Beyond Suspicion

Vladimir glanced at Katrina. Again she said nothing, though it impressed her the way Theo had put so much together. She suspected that Jack had done at least some of the unraveling.

“Sounds intriguing,” said Vladimir. “I might be interested under the right circumstances.”

“If you had fifty million dirty dollars?”

“No. If you actually had a hundred fags with life insurance in the pipeline.”

“A buddy of mine owns nine AIDS hospices. Three in California, four in New York, two in south Florida. All high-end, all wealthy clientele. No one who checks into these places is long for this earth.”

“That could be a very useful co

“I thought so.”

Vladimir’s cell phone rang. He checked the number and grimaced. “I gotta take this. Back in a minute.”

Katrina waited until he was safely outside the restaurant, then glared at Theo and said, “What in the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“Going to the source.”

“What for?”

“It’s like Jack and me figured. We find out who’s laundering all that viatical money, we find Jessie Merrill’s killer.”

“Do you have any idea who you’re dealing with?”

“Yes. Do you?”

“Eventually Vladimir is going to see right through you. You can’t bluff these people.”

“Why not? You did.”

“That’s different. I’m working from the inside.”

“Give me a little time. I’ll be right there beside you.”

“Have you lost your mind? You’re going to get yourself killed.”

“Only if you blow my cover. But you won’t do that. Because if you do, I’m taking you down with me.”

She was so angry she could have leaped across the table and strangled him. But Vladimir was back, and she quickly forced herself to regain her composure.

He sank back into the booth and snapped his fingers. The waitress brought another round of Tarzan’s Revenge.

“To your health,” said Vladimir.

He belted back the drink. Katrina did likewise, keeping one angry eye on Theo.

Vladimir put the unlit cigar back in his pocket, as if signaling that it was time to leave. He looked at Theo and said, “I’m afraid I have to go, but before I do, I want to leave you with this story. You ever heard of the money plane?”

“Money plane? I don’t think so.”

“Delta Flight 30. It used to leave JFK for Moscow at 5:45 P.M. five days a week. Rarely did it leave with less than a hundred million dollars in its cargo belly. Stacks of new hundred dollar bills, all shipped in white canvas bags. Over the years, about 80 billion dollars came into Russia that way. Just one unarmed courier on the flight, no special security measures. And not once did anyone even try to hijack the plane. Why do you think that is?”

“The food sucked?”

“Because anyone who knew about the money also knew that it was being bought by Russian banks. And if you rip off a Russian bank, nine chances out of ten says you’re ripping off the Russian Mafiya. Nobody has big enough balls or a small enough brain to do that. So that plane just kept right on flying.”

“Very interesting.”

“You understand what I’m saying?”

“I’m pretty sure I do.”

“Give us two days. If you check out, you meet Yuri.”

“Sounds good.”

Katrina said, “Tell him what happens if he doesn’t check out.”

“I think he gets the point,” said Vladimir.

“I like to be explicit with my friends. He should hear.”

Vladimir leaned forward, a wicked sparkle in his eye. “You don’t check out, you meet Fate. And he has not a pretty face.”

Theo gave an awkward smile. “Fu

“That is fu

Theo rose and said, “You know where to reach me, right, Katrina?”

“Don’t worry. We won’t have trouble finding you.”

She watched as he turned and walked away, then headed out the door, not sure if she should be angry or feel sorry for him.

Theo, my boy, you were safer on death row.

40

•

Dr. Marsh sat in silence in the plush leather passenger seat of his lawyer’s Lexus. They were just a half-block away from Mercy Hospital, an acute-care facility that sat on premier Miami waterfront, the Coconut Grove side of Biscayne Bay. Year after year it was voted “best view from a deathbed” by a local offbeat magazine. Dr. Marsh had missed his morning rounds at the hospital, and they were popping by the parking lot just to pick up his car. But Jessie Merrill was still weighing on his mind.

“Fu

Zamora stopped the car at the traffic light. “How so?”

“I don’t know if Jessie was sleeping with Swyteck or not. But she definitely wasn’t obsessed with him.”

Zamora rolled his cigar between his thumb and index finger. “You’d never guess that from the tape. She screamed his name while having sex with you.”

“These tapes she did were purely shock value. There’s nothing honest about them.”

“I’m not following you.”

Marsh looked out the window, then back. “This was exactly the kind of thing that bitch liked to do. She’d get me all hot and then say something to spoil the mood and set me off.”

“How do you mean?”

“The tapes weren’t the least bit erotic for her. It was all about her warped sense of humor. One time, before I’d decided to get a divorce, she had me on the verge of orgasm and then pretended my wife had just walked into the room. That was her favorite tape of all, watching me fly out of the bed butt-naked. Other times she’d just scream out another man’s name. She used my seventeen-year-old son’s name once, my partner’s another time. But her favorite one was Jack. She knew that one really got me.”

“Why did that name bother you so much?”

“I don’t know.”

“Is it possible that you were a little jealous of Jack Swyteck?”

“No.”

“Maybe you had reason to be jealous. Maybe when she screamed his name, it wasn’t just for effect.”

“It was totally for effect. She just wanted to make me crazy.”

“Crazy enough to kill her?”

Their eyes locked. “I told you before, I didn’t kill her.”

“Then the polygraph should be a breeze.”

“I think I’ve changed my mind on that. I don’t want to take a polygraph.”

“Why not?”

“I swear, I had nothing to do with Jessie’s death. I just don’t believe in polygraphs. I think liars can beat them, and I think i

Zamora twirled his cigar, thinking. “I have a good examiner. Maybe I can get Jancowitz to agree to use him.”

“I really don’t want to take one. I don’t care who’s administering it. Hell, it tests your breathing, your heart rate, your blood pressure. I get so furious whenever anyone asks me about Jessie Merrill, I’m afraid I’ll fail even if I tell the truth.”

“Then you shouldn’t have acted so eager to do it back in Jancowitz’s office.”

“I was bluffing. I figured the more willing I seemed to take one, the less likely he was to push for it.”

“Prosecutors can never get enough. It’s going to be hard to get him to back down.”

“Maybe if the testimony we offer is so good, he’ll do the deal even if we refuse to sit for a polygraph.”

Zamora gave his client a look. “How good?”

“We already have a good base. That joint bank account is pretty damning for Swyteck.”

“Why did she put him on that account?”

“Damned if I know.”

“Why weren’t you on it?”

“The money was never intended for me. This was something I was doing for her.”

“Got to keep the high-maintenance other woman happy, eh?”

“Do you have any idea how hard it is to provide for another woman when your wife of twenty-four years is suing for every pe