THE MARINA AT Miami Beach is home to some of the biggest boats ever built for non-military and non-freight purposes. Dot-commers, media moguls, sport stars, drug runners and heads of state all held their megayachts in Miami Beach. I stopped by the office and found a young kid taking orders from a Russian customer who was barking like a drill sergeant. I nodded to the kid and he saw me, left the Russian ranting to himself and came over. It didn’t seem to improve the mood of his customer, but he tossed me a key card attached to a float and told me to go to B14. I left and wandered out into the sunshine. The marina sat on the Intracoastal side across from South Beach, tucked in behind the island from the hurricane winds that came through as and when they chose. I found Lucas polishing the glass on the sliding door of a speedboat shaped like a spear.
“I need to see a man about a dog,” I called.
Lucas didn’t look up. “A mongrel for a mongrel, eh?” he returned in his broad Australian accent. He finished polishing the window until it was practically invisible, and then turned, rubbing his hands with the rag. Lucas didn’t just manage a marina. He had been close to my mentor, Lenny Cox. The two of them had met when they were both doing goodness knows what for their governments, in places like Iraq and Afghanistan and goodness knows where else. Now he lived the quiet life by the water, except, it seemed, when I came calling.
“How are you, mate?” He leaned over the transom and shook my hand.
“Not as good as you. Nice boat.”
“Yeah, she’s a beaut. Owned by that Mexican fella who’s got all them Spanish language TV stations.”
“Nice. Looks big enough to cruise down to Cuba,” I said with a wink.
“Nah, you’d want something like that Magnum Marine 80 down there. This thing would light up the radar.”
“You’d know.”
“Yeah. Listen, this fella’s comin’ down in about an hour and I’d like to make her sparklin’ for him. You okay to catch up for lunch? Monty’s, in an hour?”
“See you then.”
I took a walk back along the marina out onto the promenade, through South Point Park, where a group of athletic-looking folks in Lycra were doing lunges and spider crawls on the lawn. I wandered around them and over the sand hills covered in wispy grasses, and sat on the beach. I was south of South Beach, past all the action, the clubs and bars and art deco hotels. This part of the coast felt more like Cape Cod, a cooling breeze and foaming waves breaking on the beach. The main difference was the towering hotel and apartment complexes standing over the beach at the southern point. I sat for a while, not thinking about anything for a change, watching a flock of gulls play tag with the ebbing and flowing ocean, breathing in some good sea air, and then I stood and brushed off and wandered back along the promenade, until I got back to Monty’s.
I asked the girl at the desk if Lucas had arrived and she said no, and directed me to a vacant stool at the bar by the pool. Monty’s was a little too spring break for me, with the view and the pool, but it was during term and many of the snowbirds were already making the trek back to New England or Michigan or Quebec, so the crowd was light and the vibe was easy. I ordered a Sam Adams and was two sips in when Lucas arrived. He flopped down on the stool next to me and pointed at my beer to order one of his own.
“What’s news?” he asked, sipping his beer.
“Just got back from Jamaica.”
“Don’t say.”
“Yeah. Good place, you’d like it.”
“I’m alright here, mate. So what brings you to the big smoke?”
“I met a kid in Jamaica. Good kid, fast runner. Brought him over to meet some folks at the university. He might have a shot at a scholarship.”
“Nice.”
I nodded and sipped my beer. I gave Lucas the short version of goings-on with Winston and Richmond and Prestwich, and the whole sports administrator boondoggle thing. In his line of work Lucas dealt with a lot of rich and famous people, and heard a lot of things. I wondered if he knew anything about the proposed Miami Olympic bid.
“I’ve heard rumblings, sure. I think the whole show’s a waste of time, but not all folks agree. Some important people are going on about how it will make Miami an international capital. Like they’ve never walked around town and listened to all the languages going on around them.”
“Where’s the bid money coming from?”
“The usual places, mate. The state will be kicking a bit in, and the city of Miami. The tourism guys. Then there’s private sources, companies who wanna get their pound of flesh out of the whole shebang.”
“How would they handle the money, do you think?”
“Crikey, mate, how do you reckon? You know there’ll be two sets of books. One for all the official stuff, and then the payola.”
“You know anyone who might be involved in the latter?”
“Is this Miami or is this Miami?” He pointed out to the docks. “Look at all those boats. Now I’m not saying it’s all ill-gotten gains, but it ain’t a church bake sale either. This is one of the drug capitals of the world. You know that better than most.”
I did know better than most. I had been involved in a case with a drug cartel in Miami that nearly ended badly, and I resolved it with Lucas’s help, and with considerable prejudice.
Lucas continued. “Those boys know how to move cash. So I’d be looking at your end points, and whether they have any links to anyone who might know a good deal about money laundering.”
I wondered about that for a moment. Winston’s best connection to the US was through athletes he had sent here, and the best connection they would have to South Florida would be through the Jamaican community in Lauderhill. I was tossing around whether I knew anyone in that community who might know something about moving money, and decided that I did, when my phone rang. I picked it out of my pocket and looked at the screen.
“Hey, Aaron, how’s the tour going?”
“Not good, my friend, not good.”
“Why? What’s happening?”
“Your boy’s doing okay. But I got a guy turned up here claiming to be the kid’s agent.”
“His agent?”
“Yes. And I told you, I can’t have any NCAA issues. If the kid has an agent, he’s out. I need him off the campus today.”
I skidded into the parking lot by the tennis courts again and jogged into the Hecht Athletic Center. Aaron Katz was in his office and his assistant sent me right in.
“What are you doing to me, Miami?” said Aaron.
“This is all bogus. Tell me what happened?”
“The kid is off on a tour with some students, and this guy turns up at my office wanting to know where Markus is, and claiming to be his representative.”
“Who was it? What was his name?”
“Desmond Richmond,” he said.
The look on my face must have betrayed me because Aaron shook his head.
“You know him, don’t you?” He wasn’t happy. “What have you got me into, Miami?”
I took a deep breath, in through the nose, out through the mouth. The same technique I had used throughout my baseball career, on the mound, before every pitch. I felt instantly calmer. I hadn’t expected Richmond to turn up at all, let alone this quickly, but I had taken steps. I just hoped they were enough.
“Look, Aaron, this guy is not who he claims to be. He’s trying to use these young athletes for his own purposes, positioning himself for some kind of play as a sports administrator.”
“Miami, I hear you. But I don’t care. I’m sorry, but I can’t afford to care. I’ve got hundreds of student-athletes here with us right now, who will all be adversely affected by the NCAA getting any whiff of wrongdoing. And the word agent is a big red flag. You know that.”
“Aaron, this guy is not an agent. There is no written agreement between Markus Swan and this guy.”
“You know as well as I do, an agreement doesn’t have to be written. Any implication that he is acting on the kid’s behalf can be considered agency. And this guy says he handled a deal with Nike to supply Markus with equipment. That’s an agent, and that’s unacceptable. I don’t make the rules, but I sure have to follow them.”
“He said that? He said he did a deal with Nike?”
“He did.”
I thought about the new shoes Richmond had brought to Montego Bay with him. They were certainly Nikes, but he never said how he acquired them. A deal with a big company like Nike seemed to be the sort of thing he would have wanted everyone in Jamaica to know about. But right now I needed time to find out, to put Richmond back in his hole and to keep Markus on campus.
“Aaron, you saw the kid’s shoes this morning. They were as old as Methuselah. Do you think if this guy had a Nike contract his athlete would be running for a scholarship in those old things?”
I saw Aaron’s face soften a bit. “I have people looking for Markus now. I’m going to ask you to take him off the campus as soon as we find him.”
“Come on, Aaron. Give him a chance. He hasn’t done anything wrong. He’s just trying to run his way out of poverty. You know how that is. Lots of student-athletes here battle that, in football, baseball, all sports. And lots of them have to contend with people trying to ride their coattails. That’s what this clown is trying to do.”
Aaron looked at me and sighed but didn’t speak.
“Just give me until tomorrow. Let Markus run. You’re still not on the hook for anything. If you’re not happy tomorrow, then fine, it’s over, no hard feelings.”
“What if this guy Richmond can prove a commercial relationship with Markus? All he needs is to show he gave any of this Nike stuff to the kid, and it’s done.”
“He can’t prove what isn’t true,” I said, although I wasn’t sure yet that he couldn’t. “And this Nike deal doesn’t smell right. You know folks at Nike. Why don’t you call them?”
He nodded. “Okay, I will. But that might not work out for you. Or Markus. He’s got running shorts, a track top. All Nike.”
“What if I can show that all that stuff was supplied by his association, for running competitions?”
“That would be acceptable. Is that the case?”
I looked at Aaron. I wanted to tell him it was. But I really didn’t know.
“Richmond’s not his agent. You give Markus until tomorrow, and I’ll make sure you have enough proof to satisfy anyone.”
He sat down in his chair and let out a long breath. “Alright. Until tomorrow. But I will be calling the people at Nike.”
“Good,” I said. I hoped it was true.