Payback

'No, sir, nothing as complicated as that. I’m a private investigator.'

'Really?' Marshall said and laughed a little. 'What are you investigating? And please don’t say your’re investigating me.'

'Actually I wanted to talk to you about a murder.'

'A murder?'

'Tavia Hawkins. Do you know her?' Nick asked and Marshall’s facial expression changed.

'I’m afraid I do. That woman has made a career of writing lies about me. Did she send you?'

'No sir. She was found dead last night.'

'Oh my goodness, that’s terrible. How did it happen?'

'An overdose of sleeping pills.'

'Sleeping pills? I thought you said she was murdered?'

'I never said she was murdered. I just asked if you know her.'

'I see. How can I help you, Mr. Mitchell?'

'I know the story she was working on was about you' Nick lied. 'I was wondering what you could tell about that?'

'I have no idea what you’re talking about.' Marshall smiled. 'But I’d be happy to do what I can to help. Let’s get together and talk about this at another time.' Marshall handed Nick his card. 'Call me at my office and I’ll look into it. Now if you’ll excuse me.'

'Yes, of course, you have guests to attend to and I’m monopolizing your time. I’ll give you a call tomorrow and we can talk more then.' Nick extended his hand. 'Once again, it was an honor meeting you, sir.'

'You as well, I’ll look forward to your call.' Marshall stood and watched Nick until he lost sight of him. He looked around the room again and began walking very quickly through the crowd. Marshall approached a man talking to a group of ladies. 'Excuse me for interrupting, Ladies. Scotty, can I speak with you in my office. I promise it will only take a minute Ladies, and then you can have him back.'

Marshall and Scotty made their way through the crowd to Marshall’s office. By that time, Nick was in the van with Monika and Travis. Marshall entered the office and slammed the door. 'I thought you were gonna take care of Hawkins?'

'I did,' Scotty answered with blank expression on his face. 'I did just like you told me. Made it look like she OD’d on sleeping pills.'

'Right. Then maybe you can tell me why I just got finished talking to some private detective about her?'

'What?'

'You heard me. He said he wanted to talk to me about a murder, not a suicide, Scotty, a murder!' Marshall yelled. 'He was here, in my house.'

'I’m sure that the police ruled her death a suicide. I checked with my source.'

'Then it would make sense that the only way he could connect her to me is the evidence.'

'Marty, I took care of that, I shredded the paper trail and wiped her files from her work and home computers, I even took any disks she had laying around.'

'Then why was he here? Are you sure you didn’t leave anything on her computer?'

'I’m sure. The program I use is called Evidence-Eliminator. It eliminates the specific application files, temp files, system backups, it even wipes Outlook’s deleted items and sent items. And when it’s done, it eliminates the program. You know I’ve used it to clean up hundreds of times and it’s never failed me before.'

'Then why was he here?' Marshall asked softly this time.

'I don’t know,' Scotty answered in the same tone.

'Then you better find out.'

'What’s his name?'

'Patrick Mitchell. He’s going to call me tomorrow. You get on top of this, find out what he knows and who he’s told and do it quick.'

'I understand.'

'And don’t mention any of this to DeFrancisco, he’s an idiot and he talks too much.'

Outside in the van, Monika laughed. 'Yeah, asshole, you talk too much too. Got your ass on tape.'

'Nick,' Travis said. 'I was tellin’ Monika that I got something that I recorded earlier that I think you need to hear.'

'What’s that, Travis?'

'It’s a recording of two men talkin’. I knew it was important when they started talkin’ about Black. And now I’m sure one of the voices was Marshall’s.'

Travis played the recording back for Nick and Monika. After listening to the recording Nick agreed that it was Marshall that Travis recorded.

'But who’s the other guy?' Monika asked.

'Diego Estabon.'

Chapter Forty-one

Diego entered his hotel suite and immediately poured himself a glass of Tequila. Although there was a woman lying on the bed, he didn’t speak to her. Diego walked to the window and looked out. As he looked out at the Manhattan skyline he thought about how well things were progressing for him. Tomorrow he would make an easy five million dollars on the sale of prescription drugs and there would be more to come.

Diego had to laugh at his good fortune; he had bought the failing pharmaceutical company years ago as a way to launder his drug profits. It was only recently that he started selling prescription drugs over the Internet, never expecting that there would come a day when he would be able to make that kind of money. And if the buyers were the serious business men that they claimed to be, then this would be just the first of many more such deals.

DeFrancisco had gone to great lengths to assure him that the DEA investigation of Black was moving into the next phase.

Even though he had assured Marshall that the papers would be recovered, Diego was still very concerned that they would become public. Those papers contained detailed information about his drug operation. Although he never told anybody, those papers came into existence because of his carelessness. Her name was Isabelle, or at least that’s what she called herself. She was young and beautiful, and for a time, Diego lost himself in her. Over a three year period, Isabelle worked her way into Diego’s bed and into his confidence. In reality, Isabelle was a deep cover operative for the DEA. It was only by chance that he found her out when DeFrancisco told him that he had gotten wind of a South American operation and mentioned details that he’d heard. Diego knew the only person that could have that type of information was Isabelle.

It hurt him deeply to do it, but he killed her. But it was too late, Isabelle had completed and filed a report, and had turned them over to her control, who she met in Singapore when she and Diego visited there. Diego had him murdered as well, and had made arrangements to recover the report, but things went wrong and the paper got into the open and to this date have not been recovered. He knew that if those papers became public that his associates would be indicted. If that happened they would surely kill him.

His plan was simple, divert as much attention away from himself and his operation by giving them some other high profile target. He would make it appear that Black had ordered the murders of Chilly, Felix and the General and would soon murder D-Train and take over the drug traffic. Diego never forgot that Black caused him to go to jail. He had never gotten over the shame and humiliation that he suffered when Black and Bobby came out of the club. They laughed when they saw him in handcuffs with his face pressed against the hood of his car. There was one other person that he had not forgiven, that was his father, Gomez.

'Diego,' the woman said to him. 'Aren’t you going to at least say hello to me?'

'Hello, Esperanza,' Diego said to her without looking at her.

'Aren’t you glad to see me?' Esperanza asked.

'Overjoyed, my love,' he replied and continued to stare out the window.

'Have I done something to displease you?'