Mike Lawson: Dead Man’s List

To Gail—for everything—forever.

Cover Page

Title Page Dead Man’s List Mike Lawson

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Chapter 53

Chapter 54

Chapter 55

Chapter 56

Chapter 57

Chapter 58

Chapter 59

Chapter 60

Chapter 61

Chapter 62

Chapter 63

Chapter 64

Chapter 65

Chapter 66

Chapter 67

Chapter 68

Chapter 69

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Praise

Also by Mike Lawson

Copyright

About the Publisher

“Carl, goddamnit, don’t bruise his neck!”

“I’m trying not to, but he’s a strong little bastard.”

“Shit, you’re twice his size. Grab him by the hair, not the neck.”

“That did it,” Carl said after a minute. “I just saw a buncha bubbles come out.”

“Yeah, well, hold him there a while. I don’t want what happened in that movie.”

“Movie?”

“You know, the one with what’s-her-name, where she boils the rabbit.”

“Oh, yeah. But what’s that—”

“At the end there, don’t you remember? When Douglas gets her in the tub? Bubbles comin’ outta her mouth, eyes wide open, then like five minutes later the bitch pops up and tries to stab him.”

“I don’t remember that part,” Carl said. “I remember the rabbit but…”

“Oh, for Christ’s sake,” Jimmy said. “Just hold him there.”

“You got his keys?” Carl said.

“Yeah, I got the keys,” Jimmy said. “What do you think I’m jigglin’ here?”

Jimmy opened the door which led into the kitchen of the house. “Now where’s his office, den, whatever?” He started through the kitchen but stopped when he heard the refrigerator door open. “What the hell are you doing?”

“Gettin’ a Coke,” Carl said. “I’m thirsty.”

“Are you nuts?”

“I’m wearin’ gloves. What’s the big deal?”

Jimmy just shook his head. Carl, sometimes he just didn’t know.

Two minutes later, they were standing in front of the safe. It had been behind a picture, a sailing scene.

“Why do they always put it behind a picture?” Carl said. “I mean, you know where it’s gonna be.”

“They put it behind a picture because it’d look pretty fuckin’ ugly, just sittin’ there in the middle of the wall,” Jimmy said.

“Oh.”

Jimmy spun the lock on the safe.

“How the hell did Eddie get the combination, anyway?” Carl said.

“He said something about a locksmith the guy used.”

Jimmy swung open the door to the safe. Inside it were a bunch of little notebooks, the covers doodled on, the pages all ragged. Jimmy took out the notebooks, several at a time, and tossed them into his shoulder bag. Carl had said that the shoulder bag looked like a faggy purse, which it sort of did, but it was better than carrying around a shopping bag.

At the back of the safe was a wad of cash bound with a rubber band. Jimmy flipped through it. Maybe five grand. The guy’s disaster money. He handed the cash to Carl and looked back into the safe. The only thing remaining, lying flat on the bottom, was a clear plastic sheet with little pockets containing coins. Jimmy didn’t know anything about old coins but he figured these must be worth something or the guy wouldn’t have put them in his safe—but he didn’t touch the coin holder.

“That’s it,” he said, but then he noticed something under the coin holder. He lifted up the plastic and saw a flash drive for a computer. “Damn,” he muttered, “almost missed that.” He put the flash drive into his bag.

“Gimme the money.” Carl handed him the cash and Jimmy tossed it back into the safe and closed and locked the door. Eddie had said not to take any money, or anything else but the stuff he’d told them. And if that’s what Eddie said…

“Now let’s find his laptop,” Jimmy said. “And any more of these flash thingamajigs.”

Carl finished the Coke he was drinking, made a small burp, and put the soda can in Jimmy’s man-purse.

“Okey-dokey,” Carl said.

Mahoney was reclining near the pool, a big blue beach umbrella shading his head. His meaty right hand was wrapped around a frosted glass containing equal parts vodka and tomato juice. Clenched in his left hand, in the V created by two thick fingers, was a cigar. He wore white swim trunks with a red stripe down the side, and partially covering his broad chest and substantial gut, was an unbuttoned aloha shirt patterned with red hibiscuses. His hair was white and full, his legs were white, thick, and hairless, and his large bare feet were pale.

DeMarco thought he looked like a beluga whale that had crashed a luau.

“It’s about time you got here,” Mahoney said.

This complaint was typical of Mahoney. There he was—lying under an umbrella, drinking, doing nothing—while DeMarco had been forced to drive seventy miles in heavy traffic because his boss hadn’t wanted to talk over the phone. Or maybe Mahoney just didn’t want to hold the phone as this could have interrupted his drinking and smoking.

Nor did Mahoney offer DeMarco a seat or a drink. This breach of etiquette could have occurred because Mahoney was oblivious to the creature comforts of his subordinates—or it could have been because DeMarco looked impervious to such ailments as dehydration and heat stroke. DeMarco’s forefathers were Italian and his features reflected his heritage. He was five foot eleven, with heavy shoulders and strong arms. He combed his dark hair straight back, and the first strands of gray were just beginning to appear at the temples. He had a handsome face, but a hard one, and if Francis Ford Coppola had been casting extras for Godfather IV, he would have hired DeMarco on the spot.

So DeMarco stood there in front of Mahoney’s lounge chair, squinting into the midday sun. It was the first of September and the temperature was in the low eighties. As he waited for Mahoney to tell him why he’d been summoned, he glanced up at the large house in the background. DeMarco didn’t know who had loaned his boss the use of the mansion with its pool and its magnificent view of Chesapeake Bay, but he suspected it was someone trying to curry his favor. DeMarco wondered if that same person had loaned Mahoney the woman he could see in the window.

The woman—lithe and tanned—was in her thirties and she was walking back and forth in front of a large picture window, talking on a cell phone. The only thing she was wearing was a black bikini bottom the size of a stripper’s g-string. Her bare breasts, from a distance of fifty yards, were flawless.