MIKE
I prep nineteen accounts for Colorado’s transfer. They’re all accounts I’ve used before, with varying amounts of activity, enough to give them age and legitimacy. Each account is an island, with no ties to me, to the organization, or to anything that sniffs of illegality.
I promised to move it within two days, and my clock is ticking. I should move it now. Everything is ready—I am just tense at the thought of initiating the send. The transfer is where the catch typically occurs. All it takes is one sharp-eyed banker or federal agent, one established trigger parameter that I haven’t anticipated, and—boom. Game over.
Of course, it won’t happen that quickly. Oh no, they’ll be smart. They’ll leave the funds alone while the hyenas circle and sniff and gently pull one thread, then another, and approach my assistant and neighbors with bribes and threats, and tap phones and go through every financial transaction that I’ve ever made, and start earmarking assets for seizure. My car. Our home. My 401(k). Our time-share. Jacob’s college fund. Lillian’s life insurance.
I close my eyes and tilt back in my chair, inhaling deeply, holding the breath for three seconds, then exhaling, trying to reset my heart, which is galloping like a racehorse who has grabbed the bit in his mouth.
If Lillian had just waited to die for one year. One fucking year. Or if she had keeled over during a routine surgery or a car accident. No, she had to die on the damn beach at Malibu, after making a series of ridiculous calls, and right after making a fool of me and our marriage. She had to die, which freaked out the organization and prompted this move, which just might sink everything.
My phone dings and I groan and pick it up. It’s a text and I want to throw the device in the garbage disposal as soon as I read it.
Have you started the transfer yet? Ticktock.
I’ve stalled long enough. I need to just bite the bullet and do it. I push away from the desk and go to the pantry, the faux pumpkin can right up front, the key to the liquor cabinet popped out and in my hand in a second.
Lillian always thought I locked up our liquor because of Jacob, but I could give a damn if he steals a few sips. There’re not many bottles of value there, and only one worth more than a few bills. I reach up and fit the key into the fireproof locker and open the case. I reach in for the twentieth-anniversary box of Benromach, but it isn’t there. I sweep a hand over the inside of the cabinet, my panic mounting as I look for the distinct wooden box, the box that isalwaysthere, the box that has been in this case for nine years, the box that contains a slip of paper, tucked underneath the velvet lining, with the sixty-four-digit Bitcoin encryption key written on it. The encryption key that I need to access Colorado.
The box isn’t there.
CHAPTER 55
LENNY
Detective Gersh agrees to meet and suggests some preppy breakfast joint, way up in Hollywood. There’s no parking within five blocks, and I’m sweating and pissed by the time I shoulder past four hipsters and into the cramped front entryway. The interior is cool, and I squint, finding a uniform sitting in one of the booths halfway back, a damn mimosa in front of him. I pause beside him and nod, indicating for him to switch seats.
“What?” He looks up at me.
“Let me have that seat.”
“Shut the fuck up. Take that one.”
“I don’t like my back to the door.” I move to the side to give him room to get out.
“Yeah, neither do I.” The man stays in place, and if he is intimidated by my six-foot-four build and massive beer gut, he doesn’t show it.
“Fine. Scoot over.” I grip the table and begin to slide in next to him, using my ample ass to push him toward the wall.
Gersh moves just enough to accommodate, then gives me a look that could peel plaster. “You’re a pain in the ass.”
“That’s what they say.” I push his mimosa toward him with a finger that’s still grubby from digging out graves.
“Aw, screw this.” He shoves at my arm. “I’ll move to the other side. You have shoulders like a damn bison.”
I oblige, and within a minute everything is as it should be and I grunt with contentment and pick up the menu. There is chocolate chip cookie–crusted french toast, which sounds interesting, and I order that, along with a cup of black coffee.
I nod to his mimosa flute. “Drinking on the job?”
“I just got off the night shift. I’d take an Irish coffee, but I plan on hitting the bed as soon as we finish up here.”
An Irish coffee. I try not to stare at the drink card that is stuck in between the salt and pepper shakers. I’d kill for some Jameson right now. Or better yet, a Bloody Mary with an extra shot. I grimace at a pain that rips through my stomach. “Well, I won’t keep you long.”
A woman walks by in shorts that expose half her butt cheeks and legs that go up to her ears. I try not to look and fail. Gersh grins at me, and I scowl back. So this is the new generation of cops. Champagne-drinking preppies. The man has clean fingernails, for shit’s sake. Probably enjoys the paperwork.
“What?” Gersh leaned forward. “What are you thinking?”
“I had a guy like you in my academy. Name was Loresner.”