Page 13 of Baby One Last Time
A picture of a cigar-chomping, black suit-wearing, bald white guy flashed onto the screen. Sometimes I swear these guys take their fashion cues from Google images of 1920s gangsters.
“This is Miami Pete,” TJ said. “Real name Mikhail Petrov.”
“He’s the guy in charge?” Mai asked.
TJ shook his head. “Not of the whole thing. Pete’s in charge of moving the weapons. For now, he has them stashed somewhere in the greater Miami area. We’ll get to that in a minute. The CIA’s been tailing Petrov for two years, and NSA’s been tracking chatter about him almost as long. But until now, we haven’t gotten a bead on the big boss.”
“What changed?” I asked.
TJ clicked to a new slide and an image of Mrs. Leary, the pink flamingo-loving little old lady who was up to her tight curls in Russian mobsters, filled the screen. “This player got involved. She’s cautious to the point of paranoia.”
“With good reason,” Jensen said. “We did just take her down in the Flamingo Job.” He smiled at me. “It had an official name, but unofficially, we renamed it for you, Kessler.”
I scowled at him, but who was I kidding? It was nice to be picked on.
“We know Leary won’t talk,” TJ continued, “but she doesn’t need to. Her paranoia means she only launders for three bosses. Ladies and gentlemen, our suspect pool for Miami Pete’s latest deal just shrank from about fifty down to three.”
“Any of those three live in Florida?” I asked.
Sparks rose from her chair. “Exactly one.” She nodded at TJ, who advanced to an aerial map of greater Miami. Sparks pointed to an oasis of green near a small body of water. “Guy called Cal Beecher. Born and raised in Ohio, but trying to ingratiate himself with some nasty Russian oligarchs. He owns an estate he renamed La Parisienne. Possibly because he has a thing for very young French models.”
World-class creep. I hoped I would get a chance to practice some of my hand-to-hand combat skills on his face. “Is he on Vlad’s radar?” You don’t become a Russian oligarch, or get close to one, without Putin’s blessing, but there are degrees of proximity. Every step closer to the top thug was more dangerous.
Penn spoke up. “He’s nowhere near him yet. It’s the perfect time to put an end to his career aspirations.”
TJ clicked to the next slide and revealed another aerial image of Beecher’s mansion, this one overlaid with a floor plan.
“We’ve accounted for most of the house footprint,” Penn said. He pointed to one tiny room at the back. “This wasn’t in the original plan. It’s highly reinforced with rebar and concrete. Might be a safe room or a security nerve center.”
“We’re leaning toward security,” Sparks said. “Beecher uses serious electronic surveillance. It has to be centralized somewhere. It’s not a grave concern yet, but we’ll want clarity by the time we seize the weapons, then make our move on Beecher.”
Penn took over again, glancing at Mai and me. “We assume he’ll hole up here and we’ll have to storm the ramparts.”
“Just the two of us?” Mai asked.
TJ shook his head. “When we reach that point, we’ll bring in backup. Chatter points to everything going down in a couple of weeks, right after the holidays.”
“We installed a remote relay about a mile away, and we’ve been monitoring their password and security updates for a month,” Alder said. “And speaking of monitoring”—she looked at TJ—“we’ve put out the word into Leary’s network that she’s feeling heat and going underground. That means her backup protocol kicks into place and elevates her low-level stooge to point man.”
“Which makes him our next target, I take it?” I asked.
“Yep.” TJ clicked to the slide of another guy, this one trying to be John Travolta in the 70s, I guess. “Jerry Doppler, owner of the dance club Xibalba, where he holds court almost every night.”
“That guy thinks he’s the ruler of the Mayan underworld?” Bond smirked.
“Why would she put a low-level guy in charge?” Mai asked.
“Chum in the water,” I said. “Deflect all the attention to him while she goes somewhere safe. In this case, that safe place is one of our black ops sites.”
Mai didn’t so much as glance at me when I answered her. Okay, point taken. A few more minutes into the presentation, I started squirming. Mai’s attitude was darkening and rolling off her in waves. Without a blindfold to block her body language or earplugs to mute her huffs and puffs, I couldn’t focus on the briefing. Her toxic energy made my skin itch. I tried my pranayama breathing, but it was doing fuck-all.
“Kessler,” TJ leaned into my sight line, “what’s the problem?”
I smiled tightly. Yeah, that probably looked normal. “Just trying to stay focused.”
TJ glanced at Derek.
“All right, let’s clear the air,” Derek said.
