“The Cortez’s have an enforcer, I don’t know who it is, but he’s ruthless. If she wanted my tongue out, he’d do it without hesitation. This is a warning to tell her everything she wants to hear as soon as she asks.”
Sophia Thrasher looked at her husband and said,
“You have to leave. Daddy will set you up in your own practice, he’s been offering for years. Leave now.”
Thrasher shakes his head,
“Not yet, but soon. I am going to make her life a little more interesting than she expects. When I do leave, she will smear me. She’ll say I’ve been with prostitutes and rent boys. She’ll try to ruin me professionally. She’ll say I take drugs; she might even try to plant some on me. This could get very messy. I need you to know that I could never be with anyone but you or take drugs or do anything dishonest. Ok?”
Sophia had tears streaming down her face, she sobbed,
“Tonight, you need to swear and affidavit with daddy. He can hold on to that as evidence if she gets difficult. I know you love me. I love you too.”
She got up and walked over to the mirror and repaired her makeup, then came over gave him a hug and a kiss and started towards the door. Holding the handle she said with passion,
“Tell the skinny bitch to bring it on”
Chapter 33
Jemima looked at Ben’s bare bottom as he attempted to pull on his boxer shorts standing up. After losing his balance three times he collapsed in frustration onto the bed and shouted,
“I can’t even stand on one leg. For Christ sake why are you with a cripple like me?” He picked up his crutch that he had abandoned by the side of the bed earlier that afternoon and threw it across the room.
“Ahhgrh! Bollocks”
“Better now?” Jemima asked, propping herself up on one arm so that she could see him. Not waiting for an answer she continued,
“You have a gammy leg, you use a crutch, you fall over if you try and stand on one leg. And? Get over yourself and get dressed. We need to talk and I can’t concentrate if I know your nether regions are naked and accessible.”
Ben grinned loving her way of cutting through his self-indulgent moments without being rude or unkind. After pulling his clothes on he limped across to the desk, retrieved his crutch and sat down opening his MacBook.
“Email from William,” he said reading as he spoke.
“Genius. Of course.” Turning around to face Jemima, he noticed that she was sitting up in bed a pillow propped up behind her and the sheet stopping mid thigh.
“If you want to talk, it would help my concentration if you could put a top on.”
Pouting she grabbed her shirt and put it on, but only doing a couple of the buttons up.
“I thought you liked my breasts”
“I do, but they stop me concentrating on anything else. So we need to talk?”
“You first. William’s email?”
Ben read the email again then said, paraphrasing,
“They’ve worked out the code, or think they have. It isn’t scientific notation or anything similar, but biblical references. I’ll need to write a quick program to access an online King James bible and search each reference and translate out to clear text. Should have the message by lunch time.”
Turning back to his computer, he began working on the program. After a few minutes, he stopped and looked around at Jemima, still sat in bed.
“Did you say you needed to talk as well?”
Jemima’s face had lost its playfulness and become harder and serious.
“Yesterday, I spoke to Pablo.” Ben looked at her and shrugged looking a little confused.
“Pablo is our Colombian cousin who runs the Colombian end of the Cortez business. Pablo is a cocaine baron and a very suspicious man.” Jemima smiled at Ben and continued,
“As you know I can be very persuasive. Pablo now believes that I am Felicity’s right hand woman with my fingers in all of her pies and that I will be handling the receipt of his next delivery to Felicity. Six tonnes of Colombian pure will be arriving in ten days time. Pablo however is not a stupid man. He will send word to me when the ship that is carrying the coke is underway. He will then tell me the name of the ship, its destination port and estimated time of arrival. None of that is of any use to us…” Ben finished the sentence for her.
“Because he will have spoken to Felicity to confirm you are her right hand woman and she will shriek at him, tell him he is a fucking buffoon and demand to know what he told you. He will say he told you nothing, which is, in fact, true and Felicity will tighten her security further.”
Jemima nodded and then smiled.
“I have a boyfriend who is a computer genius, so that setback need not concern us.”
“Thank you for your faith in me but how do my computer skills help?” Jemima said nothing, letting Ben think and answer his own question. He sat for a moment deep in thought. Jemima was right of course, his MacBook Pro was an amazing ally and he conceded that he was pretty talented. How though, based upon the very basic information she had gleaned from Pablo, could he deduce anything useful?
Turning away from Jemima, he stared at the computer screen for a moment and began typing. Still concentrating on the MacBook, he asked Jemima,
“Where is your family operation based in Colombia?”
“Head office is in Cali, but operations and the tankers are based in Buenaventura”
Ben typed a set of instructions into the laptop and hit the enter key.
“I’m searching for a list of all of the tankers owned by CHC and their current locations and status. Do you believe Pablo when he said the shipment would be coming in ten days?”
Jemima thought for a long moment before replying,
“Yes, I do. The information he gave about the time frame was unguarded. I had pushed him, which he isn’t used to, and he reacted. He regained his composure and reverted to type. You don’t stay alive as a Capo of the largest drugs Cartel in southern Colombia by being anything other than obsessive about security.”
Ben was staring at the screen of his computer watching as a world map materialised with large dots of various colours representing Cortez boats. He hover the mouse pointer over a dot and a square appeared filled with information on the vessel. Name, location coordinates, tonnage, course and cargo. The cargo was of particular interest. He was sure the cocaine was being transported as a liquid and so needed to be shipped in a tanker. The map showed over one hundred vessels spread around the world, from Europe to Asia and North America to the tip of Africa. Turning the MacBook Pro around so that Jemima would be able to see he began describing what she could see on the screen.
“Each dot represents a Cortez ship. The majority we can discount as they are too far from Buenaventura. Of the remainder,” he indicated the ships closest to southern Colombia,
“Only these ten are tankers.” He pointed to the ships he was referring to, indicated by a red dot.
“Now none of these ships are in port at the moment or have been in port in the last twenty four hours. This means that the cocaine hasn’t yet been loaded. For the ship to be loaded with the cocaine solution and the bio-ethanol leave port and arrive in UK waters within the time frame Pablo let slip, the boat would need to follow the shortest route. The shortest route from Buenaventura to the UK is through the Panama Canal and into the Caribbean Sea. To be able to pass through the Panama Canal, the ship must be of a class called Panamax.”
Ben typed more instructions into the MacBook Pro and hit return. Of the ten tankers closest to Buenaventura that had until a moment before been on the screen, only three now remained.
Jemima looked at the remaining red dots and hovered over each in turn.
“CHC Princess, CHC Amazonia and CHC Cartagena. One of them is our ship, but we won’t know until one of them goes into port and then heads towards the Panama Canal.”
***
William read through his copy of Ernest’s will, reviewing the items he had been tasked with achievi
ng by his father. Foremost was discovering why Jonas had been killed and how this had happened. The how had been furnished by Jemima Cortez, a large amount of pharmaceutical grade cocaine that he had ingested disguised in the chilli he had been given at Alexander Cortez’s launch party. The ‘why’ was trickier.
In broad terms, the ‘why’ was straightforward. The Cortez family had murdered him. Why? What damage could an industrial chemist inflict on a leviathan like CHC Industries? What had he discovered? Something connected to a discovery that he had made while at CHC?
William’s computer pinged to announce he had received an email. Clicking the program open, he read the email. As he read he grabbed for his mobile, missed and knocked it under the desk. Crouching down he snatched the mobile and speed dialled Ben.
Without an opening greeting or a cheery ‘how are you?’ he said.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. The computer has just finished cracking the code and a fair copy is on its way to you now.” William heard the click of the keyboard key being struck and then heard the ping that indicated a new email.
“I’ve got it. I’m opening it up and bingo it’s all their. I need to read this, how many pages is it?” Ben said,
“Ten pages of single spaced A4. It documents everything from carbon based fuels to bioethanol and Charles’s and his father’s history in the cocaine business. From the early days supplying legal coke to a soft drinks manufacturer to use by the smart set during the twenties and thirties right up to when he died. Enjoy. Call me when you’re finished as we have other things to discuss.”
William put the iPhone down and sat in his leather recliner chair. Placing the MacBook on his lap, he began to read.
The first page was a covering letter to his fiancée Penny Morton and his brother Ernest, apologising for the elaborate methods he had had to use. He explained that he had sent her an exact copy of his diary and had left another one with his family solicitor to be given to his brother on his death. He would be adding to both documents from time to time and would send dated amendments to each set of documents. He apologised for the coding of the material, but she would appreciate the reason why when she had decoded it and read it. She, of course, knew the key. He would be grateful if she passed the decryption key to Ernest in the event of his death. He told her he loved her and would see her in two days time in Cambridge when he would be free from the shackles of CHC Industries.
William paused looking up from the MacBook and considered the letter and a final request to Penny to share the decryption key with Ernest. Penny Morton’s rage and grief; which he had seen was directed solely at Ernest, had allowed the Cortez family to continue for almost forty years unchecked by the authorities. Her overwhelming grief at the loss of Jonas had caused her to stick her head in the sand and continue her life cloaked in denial. Jonas, he thought, must have been quite a man. To have evoked such unswerving love and devotion, not just in life, but for more than forty years beyond their last words was seldom seen. Turning back to the computer he clicked and began reading the diary that Jonas had taken such pains to protect.
***
Ernest and Juanita sat immobile behind William while he read through the notes that Ben had emailed to him. Ernest smiled to himself as he read the analysis of CHC Industries, the structure and the evaluation of the future of petroleum and of plant based alternatives. He had identified all of this and used it as the basis of his own research. Good to know he had been on the right track, well the same track as his brother. Continuing to read his smile turned to a frustrated frown as he realised how much he had missed. The transportation method he thought they were using, the identification of the most suitable means of transportation, the chemistry to achieve this and the marketing ability of the Cortez’s.
Juanita tapped his arm as William read the final last and pointed at the document on the screen.
“Is that enough to get a person killed? Ben could go onto the Internet and get access to the majority of that in half an hour.”
Ernest smiled at the naivety of his guide.
“Some of it perhaps. What about the discovery of the solubility of Cocaine hydrochloride in water? The realisation that with a design modification during construction the liquid could be transported in their tankers. Tankers that had legitimate reasons to go to countries all over the world…”
Juanita interrupted,
“You’re missing my point. There’s nothing there. Ben guessed the transportation method and the modification. I know Jonas didn’t have the internet or Wikipedia to help him, but he wouldn’t have had enough here to blow the whistle on anyone and he would have known that. Charles Cortez and his granddaughter Felicity are terrified that William will work out whatever it is that Jonas knew. They had you killed to stop you and you were a long way from even this amount of information.”
Ernest thought for a moment, muttering under his breath to himself. He looked at her and nodded,
“Jonas died because they thought he knew something, but weren’t sure if he realised what he had discovered. I died because I was on the right track, but hadn’t connected all of the dots. The discovery of the solubility of cocaine in water was just chemistry, irrelevant. The conversion of tankers at the construction stage proved nothing, easy to pass off as a flawed innovation an experiment to improve the safety of transportation of a volatile liquid. Venting? Or was it a deliberate smokescreen? What is so vital to their operation that it warrants multiple deaths?”
Juanita stared at the screen that William was transfixed by.
“In his letter to you and Penny, Jonas said he would send dated updates to you both as new information became available”
Ernest nodded,
“Yes, and he did. This latest version that I have here is dated 30th November 1972.”
“And the previous two updates?”
Ernest thought before answering,
“About two weeks and four weeks before that. It’s along time ago though, so I can’t be sure. Why?”
“And when did Jonas die?”
Ernest looked puzzled,
“You know that better than anyone”
“Humour me.”
“19th February 1973”
Juanita looked at Ernest and said,
“Don’t you think it’s odd that you had been receiving regular updates until the end of November and then nothing. Also, if he hadn’t been active since the previous November why would the Cortez’s have waited to kill him? They didn’t need a special occasion to kill a mild mannered scientist.”
Ernest sat looking confused for a few moments and then his expression cleared as though a curtain had been drawn and everything was clear.
“Penny?”
Juanita shrugged,
“Jonas wouldn’t have given it to anyone else”
“William needs to know, he’s working on this being the complete story.”
Chapter 34
“You didn’t get all of the copies did you?” The tone was withering, loaded with contempt and malice. Charles shrugged.
Hannah swirled around Ben’s bedroom where they had been observing the decryption of the diary and the guessing Ben and Jemima had been begun relating to cocaine distribution.
“Jemima.”
Charles waited for her to continue, but got no further information from her.
“Jemima? What about her?”
Hannah stopped looked at him and groaned shaking her ethereal head and then shouted at him,
“Think for Hades sake, think you fucking half wit. Am I going to have to kill Felicity to get some company up here with more than a shared brain cell? THINK!!”
Turning away from the incandescent Hannah, he floated across the room to the bed that she had been sharing with Ben and stared down at it. It was obvious that she was untrustworthy; even weak. Her actions had proven that her overriding concern was self-fulfilment. Her behaviour was perverse and unnatural. That, he thought, he could have accepted if she hadn’t flaunted
her girlfriends. Kissing and fondling them in public. A live porn film. He had tried to educate her, but she had lain there like a sack of shit, not moving or making a sound. Now she had seen the light, but with a cripple for pities sake. That she had abandoned her family and was consorting with the enemy was humiliating, but not dangerous, as she knew nothing. As soon as he had realised that she would never be good for anything other than shopping and lunching he had cut off her access to any information on the business and the family. She had an obscene income each month from her trust fund and was given an honorary six-figure salary to stay away from the office. She wasn’t dangerous, just disgusting.
“She’s not dangerous to us. She knows nothing and can’t tell the cripple and the rest of them anything.”
Hannah looked at him and nodded, encouraging him as one would with a child.
“And? So?”
Charles realised he was losing his edge. Shit, think. Charles stopped floating and smiled a smug victorious smile.
“If she’s not a problem to us, why don’t we use her as a distraction. It’s about time she earned her keep, even if she doesn’t know she’s doing it.”
***
William sat in his leather recliner and stared into the distance. The decrypted copy of Jonas’s diary had been a revelation. The details on the future of fossil fuels had been decades ahead of its time and the hunch that a biofuel would be the way forward had helped CHC corner the market in palm oil plantations and rapeseed farms. Annabel’s decision to focus on his CHC years was logical, but flawed. If they had known he had studied the pharmacology of addiction in psycho-stimulants, specifically cocaine, in the final year of his bachelor’s degree at Cambridge they would have seen the connection immediately. It explained why Jonas had known of their involvement in cocaine. As William continued to consider the breakthroughs the Cortez’s had made in disguising cocaine to enable them to move it to an ever increasing and appreciative audience, Annabel arrived. The first he realised she had come into the room was when she slid her hands down his chest from behind and nibbled his ear lobe.
Bacchus and Sanderson (Deceased) Page 26
