Last to Die (26 page)

To her millionaire husband.

Not just any millionaire. Sally's mega-millionaire actually owns a cocoa plantation that hires child slaves.

I had no idea, he said, shaking his head. Wow. You must have felt totally betrayed.

I was furious.

Are you still?

In hindsight, I realize that Sally was so screwed up over the murder of her daughter. Like I said before, she tried everything from working for charity to marrying for money. Nothing made her happy.

Except for maybe one thing, said Jack.

What's that?

Based on her will, I'd say revenge.

Their eyes met and held. Finally she said, You're the first person I've talked to about this. I don't even think Sally's estate lawyer knows everything.

Thank you for telling me. I was hoping that if I came all this way I'd get to the truth.

Maybe it's time I got to the truth, too. The whole truth.

How do you mean?

I was thinking about what you said yesterday, how you wondered if Sally might have reached such a low point in her life that she hired someone to shoot her. Other than myself, I can think of only one other person who would have known her well enough to answer that question.

I'm listening.

A sparkle came to her eye, as if she were suddenly energized. How'd you like to meet Sally's rich ex-husband?

I thought he lived in France.

He's French, but he lives here most of the year.

You can arrange a meeting?

No promises, but with your friend Theo tagging along, I think we can pull off just about anything. Brains, beauty, brawn. How can we miss?

I know which of us is the brawn. So that must make me -

The baggage, she said with a wink, as if to confirm that she was two of the three. Now go get your brawny friend. Time's a-wasting.

Chapter
Thirty-Four The road south was paved all the way to Man, a city of about 150,000 people in a breathtaking geographical setting. It was called the town of eighteen peaks, perhaps an overly romantic appellation for a confusing and frankly unattractive collection of urban districts that were spread across a valley and surrounded by mountains. Jack had no preconceived notion of West African cities, but Man reminded him of something else entirely, a place he just couldn't put his finger on, until Theo spoke up.

Like a shitty Colorado town without all the white people.

They spent the night in Man, then set out in the morning for the coffee and cocoa farming region in western CA'te d'Ivoire. The air had been scrubbed clean by an early shower, one last tropical blast at the tail end of a seven-month rainy season. Driving at the higher altitudes was a pleasant change from the dusty trek across the baked northern grasslands, but it wasn't as beautiful as Jack had imagined it. High, forest-strewn ridges offered some insight into how the entire region had looked years earlier, before logging and agriculture claimed the rain forests.

Are we there yet? asked Theo.

Jack and Rene were in front, Theo in back. Theo flashed him a big grin in the rearview mirror, revealing not his teeth but the wedge of an orange that for some childish reason made Jack laugh. It reminded Jack of something Nate would have done, which made him think of Kelsey, which made him feel slightly guilty for having discreetly but frequently admired the shape of Rene's legs since leaving Man. It got him to thinking that maybe he wasn't interested in Kelsey after all. Maybe she'd simply managed to breathe life into a part of himself that he'd left for dead with his divorce.

Good thing we nipped it in the bud, he thought. Perhaps it was no coincidence that he'd jumped at the chance to leave the country at the first sign of anything serious between them.

About another half hour, said Rene.

Theo grumbled and went back to sleep. Over the next few miles, the road turned into dirt tracks. All signs of forest disappeared, giving way to row after row of cultivated cacao trees. Thousands of them stretched for miles up the hills and into the valley, each one about twenty feet tall with large, glossy green leaves.

Slow down, said Rene.

Jack cut his speed to a crawl as she pointed to a group of workers in the field. The team leaders were shirtless young men, each of them armed with a long pole that had a mitten-shaped knife at the end. It was their job to select the ripe cacao pods, slice them off the tree, and let them fall to the ground. Behind them were even younger-looking men, more likely boys, machete in hand and a cigarette clenched between their teeth as they performed the stoop-labor ritual of gathering the pods and cracking them open for a handful of cocoa beans.

That boy over there, she said. Probably no more than ten years old.

Again, Jack thought of Nate. Where do these kids come from?

All over. Mali, Burkina Faso. The poorest countries you can imagine.

How do they get here?

Sometimes they're stolen. Usually they're tricked. Locateurs - recruiters - will go to bus stations, city markets, wherever, and promise these kids the good life. It's all a con. That team of five over there - Sally's ex-husband probably paid some locateur sixty bucks for the lot of them.

This is his plantation?

One of his. One of twenty thousand.

Twenty thousand? he said with surprise.

Sounds like a lot, but there are over six hundred thousand coffee and cocoa farms in this country.

That's a lot of beans.

A lot of money, she said, her gaze drifting back toward the workers in the field. And a lot of kids.

He glanced in her direction, catching a glimpse of the genuine concern in her eyes. He felt a strange rush of conflicting emotions, both sadness over the tragedy she was fighting and admiration for the passion with which she fought. It seemed like a strangely selfish thought, coming to him as it did while mere boys toiled in the fields around him, but Rene was definitely the kind of woman who could make a divorced man feel alive again.

Turn down this road, she said.

The dirt tracks turned into paved highway, and Jack realized that their little detour was over. Where to now? he asked.

Almost as far as Daloa. Jean Luc has a house there.

Jack had to think a moment, having almost forgotten that Jean Luc was the name of Sally's rich second ex-husband. Have you ever met him?

No.

Know anything about him?

He's a French citizen, but he's lived most of his life here.

Obviously wealthy.

Obviously. I just gave you some idea of his labor cost.

Good money in chocolate, I guess.

Depends on what you mean by good.'

I assume Sally wasn't unaware of his wealth when she set her sights on him.

He was reasonably handsome in the one photograph I've seen. But he was in his mid-sixties. Draw your own conclusions.

They stopped at the gate at the end of the paved road. An armed guard emerged from the guardhouse.

Theo stirred in the backseat and said, You want me to take care of this?

I'll handle it, said Rene. This is one instance where looking like my sister should definitely be an advantage.

Like it's ever a disadvantage, said Theo.

She gave a little smile, then got out of the truck. The guard approached and met her halfway. Jack could hear them talking, but they were speaking French.

What's she saying? asked Theo.

Who do I look like, Maurice Chevalier? At this point, all we can do is trust her.

You're cool with that?

I am.

Good. Cuz if she fucking sells me to this guy, I'm coming after your ass with that machete.

Jack started humming Thank Heaven, for Little Girls. Rene and the guard finished their conversation with an exchange of smiles and multiple expressions of merci, merci, all of which Jack took as a good sign. She got back in the car, and the guard opened the gate to let them pass.

What did you tell him? asked Jack.

A magician never reveals her tricks, she said.

Tricks, my ass, said Theo. You promised him fifty bucks on the way out.

Twenty-five. How did you know?

These things I know, said Theo.

Drive on, she said. Jack followed the road past more cacao trees, small ones that grew in the shade of larger banana and coffee trees. After a half mile of ruts and dust, the road flattened into a relatively well-maintained driveway. It curved around a pond, leading to a huge house on the river at the foot of the mountain. It was the nicest house Jack had seen since landing in Africa, but it was a far cry from the mansion he had expected.

Pretty simple digs for a multimillionaire, said Jack.

Typical, said Rene. You flash money here, you draw bandits. It's the inside that looks like the lap of luxury.

They parked in front beside two other SUVs. Jack brought along a dossier holding his legal papers. An African man came out and greeted them on the covered porch. The guard had apparently radioed ahead to alert him of visitors. He and Rene conversed in French, and then she turned to Jack and said, This is Mr. Diabate, Jean Luc's personal assistant. He wants to know the purpose of our visit.

Jack opened the dossier and showed him a copy of Sally's will and death certificate. Tell him that I'm an attorney from the U. S., and that I have some questions for Sally's ex-husband.

Rene translated, then looked at Jack and said, What kind of questions?

Tell him that it has to do with the money -

Jack, cork it, said Theo. Rene, do your trick again. Ask him if he wants to meet Andrew Jackson several times over.

It couldn't hurt, the man said in English.

Jack did a double take, but it was worth a few bucks if the guy could speak English. Jack checked his wallet, then pulled back. Is Jean Luc even here?

In a manner of speaking, the man said.

What does that mean?

Diabate tapped his foot, waiting. Jack handed over a few bills and watched him count in silence. The man stuffed the cash in his shirt pocket, seemingly satisfied, then looked at Jack and said, Monsieur, Jean Luc is dead.

Chapter
Thirty-Five Tatum knew he shouldn't do it. But with the lawyer away, the client plays. Especially when his brother goes with him.

Jack had given him a stiff warning before leaving for Africa: Under no circumstances was Tatum to have any communication with Sally's other beneficiaries. Doing so would be a direct violation of the restraining order. Tatum promised to lay low and not to do anything stupid. Technically speaking, he never actually promised to heed Jack's advice. Besides, there was only one beneficiary he wanted to talk to, which meant that there were four others he wouldn't contact, which translated to 80 percent compliance with his lawyer's instructions. In Tatum's book, that was something to be pretty damn proud of.

Gerry Colletti was down the street from his house, walking his dog, when Tatum caught up with him. It was early morning, and Colletti was wearing his robe and slippers, the unwrapped morning paper tucked under one arm. Tatum approached from behind at a moment when he'd be most off guard, just as Colletti stooped down to collect fresh poodle droppings with his pooper-scooper.

Thought you only talked shit, Colletti. Didn't know you collected it.

Colletti dropped the newspaper and looked behind him, obviously startled. He scooped the droppings into a plastic bag and said, You're in violation of your restraining order. Get away, or I'm calling the judge.

I'm not hurting anybody.

You're within five hundred yards of me. It doesn't matter if you hurt me or not.

Doesn't matter? If that's the case, I might as well beat you to a pulp. No sense doing time in jail just for talking.

Colletti took a half-step back, trying to put more space between them. His little dog growled and bared its teeth. Easy, Muffin.

Your dog's name is Muffin? said Tatum, taunting.

Come near me and she'll chew your leg off. What do you want to talk about?

I was hoping that you and me could come to an understanding.

A modicum of tension drained from his expression, as if he liked the sound of Tatum's approach. What are you proposing?

First, you need to understand it wasn't me who attacked you in the parking lot.

I don't care about that.

What do you mean, you don't care?

I already made the judge believe it was you. I can make the cops believe it, I can make a jury believe it, I can probably even make your own lawyer believe it. Doesn't matter if it's true, so long as I can prove it.

You can't prove anything. You're like that bag of dog shit in your hand.

You're dead wrong about that, Mr. Knight. I put my best investigator on your trail. He's uncovered some pretty interesting things about you.

Tatum smiled and shook his head. So I got an impressive rEsumE. Big deal. That don't change the facts. It wasn't me who pummeled you.