They parted ways shortly afterward, Levi to spend the day alone with his parents and Dominic to church. Desert Spring United Methodist was in the heart of Summerlin, a wealthy suburb west of Vegas, and he was surprised by the size of the multiple-building complex. He parked his truck in the lot and joined the stream of well-dressed parishioners into the church proper.
A quick survey of the interior revealed the best spot for observation: high up in the back on the right-hand side, where he’d have an unimpeded view of the entire congregation. He settled into a pew and picked up a hymnal to make himself look occupied.
The church was packed and people were milling around the aisles to greet each other, so it wasn’t until the service began and everyone took their seats that he could begin a methodical scan. Starting with the pew nearest him, he went row by row, examining each face before moving on to the next.
His search was made easier by the fact that at least eighty percent of the congregation was white; ruling out all the men helped too. He located Jessica Miller in less than five minutes, sitting near the end of one of the middle pews.
She looked different. In the pictures he’d seen, she’d had straightened shoulder-length hair, but she’d since cut it into a trendy angled bob. The flattering style made her appear older and more worldly than the impression he’d gotten from her parents.
But it wasn’t her haircut that caught his attention so much as the two roided-out meatheads who were sitting on either side of her. They were wearing plain black suits, their posture rigid and their faces like stone. It couldn’t have been more obvious they were professional security if they’d had it stamped on their foreheads.
Bodyguards—or prison guards?
Filled with unease, Dominic kept his eyes on the trio throughout the rest of the service. He stood and sat with the congregation, singing along to the hymns to blend in, but his focus didn’t waver. Though Jessica seemed genuinely absorbed by the worship, the two men were clearly unaffected, alert to their environment in a way no ordinary person would be at church. She never once spoke to or otherwise interacted with either of them.
Approaching her directly was out of the question—he could blow his cover, or worse, put her in danger. So the moment the pastor gave the final blessing and the congregation shuffled to their feet, Dominic slipped out the back and waited outside the church door.
Jessica emerged a few minutes later, walking a couple of steps ahead of her guards. She had a large purse slung over her left shoulder, with no zipper or clasp closing the top. Perfect.
He walked toward her right side at an angle. “Hey, Rachel!” he said as he reached out to touch her arm. When she turned toward him in surprise, he used the brief distraction to drop a pen into her open purse.
The two men tensed, their hands hovering over their jacket buttons. Though their suits were well-tailored for concealment, Dominic could tell they were both packing shoulder holsters underneath.
Affecting a sheepish expression, Dominic backed up and spread his hands wide. “Whoops, sorry. You look just like my buddy’s college girlfriend. Didn’t mean to bother you.”
“It’s no problem,” she said with a polite smile. “Have a nice Sunday.”
“You too.” He strode away casually and didn’t look back.
Once in his truck, he riffled through the glove compartment for the receiver to the device he’d planted. The pen, compliments of McBride’s tech department, was a combined GPS tracker and audio recorder with forty-eight hours of battery life and wireless transmission capabilities. This case required more observation from a distance before he could make any plans.
He needed to find out why a young college student from Bakersfield was being followed around by armed guards.
Dominic stayed tuned into the receiver while he swung by his apartment to change and pick up Rebel on his way to North Las Vegas, but he didn’t learn anything of interest. Jessica stopped by a deli near the church and then proceeded to a residential address in Summerlin where she remained from that point on. Apart from some idle small talk in the deli, she didn’t say a single word to anyone.
He turned the receiver off when he parked at the curb outside his childhood home. It was a modest four-bedroom ranch surrounded by hardy desert landscaping that both his mother and grandmother tended to lovingly, located on a friendly suburban block lined with cypress and palm trees. The weather was gorgeous, which meant the local joggers and neighborhood kids were out in full force.
Hopping out of his truck with Rebel in tow, he waved to the next-door neighbors washing their car in their driveway. He wiped his feet on the colorful welcome mat that read, If you forgot the wine, go home, and unlocked the front door.
“You’re late again!” his mother shouted the moment he stepped into the foyer.
He sighed and unclipped Rebel’s leash, then followed her through the open floor plan to where the kitchen flowed into the dining room, currently crammed to full capacity. He was immediately besieged by a crowd of his many rambunctious, shrieking nieces and nephews, though he could never be sure if they were happier to see him or Rebel.
While the kids clambered all over him like a human jungle gym, he made his way around the dining room table to greet his brother Vinnie; his sisters Angela, Theresa, and Gina; and their respective spouses. When he got to Gina, he rested a hand on her enormous swollen belly and said, “Wow, you look uncomfortable.”
“You have no freaking idea,” she grumbled. “I swear to God, if I don’t pop by the end of this week, I’m just gonna reach up there and pull this kid out myself.”
The baby chose that moment to land a hard kick against Dominic’s palm. He laughed, kissed Gina’s cheek, and moved on to his petite grandmother Silvia before finally circling around to his mother Rita at the kitchen counter.
Like most of Dominic’s biological relatives, his mother was tall and athletically built. Despite her age, there wasn’t a strand of gray in her short black hair. “What’s your excuse this time?” she asked, referring to his habitual tardiness.
“I was at a church in Summerlin.” He saw her brightening up and was quick to clarify, “A Methodist church. For a case.”
She gave his cheek two hard pats and said, “Better than nothing. Help me get this food on the table.”
“Levi couldn’t make it today?” Angela said once the table was groaning under the weight of all the dishes and everyone was helping themselves.
Levi had started coming to these Sunday lunches every other week or so, endearing himself to the Russo clan with his dry sarcasm and excellent taste in wine. “No, his parents are in town this weekend,” said Dominic.
“Oh, that’s right, I forgot about that.” Rita eyed him over her glass. “What are they like?”
“They’re great. Really different from Levi, though.”
“And when are we going to meet the Abramses?”
Dominic coughed on a mouthful of eggplant parm, swallowed it with difficulty, and stared at her. “What? Why would you meet them?”
“Oh, come on, Dom,” Theresa said from down the table. “Don’t be dense. You’re thirty-two, you’re the last one left who’s not married—”
”What’s that got to do with anything?” Vinnie’s wife Caroline asked. “There’s no rule that says everyone has to get married.”
“But he loves Levi.” Theresa turned to Dominic. “You do, don’t you?”
Put on the spot with all his relatives watching him expectantly, Dominic spluttered for a few seconds before saying, “I . . . Yeah.”
Theresa made a triumphant noise and raised her eyebrows at Caroline like that clinched her point. In his peripheral vision, Dominic saw his mother and grandmother exchange a small smile.
“Just because you love someone doesn’t mean you’re going to marry them,” said Vinnie.
“There’s no reason for him not to, though, not these days,” Angela chimed in.
“Um, excuse me,” Dominic said, “but could we all take a beat and remem
ber that Levi and I have only been together for like six months?”
Gina shrugged and said, “Joey and Andrea got engaged after three.”
“Because she was pregnant!”
“They would have gotten married anyway . . .”
The conversation quickly devolved into a chaotic argument, everyone gesticulating wildly and shouting to be heard over one another—par for the course with this group. Dominic joined in with equal vigor and was soon able to drive the focus off himself and Levi altogether.
After their long and spirited lunch, he went to a nearby neighborhood park with Angela’s and Vinnie’s families so their kids could run around with Rebel for a couple of hours. He touched base with Levi several times via text throughout the afternoon, making sure he wasn’t spending too much energy obsessing over the pending plea deal.
When he got home in the early evening, Dominic heated some leftovers in the oven and hooked the pen receiver up to his desktop computer. He didn’t have any plans for the rest of the night—Levi was staying at his own place—and he had idle thoughts of seeing what Carlos and Jasmine were up to. First, though, he wanted to check in on Jessica Miller.
He started by reviewing the GPS data. She hadn’t budged from the Summerlin address since that afternoon—or at least the pen hadn’t. It was possible she’d switched purses and gone out again.
While he waited for the audio data to upload to his computer, he searched the address on Google Earth. His interest was piqued when the satellite photo revealed a sprawling mansion on a walled-in and well-secured property. He spent a minute squinting at the aerial view of an odd structure in the corner of the lot before he realized it was a fucking gazebo.
A property records search would be simple enough, but that could wait. He cued up the hours’ worth of audio recordings and began skimming through them.
At first, he seemed to have come up short; Jessica had clearly left her purse in an empty room for most of the afternoon. His luck changed when he reached a point in the recording from less than an hour earlier.
There were about ten minutes of pop music playing at a low volume and the sounds of a single person moving around the room. Then a door opened and closed, a second set of footsteps joined the first, and the music abruptly shut off.
“Where the hell have you been all day, Johnny?” said a voice Dominic now recognized as Jessica’s.
“Working,” a terse male voice answered: the notorious “John Williams.” Interesting that Jessica still addressed him as Johnny even though she must know by now it wasn’t his real name.
“You left me alone with those . . . those henchmen again.”
“They’re for your protection.”
She scoffed. “Protection from what?”
“You know what, Jess, don’t be stupid.”
Dominic heard the creak of bedsprings and two soft thumps like shoes hitting the floor.
“How long do we have to stay here?”
“I don’t know.”
“You said we’d travel the world.” There was a definite edge in Jessica’s voice now. “That it’d be an adventure. But all we’ve done is run around Southern California for a while, and now we’re trapped in the suburbs of Las Vegas and I can’t even do anything fun!”
“For fuck’s sake, you know we have to lay low! That PI was all over our asses for months. That kind of attention brings cops.” Several rapid footsteps were followed by Williams adding, “Is that what you want? You want me to get arrested?”
“Of course not. But . . . the PI was only following us because my parents are worried about me. If I talked to them, explained things to them—”
“Explained what to them?” Williams’s tone dropped into a dangerous register that had Dominic bristling instinctively.
Jessica had a similar reaction, judging by her sudden hesitancy. “Just . . . you know, that I’m okay.”
“Why the fuck would you want to talk to those people at all? You know they hate me. All they’ll do is talk shit about me and try to break us up, just like they did back in California. Don’t you love me?”
Her pause was brief but unmistakable. “Yes.”
“Are you sure? Because if you really loved me, I don’t think you’d want to speak to people who only want to tear us apart.”
Though Dominic didn’t hear any movement or impact, he did hear Jessica’s faint noise of pain. He bolted upright in his chair, every muscle in his body tensing.
“Or maybe that’s what you want, huh?” said Williams. “You planning to snitch on me, Jess? You’re not getting enough attention, so you’re gonna run to Mommy and Daddy and throw me under the bus?”
“No! Johnny, please, you’re hurting my arm—”
“I’ll hurt a lot more than that if I find out you tried to call those assholes. You understand me?”
There was no verbal response, just a soft gasp and then sniffling. Dominic’s right hand balled into a fist.
“Baby, come on, I’m sorry,” Williams said a few seconds later. “I’m stressed out, and you know how much talking about your parents upsets me. Why would you even bring them up?”
Jessica didn’t speak.
With a sigh, Williams said, “We just have to stay under the radar for a bit. My cousin has done a lot for us, letting us crash here and getting me steady work. We’ll let things cool off, save up some money, and then we’ll go wherever you want. Okay?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Good. I love you. I’m gonna go get us some dinner, all right?”
There was a brief kiss and receding footsteps. The moment the door shut, Jessica broke down in quiet, muffled sobs—it sounded like she was holding her hands over her mouth and nose, but Dominic could still hear her.
Rebel, who had just finished her dinner in the kitchen, wandered over to Dominic’s desk. Her tail twitched back and forth with uncertainty as she stared at his computer. She hated the sound of people crying.
Dominic wasn’t a fan either, especially when he was powerless to immediately fix the situation. He had to fight every reckless, foolish impulse he had to charge down to that house in Summerlin right now and kick in the front door. That wasn’t going to help her.
Williams was obviously involved in criminal activity, and it stood to reason that his generous cousin was as well. Jessica was trapped in a huge walled compound with armed criminals who were watching her twenty-four hours a day.
If Dominic’s next move was the wrong one, no matter how good his intentions, this would end in blood.
“Are you sure you have everything?” Nancy asked Saul as Levi set their bags on the Departures curb.
“For the thousandth time, yes.”
“Your motion sickness medication? Boarding passes? ID?”
“For God’s sake, woman, why would I not have my ID?” Saul flung his arms out in a dramatic gesture that nearly smacked Levi in the face. “What would I have done with it? You think I left it on the hotel dresser?”
“I’m gonna miss you guys,” Levi said, embracing them both in turn. They’d met Dominic for breakfast at a quirky local diner, but since he’d had to go to work, Levi had driven his parents to the airport alone.
“You’re coming to New Jersey in December,” said Nancy. It wasn’t a suggestion.
“I don’t know . . .” As much as Levi loved his family, returning to his home state only reminded him of all the times he’d been victimized there, up to and including the brutal assault he’d suffered in college. He hated remembering the spineless weakling he’d once been.
“For a few days of Hanukkah, at least. Bring your young man.”
“Hanukkah starts the same day as Christmas this year, and Christmas is a way bigger deal for Dominic’s family than Hanukkah is for ours.”
Nancy waved a hand. “So come the day after Christmas. That’s one of the upsides of dating a Gentile—you can spend Christmas with Dominic’s family and Hanukkah with yours, no problem.”
“I—” Levi stopped short and stared at
her. “You just called Dominic by his actual name.”
Nancy glanced at Saul, smiled, and reached out to pinch Levi’s chin. “I’ve always said I’d know my son’s bashert when I met him. Haven’t I, Saul?”
“She has,” he agreed.
Soul mate. Levi swallowed past the sudden lump in his throat.
“Okay,” he said quietly. “I’ll talk to Dominic about it.”
“I love you, bubbeleh.” She kissed his cheek. “Be safe.”
Levi kissed his father goodbye as well, then waited until his parents made it inside the terminal before getting into his car. He peeled away from the curb and drove north back to the city, his mind racing.
“You’re not gonna believe this,” Martine said when he entered the bullpen.
He dropped his bag and coffee mug on his desk, which joined hers so they faced each other over their computers. “What’s up?” he asked, still distracted by his parting conversation with his parents.
“You know that drive-by shooting on Saturday night? The guys who got shot were with the Slavic Collective.”
That got his attention. “You think the Parks arranged a revenge drive-by?” That wasn’t their style at all. Any violence the Parks instigated was done discreetly behind the scenes, and their victims vanished into thin air.
She shook her head. “It was Los Avispones. Gang Crimes already rounded up a couple of the shooters.”
Los Avispones were a powerful Vegas street gang—though they’d been moving up in the world lately, well on their way to becoming a legitimate organized-crime syndicate through strong ties to Asian and Central American drug cartels.
“That’s . . . weird timing,” Levi said as he sat down. “Also, why would Los Avispones target the Collective? Don’t they work together sometimes?”
“Yes, so don’t get too comfortable.” Martine nodded at her desk phone. “I just spoke with Tomasino, and he’s cool with us speaking to the guys they arrested to see if there’s any connection to Yu and Dubicki. You up for a trip to the CCDC?”
Cash Plays Page 7
