The Rich and the Dead

by Liv Spector

  “Mr. Martinez?” The girl wore a black sheath dress, a bun on the top of her head, and bright red lipstick. She looked to Lila like a child playing dress-up. “There’s a man who has a question about the de Kooning.”

  Javier sighed and leaned back in his chair. “Thank you, Allison. I’ll be there in a moment.” The gallery girl left, and Javier wearily rose to his feet. After his buzzing frenetic energy, he seemed to be hitting a low. “Never once in my life has a walk-in bought a painting. Yet I’m expected to spend time with every idiot who sniffs around this place. Give me a moment.”

  Lila stayed seated, wanting to seem engrossed in the catalog she was perusing, as Javier headed to the gallery’s main room. He turned back toward her. “Camilla, darling, are you coming?”

  “Actually, I really love these photographs. Can I stick around? Talk about getting one of these for me?”

  A flash of concern washed over Javier’s face, but then his countenance relaxed. “Fine. Of course. I’ll have Allison bring you in a glass of something cool, and we’ll talk details in a moment.”

  Javier closed the office door, and Lila held her breath as she listened for his footsteps retreating down the hall. With her drive at the ready, she leaped up and bent under the desk to insert it into the computer tower.

  Right then, the door opened. Lila held her breath. She was caught with her head under the desk. She popped back up, locking eyes with the young girl, who had a glass of perspiring white wine in her hand.

  “Ms. Dayton?” Allison said with a confused look in her eyes.

  “Thank you, dear,” Lila said coolly, taking the glass from the girl. “I love this desk of Javier’s. I was just looking to see if it was an original.” Lila took a few steps back, pretending to admire the desk. “It really is an extraordinary piece.”

  “Yes! It is lovely,” Allison said. “It’s ebonized walnut, from the Louis XVI period. Quite rare. Shall I tell Javier you’re interested?”

  “I’ll tell him myself.”

  With that the girl nodded and left the room. Lila looked at the drive, which was flashing blue, meaning it was done downloading. She removed it from the computer and tucked it into her bra for safekeeping just as Javier walked back into his office.

  “What a monumental waste of time. De Kooning! That man couldn’t afford a ticket to a museum, let alone a four-point-two-million-dollar masterpiece.” Javier collapsed into his chair with a disgusted exhale. “So, my dear,” he said, regaining his composure. “See anything that catches your fancy?”

  He paused and looked her dead in the eye. “Aside from my desk, of course.”

  CHAPTER 17

  THE FOLLOWING WEEK Effie took off for Thanksgiving in New York City.

  “I’ll spend some time with my family. But other than that it’ll be just another shopping and spa-ing trip, my dear. I usually do it every month, but you’ve been such a welcome distraction that I haven’t found it necessary. But my roots! Quelle horreur! They’re ridiculous now.”

  Effie pointed, with her face twisted into a repulsed grimace, toward her hairline, which showed a barely perceptible difference in color between her light golden locks and her slightly less golden roots. “I can’t trust any of these South Beach queens with my hair. You and I know there’s only one person who can do the right blond, and that’s Oscar. You do go to Oscar Blandi, right?” she asked, glancing back at Lila, who merely nodded. “Besides, you don’t need me anymore. Now you can rely on Mr. Rhodes’s company. Have fun!”

  Lila had told Effie about her date with Dylan, and the long kiss that ended the night. Recounting the details over drinks by the pool, Lila had allowed herself, for the first time, to enjoy the feeling. For one moment, everything felt normal. She was just a girl telling her friend about a boy.

  But the truth was so much more complicated than that.

  And so Lila waved good-bye to Effie, thankful for a break from her host’s oversight. For the last few days, Effie had been acting withdrawn and taciturn. She was constantly retreating behind closed doors to make surreptitious, whispered phone calls, which Lila had “happened” upon, forcing Effie to skitter away. Lila suspected that this trip was more than just family time and spa-ing.

  However, now that Effie was out of town, Lila could momentarily shed the skin of Camilla Dayton and hunker down on her laptop to go over the information from Javier’s hard drive. She needed to devote her days to the investigation, not Effie’s social calendar.

  She spent the next few days sitting under an umbrella by the pool, makeup off and hair undone, combing through the mountains of files from Javier’s computer.

  On her third morning, just as frustration was beginning to consume her over finding nothing, she heard someone call her name from far away.

  Lila glanced up to see Dylan’s boat pulling up to Effie’s dock. She closed her laptop with a smile and hurried across the lawn to greet him.

  He tied up his boat and walked toward her. The moment they met, he threw his arms around her.

  “You’ve been hiding from me,” he whispered into her ear. “So I thought I’d drop by. Perhaps take you on a sail?”

  She shook her head no, but when she looked into his expectant face, she heard herself say, “Yes.”

  She dashed into the guesthouse, hid her laptop, and put on a bathing suit. As she reemerged, she heard the roar of engines. Looking toward the dock, she saw an enormous red, white, and blue speedboat idling next to Dylan’s sailboat. Alexei Dortzovich, the Russian billionaire she’d met at the club, was at the helm. He and Dylan were talking. About what, she couldn’t hear over the deafening engine noise.

  She walked quickly across the lawn, but before she could set foot on the dock, Alexei’s speedboat roared away.

  As Lila boarded the sailboat, she noticed that Dylan’s face looked flushed, as if he’d just been in an argument.

  “Who was that guy?” she asked.

  “You haven’t had the displeasure of meeting Alexei Dortzovich yet?” Dylan replied. There was an angry edge to his voice.

  “Just once,” Lila said, “at the club one afternoon. What were you guys talking about?”

  “Nothing.” He set about the complicated task of getting the sailboat away from the dock and out into the sea.

  Lila decided to drop the subject for now. Instead, she picked up the bottle of champagne chilling in a silver wine cooler. “Should I open this?” she asked, which finally got a smile out of Dylan.

  “No, let me. Here, you grab the wheel. Just keep us heading straight.”

  She should have kept her eye on the horizon, but she couldn’t help but watch Dylan as he moved along the deck, grabbing two champagne flutes, popping the cork, and pouring them each a glass. She wanted to laugh out loud. She never thought real life could look like this.

  “So, why didn’t you return my call?” Dylan asked as the boat sliced through the waters. He had taken back the steering wheel after Lila proved more interested in watching him than watching the waves.

  “I’ve got a lot on my plate right now,” she said, taking a large sip of champagne.

  “Camilla,” Dylan said softly. “I like being with you, and I hope you feel the same.”

  She nodded yes. It was undeniable. Something about him made Lila feel that she could finally exhale, live, be her real self.

  “Good,” he said. His face lit up into a smile, one she couldn’t help but return.

  Dylan grabbed Lila’s hand and pulled her to him, swinging her around so that her hands were on the steering wheel and he was standing behind her. She leaned back against him, and he pressed his lips into the top of her head. Then Dylan moved his hand down her side to the soft of her belly. She turned to face him and they kissed. As their kiss grew deeper, her thoughts fluttered away like a flock of birds scattering suddenly into the air.

  For that moment, there was only him.

  “So,” she asked, as their cheeks were pressed together, “where are you taking me?”

  �
�Just a little barrier island way out in Biscayne Bay. It’s one of my favorite places in the world. And we should have it all to ourselves.”

  The sailboat gracefully cut across the water, and the skyline of Miami receded into the distance as they approached an island that looked like nothing more than a few palm trees hovering above the turquoise waters.

  Lila marveled at Dylan’s movements as he guided the boat in the right direction. Each gesture, step, and movement was full of ease.

  “How long have you been sailing?” she asked.

  “Forever. This is my granddad’s boat.” He ran his hand along the steering wheel with tender care. “I’ve always loved this boat. But after he died, it was neglected. A few years ago, my brother and I decided to fix it up ourselves. Took us three years, but now she’s a thing of beauty. Speaking of beauty,” he asked with a wicked grin, “do you have your bathing suit on under that dress?”

  To answer his question, Lila slipped the thin straps of her dress off her shoulders and let the whole thing fall to the ground, revealing a small black-and-white polka-dot bikini.

  “I’ll take that as a yes then.” Dylan laughed and threw a large anchor overboard. “You don’t mind swimming to the island from here, do you?”

  “I’m game.”

  Dylan took in the sails. Then he threw some sort of large trunk overboard and jumped in after it. Lila dove headfirst into the water.

  “What’s in the trunk?” she asked as they swam to the shore, Dylan dragging the object behind him.

  “Lunch, of course.”

  THE AFTERNOON WAS perfect. They spent the day swimming, snorkeling, eating, laughing, and drinking the two bottles of champagne Dylan had packed on ice at the bottom of the cooler. There was not a soul around to share in the fine white sand and the warm azure waters lapping at the shore. It was just the two of them, alone in paradise.

  On the trip back to Star Island, they stayed curled against each other the whole time. As Dylan steered, Lila stood behind him, her arms wrapped around his chest, her head pressed on his back, watching the setting sun slowly transform the sky into a rainbow of bruised purples and reds.

  “When can I see you again?” Dylan asked as Lila climbed off the boat and onto the dock. He had his hand in hers to steady her as she jumped onto the land’s reassuring embrace, but now he wouldn’t let it go. She leaned in to kiss him once more.

  “Thanksgiving is Thursday. . . . So, after that, I guess.”

  “Saturday?” He was still holding her hand. She didn’t want him to let go either, but her mind was already turning away from Dylan and back toward thoughts of the case.

  “Saturday,” Lila said as she kissed his hand and then let it go.

  After an afternoon of swimming and sailing, Lila’s legs felt unsteady on the stable earth. That’s what love is like, she thought as she walked toward the guesthouse. You become so accustomed to its exciting textures and rhythms that solid ground begins to feel unnatural.

  Lila noticed that the lights in Effie’s master suite were all on. She stepped forward, curious. Was her host already back from New York? Wait, did I just say love?

  She shook off thoughts of Dylan and entered the house, climbing quietly up the grand staircase.

  Effie’s bedroom door was open. Lila called out her name. Upon hearing nothing, she stuck her head inside. No Effie. She was about to head back to the guesthouse when she heard muffled shouting from inside the bathroom.

  “Effie?”

  Still no response. She paused, quieting her senses so that she could hear even the smallest noise, a skill she’d honed during her years as a cop. Then she heard the muffled voice again. It sounded like Effie was crying.

  She crept closer to the bathroom door to listen.

  “How can you say that,” Lila heard Effie cry, “and say you love me at the same time?” The crying turned hysterical. “No!” Effie shouted. “I don’t care what the others think.”

  Never once in all their late-night talks about love and men had Effie even come close to giving Lila the impression that she had a special somebody. There were men in Effie’s life—an endless rotation of attractive men going through the revolving door of her bedroom—but what Lila overheard was an Effie that she didn’t know existed. Just as she was turning to sneak back out of Effie’s room, the bathroom door opened.

  Lila froze in her tracks. Effie stood in the doorway, her eyes red and a startled look on her face. Both women stared at each other.

  “You’re back!” Lila said. “So soon?”

  “What are you doing here?” Effie asked peevishly, but Lila saw that her eyes were darting nervously around the room.

  “I thought you were spending Thanksgiving in New York.”

  “Plans changed. My family was driving me bonkers.” She scowled at Lila. “So I see you’ve made yourself quite at home in my absence. Thought you’d take over my room when I was gone?”

  “No, Ef. Don’t be crazy. I just saw your light on, so I came to see if you were home.”

  “And now you’ve got your answer.”

  Lila didn’t understand why Effie seemed so angry.

  “Plus, I wanted to ask if I could borrow a dress,” Lila lied. If there was one tangent she had found that could distract Effie from a bad mood, it was clothes.

  Effie frowned, then ducked back into the bathroom. “Take whatever you want,” she said as she began to draw a bath. “You always do.”

  Before Lila could ask her what she meant, Effie closed the door on her.

  CHAPTER 18

  DESPITE THE HIGH of her day sailing with Dylan and her low of fighting with Effie, all Lila really wanted to do was get back to searching Javier’s files. She couldn’t believe that a man with his fingers in so many black markets had no dirt on him. Finally back in the comfort and safety of the guesthouse, Lila could return to reviewing his files.

  Once again, she plowed through the usual stuff. Invoices. Texts for various gallery openings. E-mails to and from artists. Then she stumbled upon something alarming. A subset of files were under military-grade data encryption. Whatever Javier had saved there was something he wanted to keep very, very secret.

  Lila didn’t bat an eye at the heavy encryption. When she was still a cop, she’d been part of an investigative team that went after Shadow, the notorious ringleader of an international hacking collective. He’d been convicted of more than a hundred counts of identity fraud, grand larceny, and conspiracy in 2015. But this was still 2014, and Shadow was a free man. She knew that, for a fee, he’d crack this encryption.

  It would be easy, but expensive. Of course, Lila didn’t care about the money. She remembered from the investigation how to get in touch with him. She typed his e-mail address, xXxXXxshaDOWxxXxX@gmail.com, into her computer with the message “i walk through the Va11ey of the shadow of d3ath” and hit Send. Seconds later, he e-mailed back. The terms were quickly established, she wired the money, and he downloaded the files. Hours later the encryption was cracked.

  It surprised Lila how little she cared about giving money to a known criminal. Perhaps the laissez-faire attitude of Miami was infecting her. Then again, it probably helped that she knew she’d be throwing him in jail soon enough.

  As she reviewed the files, Lila quickly understood why Javier was so anxious to hide this information. She was staring at concrete proof that Miami’s elite art dealer was also a world-class arms dealer.

  It all made sense. The mystery. The money. The secrets.

  “So that’s the source of all his wealth,” Lila muttered as she pored over page after page of documents detailing the acquisition and shipment of assault rifles, machine guns, and large quantities of ammunition. The destinations for these weapons of minor destruction read like a UN conflict list: Sierra Leone. Honduras. The Ivory Coast. Bogotá. The Congo. Syria. Places of human suffering, mayhem, revolution, and repression, where arms trafficking was internationally prohibited. There was an incredible number of records detailing wire transfers fro
m global bank accounts to one in the Cayman Islands, which Lila presumed was Javier’s.

  But there was one file that didn’t fit with the others. In it were a number of documents with detailed information about a man named Frederic Sandoval. It was an entire dossier on his movements. Where he was. What he was doing. Lila looked at countless surveillance photos showing a long-faced man who appeared to be around sixty, with thinning hair and stooped posture. Javier had been compiling this information for several months.

  Why is Javier so interested in this guy? Lila wondered.

  She turned to the exhaustive database compiled by Teddy and typed in Frederic Sandoval. There was nothing. Nothing under Fred. Nothing under Sandoval. She then typed the name into an online search. There were plenty of Fred Sandovals in the digital universe, with their Facebook pages and LinkedIn profiles, but none of them resembled the man exhaustively watched by Javier.

  Never since she’d left the Miami PD had Lila wished she was still a cop as much as at that moment. If she was on the force, she could have access to background checks, credit card activity, and anything else she’d need to uncover a possible connection between Sandoval and Javier. But that was all in the past. She wasn’t a cop anymore.

  Wait, Lila thought, shaking her head. This was still the past. She was still a cop.

  And suddenly she knew how she would find out who Frederic Sandoval was.

  CHAPTER 19

  PRETENDING TO BE someone else is a difficult task, but Lila discovered that pretending to be herself was even harder.

  She needed to figure out how Sandoval and Martinez were connected, and she knew the best way was to access the Miami Police Department’s criminal records database. And the only way to do that was by becoming her old self, Detective Lila Day, so that she could sneak into the police station.

  Teddy had warned her against the dangers of meeting herself in the past. Which was why the night of Thanksgiving would be perfect for this particular undercover stint. On Thanksgiving, she knew that past-Lila would be sitting at her mother’s cheap dining room table and wolfing down a meal her mom had spent all day cooking. And not only would her past self be out of the station on Thanksgiving—so would almost everybody else.