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“There was an orange T-shirt there as well, but I don’t want to jump to conclusions.”
Rinaldo nods with his hand still covering his eyes. Again, his reaction isn’t what I expect. I’m waiting for him to give the order to start taking out the gangs, but he doesn’t. He just sits there.
“Sir?”
“It’s all my fault, Evan. I never should have let Lele bring her here. I never should have gotten so close. Someone figured it out, and I didn’t think about what kind of danger I was putting her in. I didn’t protect her. It’s all my fault.”
I swallow past my tightening throat. I have no idea what I should say. I knew he would be upset when he found out, but I hadn’t expected this.
“She should have had her own security,” he says. “Jesus, Evan, I fucked up. I fucked up, and now she’s…she’s…”
He can’t continue, and I still have no words. I did it to protect him, not to hurt him. I didn’t realize he’d be hurt.
Maybe I fucked up.
“I need you to do something for me, Evan.”
“Of course, sir. Anything.” I let out the breath I had been holding.
All right. Back on track now. Send me to take revenge.
“Get the bank account information that’s in her name. Withdraw all of it. There’s a safe-deposit box as well—get the contents. Once you have it all, bring it back to me.”
“All right,” I say. “Can I ask why?”
“Felisa has a daughter,” he says quietly. “I need to make sure it all goes to her.”
A daughter? Who is the father? Rinaldo?
I don’t ask. I don’t think I want to know.
While Jonathan begins his research on the close members of the group, I drive up to Rinaldo’s office to do a bit of my own. All the little, niggling feelings that had been in the back of my head during official meetings were in the forefront of my mind now. I should have trusted my instincts before. If I had, maybe this wouldn’t have happened.
Ralph has decided to go along for the ride. He follows me up the stairs to Rinaldo’s office and watches as I start looking through his desk. I’m not completely sure what I’m trying to find, but I feel there has to be something to give me some insight.
“How did they get Capone?”
I glance up, recognizing the voice but not being able to place it right away. There is no one there but Ralph, and I realize that the voice is technically my own. I just don’t really remember saying the words.
“Tax fraud. The bookkeeper.”
Ralph nods slowly as his mouth turns up in a half-smile.
“Kind of cliché, isn’t it?”
Ralph just shrugs. I don’t have Jonathan’s laptop to access all the files, so I head over to the main filing cabinet to see what I can find there. Everything inside of it is related to the legitimate businesses, which isn’t a surprise. It’s not like you keep detailed records labeled “meth sales” out in the open.
I pull out some files on the uniform business, but it’s not very helpful. I do find a passcode to a digital file though and take it over to Rinaldo’s desk and boot up his computer. The file is easy enough to locate, and I wonder if Jonathan knows how unprotected some of the stuff on here is. I make a mental note to have him tighten the security.
From the computer file, I can at least figure out that the caviar sales are partially driven through uniforms. That leads me to the rest of the caviar sales and the used car lots. One of the lots catches my eye—it’s the same one where I bought the Camaro.
Caviar sales are tied to all the import cars, ironically enough. The domestics seem to be wrapped around meth distribution. On a whim, I check the sale of my own car. I knew what I actually paid the guy and see the discrepancy between what’s been recorded. I expect that—it’s how money is laundered in the first place. I make note of the exact difference before I dig deeper.
The ledger containing the meth distribution doesn’t match. It’s only two hundred off, and someone might have excused it as a typo, but it’s enough to make me keep looking.
“Who do you trust?”
I glare at Ralph, who is now lounging on the couch against the wall.
