take as long as you want, my friend, but I’ve got an appointment at noon.”

  “Funny, so do I,” the homeless man laughed as he shuffled off. “Got that board meeting you was talkin’ about. On Fifth Avenue, no less.”

  Hicks watched the man trudge back into the growing wind and head west, leaving him alone with the pushcart filled with things only of value to him. We were all like that, Hicks thought; pushing our own cart filled with shit we thought valuable through the world. Some valued love or comfort or money. Most wanted all three and thought money could lead to the other two. And if money didn’t lead to it, then it certainly could buy it.

  The formula varied, but Hicks knew everyone had at least one thing they valued most in this world. To that homeless man, it was his cart. But most of the people Hicks dealt with had their valuables stashed elsewhere in encrypted files on hard drives or in safe deposit boxes in banks no one was supposed to know about. They kept their secrets buried deep within themselves and prayed that no one ever looked for them. But someone always found out because part of every secret kept was the yearning to be discovered. To get caught. To tell. To let someone in on it. To confess.

  Hicks had been in the intelligence game for over twenty years. He’d seen damned near every aspect of the human psyche known to man and yet it still managed to surprise him. No matter how many ops he’d run in any part of the world, he’d always learned something new from each one.

  Even from a homeless man while he smoked his cigar on the street of a city bracing for Snowmageddon. He flicked his cigar ash into the concrete ashtray next to him. Or maybe it wasn’t that deep. Maybe all of it was just unrelated bullshit.

  Hicks’ cigar had burned down to a nub when the homeless man came toddling back for his cart, looking more refreshed than when he’d left. A cup of hot coffee piped steam through its plastic lid.

  Hicks dug his hand into his pocket, came up with a twenty and held it out to the man.

  He expected the homeless man to take it. Instead, he just looked at it. “What’s that for, mister?”

  “Storm’s coming,” Hicks said. “I was thinking this could help you buy something to keep you warm.”

  But the homeless man backed away from the money, back toward his cart. “No thanks. I got all I need in this cart right here. Being prepared is what you might call a motto of mine.”

  Hicks put the twenty back in his pocket. “Mine too.”

  Hicks ground out his cigar in the ashtray. A light snow, barely a flurry, had begun to fall. The day was almost too pretty to ruin by threatening someone into working for him.

  Almost, but not quite.

  VINCENT RUSSO’S office suite was a modern space in the Helmsley Building that straddled Park Avenue on Forty-fifth Street. Russo had gone with a chic minimalist décor: gray walls and glass desks; sleek telephones and computer screens. The paintings on the wall were equally chic, bland swirls that had just enough color to make them interesting. The receptionist Russo had hired matched the décor: pretty, but inscrutable.

  The reading material in the reception area had obviously been placed there for specific effect. Lifestyle magazines showing wealthy white people of a certain age with good hair and better teeth living the life they’d always imagined. Golfing. Yachting. Sitting on a beach. Biking through woods. Boarding a private jet with grandkids in tow. Not a bald spot or a pot belly or a loud Hawaiian shirt in the whole bunch. Walmart had no place in the world Vincent Russo could provide to his customers. A great big dream there for the offering.

  And since Hicks had been tracking every email into and out of Russo’s firm for the past six months, he knew it was all one big lie. The office looked like it was trying too hard to be something it wasn’t; just like the man whose name was on the door.

  Hicks looked up when he saw Vincent—never call him Vinny—Russo walk down the hall to greet him. From hacking into the firm’s security cameras, Hicks knew that Russo normally sent his secretary out to bring prospective clients back to his office, but not this time. After all, not every client walked in the door with five million in cash.

  Vincent Russo was a large, solid man, a shade over six feet tall and just north of fifty years old. He moved like a man who was used to being given his way due to his size, which made it all that much easier for him to disarm you with his charm. He still had all of his hair and most of it was black, combed straight back from his broad sloping forehead.

  “Mr. Warren, I take it?” Russo asked as Hicks stood to greet him. “Vincent Russo. Very happy to meet you, sir.”

  Russo went to shake Hicks’ hand, but stopped when he noticed Hicks was still wearing his black ski cap and black gloves.

  “Bad bout of rosacea, I’m afraid,” Hicks lied; playing it mousey. “Makes everything I touch that much more sensitive, so the gloves help minimize my discomfort.”

  Hicks wasn’t sure if Russo knew what rosacea was, but it made him forget all about shaking hands. “Of course. I’m… sorry. Please, come back to my office where we can talk more privately.”

  Hicks let the larger man lead him back to his office, although Hicks already knew exactly where it was. As they walked, Russo provided a narrative of the dozens of people on the phone in the low cubicles.

  “As you can see, we’re a small but mighty shop here, Mr. Warren. And if you give me just a few moments of your time, I think I’ll be able to prove to you that everyone in this firm is dedicated to giving each and every customer our undivided attention. And, as I’m sure you’ve heard, most of our customers have been very happy with the results.”

  Hicks offered a simper that fit the character he was playing. “I’ve heard nothing but great things about your company, Mr. Russo. I’m sure we’ll get along just fine.”

  Russo ushered Hicks into his office and closed the door behind them. It was a corner office, with no windows out into the cubicle farm outside. There was no way anyone could see what was going on inside, either. The windows behind Russo’s desk faced north onto Park Avenue. There was no way that anyone could see into the office from that angle, either.

  Hicks sat in one of the chairs facing Russo’s desk, which was as sparse as the rest of the office. No knick knacks on the walls; no mementos. Just a slim computer monitor, a sleek phone, and an old fashioned metal stapler engraved as thanks for speaking to an accounting group three years before.

  The only visible hint of a life beyond his business was a picture of his son posing for a Little League portrait in full unif
orm. It was a cute pic, but Hicks knew the smiling boy in that photo had grown up to become the greatest heartache in Russo’s life.

  Hicks noticed Russo didn’t display any pictures of his wife or daughter. That might have told Hicks something about Russo family life, if Hicks hadn’t already known the whole story.

  “Now, how might we help you today?” Russo asked when he was seated.

  “You can help me get rich, Mr. Russo.”

  Russo laughed. “That’s always the ultimate goal, of course. Given that you’ve told us that you have a substantial amount of money to invest, we have a variety of options available to us. It would help if you could give me an overview of where you’re currently invested so I can help chart a course for your future.”

  “Chart a course for my future.” Hicks let the words sink in. “I like the sound of that. Very nautical. Paints a nice picture.” He reached into his nylon messenger bag and pulled out a thick file of papers bound by a precariously thin rubber band. He’d wanted Russo to be underwhelmed by the initial presentation. All the easier to overwhelm him at the right time.

  “I’ve held many of these investments for a long time,” Hicks explained as he handed the bundle over to Russo, who reached to take it with both hands. “I didn’t feel comfortable emailing or sending all of this stuff by courier. I wanted to give it to you in person.”

  “That’s understandable,” Russo said as he took the bundle from him and laid it on the desk. “But we should probably start with some preliminaries. For example, what kind of business are you in?”

  Hicks nodded down at the pile. “You’ll see. It’s all right there.”

  Russo picked up the bundle again and gave an exaggerated grunt. “There’s quite a bit here to review all in in one sitting.” The thin rubber band snapped as he tried to remove it. “It might take me some time to go through it in order to get an accurate picture of your portfolio.”

  “It’s not as intimidating as it looks,” Hicks said as he took off his ski cap. “Besides, I think you’ll find much of it familiar.”