“You like my club?” he asked.

  His guests couldn’t take their eyes off the girl in the long, red wig swinging naked on the pole.

  Vladimir said, “I have to run this joint seven days a week for an entire month to clean the amount of cash I can wash in a single viatical settlement.”

  Leonid from Brighton Beach shot him a steely look. “We didn’t come here to talk viatical settlements. That’s off the table.”

  “I just don’t understand why.”

  The banker raised his hands, as if refereeing. “Let’s not go down that road. The fact is that Brighton Beach was planning to flush ten million dollars a month through viatical settlements for the foreseeable future. That option is no longer attractive. So all we want to know, Vladimir, is this: What alternative are you offering?”

  He sipped his vodka. “The blood bank is coming along.”

  “Ha!” said the wrestler. “What a joke.”

  “It’s not a joke. It’s on the verge of taking off.”

  “Will never work. You can’t possibly do enough volume to wash ten million dollars a month.”

  “How would you know?”

  “The best money-laundering operations have some amount of legitimate business. You have two stinking vans. You can’t even draw enough blood off the street to fill the handful of orders you get each week.”

  “We’ve filled every single order.”

  “Yeah. And you had to take blood from cadavers to do it.”

  The banker grimaced. “You took blood from cadavers?”

  Vladimir was smoldering.

  “Tell him,” said the wrestler.

  “It’s not important.”

  “Then I’ll tell him. We had a woman in Georgia with a two-million-dollar viatical settlement. AIDS patient. Should have been dead three years ago, so the order went out to expedite her expiration. Vladimir farmed out the job to some joker who injected her with a bizarre virus, which is a whole problem by itself. But to make matters worse, he took three liters of blood from her.”

  “Is that true, Vladimir?”

  He belted back the last of his vodka, then poured himself a refill. “Who would have thought they’d notice?”

  “Ever heard of an autopsy, you idiot?” said the wrestler.

  “It was an honest mistake. Why leave perfectly good AIDS-infected blood in a dead body when you can sell it for good profit?”

  “It’s that kind of small-time, foolish greed that makes it impossible for us to do business with you people in Miami.”

  “So this is why Brighton Beach canceled the viatical contract?” said Vladimir.

  “Your man shot her up with a virus so rare that the National Center for Disease Control has her blood under the microscope. And then he took three liters of her blood with him. Why not just paint a big red ‘M’ on your chest that stands for ‘murderer’? You’re going to get us all caught.”

  “So you admit it. One mistake in the whole arrangement, and the hot shots in Brighton Beach think they can just walk away from our deal.”

  “We don’t have to explain ourselves to you people. The decision was made, and it was blessed at a high level. End of story.”

  “It’s not the end of it,” Vladimir said as he pounded the table with his fist. “We put a lot of time into this viatical deal. Things are in place. And you just think you can pull the plug, see ya later?”

  “We have good reasons.”

  “None that I’ve heard.”

  “I’ve said all I’m going to say.”

  “Then fuck you!” said Vladimir as he threw a glass of vodka in his guest’s face.

  The wrestler lunged across the table. Dancers screamed and ran for it as the banker ducked to the floor. Three huge bouncers were all over the wrestler before he could get a hand on Vladimir.

  The wrestler was red-faced, eyes bulging. But the bouncers had both his arms pinned behind his back.

  “This is the way you treat your guests?” he said, huffing. “I was invited here.”

  “And now you’re invited to leave.” Vladimir jerked his head, a signal to his boys. “Throw his ass out.”

  The wrestler cursed nonstop in Russian and at the top of his lungs as the bouncers put the strong-arm on him and dragged him away.

  The banker peered out from under the table.

  “You too, Sasha. Beat it.”

  The little man scurried away like a frightened rabbit.

  The barmaid immediately replaced the spilled bottle of vodka. Vladimir refilled his drink, and with a snap of his fingers the dancers resumed their posts at the brass poles, backs arched, breasts out, hair flying. The music had never stopped, and the scuffle was over.

  Or maybe it had just begun.

  Either way, the girls kept right on dancing.

  48

  •

  Jack watched the six-o’clock evening news from the couch in his living room. Cindy was right beside him, their fingers interlaced. She was squeezing so hard it almost hurt, and Jack wasn’t sure if it was a sign of support or anger.

  Rumors of an impending indictment had been flying all afternoon, and in a competitive news market where a story just wasn’t a story unless “You heard it here first,” the media was all over it.

  A silver-haired anchorman looked straight at him as the obligatory graphic of the scales of justice appeared behind him on the screen. “A former girlfriend is dead, and a questionable million-and-a-half-dollar deal is under scrutiny by a Florida grand jury. Jack Swyteck, son of Florida’s former governor Harold Swyteck, may be in trouble with the law again.”

  “Why do they have to do that?” said Cindy.

  “They always have.” His entire life, any time he’d gotten into trouble, he was always “Jack Swyteck, son of Harold Swyteck.”

  Trumpets blared and drums beat, the usual fanfare for the Action News opening.

  “Good evening,” the newsman continued. “We first brought you this exclusive story several weeks ago, when the body of thirty-one-year-old Jessie Merrill was found dead in the home of prominent Miami attorney Jack Swyteck. At first blush her death appeared to be suicide, but now prosecutors aren’t so sure. Action News reporter Heather Brown is live outside the Metro-Dade Justice Center. Heather, what’s the latest?”

  The screen flashed to a perfectly put-together young woman standing in a parking lot at dusk. The Justice Center was visible in the distant background, and a half-dozen teenage boys wearing bulky gang clothing, thick gold chains, and backward Nike caps, were gyrating behind her, as if that added credibility to her live report. Long strands of black hair slapped at her face like a bullwhip. She’d obviously committed the cardinal rookie mistake of positioning her roving camera crew downwind.

  “Steve, sources close to this investigation have told Action News that a grand jury has been looking into the death of Jessie Merrill for some time now. Information obtained exclusively by Action News indicates that Miami-Dade prosecutor Benno Jancowitz has presented to the grand jury something that one source calls substantial evidence that Ms. Merrill’s death was not suicide but homicide. This source went on to tell us that indictments could come down at any time now.”

  The anchorman jumped in. “Is there any indication who may be charged and what the charges may be?”

  “That information has yet to be released. But again, the operative word here is ‘indictments,’ plural, not just the indictment of a single suspect. Sources tell us that this could turn into a case of alleged murder-for-hire. Right now, the spotlight is on Jack Swyteck and his former client, Theo Knight. Mr. Knight has a long criminal record and even spent four years on Florida’s death row for the murder of a nineteen-year-old convenience store clerk before being released on a legal technicality.”

  “Technicality?” said Jack, groaning. “The man was innocent.”

  Cindy gave him a soulful look, as if she fully understood the telling nature of the media’s negative spin on Theo’s belated vindication. It would probably be the same for Jack. In the court of public opinion, it didn’t matter what happened from here on out. The stigma would always be there.

  Jack switched stations and caught the tail end of the anchorwoman’s report on Eyewitness News: “Repeated calls to Mr. Swyteck this afternoon went unanswered, but I understand that Eyewitness News reporter Peter Rollings has just managed to catch up with his famous father, former Florida governor Harold Swyteck, on Ajax Mountain in Aspen, Colorado, where he and the former first lady are enjoying a ski vacation.”

  “What the heck?” said Jack.

  The screen flashed to a snow-covered man on the side of a steep mountain. It was a blizzard, nearly white-out conditions. Jack watched his father stumble off the chair lift, practically assaulted by some guy in a ski mask who was chasing him with a microphone.

  “Governor! Governor Swyteck!”

  Harry Swyteck looked back, obviously confused, one ski in the air in a momentary loss of balance, poles flailing like a broken windmill. He finally caught his balance, and momentum carried him down the slope.

  The shivering reporter looked back toward the camera and said, “Well, looks like the former governor won’t speak to us, either.”

  Jack hit the off button. “I can’t watch this.”

  The phone rang. For an instant, Jack was sure that his father was calling from deep in some snow bank to ask “What the hell did you do this time, son?” The Caller ID display told him otherwise. Jack hadn’t been answering all afternoon, but this time it was Rosa.

  “Well, the wolves are out,” she said.

  “I saw.”

  “Your old man should take up hot-dog skiing. He must have skidded at least fifty yards on one ski before sailing down that mountain.”

  “That’s not funny.”

  “None of this is. That’s why I called. I want to meet with both you and Theo. Tonight.”

  “Where?”

  “I’m home already, so let’s do it here.”

  “How soon?”

  “As soon as you can get your buddy over here. We need to get to Theo before the prosecutor does.”

  “You don’t seriously think that Theo would cut a deal with Jancowitz, do you?”

  “You just heard the news as plainly as I did. Theo is targeted as the gunman in a murder-for-hire scheme. It’s standard operating procedure for a prosecutor in a case like this: You get the gunman to flip in order to nail the guy who hired him.”

  “I agree that we should meet, but you need to understand. I didn’t hire Theo to do anything. And even if I had, Theo would never testify against me. I’m the guy who got him off death row.”

  “Let me ask you something, Jack. How many years did Theo spend on death row?”

  “Four.”

  “Now answer me this: You think he wants to go back?”

  Jack paused, and he didn’t like the direction his thoughts were taking him. “I’ll see you in an hour. Theo and I both will be there. Together. I guarantee it.”

  49

  •

  Katrina picked at the peas in her microwaved-dinner tray. The evening news had drifted into the weather segment, but she was still pondering the lead story. Two things were clear to her. The indictments were a foregone conclusion. And the timing of the leaks had a funny smell to them. She pushed away from the kitchen table and grabbed her car keys.

  It was time to call Sam Drayton.

  Rarely did she make a call directly to the lead prosecutor, but this was no time to get caught up in Justice Department bureaucracy. In less than five minutes she reached the 7-Eleven on Bird Road. She jumped out of her car, hurried past the homeless guy sleeping on the curb, and called Drayton from the outside pay phone.

  “Moon over Miami,” she said into the telephone. It was the code phrase that would immediately convey to him that she was talking of her own free will, not with a mobster’s gun to her head.

  “What’s up, Katrina?”

  “Swyteck and his friend Theo are all over the local news tonight. Story has it that they’re going to be indicted in a murder-for-hire scheme.”

  “Is that so?”

  “As if you didn’t know.”

  “I’m in Virginia. How would I know?”

  The homeless guy had his hand out. Katrina gave him a quarter and waved him away. “Look, if Swyteck and his friend are going to be indicted, that’s fine. That’s the way the system works. But these leaks aren’t fair.”

  “I can’t control what comes out of the state attorney’s office.”

  “Like hell. You asked Jancowitz to leak it, didn’t you?”

  “Grand-jury investigations are secret by law. That’s a pretty serious accusation.”

  “Two days ago, after Swyteck paid me a visit at the blood unit, I called and told you I needed him and Theo Knight out of my hair. Suddenly it’s all over the news that they’re about to be indicted in a murder conspiracy. You expect me to believe that a leak like that one is just a coincidence?”

  “Totally.”

  “Stop being cute. Swyteck’s bad enough. But do you know what it means to a guy like Theo Knight to have the word on the street that he’s a grand-jury target on a murder charge?”

  “I told you, I can’t control what Jancowitz does.”

  “Don’t you understand? Theo sat across the table from my boss at the Brown Bear and talked viatical business. He made it clear that he’s figured out the money-laundering scheme. Vladimir isn’t going to let a guy like that just sit around peacefully under the threat of an indictment. He’ll put a bullet in his brain before he can cut a deal with the prosecutor and tell everything he knows about the money-laundering operation.”

  “I can’t control what the Russian mob does.”

  “Is that all you can say, that everything’s out of your control?”

  “I can’t control the things I can’t control.”

  “Then maybe you can’t control me, either.”

  “Watch yourself, Katrina. Don’t bite the hand that feeds you.”

  “You’ve got nothing on me. I went to the U.S. attorney’s office the minute I discovered that my employer might be doing something illegal. I volunteered for this undercover work because I wanted to nail these bastards worse than you did.”

  “Ah, yes. Katrina the Whistleblower.”

  “It’s true. I was squeaky clean coming in.”

  “You’re not squeaky clean anymore, honey. You turn against me, I’ll turn against you. As far as I’m concerned, you’ve been part of an illegal operation for the past eight months.”

  “You son of a bitch. You just see this as a cost of doing business, don’t you? If someone gets in your way, you just push them aside for good.”

  “I’m simply trying to preserve the integrity of an eight-month investigation that has cost the U.S. government over a million dollars.”

  “And a bullet in the back of Theo Knight’s head is a small price to pay. Is that it?”

  “Listen, lady. We wouldn’t be in this mess in the first place if you hadn’t fumbled around in the dark and picked up the wrong cell phone.”

  “Actually, we wouldn’t be in this mess if you hadn’t told me to beat the holy crap out of Jack Swyteck for treading too close to your blessed investigation.”

  “I never told you to do that.”

  “Maybe not in so many words. But I told you that Vladimir was going to make me prove myself somehow, and you said go ahead and do what I had to do. I’ll stick to that story until the day I die.”

  Silence fell over the line, then Drayton finally spoke. “I’m warning you, Katrina. Don’t you dare do anything stupid.”

  “Don’t worry. If I do, you’ll be the last to know.” She hung up the phone and returned to her car.

  50

  •

  Jack picked up Theo from Sparky’s, and the two of them reached Rosa’s house in Coco Plum around eight o’clock. Hers was typical for the neighborhood, a thirteen-thousand-square-foot, multilevel, completely renovated, Mediterranean-style quasi hotel with a pool, a boat, and drop-dead views of the water.

  “Nice digs,” said Theo as they stepped down from Jack’s car.

  “Yeah. If you like this sort of overindulgence.”

  “Spoken like a true have-not.”

  They climbed thirty-eight steps to the front door but didn’t have to knock. Rosa spotted them in the security cameras. She greeted them at the door and then led them to her home office, a term that struck Jack as especially meaningful, as this particular office did seem larger than the average home.

  Rosa’s former law partner was already inside waiting for them. Jack knew Rick Thompson. They shook hands, and he introduced himself to Theo. Then Rosa explained his presence.

  “I invited Rick because it seems appropriate for Theo to have his own lawyer. From what we’ve heard so far, you two may end up being codefendants on a conspiracy charge.”

  Rick said, “You never want alleged coconspirators to be represented by one lawyer. It tends to reinforce the idea of a conspiracy.”

  “I agree with that,” said Jack.

  “Sounds good to me, too,” said Theo. “Except I doubt I can afford my own lawyer.”

  Rosa said, “No problem. Jack will pay for it.”

  Jack did a double take, but before he could say anything Theo slapped him on the back and said, “Thanks, buddy.”

  “You’re welcome,” was all he could say.

  Jack and Theo seated themselves in the armchairs on one side of the square coffee table in the center of the room. Rick sat on the leather couch. Rosa stood off to the side as her housekeeper brought pitchers of iced tea and water on a silverplated tray. Jack glanced discreetly at his lawyer and caught her taking in a long, meditative eyeful of the framed work of art that hanged behind her desk. It was a contemporary piece by the late Cuban-born artist Felix Gonzalez-Torres, a renowned boundary-buster who was best known for ephemeral pieces made of candies or printed paper that visitors could touch or even take home with them. Rosa liked to call her little share of Felix “the stress-buster,” as it calmed her just to look at it. Jack wasn’t sure if the magic flowed from the innate beauty of the work or from the sheer joy of having acquired it long before the artist died and his work started selling at Christie’s for seven figures.