by Jean Martino
Later that night when she called to fill Jessica in on what had happened so far, her sister sounded alarmed.
“Linda, I think you should come back here as soon as possible. It doesn’t sound like your staying there is helping you find Cindy and Michael, and Scott seems to have it all under control.”
“I know, but I can’t leave here until this is all resolved somehow,” said Linda, feeling drained. “I am sure wherever Cindy and Michael are they are okay, but it seems also that they feel I shouldn’t know in case what happened today happened; those reporters and the FBI. I never was good at lying, so I’m sure they decided the best thing was for me to know nothing.”
“I understand,” said Jessica, sighing. “They did all they could by selling your stock and depositing the money in that bank account to let you know not to worry. But it’s hard not to. I’m still confused as to where they could have sent the money to in Australia.”
“That makes two of us,” said Linda. “But I’m not worried about that right now as much as Michael getting clear of any charges connecting him to money laundering. Scott said earlier when I talked to him in LA that he had some good news for me when he returns tomorrow, so I am holding positive thoughts.”
“Linda, do you think they could be in Australia?”
“I wondered that too, but I don’t know.”
“Well if they are then they would have gone to your home I think and we go by twice a day to check your mail and---”
“Jessica!” Linda suddenly cried. “Perhaps they will try to contact me through the postal mail. Have you received anything that looks unusual lately?”
“No,” she replied. “Only advertising stuff wanting you to buy stuff at discount or enter competitions, and some travel brochures--—”
“Travel brochures? Who from?”
“I don’t remember. I tossed them all in the garbage bin as I received them. I didn’t think you’d be interested in them.”
“Could you find them?” asked Linda.
“Oh shit!” cried Jessica. “Am I thinking the same as you that perhaps Cindy had some brochures sent to you from where they are?”
“Probably not,” said Linda, sounding tired. “I’m just grabbing at straws right now.”
“I’ll go through the bin and see if I can find them,” said Jessica. “It’s worth a try. Have you thought anymore about that American man who was looking for you here and who he’d be?”
“Joe? Did he give a last name?”
“I forgot to ask,” said Jessica.
“Well it doesn’t matter because I don’t know any American man named Joe. The only people here that have my home address in Australia are my special friends, and a few others and of course Cindy and Michael.”
After they hung up, Linda called Michael’s parents.
“Carmel,” she said when Carmel Brampton answered. “This is Linda. I don’t have any more news for you right now but wanted to touch base with you and let you know I haven’t forgotten you.”
“We appreciate that,” said Carmel. “Geoff and I have been racking our brains trying to think where Michael and Cindy could be but we can’t think of a thing. We have our prayer group at the church praying for their safety.”
“Prayer is good right now,” said Linda, feeling empathy for them. “I’ll call you tomorrow and sooner if I hear anything. You both take care now and try not to worry. I am sure Michael and Cindy are alright wherever they are, and my friend, the detective, is still working on it despite the FBI involvement.”
She walked out into the kitchen to find Maggie working on a wall hanging. “That’s lovely,” she said, sitting down next to her. “My daughter never had the patience to do crafts. I used to when I was first married to my late husband. I made heaps of things to hang around the walls.”
Matt had gone out the back to water the lawn. He was a quiet man like Jessica’s husband, Bill, and supportive, but, like Bill also, he didn’t push himself in where he felt he couldn’t contribute anything. He knew there wasn’t anything he could do regarding the situation with Linda except be there if needed.
“Matt sure is nice,” said Linda.
“Thanks,” said Maggie, staring through the window and smiling. “He’s a good man. And a good husband and father. I was lucky to marry him.”
“And he, you,” said Linda, standing up. “Right now I could use a stiff drink. Got anything around here?”
“Sure,” Maggie laughed. “I think we all could use a stiff drink right now. Let’s get all the stuff and take them out onto the patio and join Matt out there. It’s a beautiful night. And you can tell me all about Australia.”
As they were heading out the door with their trays of food and drinks, the phone rang. Linda continued outside while Maggie raced back to answer it.
“Hey,” cried Matt, seeing Linda struggling out the door with her tray and rushing to help her. “We gonna have a picnic?”
“You bet,” Linda laughed. “Maggie and I feel like getting looped and thought you’d like to join us.”
“Linda!” called Maggie coming to the door with the phone. “It’s your sister in Australia. She said she needs to talk to you right away.”
CHAPTER 21
Thursday morning June 26th:
Max answered the door still unshaven and holding his cup of coffee. “Hey Scott!” he cried. “What brings you here so early this morning? Thought you were still in LA?”
“I took the red eye back to San Francisco, then a taxi to the airport here to pickup my car. Faster than waiting for a direct flight to here,” Scott said.
“Had breakfast yet?”
“Sure did,” said Scott. “Been home and showered and changed and grabbed a bite to eat. Linda is still at Maggie’s. I’ll pick her up later. Is Mary up yet? I need to discuss something with you in private.”
“Mary’s still sleeping. She never gets up before nine am now that the kids are grown and out on their own. She says she has earned the right to sleep in now every morning.” He led the way into the living room where the morning’s paper was spread out over the carpet. Picking it up, he pointed to a chair. “Want coffee?”
“No thanks,” said Scott. Then he opened his briefcase and took out a wad of printouts. “I want you to run your expert eye down this list and tell me if any names on it ring a bell... AKA’s, that sort of thing.”
Max put his mug on the coffee table and took the sheets, then studied them for a long while. Finally he put them down again. “Carl Denholm’s the only one. Why? Who are they?”
Scott explained all that had happened in LA with Benny, then said, “I need to find out who is in the consortium that owns Carl Denholm’s hotels in Vegas. I need to find out the names of all of them.”
“Wait,” said Max, “are we thinking along the same lines here? Are you thinking these names on this list have connections with the people in the consortiums? And, if so, which consortiums are we talking about?”
“That I don’t know at this moment but hear me out for a minute.”
“Shoot,” said Max, picking up his mug again and leaning back on the couch.
“OK,” said Scott, then took a deep breath. “It’s impossible to trace where the money came from that they used to buy into the hotel consortiums for now, but I have a strong suspicion it’s money accumulating off shore, probably in underground banks in Pakistan or India or even Asia. And you know how easy it is for vast sums of money through those underground banks to be moved around from one place to the other by the internet without leaving a paper trail.”
Max nodded. “Hawalah,” he said, using the Arabic word meaning the transfer of money between two persons using a third person. “Or is it Hundi now?”
“Either one will do depending on which country its being done in,” said Scott. “But whichever system it is, it’s done through those underground banks that have no record keeping procedures, only coded messages, or chits, or telephone calls to transfer money from one country to another country.”
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Max shook his head. “A haven for drug traffickers.”
“And gun runners, and other criminal activities which I don’t want to get too deep into for now. But let’s say the owners wanted to get it into the US and legitimize it somehow. What if they sent some of it by electronic transfer to those hotels I mentioned, and then it was absorbed into the Casino’s profits. Or it could have come in through other ways, smuggled in as cash by couriers, or through internet bank accounts. There are also other ways like foreign currency exchanges, or other money transmitting services; drafts, or checks which would eliminate the need to go through financial institutions. OK, that would be hard to trace, but apart from the ownership in the hotels, let’s say these people also wanted to get some of that money out of Nevada and into some other enterprises. I know it’s done through other businesses by filtering it into cash flows, but what if there was more money in those underground banks than they could filter back into those businesses, via the Casino, without causing suspicion from the IRS?”
He stopped and waited for a minute. Max remained silent.
“They could start filtering it through the stock market, buying and selling the same futures commodities; paying for it through their cash money then receiving checks to legitimize their profits. And using that money to buy stocks; allowing the trading and selling on the open market to bring them in more legitimate money, which we now know was happening. But how did they do all that without identifying themselves? I’m thinking right now that Denholm had to be the main mover of funds and perhaps the linchpin in the consortium. I’m wondering if the money he sent to Michael to invest had to be broken into smaller units and shown under different names, perhaps AKA’s, or aliases, and then the dividend checks, and we are talking about huge dividend checks right now, would be electronically transferred to all of the different names shown in Michael’s data base, eventually being rerouted back into the economy in legitimized businesses that even the FBI couldn’t keep track of.”
Max sat up straight, his face showing his excitement. “Are you telling me you think Denholm was a front for bigger fish who used aliases?”
“I’m thinking along those lines.”
“So right now the only names known are those on this list. And they could be aliases for the owners in the consortium that owns those hotels in Vegas, who could be using aliases also to cover their true identities. And,” he continued, “if we can find out what aliases those hotel owners use or used we might be able to track them back to these clients.”
“You got it buddy,” said Scott, his face showing his own excitement. “Michael must have found out who he was really dealing with and knew he had only one way to get out of it... to disappear... period. Not even letting Cindy’s mother know where they were because what he did with these people’s stock will make him a target for every hit man in the underworld. And anyone connected to him would be under the gun too.”
“What do you mean what he did with their stock?”
Scott explained in detail what Benny had told him. “He dumped it all,” he finished. “Every last goddamn share they all had invested in, and the money was sent flowing back into the Vegas bank accounts, which we know now will have them all running for cover from the IRS, and the FBI if they get wind of it.”
“Shit!” cried Max. “Michael had better stay hidden if he values his life.”
“Which brings me to my next question,” said Scott.
“Don’t even ask it,” said Max. “We can’t afford to tangle with those gorillas. You know that.”
“I do,” said Scott, “but what if we could get the information on those in the consortiums, tying them all in to those stock holders and Denholm, and somehow use it to get Michael off the money laundering charge by offering it all to the FBI?”
“Unless of course,” said Max, “the FBI already have this information themselves. If they have closed down McLean’s then they would have gotten into the data bases and found all this wouldn’t they?”
“I don’t think so,” said Scott, “even if they did put their experts on checking the hard drives at McLean’s. Benny said his last instruction from Michael, after placing the sell orders, was to wait a day then move all those accounts to the main data base; wiping out Michael’s data base entirely by using some special stripping software to scourge it from the hard drives of every computer hooked into McLean’s computer network. The discs Benny gave me were the ones Michael had made before the sell orders went out and the data base was deleted.”
“And no one else in the firm would have this information?”
“I can’t be sure of that but it would seem like Michael covered all his tracks.”
Max stood up and began pacing back and forth across the carpet. “So, if this is the only record of those accounts, then the FBI wouldn’t know about it, and, wait... what about that Trust Fund you said Michael used to bring in the money and send it out to those people.”
“Benny said it had all been done on the internet which leaves no audit trails, and the balance left in that account, which I’m presuming was the broker’s commission fees, transferred to McLean’s personal bank account before he closed it down entirely.”
“So these accounts would now show up in the firm’s main data base as being just ordinary investors and no one could track them to Michael as being his clients, or affiliated with Denholm?”
“Once again, that I couldn’t be sure of. All I know now is that Michael could not possibly have been aware of who those people were connected to when he first started taking care of them. He had been instructed to by Roger McLean, I’m sure of it, and now Roger McLean is dead no one else, especially that dimwit they have for a president, can prove Michael was deliberately involved in anything underhand.”
“So when he did figure it all out he realized those people weren’t ones to fool around with, and that house had been an unwitting bribe for him to continue, until he finally knew the only way to get out of the clutches of these people was to just up and disappear.”
“Exactly.”
Max paced back and forth for a while, his mind racing. Scott knew what he was thinking, that Michael had nothing to fear from the FBI now because no one could prove he was a willing participant. However, Carl Denholm and his cohorts had a lot to lose if the FBI found him. The only way Michael could be safe now was to turn this file and the connections those people had to Carl Denholm’s hotel consortium over to the FBI. Michael wouldn’t even have to be involved once the ball was set rolling. His discs would be enough evidence if they could find the connections through aliases.
Max stopped pacing and turned to Scott. “I would have to go through the chief on this,” he said. “I couldn’t do it without him knowing.”
“I know,” said Scott. “I expected that.”
“OK,” said Max. “Where are you going now?”
“To Maggie’s, then I’m taking Linda back to my house for now.”
“Are you sure that’s smart? I mean if the FBI aren’t watching you and the reporters aren’t sneaking around, then it’s a possibility someone from Denholm’s mob might be watching your house. By now the whole world will know you are involved in some way even if only through being Linda’s friend.”
“Actually I thought about that too,” said Scott, frowning. “It seems to me that if the FBI and those other creeps really wanted to get to Linda they could have done so before this. I think if they are out there watching and waiting it will be only because they hope she will be contacted by Michael. She has nothing to tell them and they know that. That’s what Michael wanted, which is why he had to keep her in the dark on their whereabouts.”
“And the reporters?”
“They already found out last night she isn’t easily intimidated and has nothing to tell them.”
“Yeah, I saw her on the news last night fending off those damn newshounds. She came across very much in control. I’ll get back to you as soon as I can set up a meeting with the Chief.”
/> Scott stood up and handed over the discs, then shook Max’s hand. “Thanks buddy,” he said, “appreciate all you’re doing to help.”
* *
“I’m starting to feel like a gypsy,” Linda said, smothering a grin as Scott carried her case and plastic wrapped new clothes on hangers into his home.
“Cutest gypsy I’ve ever seen,” he said, taking her things down to his bedroom. “Love what you had done to your hair. Makes you look twenty years younger and sexy too, and sassy.”
“That’s what Maggie said too, I mean the sassy bit.” She stared in the mirror over the dressing table and fluffed her hair with her hands then shook her head and watched it bounce back into the same style again. Now that she had had time to adjust to it she loved it.