Sleight of Hand - By Phillip Margolin Page 0,1

but drugs were now the focus of his miserable life.

Norman’s girlfriend, Vera Petrov, was as ugly and hapless as Norman, but she was capable of maintaining steady employment. She was also a second cousin of Nikolai Orlansky, a major player in the Russian Mafia, whom she’d prevailed upon to give Norman a job sweeping up in one of his many taverns.

Norman was the type of person no one noticed, the human equivalent of a sagging armchair that has been stored in a dusty corner of a side room. Evil things happened around Norman all the time and no one seemed to care that Norman had witnessed them. But Norman had eyes and ears and a memory, which, weak as it was, still retained the sights and sounds of startling events involving murder and torture, especially when he was the person assigned to clean up the gore.

Never in a million years would Norman have considered informing on his employer. He had seen what happened to those who crossed the Russian. Then he came to the attention of an undercover federal agent who befriended Norman and listened intently to everything Norman said when he was under the influence of drugs and/or alcohol. Many of his tales concerned horrifying exploits in which Nikolai Orlansky was directly involved, the type of activities that could send the Russian to prison for life or even to death row. So Norman’s “friend” set him up, and the next thing he knew he was faced with having to choose between years in prison for possession of a controlled substance with intent to distribute or testifying against a man capable of telling off-color jokes while skinning a living, screaming human being.

Norman had been ordered to show up in the morning at an office in a strip mall identified as the corporate headquarters of International Products Limited. There he would be debriefed in preparation for his testimony in front of a federal grand jury. If he did not show up, he was doomed. If he did show up, he was doomed. Confronted with this lose-lose proposition, Norman drove to the nearest tavern.

By the time his wallet was empty, Norman could barely walk. As he staggered to his car, he was so inebriated that he barely noticed the blustery, chill wind that had driven the temperature down into the twenties. Norman planned to drive home from the tavern. The possibility of being arrested for drunken driving or committing vehicular homicide never entered his alcohol-addled brain. However, he did notice that it was awfully dark in the back corner of the lot where he had parked. Wasn’t a light shining down on his space earlier in the evening? Since it took too much effort to answer that question, Norman abandoned the task, even though the broken glass crunching underfoot provided a clue to the fate of the streetlight suspended over his vehicle.

Norman fished his car key out of his pocket and bent over, squinting at the keyhole. It was very dark and his hand wouldn’t stay still, so the task of putting the key into the lock presented a problem. He was concentrating so hard on opening his door that he was unaware that someone was standing beside him until he saw a blue-jeans pant leg out of the corner of his eye.

“What the fuck!” Norman exclaimed, adrenaline juicing his muscles enough to permit him to jump back into the side of his car.

“Good evening, Mr. Krueger.”

“Who are you?” Norman gasped.

The new arrival showed Norman his hands. They were empty. Then they weren’t. A business card appeared where none had been before. The man held it out to Krueger.

“How did you do that?” Norman asked, amazed.

“Magic,” Charles Benedict answered with a friendly smile.

Norman squinted at the card. Then he looked at the dirty jeans, ratty sweatshirt, and old sneakers.

“You’re a lawyer?”

“I am,” Benedict said, as he made the card vanish. “I represent Mr. Nikolai Orlansky.”

It took all of Norman’s willpower to keep from soiling himself.

“A little bird told Mr. Orlansky that you are planning on singing to the feds,” Benedict said.

“No, no. That ain’t true. You tell Mr. Orlansky he ain’t got nothing to worry about here.”

Benedict smiled. “Nick will be very happy to hear that. Hey, want to see another magic trick?”

Even though Norman was anxious to leave, he didn’t want to be rude, and the first trick had been mystifying.

“Uh, sure,” he said.

“Great.” Benedict pushed up the sleeves of his sweatshirt and rotated his hands again.

“Nothing in my hands or