The Brethren

"Fifteen thousand;" Trevor said, then gulped his longneck beer.

"You serious?" Prep asked, chalking his cue stick and glancing around the smoky table.Trevor had never bet more than a hundred bucks on any game.

"Yep."Another long pull on the bottle. He was feeling lucky. If Spicer had the guts to lay $5,000 on the game; Trevor would double it. He’d just earned 33,000 tax-free dollars. So what if he lost ten? That much belonged to the IRS anyway.

"I’ll have to make a call," Prep said, pulling out a cell phone.

"Hurry.The game starts in thirty minutes."

The bartender was a local who’d never left the state of Florida but had somehow developed an intense passion for Australian Rules Football. A game was on from – Down Under, and it took a $20 bribe from Trevor to get the channel changed to ACC basketball.

With $15,000 riding on Georgia Tech, there was no way Duke could miss a shot, at least not in the first half. Trevor ate french fries, drank one bottle after another, and tried to ignore Prep, who was standing near a pool table in a dark corner, watching.

In the second half, Trevor almost bribed the bartender to switch back to the Aussie game. He was getting drunker, and with ten minutes to go was openly cursing Joe Roy Spicer to anyone who would listen. What did that redneck know about ACC basketball? Duke led by twenty with nine minutes to go, when Tech’s point guard got hot and nailed four straight three’s. Trevor had Tech and eleven.

The game was tied with a minute to go. Trevor didn’t care who won. He’d beat the spread. He paid his tab, tipped the bartender another $100, then flashed a smart-ass salute to Prep as he walked out the door. Prep flipped him the bird.

In the cool darkness, Trevor skipped along Atlantic Boulevard, away from the lights, past the cheap summer rentals packed tightly together, past the neat little retirement homes with their fresh paint and perfect lawns, down the old wooden steps to the sand, where he took off his shoes and strolled along the edge of the water. The temperature was in the forties, not unusual for Jacksonville in February, and before long his feet were cold and wet.

Not that he felt much-$43,000 in one day, taxfree, all hidden from the government. Last year after expenses he’d cleared $28,000, and that was working practically full time-haggling with clients too poor or too cheap to pay, avoiding courtrooms, dealing with penny-ante real estate agents and bankers, bickering with his secretary, cutting corners on taxes.

Ali, the joy of quick cash. He’d been suspicious of the Brethren’s little scam, but now it seemed so brilliant. Extort from those who can’t complain. How thoroughly clever.

And since it was working so well, he knew Spicer would turn up the heat. The mail would get heavier, the visits to Trumble more frequent. Hell, he’d be there every day if necessary, hauling letters in and out, bribing guards.

He splashed his feet in the water as the wind picked up and the waves roared in.

Even more clever would be to steal from the extortionists, court-certified crooks who certainly couldn’t complain. It was a nasty thought, one he was almost ashamed of, but a valid one nonetheless. All options would be kept open. Since when were thieves known for their loyalty?

He needed a million dollars, nothing more or less. He’d done the math many times, driving to Trumble, drinking at Pete’s, sitting at his desk with the door locked. A lousy million bucks, and he could close his sad little office, surrender his law license, buy a sailboat, arid spend eternity drifting with the winds around the Caribbean.

He was closer than he would ever be.

Justice Spicer, rolled over again on the bottom bunk. Sleep was a rare gift in his tiny room, on his tiny bed with a small, smelly roommate named Alvin snoring above him. Alvin had roamed North America as a hobo for decades, but late in life had grown weary and hungry. His crime had been the robbery of a rural mail carrier in Oklahoma. His apprehension had been aided mightily when Alvin walked into the FBI office in Tulsa and declared, "I did it." The FBI scrambled for six hours to find the crime. Even the judge knew Alvin planned it all. He wanted a federal bed, certainly not one provided by the state.

Sleep was even more difficult than usual because Spicer was worried about the lawyer. Now that the scam had hit its stride, there was serious cash lying around. And more on the way. The more Boomer Realty collected in the Bahamas, the more tempting it would become for Trevor. He and he alone could steal their ill-gotten loot and get away with it.

But the scam worked only with an outside conspirator. Someone had to sneak the mail back and forth. Someone had to collect the money.

There had to be a way to bypass the lawyer, and Joe Roy was determined to find it. If he didn’t sleep for a month, he didn’t care. No slimy lawyer would take a third of his money, then steal the rest.

Chapter Nine

DEFENSEPAC, or D-PAC as it would quickly and widely become known, made a roaring entry onto the loose and murky field of political finance. No political-action committee in recent history had appeared with as much muscle behind it.

Its seed money came from a Chicago financier named Mitzger, an American with dual Israeli citizenship. He put up the first $1 million, which lasted about a week. Other Jewish high-rollers were quickly brought into the fold, though their identities were shielded by corporations and offshore accounts. Teddy Maynard knew the dangers of having a bunch of rich Jews contribute openly and in an organized fashion to Lake’s campaign. He relied on old friends in Tel Aviv to organize the money in NewYork.

Mitzger was a liberal when it came to politics, but no issue was as dear as the security of Israel. Aaron Lake was much too moderate on social matters, but he was also dead serious about a new military. Middle East stability depended on a strong America, at least in Mitzger’s opinion.

He rented a suite at the Willard in D.C. one day, and by noon the next he had leased an entire floor of an office building near Dulles. His staff from Chicago worked around the clock plowing through the myriad details required to instantly outfit forty thousand square feet with the latest technology. He had a 6 A.M. breakfast with Elaine Tyner, a lawyer/lobbyist from a gigantic Washington firm, one she’d built with her own iron will and lots of oil clients. Tyner was sixty years old and currently regarded as the most powerful lobbyist in town. Over bagels and juice she agreed to represent D-PAC for an initial retainer of $500,000. Her firm would immediately dispatch twenty associates and that many clerks to the new D-PAC offices where one of her partners would take charge. One section would do nothing but raise money. One would analyze congressional support for Lake and begin, gently at first, the delicate process of lining up endorsements from senators and representatives and even governors. It would not be easy; most were already committed to other candidates. Yet another section would do nothing but research-military hardware, its costs, new gadgets, futuristic weapons, Russian and Chinese innovations–anything that candidate Lake might need to know.

Tyner herself would work on raising money from foreign governments, one of her specialties. She was very dose to the South Koreans, having been their presence in Washington for the past decade. She knew the diplomats, the businessmen, the big shots. Few countries would sleep easier with a beefed-up United States military than South Korea.

"I feel sure they’ll be good for at least five million;" she said confidently. "Initially, anyway"

From memory, she made a list of twenty French and British companies that derived at least a fourth of their annual sales from the Pentagon. She’d start working on them immediately.

Tyner was very much the Washington lawyer these days. She hadn’t seen a courtroom in fifteen years, and every meaningful world event originated within the Beltway and somehow affected her.