The Whistler (The Whistler #1)(13)
Hugo added, “Let’s play it safe and say we’ll have forty-five days to do our assessment.”
“That’s not enough time,” Myers said.
“That’s all we have,” Lacy said.
“What can you tell us about your mysterious client?” Hugo asked. “How does he know what he knows?”
Myers sipped some water and smiled. “Once again, you assume the person is a ‘he.’?”
“Okay, what do you want to call him, or her?”
“There are only three links in our little chain. Me, the middleman who referred the client to me, and the client himself or herself. The middleman and I refer to the client as the mole. The mole could be male or female, old or young, black or white or brown, doesn’t really matter right now.”
Lacy said, “The mole? That’s not very original.”
“What difference does it make? You got a more descriptive name?”
“I guess it will have to do. How does the mole know so much?”
Myers crammed half a soft taco into his mouth and chewed slowly. The boat rocked in the wake of something larger out there. Finally, he said, “The mole is very close to Judge McDover, and is trusted implicitly by Her Honor. Trusted too much, it appears. That’s all I can say right now.”
After a gap in the conversation, Lacy said, “I have another question. You said these people, meaning Dubose and his gang, are very smart and use good lawyers. Obviously, McDover also needs a good lawyer to clean her share of the dirty money. Who does she hire?”
“Phyllis Turban, a trust and estate lawyer in Mobile.”
“Wow, the girls are getting a black eye in this story,” Lacy said.
“She and McDover were in law school together, both divorced with no children, and very close. So close that they might be more than just friends.”
They swallowed hard and digested this. Lacy said, “So to summarize the case so far, our target, Judge Claudia McDover, takes bribes from thugs, skims casino cash from the Indians, and somehow launders the money with the help of a very close friend who happens to be an estate lawyer.”
Myers smiled and said, “I’d say you’re on the right track. I need a beer. Anybody want a beer? Carlita!”
—
They left him on the pier, waving good-bye and promising to keep in touch. He had dropped hints about disappearing into even deeper cover, now that the complaint was filed and would soon cause trouble. Lacy and Hugo had detected nothing that would indicate how or why Vonn Dubose and Claudia McDover would suspect Greg Myers, formerly known as Ramsey Mix and a man they had supposedly never met. It was another gap in his story, of which there were far too many.
5
They spent the next day in the office, brainstorming with Geismar and putting together a plan. With the complaint on file, the clock was ticking. If things stayed on schedule, Lacy and Hugo would soon drive to the small town of Sterling and serve a copy of it upon the Honorable Claudia McDover. By then it would be imperative to know as much as possible.
First, though, they needed to visit death row. Hugo had been there once, on a field trip in law school. Lacy had heard about Starke her entire career, but had never found the excuse to see it. They left early enough to beat the morning rush around Tallahassee, and by the time the traffic thinned on I-10 Hugo was nodding off. The prison was two and a half hours away. Lacy had not been forced to walk the floors with a crying baby all night, but she had not slept much either. She and Hugo, as well as Geismar, felt as though they were probably sticking their noses into a mess that someone else should clean up. If Greg Myers could be believed, serious criminal activity had been rampant in Brunswick County for a long time. Investigators with far more resources and experience should get the nod on this one. They were lawyers, after all, not cops. They didn’t want to carry guns. They were trained to go after corrupt judges, not organized crime syndicates.
These thoughts had kept her from sleeping most of the night. When she caught herself yawning, she whipped into a fast-food drive-thru and ordered coffee. “Wake up,” she scolded her partner. “We have an hour and a half to go and I can’t stay awake either.”
“Sorry,” Hugo said, rubbing his eyes.
They slugged coffee, and as she drove Hugo summarized one of Sadelle’s memos. “According to our colleague, from 2000 through 2009, there were ten lawsuits in Brunswick County involving a company called Nylan Title, a Bahamian outfit whose registered agent is a lawyer over in Biloxi. In each case, the opposing party tried to compel the identities of the real owners of Nylan Title, and each time the judge, our friend Claudia McDover, said no. Off-limits. A company domiciled in the Bahamas is governed by its laws, and they have a way of protecting their companies. It’s all a shell game but it’s legal. Anyway, Nylan Title must have some great lawyers because it is undefeated, at least in Judge McDover’s courtroom. Ten to zero.”
“What kinds of cases?” Lacy asked.
“Zoning, breach of contract, diminution of property value, even an aborted class action by a bunch of condo owners claiming defective workmanship. The county sued Nylan in a dispute over property valuations and taxes.”
“Who shows up on behalf of Nylan?”
“The same lawyer out of Biloxi. He’s the corporate mouthpiece and seems to know what’s going on. If Nylan is indeed Vonn Dubose, then he’s well hidden, just like Myers says. Layers of lawyers, as he put it. Nice phrase.”