Private L.A. Read online

  “It’ll work,” Sci said. “Think of it like a tick.”

  “You mean as in dog tick?”

  “Or deer tick, or in this case, digital file tick,” he replied. “The program they’ll devise will be tiny and will attach itself deep in the metadata of the transfer file. To any but the most sophisticated of coders, it will look simply like a string of numbers, an afterthought.”

  Mo-bot nodded. “The tick will also have the ability to replicate itself so one of its offspring will travel in the metadata of each subsequent transfer, on and on, kind of like a computer virus, but not.”

  “So how do we get the money back?”

  “The tick will be programmed to transmit a location back at each stop, each account,” Sci said.

  “No matter how many times the money’s transferred?”

  “That’s the idea,” Mo-bot said.

  “Okay,” I said. “I’m impressed. I didn’t know we could do that sort of thing.”

  “Learn something new about your company every day, Jack,” Sci said.

  We’d reached the parking garage by then, and I told them I’d meet them back at the offices. I wanted to swing by Justine’s. She’d called in sick and I wanted to see how bad her hangover had turned out.

  As I climbed into the Touareg, my cell rang. I fired the ignition so the Bluetooth function on the stereo connected before answering. “Morgan.”

  “Is that you, Jack, my California friend?” came a male voice soaked in the Caribbean.

  It had been a while, but I recognized it. I backed out of the parking space, heading for the exit. “I believe I’m speaking with Carlos San Cielo?”

  “Long time, Jack,” San Cielo replied. “I’m calling from the Caymans.”

  “Lucky you.”

  “Beautiful day here,” he said. “Thanks for the assignment.”

  “Thought of you first. Hope you found something?”

  The detective hesitated. “I did. But it cost you a bit more than my ordinary retainer and daily fee.”

  “How’s that?” I asked.

  “This shithead attorney down here, the filing agent,” San Cielo replied. “He tells me he can’t divulge the names of the owners of this ESH Ltd, even after I lie and tell him I represent Mr. Deep Pockets, who wants to make many of these phony corporations.”

  “Okay?” I said, driving out of the parking garage and heading toward the Harbor Freeway, Santa Monica, and Justine’s house.

  Another pause. “I had to pay him five grand to get him to cough up what you wanted to know.”

  “I’ll pay it,” I said, weaving through traffic. “Who’s behind ESH?”

  San Cielo whistled, said, “I cannot believe it when he said it, so I asked to see the articles of incorporation for my own eyes.”

  “Out with it, Carlos, I’m a busy man,” I said.

  “Oh, yes, of course, Jack. It is just that I am not so used to … Thom and Jennifer Harlow and a David Sanders and a Terry Graves. They own this LTD called ESH.”

  I left the freeway really confused. The Harlows and their attorney and head of production had moved money through an offshore corporation to their own company? Why? I supposed there had to be certain tax benefits. But then why had Sanders claimed that the Harlows were almost bankrupt, when they had access to millions offshore? And why had Sanders lied about it in the first place?

  He’d told us that Thom Harlow claimed to have a new secret investor who was willing to front him enough money to finish Saigon Falls. And yet the financial records clearly showed that the twenty-seven million transferred to Harlow-Quinn Productions came from another Harlow-owned concern. Why? Was that how the investor wanted it? Was he or she offshore to begin with?

  “Jack?”

  “I’m here,” I said finally. “Did you ask the attorney how much money the company had?”

  “Of course,” San Cielo replied. “The answer cost you another five grand.”

  “Another?” I replied, turning a corner. “How much did this conversation cost me altogether?”

  A hesitation. “Uh, twenty in all.”

  “Twenty?” I said, my eyebrows rising. “This had better be good information, Carlos, or I’ll have to seriously reconsider our business relationship.”

  “No, no, Jack, it is the best information money can buy about this ESH Ltd,” San Cielo assured me. “The agent was very happy after all to show me and to make copies of records. Much money in ESH. More all the time.”

  “From where? From who?

  “Many places and companies and peoples from all over the world,” he replied. “There is currently another twenty-three million in account of ESH Ltd in Panama.”

  Twenty-three million. “That it?”

  “Well, I scan and send all records to your office. You can see for yourself where money comes from.”

  “Do that,” I replied, turning onto Justine’s street. “Send them to Maureen Roth.”

  “The Mo-bot. Yes, of course, within two hours tops.”

  “Carlos?”

  “Yes, Jack?” he replied, sounding a tad defensive.

  “Good job. Glad to do business with you.”

  I could almost hear him smile from four thousand miles away. “I look forward to representing Private’s interests in the future.”

  “I’ll let you know,” I said, pulling into Justine’s steep driveway.

  I hung up, parked, set the brake, and sat there a moment, car still running, thinking that there could be another explanation for the money in ESH Ltd’s accounts, and for its sources. The Harlows were international superstars. They made movies all over the world. Their movies were shown all over the world, generated income from all over the world. It probably made sense in a lot of ways to have a company with an account off-shore, someplace tax neutral, or something like that.

  I was still dwelling on that scenario as I started to climb out of the SUV, figuring I’d check on Justine at the door, be on my way, no need to even shut the motor off. So I was barely aware that another vehicle had stopped in the street behind me, and that a man in dark denim clothing was climbing from the car. But as I took that first step, turning to close the door, I caught a glimpse of something in the man’s hand, and felt panic explode when he swung a suppressed pistol at me.

  Chapter 88

  “THEY DECIDE IT is better to pay ten million dollars than seven,” Cobb said quietly when Alice, the waitress who had taken their lunch order, walked away. “Why?”

  He and the rest of his men, Watson, Nickerson, Hernandez, and Kelleher, sat in a booth at the Robby Eden Café on Atlantic Avenue. The café offered burgers and interesting sandwiches. But more importantly, it was less than a mile from the garage where they’d been living the past two months.

  In that time they’d become regulars at Robby Eden’s, wearing olive-green work clothes that made them part of the crew at L.A. Standard Demolition, a fictional service devised to allow them to move about unnoticed.

  Cobb looked out from behind the heavy makeup and the dark glasses he wore in addition to the uniform, peered around the table at his men, still waiting for an answer. Only a few minutes before, they’d seen the phrase “Ten Tomorrow” appear on the city’s website, notifying them of the mayor’s decision.

  “Ten million is a lot these days, no matter who you are, Mr. Cobb,” Kelleher offered. “Probably take time for them to get the money together.”

  “Sounds right to me,” Hernandez said.

  “Who cares?” Nickerson said. “It’s ten million, right? Which is a lot better than seven million. Or am I missing something?”

  “We’re not after seven million, or ten million, Mr. Nickerson,” Cobb said.

  “Yes, I know, Mr. Cobb,” Nickerson replied. “But that might be all we get if they don’t move the money out of some big government account.”

  Cobb shook his head. “That’s where it will come from, and they’ll try to trace the money.”

  “You don’t know—” Watson began.


  “We do know, Mr. Watson, by deductive reasoning,” Cobb insisted. “It only makes sense, which is why you’re going to send that money off into oblivion, and while they’re chasing that paltry ten million, you’re going to have the account codes and passwords necessary to steal them blind, whatever is in the big account, however much we want.”

  “What if there’s nothing?” Hernandez demanded skeptically. “Not a cent beyond ten million, Mr. Cobb?”

  With no hesitation, Cobb said, “Isn’t it obvious, Mr. Hernandez? We’ll call the scammers on trying to track the money, and Mr. Kelleher will step up to take No Prisoners out for a spin again.”

  “Sounds like a plan,” Nickerson said, raised his hand, and called to the waitress, “Say, Alice, can we get our check?”

  Chapter 89

  I DID THE only thing I could think of, ducked and threw myself back into the car, hearing the spit and ping of the suppressed round shattering the driver’s-side window of the Touareg, then another, smacking the door as I yanked in my legs, adrenaline surging, trying to get to my gun.

  But I couldn’t reach it, and I could hear footsteps. Lying across the bucket seat and the central console, I saw the emergency brake lever, released it.

  The door was still open as the heavy Touareg almost immediately began to drop back down the steep drive, slapping the side of the guy trying to kill me.

  He swore in Russian, wild-eyed, trying to stop my vehicle and get a clean shot at me. I slammed the shift into reverse, kicked the gas pedal, pinned the shooter against the door, dragging him as we went flying backward into the street, hurling him from my sight when we crashed broadside into his car with a sound like a dump truck dropping its gate.

  On impact I’d been slammed back against the seats, but I came up fast, dug for my pistol, kicked my way out through the door and up into a squared-off shooter’s stance, sweeping the …

  He was sprawled, grunting, on the road beside an older Pontiac Trans Am that was making coughing noises and backfiring. His gun lay eight feet from him. I kicked it farther away into the gutter, noticed that his right leg was grotesquely broken, and now bright blood bubbled at one corner of his lips. Behind me I could hear Joy and Luck, Justine’s terriers, barking wildly inside her house.

  “Why’d you try to kill me?” I asked.

  “Fuck you,” he rasped.

  I kicked him in the broken leg, barely aware of people coming out of their houses, happy to hear him scream, or at least try. “Why?” I asked again. “Or this time, I’ll stomp on your leg.”

  “There is no why,” he said in a thick Russian accent. “I do job. Hired.”

  “By who?” I demanded. “Who wanted me …?”

  The Russian got a look of disbelief on his face, coughed up a gout of that bright frothy blood, and died there in the back-streets of Santa Monica, right in front of Justine’s house.

  Chapter 90

  AN HOUR EARLIER, Justine was sitting in an overstuffed chair in her bedroom, both dogs in her lap, still dressed in her workout clothes, wanting to cry again. She’d seduced a married man with a pretty wife and kids who rode in car seats and sang about the wheels on the bus. Pulling Joy and Luck close to her, she thought miserably, I’m a home wrecker.

  The idea went against nearly everything Justine stood for, and yet there it was, hovering about like a ghost, trying to get her to break down, to succumb to the weight of what she’d done with Paul, and of the attack in Mexico.

  She was suffering, but it didn’t mitigate things, she thought fiercely. A diagnosis of PTSD would not change what she had done, who she was, what she had become.

  Justine’s next thought was that she had to right things somehow, atone for her sins. Should she go to Paul’s wife and confess? But what good would that do? She’d scar the poor woman and destroy their marriage. The truth was, Justine had been the aggressor. She had encouraged the tension that had been building with Paul, knowing nearly nothing about the man, not even his last name. It was true that he’d allowed himself to be seduced, and asked her out for coffee the day before, but …

  It was all so confusing. She didn’t know what to do. Then she did. She called up Ellen Hayes, a fellow psychologist she admired, got put through.

  “Justine,” Hayes said. “So good to hear from you.”

  “It’s been too long, Ellen,” Justine allowed. “But I’m looking for a recommendation for a therapist who specializes in the aftermath of trauma.”

  “That would be you, dear.”

  “The referral is for me, Ellen.”

  Silence, and then, “Are you all right?”

  “Physically, yes,” Justine said. “The rest I’m trying to figure out.”

  “Then you’ll come see me,” Hayes insisted. “I can fit you in … how about tomorrow afternoon, four?”

  “Perfect, and thanks,” Justine said, and hung up.

  She went into the shower, stood there under the beating hot water, trying to take hope from the fact that she’d soon be able to talk to someone about what had been going on in her life. In the meantime, she told herself she had to have some purpose for the rest of her day, or she’d surely drive herself guilty, bitter, and quite possibly crazy.

  Drying off, Justine forced herself to make a list of options.

  She could return to Guadalajara, find Adelita Gomez, figure out her relationship to Captain Gomez, if any. But that idea made her almost breathless, and she realized she feared Captain Gomez almost as much as she did Carla, the big woman in the jail cell.

  That left, for today, anyway, the Harlows’ charity, Sharing Hands.

  After drying her hair and dressing in yoga pants and a USC Trojans sweatshirt, Justine got her laptop, sat on the floor in her living room, and called up the Sharing Hands website. Tom and Jennifer Harlow dominated the charity’s home page, heads touching, hands clasped, shooting the camera fetching looks, as if they’d been interrupted in a moment of deep intimacy but were still darn happy to see you.

  Indeed, at first glance, Justine had trouble understanding that this was actually a website for an organization that benefited orphans. But then she saw that in the background of that photograph of the Harlows, there was a jungle landscape with a clearing and a bright-white school building.

  Reading through the rest of the site, which showed orphanages being built and happy children gathering around one or both Harlows, Justine was struck by the scope of what they were trying to do, how many children they were trying to help, and the gentle, respectful request for money to fund that vision that appeared on every page: “Help Our Hands Share.”

  And a PayPal button. They made it that easy.

  Justine decided to check the California attorney general’s site for any complaints about the charity, and found none. She consulted several online charity watchdogs. Sharing Hands received exemplary reviews for transparency and innovation, as well as gushing praise for the actors’ involvement. Several reviews also noted the Harlows’ decision to keep back fifty percent of all raised money to build an endowment for the non-profit, much the way universities do to ensure that scholarships and other good works continue far into the—

  A tremendous crashing noise out in the street in front of her house tore her away from the computer.

  Joy and Luck went nuts, racing across the living room and up onto the couch below the front window, howling and barking. Justine got up, looked out through the blinds, and saw Jack’s Touareg smashed into the side of a black Trans Am.

  Jack was holding a gun on a man who was obviously bleeding to death.

  Chapter 91

  MY IRISH LUCK that two of my favorite LAPD detectives were sent to investigate what had happened in front of Justine’s house. Lieutenant Mitch Tandy and Detective Len Ziegler were the same duo who had attempted to railroad me for my old girlfriend’s murder. I kept things professional, answered every question straight, told them I’d been with the mayor and Chief Fescoe that morning, that I’d driven to Justine’s to check on her, and what ha
d happened during the attack.

  “He said he was hired?” asked Lieutenant Tandy, a tough little guy in love with tanning beds.

  “He said it was a job,” I replied. “I asked who hired him. He died.”

  We were standing in Justine’s driveway. She stood off to the side, holding Joy and Luck on leashes, taking in the swarm of crime scene investigators and patrol officers who’d taken over her neighborhood.

  “Convenient, he croaks like that,” said Detective Ziegler, a former swimmer gone to pot, with big shoulders and a Milwaukee tumor where his waistline should have been. He looked more and more like a walrus every time I saw him.

  “For who?” I asked, already knowing where this was leading.

  “You,” said Ziegler, who also seemed to approach everything in life through the prism of conspiracy theories that crystallized out of his head in all sorts of illogical shapes and sizes.

  “You know, Len, for once I agree with you,” I said. “It was extremely convenient for me that he died and I didn’t. Sorry if I don’t apologize for that.”

  Tandy gave a flick of his hand, calling off the conspiracy walrus. “Any idea who’d want you dead, Jack?”

  I was unnerved to come up with multiple possibilities, Carmine Noccia, No Prisoners, whoever took the Harlows, and my own brother among them. But what good would telling these guys do? I’d just be asking them to stick their nose in affairs I’d rather keep quiet.

  “No,” I said at last. “I’ve been doing nothing lately but spreading good cheer and doing good deeds. Ask anyone.”

  “Right,” Ziegler said. “You’re a regular Thom Harlow.”

  I ignored him, talked to Tandy. “You’ll tell me who he is?”

  “I think you know who he is,” Ziegler said.

  I did, actually. I’d searched the car and found a wallet and ID: Vladimir Karenoff, thirty-seven, resident alien currently living in Brighton Beach, New York. The car was registered in New York as well. I’d taken photos of all his documents and returned them before the police arrived.