Blond Cargo (14 page)

Jack planned to take him down first.

22

Chris’s petulance filled the Skype screen as Jack forwarded the names of two specialists in the San Francisco area.

“The neurologist, Dr. Pick, said he’d squeeze you in on Monday if that works. He sounds like a good man and came highly recommended.”

“I’ve got a lit test. I’m playing catch-up as it is.”

“Then the day after. It’s important you make time,” Jack said, trying to keep the impatience out of his voice. “You shouldn’t be walking around in pain at this point in the healing process. It worries me.”

Chris’s silence hung heavily in the air. He wasn’t maintaining eye contact with the computer’s camera.

“Chris?”

The silence stung Jack to the core.

“Dr. Leland is waiting for your call. She understands the need for discretion and promised me that she took doctor-patient confidentiality very seriously. She sounded, uh, comfortable. Easy to talk to.”

“For a shrink . . . Maybe you should see her if she’s so easy.”

“Is that a note of humor I detect?” Jack said, trying to lighten the mood.

“All right, Dad, I’ve gotta go. I’ll let you know what the doc has to say. Thanks for setting it up, and thank Tommy for me. And stop worrying. It doesn’t help.” Chris abruptly clicked off.

His son’s image disappeared from the screen as quickly as Jack’s smile.

“Speak of the devil,” Maggie Sheffield said over the glow of her Marlboro. She lipped it off to one side of her mouth, keeping the smoke out of her eyes as she peered down at the parking lot directly below her deck.

Raul Vargas had just gotten out of his Mercedes and glanced up the cliff at the blowsy woman with the crazy red hair.

“Are you talking to me?” he said, brimming with attitude.

“You’re popular all of a sudden. A person of interest, as Don Johnson used to say.”

Raul’s eyes darkened. “What the hell are you talking about? Are you drunk again?”

“What’s it to ya?” Maggie stood up on unsteady legs and tamped out her smoke in an overfilled ashtray. “Happy hunting.” She walked inside, locking the door behind her. She freshened her cocktail, dialed a number on her cell, and walked back out onto her balcony.

Maggie stopped short, her breath caught in her throat. Raul Vargas was standing in the shadows. Intimidating. Stone still.

“Explain,” he said quietly.

Maggie fought to keep her hand from shaking and spilling her drink. “A cop was asking questions . . . about you.”

“What cop?”

“What’s it to ya?” she said, her voice rising in volume.

“What cop?” Raul took one step forward.

“Jack Bertolino,” she answered quickly.

“What did you say?”

“I said you were a shark. Always cruising. Was I wrong?”

Raul took another step toward her.

“You wanna talk to him?” She thrust her cell phone out to keep him at arm’s length. And then said, taunting, “I’ve got him on the line.”

“You gotta fucking be kidding me.” Raul grabbed the phone from her hand. “Who the fuck is this?”

“Jack Bertolino here. Is there a problem, Raul? You strike out at the bar? She’s a little out of your league, don’t you think?”

“Fuck you.” He tossed the phone at Maggie, who fumbled for it, dropped her drink and the phone. It clattered onto the wooden deck and landed in a growing puddle of gin and tonic. By the time she had grabbed it and wiped it off, Raul Vargas was a shadow walking briskly down the path toward his car.

Maggie was still shaking as she dialed the phone again. Praying that it still worked.

Jack was standing outside Hal’s Bar and Grill. He had just finished dinner and was headed for home. He was genuinely concerned as he answered the phone again.

“He scared the bejesus out of me,” were the first words that spilled out of Maggie’s mouth.

“Is he still there?” Jack asked, pressing.

“No, the little prick just sped out of the lot and—” She stopped as she heard the sound of metal scraping concrete. “Yup, good, he just bottomed out his fancy car on that first speed bump. Couldn’t happen to a nicer schmuck.”

“Are you okay? Do you need help? Should I call the cops?”

“I wouldn’t say no if you wanted to take a ride over and tuck me in.”

Jack had to smile. “You sound fine.”

“I’ve got a Colt special next to my bed, and I know how to use it.”

“Good to know. Now lock your door and call me if he comes around again.”

“Good night, Detective.”

Maggie lit another cigarette and took one last look at the reflection of the moon on the still water of Paradise Cove through an exhale of smoke.

23

Polished brown granite sheathed the monolithic KPMG building on Bunker Hill. Jack stopped in front of the glass atrium that connected the two towers that comprised the Wells Fargo Center, sipping a Starbucks, watching the flow of well-dressed professionals enter and exit the downtown high-rise.

He knew that Raul Vargas was securely ensconced on the thirty-eighth floor because he had followed him from his father’s estate in Malibu, right into the lobby, and then watched as the elevator carried Raul all the way up to his father’s corporate offices.

“Hey, Bertolino.”

Jack turned as Tim Dykstra appeared behind him. Jack wasn’t surprised to be approached by the mayor’s head of security and main fixer. He hadn’t expected the hammer to drop so soon, though.

“Just the person I wanted to see,” Dykstra said, wearing a tight smile as he proffered a handshake. It was as hard as the man’s disposition and reminded Jack why he’d turned down the mayor’s job offer.

“The mayor didn’t come right out and say it, but I know he’d be pleased if you’d let up on Raul Vargas,” Dykstra said, running his hand through his gray, military-cut hair. His probing eyes were unblinking, as if he could control the outcome of this conversation with sheer willpower. “The kid paid his debt to society, and the mayor holds Philippe Vargas in high esteem.”

“So, tell me, Tim, what did Vargas have on the mayor that got him to intercede in the release of his son? A letter to the president, no less?”

“Don’t go there, Jack. You’re a political animal. Don’t be naïve.”

“And the cardinal? And two members of the city council? Did Phil butter all of their bread?”

“You made the right decision, Jack.”

“How’s that, Tim?” Jack held his gaze until the old warrior blinked.

“Not coming on board. You’re not a team player. You’ve got to go along to get along in this world, Jack.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” Jack caught Cruz out of the corner of his eye exiting the parking structure in Jack’s BMW and driving up Grand Avenue, away from Jack and his unscheduled street meet. The kid had great instincts, Jack thought as he turned to walk away.

“You can take the wop out of the neighborhood—”

Jack spun on his heel. “What’d you say?”

“I vetted you, Jack. There were rumors circulating that you were dirty. A hired gun for the mob; I guess they were more than rumors. Another greaseball on the pad.”

Jack struck like a cobra. Grabbing Dykstra’s lapels, he muscled all two hundred pounds of the man off the pavement and slammed him up against a nine-foot steel sculpture that rang like a bell when his head whiplashed back.

“Call 911!” someone in the gathering crowd yelled. Jack knew this was the wrong time and place for an extended confrontation.

What he didn’t know was Peter Maniacci was standing in the crowd, all eyes and ears.

Jack let Dykstra’s feet touch the ground and stepped back, assuming the stance as two armed security guards exited the building and strode in their direction. Tim Dykstra, red-faced and apoplectic, straightened his shirt and wisely fought the urge to charge.

“Stay away from Raul Vargas. And uh, when you go down, Jack, I’m gonna be there to pound the first nail in your coffin.”

“Send my regards to the mayor,” Jack said through a relaxed grin. He casually sauntered away, blending with the flow of pedestrian traffic to meet Cruz at the Music Center, their fallback location.

Raul Vargas had worked himself into a manic froth by the time he slid behind his desk and drained the last of his coffee. Who the hell did Jack Bertolino think he was, asking questions about him on his own stomping grounds? Defaming his name. Bertolino had to go. First he’d try to enlist someone in Malic’s gang to do the dirty work, but if Raul had to take matters into his own hands, he would. Bertolino was tenacious, and if he continued to make waves, Raul ran the risk of losing his father’s support.

Somehow, Bertolino had connected him to the dead woman at the cove, and he had clearly tied him to the kidnapping of the Cardona girl. As he’d known for several weeks now, Angelica was a liability. As long as she was alive, on American soil, his freedom was in serious jeopardy.

Raul told himself to calm down. He was due in a meeting with the entire staff, and he had to appear cool and collected. He wasn’t well liked by the rest of the Vargas organization, which he could live with, until he had rebuilt his nest egg. But Malic was a different story. He had to be brought on board and dealt with in a calm, controlled manner, or the man could be his undoing.

All Malic had to do was send his sex video to the police, or to one of the local news hounds who were always snooping around, and Raul would be tied to the death of one woman he had raped and the disappearance of another. The evidence would be circumstantial on both fronts, but a jury would convict him out of pure malice. Everyone hated the rich kid. He would spend the rest of his days as some Rufus’s boy toy until there was nothing left of his ass, his dignity, or his life.

But come to think of it, he wouldn’t last a night in prison if Vincent Cardona heard that he had set up his only flesh and blood. With the Mafia’s connections in the federal prison system, Raul would be dead by first light.

He had to be smart. He couldn’t let that happen.

“Halle, could you be a sweetheart and bring me a cup of coffee?” Raul said into his phone. “And are we still meeting in the conference room?”

“The meeting started ten minutes ago. I thought you were already there.”

“Shit!” Raul said as he gathered himself, grabbed a file, and ran down the plush carpeted hallway.

Cruz was tapping out an inscrutable beat on the dashboard as Jack pulled to a stop at 201 North Figueroa. Mateo was just exiting the City of Los Angeles Department of Building and Safety, where he was doing research on the Vargas development project.

“You’re going to love this,” he said as he jammed Cruz forward and squeezed his six-foot-two frame into the tight backseat. “No worries, I’m fine,” he said, giving Cruz a hard time for not relinquishing the shotgun seat. “Straight ahead and make a right onto Second. I’ll tell you when to pull over.”

Mateo directed Jack to stop in front of the Regent Hotel. The fifteen-story building might have been tony in the twenties, but it looked tired now, and ready for the wrecking ball. The brick façade was stained almost black; the signage was missing the
E
in
Hotel
. Men and women who looked more transient than genteel walked through the pitted brass doors while small groups congregated on the sidewalk in front of the building, smoking, furtive eyes tracking for dealers, hoping to score. Jack knew the unmistakable look and body language.

“I thought you were staying at the Hyatt,” Jack tossed out dryly.

Cruz barked a laugh. Mateo batted the back of his car seat.

“It’s a revolving door,” he said, referring to the hotel. “They get busted for possession or public intoxication, spend a few dry nights on the county, and when they get out, they check back into the no-tell hotel, where it’s one-stop shopping for crack.”

“And we’re here why?” Jack asked, knowing there was more and wondering where he got his info.

“Well, the woman at the records counter got very chatty. Her name’s Cathy; I think she’s a lapsed Catholic.”

“If she wasn’t before she met you . . .”

“She
was
having unclean thoughts,” Mateo said in agreement.

“And her religion is germane to the discussion because . . . ?” Jack asked.

“The L.A. archdiocese owns this property. And it’s the cornerstone of Vargas’s new development project. It went from being a tax and insurance liability to being worth ten times its appraised value. Philippe Vargas made the cardinal a true believer and coerced the august man of the cloth to write a letter to the president extolling the virtues of his drug-dealing son.”

“A win-win,” Cruz chimed in.

“The mayor’s also a very happy camper. He can take credit for eradicating a blight on his new downtown, raising tax revenues, and cleaning up a drug-infested cesspool, which is a drain on local law enforcement.”

“And that’s why two members of the city council were also pulled into the letter-writing loop,” Jack said.

“That’s right,
jefe
. The Catholic Church is happy, Vargas gets what he wants, and the mayor and city council members get reelected for fulfilling campaign promises to rejuvenate their City of Angels.”

“And Raul Vargas is a free man,” Jack said tightly as he pulled away from the curb.

“Where to?” Mateo asked.

“I’m dropping you at the Hyatt. Cruz and I are going to track Raul. What time are you having dinner with ‘Chatty Cathy’?”

“I’m not going to dignify that question with a—”

“What time?”

“Six o’clock, straight up.”

The three men shared a laugh.

Raul looked ragged from the day at the office and had no idea that the BMW that shadowed him to his condo in Brentwood contained Jack Bertolino and Cruz. A BMW in Los Angeles was so common, it didn’t raise any alarm bells.

Cruz had his nose buried in his laptop, admiring his handiwork. The GPS system he had planted on Raul’s car was working like a charm.

Jack drove past the condo building as Raul pushed his electronic key out the window, swiped the pad, and drove down into the secure underground parking garage. Jack took note of the alleyways and surrounding buildings in case he had to do some up-close-and-personal surveillance.