I took a deep breath and pulled out the photo, giving it a quick glance before closing my eyes.
‘‘Oh, no,’’ Cat said sadly. ‘‘Oh, Abby, I’m so sorry!’’
‘‘No,’’ I said hoarsely, opening my eyes to look at my sister. ‘‘He’s not dead, Cat. Chase Rivers is alive.’’
Candice heaved a sigh of relief. ‘‘Thank God,’’ she said, then got straight to business. ‘‘Okay, ladies, it’s pretty obvious we’re running out of time here. This is the game plan: First, we take both cars over to the Las Vegas Hilton and leave one there.’’
‘‘Why?’’ Cat asked.
‘‘Because if we get spotted while we’re in one car, we can dump it, make our way back to the Hilton by bus, taxi, or monorail, and still have a car to drive.’’
‘‘Good thinking,’’ I said.
‘‘Next we’re heading to Jabba’s. What he gives us will determine our next move. Either way, we’re done with the Luxor, so grab everything you came in here with ’cuz we’re not coming back.’’
Cat sighed as she looked around at our cushy digs. ‘‘So sad to let the other two days on our voucher go to waste.’’
‘‘We can’t risk it,’’ Candice said. ‘‘We already know the Feds are handing out flyers. All we need is for one observant hotel guest to notice how familiar we look and we’re trapped.’’
‘‘Let’s roll,’’ I said, pulling on my Yankees ball cap and some dark sunglasses, as I felt a renewed sense of urgency. I didn’t know what had happened to Delgado, but my radar hinted that he’d died violently and as quickly as his image had faded from his photograph.
* * *
Candice and I cruised to the Hilton with Cat following close behind in her red Mini. ‘‘Obey all traffic signals and speed limits,’’ Candice had warned. ‘‘The last thing we need is for one of us to get pulled over.’’
After dropping the red Mini at the Hilton, we back-tracked along Las Vegas Boulevard to the highway, then drove to Jabba’s house. We rang the bell and his mother answered. ‘‘We’re here to see Jabba,’’ Candice said when she answered the door.
Jabba’s mother looked a great deal like her son, with the same curly black hair, puffy red cheeks, and black-framed glasses. ‘‘He’s in the basement,’’ she said. ‘‘Come right in.’’
We made our way down the stairs and found Jabba at his desk playing a video game. ‘‘I was wondering when you guys were going to come by,’’ he said, firing off a series of lasers at the enemy warship.
‘‘We got hung up,’’ Candice said, reaching into her purse and coming up with a wad of dough. ‘‘There you go,’’ she said. While Jabba counted the money, Candice asked, ‘‘Have you heard from Fred?’’
‘‘Yeah, he came by last night. He grabbed his computers and he left town.’’
‘‘He left town?’’ Candice said. ‘‘Do you know where he went? He owes us our money back.’’
Jabba looked at her as if she’d just said something stupid. ‘‘Good luck with that,’’ he said. ‘‘Fred’s heading to Costa Rica. He’s officially retired.’’
Candice looked at me and Cat as if to say, ‘‘Sorry.’’
‘‘It’s fine,’’ Cat said. ‘‘We got our money back last night, Candice, plus two cars. It’s fine.’’
‘‘It’s all here,’’ Jabba said, then reached to the shelf above his computer and handed us a thick envelope. ‘‘Some of that stuff I’d already researched, so I just made a copy of what I’d dug up.’’
‘‘What do you mean?’’ I asked as my radar hummed.
‘‘A guy came to me the other night and asked me to pull some intel on one of the names on the list.’’
‘‘What guy?’’ I said, my heart beginning to race.
Jabba looked at me squarely. ‘‘He didn’t give me his name, and I wouldn’t tell you if he did.’’
‘‘That’s fine,’’ Candice said. ‘‘I can respect that. But can you at least tell us what he looked like?’’ Jabba considered that for a moment, so Candice added, ‘‘Her boyfriend’s gone missing, and we think he’s in danger. We’re trying to find him and anything you can tell us might really help locate him.’’
With a sigh Jabba said, ‘‘I dunno, he was kinda tall and he had blond hair.’’
My heart thumped harder in my chest. ‘‘Dutch,’’ I said breathlessly. ‘‘Jabba, when did he stop by?’’
Jabba shrugged. ‘‘Two or three nights ago?’’ he said as if it was a question. ‘‘I can’t remember.’’
Candice and I shared a look. ‘‘What intel was he after?’’ she asked, but as she did, an alarm sounded on Jabba’s computer.
‘‘Warning!’’ it said. ‘‘Warning, Will Robinson! Intruder! Intruder alert!’’
‘‘Oh, shit!’’ Jabba said, whirling around to his computer screen, where his fingers began to click furiously on the keyboard.
‘‘What’s happening?’’ Cat said.
‘‘No, no, no, no, no!’’ Jabba growled. ‘‘That’s not possible!’’
Jabba’s computer continued to bleep and whistle. Candice peered over his shoulder. ‘‘Someone’s breached your firewall,’’ she said.
‘‘Tell me something I don’t know!’’ Jabba snapped as sweat broke out onto his forehead. ‘‘Goddamn it!’’ he yelled at the screen as his fingers continued to blaze across the keypad.
‘‘Come on,’’ Candice said to us. ‘‘We need to go—now!’’
Before we could even turn to leave, Jabba jumped up and yanked the plug out of the wall. He was breathing hard and running his hands through his hair. ‘‘Yeah, that’s a good idea!’’ he said, and he began to hurry around the room grabbing notebooks and a few Star Wars figurines and shoving them into a duffel.
As we headed for the stairs, we heard him shout, ‘‘Ma? Maaaaaaaaa!’’
She opened the door as we reached the top stair. ‘‘Yes, dear?’’ she said as we hurried past her.
‘‘We gotta go!’’ he said. ‘‘Right now!’’
‘‘Oh, my,’’ she said as I looked back before we walked out. Her face was pale and frightened as she hurried around grabbing up as many cows as she could hold.
‘‘Abby!’’ Candice said, and I whipped my head back around. ‘‘Let’s go!’’
We bolted out the door and Candice already had the engine turned over and was gunning the gas before I had a chance to strap on the seat belt. ‘‘What was that all about?’’ Cat asked from the backseat.
‘‘From what I could tell it looked like a federal hacker got into Jabba’s system,’’ Candice explained. ‘‘They’ll trace it back to his house within a half hour if they’re any good.’’
‘‘Jesus!’’ I said as I stared in the passenger side mirror. ‘‘I’m starting to feel like no matter where we go or who we talk to, we’re barely one step ahead of the Feds.’’
‘‘At least we’ve been ahead,’’ Candice said. ‘‘But you’re right, this Robillard guy is relentless.’’
‘‘What do we do now?’’ Cat said.
‘‘We go someplace where a guy like Robillard would never think to look for us. We need to hide in plain sight and sort through this intel, then come up with a game plan.’’ Candice said.
‘‘Where’s that?’’
‘‘You’ll see,’’ she said with a smirk. ‘‘I promise, it won’t be boring.’’
* * *
‘‘You weren’t kidding,’’ I said as we pulled up to one of the most unique-looking buildings I’d ever seen. Reflective glass, black-and-white piano keys, a pink neon piano, and white wavy walls with painted sheet music formed the entrance to the Liberace Museum.
‘‘I’ve always wanted to come here,’’ Cat said over my shoulder. ‘‘Sort of an indulgence into tacky, wouldn’t you say?’’
‘‘I met Liberace when I was little,’’ Candice confessed as she pulled into a parking slot.
‘‘You did?’’ Cat and I said in unison.
Candice smi
led, her eyes taking on a distant cast. ‘‘My dad played in his orchestra,’’ she said. ‘‘My sister and I used to hang around backstage. One night before his show, he took us to his dressing room and let us try on his jewelry and his capes. I’ll always have a soft spot for him.’’
‘‘You are hands down the most interesting person I know,’’ I said.
Candice’s smile widened. ‘‘Then you need to get out more.’’
We paid the admission of twelve dollars and fifty cents per adult and entered the foyer of the museum. Paintings and photographs of the pianist were everywhere. ‘‘Come on,’’ Candice said. ‘‘We can go to the cafeteria and get something to drink while we look this stuff over.’’
We followed behind her as we wove through the tourists and exhibits, but Cat kept getting distracted. ‘‘Would you look at that?’’ she said, stopping in front of an elaborate and downright gorgeous fuchsia, pink, and peach turkey-feather cape.
‘‘We’re not here to sightsee,’’ I reminded her.
After getting a round of Cokes, we sat down at an empty table and Candice pulled out a thick stack of paper from the envelope Jabba had given us. ‘‘He’s thorough,’’ I commented.
‘‘Apparently,’’ Candice said as she flipped through the pages. ‘‘Let’s break this down into three piles,’’ she said. ‘‘Abby, do you still have that notebook?’’
I dug around in my backpack and came up with the pad of paper, which I handed to her. She began to flip the pages back to get to a blank page when she stopped on my drawing of the oak tree. ‘‘What’s this?’’ she said.
I looked at the pad and shrugged my shoulders. ‘‘I have no idea. When I was trying to have my crew direct me to where Dutch was, I kept getting that tree, but it morphed into this one,’’ I said, turning the page to the palm tree.
‘‘And what’s this?’’ Candice asked.
I could feel myself growing anxious as I saw her point to the rough gravestone at the base of the tree. ‘‘A gravestone,’’ I said quietly.
‘‘Whose?’’
I looked her in the eyes. ‘‘Dutch’s.’’
‘‘Oh, Abby,’’ Cat said, and she squeezed my arm. ‘‘Did they tell you he’d been killed?’’
I could feel the tears welling in my eyes. The image on that page was so disturbing that I refused to look at it again. ‘‘Not exactly,’’ I said. ‘‘But I have this terrible feeling that if we don’t find him soon, he’ll die.’’
‘‘Then let’s get to it,’’ Candice said, and pulled off three sheets of paper while I passed out pens. ‘‘Take notes on anything you might think is important so that we can summarize for the whole group when we’ve gone through the material.’’
* * *
An hour later we were ready to each give a summary of the material we’d skimmed through. Cat went first. ‘‘I had Ricardo Delgado and his family,’’ she began as she squinted at the notes she’d jotted on her paper. ‘‘I’ll start with the kids; Bethany Delgado is the youngest at twenty-two. She’s been in rehab twice, both times for prescription-pill addiction, and has been jailed once at the tender age of eighteen for possession. In the past two years it looks like she’s gotten her act together. She’s currently attending the Las Vegas beauty school and her graduation date is set for this spring.
‘‘Moving on to Ricky Delgado,’’ Cat continued, the corners of her lips pulling down in a frown. ‘‘This kid’s a major troublemaker. He’s got a line of arrests from assault on an ex-girlfriend to possession of narcotics with intent to deliver, to three DUIs.’’
‘‘Model son,’’ I mumbled. Candice smirked and Cat nodded.
‘‘Now, the wife is an interesting woman. In the eighties she was a backup singer for Bette Midler and had mild success with a CD she released in Japan. She and Ricardo were married in nineteen eighty-two and they’ve been legally separated three times.’’
‘‘Some couples never learn,’’ I said.
‘‘Well, it looks like this time around Paloma Delgado might have. She filed for divorce a week ago. Ricardo’s attorneys have yet to respond.’’
‘‘What about Ricardo?’’ Candice asked.
Cat’s eyebrows danced. ‘‘He’s the juicy part of the report,’’ Cat said, turning her paper over to get to the notes on the back. ‘‘Ricardo Delgado was born in Spain, and given a special political-asylum visa that has been renewed every six years since nineteen eighty.’’
‘‘Huh?’’ I said. ‘‘Why hasn’t he just applied for citizenship through his wife or his kids?’’
‘‘Oh, he’s applied,’’ said Cat. ‘‘And he’s been denied every single year, again, since nineteen eighty.’’ I opened my mouth to ask another question, but Cat held up her hand. ‘‘Hold on,’’ Cat said, ‘‘I’m getting there. It seems that when Ricardo was in Spain, he had close ties with a certain member of the Spanish Mafia. Delgado became an informant to the CIA, and it was the CIA who offered to help him get asylum when a contract was put on his life because of some missing mob money. It appears the CIA has been willing to offer him sanctuary in this country for his cooperation, but they’re unwilling to allow him citizenship.’’
I gasped. ‘‘Delgado was an informant to the CIA?!’’
‘‘He was,’’ Cat said. ‘‘And guess who his handler was?’’
‘‘Raymond Robillard,’’ I said putting two and two together.
‘‘Wrong,’’ said Cat smugly. ‘‘It was Donovan Kelton.’’
Candice looked through her notes. ‘‘You spoiled my surprise,’’ she said. ‘‘I had the summary on Kelton.’’
I blinked several times, trying to piece the jigsaw together. ‘‘So Delgado’s business partner was also CIA?’’
‘‘Ex-CIA,’’ said Candice. ‘‘He resigned abruptly from the agency in nineteen seventy-seven, when he failed a lie detector test regarding what he knew about Delgado, and the CIA began monitoring his personal bank accounts. It appears that the CIA was suspicious about the amount of money Delgado stole before he was granted asylum in the U.S. The implied sense in these reports is that Delgado may have revealed the real sum to Kelton at some point, who may have hidden that figure from his superiors. Oh, and it gets even better,’’ she said, her eyes twinkling with the bit of juicy news she had to tell us. ‘‘Kelton has made a freaking fortune being Delgado’s business partner. He’s got gobs of money and his real estate holdings are quite substantial.’’
My radar hummed again. ‘‘So, how does Robillard figure into this, then?’’ I asked. ‘‘I mean, there has to be a connection between Robillard and Delgado.’’
‘‘I’ve got Robillard,’’ said Candice, pulling out her notes. ‘‘But on paper there’s no direct link that I can find between him and Delgado or Kelton, or even Frost for that matter.’’
‘‘So tell us what you have,’’ I said.
‘‘Raymond Robillard began working for the CIA in nineteen seventy-five. He was deployed to Brussels for three years before coming back to the States in nineteen—’’
‘‘Whoa!’’ Cat said, interrupting Candice as she dug through her notes. ‘‘Did you say Brussels? As in Belgium?’’
‘‘Yes,’’ Candice said.
‘‘Delgado lived there for a year, nineteen seventy-six to nineteen seventy-seven, right before his asylum was granted and he came here. In fact, that’s where Kelton was based out of for the first two years he worked with Delgado.’’
‘‘That’s it,’’ I said. ‘‘That’s the connection. They had to have met in Brussels right before Kelton got in hot water.’’
‘‘So, what?’’ Candice said. ‘‘Delgado and Robillard meet, and hatch some plan to hide the mob money that we’re assuming Delgado stole? Then Frost finds out about it later?’’
‘‘It works,’’ I said. ‘‘At least, geographically. And Kelton could have been in on it too, which would explain why he and Delgado have been tight all these years. They’d each have something to lose if the othe
r talked.’’
‘‘It’s a little sketchy for me,’’ Candice said.
I sat back in my chair and looked at them as a memory came back to me. I remembered sitting with Dutch right after I’d worked with a sketch artist to draw the profile of the man who’d killed Cynthia Frost and I’d told him that there were was a link to Vegas and to Thailand. ‘‘There’s a connection between all three,’’ I said firmly. Delgado, Kelton, and Robillard. I can just feel it!’’
‘‘If there is,’’ said Candice, ‘‘then it would explain what Robillard is really doing out here and why he’s so intent on destroying Dutch’s reputation. He’d have to know that Dutch suspected a link between Kelton, Delgado, and Robillard, and that Dutch was investigating him using his security company as a cover.’’
‘‘You said Kelton and Delgado were in business together?’’ I asked Candice.
‘‘Real estate development,’’ she confirmed. ‘‘Both Delgado and Kelton have funded buildings all over Vegas.’’
‘‘Delgado owns property everywhere,’’ Cat said, going back to her notes. ‘‘He’s got property in Nevada, Texas, New York, and Arkansas.’’
‘‘Arkansas?’’ I said. ‘‘That’s an odd place to invest in. What’s he developing, pig farms?’’
‘‘Diamonds,’’ Cat said.
I blinked. ‘‘There are diamonds in Arkansas?’’
‘‘According to this there are. Delgado owns a diamond mine in Murfreesboro, Arkansas.’’
For some reason my radar hummed extra loud at that and my head filled with the oak-tree image again, which morphed into a palm tree.
‘‘What?’’ Candice said as I sat and stared off into space.
‘‘I don’t know,’’ I said. ‘‘But there’s something about that diamond mine. Does Kelton have an interest in it?’’