Ian Hamilton - The disciple of Las Vegas

Ava had broken his arm and his nose. She took him to a hospital to get patched up and then drove back to the bank to conclude the business. When they returned to his car, she locked him in the trunk. She had no idea how long it took for someone to find him.

She thought she had handled Leung with only as much force as was needed. If he hadn’t attacked her he wouldn’t have been hurt at all, except for his ego and his wallet. Just as she was wondering what part of the ordeal had made him angry enough to pay people to come after her, her phone rang.

“This is an interesting account,” Johnny said.

She noticed he was using his cellphone. “What did you find?”

“It looks like it was used as a transit account — money in and then, just as quickly, money out.”

“Can you give me the amounts and dates?”

“Do you have a notepad? There’s quite a bit of detail here.”

“In front of me.”

“I’ll give you the deposits first.”

“Go ahead.”

There were fifteen deposits, all of them less than $5 million, just as Louis Marx had described. The dates were random. In one week three deposits had been made and there was a gap of close to three weeks between two others. The very first deposit was for $4 million, Ava saw. Marx had said that Cousins fronted $2 million. That meant that the $2 million Cousins was supposed to have put in the account was never deposited. As Johnny gave her the deposit amounts, Ava kept a running tally. They totalled $58 million, a bit more than Chang had said.

“What a strange pattern,” Ava said.

“The withdrawals are even weirder,” Johnny said.

“How so?”

“The day after each of these cheques was cleared, a wire was sent to Costa Rica for almost that exact same amount.”

“Costa Rica? That’s hardly an offshore haven.”

“I know, and what’s stranger still is that the money was sent to six different banks and to fifteen different individuals. Crazy, huh?”

“Give me the details,” she said.

As she copied the names and the amounts withdrawn, a pattern began to emerge. “Johnny, those wires weren’t the only withdrawals, right?”

“No. Every time a wire was sent, money was transferred on the same day to another Toronto Commonwealth account.”

“Jim Cousins’ personal account?”

“Yep.”

“And if I’m doing my numbers correctly, it looks like it was for three percent of every deposit.”

“More like three and a half.”

“A commission?”

“Why not?”

“For laundering money?”

“That’s a logical conclusion.”

“So, Johnny, why didn’t alarms go off at the bank?”

“Read the list I just gave you. Six banks. Fifteen people. Costa Rica. How does that fit any money-laundering profile you’ve ever encountered?”

She read the names Johnny had given her. Wilma Castro Hernandez. Maria Rodriguez. Jose Villanueva. And so on. “It doesn’t.”

“Exactly. So the bank wouldn’t have picked up on anything.”

“So we’re either dealing with a very sophisticated money-laundering operation or something entirely different. How about Cousins’ account?”

“Closed about two weeks ago.”

“How long was it open?”

“About six months.”

“Was there ever two million in it?”

“Not until these transfers started, and it didn’t get to two million until they came to an end. And then, of course, the account was closed and the money was moved out.”

“Where did Cousins send it?”

“Jersey.”

“New Jersey?”

“You should be so lucky. Jersey in the Channel Islands. Although…”

“Did you find something?” she urged.

“There are some attachments to the Jersey wire transfer file. Give me a minute.”

Please be good to me, she thought.

“If this guy Cousins is trying to hide money he must be an amateur,” Johnny said when he came back on the line. “Two days after his money went to Jersey he must have tried to do something with the account there, because we got a request from the bank to reconfirm the account holder’s status with us.”

“And?”

“They provided us with a copy of his passport and, believe it or not, his Kelowna address and a forwarding address in the U.S.”

“I love you, Johnny Yan,” she said.

“And so you should. This is going to cost you a dinner,” he said, and then gave her Cousins’ San Francisco address.

Ava hung up, hardly believing her luck.

She went online and found the building, an apartment/hotel with units available for rent by the week and month. She checked the time. It was mid-morning on the U.S. west coast. She dialled the number on the website. A pleasant, young-sounding woman confirmed that there were vacant apartments. Ava gave the woman her name and asked if she could stop by to see them the following day. That wouldn’t be a problem, she was told.

“And by the way,” Ava said, “I have a work colleague named Jim Cousins who said he was moving into the building. Is he in residence yet?”

“He is, indeed,” the woman said.

Ava emailed her travel agent and asked her to book a seat on the first flight out of Manila to San Francisco. She would call Uncle in the morning. She just wasn’t sure how much she was going to tell him.

It was almost 9 a.m. by the time Ava got to the airport and began the slow, torturous process of getting to the boarding gate. She had planned to go to the first-class lounge before her flight, but by the time she got through security there was only fifteen minutes before departure, so she went directly to her gate. She turned on her cellphone to call Uncle and saw that he had left two messages. She chastised herself for not calling him earlier.

“Uncle, I’m sorry,” she said when he answered his phone. “I left the hotel early this morning and I didn’t want to wake you.”

“You worried me,” he said softly. “Where are you?”

“At the airport. I’ve located Jim Cousins. I’m on my way to talk to him.”

Even over the phone she could hear his breathing change, his spirits rise. “Good God, so soon. Even for you, Ava, this is fast.”

“I was lucky, and if my luck holds he’ll be exactly where I think he is.”

“Where?”

“In an apartment in San Francisco.”

“How did you do it?”

“That doesn’t matter. You can tell Chang if you want, but it might be wise to wait until I actually get there and confront him.”

“I think he should know.”

“No promises, though.”

“What do you mean?”

“Just because I’ve located Cousins doesn’t mean he’ll be there. And even if he is, it doesn’t mean we’re any closer to recovering the money. So be careful about what you say. Don’t let them draw the wrong conclusion.”

“Where is the money?”

“I have no idea,” she half-lied.

She could sense his doubt — he knew she wasn’t telling him everything. “When you find out, call me in Hong Kong. I am going to fly back today after meeting with Chang and Ordonez,” he said.

“I will,” she promised. The call for first-class passengers to board the plane came over the PA. Ava was guided to her seat by a series of flight attendants. When she had settled in with a cup of coffee in hand, she reviewed her notes, trying to make sense of the information Johnny Yan had given her. Aside from the fact that all the money had gone to Costa Rica, the amounts and the recipients and the banks seemed to be almost completely random. The same wasn’t true for the three and a half percent that had found its way into Jim Cousins’ bank account. It was obviously for services rendered, but what services?

She sat up straight and gingerly stretched her arms. Her shoulder still ached, and a combination of wine, Tylenol, and the comfort of the Peninsula’s bed hadn’t blunted the pain. She tried to distract herself by focusing on the documents Chang had sent early that morning. The detectives’ report was long on verbiage and short on substance. Maybe they’re getting paid by the word, she thought. Most of it focused on Cousins. They had come up dry at the bank and had run into a brick wall with the lawyer, who wouldn’t breach his trust.