Chapter Six
It was late in the evening when the charter plane carrying Daniel Beason landed at Sky Acres Airport, a public-use airport located six miles southwest of the central business district of Millbrook, a city that was ninety miles north of New York City. Knowing that he was a suspect in two murders, he decided that it was best not to arrive in the city from Turks and Caicos.
In the 1970s, the Turks and Caicos Islands were declared an official offshore center. That meant there were no taxes on income or capital gains, no inheritance or estate taxes, and there were strict confidentiality laws. The Turks and Caicos Islands provided a full range of international banking and trust services. As there was no direct taxation, Turks and Caicos banks were able to offer their clients higher rates of return and lower margin costs, making it an attractive location for people trying to hide their money.
Beason had come there looking for the information that Elias Colton had gotten from the Albanians. He had become involved with Elvana Vetone, the daughter of Troka Clan member Saemira Vetone, and he convinced her to give him the data. It was Elvana who snuck into her father’s house and copied data on transactions, dates, times, contacts, and their locations. Colton thought that being in possession of the information would put him and Beason in a stronger position, but it just ended up getting him killed.
After Lendina Neziri, the Mik of the Troka Clan, killed Andrea Frazier and left Beason alone in the warehouse, he looked at her body and the blood pooling around her head.
“Sorry, Andrea.”
He stooped down and picked up her purse, quickly got her phone and the $20,000 he had given her, and he left the warehouse on foot. Once he had gotten somewhere he thought he’d be safe for a while, he got Andrea’s phone and called the last number she dialed.
As he expected, her last call was to her pilot friend. Once Beason explained the situation and that Andrea was dead, the pilot agreed to take him to the island. But instead of the $15,000 he’d told Andrea it would cost to take him there, now the pilot wanted $25,000 in cash and upfront.
“Or the wheels never leave the tarmac.”
“Deal,” Beason said, wondering where he was going to get the other $5,000 he would need.
He had to chuckle because, at times like this, he would call Quentin, and he would have given him the money. But he was dead. Quentin was the first person he met when his parents dropped him off at college. They became fast friends and, eventually, roommates. Now he was dead, and Beason knew that he was responsible.
What was Quentin doing there? he’d asked himself a thousand times. But Beason had to set his grief aside for the moment and figure out where he was going to get the money, and at the same time, he knew that he only really had one choice. It was risky, but it was a risk that he had to take.
“You got a lot of nerve calling me,” Susan’s sister said.
“I know, and I’m sorry to drag you into this, but I need you to get a message to Susan.”
“Haven’t you caused her enough harm?”
He really didn’t have time for this. “Yes, I have, and I’m trying to fix it, but I need her help.”
Beason told her that he had $10,000 in their home safe, and arrangements were made for her son, Wesley, to deliver the money. When Beason arrived in Turks and Caicos, he asked the pilot to come back for him in a couple of days, but he refused.
“I can pay you double,” Beason said because he had money in several banks on the island.
“I really don’t give a fuck. Andrea was good people. Now get the fuck off my plane.”
It didn’t matter. He was there, and Beason would find a way back once he had gotten what he came for. The thing to do then was to make his way to Colton’s house in the Cooper Jack Bay settlement. He caught a cab to the house, and when he arrived, Beason went around to the back of the house. He jimmied the lock and went in. The place looked different somehow, but he attributed that to the fact that he hadn’t been in the house in years. Beason looked around and wondered where to begin his search.
“Don’t move,” a female voice said and cocked the hammer on her gun. Beason put his hands up. “Turn around, slowly. I don’t mind shooting you,” she said, and he did as he was told.
“Marva?” Beason said to the woman with the thick salt-and-pepper dreadlocks pointing a gun at his head.
“Danny?”
“What are you doing here?”
“I live here. What are you doing here?”
“Elias is dead.”
“I know. That doesn’t answer my question though. What are you doing in my house?”
“I think that Elias may have left some important information here. I came to see if I can find it.”
“Is that what got him killed?”
“Yes.”
“It got him killed, and now you’re looking for it?”
“Or they’ll kill me too.” He paused. “Can I put my hands down now, Marva?”
She lowered the gun and nodded. “Go ahead.”
“Thank you. Can I sit?”
“Go ahead, have a seat,” Marva said, and she sat down too, but she kept the gun in her hand.
“Wow, Marva. What’s it been, fifteen years?”
“Seventeen. I’ve been down here for seventeen years.” It was seventeen years ago that Marva Nichols gave Elias Colton an ultimatum.
“You can be with me, or you can be with Cissy, but not both.” After sharing her bed with him for the last five years, Marva had reached her breaking point. It broke her heart when he told her that he was staying with Cissy.
Staying with Cissy’s money was closer to the truth. Divorcing Cissy would ruin him, his company, and everything he had spent a lifetime building, he explained to her. “I love you, Marva, and I always will, but I can’t lose everything,” he told her, and that made the hurt even greater. He had chosen money and power over being with her.
So she left. Without letting him know where she was going or saying goodbye, Marva left the country. She had some money in the First Caribbean International Bank on the island. Her plan was to cash out and decide what to do from there. She had been there for a week when she opened her hotel room door, and Colton was standing there. Marva let him in, and she made it clear to him that their relationship was over and there was nothing that he could say or do that would change her mind. Colton said that he understood, but he still wanted to take care of her, so he bought her that house and put it in Marva’s name so Cissy would never find it.
“As many times as I’ve been here, I never knew you lived here.”
Marva chuckled. “I was right here in the house every time you were here.”
“I did not know that.”
“How would you? You always insisted on staying in a hotel when you were on the island.”
“That’s true.”
“So what information are you looking for?” Marva asked, and once Beason explained with as little information as he could, Marva suggested that he should get started with Colton’s computer. She showed him the way to the room that Colton stayed in when he came to the island.
“Over means over. At least it does to me,” Marva said.
“I see,” Beason said and got started.
It didn’t take long for him to realize that the files he needed weren’t on that computer. Therefore, with Marva’s permission and assistance, they began searching the house. It was almost midnight when Beason put his hands up in surrender. Marva had given up an hour before that and was sitting outside on the lanai, sipping a cocktail, when Beason came and sat down next to her.
“Any luck finding it?”
“Nothing.”
“I can’t think of anyplace else to tell you to look.”
“It’s not here. I was sure that if he kept a copy, it would be here.”
“The only other thing I can think to tell you is that Elias had a safe deposit box at CIBC First Caribbean Bank. Maybe it’s in there. I have a banking relationship with the bank’s manager. We can go by there tomorrow morning, and I’ll see what I can do. Other than that, I can’t help you.”
“Thank you, Marva. You’ve done more than enough.”
“In the meantime, I’m going to call it a night. Do you have someplace to stay on the island?” she asked since he usually stayed in a hotel.
“No. I came straight here from the airport.”
“You’re welcome to stay if you like.”
“I wouldn’t want to put you out.”
Marva stood up. “You are not putting me out. Come on. I’ll show you to your room, and we can go to the bank first thing in the morning.”
After a long and refreshing hot shower, Beason got into bed and tried to get some rest, but he found himself thinking about the mess he was in. The information that was contained on the drive wasn’t there. What he had to think about was what he was going to do if Marva came up empty at the bank the following day. What was he going to do next? Stay in Turks and Caicos, or go somewhere else and start over? He didn’t know, but Beason decided that he would make that decision after they went to the bank.
However, the following morning when they arrived at CIBC First Caribbean Bank to see if Marva could talk the manager into allowing them to look at Colton’s safe deposit box, things fell apart seconds after they walked through the door.
Marva looked around for her contact. “I don’t see him,” she said.
Beason looked around the bank, covered his face, and turned around quickly.
“We have to get out of here now.”
“Why? What’s wrong?”
“Meagan is here.”
“Meagan Colton?”
Beason nodded.
“Where?” Marva asked anxiously.
“At the desk with the blonde in the blue dress,” Beason said, pointing in that direction as discreetly as he could.
Marva looked at the young woman she had known since she was a baby. When Meagan was very young, Marva was Daddy’s little secret whom Mommy could never know about. She smiled as they left the bank, thinking that the price of young Meagan’s silence was ice cream and watching the cartoons that her mother wouldn’t allow her to see.
Dejected, Beason walked away from the bank knowing that if the information was in that safe deposit box, it was unavailable to him now. As they drove back to Marva’s house, Beason knew that it was decision time. He had some money in several of the banks on the island, so he would be all right. The bulk of his money was stashed in banks in Switzerland, but since Neziri’s associate, Besnike Fazliu, was in Switzerland, that was the last place he wanted to go.
You need to go back and clear your name, he thought.
Beason wondered, if the information were in the safe deposit box, would Cissy, not knowing what it was, turn it over to the police? Then it occurred to him that if Meagan was now in possession of the information, she may be in danger too.
All the more reason to go back and clear your name.
He was accused of murdering his two best friends, something that he could never do. Although he had his suspicions, Beason had no idea who killed Quentin, but he knew that Neziri killed Colton and Andrea Frazier. He was a witness to both murders. That meant that all he had to do was go to the police and tell them what really happened. Of course, he would have to tell the police everything that he and Colton were involved in, but at least he wouldn’t have to spend the rest of his life on the run.
No, you’d be in jail. He laughed aloud.
“What?” Marva asked.
“Just thinking about the reality of my situation,” Beason said, because the truth was, even if he did go to the police and tell them everything and they by chance believed him, and they arrested Neziri for the murder, and by some miracle he avoided going to prison, he would still have the rest of the Troka Clan to deal with.
“And that is?” Marva asked as she pulled into her driveway.
“That I need to go back. There is no way in hell that Elias didn’t make a copy of the data. I just need to find where that is and return it to them.” He chuckled. “Then I need to convince the police that I didn’t kill my two best friends, without implicating the guy who actually did it.”
“Good luck with that,” she said and got out of the car. Beason followed her inside the house.
“Thanks. How I’m gonna do all that, I have no idea,” he said, chuckling as he closed the door behind them.
“Neither do I,” Marva said, and then she stopped moving and held up one finger.
“What?”
“Somebody is in here,” she said, noticing that one of her couch pillows was in the wrong place.
Just then, a man came rushing out of the coat closet and tackled Beason. As they wrestled around on the floor, Marva got her gun. With one in the chamber, she took aim as the men rolled around on the floor, exchanging blows until the intruder got on top of Beason and began choking him.
Beason heard the shot.
And then he saw the shock in his adversary’s eyes, then watched the life disappear from him. The grip around his throat loosened before he fell to the floor.
“Thank you,” Beason said, trying to catch his breath. He got to his feet.
“You’re welcome. Now you need to get out of here,” Marva said, waving the gun toward the door.
“Thank you, Marva,” Beason said and left her to deal with the police.
Beason made his way to the banks he had on the island and closed his accounts. Now that he had money, Beason had to ask himself again, do I want to go back or start over? If he decided to start over, that meant he was going to Switzerland and would take his chances with Besnike Fazliu because there was no way he could start over with the money he had.
“Where to?” the driver asked when Beason got in a cab after leaving the bank.
“Just drive and I’ll let you know.”
As he sat looking out the window, Beason thought about Quentin and Andrea, Susan, and now Marva. Two of them were dead because of him, and there was no telling what was going to happen to Marva when the police came. And Susan would be left to clean up the mess from the Rousseau Land Development scheme that he and Colton ran to funnel millions of dollars through several front companies and intermediaries to finance their smuggling operation. Each of their sacrifices demanded that he go back and find a way to make this right.
So he was back in the country, ninety miles away from the city, not really knowing what he was going to do but determined to do it.