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It was said that Tikhonov’s remarkable rapid rise as a successful businessman was in large part due to his having served in Russia’s Sluzhba Vneshney Razvedki, the latest incarnation of the external spying and intelligence-gathering agency formerly known as the KGB. Being closely associated with high-ranking politicians in the Kremlin—powerful ones whom he had worked with in the SVR—did not hurt.
Nikoli Antonov was thirty-seven years old. Born in Russia, he was fluent in his mother tongue, but had no obvious accent due to his early years attending a Helsinki boarding school. He looked Western European, and dressed expensively, favoring custom-tailored dark two-piece suits with a crisp white dress shirt, no tie.
O’Sullivan had told Harris, “Mr. Antonov embodies Teddy Roosevelt’s ‘Speak softly and carry a big a stick.’ He can be quietly ruthless.” And that Antonov had been sent to Philadelphia by Tikhonov to get Lucky Stars up and running, and then was set to do the same in Macao, where Tikhonov was opening a new casino.
“Mr. Antonov,” O’Sullivan went on, “wants to have an acceptable explanation of what happened—and what’s been done about it—when Mr. Tikhonov is made aware of the situation.”
“He doesn’t know?”
O’Sullivan shrugged. “I don’t think so. At least not yet. Mr. Antonov is very selective about what he tells me. He’s good about just letting me do my job on the straight and narrow. And that’s why I wanted to let you in on something—and why I just said you were getting ahead of me.”
Harris raised his eyebrows, wrinkling his forehead.
“You’ve got my undivided attention.”
“As I said, Tony, Mr. Antonov prefers to deliver good news to his boss, such as how a problem was addressed and was no longer a problem.” He glanced up at the image of Hooks smirking at the Winner’s Lounge, then looked at Harris. “I know you have plenty of open cases you’re working. Homicide clearance rate is still about—what?—maybe forty percent?”
Harris nodded. “Sometimes a little bit better.”
“Still better than Camden’s thirty percent, huh?” O’Sullivan grinned, then added, “So if I were you, I wouldn’t put too much effort in this job.”
Silently, Harris, holding his right hand palm up, gestured with his fingers Give me more.
O’Sullivan looked him in the eyes.
“Okay,” he then said, “let’s say, hypothetically of course, that someone with a real motivation found this golden-voiced rapper first, and then recovered the merchandise, or what’s probably left of it, and then made an example of him to others who might think that if a dipshit like Hooks could get away with ripping off a casino, so could they. Go hit the one across the street, or any of the others in Philly or at the Shore.”
Harris narrowed his eyes.
O’Sullivan shrugged, and then said: “Ghetto punks are killing each other every day in this city, and there doesn’t seem to be an end to it.” Then he added, his tone dripping with sarcasm, “I’ve heard there’s even a name for it—Killadelphia?”
Harris pursed his lips, then nodded.
“Yeah. I may have heard that, too,” he said, adding his own sarcasm.
“That may be job security for you,” O’Sullivan said. “But when those ghetto punks bring their shit into my casino . . .”
After a moment, Harris said, “Kind of hard to be surprised it happened, no? They built this fancy place with lots of money in the middle of a really rough part of town, not to mention right across the bridge from Camden. That’s like dragging a carcass of raw meat past a pack of starving dogs.”
“Tony, those animals this morning killed a poor bastard just trying to make a living selling watches. And they may have killed a beautiful, innocent young girl.”
After a moment, Tony sighed disgustedly.
“I hear you, Sully. And agree. But—”
“No buts,” O’Sullivan said sharply. “Being a wild dog, particularly a starving one, to use your analogy, usually does not end well.”
Harris raised his eyebrows again.
“That mean what I think it means? You’d be party to that, Sully?”
O’Sullivan shook his head.
“Not only no, Tony—hell no. You should know me better than that. Never. That’s why Mr. Antonov ordered me to give you everything you ask for—copies of the videos, everything—on the level . . .”
His voice trailed off as his eyes scanned the room. Then he motioned for Harris to follow him across the room.
“Look, Tony,” he said quietly a moment later, “I’m going to do everything in my power to help you do your job. But that doesn’t mean other gears aren’t turning. I don’t know for a fact that they are—on my mother’s grave, I swear it—but I do know that I cannot control what others do. Just as you can’t.”
