Dying for the Highlife (4 page)

I drove from Grier’s office out to Highway 50, heading away from the casinos and restaurants that were the anchor of South Lake Tahoe’s economy. A few minutes later I pulled into my driveway, the pine needles from the two trees in my front yard crunching under my tires. I kept busy working around the house for the next few hours. When Grier called late in the afternoon, I was replacing a board in my fence that had been mangled by critters, maybe raccoons, or a coyote seeking passage.

“This guy Jimmy Homestead must be swimming in dough,” Grier said.

“Huh?”

“Yeah, get this. He bought a Lamborghini at a dealership in Orange County a couple weeks ago. Bought it on his credit card. Total came to a hundred sixty-eight thousand dollars.”

“Really?”

“There’s more. He rang up thirty thousand dollars in other purchases. Looks like he bought himself a new wardrobe and some jewelry at Nordstrom’s in Los Angeles. And look at this, he charged fifty-five hundred at the one of the brothels in Carson City.”

“When?”

“A week ago.”

“Any hotel charges?”

“He was staying here, at Harrah’s, last week. But since they already charged him, it seems he’s checked out.”

I thanked Grier and said I’d come by to pick up the reports. Then I sat and considered the information. A $168,000 Lamborghini? It was preposterous. Jimmy Homestead was the kind of guy who talked about fancy cars, not owned one. Where could the money have come from? I guess he could have pulled off a major score on a cocaine deal. It didn’t seem likely, though; I couldn’t imagine Jimmy having the brains or balls for it. Or maybe he’d become a gigolo for a wealthy old lady. That was possible, but seemed farfetched.

I went to my desk, did a Google search on Jimmy Homestead, and got my answer. A brief newspaper article came up, reporting that four weeks ago, Jimmy Homestead had won a California State Lottery prize of $43 million. I was stunned for a moment. “Well, that explains that,” I said out loud, sipping coffee and staring out my window. What would a guy like Jimmy Homestead do with all of that money? Based on my recollection of him from fifteen years ago, it was feasible he might blow through it in a couple of years. Sheila Marjorie’s account of his life also suggested Jimmy would probably not take a prudent approach to money management. His new car and his other purchases, including over five grand at the bordello, seemed to indicate Jimmy was on a roll. I imagined he was partying up a storm—booze, blow, and expensive hookers.

It now seemed pretty clear how Sheila intended to pay me. Obviously she knew Jimmy had run into a windfall, and she intended to get him to share the wealth. I was curious why she wouldn’t tell me about it. Maybe she thought I’d double my rates.

Half an hour later, I returned home with the reports from Grier. I pored over the papers, plotting Jimmy’s activity over the last thirty days, searching for some pattern that might reveal his whereabouts. He seemed to be bouncing around California and Nevada like a pinball. I finally set the records aside and took off in my truck, heading east across the border into Nevada, settling in for the forty-five-minute drive over Spooner Pass to Carson City. My destination was the last place the records showed Jimmy had used his credit card: the Tumbleweed Parlor Ranch.

I
t should have been a happy day for Mort Homestead. After five years in the state prison at Folsom, his parole was granted. They kicked him free with the clothes on his back, forty-eight dollars cash, and a ride to the bus stop. The guard in the prison van gave him a hard look as Mort stepped out onto the street.

“You think you’re something special,” the guard said. “You ain’t.”

“Go back to your job. It’s your calling,” Mort said, his eyes pale green under his thin eyebrows.

“Good luck out there, asshole,” the guard sneered. The van pulled away in a wash of gravel and exhaust.

Mort stood at the bus stop, internalizing the brief exchange, filing it away as fuel for future situations. It was a mental practice he’d learned at a young age, at first to deal with his father, and later as a response to the myriad frustrations of his teen years. Every denial he suffered, every woman who rejected him, every person who didn’t cooperate—Mort stored it all, saving it as an energy source for when it was needed.

For his first three weeks in Folsom, each day had been a proving exercise. As a forty-three-year-old white man convicted of investment fraud, he was an obvious target, a white-collar criminal thrust into a jungle of predators. The facility was divided into camps run by the Black Guerrilla Family, the Mexican Mafia, and the Aryan Brotherhood. They ruled via intimidation and swift violence. The penalty for the slightest disrespect was generally a severe beating, if you were lucky, or if not, a gang rape. Of course, the latter also could occur without provocation. Mort was attacked by a group of black inmates his first week, and while defending himself bit off one of his attacker’s ears. The next night they came for him again. This time Mort was prepared with a knife he bought from a fellow inmate. He nearly castrated one man and cut off another’s thumb.

It didn’t take long for the rumors to spread. Mort Homestead was a psychotic loner who was quick with a knife if provoked. Yard wolves sought out younger, easier victims. The gang members kept their distance and watched him warily. Mort didn’t fraternize much with the inmates, whom he generally considered a lower life form. But at times it was necessary to reinforce his reputation, and once, during a fight with a drug-crazed Mexican, Mort’s cheek was sliced open. He still wore the scar, like a diagonal second mouth.

Mort didn’t wait for the bus. Instead, he walked six miles east, pacing steadily toward the foothills, away from Sacramento. Eventually he left the road and hiked into the rolling hills. He strode with a single-minded purpose, and though the midday sun was hot, he did not stop to rest in the shade of the oak trees, even after his feet began to blister in his loafers. Sweat soaked through his shirt, and he stripped it off and let the sun beat down on his shoulders and back. His muscles glistened, taut and corded from hours of mindless prison workouts. He shaded his eyes from the sun and kept walking.

He didn’t stop until he reached the base of a large oak on a small rise. He stepped off ten paces north, stopped at the three rocks he had left there, then continued through some scrub into a gully where he’d hidden a shovel. Mort went back to the spot and began digging into the hard, crusty ground. It took over an hour, but finally the shovel hit a small steel box. Mort pried it from the earth and opened it. The canvas bag was still there, with the $7,000 in cash Mort had stashed before the courts confiscated his bank accounts, cars, and real estate.

A couple of hours later he was on a bus, heading into Sacramento. He got off and walked to the Hilton near the state capitol building.

The clerk at the reception counter was a man of mixed race in his twenties. He looked up as Mort approached and wrinkled his nose.

“A room, please,” Mort said.

“Sir, this is a business-class hotel, and we have a dress code.”

“I’m aware of that.”

The clerk felt Mort’s eyes staring into his, and he involuntarily stepped back.

“Yes, then. I’ll need to see a credit card to cover incidentals.”

“I’ll give you a cash deposit.”

“Sir, we typically…”

“What’s your name?”

“My name?”

“Is there something the matter with your hearing?”

The young man opened his mouth but could only manage a confused sputter.

“You want to leave your name out of it, fine. Here’s enough cash to cover the room and a deposit. Get me a key, please.”

“Yes, sir,” the clerk said, deciding he wanted this man away from the counter as quickly as possible.

Mort took the elevator to his room and went inside. He washed his face over the sink, then lay on the bed. He expected he’d be tired, but after a minute he rose, sat at the desk, and again considered the blend of fate and circumstance now directing his future. He had learned of his nephew winning the lottery while in prison. What strange cosmic alignment would result in a worthless dirtbag becoming vastly wealthy, while a rich executive loses everything and rots in jail? The world was a mysterious place. People suffered undeserved fates all the time.

He picked up the phone and dialed the number for his older brother, John Homestead. Mort was mildly surprised when John picked up.

“Well, I didn’t think you’d be home, but I figured I’d try anyway,” Mort said. “I thought you’d be working, but looks like I was wrong.”

“Who is this? Is it…Mort?”

“That’s right, John, it’s your long lost brother.”

“You calling from Folsom?”

“No, they released me today.”

“They did, huh?”

“Yeah. Thanks for staying in touch.”

“I find it funny you’d think I would.”

“Five years in that shithole, and you couldn’t be bothered to pick up the phone?”

“I don’t want anything to do with you, Mort. I don’t think I can put it more plainly than that.”

“We’re brothers.”

“You know our status,” John said. “You going to prison hasn’t changed a thing.”

“You gonna hold a grudge against me forever?”

“Listen to me. I was stupid to trust you on your swindle. It bankrupted me and screwed up my existence beyond repair. But I’ve moved on in my life.”

“You need to get over yourself,” Mort said.

“You got to be kidding.”

The phone went quiet, then Mort said, “So, have you talked to Jimmy?”

“Why?” John said.

“I don’t know, John, seeing how all you ever did is complain about money, I think it’s an obvious question.”

“Maybe your time in jail has left you with some wires disconnected.”

“No, I’m thinking real clearly.”

“Then spell it out, Mort, because I’m ready to hang up.”

“The California Super Lotto was forty-three million a month ago.”

“Who gives a shit?”

“You’re telling me you don’t know?”

“About what?”

“The little dipstick hasn’t told you, huh? Jimmy won it, John. Forty-three million bucks.”

“Yeah, sure he did. You know what, Mort? I’m not as gullible as I used to be. I think this is another one of your scams. I don’t believe a damned thing you say.”

“Hey, don’t take my word for it. Contact the
San Jose Mercury
. They wrote an article about it. You know what’s funny, John? Your own son wins forty-three mil and won’t even cut his old man in for a few hundred grand. You must feel real special about that. Kind of makes you want to revisit the whole concept of fatherhood, huh?”

“Don’t ever call here again,” John Homestead said, and hung up.

Mort stood and laughed out loud for a long time, holding his stomach and wiping tears from his eyes. Then he sat back down at the desk and considered his next move.

• • •

After slamming down the phone, John Homestead found and printed the online article, and read it over and over while pacing around his small apartment. His hands were shaking and he couldn’t make them stop. Finally he took a long drag from a bottle of gin, and that helped. He sat on his couch, closed his eyes, and tried to meditate, the way his shrink had taught him, but a minute later he was walking from room to room, as if searching for something. Another belt of gin calmed him a bit more, and he started to sort through it all.

Hours passed, and the apartment became dark. John turned off the old Super 8 projector he’d set up on the coffee table and stacked the reels scattered about. It had been many, many years since he’d watched those movies. The images on the old celluloid seemed to be from someone else’s life. He could barely even recognize himself—lean and tanned, a confident smile under a full head of blond hair, his sexy second wife next to him—god, what a piece of tail she’d been! And his sons, Marty and Jimmy, throwing the football, opening presents at Christmas, hamming it up for the camera. Christ, had he really lived that life? Had he been happy then? He looked happy, but he couldn’t remember how it felt.

He took another swig off the bottle and stared into the darkness. So much he once had, and so much he’d lost. Looking back over his fifty years, it seemed unreal that after all he’d been through, he’d end up with nothing. He once had money and a young, gorgeous wife, and he smiled at the stirring in his groin as he thought of her. But his smile faded quickly, because no woman would have him now—a fat, aging man without a pot to piss in.

And his kids—his two boys, Marty and Jimmy. Poor, innocent Marty, not a hurtful bone in his body. Not real smart, but such a sweet kid. Marty the pleaser, always did his chores without being asked, never a problem in school, just a kid who wanted to make his parents happy. But now he was dead, no-luck Marty, one of the few American casualties in the Gulf War. He’d been a little too anxious to please his commanding officer, and he died by a sniper’s bullet in Kuwait. No one else in his battalion was even wounded.

But Jimmy wasn’t like that; he was almost the polar opposite of Marty. Smart but lazy, Jimmy always found a way to shirk his responsibilities, never wanted to work, just wanted everything handed to him. Nothing was ever his fault, no, and when the going got tough, Jimmy would be the first to fade. And he had a mean, jealous streak—he was a me-first, screw-everyone-else person. John Homestead shook his head, trying to come to terms with his turmoil of emotions, because he had once been the same way. And now he was alone, in poor health, and nearly destitute. Perhaps it was all his fault. If so, he accepted it. But he couldn’t find a rationale to justify the behavior of his son, who had won a $43 million lottery and hadn’t called his father.

Finally John turned on a light and went to his bedroom closet. Without fully knowing why, he reached to the high shelf and found the hard plastic case that held his pistol.

A
little before noon, Tony Sanzini walked out of his mother’s house to get the mail. Among the bulk ads and a few bills (all his mother’s, since she paid the utilities) was a plain white envelope addressed to him in chicken-scrawl penmanship. There was no return address, but he recognized the handwriting of his old buddy, Peco Gomez, who was serving a ten-year jolt in Soledad. Sanzini sat down at his mother’s kitchen table and opened the letter.