Deep Black Read online

  ‘OK.’

  ‘Thank you, Nick. Thank you . . .’

  I put the cell back in my pocket, and headed for the flat. What the fuck was that all about? I supposed I’d find out soon enough.

  I got to Costco early and sat on a bench outside the entrance by the vending machines. The Pentagon was walking distance away, so the whole place was crawling with people in freshly starched and pressed camouflage BDUs, grocery basket in hand instead of an M16. It felt like the world’s biggest Naafi.

  I hadn’t seen her arrive, but about twenty-five minutes later Renee was walking towards me. Chloë was slumped in a front-loading harness, surrounded by her mum’s hairy nylon coat.

  I stood up. ‘Hello.’

  ‘No problems getting here?’

  ‘None at all.’

  Chloë was sound asleep, her head to one side and dribbling. Weren’t babies’ heads supposed to be supported? Fuck, what was happening to me? I was turning into a German grandmother.

  ‘Nick, I haven’t got long. Do you mind if we shop and talk? I don’t want Jerry getting worried up because I’m late back.’

  She collected a trolley and we went inside. Chloë’s head lolled from side to side but she didn’t wake. Renee didn’t know the layout of the aisles yet, but was soon throwing in nappies, baby lotion, bags of fruit. She didn’t really have a shopping plan. It was just kit-in-the-trolley stuff. I knew it well.

  ‘Jerry told me he asked you to go with him to Baghdad next week.’

  ‘He sounds pretty excited about this guy. But I can’t go.’

  She threw in a six-pack of tuna. ‘He’s got it into his head that this could be the last chance he ever gets to take a great picture. It’s like he sees the Washington Post as the end of the line.’

  We moved along the aisle.

  ‘Problem is, Nick, I want him to stay here and paint the apartment and do family stuff with me and Chloë, but at the same time I don’t want him to feel I’m standing in his way.’ She looked up and smiled about her predicament.

  I was feeling uncomfortable. This should have been just between the two of them. It was their problem, not mine.

  ‘I know he appears the cool guy, but he’s incredibly vulnerable. This Nuhanovic thing has got him not seeing straight. I can’t stop myself thinking about Chloë being an orphan. I wake up at night and—’ The trolley was filling. She sniffed. She was on the verge of tears. ‘I love him for it, but—’ She stopped and stared straight ahead. ‘I had this thought, you see . . .’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Go with him.’

  I looked her in the eye, focusing beyond the tears. ‘I don’t know what he’s told you, but I’m not really in that line of work any more.’

  She smiled knowingly as one dropped on to Chloë’s hat. ‘Oh, c’mon, Jerry’s told me a million times about the man who saved his life in Bosnia, and I’m pretty sure advertising isn’t the business he’s just got out of.’

  ‘I don’t do that other stuff any more.’

  ‘I’ll beg if you want me to . . .’

  I lifted a hand.

  She touched my arm. ‘I’m sorry, Nick. Unfair of me, I know. But I’m going out of my mind here. When you turned up today I thought, well, maybe . . .’

  She stroked Chloë’s head as her eyes searched mine. ‘I believe him: this will be the last job. But I want him back safely.’

  19

  I went through the underground shopping arcade at the Crystal City Metro and came out the other side. Dead ahead were the five tall grey concrete apartment blocks that I still called home. They were so drab they wouldn’t have looked out of place in a Sarajevo suburb, which probably explained why the concierge of my block was Bosnian.

  Jerry’s offer had stirred up all kinds of stuff, and my head was like a washing-machine with a full load on. You usually regret more the things you don’t do than those you do. Maybe this was one of those times. But then again, it could be a total gang fuck. I knew the best thing to do. Go shopping for the bike, pack and fuck off south. At least there’d be some sun.

  I got into the lift. But it would be great to do some work again, wouldn’t it? After all, I’d just be holding a photographer’s hand as we drove to this ayatollah’s hotel.

  Back in the apartment, I put some bread in the toaster, cut up a bit of Cracker Barrel, and made myself a big mug of tea. There’d be no harm in running a few basic checks on Jerry in case I met up with him again. I only knew what he’d told me, and words have always been cheap. I checked Baby-G – 15:14: nearly time for the afternoon talk shows but, just for a change, I was beginning to feel I had something better to do.

  I got online as I shoved the first slice of toasted cheese into my mouth, and kicked off with a Google search on ‘Jeral al-Hadi’. There were 418 results. Adding a photograph to the search brought it down to 202. The first few seemed to back up what he’d told me about his life since we last met. I’d go back to them if all else failed, but for now it was enough to know that Jerry’s career curve had taken an impressively vertical trajectory since Bosnia days. His work had appeared in Time and Newsweek, and he’d just missed the Pulitzer short list in 2001 for his photo reports from Ground Zero.

  I took a swig of my brew. It was a pity I couldn’t be doing this officially, using Hot Black’s facilities. I could have logged straight on to Intelink and got a shedload of background much more quickly. All the same, it’s scary what anyone can come up with after just an hour or three on the net.

  I did a new Google search, this time for ‘people finder + USA’. What I wanted was a company that ran checks on social-security numbers, past addresses, even the names and telephone numbers of neighbours, in any of the fifty states. The first link I clicked looked perfect. On their home page, I entered Jerry’s name and state, and immediately got a list of addresses, probably everywhere he’d lived over the last ten years. It even gave his age, thirty-three. I clicked the link against the most recent address, in Buffalo, and it gave a phone number. I wasn’t surprised not to find the DC address at the top: they’d only just moved, and the database hadn’t caught up.

  So far so good, but there was a lot more I could find out. So why not? Various services were on offer, from basic background at $39.95, to due diligence with criminal search at $295. The more comprehensive the search, the longer it took. I checked the delivery times and signed up for the best I could get: the $59.95 advanced background search sounded good to me. It promised everything from aliases and bankruptcy proceedings, to boat ownership and criminal records. Everything, in fact, apart from his shoe size.

  I keyed in my credit-card number and details, chose a user name and password, and was told to check my email box in two hours. I then forked out an extra $19.95 for the marital-records service, suggesting they started with Buffalo.

  I then ran a name check for Renee al-Hadi but drew a blank. Some states had direct online marriage databases. They all got the al-Hadi question as I waited for the paid information to come through, including Nevada. But they hadn’t run away to Las Vegas and got married by a Sikh Elvis impersonator at a drive-thru house of love. Shame, it sounded like fun. I’d just have to wait for the New York state records to come through, and take it from there.

  I logged on to anybirthday.com and entered Chloë al-Hadi. There was only one, and it gave her date of birth as 9 May 2003.

  If I could, I wanted to find something linking Jerry to the DC address. Telephone databases were most likely to be up to date; I went to any-who.com and keyed in the number on his card. Sure enough, the reverse number lookup gave me the new apartment.

  Next Google search was for ‘dating + background check’. I got another search company, this time one that helped run checks on prospective dates, maybe people you’d met through the internet. It looked like it was just as healthy to be paranoid in the dating game as it was in my ex-line of work. I wanted to cover all the angles, and if the results didn’t correlate, I’d need to know the reason why.


  I now had nothing to do but wait while they did their stuff and got back to me. I went into the kitchen and got more tea and toasted cheese under way. This was basic stuff I was doing, at the very bottom of the intelligence food chain, but it felt good to be doing something familiar at last. It beat going the best of three falls with my psyche in Ezra’s office, or watching others do the same thing on Gerald Rivera, that was for sure.

  It was only when I smelled the cheese burning that I started to wonder what the fuck I was doing. It wasn’t as if I was going with him, was it? Was I just checking him out because I simply didn’t trust anyone any more?

  20

  With a mug of fresh monkey tea in front of me, I went back online. Google took me to a site called classmates.com. I registered as Donald Duck and tried the same for a Hotmail address. But it seemed a million and one others had had the idea first, so I made up some other shit and gained instant free access to the site. There seemed to be thirty-three schools in Lackawanna, from Baker Victory High to Wison Elementary. Guessing Jerry’s date of birth as 1971, I went through them all systematically, searching from kindergartens in 1975 to high schools in 1990.

  Within twenty minutes, I had a positive hit. Jeral al-Hadi had attended Victory Academy, and the school site gave a list of twenty-three classmates, complete with email addresses. They all wanted to get together and show their new baby photos and tell everyone how successful they were. If necessary, I could either email them or go back to anywho for their phone numbers.

  Next, I dipped into the sex-offenders register for New York and neighbouring states, an online service to comply with ‘Megan’s Law’. Jerry had a clean sheet. Did his story about moving quite recently to DC stack up? And when exactly had he moved? Why did this all matter anyway? I knew the answer, of course, but was trying to avoid it, hoping I’d find something that would make me not want to go with him.

  I sat and thought a bit. I was sure I’d seen a VCR in the apartment. I went to infospace.com and hit the link called ‘near an address’. I keyed in ‘video store’, then Jerry’s address. Video Stock was the nearest video rental place, just 0.2 miles away. I went back to Google and entered ‘Video Stock + DC’. There were twenty-four branches. I picked up the phone and dialled the one that looked furthest away.

  A young guy answered. ‘Video Stock, this is Phil, how may I help you?’

  I gave him my best-mate voice. ‘Yeah, hi, Phil – listen, somebody in your store was really helpful to me a few days ago. Fantastic service. Tallish guy, brown hair?’

  ‘There’s a lot of us here.’

  ‘Well, you know, I want to write to the manager about it. Doesn’t happen very much, these days, that kind of service. What’s the manager’s name?’

  ‘Mike Mills.’

  ‘That’s great. Listen, I might write to your headquarters too. What’s your store number?’

  ‘One thirty-six.’

  ‘That’s great. And you’re Phil, right?’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘OK, thanks, Phil, you’ve been a real help. You take care now.’

  I put the phone down and dialled again, this time to the store near Jerry.

  ‘Video Stock, this is Steffi, how can I help you?’

  ‘Hi, Steffi, this is Mike Mills. I’m the manager at Renton, store one thirty-six. Listen, I could use your help. Our computers are down and we have one of your customers here who wants to rent but he doesn’t have his card with him. Could you just verify his details for me?’

  ‘Sure. Go right ahead.’

  I gave her Jerry’s name and address, and Steffi checked her computer. ‘Yeah, I got him.’ Then, without me even asking, she gave me his account number.

  ‘No problems with him? No late returns?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘When did he open the account?’

  ‘September.’

  ‘This September just gone?’

  ‘Yep.’

  While I was on a roll, I thought I might as well push my luck. ‘OK, I’ll sign him up by hand here and enter it in the database when the computer’s back up. He wants to charge this to the card he uses at your store – hey, yeah, one moment, folks – sorry, Steffi, I’m holding up a whole line of customers here. Read me the credit-card number and expiration date?’

  And she did. The weakest link in any security chain is always a human being.

  It might not be so easy coming by the next piece of information. I wanted to check that Jerry owned the Jeep, but I didn’t know the registration: all I knew was that the Cherokee had looked about three years old. I couldn’t just phone the Department of Motor Vehicles and ask. At least, not directly.

  I went to docusearch.com and akiba.com, but a plate check would take one business day. I went to the DMV site for Washington DC, and checked their criteria for releasing information. They protected the privacy of individuals by closely adhering to the Driver’s Privacy Protection Act. Therefore, they would release driver’s records only to the following requesters: driver, with proof of identity; driver’s representative (for example, a spouse), with written authorization from the driver and a copy of the driver’s proof of identification, bearing a discernible signature; law-enforcement representatives, with documentation showing driver’s involvement in an investigation; government entities, as part of an established activity requiring records (for example, security clearances, investigations, and recruitment); attorneys, with written authorization from their client to obtain records; individuals or entities requesting information through the Freedom of Information Act; or insurance company representatives, with written authorization from the driver as part of an established investigation. That last one would do. The only problem was, requesters had to produce the client’s name, date of birth, and driver’s licence or social-security number – and they had to produce it in person.

  When people don’t have a reason to be suspicious, it’s easy to gain their trust. Next thing I did, therefore, was a Google search for Chrysler and made a note of the head-office telephone number and address, and the same details for dealers in Buffalo and DC. I then did another to get the number for the Motor Vehicles Department in DC. After a five-minute wait – during which I was told I was a valued customer, my call was important to them and I was moving up the queue – I finally got through to a human.

  ‘Hi, I’m calling from Kane Doyle, Chrysler dealership in Buffalo, New York. We got a vehicle recall problem with some 2001 Jeep Cherokees, and I have an ownership issue I hope you can help me with. See, we have a customer just moved from Buffalo to DC and I’m trying to work out if the recall is our responsibility or DC’s. I’ll give you his address, if you could just verify ownership?’

  ‘I need some sort of—’

  ‘No problem, I’ll give you the number here, Kane Doyle, Delaware Avenue, and you can call us back?’

  ‘No, that’s OK, I guess. What’re the details?’ Nothing like the threat of extra workload to get a civil servant to change his mind.

  I gave him Jerry’s name and address. He hit a few keys. ‘Yeah, Jeep Cherokee.’

  ‘Year of registration?’

  ‘2001.’

  ‘That’s right. Tell me, is he still on Buffalo plates, or has he reregistered for DC? If he’s switched plates I’ll get the DC guys to deal with it.’

  ‘Still on Buffalo plates.’

  ‘Ah, well, guess it’s my baby, then. Look, thanks for your help.’

  It was that simple. Jerry’s car checked out.

  I sat back and took a long gulp of monkey. The next part of the session was going to be very interesting and quite a lot dirtier.

  21

  Seven twenty. It would be dark soon. For once it was going to be an advantage that I hadn’t done any washing in ages.

  I picked my keys and cell off the kitchen worktop. As I turned towards the window and caught sight of his office on the other side of the Potomac, I thought about Ezra.

  I thumbed in his voicemail, my very own 911 number he’d give
n me in case I needed some emergency shrinkage. I couldn’t be arsed to go into the living room for the landline, and that, I thought, was a good sign of normality returning. If I’d still been his patient, he would have been proud of me.

  Still looking out over the river, I pictured him doing the business with yet another in the long line of George’s fruits, going through the same fucking pantomime. ‘We must have complete trust between us. Blah-blah-fucking-blah.’

  The voicemail gave me about a hundred options before I could talk. ‘It’s Nick. You probably know this already – George will explain if you don’t – but I won’t be coming any more. You’re right about the suicide thing. I won’t be taking the pills and jumping off the bridge, so no need to worry. And thanks, I suppose.’

  I wasn’t too sure how that felt but, fuck it, no more Ezra.

  Thirty minutes later I was on the Metro, heading back to Chevy Chase. In a carrier-bag I had a pair of washing-up gloves and a torch.

  The road was just as busy when I got out as it had been when Jerry waved me off, but now it was dark. The street-lights glinted on the slowly moving traffic. Washington’s worker-bees had their heads down determinedly as they made their way home. Most of them just wanted to close the front door, get the telly on and throw something into the microwave. It was etched in their faces.

  Jerry’s apartment block was easy to find. Just before I got to it I took a turning to the left that brought me round the back, into their communal garden. I sat on a bench as if I belonged there, a resident taking some air before the microwave went ping. I looked along the line of windows on the first floor. Two had no blinds or curtains, very bright white walls and a bare bulb hanging from the ceiling. I could even see Chloë’s mobile turning just above the window-ledge.