Nobody’s Hero (Ben Koenig #2)

Chapter 70

Metropolitan Detention Center, Brooklyn – better known as MDC Brooklyn – was the federal prison that served the Eastern District of New York. It was a boxy, low-rise building in Sunset Park. A cube-shaped warning of what awaited anyone who slipped on the criminal-justice banana skin. Originally a warehouse, it was converted into a federal prison in the mid-nineties. It now warehoused human beings.

Koenig was no prison abolitionist, but even he thought MDC Brooklyn was grim. It was smelly, it was cold, and it was damper than a puddle. It looked like it was held together with black mould.

Draper had wanted to call Smerconish. Let him know they were back on US soil. Koenig hadn’t wanted her to call anyone – ‘Trust no one’ seemed a good maxim right now – but in the end it was moot. They needed his connections. When Draper told him what they needed, he’d asked one question: ‘Is it necessary?’

‘Yes,’ Draper had replied.

‘Consider it done then.’

They were met at MDC Brooklyn by five FBI agents. Special Agent in Charge Isaacs and four lackeys. Isaacs was a doughy man with deep-set eyes. He looked like a cartoon toad. He checked their passports, raised an eyebrow at Koenig’s and Draper’s diplomatic status, paid special attention to the forged passports of Margaret and Carlyle, then took them through security. The guard asked Margaret to remove the hairpin that kept her bun together. She pulled it out and handed it over. It was long and smooth with a ribbed collar.

‘Be careful with that, please,’ she said. ‘It’s Roman.’

‘Nice,’ Koenig said.

She shrugged. ‘I wasn’t always old, dear,’ she said. ‘I used to have suitors.’

Isaacs led them into an interview room. It had been set up with a camera and recording equipment. A steel table was bolted to the floor.

‘We only need a speakerphone,’ Draper said. ‘No camera, no recording equipment.’

Isaacs scowled. ‘We’ll get you a phone,’ he said, ‘but everything else stays. Including me. That’s non-negotiable.’

‘I’m not negotiating.’

‘Miss Draper, I’ve been ordered to facilitate this meeting, but the prisoner is in my custody. We have a lawful reason to—’

‘You don’t have the security clearance, Agent Isaacs,’ Draper said. ‘No one here does.’

‘Don’t blow smoke up my ass,’ he said. ‘ None of you have security clearance. Mr Koenig looks like he sleeps in a dumpster, you used to carry a badge but don’t any more, and your friends presented counterfeit passports to a federal agent. That’s a crime. As far as I’m concerned, you’ve all committed a crime. And your diplomatic passports don’t mean shit stateside. We either arrest you or we cooperate – the choice is yours. Don’t take long. I’m a reasonable man, but my IBS is acting up. It’s making me crabby.’

‘Agent Isaacs, in fifteen minutes the attorney general will call the speakerphone you’re going to get me. You can explain to her then why you’ve gate-crashed a matter of national security. No skin off my ass. Either way, you’ll be leaving this room.’

Which stopped Special Agent in Charge Isaacs in his tracks. The AG was Isaacs’s boss in the same theoretical way the president was his boss. You expected to go your entire career without meeting either. Unless you were getting an award, you didn’t even want them knowing your name.

‘Don’t leave this room,’ Isaacs said. ‘I need to make a call.’ He got a phone out of his belt holster and used his thumb to flick it open. He left the room. The four other agents left with him. The one at the back turned and winked. Koenig got the impression that Isaacs was a bit of an asshole.

‘Who the hell still has a flip phone?’ Draper said when the room was empty. ‘Although he was right about one thing.’

‘What’s that, dear?’ Margaret said.

‘Koenig does look like he sleeps in a dumpster.’

Five minutes later, the camera and recording equipment had been removed. Five minutes after that, the person they’d come to see shackle-shuffled into the interview room.

She took one look at them, screamed and launched herself at Koenig. The prison officers with her held her back as best they could, but it was like they were wrestling a greased pig. Eventually, and after much cursing, they got her to the floor. Even then, the woman managed to twist her heavily bandaged head so she was facing Koenig. She shrieked and spat and hollered and panted until foam formed at the corners of her mouth and snot hung from her nose. Koenig didn’t think he’d ever seen anyone look so angry.

‘Hi, Cunningham,’ he said. ‘How’s your forehead?’