by James Lepore
“I’ll come with you.”
“No way. If I learn anything I’ll give it to you. You can add it to your trove of information, to be used as we’ve agreed.”
19.
4:00 PM, December 12, 2004, Newark
On Sunday afternoon Jay drove to Newark to see Bill Davis. He did not call him in advance. If Davis had been persuaded by Chris Markey to retract his story, there must have been a compelling reason, and he might refuse to meet, or avoid Jay’s calls. The storm that had started during Markey’s visit to Jay’s office had sputtered on and off over the last two days, but was now gathering force, and snow was falling heavily as he drove along Route 280—one of the many major highways that crisscrossed northern New Jersey’s suburban sprawl—into the city.
He’d spent the bulk of his time over the past two days organizing, in his mind and on paper, the facts, events, and personalities that had been swirling in his head since the night he learned of Danny’s murder. He did no legal work in those two days, but neither did he drink. Clearheaded for the first time in weeks, he was certain that the seeds of Dan’s death were planted thirty years ago while Bryce and Kate Powers were living in Mexico, and that Bryce and Kate had surely reaped from the same sowing.
Hoping that Davis would go on record with the true story, Jay had brought a small cassette recorder with him—the one he used at his office to dictate letters to Cheryl—and he checked to make sure it was still in the front pocket of his coat as he neared the Colonnade Towers. There was a Sorry, Full sign across the entrance to the underground parking garage. As he drove slowly past it he could see, through the swirling snow, a crowd of people milling about the atrium lobby that connected the two buildings. The spaces on the street were also all taken, but Jay remembered that at the side of Building B there was a service entrance and a small blacktopped area designated for delivery vehicles. Danny, who encountered no rule that he was not happy to break, had pointed this area out to Jay as a good place to park, especially at night, if the underground garage was full. Jay parked there, and after trying the door of the service entrance and finding it locked, he trudged through the snow to the main entrance, over which was hung a sign, rimmed in flashing colored lights, announcing “Tree Lighting Tonight 5 p.m.”
In the center of the lobby there was a tall Christmas tree—maybe twenty feet high—decorated to the hilt and strung with as yet unlit multicolored lights. It was four fifty-five. The crowd of a hundred or so people, mostly parents with their kids and a sprinkling of grandparents, was waiting for the big event. Jay made his way through the chatting adults and the scampering kids to the Building A elevator, where, once inside and riding up, he heard the same piped-in Christmas carols that were playing in the lobby. With Danny gone, and his two boys out of the picture, Jay had been trying not to think about Christmas, but what was the use? Too many reminders.
On the tenth floor, Jay found Davis’s apartment, 10D, and rang the bell situated on the left doorjamb, hearing its muted ring inside. The long hallway, subtly lit by tasteful brass sconces, seemed hushed after the noisy activity of the lobby, where, Jay thought, Bill Davis could very well be, sipping eggnog with his friends and neighbors, waiting for the tree lighting to take place. After a minute or so, he tried again, and then knocked sharply, saying, “Bill, it’s Jay Cassio. Are you there?” Again there was only quiet, and Jay, disappointed, took one of his business cards out of his wallet, found a pen in an inside coat pocket, wrote on the back of the card “Bill, Please call me. It’s important,” and slipped the card under the door.
At the elevator, Jay pushed the down button and was bracing himself for the seasonal Muzak, when he heard a door opening in the direction of Davis’s apartment. Turning, he saw a young Hispanic man, in his mid-twenties, with thick, shiny black hair and a heavy beard, step out of 10D. He was carrying a gun with a silencer attached to the end of its barrel. He stared at Jay and, no more than thirty feet away, Jay stared at him. Then, as Jay heard the elevator doors opening and the sounds of “Silent Night” coming from the car, the man raised his arm and aimed his pistol at Jay’s head. As he was pulling on the trigger, another young Hispanic man, a taller, near-clone of the first, stepped out of the apartment into the shooter’s line of fire, causing him to crouch and move to the right before firing. As this was happening, Jay was stepping into the elevator, pushing the L button, and wondering if the doors would close in time to save his life, or if he would die in Newark, where he was born.
In the lobby the holiday crowd, now even bigger, was gathered around the tree, now beautifully lit, belting out carols while the Muzak continued to play in the background. Jay quickly walked into the crowd, thinking he could make his way to the front entrance and thence out into the night; but before he could get there, he saw the stairwell door open and his pursuers enter the lobby, where he was easy to spot, standing six-foot-three, and white, among a sea of mostly smaller people, all of them black.
The young Latinos headed around the crowd to their right, toward the front doors, to block Jay’s escape. Jay watched them commit themselves, and then moved quickly in the opposite direction, toward the service entrance at the side of Building B, where his car, and escape, awaited. The service door opened easily from the inside, and as he was pulling it closed behind him, he saw the two Latinos entangled in a group of children at the hot chocolate table. He got a good look at them, and they him. The last thing he saw was the sly smile on the face of the shooter.
Jay’s Saab was equal to Route 280’s slick, snow-covered roadbed, with its sweeping curves and steep climbs and descents, as was Jay, the storm and the dangerous road no match for the adrenaline pumping godlike strength and clarity through his veins and into his mind. Not until he was home and had taken off his coat did exhaustion begin to set in, and did his brain register the pain in his upper left arm, which was soaked with blood through his wool sweater and the shirt he wore under it. Peeling off his clothes in his kitchen, he saw that the wound was a two-inch furrow, a half inch deep, and that the flow of blood was slowing to a seeping trickle.
Sweating and a little nauseated, he poured himself a juice glass full of bourbon and drank half of it straight off. Then he found a small towel, soaked it with hydrogen peroxide, and wrapped it around the wound. Naked from the waist up, he brought the bourbon bottle, the half full glass, and his cigarettes into the living room, where he sat on the couch. He finished the glass of bourbon and poured himself another. He did not have the strength to light a cigarette, nor to reflect much on his near-death experience. Just before he fell asleep, he remembered the sardonic smile on the shooter’s face as he made his escape. We will meet again gringo, it said. Have no doubt.
20.
June, 2003, Mexico City
The suitcase was made of a dark brown, heavy-duty synthetic material with a faux leather look to it. It had chrome fasteners and a belt of chrome around its perimeter. It was on the coffee table when Isabel entered Herman’s living room and, although she and Herman and Edgar and Jose Feria were sitting around this table, the suitcase had not come up in their conversation. Isabel assumed it contained cash—American dollars—which she had been transporting for Herman to places in and out of Mexico for the past two years.
“Do you know Juan Paredes?” Herman asked Isabel.
“No.”
“You never met him, not even once? He considered himself quite attractive to woman.”
“I would tell you if I did.”
“He’s dead,” Herman said. “His head is in the suitcase.”
Isabel gave Herman one of her nothing looks, and then glanced over at Jose, who was smiling. She had heard that Jose beheaded his victims, but had been reluctant to believe it, even of him. She looked back at Herman, remaining silent, her face a blank.
“Would you like to see it?”
“No.”
“We’ll show you, anyway.” Herman nodded at Jose, who deftly flipped up the suitcase’s clasps and lifted it open. There, lying on a cr
eamy white towel, was indeed a human head, the face pallid and ghostly, the long, dark hair greasy, the raw, jagged flesh of the neck, where Jose’s machete had done its work, ringed with dried blood. Jose reached in, took his trophy by the hair, and lifted it, dangling it at eye level before Isabel, who looked from it to the still smiling Jose, not sure which face was the more ghastly.
“Take it away,” Herman said, “and say good-bye to Isabel. You won’t be seeing her for a while.” The facetiousness of this comment was lost on Edgar and Jose, but not on Isabel. They never said hello or good-bye, and everything in between they kept to the absolutely practical. She watched as Jose carefully—tenderly—replaced the head, closed the suitcase, and rose with Edgar. Ignoring her, Herman’s panthers, as he had taken to calling them, nodded to their master and left.
“Macho Juan was stealing from us,” Herman said when the Ferias were gone. “You will take his place.”
Isabel knew who Paredes was: a former high school teacher in Guadalajara who spoke unaccented English, recruited by Herman to run a money laundering operation in the States.
“Where will I live?”
“In West Palm Beach, in a condo owned by Senor Bryce Powers.”
“Who is Senor Bryce Powers?”
“A businessman with bank accounts in many cities. Our cash is placed in those accounts and then wired to private banks. Powers gets a fee for each transaction.”
“How much cash?”
“Many millions. And business is getting better. You will be busy.”
“You trust me so much?” Isabel’s affect had remained flat, but she let a slight smile flicker across her face as she said this. It was a deceitful smile, one that she knew Herman would take as a sign of timidity and even affection. It was one among many in the repertoire she used to seduce men so that Herman could photograph them and bend them to his will.
“You could have stolen and run off any time in these past two years. We know each other a long time, Isabel. I have kept my word, have I not?”
Isabel had lived with Herman for five years before moving into a one-bedroom apartment in his building. She drove a Mercedes convertible and had had private tutors in English, world literature, French, and art history. But she was watched at all times and she knew it, her only freedom the freedom to think as she pleased and assess her prison, which she did constantly. The phone in her apartment, she knew, was bugged, the tapes delivered daily to Herman by the woman who cleaned for both of them.
“Yes,” she replied, lying again, knowing that Herman’s word was worthless, and that, had she tried to run, he would have known about it and run her to ground almost instantly. And then killed her.
“Then you surely know that if you steal from me, you will not get away with it. My young panthers will track you down, and they will do horrible things to you before they slice off your beautiful head. I do not believe you will steal from me. You are too intelligent. I only tell you this because you raise the question of trust. And because now we are talking about large sums of money. My money.”
“How long will I be in the States?”
“I’m not sure. A year, two years. We think Powers may be stealing as well. Everyone lies—the dealers, the collectors, the middlemen. Some of them are not our people. We launder for several other organizations from time to time, for very fat fees. You will keep a close watch on Powers.”
“How close?”
“As close as possible. Sleep with him if you have to. He is coming to the end of his usefulness, anyway, but if he is stealing I of course want to know, and we would want to recover our money. He was a hundred and fifty thousand short last month. I don’t think Paredes had that kind of balls.”
“It could have been the dealers or the collectors.”
“We have killed our dealers in New York and New Jersey. Their replacements will not steal—for a while—so we will see. With the Medellin and the Felix people it is not so simple. We cannot kill them without clear proof. Your job will be to tell us if Powers is stealing. We will handle the others.”
“Does Powers handle cash?”
“Yes. Occasionally deliveries are made directly to him. With large sums it is easier, and safer. He would then send Paredes out to make numerous deposits.”
“If he’s smart, he’s taking from the Medellin and Felix people.”
“Of course.”
“When do I leave?”
“Tomorrow. Powers will meet you in West Palm Beach. You will have a lot to talk about. We have already started contacting the dealers, so you will have no trouble there. You will contact me through our lawyers in Houston. Go and start packing. We will go over the details tonight at dinner.”
Isabel got up. She was wearing a long, white cotton skirt, with the miniature faces of Incan gods printed discreetly on it, white sandals, a navy blue jersey top, and a white cashmere sweater tied around her shoulders. Her necklace was of the finest cultured pearls. The faint smell of Mexico City’s polluted air reached her nostrils from the open French doors that gave onto the apartment’s wraparound balcony. She had slept late that morning, then gone to her spa after breakfast. She stood now, letting Herman, a connoisseur, appreciate her beauty for a second before turning to leave. “Sit,” he said.
Isabel sat. “Yes?” she said.
“Your pay will be doubled. And when you return—if all goes well—your life will be different. No more sucking strange dicks simply because I say so. Perhaps it is time for you to settle down with one man. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Herman, I do. Thank you.”
Isabel left, and Herman took his drink out to the balcony, where he stood and gazed out at the endless expanse of Mexico City. The seat of his kingdom. Isabel, twenty-six, was not yet in her prime as a woman, but she, too, was coming to the end of her usefulness. It saddened him that she had to die. No Arabian thoroughbred, no mythical goddess, no flawless, perfectly cut diamond, nothing that is defined strictly by its physical beauty could compare to her. She had suffered, and it did not escape Herman, who, at the age of sixty-four, had seen all there was to see of life, that Isabel’s pain had deepened and burnished her beauty. But Rafael was in line to be president, and Lazaro was about to be appointed attorney general; and Herman’s tentacles, legal and illegal, reached everywhere. They would control the entire country, and could do anything they wished to do. It would be dangerous to keep Isabel, who knew much too much about Herman’s business and his connections with Rafael and others, around. He would do a good thing: He would end her suffering. And perhaps use her to help him eliminate Senor Powers, who had assuredly suffered as well, but who, unlike Isabel, had brought all of his pain upon his own head.
21.
11:00 AM, December 13, 2004, Montclair
“If the police don’t have your card, that means the killers do,” said Frank Dunn.
Jay did not answer. Frank watched as he consumed the bacon, eggs, home fries, and toast that he had made for both of them. They were sitting at Jay’s kitchen table. Outside, the snow had finally stopped and the world was silent. Bill Davis’s body, shot once in the forehead and once in the heart, at close range, had been found earlier that morning by his daughter, who had come to pick him up for church. During the tree lighting ceremony last night several people had seen two swarthy Latino men, in their mid-twenties, chasing a tall, good-looking white man with long, wavy brown hair, in his late-thirties-to-early-forties, through the lobby. This Frank had learned from Linda Marshall, who, tipped off by one of her many police contacts, had arrived at the Colonnade Towers while the crime scene team was still in Davis’s apartment.
“Do you think Garland’s holding the card, playing games?” Jay asked, pushing his empty plate away.
Frank had found Jay in his living room, drinking coffee, reading the Star-Ledger, a blood-soaked towel clumsily knotted around the top of his left arm. The detective thoroughly cleaned Jay’s flesh wound, put a makeshift butterfly bandage on it, then made breakfast while Jay recounted th
e events of the evening before.
“No,” Frank replied. “I talked to the uniformed guys that responded. There was no business card under the door.”
“Well,” said Jay, “I’m going to Florida tomorrow, anyway.”
“That might not be a bad idea, actually.”
Linda had spotted a man crossing the lobby who matched Jay’s description of Chris Markey. When she tried to interview him she was abruptly blocked by his two assistants. A few minutes later Ralph Greco appeared to tell her that there would be no press interviews of any kind and that she had to leave the building so that his people could secure it and do their work. When Jay’s phone went unanswered, she’d called Frank.
“I’ll need Angelo Perna’s number.”
“Angelo Perna?”
“Yes, Angelo Perna.”
Frank, sipping his coffee, remained silent. That Jay had been in a free fall was obvious, but free falls were not always bad. They could clear the head in an amazing way, as long as you didn’t hit the ground.
“I’m going to talk to the clerk at the hotel, too,” said Jay.
“And what else?”
“Visit the office at Royal Palm Plantation in West Palm. That’s the property that Donna Kelly was supposed to be running for Bryce. It’s the only Powers property in Florida, in any event.”
“Just drop everything?”
“I could use a vacation.”
“So you’re looking at this like it’s a two-week cruise where the passengers get to solve a murder as a fun activity?”
“Of course not.”
“It could take time,” Frank said. “What about your practice?”
“I’m worthless at the office. I’ve been giving Donnie more and more work. He can pretty much run it while I’m gone.”
Frank lit a cigarette and looked out of the bay window in Jay’s kitchen to the white-clad woods behind the house. Donnie, he knew, was Don Jacobs, an aggressive young lawyer who had been sharing office space with Jay for the past year, and who Jay gave work to from time to time.