James Grippando - Beyond Suspicion

The second book in the Jack Swyteck series

The newsstand had a half-dozen Russian language newspapers to choose from, and I wasn’t in Moscow. I was in Hollywood, Florida, a typical suburban community north of Miami. Naturally, I had to ask: What gives?

It turns out that south Florida – known for its ethnic diversity, though usually with a Latin beat – has a sizeable Russian population. The vast majority are law-abiding, good people. But there’s a dark side, too. Take Tarzan, for instance. No, not Johnny Weismüller. This Tarzan is a legendary, muscle-bound Russian mobster famous for the drug and sex orgies on his boat off Miami Beach. He’s now even more famous (not to mention incarcerated) for a serious but unsuccessful scheme to buy a nuclear submarine from a former Soviet naval officer and then use it to smuggle cocaine from Colombia.

Miami has a new criminal powerhouse knocking at its gates. Brighton Beach, New York is the only place in America with more Russian mobsters – the Mafiya, as it’s called. Thankfully, the Mafiya is nowhere near as well organized as La Cosa Nostra , but they are definitely here and growing stronger. With a little help from my law enforcement contacts, I was able to find a Ukrainian-born undercover agent who was willing to tell me all about it. One meeting with him, and I knew: There had to be a novel in this.

At the time, I was wrapping up a six-month investigation into the “dirty blood business.” I took an inside look at a company that, for profit, collected samples of diseased blood from drug addicts, the homeless, and anyone else who was willing to sell infected bodily fluids to medical research companies. I was surprised to find how loosely regulated this industry was, particularly when you consider that many specimens are collected from people with AIDS and other deadly diseases. It was this business side of terminal illness that started me in an even more intriguing direction: viatical settlements.

Viatical settlements are a growing facet of the insurance industry that started with the rise of the AIDS epidemic in the late 1980s. Although most people have never even heard the word “viatical,” a recent study reported by a leading insurance company concluded that the industry will soon exceed $10 billion. Basically, it’s a way for someone diagnosed with a terminally ill disease to get the money they need to fight their disease, or simply to live comfortably in the time they have left. The patient signs his life insurance benefits over to a group of investors. In exchange, the investors pay an immediate, lump-sum cash settlement to the patient, usually about half the value of the policy. So, with a policy of one million dollars, the patient gets a quick half million dollars while he’s still alive, to do with as he wishes. The investors collect the full death benefit when the patient dies, doubling their money. It’s a little ghoulish, since the investor is betting (indeed, hoping) that the patient will die soon and provide a quick return on the investment.

As a writer, this concept immediately intrigued me – the very idea of a total stranger having a serious financial interest in your early death. I was even more interested when I came across the findings of a Florida grand jury, which concluded that “fraud in the viatical-settlement industry is rampant” and that as many as 40% to 50% of the settlements were tainted with fraud. As I dug deeper, I discovered a Texas case in which the accused ring-leader of an alleged $10 million viatical settlement scheme happened to be on parole from a murder-for-hire conviction. Although no one was found to have been murdered as a way of expediting the pay-off to investors, it got me to wondering… what if?

Which brings me back to the Russian Mafiya. By now, you can probably see where this is going. At least you think you know where this is going. I promise you’ll be surprised when you read Beyond Suspicion.

– James Grippando

Outside her bedroom window, the blanket of fallen leaves moved-one footstep at a time.

Cindy Swyteck lay quietly in her bed, her sleeping husband at her side. It was a dark winter night, cold by Miami standards. In a city where forty degrees was considered frigid, no more than once or twice a year could she light the fireplace and snuggle up to Jack beneath a fluffy down comforter. She slid closer to his body, drawn by his warmth. A gusty north wind rattled the window, the shrill sound alone conveying a chill. The whistle became a howl, but the steady crunching of leaves was still discernible, the unmistakable sound of an approaching stranger.

Flashing images in her head offered a clear view of the lawn, the patio, and the huge almond leaves scattered all about. She could see the path he’d cut through the leaves. It led straight to her window.

Five years had passed since she’d last laid eyes on her attacker. Everyone from her husband to the police had assured her he was dead, though she knew he’d never really be gone. On nights like these, she could have sworn he was back, in the flesh. His name was Esteban.

Five years, and the horrifying details were still burned into her memory. His calloused hands and jagged nails so rough against her skin. The stale puffs of rum that came with each nauseating breath in her face. The cold, steel blade pressing at her jugular. Even then, she’d refused to kiss him back. Most unforgettable of all were those empty, sharklike eyes-eyes so cold and angry that when he’d opened his disgusting mouth and bit her on the lips she saw her own reflection, witnessed her own terror, in the shiny black irises.

Five years, and those haunting eyes still followed her everywhere, watching her every move. Not even her counselors seemed to understand what she was going through. It was as if the eyes of Esteban had become her second line of sight. When night fell and the wind howled, she could easily slip into the mind of her attacker and see things he’d seen before his own violent death. Stranger still, she seemed to have a window to the things he might be seeing now. Through his eyes, she could even watch herself. Night after night, she had the perfect view of Cindy Swyteck lying in bed, struggling in vain with her incurable fear of the dark.

Outside, the scuffling noise stopped. The wind and leaves were momentarily silent. The digital alarm clock on the nightstand blinked on and off, the way it always did when storms interrupted power. It was stuck on midnight, bathing her pillow with faint pulses of green light.

She heard a knock at the back door. On impulse, she rose and sat at the edge of the bed.

Don’t go, she told herself, but it was as if she were being summoned.

Another knock followed, exactly like the first one. On the other side of the king-sized bed, Jack was sleeping soundly. She didn’t even consider waking him.

I’ll get it.

Cindy saw herself rise from the mattress and plant her bare feet on the tile floor. Each step felt colder as she continued down the hall and through the kitchen. The house was completely dark, and she relied more on instinct than sight to maneuver her way to the back door. She was sure she’d turned off the outside lights at bedtime, but the yellow porch light was burning. Something had obviously triggered the electronic eye of the motion detector. She inched closer to the door, peered out the little diamond-shaped window, and let her eyes roam from one edge of the backyard to the other. A gust of wind ripped through the big almond tree, tearing the brownest leaves from the branches. They fell to the ground like giant snowflakes, but a few were caught in an upward draft and rose into the night, just beyond the faint glow of the porch light. Cindy lost sight of them, except for one that seemed to hover above the patio. Another blast of wind sent it soaring upward. Then it suddenly changed direction, came straight toward her, and slammed against the door.