The Alibi Man

Chapter 54

Bennett Walker buzzed his window down halfway, looked at the kid in the car beside him, and said, “I’m not doing this here. I’m not being seen with you.”

He lifted a small duffel bag off the passenger seat. “There’s twenty-five thousand dollars in this bag, just like we agreed. If you want it, come and get it.”

The kid stared at him, his mouth hanging open. There was pizza sauce on his face. For some reason, that image would stay with him: the idiot kid with pizza sauce on his face.

He drove slowly around the end of the buildings, going behind the shopping center, and made his way toward South Shore, checking his rearview mirror.

The kid followed. Of course he did. Greedy little shit.

He took a right on South Shore and drove past Players, then took a left and another left onto the grounds of the old polo stadium, via what had been a service entrance. Abandoned now for several years, the stadium stood sagging, in a shambles from hurricane damage, waiting for progress to come along and flatten it.

Bennett pulled in at the far end of the stadium, parked his car, and got out. Creepy place, he thought. Not like it was in the old days, when the barns were full and the place was electric with the energy that surrounded high-goal international polo. The outdated security lights were lit, but they gave little in the way of light or security and did nothing to dispel the feeling of being in a ghost town.

The kid pulled in beside him, parked his car, and got out.

Neither of them noticed the third car, which killed its lights and stopped just off the road.

“Hey, man,” the kid said, his tone too familiar, like they were contemporaries, friends even. “I can understand you not wanting to do this in front of people. Believe me, I don’t want to make this difficult for you. I’m providing a service. I want my clients to feel comfortable.”

Bennett stared at him. “What the fuck are you talking about, you slimy little shit? You’re a blackmailer.”

The kid held his hands up and made a pained face. “No, no, no. That’s such an ugly word. That’s not what this is at all. You’re paying me a fee to manage some information for you. That’s all. It’s business.

“A man like yourself, you have a name to protect, yet you want to live a certain lifestyle… Think of me like a personal assistant.”

“I don’t want to think of you at all,” Bennett said flatly. “Let’s get this over with.”

He set the duffel bag on the trunk of the kid’s car and unzipped it. “Twenty-five thousand. I’m not sticking around while you count it.”

“That’s cool, Mr. Walker,” the kid said. “I don’t want to put you out.”

Bennett turned and stared at him again. Unbelievable. What was there to say?

“Now, I’m sure you understand this only covers Saturday night,” the kid said.

“What?”

“The information specific to Saturday night,” he clarified. “There’s the other thing we haven’t discussed.”

“What other thing?”

The kid made the pained face again. “I hate to bring it up. I really do. But in light of recent events-”

Bennett advanced on him, towering over him. “What the hell are you talking about?”

The hands went up again. “Last April. End of the season. During the big Super Bowl or whatever you call it in polo.”

“The U.S. Open? What about it?”

“There was a night at Players… a girl… in your car…” the kid prompted. “She wasn’t very happy…”

Everything went cold inside Bennett. A fan, a polo groupie… he came on to him… She wanted it… They went outside…

“She was crying,” the kid reminded him. “You told me I didn’t see anything.”

He had paid the girl ten grand to shut up. She had been all over him in the club. No one would have believed her-without a witness to back her up.

Funny, Bennett thought, he had been agonizing over what he was going to have to do. Now he just acted. He put his hand into the duffel bag, curled his fingers around the short crowbar, pulled it out, and struck Jeff Cherry with it as hard as he could, burying the thing in his skull.

The kid’s head cracked like an egg. Blood and brain matter splattered, but not as much as Bennett had imagined. One hard overhand stroke, and that was it. He didn’t even have to bother to ill the crowbar free to give him a second whack.

Bennett stepped back and stood there as the kid dropped to his lees and fell over dead.

As simple as that.

He popped the trunk on the kid’s car, put the body inside with half a dozen mostly empty boxes from Sal’s and numerous crumpled Krispy Kreme bags. From the duffel bag he took a couple of small bags of cocaine and planted them among the rest of the trash, making certain to get a little drug residue on the kid’s fingers.

He closed the trunk. When the car and eventually the body were discovered, no one would find it hard to believe the kid had been on the wrong end of a drug deal gone bad. Everyone knew he supplied Players’ customers with recreational substances. Jeff Cherry would be considered just another fatality in the war on drugs.

Damage control.

“A pity it will not go so easily for you.”

He startled at the sound of the voice and spun around.

A square, neat man in a brown suit stood pointing a gun at him.

“You are wondering who I am,” the man said.

His accent was Russian. That realization sent chills through Bennett Walker like shards of glass.

“I am Alexi Kulak,” the man said. “I loved Irina Markova. You killed her. And I have come to kill you.”

As simple as that.