Beyond Suspicion

“Years of pent-up anger, is that it?”

“It’s a long time, but who knows what was going through her head?”

Jack took another long sip. “I think I know.”

“You want to share?”

Jack glanced at the mirror behind the bar, speaking to Mike without looking at him. “Jessie couldn’t have kids.”

“She apparently had one.”

“I mean after that one. I saw her whole medical file during our case. She had PID.”

“What?”

“Pelvic inflammatory disease. It’s an infection that goes up through the uterus to the fallopian tubes. It was cured, but the damage was done. Doctors told her she’d probably never have kids.”

“How did she get it?”

“How do you think?”

Mike nodded, as if suddenly it was all coming together. “You and her break up, she finds out she’s pregnant. She comes back to you before she’s really started to show and tells you she wants to get back together. But you’ve already met Cindy Paige, so she keeps the baby a secret. Last thing she wants is you coming back to her just because she’s pregnant.”

Jack filled in the rest, staring through the smoke-filled room. “She gives up the baby for adoption, meets some guy who gives her PID, and just like that, she finds herself in a situation where she’s given away the only child she’s ever going to bring into this world.”

They glanced at one another and then looked away, their eyes drifting aimlessly in the direction of whatever nonsense was playing on the muted television set.

“Hey, Jack,” said Mike.

“Yeah?”

“I think I figured out why Jessie came back to stick it to you as her attorney after all these years.”

Jack swirled the ice cubes in his glass and said, “Yeah. Me too.”

39

•

Katrina walked into the Brown Bear around six-thirty with Vladimir at her side. The restaurant was about half-full, and she spotted Theo instantly. They walked right past the sign that said please wait to be seated and joined Theo in a rear booth.

Katrina made the introductions, and they slid across the leather seats, Katrina and her boss on one side of the booth, across from Theo.

The Brown Bear was in East Hollywood, just off Hallandale Beach Boulevard. It had a huge local following, mostly people of Eastern European descent. The newspaper dispenser just outside the door wasn’t the Miami Herald or the South Florida Sun-Sentinel but eXile, a biweekly paper from Moscow. Behind the cash register hanged an autographed photo of Joseph Kobzon, favorite pop singer of former Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev and a household name to generations of Russian music lovers, known best for his soulful renditions of patriotic ballads. The buzz coming from the many crowded tables was more often Russian or Slovak than English or Spanish. Meals were inexpensive and served family-style, gluttonous portions of skewered lamb, chopped liver, and beef Stroganoff. Caviar and vodka cost extra. On weekends, a three-piece band and schmaltzy nightclub singer entertained guests. Reservations were essential-except for guys like Vladimir.

Katrina wondered if Theo had any idea that the Cyrillic letters tattooed onto each of her boss’ fingers identified him as a made man among vory, a faction of the Russian Mafiya so powerful it was almost mythical.

“Katrina tells me you used to work together,” said Vladimir.

She shot Theo a subtle glance. Vladimir had quizzed her on the car ride over, and she’d been forced to concoct a story. Revealing the true circumstances under which she and Theo had met would only have exposed herself as a snitch.

“That’s right,” said Theo, seeming to catch her drift.

Katrina took it from there. “I’ve come a long way from slogging drinks at Sparky’s, haven’t I, Theo?”

“You sure have.”

“I like that name,” said Vladimir. “Sparky’s.”

“I came up with it myself. The old electric chair in Florida used to be called ‘Old Sparky.’ When I beat the odds and got off death row, I thought Sparky’s was a good name for a bar.”

Vladimir smiled approvingly, as if serving time on death row only confirmed that Theo was all right. “Do you own this Sparky’s?”

“Half of it. I’m the operations partner. Buddy of mine put up all the money.”

“Other people’s money,” Vladimir said with a thin smile. “We should drink to that.” He signaled the waitress, and almost immediately she brought over three rounds of his usual cocktail, one for each of them.

“What’s this?” asked Theo.

“Tarzan’s Revenge.”

“Ice-cold vodka and Japanese sake poured over a raw quail’s egg,” said Katrina.

“I didn’t know Tarzan drank.”

She didn’t bother explaining that Tarzan was not Joh

“Cheers,” said Vladimir, and each of them belted one back.

Just as soon as the first round was gone the waitress brought another. Katrina joined in the second and third rounds but passed on the fourth and fifth. She’d seen Vladimir operate before, knew he could outdrink any American, and knew that Tarzan’s Revenge was Vladimir’s way of loosening tongues and tripping up rats.

“Tell us more about your proposal,” said Vladimir.

“Let me start by being upfront with you. I’m not go

“You mean the lawyer?”

“You know who I mean.”

Vladimir was stone-faced. “You said you had business.”

“That’s right. And for me, business is business. Swyteck’s not part of it. So, it’s your choice. You can tell me to shut up and go away, that you don’t want shit to do with any friend of Jack Swyteck. Or you can put my friendships aside and act like a businessman, which means both of us make a lot of money.”

Vladimir removed a cigar from his inside pocket, unwrapped the cellophane. “Everyone I do business with has friends I can’t stand.”

“That’s what I thought you’d say. You look like a very smart man.”

“What are you offering?”

“Viatical settlements.”

“How much?”

“The sky’s the limit.”

Vladimir laughed like a nonbeliever. “I’ve heard that one before.”

“Maybe so. But not from someone who understands your business the way I do.”

“You know so much, do you?”

“You got a lot of cash on your hands.”

“What makes you think that?”

“It’s written all over your face. And your hands,” he said as he glanced at the Cyrillic letters on Vladimir’s fingers.

Katrina said nothing, but she was starting to reconsider. Maybe this Theo isn’t as dumb as he looks.

Vladimir said, “A guy could have worse problems.”

“But too much cash is still a problem. So I figure it works this way. You got a pot of dirty money.”

“I have no dirty money.”

“Just for the sake of argument, let’s say you got fifty million dirty dollars. Some from drugs, some from prostitution, extortion, illegal gaming, whatever. We can all talk freely here. We’re among friends, right, Katrina?”

“Old friends are the best friends,” she said.

“Okay,” said Vladimir. “Let’s say fifty million.”

“Let’s say I got a hundred guys dying from AIDS who are willing to sell their life insurance policies to you for five hundred thousand dollars a pop. You do a hundred separate deals, all impossible to trace, and pay out fifty million in cash. My guys name some offshore companies formed by your lawyer as the beneficiary under their life insurance policy. When they die, the life insurance company pays you the death benefit. Clean money.”

“How much?”

“Double. You start with fifty million in dirty money. In two years you got a hundred million in clean money straight from the coffers of triple-A-rated insurance companies.”