The Payback Game (20 page)

The whole operation had taken less than a minute.

Boff nodded. “This was a well planned op.”

As they watched, Galvani spoke to Green for a couple minutes, then stepped back into his SUV and drove toward 1
st
Avenue.

“Back to
Brooklyn,” Boff said.

“Frank,” Wallachi said, “I wish we knew what was in those bags.”

“I know someone who might be able to help us get a handle on that.”

“Who?”

“A friend of mine.” He said nothing more.

Galvani returned to the parking garage and drove inside. About ten minutes later, he and Laterza came back out in the Beamer. Laterza drove to
Crown Heights, let Galvani off in front of his apartment building, then took off.

The next morning, Boff’s information broker, Billy Wright, called to tell him he had a dossier prepared on Bassett and a financial workup for Doyle. Knowing Wright liked sweets and junk food as much as he did, Boff stopped along the way to pick up a box of Dunkin’ Donuts.

Wright was talking to a customer at the counter in his shop when Boff walked in. After the customer left, Wright put the CLOSED sign on his door, then led Boff to the backroom, where Boff set the donut box down on a table next to a Krupp coffee maker. Then he grabbed a bag of Wright’s pricey Weaver’s coffee and a filter and started brewing a fresh pot.

“I’m curious, Frank. Why the interest in Bassett?”

“Just a hunch.”

When the coffee started dripping, Boff took two Bavarian Kreme donuts out of the box, handed one to his ex-DEA partner, and sat down on a chair with his own.

“But after what you saw in Massena,” Wright said, “you basically had the case cracked. Maloney was killed because he was some kind of threat to the biker operation. Doyle got whacked because he was looking into the cop’s murder. So, again, why Bassett?”

“I don’t know exactly,” Boff replied, licking cream off his forefinger. “Maybe it’s just that something about him keeps nagging at me. I didn’t buy his excuse for not having the gym built in time. It just doesn’t ring true for me. And it’s certainly possible that Doyle may have been getting ready to fire Bassett when he was killed.”

Wright made a face. “You don’t actually think Bassett killed Doyle just to save his job, do you? That’s a bit of a stretch.”

“Probably is, Billy. Just hang with me a bit on this idea, okay?”

“Okay. You’re the boss.”

Wright slid off his chair, filled two mugs with coffee, handed one to Boff, and sat back down.

“I know this Bassett thing may be farfetched,” Boff said, “and it’ll probably amount to nothing. But it still feels like an itch that needs to be scratched. The bottom line here is there’s no harm in checking him out. Anyway, tell me what you found out about the guy.”

Wright swiveled his chair around to face the screen, typed a minute,
then studied what was on his screen before he turned back around. “I hacked into the non-profit’s computer and got Bassett’s Social Security. Based on what I found, Bassett appeared to have been having money problems, at least for awhile. But then, just like that—” Wright snapped his fingers “—his problems got solved. Over the past few months.”

“What kind of financial problems are you talking about?”

“Well, first, you gotta keep in mind that Bassett was making a shitload of money with his venture capital firm before it imploded. And like a lot of guys with big bucks, he wasn’t shy about spending his money.”

“On what?”

“Three years before his company crashed and burned, Bassett bought a condo in a fifty-four story, luxury high-rise called Sky House on East 29
th
Street. Two bedrooms, two baths, about eleven hundred square feet on the fortieth floor. With a magnificent view.”

“Costing…?”

“I spoke to a realtor familiar with the building. He said in the neighborhood of a million and a half.”

“That’s a hefty nut to bear.”

“There’s more. A year later he bought a two-bedroom condo/townhouse in Hampton Bays, a half block from the beach on Shinnecock Bay. Couldn’t get an exact fix on the price, but the average cost for a townhouse like that in Hampton Bays is around three hundred and fifty thousand. Basically, this guy was mortgaged up the kazoo.”

“When his business collapsed, did he lose either of the homes?”

Wright shook his head. “No. Although he had to take out second mortgages on both of them. I asked a buddy at a credit agency to check out his plastic. The guy was close to maxed out and was paying only slightly more than the minimum to avoid an interest rate bump.”

Boff took another bite of his donut, chased it with coffee,
then said, “Did Bassett’s financial situation change when Doyle hired him?”

“Not at first. I did some research on how much a nonprofit CEO makes in salary. The national average is around a hundred and sixty thousand. This is
New York, so we can maybe bump it up another forty grand or so.”

“Considering the nut he was carrying, that’s not a lot of money.”

“Right. And here’s where it gets interesting. Like I said before, a few months ago his financial picture suddenly started to brighten. My credit agency guy said Bassett began paying off a lot of the principal on his cards.” Wright paused to take a bite of his donut and then sip some coffee. “So if Bassett was paying off card debt, we can assume he was no longer under the gun with the mortgages. I mean, shit, a guy facing the loss of a home sure as hell doesn’t pay extra to credit card companies.”

Boff nodded. “Obviously he must’ve come into some money. Did you get a handle on that?”

Wright shook his head. “I tried, Frank. I tried. But if Bassett had a sudden windfall, I couldn’t find out where it came from.”

Boff thought a few minutes about what Wright was saying. “Well, one possibility comes to mind,” he finally said. “At the beginning of this year, Doyle organized a charity event to raise money to build a summer camp for the kids he was helping. The event raked in two million. According to Cassidy, Doyle expected to have the camp built in time for this summer. But it wasn’t. And Doyle was pretty upset about that. When I met with Bassett at Cassidy’s hangout, the guy told me that when he realized he wouldn’t be able to get the camp going this summer, he put the bulk of the money in certificates of deposit.”

Wright nodded. “So…so you’re thinking what if he
didn’t
place the money in CDs. What if, based on the sudden change to his financial situation—”

“—he siphoned off a nice chunk of it and put it in his pocket.”

“Taking your little theory further,” Wright said, “Doyle somehow found out that Bassett was embezzling from the nonprofit and threatened to go to the D.A.”

“So to stop him from doing that,” Boff concluded, “Bassett had Doyle
whacked.”

At this, Wright shrugged and sipped some coffee. Neither man said anything for a minute. Then the information broker said, “Well, it’s an intriguing theory, Frank. But without proof of embezzlement, that’s all it is. A theory. Digging up concrete proof of embezzlement is beyond my talents. You got any suggestions?”

“Not just yet. Let’s table that for a moment and turn to Doyle. Let me hear what you found on his financial records.”

Wright turned around to the computer, typed some more, read what was on the screen, then swiveled back around.

“Doyle appeared to be a straight arrow when it came to his finances. Paid his taxes on time, did the same with mortgage payments and any other outstanding debts. There was, however, one thing I found a bit off kilter.”

“What’s that?”

“Doyle’s records show that he had a personal accountant, presumably to handle all his finances. But a couple weeks before he was killed, Doyle hired a second accountant. A corporate one.”

This perked up Boff’s interest. “What kind of work does the corporate guy’s firm do?”

“A variety of things, but the bulk of their business comes from nonprofits.”

Boff thought about this for a minute. “So the obvious reason for hiring a corporate accountant when he already had a personal one—”

“—was to have the corporate guy audit the books to see if they were cooked.” Wright spread his hands. “You know, Frank, there are an awful lot of ifs in this theory of yours.”

“Yes, there are. So at some point, I’m going to want to talk to this second accountant. Did you get his name?”

“Stuart Hamilton. Works for Plante & Young.” Wright spelled the names and Boff wrote them down.

“Let’s set the money aside for awhile,” Boff said. “Tell me what you found out about Bassett’s personal life.”

Wright swiveled back to the computer again, typed again, then took his time studying what came up before turning back to Boff.

“Bassett grew up in
Harlem. Father was a sanitation man. The old man didn’t make enough money to be able to send Bassett to a top college. But Earl must’ve done well in school, because he got a scholarship to Princeton and another full ride to Wharton. After graduating from business school, he worked eight years for an investment banking firm. He apparently made enough money at that firm to start his own venture capital company.”

“Which you said did well, right?”

“It certainly appears so.” Wright glanced at his computer screen again. “Well, at least at first. But with a sudden downturn in the economy, Bassett’s company was forced to fold. At that point, the only work he could find was short-term consulting. Until Doyle offered him a full-time gig.”

“And your conclusion?”

“Well, except for his sudden windfall, Bassett looks clean and legit. But the same can’t be said for his siblings.”

“Oh? How many brothers and sisters?”

“Four brothers. One’s serving life for killing a cop in a bungled bank robbery. A second, Reggie, was a big-time drug dealer in Brooklyn until he got busted. Served about ten years. Got out three years ago.”

“Did Reggie go back to dealing?”

Wright shook his head. “Don’t know. Couldn’t get anything on that.”

“What about the other two brothers?”

“One is a mob lawyer. Name’s Carmelo. He came close to being disbarred once over alleged jury tampering, but the D.A. couldn’t make it stick. The last brother, Dwayne, is an auto mechanic at a garage in Brownsville.”

“Spell the mechanic’s first name for me.”

“D-w-a-y-n-e. This one’s never been arrested, although it appears he was a person of interest in the killing of a gun dealer associated with the Hells Angels.”

That caught Boff’s attention. “Is Dwayne an Angel?”

“Don’t know.”

“Where’s the shop he works at?”

Wright checked his computer. “Mike’s Auto Repair. Two-forty-eight Junius Street.”

Boff wrote the address on his pad. “I’ll check Dwayne out with Wallachi. If he’s a member of the Hells Angels, it’ll be another interesting piece in the Earl Bassett puzzle.”

At this, Wright shrugged. “Frank, if you ask me, this guy Bassett’s a sidetrack. Even if he
was
embezzling, the weight of evidence says it was Galvani and/or the Angels that had Doyle killed. You were hired to find the reporter’s killer, not go off on a wild goose chase.”

Boff finished off the last of his donut without a word, then washed it down with coffee. Then he stood up and said, “What you say is true to an extent. But I’m not about to scratch Bassett off my suspect list. Not just yet.” As he started for the door, he said over his shoulder, “Well, the upside is I’m making good money from Cassidy as this case drags on.”

“What’s the downside? There’s always one.”

Boff turned back to Wright. “I might get killed.”

The first thing Boff did after leaving Wright’s shop was to call Detective Damiano. “Close any of your cases yet?” he asked her.

Only o
ne. Still backlogged. How about you? Making any progress?

“Quite a bit. We saw Galvani and his crew make a phony raid. He also used that church SUV I told you about to pick up some kind of contraband in upstate
New York. It was smuggled in from Canada. He delivered the contraband to the Hells Angels club.”

Wow
! That
is
progress! Well done, Mr. Boff. Now how do the phony drug raids and the smuggling fit together?

“I’ll tell you later. In the meantime, could you check with DMV for a Dwayne Bassett?” Boff spelled the full name. “He works in
Brownsville, so I’m assuming he either lives there or nearby. I want to know what kind of vehicle he drives.”

I’ll call it in. You wan
na hold?

“Yes. Thanks.”

Boff took out a pad and pen. After a few minutes, the detective came back on line.

There were two guys
in Brooklyn by that name, but one of them spells it D-u-a-n-e. The other one lives in Brownsville. He drives a Kawasaki Vulcan, license plate number DCG-six-six-two-four.

“Thanks.”

Wanting to get a handle on what the contraband might be, Boff drove to midtown
Manhattan around noon. Leaving his car in a garage, he walked to the park in front of the New York Public Library on 6
th
Avenue. There he found one of his former DEA partners, Marty Schlosberg, waiting for him on a bench. The agent was chowing down on a deep-fried hot dog from a nearby vendor’s cart.

Schlosberg was around Boff’s age, with badly thinning hair that was prematurely gray around the temples. As Boff sat on the bench, Schlosberg handed him a dog like the one he was eating. They didn’t say hello or shake hands, but that didn’t bother Boff. He knew his ex-partner wasn’t a fan of his. None of his former partners were. Except Wright. Taking the hot dog, he noticed that the agent had put on considerable weight since the last time he had seen him.

“Marty,” he said to open the conversation, “it looks like you put on all the weight you’d taken off.”

The DEA agent nodded. “Yeah. I couldn’t hack that concentration camp diet my wife had me on, so I quit it. She was pissed at me for awhile. Even threatened to get a divorce. But she got over it in a few weeks.”

“I expect you received a promotion from our last caper?”

“I did. Just don’t ask me to thank you. I got an ulcer from all the aggravation you gave me on that case.”

Boff smiled. “Does that mean you don’t want to work another case with me?”

Schlosberg shrugged. “If this op can get me another bump in salary grade, I’ll suffer with you again. Whatcha got?”

Before replying, Boff took a bite on the dog, which in addition to sauerkraut, was covered in pickle relish and hot, spicy mustard.

“That vendor makes a fine dog,” Boff said while chewing. “I think I’ll put his name in nomination for a Vendy.”

“What the hell’s a Vendy?”

“An annual award for New York’s best street food.”

“Only
you
would know something like that. So tell me, what’re you working on now.”

Boff gave him a rundown, beginning with Cassidy’s hiring him to find Doyle’s killer and Maloney’s faked heart attack and ending with the contraband delivery to the Hells Angels. He didn’t think Schlosberg would have any interest in Bassett, so he didn’t mention him.

When Boff was done, the DEA agent gazed at the vendor’s stand for a few minutes as he pondered what he’d just heard. Then he nodded and looked back at Boff. “Based on the fact that Massena is close to the Canadian border, I believe the stuff in the bags Galvani delivered to the bikers was BC Bud.”

“BC Bud? What’s that?”

“It’s a new, high potency marijuana. Grown hydroponically in Canadian greenhouses. BC stands for British Columbia. The Hells Angels there have largely taken over management of the industry.”

“How big of an operation are we talking about, Marty?”

“It’s estimated that between sales in Canada and the U.S., it’s a billion-dollar business.”

Boff whistled. “That’s major league. What makes this grass so much stronger than garden-variety pot?”

Schlosberg wolfed down more of his hot dog, then spoke with his mouth full. “It has a THC content ranging from fifteen to as much as twenty-five percent higher than regular grass.”

“That’s quite a difference
. How do they make it so strong?”

“What I’m told, greenhouses in
British Columbia isolate and clone selected female plants. Then they harvest the buds from the unfertilized flowering top. Hence the name, BC Bud. One of my contacts with the Canadian Mounties told me there are two to three thousand of these greenhouses in British Columbia.”

“How do they bring it across the border?” Boff asked.

“The usual methods. You know, filling tires with it, creating false beds under trucks, and so on. What you described about the exchange between the two church SUVs sounds like a good way of getting the stuff into the U.S. I mean, not many border guards are going to take the time to look too closely at your typical Canadian family, as you described them, and riding in a church vehicle, no less.”

“How can you be so sure the stuff smuggled in to Galvani was BC Bud?”

“It’s the only thing that makes sense, Frank. You know damn well the Hells Angels can get guns, heroin, cocaine, and regular pot right here. The only thing of value I can think of worth smuggling in from Canada is BC Bud.”

Boff finished the last of his hot dog and stood up. “You want another one, Marty?”

“Already had two. Don’t want to make a pig of myself. But help yourself.”

He walked over to the vendor, bought another dog with the same trimmings, then sat back down and said, “Would they ship this stuff all the way to the East Coast from
British Columbia? That sounds a lot more risky than just slipping across the border into Washington or Montana and selling it on the West Coast. California must be a huge market for them.”

“It is, Frank.” Schlosberg finished off his dog, looked longingly at the vendor, then said, “You know, I don’t believe the stuff in the church vehicle came from the West Coast. The farthest East the BC Angels have tried to smuggle it in was
Indiana. They got caught doing it.”

“If it didn’t come from the West, then where did it?”

The DEA agent used three paper napkins to wipe his greasy hands before replying. “Our latest intel says the indoor cultivation process has gradually expanded to other areas of Canada. Including the Prairie Provinces. Ontario.
And
Quebec. In Quebec, it’s marketed by the Montreal Hells Angels as ‘Quebec Gold.’ Lemme check something.” He took out an iPad, fiddled with it awhile, then looked up. “Massena’s only seventy-one miles from Montreal,” he said. “So the Montreal Hells Angels could send someone like that family down Canadian Highway 401 to the New York border near Massena. An hour and a half trip. Tops.”

“Has any of this Quebec Gold been showing up in
New York?”

“Not yet. So far, it’s only surfaced in Connecticut and Massachusetts. Primarily in the cities of Bridgeport, New Haven, Hartford, and Boston. From what you’ve told me, though, I’m guessing the New York Hells Angels are getting ready to launch sales in this city.
New York’s potentially a massive market. The money they stand to make here would dwarf all their other illicit activities combined.”

“How much is this stuff selling for on the street?”

“Oh, anywhere from four to six thousand bucks a pound. Based on your description of the size of those bags, and the fact that it took two guys to carry each one, I’d estimate, oh, close to three hundred pounds was smuggled in. Do the math, Frank. You’re looking at a street value for that haul of roughly three million.”

Boff nodded. “I’m also betting this wasn’t their first smuggling run. What puzzles me is why, if they have all this Quebec Gold, it hasn’t spiked yet in
New York.”

“Why? My best guess is if their operation here is going to be as large as I suspect it will be, they need time to organize a distribution chain.”

Boff held up one finger. “Unless they use an
established
dealer. That would speed things up considerably. I might know someone who could help us get a handle on who that dealer might be.”

Schlosberg sent another yearning glance in the hot dog vendor’s direction. Then he frowned and said, “Aw, what the hell. Why starve myself?” He walked over to the cart, bought another dog, and came back. After taking his first bite, he said, “One thing that might help us narrow down who the dealer is
would be to concentrate on Brooklyn. It just makes sense they’d start selling it in the most populated borough of the city.”

Boff nodded. “Okay. So, Marty, what’s a home run for you here?”

“Raiding the Hells Angels’ club sure as hell isn’t it. NYPD has tried that a few times, and all the cops had to show for their trouble was a bunch of harassment suits filed by the bikers. No way do I want to go that route. Especially since we don’t know where they’re stashing the stuff. I highly doubt it’s at their headquarters. We need to find out where they’re stockpiling it.”

Boff waved that suggestion off. “Forget about that. Even in the unlikely event you do find where the drug’s being stored, that does nothing for me. I want Galvani and the longshoremen, too. Not just the Angels.”

The DEA agent grabbed his stomach. “Arrgh. Already you’re giving me heartburn.” He put his dog on the bench, then reached down, opened his briefcase, and pulled out a bottle of Mylanta. He gave it a resigned look, then took a slug. As he swallowed, he put the antacid back. Then he picked up the dog again. “Okay, Frank. How about this? We tail Galvani to Massena the next time he picks up a shipment. There we bust him and flip him to testify against everybody involved in the op, including the Hells Angels and the distributor.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Boff said in a flat voice.

Schlosberg narrowed his eyes. “Why do I have a sneaky suspicion you have a hidden agenda here?”

Boff said nothing.

“Please tell me you’re not planning on doing what you did in our last case.”

Boff stayed silent.

“Jesus Christ, Frank! You can’t keep killing off your targets. I know about what you did to that Israeli mobster and his bent cop in Las Vegas. And I suspect you lied to the Westchester County cops when you said Yusef Force told you he wouldn’t surrender. Just so they’d storm the house and kill him.”

At this, Boff let out a short laugh. “You have a vivid imagination, Marty.”

“Maybe so. But I don’t want your thirst for vengeance gumming up my operation.”

Boff pointed the remains of his dog at the agent. “It’s not
your
operation, Marty. It’s
mine
. And from our wonderful past history together in the DEA, I know exactly what will happen if I let you run things. The Hells Angels are the big prize for you, not Galvani. So after you flip the cop, the mutt goes into Witness Protection. Which means I end up with one very unhappy client. A client, I might add, who wants this cop to pay for killing a close friend of his.”

Schlosberg frowned. “Okay, okay! Don’t get your balls in an uproar. What if I don’t bust and flip the cop? What if I just observe him picking up the contraband in Massena and follow him to the Hells Angels’ headquarters here? We’d have probable cause and could bust Galvani
and
the Angels on the spot. That’d satisfy Cassidy, right?”

Boff shrugged. “To a degree. Or at least it would’ve in the beginning. Besides killing Doyle, though, Galvani also sent a couple goons with knives to attack Cassidy’s protégé, a young reporter named Hannah Riley. Whom he’s extremely fond of.”

Schlosberg just sneered. “Aw for chrissake, just tell me this. After you make
all your Machiavellian moves, do I get the Angels?”

“Yes. You have my word on that.”

“And what about Galvani?”

“Leave him to me.” Boff stood up. “Thanks for the hot dog
, Marty. Let me know the minute you get a spike on Quebec Gold. I suspect it’ll be soon.”

As he started to leave, it hit Boff that Schlosberg might also have a hidden agenda. He turned back. “Marty, under
no
circumstances are you to try and find out where they’re stashing the stuff. I’m pretty sure you won’t locate it, and in the process, you’ll just tip off the bikers that we’re onto them. Then we end up with squat. The Angels will unload the Gold on another dealer, and we’ll get shut out on all fronts.” He took a step closer to his former partner. “Are we clear on this?”

“All right. All right, already! I’ll do whatever you say, Frank. But you’d better come up with a good plan to collar these dirtbags.”

“I always do. In the meantime, I want to be more convinced that it was Quebec Gold in those duffle bags and not something else.”