by Roy Glenn
“Who is she?”
“She’s Vinnelli’s mistress. I thought the name sounded familiar but couldn’t place it. Her name is Amanda White. McManus is her maiden name; Eileen is her middle name.”
“Mistress, huh?”
“Bad boy.”
“Does his wife know?”
“Near as I can tell she doesn’t.”
“So what do you have on Eileen McManus?”
“Just about everything is in her name. He uses her to hide his money. I got financials on the offshore accounts he has.”
“Is there any way to link it to him?”
“Yes. There’s one company that filed for bankruptcy that lists Eileen McManus as CEO, and Vinnelli and DeFrancisco as being on the board of directors. It was originally the holding company, for lack of a better term, that hid all their other shit. After DeFrancisco went to jail, Vinnelli got careful and cleaned up a lot. She sold off all the other companies and they changed hands through a series of dummy companies that move the money out of the country, and it all ends up back in her hands.”
“How much money we talking about?”
“I’d say about seven or eight million. Maybe more; give me some time, I’m still looking.”
“All of it in offshore accounts?”
“Pretty much.”
“I guess this would be a good time to have that conversation about some of your skills.”
“Okay, lets.”
“How good are you?”
“I’m very good, Mr. Black. How good depends on what skill you’re talking about.”
“I want that money. Do you have the skills to get it?”
“As much as I’d like to say yes, I can’t. Our old partner Jett Bronson could pull that off in his sleep.”
“What about Travis Burns?”
“Yeah, maybe. I know he did that other thing for you with Diego, but this would be different.”
“Not knowing a lot about computers, tell me why it would be different. And do it so I can understand it, please.”
“See, that time Travis had a number of advantages. Knowing that a transaction was about to take place. He had access to the hardware the original transaction was run on, and he was able to get the password. That made it easy. So all he had to do was to go in behind them and transfer the money out. In this case, the money is, like I said, for the most part all offshore; mostly in the Cayman Islands, so he would have to have the same access or password. But that’s just me thinking. Travis may be a badder boy than I give him credit for.”
“See what you can do to make that happen.”
“Yes, sir,” Monika said and saluted me with a smile on her face.
I was about to leave when something she said crossed my mind. “One more thing.”
“What’s that?”
“That bankrupted holding company you told me about, Diego Estaban or Martin Marshall wouldn’t be on that list of directors, would they?” I asked, thinking that as his position and power grows that I might need some leverage against Martin.
“No.”
“I want you to look for anything that links Martin Marshall to Vinnelli or DeFrancisco.”
“I’ll do that. But I think I may already have that.”
“What’s that?”
“I found a draft of a leaked memo written by a Justice Department attorney named Ken Thomas. In the memo, Thomas alleges that DEA agents in Peru are in league with drug traffickers and are implicated in money laundering and murder. Thomas’s allegations centered on an undercover operation called Peru-Man, which targeted traffickers in Peru and was overseen by DeFrancisco. At the time he was a DEA group supervisor in Miami. As part of that operation, DeFrancisco and the agents working under him, one of which was Vinnelli, had uncovered evidence that DEA agents in Peru appeared to be assisting traffickers in Peru.”
“How does that relate to Marshall and how does it work for us?”
“I’m getting to that. But later that same year there were charges raised that led to DeFrancisco’s operation being shut down.”
“What was that?”
“There was an operation called white-light that was setup to specifically target Diego Estaban and a Peruvian National Police colonel named Gonzalez.”
“Diego, my old friend,” I laughed.
“Estaban and Gonzalez were widely recognized to be involved in trafficking and arms dealing at the highest levels. Working with various sectors of the Peruvian military, they have fielded death squads responsible for murdering thousands of Peruvians.”
“Now we’re getting somewhere.”
“See, I told you. It all comes down to a meeting in Panama between Gonzalez and Vinnelli that was not coordinated properly with the Peru office. Vinnelli was instructed to contact the Peru office before finalizing a meeting with Gonzalez. Vinnelli had met with Gonzalez for two days in Panama without notifying the Peru office. DeFrancisco and Vinnelli offered different accounts of the meeting in Panama with Gonzalez.”
“How so?”
“Vinnelli claims the meeting was unplanned. DeFrancisco told investigators that the meeting was planned in advanced. DeFrancisco said he recalled Vinnelli calling from Panama to report his interview of a big player; however, DeFrancisco could not remember if Vinnelli identified the player as Gonzalez. That put in motion a major criminal investigation targeting DeFrancisco and Vinnelli. DeFrancisco and Estaban were involved in a scheme with an informant named Isabelle Vega. She was going to testify about Diego’s operation and that DeFrancisco and Vinnelli were extorting money from traffickers in exchange for promises of lenient jail sentences. But the report disappeared, and Vega turned up dead. Vinnelli got a reprimand for the meeting and that squashed it.”
“What does that have to do with Marshall?”
“It doesn’t necessarily link Marshall to them, but it does link the two of them to Diego.”
“Marshall and Diego were partners. So you would have to connect Marshall to Diego to link it to DeFrancisco and Vinnelli.”
“Exactly. Then you add this conversation between Marshall and Diego.” Monika made a few clicks on her laptop that I couldn’t follow if I had to. “Listen to this.”
The first voice I heard was Martin Marshall’s. “I don’t want there to be any way this can come back and bite me.”
“You worry too much, my friend.” That was Diego Estaban. “Once the word begins to spread about his involvement in this business, his political allies will run for cover and you will have no need to fear him.”
“But if you can’t find that package or it becomes public, it will put me and a lot of our friends in an extremely compromised position.”
“If that happens, which it won’t, because I assure you that the package will be recovered, we have set these things in motion so the spotlight will be on Mike Black and … ” Diego laughed. I hated the way he laughed. I’m glad I killed him. “ … others, who I will make known to you when the time is right.”
“There is one other thing that concerns me.”
“What is that, my friend?”
“DeFrancisco. He’s shaky. I am not sure we can trust him to keep his mouth shut if anything goes wrong.”
“How much does he really know? What have you told him?”
“I only told him what he needed to know to put the operation in motion. Still, he has me, and I don’t need any more heat.” That’s Martin, always looking out for himself. “I just got somebody else’s stink off me.”
“He is your man. When he has outlived his usefulness you will have to insure his silence.” I took care of that for him.
When the recording was over, I smiled at Monika.
“Where did you get that?”
“Travis recorded it while we were running surveillance on Marshall.”
“I knew I liked that kid.”
“He does impress sometimes.”
“That’s exactly what I need,” I said to Monika and somebody knocked on her door.
“Excuse me a minute,” she s
aid and went to answer the door.
When she came back, Monika said that it was Kevon knocking. “He said that Bobby called and needs to talk to you. He said it was important.”
I stood up. “Let me go see what Bobby wants. You stay on this and talk to Travis about doing that other thing. We’ll talk more about that after you talk to him.”
Monika walked me to the door. “I’ll call you if I get anything else I think you can use. Do you want me to take a look at Marshall?”
I thought about Marshall knowing that she was looking at Vinnelli. “Yes … and no.” I took a step closer to Monika and leaned in close to her ear. “It was Marshall that gave me that name. When I talked to him, he told me that he knew you were looking at Vinnelli; said you were very talented.”
“I’m flattered by the compliment, but that is not good. I’ll try to cover my tracks a little better,” Monika assured me. Then she thought for a second. Monika put her hands on my chest, and I stepped closer as she whispered. “There might be another explanation. Other than me being sloppy, I mean. Felix and General Peterson used to work for Diego.”
“Felix is the guy you and Nick used to work for, right?”
Nick told me about him. They used to call him Uncle Felix, I don’t know why. After the rest of their unit was killed, they were flown back to Fort Brag, debriefed, and processed out. Uncle Felix approached them the next day. He told them that General Peterson, their former commanding officer, had recommended that he talk to them. He recruited them to do jobs for him that required their skills. It was Felix that set them up in a front business as private investigators.
“Right. Marshall was partners with Diego, so he had to know what we were doing in South America.”
“And that you, Nick and Jett survived,” I whispered in her ear.
“He would know what skills we had, and he knows Nick works for you now.”
“Which means he knows who you are…”
“And probably has somebody shadowing my on-line movements. It won’t happen again.”
“For the time being, you stay on Vinnelli.”
“Does that mean I can’t, say, ask an old friend, say, in Israel, to stick his nose in?”
“No, it doesn’t mean that at all. I like the way you think. We’ll talk soon,” I said and left.
When I got in the car, Kevon handed me the phone; it was already ringing. “Where you at?” Bobby asked as soon as he answered.
“Just leaving Monika’s apartment.”
“Did you fuck sexy one eye?”
“No, I got her working on that thing for me.”
“That don’t mean you ain’t fuckin’ her.”
“What you want, Bobby?”
“Did I miss a meeting today?”
“No.”
“I just wanted to be sure.”
“That’s what was so important?”
“Yeah, that was it. You coming by the club tonight?”
“I don’t know, maybe.”
“CeCe was up here asking for you the other night after you left.”
“I’m not surprised.” What has surprised me was that she hadn’t called since I gave her the number. “I’ll get with you later,” I said and ended the call.
I handed the phone back to Kevon. “Where to now, boss?”
“Let’s go eat. I’m hungry.”
Chapter 33
“Where you wanna go?” Kevon asked, sounding less than enthusiastic. The last couple of weeks I’ve been on this no-meat thing. Maria showed me a video about how eating a vegetable-based diet is much healthier than meat-based diets, because eating a meat-based diet puts you at higher risk for heart disease, some types of cancer, high-blood pressure, and shit like that. I don’t know if I agree with the science behind it, but I do feel better since I stopped eating meat.
Since then, me and Maria have been dragging Kevon all over the city to these vegetarian restaurants. He hates it because Kevon is a hardcore carnivore. But tonight I felt like eating some meat.
“Let’s go to the Blue Water Grill.”
Kevon smiled because we’d eaten there before, and he knew they served meat. “Refresh me memory.”
“It’s on Union and 16th Street. Call and make reservations.”
On the way downtown, I thought about what I had on Vinnelli and what I would do with it. Naturally, I wanted to take his money, but I wanted to hurt him, hurt him like he hurt me. I really wanted him dead. I just didn’t want the problems that might come with that.
So what was I gonna do?
Reservations and a couple of hundred dollars got us a table right away. The Blue Water Grill is a converted bank on Union Square. It used to be a restaurant called Metropolis and is one of the most popular restaurants in New York, according to the Zagat survey.
It was decorated with marble and dimly lit red chandeliers that illuminate the dining room. There’s an outdoor café and a subterranean lounge that features live jazz music.
As soon as our waitress got to the table Kevon said, “Filet Mignon.” And put down the menu.
“And for you, sir, or are you going to need some time?” she turned to me and asked.
“You can bring me a Remy Martin VSOP and bring him one too. When you get back with those, I should be ready to order.”
When the waitress returned with our drinks, I ordered the Blue Water Grill chopped salad and a couple of Maki Rolls. Spicy yellowtail and shrimp roll and spicy lobster, and tuna roll with avocado and jalapeños. I love jalapeños.
For my entrée I chose the grilled wild-striped bass, marinated with extra virgin olive oil, lemon, garlic and capers. Broccoli rabe and marinated farmers market vegetables. I was gonna get the lobster mashed potatoes, but I settled for the cream spinach.
We were just about done with our meal when Kevon pointed something out to me. “That woman there in the orange suit; she has been watching you for some time now.”
“How do you know she’s not watching you?”
“That was my first thought as well. So I watch her looking at you, until she see me watching her, then she look away.”
I turned to see who he was talking about. She was very pretty, kind of classy. The longer I looked the more she looked like I knew her from somewhere. She was sitting with an older white man, having drinks, and talking. When we made eye contact, she smiled and raised her glass. I picked up mine and did the same.
“I told you. The woman has been watching you all evening,” Kevon said.
“Like I know her from somewhere.”
“Want me to ask her where you know her from, boss?”
“No. Enjoy your food, she’ll be all right.”
It wasn’t too much longer after that when the two of them got up. They shook hands like they had just completed a business deal. They walked off together, but she stopped at the bar while he left the restaurant.
“I’ll be back.”
“Want me to go with you, boss?” Kevon smiled and asked.
“No, I think I can mack a woman by myself.”
I got up from the table and walked over to the bar. The woman smiled when she saw me coming.
“Hello, Mr. Black. How are you?”
“I’m fine,” I said and signaled for the bartender. It was obvious that we had met before, but I still had no idea who this woman was or where I knew her from.
“Remy VSOP,” I said to the bartender and turned to her.
“I thought it was you, but I wasn’t sure. And I kept looking and looking. Your friend must have thought I was trying to flirt with him.”
“He did.”
“When you turned around I was sure it was you.”
“You have me at a disadvantage.”
“You don’t remember me, do you?”
“I remember you, or I should say I recognize you. I just don’t know from where.”
She laughed. She had a pretty smile. “I’m not surprised. Even though the last time you saw me I was naked.”
“You were?”
“Yes … I was.”
I was really confused then. “If the last time I saw you, you were naked, I should at least remember your name.”
“But you don’t, do you?” she asked and continued to smile at me. She didn’t seem the least bit angry that I didn’t remember her name.
“No. I really don’t remember your name, naked or not.”
“That’s because I probably never told you my name; at least not my real name.”
“That makes me feel a little better.”
She extended her hand. “I’m Jada West.”
“You’re Jada West. I heard a lot about you.”
“You have?” Jada smiled and laughed a little. “Well, I think I should be honored.”
Jada West was slowly making a reputation for herself in some circles. She ran an agency for high-priced call girls. Simply put, Jada West was one of the top madams in the city. But by never being a client of hers or anybody that worked for her, that still didn’t answer the question of where I knew her from.
“Like I said, I’ve heard a lot about you, so it’s me who’s honored to meet you. Or meet you again.”
“Let me stop messing with you. We met a couple of years ago at this little club called Ecstasy. They were having a private party for The One and his entourage and you were there. I was one of the dancers that night.”
I looked at her a little closer. “I remember you now,” I said even though I didn’t.
Jada gave me a look that told me that she knew I still didn’t remember her. “We didn’t talk for very long. You told me that you enjoyed watching me dance. I asked you if you were a friend of Bruce, Bruce. And you said that you owned the company that manages The One.”
“Now I remember you,” and this time I actually did. “I remember watching you dance. You were incredible.”
Jada laughed. “I could do a little something back then.”
“In fact, Bruce, Bruce invited me down there that night to see you; said you were the show.”
“That was a long time ago.”
“And I know why. I take it that this is much more profitable for you?”
“It is; and much easier on the feet.”
I looked down. “And you have such pretty feet.”
Jada giggled and I enjoyed the sound of it, and the smile that came with it. We talked at the bar over drinks for a while, mostly about the differences in our businesses. “Your clientele is primarily working class guys. Where my clientele is a bit more upscale,” Jada said confidently. “My clients are doctors and lawyers, actors, directors and producers, executives, CEOs and politicians.”
