The Last Witness

[FOUR]

As they watched Amanda walk toward the entrance to the restaurant, three men-one fit and tanned who looked to be in his thirties and two middle-aged and sunburned-entered. Young blonde women, in tight dresses and high heels, were on their arms.

Amanda, seemingly oblivious to the group, squeezed past and went out the door.

The blonde with the younger man, who evidently was leading the group, giggled and grinned as she leaned into him. She was trim and tall and tanned, with a beautiful face featuring bright emerald eyes that seemed to miss nothing.

The younger man scanned the restaurant. He and Chad made eye contact, and Chad nodded once. Then he turned to the group and gestured for them to go into the bar.

Matt studied the guy as they left, and did not like what he saw.

“Who was that?” Matt said as he and Chad settled back in their chairs.

“Nick Antonov’s guy. He’s local, out of South Beach.”

“Looks like an ABC.”

“SoBe?”

“Okay, a SoBe ABC. South Beach American-born Cuban.”

Chad nodded. “Right. Forgot that one. Well, Little Havana is right next door to South Beach. Anyway, I met him yesterday at Key West International. The FBO put Nick’s small jet next to my Lear. Something Perez, I think.”

“‘Small jet’?”

“It’s a Citation. His bigger one is a Gulfstream, a G-four, I think.”

“You mean Tikhonov’s G-four,” Matt said.

Yuri Tikhonov, forty-eight, had significant investments in Philadelphia, as well as other cities in the U.S., in Europe, and in his homeland of Russia. He was worth billions, having made his first thousand million dollars shortly after the age of thirty-five. Many of the skills that made him a highly successful businessman, it was said, he had honed in the Sluzhba Vneshney Razvedki, Russia’s agency for external spying and intelligence gathering.

Others suggested that it had more to do with his close relationship with high-ranking politicians in the Kremlin-men he had served under in the SVR, once known as the KGB.

“Okay, I take your point,” Chad said. “The planes are the casino’s. And since Nick works for the casino, and it’s Tikhonov who owns a huge chunk of the casino, they’re his. I just never see him on them.”

Matt speared two oysters from their shells as he said, “I don’t have to guess why those Florida hotties are hanging with older guys.”

“That’s the curious thing. They’re not from Florida. The girls are Russian. They work at the casino. Casinos plural-I heard that they rotate the girls. That one on Nick’s arm, Star, she’s a twenty-one-year-old Ukraine.”

“What about those older guys?”

“I dunno. Maybe Nick’s clients from Philly or Jersey?”

Matt was quiet for a long moment, clearly lost in thought. Then he made a face and drained his single malt. Putting down the glass, he looked at Chad.

“How tight are you with Antonov and his crowd?” Matt suddenly said, somewhat sharply.

“What do you mean?” Chad shot back, his tone indignant. “I don’t fuck around with those girls-or any girls-if that’s what you’re implying. The mother of your goddaughter would have my nuts served to me on the tip of the dull rusty knife she used for the castration.”

“And the girls on your boat?”

“Screw you, Matt! They’re hired by the PR firm. They’re legit.”

“No shit?” Matt said, pushing his chair back to stand. “How can you be sure?”

“I’m sure, damn it,” Chad said, working to keep his voice low. “Why are you even suggesting otherwise? What’s gotten into you?”

“Well, it wouldn’t be the first time you got conned into some shady deal.”

Chad tossed his fork and knife onto his plate and crossed his arms.

“You’re not going to let that thing with Skipper go, are you?”

Matt shrugged. “‘That thing’? I’ve told you that I don’t begin to blame you at all for his death-the dipshit was going to get himself killed one way or another all on his own. I’ve been told that I shouldn’t speak ill of the dead, but it’s one thing that he ruined his life-and it’s something entirely worse that he almost got Becca killed. As I’ve said, my point is that you didn’t walk away from Skipper when you could have.”

Matt and Chad had grown up with J. Warren “Skipper” Olde, whose history of booze and drug abuse had begun when they all attended Episcopal Academy prep school. His father made a fortune building McMansion subdivisions across the country. While the twenty-seven-year-old Skipper had a few legitimate-if questionably successful-real estate projects in development in Philadelphia, it turned out that he supplemented his cash flow by being actively involved in the manufacture and sale of methamphetamine.

Skipper, on September ninth, had been in a seedy motel room at the Philly Inn, one of the properties owned by the company that Chad Nesbitt had invested in. It was on Frankford Avenue, which had come to be known as the Boulevard of Broken Dreams. They had planned, when the timing-and tax break-was right, to demolish and replace the two-story motel with upscale condominiums. At about two o’clock that September morning, with Becca Benjamin, Skipper’s twenty-five-year-old girlfriend, waiting right outside the room in her Mercedes SUV, the meth lab in the room exploded.

The motel became consumed by the chemical-fueled inferno. Two illegal aliens who had been cooking the methamphetamine were killed. Skipper was critically burned. Becca suffered burns and a severe head injury.

Ambulances rushed Skipper and Becca to the advanced Burn Center at Temple University Hospital. There, Matt met the head of the burn unit, Amanda Law, MD, FACS, FCCM.

The bodily injuries had been bad enough. But the next day one Jesus Jimenez, sent to permanently settle an ongoing disagreement over drug money, snuck into the Intensive Care Unit and pumped thirteen rounds of 9mm into Skipper.

Amanda had confided to Matt that it was her brutally cold professional assessment that Jimenez had done Skipper a favor. There was no question that if he was not going to die from his burns, he would’ve suffered a long and painful recovery from them and never been the same again.

Meantime, Becca, recovering from her injuries, battled with Survivor Guilt, and Amanda had arranged for her to be treated by Dr. Amelia Payne, who had been her suitemate at the University of Pennsylvania. The surname was no coincidence-Amy was Matt’s sister, and had long held the same opinion as Amanda vis-a-vis the Wyatt Earp of the Main Line hanging up his gun belt.

Chad looked out the dining room windows at the Atlantic, then turned back to Matt and said, “I thought I was doing the right thing investing in Skipper’s project. And when it all blew up, so to speak, especially after learning about the damn meth, I admitted I’d made a mistake-a huge mistake, okay? — one that I’ve been lucky has not caused any fallout with Nesfoods. As you just said, ‘No good deed goes unpunished.’” He paused, then added, “So, that said, I am not making any damn mistake with Antonov and whatever he and his South Beach Cuban are up to.”

Matt met Chad’s eyes for a long moment, nodded, then exhaled audibly.

“Okay. Sorry,” Matt said, not sounding completely apologetic. “It’s just that something about that SoBe Cuban rubbed the cop in me really wrong. It triggered my Don’t Believe Anyone mode. That, and I’m suddenly ten kinds of really pissed off. I brought Amanda down here to have a pleasant time away from Philly-and we’re not here forty-eight hours and the shit has followed us. Now she’s upset. .”

Chad nodded. “I understand, man. No apology.”

“Thanks,” Matt said, and looked over his shoulder. “If Amanda returns, tell her I’ll be right back.”

“Where are you going?”

“To hit the head. Mother nature calls.”

And to make a call so maybe we can get this shit behind us and get back to having a good time.

Right. Dream on, Matty.

Unless we find out that Maggie has suddenly popped up safe somewhere, her missing is going to keep weighing on Amanda. .

Matt crossed the dining room and entered the gentlemen’s facility that was between the dining room and the bar. When he exited, he turned in the direction of the bar. He expected to see the men with the young women as he entered, was surprised they weren’t there, then went through the bar and outside. He followed the path lined with flickering tiki torches down toward the immaculately groomed beach, pulling out his cell phone as he went.

When he looked at the screen, he saw that Mickey O’Hara had texted three times and, in the last hour, called twice and left voice-mail messages.

What the hell is up with him?

Well, first things first. .

He speed-dialed Jason Washington.

“Good evening, Matthew,” Jason answered on the first ring.

“Sorry to have taken so long. It’s been a very interesting day since you called.”

“What do you have for me?”

“I’ll tell you about the other later. To answer your question about Maggie McCain, Amanda said she has not spoken with her in about a week. She doesn’t recall exactly which day. But it’s been since Maggie came back from a trip to the Caribbean.”

“We’re aware of the trip. Did she say if she understood it to be business or pleasure?”

“We”? Matt thought. That certainly sounds official.

“‘Vacation’ was the word she used. Amanda has spent the last half hour trying to call and text her, since learning about her house catching fire-”

“How did she hear that?” Washington interrupted.

“Not from me, obviously,” Matt said. “Chad Nesbitt told us just now at dinner. Said it started as a home invasion. Any truth to that?”

“Your friend whose family owns Nesfoods?” Jason asked, but it was more of a statement and effectively evaded Matt’s question.

“Yeah. He’s down here on business. Actually, it seems like half of Philly is down here.”

“Did he say how he knew? Did he have any other information about her?”

“No, not really anything else. Only that his wife had driven past and seen the damage and crime-scene tape-and said that she hadn’t known Maggie was back from her trip.”

There was a moment’s silence before Washington said, “Okay, got it. Thank you.”

“What the hell is going on, Jason?”

“Let me know if Amanda hears from her. I will get back to you, Matthew,” he said, dodging the question as he broke the connection.

Matt stared at the glowing screen.

If she hears from her?

Then if someone did die in Maggie’s house, it wasn’t her.

She’s simply missing.

He shook his head, then speed-dialed Mickey O’Hara.