The Downtown Deal (4 page)

"I
noticed the case was still sealed. How come you never drank any of it?"

"Neither
Sandra nor I are big on wine. I mean, we're not connoisseurs. She likes —
liked a glass of Chardonnay with dinner, that kind of thing. But this stuff is
red, or so the Baron told me, and she preferred white. We had that little wine
pantry to keep a few bottles in there for her, and for company. You know, for
dinner parties and whatnot. I just put it in there down on the floor and forgot
about it. Then, before we could use any of it, we divorced."

"Speaking
of your divorce, was it amicable?"

He
shrugged. "It was as amicable as these things can get, I suppose. I mean,
we weren't spitting on each other or anything, but it did take a lot out of me,
both monetarily and emotionally. I really don't want to go any further into
it."

I
exhaled. "All right, I'll go get the wine. I've got a key, compliments of
Ryan Farrow."

"Great,"
he said. "Just be very careful with it, okay? It's expensive stuff."

"Yeah,
I know. So I'm told."

"I'll
let you know when I want to pick it up."

"You
mean, you're not coming to get it anytime soon?"

He
said, "If I kept in my house, someone could break in and steal it."

"Steal
it? Out of your house? Why would anyone do that?"

"If
someone wants it badly enough, they'll do it."

I
leaned forward in the booth. "By someone, you mean the Farrow
brothers?"

"Them,
or … whoever."

I
scratched my head. "Isn't your home safe? I mean, you must have a pretty
good security system."

"Oh,
I definitely do. But if someone wants that wine, they'll break in and take it,
security or no security. So will you keep it for me? For just a little while?
I'll throw in an extra twenty-five hundred for your trouble."

That
got my attention. "Okay. Consider it stored."

"And
don't open any of the bottles. Not even the case."

This
wasn't adding up. Why would the Farrows be so hot to get this wine if, as Blake
says, it didn't belong to them. They didn't strike me as common thieves, so
they must have a deeper reason. And then, why would Blake go all this way to
protect it. He said he never even drank wine. To hear him talk, you'd think he
didn't know or care anything about it, the way he let it sit around untouched
in that little cooler all that time.

"What's
the deal with this wine?" I asked. "Why's it so important to
you?"

His
voice ticked downward, barely audible in the racket of the coffee shop.
"It's not important to
you
,
Jack. That's what you have to remember."

I
didn't like that shit at all, but he was paying the freight, so he got to
decide what's important. Reluctantly, I nodded, and I agreed to his
don't-open-don't-touch rule. Then I said, "Now, who are these Farrow
brothers, anyway?"

"They're
mortgage bankers. One of them's been seeing Sandra for about six months."

I let
that go. Colby told me his brother had been seeing Sandra for a year. Either
Blake wasn't tracking her activities as closely as he might have liked, or she
was lying to him for the first six months of her relationship with Ryan Farrow.
Or maybe both.

"Are
they involved in any kind of competition with you at present? Would they try to
undermine any of your deals?"

"We're
not really competitors. They represent the big money lenders, finding borrowers
for them on large real estate projects. But let's just say they certainly
wouldn't go out of their way to avoid making things difficult for me. Over the
years, I've had my problems with them."

Just
then, the waitress brought our drinks. Blake got his iced tea in a really tall
glass, taller than anything he was used to, I could tell, and very big around.
He looked at it as though a UFO had landed on the table.

My
beer came in a bottle, accompanied by a frosty pilsener glass. I poured it and
took that first refreshing sip. Call me crazy, but I think beer always, always
tastes better out of one of those slender, V-shaped glasses.

Once
the cold beer slid down my throat, I said, "You know, Mr Blake, I'm not
real clear on why you want me, of all people, to work on this. For the money
you're paying me, you could hire a real PI, one with a Nevada license, to work
this case. Or, for that matter, you've got No-Sleeve Steve and … and … what's-his-name
working for you already." I remembered all too well his two goons who
pounded a lot of sense into me one day not so long ago.

He
chuckled. "You mean Julius? Ha! Steve and Julius find the killer? Ha! They
couldn't find the sink in a kitchen."

He
pushed his iced tea aside. I could tell he wanted no part of it.

Then
he said, "And as for some other PI, I don't want any other one. I want
you." He spoke in a honeyed voice, smooth and persuasive. "After all,
it was you who returned over eighty-five thousand dollars of my money back in
February, when you could've kept it, without my ever knowing about it. You've
got integrity, Jack. That's a rare commodity in today's world. Something you
can't license, and it can't be had for a price."

Sure,
I could've kept his money, and I almost did. I damn sure could've used it, too.
Back in February, before I switched to no-limit hold'em, it was getting harder
and harder to make a living at those low-limit stud games at Binion's.

But he
was wrong when he said no one would've known.

I
would've.

"Mr
Blake, let me see your cell phone."

I saw
his head go back just a little. "My cell phone? What for?"

"Just
let me see it, please." I put my hand out, palm up.

"What
do you want it for?"

"I'm
going to copy down certain names and numbers."

His
nostrils flared at this notion. "My cell phone is private. And it's got
nothing to do with this."

"What
do you think, I'm going to publish the number in
Las Vegas Weekly
? Now,
either you trust me on this, or we can't have a deal. I'm working on
your
behalf here."

"How
about if I read the names and numbers to you?"

"So
you can skip over the ones I want?" I shook my head. "Let me see the
phone. Like I said, it's in
your
best
interest."

He
slowly reached into the inside pocket of his suit jacket, and out came the cell
phone. He slid it across the table, and I went straight to his directory.
Scanning the names, I saw what you might expect. Local officials, real estate
people, and so on. Most had local numbers.

"Do
you have a pen?" I asked. I knew this aggravated the shit out of him, but
I didn't care.

He
produced a pen, a nice one, from his other inside jacket pocket. First, I wrote
down his cell number, then I began jotting down names and numbers from the
directory on a napkin.

"Hey,
those are private." he said. "Confidential numbers. No one's supposed
to have them."

I
stopped writing to look up at him. "You have them."

"I
mean no one else but me," he said, knowing his protests were falling away,
dying unattended by the side of the road.

"Don't
worry. I won't tell anyone where I got them."

He
tossed his hands up in the air in exasperation, then let them land softly on
the tabletop. He looked around the room, trying to occupy himself.

Needing
something to do while I invaded his confidential phone directory, he reached
for a packet of Splenda, opened it, and was about to pour it into his enormous
iced tea glass. He thought better of it, then, not knowing what to do with the
open packet, dumped its contents into his empty coffee cup.

Our
food arrived, but I kept writing. I was on my second napkin.

"Go
ahead and eat while I do this," I chirped. "Go on. I'll catch
up."

Soon,
I came to a single name, "Netty". I wrote down the number.

"Who's
Netty?" I asked.

He
fiddled a little with his salad. "A friend."

"Female?"

He
nodded.

"How
close a friend?"

He
looked at me, right into my eyes. Almost right through me. "Close
enough."

"What's
her last name?"

He put
down his fork in frustration.

"That's
none of your business."

Now it
was my turn to put something down. I slammed his phone on the table in front of
me. The sharp report got his attention.

"None
of my business? I've got ten thousand reasons why it
is
my business. You
know, Frank Madden is working this case for Las Vegas Metro. If you don't
happen to know him, let me tell you that if you start high-hatting him like
you're doing to me, he'll have your ass downtown in about two seconds
flat." He opened his mouth to deliver a sharp response, but I wouldn't let
him interrupt. "Now, I know you're not used to having anyone talk to you
like this, Mr Blake, but I'm speaking the truth. We're supposed to have the
same goal in mind here, but if you're that upset by it, just fire me, I'll
return your money, then I'll go play poker this afternoon."

To
underline the point, I reached into my pants pocket, pulling out nearly the
entire ten grand he'd given me, all in cash, folded over with a rubber band. I
held it at eye level between my thumb and first two fingers, slowly turning it
from side to side.

He
said, "She and I are no longer seeing each other."

Someone
in the party of eight at the next table told a rip-snorter of a joke, sending
the entire table into laughing fits, and drowning out any normal tone of voice.

As I
returned the cash to my pocket, I had to shout out the question, "When did
you break up with her?"

"Six
or eight weeks ago. She's not involved with this at all."

Without
comment, I looked at his text messages. Most were to and from Netty, suggestive
cooings to one another, or else setting up times to meet, that kind of thing. I
read a few, but they were all pretty much alike, all carrying the whiff of hot
sex. The two of them were obviously a heavy item. The messages stretched back
to last March, then dried up during the summer.

"There,"
I said, smiling, as I finally returned his cell phone. "Now, that wasn't
so hard, was it?"

I put
his pen down, but didn't give it back to him.

I
started eating, and we both fell silent for a few minutes. Pretty soon, I said,
"I need to ask you something else. What deals do you have cooking with
your company."

He was
a cool one, not fidgeting in the least, his voice hanging on to its satiny,
alluring timbre, while he pushed his salad around on his plate.

"We're
building a new shopping mall out in Henderson, and we're about to start
construction on a new bank building up in the northwest part of town."

"Anything
peculiar about those? Any unusual obstacles standing in your way?"

"Not
really, no. They're moving along as expected."

"That's
it, then? Just those two?"

"That's
it. Well, except for …"

I let
him wrestle with his hesitation while I refilled my beer glass, sipping a
little of the head as it brimmed over down the sides.

Then I
said, "Except for what?"

"There's
this lot we want to buy on the edge of downtown. We're negotiating for it
now."

"What
kind of lot?"

"About
five acres. Zoned industrial. It's nearly vacant. Got a couple of old warehouse
structures on it in one corner."

"What
do you want with that?" I asked.

"We
own a few parcels surrounding it. That's all I'm going to tell you."

"Are
the Farrows involved in any way?"

"No."
He stirred his salad around with his fork.

"Who
owns this lot now?"

He ate
some salad, then washed it down with a sip of iced tea. I noticed his
discomfort at lifting the large glass. "None of this has anything to do
with Sandra's death."

"You
don't know that. Now who owns the lot?"

"Forget
it, Jack. Our discussion is over."

Blake
was one cool customer, all right. He'd given up quite a lot here under my
duress and I figured I'd pushed him as far as you can push a guy like this.
Farther, really. I knew anything more would be counterproductive, so I quit
while I was way ahead, and went back to my club sandwich.

I
had other stops I needed to make, but I wanted to get back
out to Beachview first and retrieve the wine. Blake was obviously nervous about
it, and while I had put the fear of God into the Farrow brothers, they seemed
to want it pretty badly, too. I had a hunch they might eventually push their
luck and come back for it anyway, despite my threats.

Getting
into the house was no problem, since I had the key, but I noticed that the door
had only a hardware-store deadbolt, which wouldn't stop anyone who really
wanted in. I made a mental note to tell Blake to get decent locks for the house
he currently lived in.

Once
inside, I went straight back to the kitchen. The old wooden box was still
there, still nailed shut, so I pulled it out of its cool nook. Before carrying
it out to my car, I decided to have another look around.

The
living room looked the same, nothing disturbed. I glimpsed the bloody carpet
again. The reddish stain was concentrated in one small area where Sandra Blake
obviously bled heavily. That told me she fell in that spot right after being
shot, without much moving around, while her blood poured out of her, soaking
into the thick yellow carpeting.

On the
wall, a couple of feet behind where she would have been standing, was the
evidence of the exit wound: the bullet hole, along with somewhat symmetrical
blood spatter. From about three feet away, I raised my arm straight out, as
though I had a gun in my hand pointing at the spot where she must have stood. I
wondered about her final thought as she saw the barrel of the gun rise up to
eye level, inches away. Was she consumed by fear? Surprise? Hatred?