“Do you have anything else to say, Akiva?”
Decker spoke carefully. “Just that maybe Ephraim found out about Chaim’s drug dealing and considered telling your father-in-law.”
“Ephraim wouldn’t… tattle on Chaim-especially if it were a one-shot done deal. What would be the point? To give an old man heartbreak? Besides, if Chaim did score big-one time-it would have been at least six months ago, after Chaim told me that the business was looking up. So how would that fit in with Ephraim’s so-called ongoing business conflicts with Chaim?”
A good point. “Maybe he scored more than once.”
“Then he would have made frequent trips abroad. I’ve already told you that he didn’t. We’re back to where we started.”
“Well, maybe he was debating another big score, but this time Ephraim found out.”
“And how would Ephraim have found out? Frankly put, the two men didn’t like each other. They rarely talked and only to keep peace in the family. Ephraim thought that Chaim was a self-righteous prig, and Chaim thought Ephraim was an irresponsible jerk. They kept their personal business very separate from one another.”
“But they did intersect in some capacity.”
“In some limited capacity, yes.”
“In business specifically,” Decker said.
“Yes.”
Inventory, Decker thought. Ephraim was in charge of inventory. “Hey, how about this, Jonathan? Maybe Chaim didn’t make frequent trips abroad. But maybe his products did. What about the merchandise? Did he import stock from Europe or Israel?”
“The family operates on high volume, low price. They buy cheaper wares that come from Asia, lots of Korean-made-”
“Well, isn’t Haifa a major port stop from Asia? Rotterdam too? I mean, how easy would it be to take off the backs of the computers or stereos or VCRs or portable phones or CD players and slip in a dozen bags of ecstasy pills. It wouldn’t have to be even that much. Say you bring in ten thousand pills a load, which is not very much to hide in big electronic equipment. At twenty-bucks-a-pop street value, you’re talking around a quarter of a million dollars a shipment. And how many shipments does Chaim get in a year?”
It was a rhetorical question. Jonathan didn’t respond.
Decker said, “It’s much easier to stuff the contraband into merchandise than to bring it across with people. And way more practical. Even if customs were to check for drugs, maybe they’d check one or two pallets. They’re not going to go through the entire shipment unless they’re suspicious, right?”
Decker was becoming animated.
“Ephraim’s doing inventory one day, checking numbers on a list with numbers of the actual wares, and a back falls off a VCR. He suddenly discovers a bag of pills that was accidentally left behind. He knows instantly what’s going on because he was a former drug addict. He goes to confront his brother but-”
“Forget it,” Jonathan said quietly.
“What?”
“I said, forget it!” Jonathan’s face turned hard. “Screwing Chaim isn’t going to bring either Ephraim or Shayndie back to life. The family has already been destroyed, Akiva, do you hear me! Destroyed. My wife has been destroyed! I will not be a part of this. I will not bring any more misery to my family!”
“Even if there’s evidence Chaim set up Ephraim?”
“But you don’t have that evidence, do you?”
“Well, no, not yet-”
“I don’t believe that for a minute!” Abruptly, the rabbi’s face broke, tears rolling down his cheeks, blotted up by his beard. “If you want to come after someone-if you need to come after someone-then damn it, come after me!”
“What are you talking about, Jon?” Decker studied his brother. “What’s wrong?”
Without warning, Jonathan jerked the van sideways, swinging it onto the shoulder of the expressway. He almost skidded out as the van bounced on wet dirt and gravel and small patches of ice. He killed the motor, slumped over the steering wheel, and sobbed. When he spoke, Decker could hardly understand him.
“I messed up, Akiva,” Jonathan choked out.
“What? How?” Decker touched his shoulder, then slipped his arm around him. “C’mon, buddy, it can’t be that bad. Talk to me.”
“It is that bad!”
“Talk to me anyway.”
He lifted his head, his eyes wet and red. “I messed up… with Shaynda. I lied to you. I… lied.”
Vehicles were zipping past them, narrowly missing the van’s taillights. Heart hammering in his chest, Decker waited.
“She called me-Shayndie called me.”
Decker held his breath. “When?”
“The morning she was murdered! That’s why it was such a shock! I had just spoken to her about three hours earlier.”
“Around seven in the morning, then,” Decker said. “Did she call you at home?”
The rabbi nodded. “She called me…” He strangled on a deep sigh. “She said she was okay… that she was being taken care of. But I couldn’t tell anyone-not even her parents, especially not her parents, especially not her father. She had sneaked out to call me, but it was against the rules if she wanted to stay where she was. If he found out that she broke the rules, he’d kick her out. So she had to go back really quickly… before anyone found out.”
“Who’s he?” Decker asked.
Jonathan shrugged helplessly. “We spoke for about… one, two minutes. Then she said she had to go. Just please, please don’t tell anyone that she had called.” He looked at Decker with puffy eyes. “I begged her to tell me where she was. I begged her to tell me who she was with. Of course she refused. Just that she was being taken care of by someone big and powerful. And that she was okay.”
A long silence.
“I told Chaim,” Jonathan admitted. “I couldn’t help it, Akiva. I just… he was my brother-in… if it had been my daughter…”
He turned away, beside himself with despair.
“I told him that he couldn’t tell anyone. I told him it was imperative that he kept this between the two of us. But he probably told Minda. Maybe she told the wrong person… I don’t know. I’m plagued with the thought that I inadvertently set her up.”
“It doesn’t sound like it-”
“She begged me not to tell anyone… I should have taken it as a warning. Maybe my phone was tapped. Or maybe Chaim’s phone was tapped when I called to tell him. I should have pressed her to tell me more, but it was so short…”
“If she called you at home, we could trace the call. It’s probably a phone booth, but that could give us an approximate location of where she was staying… assuming that she walked over to the phone booth.”
“I should have gone to you.” Jonathan wiped his eyes. “Asked you for advice before I acted. The way I did it… not only did I break confidentiality… but it may have cost Shayndie her life.”
Decker exhaled, then shrank in his seat. Jonathan misinterpreted his body language. “You despise me.”
The laughter from Decker’s throat was strong and sour. “Oh my my!” He turned to his brother. “You think you screwed up, guy?” He looked at the van’s ceiling. “I messed up big time! I saw her, Jonathan. I saw her and let her go-”
“What?”
“I let her go because she was being protected… or so I thought.”
“What? Who?”
“It’s better if you don’t know,” Decker said.
Jonathan grabbed Decker’s shoulders, fury in his eyes. “I just bared my soul to you. Your response is not good enough!”