J.D. Trafford - Michael Collins 03 - No Time To Hide

by J. D. Trafford

  Vatch took a breath and waited to see if Gadd was going to ask another question or wanted him to proceed. She didn’t say anything, so he continued his story.

  In an actual criminal trial, a witness was not allowed to talk without a specific question. A good defense attorney would object and a judge would sustain the objection, stopping the narrative. But this was an initial grand jury proceeding. There was nobody to object. There was simply United States Attorney Brenda Gadd, alone in a room with a witness and the grand jurors. The playing field was so tilted in the government’s favor that most attorneys are unable to remember a time when a grand jury had refused to indict the accused. So here, Gadd wanted Agent Vatch to tell this part of the story uninterrupted and that was exactly what happened.

  “It took about six months of reviewing computer files and paper files before our forensic accountants could identify where the bank accounts were located,” Vatch said. “Once they were located, we had to force these banks to respond to our subpoenas, which was not easy, and then the process had to be repeated every time the money was moved.”

  “The money moved?”

  “Many times,” Vatch said. “We found the original accounts, but they all had minimal funds or were closed by the time we had located them and the banks released the information.”

  Gadd went back to her table and turned on a projector. It was time to move forward. She also didn’t want Vatch talking about his little debacle in Florida after the botched arrest in New York.

  A small fan inside the projector whirled to life, and the jurors turned toward the screen. A chart showed a diagram of how Michael Collins had purportedly transferred over $500 million from Krane’s accounts to a series of other foreign bank accounts throughout the world. There were dozens of boxes with arrows to other sets of boxes, and then another series of arrows and boxes and then another.

  Brenda Gadd allowed the jurors a moment to review the complex chart on their own, and then she got up, walked to the witness stand, and handed Agent Frank Vatch a laser pointer.

  “Tell us how the money got from Krane to Michael Collins.”

  Vatch closed his eyes for a second, remembering the numerous times he had rehearsed this testimony with Gadd in the last month. Testifying felt good, but the actual criminal trial would feel even better. He opened his eyes.

  “Perhaps it’s easier to work backwards.” Vatch pressed a small button on the device in his hand. He pointed it at the bottom of the screen.

  “Do you see down here?” Vatch bounced the red dot from the laser pointer between two large boxes.

  Gadd nodded her head. “Yes.”

  “These are two major withdrawals that were made by Michael Collins. The first is a rather large donation to his parish here in New York. He is very close to the priest there. Then we have another withdrawal when he purchased the Sunset Resort and Hostel in Mexico through a shell company. There’s no dispute that this donation and the acquisition of the resort were done by Mr. Collins with Joshua Krane’s assets.”

  Vatch pointed at the series of boxes directly above these two itemized withdrawals.

  “These are the accounts where that money came from.” Vatch moved the laser pointer to the next series of boxes and then to the next. “As you can see, the money was transferred multiple times, but the trail clearly goes from Joshua Krane’s original foreign bank accounts to Michael Collins.”

  “And you have copies of every money transfer and purchase made from these accounts, which provide the foundation for the chart that we are now looking at?”

  Vatch set the laser pointer down and nodded.

  “Absolutely.” Vatch pointed at a large stack of documents sitting next to the projector. “They’re right there. Every receipt. Every account statement. There are also emails between the bank and Michael Collins that discuss the transactions. There is no doubt in my mind that Michael Collins stole this money from his law firm’s client, Joshua Krane.”

  ###

  The cab stopped in front of Vatch’s apartment. The cabbie got out, popped the trunk, and removed Vatch’s collapsed wheelchair. He fiddled with the lever. Eventually the wheelchair opened and the cabbie set it on the sidewalk near the open passenger side door.

  Vatch grabbed the small handle above the door. He pulled himself out of the back seat and into the wheelchair. “How much?”

  The cabbie looked through the window at the meter. “Thirteen twenty.”

  Vatch nodded. He got out his wallet and handed the cabbie a ten dollar bill and four ones.

  The cabbie looked at the cash in his hand.

  “That’s it?” he said. “No tip. I haul that wheelchair around and get no tip from you?”

  Vatch’s face sharpened. “You got a tip.” Vatch’s tongue flicked out of his mouth as he pointed at the cab’s meter. “You owe me eighty cents, according to that thing, and I’m letting you keep it.” Vatch undid the wheel lock and turned, while the cabbie started yelling at him.

  After Vatch had rolled ten feet, he turned around.

  The red-faced cab driver continued to rant.

  “Hey,” Vatch pointed. “Quiet down, you’re disturbing my neighborhood.”

  This began a new line of insults as a random group of neighbors emerged to watch the commotion. After another ten feet, Vatch stopped and turned.

  “Okay, here’s an additional tip of the non-monetary variety: Next time don’t take the scenic route like I’m a tourist. You wasted five minutes of my life, padding that meter.”

  The watchers burst out laughing. They heckled the cab driver as he left. For Vatch, it was a small triumph. It added to the larger triumph earlier in the grand jury room.

  This was a good day, thought Vatch, and he wanted to share it with one of his only friends.

  “Seen Anthony?” Vatch asked the largest woman in the crowd. She lived down the hall from him, known for wearing a small amount of tight clothing to show off her “curves.”

  “Up with Spider.”

  She pointed to a group of teenagers hanging out on the corner about a half-block away. There were seven of them, ranging in age from eleven to nineteen. Spider was easy to pick out. Spider was the tallest, more than six-feet tall with long arms, and even from a distance, Vatch caught the reflection of his gold teeth. All of the group’s energy was directed at him. Spider was the leader, a magnet. He was the guy that the others wanted to impress.

  Vatch saw Anthony standing a little off to the side, clearly not one of the gang, but trying to be included. Vatch wanted to go down there, grab Anthony, and disperse the group of thugs-in-training. But, he knew that wouldn’t work. It would only push Anthony further away.

  “Thanks for keeping an eye on him,” Vatch said to the woman.

  “Watching him ain’t hard.” The big woman shook her head. “Keeping him outta trouble is hard. Ms. Finkel’s purse got stoled yesterday. Nobody seen it, but Anthony was around.”

  Vatch nodded, taking it in. The information wasn’t surprising. He had heard a growing number of similar allegations recently.

  “I’ll talk to his mom.” Vatch looked back down the street to the corner, suddenly feeling less victorious. “Maybe his mom can talk to him about getting Ms. Finkel’s purse back.”

  “Better.” The big woman put her hands on her ample hips. “She was packing in that purse.”

  “Old Ms. Finkel was carrying a gun?”

  The big woman pointed at Vatch’s belt where he holstered his government-issued Glock 22.

  “Don’t everybody?”

  CHAPTER SIX

  Michael watched the security video of Garvin coming into the Sunset’s bar. He had bought the camera six months ago. Andie hated it, but Michael had been feeling more paranoid than usual at the time. The camera calmed him, a security totem.

  He clicked a few buttons on the computer, saved the images, and then emailed himself a copy of the files. Could be helpful later, thought Michael.

  He walked over to the resort’s credit card
machine and slid his card through. He’d already done it before. Michael knew what was going to happen, but he hoped for something different this time.

  He hunched over the machine and waited. The word “PROCESSING” flashed at him. Then Michael glanced impatiently around the small back office. The desk was cluttered. It was surrounded with boxes of toilet paper, towels, and cleaning supplies. Behind it, there was also a sad, rusted, rarely used filing cabinet.

  Michael looked down at the screen, again. A different word had appeared during the seconds that he had looked away: DECLINED.

  Michael felt his muscles tighten. Tad Garvin was telling the truth. His bank accounts were frozen.

  “What’s going on?” She stood in the doorway.

  Michael turned and saw Andie Larone.

  “How long have you been there?”

  Andie came toward him.

  “Long enough to be worried.” She looked at the credit card machine, and then at the bank card in Michael’s hand.

  He followed her eyes. For a moment, Michael thought about telling her about Garvin and the indictment, but he held back.

  “Nothing’s going on.” Michael picked his wallet up off of the desk, opened it, and put the card away.

  Andie’s expression fell.

  “Come on, Michael.” She put her hand on his shoulder. “I thought we were past this.”

  “It’s fine.” Michael brushed her hand away and started to walk out of the room. He didn’t want to talk. “I just need some time alone to figure some stuff out.”

  “That’s what you always want.” She became irritated. “That’s always been the problem.” Andie followed him. “What happened this morning? I woke up and you were gone.”

  “It’s nothing.”

  “You’re lying, Michael.” Andie waited for him to deny it, but Michael said nothing. “I’m not an idiot,” she said. “I saw the man who you were talking to get into a helicopter. He didn’t exactly fit in. His assistant was asking some of the guests about getting to the nearest Starbucks.”

  Michael let her comments pass. He walked out of the office and through the lobby while Andie continued.

  “When are you going to trust me, Michael?”

  Michael stopped at the front door, ready to go outside. The bright sun cast half his face in shadow.

  “I tried that before and you left, remember?” It was cruel, but it was true. Although they had worked hard to patch their relationship together since Andie had come back to the Sunset, their past was still unresolved. She was gone for almost two years, after accepting and then rejecting his proposal to be married. It was a record for the world’s shortest engagement. No letter. No phone call for two years. It still hurt.

  Michael turned away. He took a step out the door and then stopped.

  “I love you.” Michael was unable to meet her eyes. “I just need a day or two, okay? Then we can talk.”

  “Promise?” Andie asked as Michael starting walking away.

  “I’ll try.”

  ###

  It was a two-hour bike ride from the Sunset Resort to the dirt path.

  He stopped and looked up at the bright, cloudless sky. Michael breathed hard. Sweat beaded and rolled down his face. It felt good.

  There weren’t any signs, and the path didn’t appear on any official maps. For archaeologists and locals, however, it was well known. The path was one of the easiest ways into the Sian Ka’an Reserve.

  The name of the reserve, roughly translated from Mayan, meant “where the sky was born.”

  It was a 1.3 million-acre oasis of forests, wetlands, and coastline, protected from the constant onslaught of developers and land speculators. The Sian Ka’an Reserve was also one of the few places in the Yucatan that hadn’t dramatically changed in the past thirty years, and arguably it hadn’t changed much in the last ten thousand.

  The path led away from Highway 304 about five kilometers through a prairie savannah and then to the more densely vegetated portion of the reserve. All of the Sian Ka’an was wild, but this part was the wildest.

  As Michael biked further, it was more likely that he’d see the foundation of a 1,200 year old Mayan structure than another person.

  After twenty minutes, the path faded and the ground softened. It was no longer possible to peddle, and so Michael stopped.

  He laid the bike down. He took his pack off the bike’s rear wheel rack. Then Michael removed his GPS from the pack’s front pocket and recorded his location. If he didn’t preserve his coordinates, it was unlikely he’d ever find the mountain bike again.

  Then Michael drank half his bottle of water. He paused when he was done, listened and looked for anything that was out of place. He stared behind him, searching to see if anybody had followed. Then, Michael loosened two straps, put the straps over his shoulders and the pack on his back.

  Michael paused, took a deep breath of the heavy air, and started hiking even deeper into the reserve.

  ###

  After his mother had died, Michael had moved from Boston to New York. He spent the rest of his teen years in the rectory with Father Stiles or alone, wandering the streets. These were not the typical activities of a teenage boy, but nothing about Michael’s life was typical and he figured nothing about his future would be typical, either.

  During one of his walks through Manhattan, Michael had discovered the Gotham Book Mart. A rusted metal sign hung over its large black awning. The sign depicted three men in a fishing boat trying to reel in a book from the sea. Underneath, in large block letters were the words, “WISE MEN FISH HERE.”

  Inside the red brick building, old and new books filled shelves and were piled high on top of tables. A literary critic once said it was “a place filled with observations.”

  Its owner tried to nudge the masses toward new writers with different voices, but over time the masses didn’t want to be nudged anymore. They were more interested in books with large stickers on the cover proclaiming 30% off. Sales dropped as people bought books elsewhere, bad financial decisions were made, and the store eventually closed.

  While it was still open, however, Michael had found a self-published ‘zine dedicated to the New York Underground. It was filled with black and white photographs, sketches, and maps interspersed with stories about the thousands of “mole” people who had lived beneath the city. There were poems about abandoned subway stations decorated with elaborate mosaics and reviews of secret nightclubs far underneath Broadway that had been built during Prohibition.

  Most were myth, but some of the maps were real. Michael would go out late at night and sneak into the sewer system, exploring the tunnels and caves and letting his imagination take him to a better place.

  His knowledge of the underground had helped him escape Agent Vatch once before, maybe it would work, again.

  Like subterranean Manhattan, the Sian Ka’an was a world that had been left behind. Rather than sewers and subways, the Sian Ka’an had old Mayan aqueducts, caves, and ponds.

  Michael checked his GPS, cut north-east for fifty yards and stopped at a large sinkhole. It was about one hundred yards wide, filled with crystal clear water and no apparent tributaries.

  Michael took off his backpack and laid it on the ground. Then he stripped down to nothing. He tossed his sweaty t-shirt, shorts, and boxers to the side and jumped in with goggles in hand.

  The water was cool, and it sent a shock through his naked body as his temperature dropped. Although the water’s salt stung some of the superficial scrapes he’d endured on the hike, it was worth it.

  He came up for air, feeling alive and free.

  Michael put the goggles on, and then he swam back and forth. He reached his arms out as far as they could go, and then scooped them back. He dipped under the surface of the water, making shallow dives at first, and then diving deeper.

  He was weightless. The underwater world was a large room of filtered light. He tried to stay submerged as long as he could.

  Michael returned to the t
op of the water. The Caribbean sun instantly dried his face, then he took a breath and dove back into the peace as soon as he could.

  ###

  Michael lazed in the water for awhile, but he had a purpose. This wasn’t a pleasure trip. Michael got out and walked over to the pack amidst the pile of his clothes.

  He opened the top, and then got his GPS, the same one that had recorded the location of his bike and had guided him to the sinkhole. He pressed a button on the GPS’s bright yellow plastic casing, waited for it to power on, and then he used a Velcro strap to attach the device to his wrist.

  Finally, Michael reached into the pack’s largest compartment. He grabbed a long rope with a carabiner clip attached to the end.

  With rope in hand, he ran a few yards and jumped back into the water.

  He swam out toward the middle of the sinkhole, checked the GPS on his wrist, and then swam another ten yards to the left.

  Michael dove down, pushing himself deep into the hole. The water was still clear, and he could see schools of brightly colored fish darting away from him while larger fish jerked past with a few turns of their tails.

  He looked, but didn’t see it.

  Michael returned to the surface. He caught his breath, and then dove back down into the hole, deeper this time, holding the rope with the carabiner tight in his hand.

  He felt the pressure building in his lungs, but he didn’t want to return to the top. He was close. He knew it was there. He just couldn’t see it. When he couldn’t hold his breath any longer, Michael started to swim back to the surface, and it was then that he saw an unnatural block of square, plastic foam hiding in a narrow shadow.

  There was relief, but there wasn’t time to celebrate.

  Michael was a second behind. He took in some water as he reached the surface, and he emerged in a fit of coughs. Michael tried to recover. The water burned his lungs and made him gag.