Undercover Connection

“You’re sure?”

“Positive. The bodies discovered were all men.”

“Oh, thank God. I mean... I’m not glad that anyone was dead, but—”

“It’s all right,” Jorge assured her. “I understand. So, tomorrow will be tense. I’m going to get out of here. Let you get some sleep.” He started to rise, and then he didn’t. “Never mind.”

“Never mind?”

“I’m going to stay here.”

“I don’t need to be protected,” she said. “Bolts on the door, gun next to the bed.”

“You don’t need to be protected?” Jorge said. “I do! Safety in numbers. Bolt the door and let’s get some sleep.”

She rose. “Okay, I lied, and you’re right—anyone can be taken by surprise. And I have been a jerk and I don’t know why.”

“I do,” Jorge said softly. “You really shouldn’t be working this case. You have a personal involvement. And in a way, so do I. I’ve met Mary.”

Jasmine nodded. “I don’t feel that I’m really up to speed yet, despite what we learned from Wolff. I’ll get you some pillows and bedding,” she told him.

“What time are we supposed to be where?” he asked her as she laid out sheets on the sofa.

“Ten o’clock, back at the club.”

“I’m willing to bet half of it will still be shut down.”

“We won’t be going to the floor. We’ll be picking up our pay in the offices, using the VIP entrance on the side to the green room and staging areas.”

“You know that we can get in?”

She nodded. “I wound up with Natasha and the other girls in a little group when the police were herding people for interviews. Natasha asked the lead detective—Detective Greenberg is in charge for the City of Miami Beach—and he told her that they’d cordon off the club area until they finished with the investigation. Owners and operators were free to use the building where the police weren’t investigating.”

“Then go to bed. We’ll begin again in the morning.”

Jorge was clearly thinking something but not saying it.

“What?” she pressed.

“I didn’t know until today that the FBI was in on this case—the briefing was why I arrived late. MDPD found the group operating the Gold Sun Club to be shady, as did the cops with the City of Miami Beach. But there’s been no hard evidence against them and nothing that anyone could do. I know you’ve been talking to Captain Lorenzo about them for a while, but...we just found out today that Smirnoff was about to give evidence against the whole shebang. I’m just—”

“Just what?”

He grimaced. “I like the Feds. They have more resources than we do. They have more reach across state lines. Across international lines. And I don’t know how long I’ll get to be one of the models—if the big show ended in disaster, I could be out fast. And then I won’t be around to help you.”

“I’m willing to bet the Deco Gang will keep planning. Kozak will say that all the people who had been hired for jobs at the club will still need work. He’ll go forward in Smirnoff’s name—Smirnoff would not want to have been frightened off Miami Beach. We’ll be in.”

“You will be. I may not. So, I’m just glad that...well, that there’s another law enforcement agent undercover on this case. Speaking of undercover...” Jorge grabbed his blanket and turned around, smiling as he feigned sleep.

Jasmine opened her mouth to speak. She shook her head and went to the bedroom. Ready for bed and curled up, she admitted to herself that she just might be glad for Jacob Wolff’s involvement, too.

She had assumed the group was trading in prostitution, turning models into drug addicts and then trafficking them.

She hadn’t known about the bodies in the barrels. And she hadn’t suspected that Smirnoff was going to die.

So she was glad she would have backup if she had to continue getting close to these dangerous players. Otherwise she probably should back right out of the case.

Except she just couldn’t. They had Mary. They had her somewhere.

And Jasmine had to pray her friend was still alive.

Chapter Three (#u572d0887-8df4-5438-af8f-26ac52ec6294)

Jacob could remember coming to South Beach with his parents as a child. Back then, the gentrification of the area was already underway.

His mom liked to tell him about the way it had been when she had been young, when the world had yet to realize the beauty and architectural value of the art deco hotels—and when the young and beautiful had headed north on South Beach to the fabulous Fontainebleau and other such hotels where the likes of Sinatra and others had performed. In her day, there had been tons of bagel shops, and high school kids had all come to hang out by the water with their surfboards—despite a lack of anything that resembled real surf.

It was where his parents had met. His father had once told him, not without some humor, that he’d fallen in love over a twenty-five-cent bagel.

The beach was beautiful. Jacob had opted for a little boutique hotel right on the water. Fisher House had been built in the early 1920s when a great deal around it had been nothing but scrub, brush and palms. It had been completely renovated and revamped about a decade ago and was charming, intimate and historic, filled with framed pictures of long ago. The back door opened to a vast porch—half filled with dining tables—and then a tiled path led to the pool and beyond down to the ocean.

Jacob started the morning early, out on the sand, watching the sun come up, feeling the ocean breeze and listening to the seagulls cry. The rising sun was shining down on the water, creating a sparkling scene with diamond-like bits of brilliance all around him.

It was a piece of heaven. Sand between his toes, and then a quick dip in the water—cool and yet temperate in the early-morning hour. He loved it. Home for him in the last few years had been Washington, D.C., or New York City. There were beaches to be found, yes, but nothing like this. So, for the first hour of the day, he let himself just love the feel of salt air around him, hear the lulling rush of waves and look out over the endless water.

There was nothing like seeing it like a native. By 9:00 a.m., he was heading along Ocean Drive. The city was coming alive by then; roller skaters whizzed by him and traffic was heavy. Art galleries and shops were beginning to open, and tourists were flocking out in all manner of beach apparel, some wearing scanty clothing and some not. While most American men were fond of surf shorts for dipping in the water, Europeans tended to Speedos and as little on their bodies as possible. It was a generalization; he didn’t like generalizations, but in this case, he was pretty sure he was right.

A fellow with a belly that surely hid his toes from his own sight—and his Speedo—walked on by and greeted Jacob with a cheerful “good morning” that was spoken with a heavy foreign accent.

Jacob smiled. The man was happy with himself and within the legal bounds of propriety for this section of the beach. And that was what mattered.

He stopped into the News Café. It was a great place to see...and be seen. Before he’d been murdered, the famous designer Gianni Versace had lived in one of South Beach’s grand old mansions. He had also dined many a morning at the News Café. Tourists flocked there. So did locals.

Jacob picked up a newspaper, ordered an egg dish and sat back and watched—and listened.

The conversation was all about the shooting of Josef Smirnoff at what should have been one of the brightest moments in the pseudo-plastic environment of the beach.

“You can bring in all the stars you want—but with those people—”

“I heard it was a mob hit!”

“Did you know that earlier, like in the morning, three bodies were found in oil drums out in the Everglades?”

“Yeah. I don’t think anyone had even reported them missing. No ID’s as of yet, but hey...like we don’t have enough problems down here.”

People were talking. Naturally.

“Told you we shouldn’t have come to Miami.”