Connections in Death (In Death #48)(66)

“First, there’s nothing that implicates Vinn re Jones. Oh, and I just want to say, skimming through her tablet—she’s good.” He only grinned at the cool look Peabody aimed over her shoulder. “Not just the sexy moves—which my She-Body has plenty of.”

“Do not,” Eve warned as her eye twitched. “Do not.”

“She’s got other stuff she recorded on there. Like, ballet stuff and tap and all that. And she’s not stupid. On her PPC I found a small personal account. It’s not a lot, but it looks to me like maybe she culled out some of her tip money—that’s how it reads—and set up her own nest.”

“Great. Can we move on to criminal behavior?”

“You bet. He keeps a calendar—appointments. And he has regular meetings with Jones. Once a month. And that coincides with deposits he makes. Meets Jones, stashes money.

“You said to keep it moving,” McNab added, “so I didn’t stick, more got overview, right? And part of that is him also moving product for Jones. Illegals.”

“Is that so?” Eve mused.

“Like I said, good records. My take? Jones skims some of the product, passes it to Cohen, Cohen sells it to his contacts, and they split the profit. Or they did.”

“What does that mean?”

“That end’s been falling off—from my skim—the last eight, nine months.” From the back, McNab gestured with his coffee, downed some. “Less product passed, so less profit for Cohen. He has a client list—disbarred or not—and he lists Jones as a client, and the share from illegals as part of his rolling retainer for legal advice. About six months ago, he took on a client he names as Bang-Two, and it looks like he’s working the same kind of deal. Smaller, but the same sort of deal, and with this one, he’s pulling some from their sex trade.”

“He gets a cut?” Eve demanded.

“Sort of. How it reads?” Now McNab scooted up in his seat. “Cops bust one of the sex workers, Cohen goes in as their representative. He doesn’t have to be an accredited lawyer to do that, as long as the person represented is aware he’s not. He takes a fee and lists that as part of his consulting business. It’s tangled, Dallas, but it’s all down there in his records.”

“No mention of Pickering?”

“I ran a search of the name to speed it up, got nothing.”

“Okay.” She pulled into Central’s garage. “I want you to fine-tune this while we take Cohen into interview. Anything you get, anything, you pass on when you get it.”

“It’s a lot. I can ask the captain or maybe Callendar to jump in.”

“Whatever it takes.” She thought of her approach as they walked to the elevator. “Peabody, have him brought up. He can sweat in the box while I work this out a little. And I need to update Whitney. McNab, copy everything to my office comp.”

“Already done.”

“You’re worth the coffee.” Impatient with the elevator, she pushed off, hopped on a glide with Peabody trotting after her.

In her office she contacted Whitney, played it out, sent a quick text to Roarke that she was going in.

She wished she had time to read through, even skim through, what McNab had dug out, but the clock was ticking.

Bang-Two, she thought. He’d pulled another partner/client from the Bangers, someone ambitious, looking to undermine Jones.

Jorgenson. He just kept fitting the bill.

Jones cuts back on Cohen’s take, she thought, so Cohen’s fine with the undermining.

Killing two people, putting the cops’ target on Jones’s back? Serious undermining. Just how much does Cohen know?

She put together a file—a nice, thick one—took time for another hit of coffee, then headed out.

“Let’s burn his balls, Peabody.”

Peabody aimed a look—the Officer Puppy look. “Do I have to be good cop?”

“Today? No good cops in the box.”

“Woo! He’s in Interview A.”

“He’s probably going to start bitching about false arrest, harassment, and other bollocks,” Eve said as they walked. “When we get going, it’s going to all be a big misunderstanding and how we’re guilt-by-associating him.”

“Well, he is guilty by association.”

“Oh yeah.” Eve paused outside the interview room. “Once he realizes we’ve got him on the tax evasion, the fraud, profiting from illegals, he’s going to start talking deal.”

“And we say screw that.”

“Depends.”

Peabody actually danced in place—the frustrated dance. “Aw, come on, Dallas.”

“How much do we care about him doing a time in some white-collar cage for the tax shit? That’s the feds’ worry—but we use it as a hammer on the murders.”

“Ooooh! Squeeze him with the taxes, the fraud.” Following, Peabody nodded, and changed to a quick, satisfied shuffle. “Then dangle a deal, maybe, if he flips on the rest.”

“Right. We use a deal, the idea of one, like the candy at the end of the stick.”

“It’s a carrot at the end of the stick.”

“Who the hell wants a carrot when there’s candy? Reo’s up to date, on her way in. Let’s see how it goes.”