"The truth," Sam said, grinning at him.
Kilgore went pale beneath his tan. "Shit, Sam, I'm serious. He'd have you skin my ass alive if he knew I shot his fuckin' nephew, man."
"Not that version of the truth, son," Sam said. "The version where Nicholson and that piece of shit we were gonna question tried to kill us. Assholes got Horton, too, but we made 'em pay."
"Is he gonna believe that, Sam?"
"Shit, boy, I reckon that's up to you and me, ain't it?"
"That's what I mean. Why's he gonna believe us?"
"I been with him for a long time, Kilgore. Since before you and Horton was even born. In fact, I was collecting for Pinkie before he even got married."
"Yeah, but what about me?"
"You? You been tight with Horton ever since he started, ain'tcha?"
"Yeah, that's true."
"You think Pinkie don't know Horton trusted you?"
"Horton trusted me?"
"Sure he did."
"How do you know?"
"Horton trusted you enough to bring you into that deal with the Mexicans to spy on Pinkie, didn't he?"
Kilgore went pale again. He took his foot off the gas and turned to stare at Sam.
"Drive the damn car, boy." Sam laughed. "What's wrong, Kilgore?"
"How the hell did you know that? Did Horton tell you?"
"I'm an old dog, son. Not much slips by me. In this business, to get to be my age you gotta pay attention. It coulda been me you shot, couldn't it? If I hadn't had that talk with you yesterday about who to trust?"
"I wouldn't a shot you, Sam."
"We don't know that, Kilgore. What we know is that you didn't shoot me. Instead, you shot Horton. It was the right thing to do, but Pinkie might not see it that way. There's that family thing goin' on with him, ya know."
"What're you sayin'?"
"I'm sayin' you and me, we got a bond, now. It cuts two ways. I got your back, and you got mine. What we did, we did out of loyalty to Pinkie. That's the thing, see. But he don't need to know all the details; it would just upset him, and it's all taken care of, now."
"So you're gonna do the talkin' this afternoon when we see him?" Kilgore asked.
"I think that'd be best. You just back me up. What Pinkie needs to know is what we found out about the Mexican with the scars on his face that Nicholson told us about."
"What about the other guy? The one Nicholson set up, from the St. Thomas bunch?"
"What about him?"
"You gonna tell Pinkie what he said?"
"Sure. He backed up Nicholson's story about the guy with the scarred face, whoever the hell he is. I'll tell Pinkie that."
"What about the woman?"
"I don't know. That's pretty far-fetched. It could be kind of a distraction, a story about a woman frontin' for a new cartel. What do you think?"
"I was just askin', tryin' to learn from the master. It is pretty far out there, ain't it? A woman?"
"Yeah. I don't know, son. We'll see how it plays out with Pinkie. You got the trophies for him?"
"Yeah. On ice, in that little cooler in the trunk."
"Good. When I give you the word, you get 'em out and pass 'em to Pinkie. It'll be when I'm tellin' him about what each one of 'em said, okay?"
"Yeah, okay."
"And Kilgore?"
"Yeah?"
"Relax, son. I got your back, just like you got mine. It's gonna be fine."
****
"I need whatever you can get on this woman," Jansen said, cupping both hands around his beer mug and leaning across the table in the dim booth.
"What do you have besides her name?" his companion asked. "Address, by any chance?"
Jansen shook his head, "She and her husband live on a yacht down in the islands. They run a charter business, but it may be a front. The husband's a retired cop; he's supposed to have a lot of connections to different federal agencies, so be careful how you go about it."
"I'm always careful. Where's he retired from?"
"I'm not sure."
"Same last name?"
"I don't know. You should be able to get that stuff off the web, no?"
"Yeah, sure. It's just that the more you can give me up front, the quicker I'll get something you can use. Mind if I ask why you want this?"
"Does it matter? I'm paying you well, and I don't ask for much, do I?"
"No. It's just that if I know why I'm looking, it can narrow the search quicker."
"Why's that?" Jansen asked, frowning.
"Based on what you've given me so far, I'll start with public stuff online, and then go to credit reports and shit like that that I have to pay for. That takes some time."
"Why not start with your internal database?"
"I'll get there, but it's my last stop. The less time I spend there, the better. If I do too much random poking around, it'll get picked up by the bots and somebody'll want to know what I'm doing."
"Bots?" Jansen asked.
"Internal surveillance algorithms."
"I thought you had the clearance to get into all the Bureau's files. That's what the hell I'm paying you for."
"Easy, Art. I got the clearance, but that doesn't mean they're not watching me. The system knows what's been assigned to me to research."
"Then how can you go looking for somebody like her that's not assigned to you? Won't they catch you every time?"
"The bots will pick it up. It may or may not go any further; that depends on a whole bunch of variables."
"How the hell do you deal with that?"
"The more I know about her before I start querying our database, the less likely I am to trip an alarm. If I can somehow tie her into something that's been assigned to me, that's like an explanation, and nothing happens. If I just sit down at my desk tomorrow and start searching our records for her, that'll get noticed. But if I already know she's connected to somebody who's also connected to somebody I'm assigned to research, I can work my way to her that way. Then the bots think I'm just following through on my assignment and no flags get raised. See the difference?"
"Yeah, okay. Sorry I asked. What a pain in the ass."
"That's why you're paying me so much. It's not as simple as everybody thinks."
"I see that. Look, would it help if I told you we think she's fronting for a new cartel that nobody knows much about?"
"Possibly. But it would help more if you could tie her to some of the people already under our surveillance. That helps me find the kind of linkage that keeps me out of trouble."
"The only names I've got have already been busted and put in prison."
"No matter. That's even better, actually. These are people she's worked with?"
"Our information is that she framed them, set them up for you guys."
"Okay, that's great! That'll probably make it pretty easy for me to get to her from somebody I've been assigned. Who are they?"
"Sam Alfano, Ralph Giannetti, Mark Murano, and Jonas Pratt. Those are the ones we heard about."
"Jesus, Art! That's all the big ones we've had in the last few years. You sure about this?"
"No. That's why I want you to see what you can find on her. Is that enough to get you started?"
"Oh, yeah, man. I've got stuff working on all those guys already. Shouldn't be any big deal from me to get whatever's in the files on her, if she really had contact with them."
"How long?" Jansen asked.
"Give me 48 hours. That should get me a good start. Then we'll see where it goes, okay?"
"If that's the best you can do." Jansen said. He put a $20 bill on the table and anchored it with his nearly full beer mug.
"I'll call if I get anything sooner," the other man said, as Jansen turned to go.
"One more thing," Jansen said.
"What's that?"
"Let me know if there's any sign of Russians or Eastern Europeans involved."
"No problem."
"Good. Maybe there's a bonus in it for you if you get something
quick."
****
The bellboy blanched when he saw the scarred face of the man who opened the door to his knock. "M-message for you, Mister Montalba."
Guillermo Montalba chuckled at the man's reaction, but the expression on his face was frozen in that blank scowl that gave people nightmares. He tipped the bellboy and took the manila envelope from him. Montalba, called Willie by a few select people, and "the scar-faced bastard" by most others, was used to the reaction.
He knew people wondered what had happened to him, but no one knew the true story. He fueled selected rumors about his having been tortured by rivals. That added to his fearsome reputation. The truth would just have made people think he was crazy. What kind of lunatic would pour acid on his own face because he didn't have the money to pay a plastic surgeon to alter his appearance?
Closing and locking the door, he sat down at the desk and tore open the envelope, finding a microSD card, as he had expected. He reached into his briefcase and took out a small digital recorder. Inserting the microSD card, he plugged in earphones; he wouldn't risk someone in a neighboring room overhearing the recording.
The man who had retrieved the card from the bloody scene of Nicholson's meeting last night had warned Willie about the screaming. At Willie's suggestion, Nicholson had concealed a tiny recorder in the abandoned motel on a side road off the Old Tamiami Trail in advance of the gathering. Not wishing to hear more than he had to, Willie fast-forwarded through the screams, pausing to listen to the questions and answers. He could have guessed most of what he heard, but one thing surprised him.
Nicholson had set up a local hood for Sam the Barber. He had told Sam the guy worked for "the scar-faced bastard." The man had mentioned a shadowy cartel supposedly run by a woman. As unlikely as that seemed, Willie had heard an occasional rumor to that effect, but not recently. Back when Giannetti's boy Murano had been active, there had been some rumblings about a woman who was fronting for a group that demanded a "tax" to guarantee safe passage of goods through the Caribbean and into South Florida.
The rumors had faded when Murano was incarcerated, but Willie couldn't afford to ignore this. Unfortunately, no one had a name for the mystery woman, or for her organization. Finished listening, he took the microSD card out and held it over an ashtray with tweezers. He melted it into a blob of sooty black plastic with a butane lighter and took it to the bathroom, where he flushed it down the toilet.
His recollection of the rumors surrounding Murano's downfall was that the woman was strikingly beautiful, and that she had somehow set Murano up for the Feds to get him out of her way. He would have frowned if his features permitted it; instead, he clenched his jaw as he considered how to find out more about the woman.
Chapter 13
"I'm not sure I understood that correctly, Noah," Paul said. "You have a warrant to monitor our satcom traffic?" Paul and Connie were sitting at the saloon table aboard Diamantista II with Paul's iPhone between them. Their guests were ashore, taking a taxi tour of St. Martin. "O'Brien didn't tell me that."
"That's right, Paul," Noah Johnson replied. "Now don't be insulted by this, but I need to remind you that the FBI doesn't normally discuss this sort of thing, especially with people who might be considered targets of the investigation."
A flush spread over Connie's face and she leaned toward the iPhone. Paul put a hand on her forearm, shaking his head. She clenched her jaw and sat back, a frown on her face as Johnson continued.
"Not that you two are the targets, but still, we wouldn't be having this conversation except for your relationship with O'Brien. He's told me about your background, and about the way you came to know one another."
"I know that," Paul said, still keeping his hand on Connie's arm. "I'm just a little surprised Bill didn't mention the warrant, if you were willing to share it at all."
"He didn't know; we just got the warrant yesterday, based on some new information. I mentioned it as a courtesy; since you're obviously not the targets of the investigation, and because of your relationship and background. Your emails will get scooped up in the net, along with your browsing history. Not that I think you have anything to hide, but ... "
"Okay, thanks. We actually don't use the satcom system much for our personal stuff anyway. It's pricey, so we only use it if we have to. It's there as an amenity to our guests, and we bill them for it."
"I see. Well, we'll be watching that until further notice. Have the Lewises been using it much?"
"Actually, they have," Connie said. "Much more than any of our other guests have."
"Uh-huh," Johnson said. "And how long have they been aboard?"
"Five days," Connie said.
"Okay. So we've missed five days of their traffic; that's useful to know."
"How so?" she asked.
"Once we see who they're corresponding with, we might be able to go back and pick up the messages we missed, depending on what email service their correspondents use."
"Okay," Paul said. "What else should we know?"
"Aside from the warrant and their email, the real reason I asked O'Brien to put us in touch is that I need to know what they're up to."
"You want us to spy on them for you?" Connie said, her tone sharp.
Paul shook his head. "What Connie means is -- "
"It's okay, Paul," Johnson said. "That's a reasonable question. The answer is no; we don't want you to spy on them, exactly. Think of it as us knocking on your door and asking what you've seen going on at the house across the street. We're looking for facts, not supposition, and only for information that's obvious to a casual observer -- no snooping on your part, please. That could tip them off. One concern we have is whether they're planning to skip out. I mean, a big yacht like that, they could decide to -- "
"Can we back up a second, here?" Paul asked.
"Sure," Johnson said. "What's on your mind?"
"What is it that you suspect they've done?"
"O'Brien didn't tell you?"
"He was pretty vague," Paul said. "He mentioned a lot of stuff that I couldn't quite follow about metadata analysis from several ISPs that might point to some kind of fraud. He said there were a lot of names on the list, and that you weren't quite sure what was happening, or whether the Lewises were even involved. You must have moved along from there if you have a warrant to monitor their emails."
"Yes. You're right. Thanks, Paul. I was getting ahead of myself. Let me give you some background. This could take a while; when are the Lewises coming back?"
"They're on an island tour. They just left, so we've probably got all afternoon," Connie said.
"Okay, good. How much do you know about the Bank Secrecy Act?"
"That's the $10,000 rule, right?" Connie asked.
"Well, that's part of it. There's the hard and fast requirement imposed on banks to report cash transactions over $10,000. That gets a lot of attention, I guess, but there's a lot more to it than that. The BSA's pretty far-reaching, and banks are encouraged to report any transactions that they deem suspicious, whether they're cash or not. Have you heard the terms 'structuring,' or maybe 'smurfing?'"
"I've heard of 'smurfing,'" Paul said. "Money laundering, right?"
"Yes, that's the context, all right. 'Structuring' and 'smurfing' both refer to breaking up a single banking transaction into multiple ones in an effort to avoid attracting attention, or triggering reports to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network run by the Treasury Department. Money laundering might or might not be involved."
"But it only covers cash transactions?" Connie asked.
"That's the one that gets all the attention," Johnson said. "There are several types of reports. A $10,000 cash transaction requires a Currency Transaction Report, or CTR, but there are record keeping requirements for lesser amounts, and the regulations apply to a much broader range of organizations than just banks. Money Service Businesses, or MSBs, are covered, among others."
"What's an MSB?" Connie asked.
"It's a broad cat
egory," Johnson said, "Think check cashing services, places that sell or redeem money orders or traveler's checks, just to name a few. Get the idea?"
"Yes, thanks. I didn't realize Big Brother was quite that nosey," Connie said.
"Well, that's one way of looking at it, I guess. The intent is to make it tough for people to move money around for illegal purposes. Like I said a minute ago, CTRs are pretty well known; so's the $10,000 rule. But there's another category of reports called Suspicious Activity Reports, or SARs. That's what flagged the Lewises."
"And what's an SAR, in a nutshell?" Paul asked.
"Any covered institution -- could be a bank, an insurance company, an MSB, almost anything -- is required to file an SAR any time they see activity that might indicate somebody's trying to avoid the $10,000 rule, or any other currency regulation. There's obvious stuff, like two cash deposits from the same customer to the same institution in a relatively short time that total more than $10,000, for example. Less obvious would be a bank somehow discovering that a customer split a deposit of more than $10,000 in cash over two different banks. How would they notice? Maybe a customer inadvertently leaves a deposit receipt for the other bank at the teller window. Dumb, but it happens."
"So then the bank has to file an SAR?" Connie asked.
Johnson chuckled. "Maybe. Maybe not. Let's say the teller knows the customer runs a retail business that takes in a lot of cash -- maybe a dry cleaner -- and they do this frequently, for some sound business reason. Then the bank wouldn't think it was suspicious, so they wouldn't have to file an SAR."
"That's clear as mud," Paul said.
"Yeah, and in a lot of cases, the banks report it anyway, either to play it safe under the reporting requirements, or because a new employee didn't know the customer, or ... well, you get the idea."
"What a mess," Connie said.
"Uh-huh, it is," Johnson agreed. "Before I tell you how we deal with that, I need to let you know one more quirk about the reports we've talked about. You with me so far?"
"Maybe," Paul said.
"Well, you asked. Not that I blame you. Now, the next quirky thing. When an institution files a CTR, they're required to let the customer know, okay?"
Sails Job - A Connie Barrera Thriller: The 6th Novel in the Caribbean Mystery and Adventure Series (Connie Barrera Thrillers) Page 9