Her 24-Hour Protector (14 page)

“Haven’t you got some work to do, Perez?”

“Yeah. I got work. I’m just wondering if we’re like, still a team here, you know?”

Lex grunted.

She remained, arms akimbo, looking at him.

“Look.” He glanced around the office, lowered his voice. “I’ll explain it all, I promise. Between you and me, I got myself messed up personally with this woman, and I need to get myself off this case. And I will as soon as Quinn gets back.”

She studied him for a few beats. “You gonna be okay?”

“Yeah, as long as you quit hassling me and get off my back for a few minutes.”

Perez sat at her desk, began busying herself irritably with
her computer, and Lex felt bad. Rita Perez had worked for the FBI for twenty years now, and she’d always been there for her partners. She had that kind of rep, never fussed about stuff like tenure, and who’d been where longer. She was one of the most decent, fair, equality-minded people he knew. And apart from the recent bachelor auction fiasco, he trusted her with his life. “Everything okay with your niece?” he muttered.

She glanced up, that dark all-knowing brow of hers crooking higher. “What? You want to be my friend now?”

“Whatever. Don’t worry about it.”

“Marisa is fine,” she snapped. “Better than fine—she’s got a new man in her life.”

“Who?”

“Patrick Moore, an accountant and a really decent guy who came out of nowhere into her life. I’m happy for her. She’s had a rough haul since her miscarriage. She’s opening up her own nanny agency now.”

“That’s great, Perez. Tell her I’m happy for her.” And he was, genuinely so.

Perez hesitated. “I’m having them both over for dinner next weekend. Want to come?”

“Thanks. Maybe I will. I—” The phone on his desk rang, and he snagged the receiver. “Special Agent Duncan,” he barked.

It was his contact from the financial crimes unit in New York returning his earlier call. And what Lex heard next made him sit forward sharply.

The New York unit apparently now had an informer, a retired personal accountant of Frank Epstein’s from the old Frontline days who’d kept copious copies of records—payroll, budgets, tax files, receipts—all because he feared he might one day need “insurance” against Epstein. And among those records was a mention of a business deal with Harold Rothchild.

“Can you fax those pages through, the ones that pertain to Rothchild?”

“It’s just two pages—a copy of a letter from Epstein’s desk to Rothchild, outlining the parameters of a pending partnership in a property deal. I’m sending them as we speak.”

Lex walked over to the fax machine, phone still to his ear. “They’re coming through now—” He stilled when he saw Epstein’s letterhead inching out of the machine, his mind veering wildly off track and back into time. Because next to Frank Epstein’s name was a little logo—a cartoon lion with a crown on its head.
The same logo Lex had seen on the bumper of the metallic-blue Cadillac that used to bring the brown envelope of cash to his mother’s house in Reno each month.

Heart thudding, Lex removed the fax, stared at the logo. “That little drawing—”

“It was Epstein’s logo for a while, back in the day,” said the New York agent. “It’s on all his personal correspondence from that period. Apparently those in Epstein’s inner circle used to call him the Vegas Lion, or the Lion King, a bit of egotistical motivation that led him to dub his next big casino project the Desert Lion.”

Lex hung up, feeling light-headed.

“What was that?” asked Perez.

“FBI New York.” He bit his lip, thinking.

“Do they have something on Harold and Epstein?” She came over to his desk. “What’s the fax say?” she asked.

Lex reached for his jacket. “I need to pay Epstein a visit. I’m going to the Desert Lion.”

She cursed.
“Duncan—”

He held up his hand. “I promise, I’ll explain. Later. But where I’m going now has nothing to do with this case. This is personal.”

“What about the fax?”

“On my desk.”

She glowered at him for several beats, then threw up her hands and muttered something in Spanish as he left.

Jenna stormed into the hallway, Napoleon’s little doggie nails clicking on the marble behind her. She was insanely relieved no one appeared to be home. But as she headed for the stairs, aiming for a hot shower, and some serious thinking, she caught sight of the headline on one of the morning papers that Clive routinely placed on the hall table.

The main story and photo was of the big auto pileup on the freeway last night. Her mouth went dry. Jenna snagged the paper, quickly scanned the story.

Thank God, there was nothing about any deaths or terribly serious injuries. There was also no mention of who had caused the pileup. Yet. She flipped the page and read the continuation of the article, a smaller headline underneath the story suddenly snaring her attention. And her blood ran cold.

There’d been a murder.

The owner of the Lucky Lady, a fortune-teller named Marion Robb, was found early this morning, her throat slit.

Jenna folded the paper, numb. Afraid. Somehow everything was connecting, and she couldn’t see the patterns. She climbed the stairs, mechanically going through the motions of showering, dressing, feeding Napoleon. But all she could think of was Lex, of what the Lucky Lady had told him about his mother, and how the fortune-teller had alluded to Vegas’s dark mob past and Sara Duncan’s possible involvement.

Sara’s throat also had been slit.

Had that dark mob past finally caught up with the present in that murky psychic store that sold dreams?

Jenna thought of her own father and his possible ties to Epstein, and of the stories about Epstein’s old links with Vegas Mafia. She thought of the death threats in her dad’s
drawer—how they promised to avenge a past deed, how they all referred to The Tears of the Quetzal and how Candace was the “first” to be taken out. How her dad had lied about the fire in South America.

Jenna sagged onto her bed, inhaling deeply. Lex was the one person in her life that remained a lighthouse through this maelstrom. And she’d run from him. She’d pushed him away.

And he’d said he loved her.

Her eyes misted.

She couldn’t begin to articulate how messed up that made her feel. Being with him last night, having him make love to her in his bed, was like nothing she’d ever experienced. He’d made her feel whole. As if she’d come home somehow.

More home than she felt here in the Rothchild mansion now.

She angrily brushed away an errant tear.

She’d been overwhelmed by it all—along with the shock of almost being killed and by the gravity of what she must now do to her own father. To her family. But in truth, Jenna knew the course was the right one, and she had to find the courage to go through with it.

Candace was, after all, family, too. She needed justice, too.

Jenna wondered if Lex was even aware of the Lucky Lady’s murder. It wouldn’t be an FBI case, as far as she knew, so he might still be unaware. She needed to talk to him.

She dialed his cell phone, but it went straight to voice mail.

She tried his office number, again voice mail. Jenna walked to the window, looked down into their beautiful garden, their wealth visible, tangible. She thought of Lex, his orphans. His mother. His strong sense of allegiance. Honor.

Of course he couldn’t lie about her finding the death threats—she’d basically asked Lex to go against everything he was. She needed to see him. Talk to him.
Now.

She grabbed her keys off her dresser and ran down the stairs.

Perez found Jenna Rothchild in a small FBI waiting area, not looking at all like the Jenna Rothchild she knew. Sweet little dress, flat sandals, hair all loose and unstyled, no jewelry. Jenna had asked to see Lex, and Perez was vaguely amused by the idea that the tail she’d put on Jenna Rothchild this morning had been led right back to the FBI field office. It appealed to her twisted sense of humor. “Agent Duncan isn’t in, Ms. Rothchild. I’m Agent Perez, his partner. Is there anything I can help you with?”

She got up, looking nervous.

“You okay, Ms. Rothchild?”

“I…I’m fine.”

“You got a pretty bad bruise on your cheek there. Did someone hurt you?”

She swallowed, tensing, arousing Perez’s veteran instincts. Something weird was up. First Duncan. Now this woman. Acting odd. They were in on something, and Perez had a feeling it was more than just sex. Perez would do anything for her partner, even if it meant crossing the line, just a little. Because that’s what partners were for, right? They had each other’s backs. And Rita Perez was sensing something deep under the surface here. Something not so good. Something that maybe involved the Desert Lion.

“I…walked into a door,” she said, touching her bruise.

“Duncan says you were followed last night.”

Rothchild’s eyes flickered fast. She turned and looked as though she was about to hightail it out of the place, skittish as a damn deer. But then she wavered. “Is Lex maybe out investigating what happened with that psychic murder?”

“Psychic?”

“I…it’s nothing. Thank you for seeing me.” She spun and began to stride out the building.

“You want me to tell him you stopped by, Ms. Rothchild?” she called after her.

Jenna wavered, turned. “Could you tell me where he went instead?”

Perez chewed on the inside of her cheek, very curious now about a psychic, a little plot of her own hatching. “Yeah,” she said suddenly. “He went to the Desert Lion to see Frank Epstein.”

Jenna’s eyes widened for a moment. “Thanks.” And she was gone.

Perez returned quickly to her desk, snagged her phone and called the tail she had on Jenna. “Hey, you just cut a break, Savalas. I’m taking over your babysitting duties, okay?”

“All yours. Fill your boots, Perez.”

“Hey, Savalas—” she said before she hung up “—you hear anything about a psychic being murdered?”

“It’s an LVMPD case. Happened last night. A woman who owns the Lucky Lady psychic store had her throat slit. Guess she didn’t see it coming.” He chuckled at his own sick joke. “So much for being psychic.”

Or lucky.

“Careful you don’t choke on your lollipop there, Kojak.” Perez hung up and made for her vehicle. If Duncan wasn’t going to tell her what was up his butt, she’d find out herself.

“Men,” she muttered. “They need a damn mother half the time.”

F
rank Epstein was not in the building. Lex asked to see Mrs. Epstein instead. It was a personal visit, but he wanted results, so he showed his badge. The receptionist picked up the phone, spoke to Mercedes, then handed Lex a special key card and pointed to a private elevator on the far side of the bank of main elevators. “She’s in the penthouse apartment, thirty-third floor. She’ll be expecting you.”

Lex watched the lights blink as the car climbed to the top of the luxurious five-diamond casino hotel thinking that the little Lion King logo circa three decades ago, stuck onto the bumper of the pale-blue Cadillac might mean nothing. Anyone could have put that sticker on his car—it didn’t necessarily mean that the man who drove it worked for either the Frontline or Frank Epstein. Or had anything to do with killing his mother. And the man who regularly brought the money certainly had not been the one with the hairy hand and raspy voice.

But the sticker in conjunction with the fact that Sara Duncan did at one point work for Epstein, and then mysteriously packed her bags and left in the quiet of night for Reno after allegedly being sacked by Epstein, is what had now brought Lex here. He wanted to hear from Frank Epstein’s mouth the circumstances around the firing of his mother. And in Epstein’s absence, Lex planned to ask Mercedes flat out if she’d known Sara Duncan and who might have been visiting her in Reno once a month in a blue Cadillac convertible. With a brown envelope full of cash. And her husband’s Lion King logo on his bumper.

The elevator car stopped on the twenty-ninth floor, and two suits got in. Both sported Desert Lion name tags. The older man’s tag decreed him Roman Markowitz, security head. Lex judged him to be in his sixties, but still a powerful man with darkly tanned olive skin and a thick head of pepper-gray hair. He threw an odd glance at Lex, then pressed the button for the thirtieth floor. Hairy hands, Lex noted. The doors slid closed, and the car began to ride up again.

It stopped, and as the two men exited the car, the older one turned to the younger. “Should be a long night.”

The blood in Lex’s veins turned instantly to ice.

The voice!

The doors slid closed.

He stared at them in a moment of raw shock. He’d know that distinct sandpapery voice anywhere—a sound that had haunted his childhood dreams. And lived in his adult ones.

The voice of the man who’d killed his mother.

Lex lurched forward and punched the Open Door button, but it was too late. The car had started to climb again. He hit the button for the thirty-second floor instead. Pushing through the gap in the doors as they started to open, he dashed down the passage, twisting and turning through the mazelike layout,
looking for fire exit stairs. He bashed through the fire exit door, an alarm going off as he clattered down two floors, hit the bar to open the door to the thirtieth floor. But his weight slammed solid up against the door. It was locked from the inside of the stairwell. A security measure.

He swore. Then he heard footfalls clattering down the fire escape stairs. He’d set off the alarm. They were probably watching him right now from the cameras up in the security room—the omnipresent Vegas eye-in-the sky. Lex squared his shoulders, and pulling his jacket straight, he began to calmly climb back up the stairs. Two security men stopped him. “Excuse me, sir—”

Lex held up his badge. “I’m on my way up to see Mrs. Epstein. Looks like I must have gotten off on the wrong floor.”

The security guards exchanged sharp glances.

“You can check with Mrs. Epstein’s receptionist if you like, she’s expecting me,” he said casually as he pushed past them. “I’ll just head back up the way I came.”

As Lex went back through the fire door the guards had left propped open, he heard one of the men key his radio, checking Lex’s story and clearing him with reception. He made for the private elevator, heart slamming.

He’d bet his life that the security head for the Desert Lion was the same man he’d glimpsed through the louvered slats of the closet, wielding the knife that had slit his mother’s throat. The voice, skin tone, age, hair, his association and current position with Epstein’s casino all fit.

And now he had a name—Roman Markowitz.

Lex wondered if Markowitz knew who he was—that Special Agent Lex Duncan was actually the child of Sara Duncan, the child he’d come looking for on that fateful day in Reno thirty years ago.

Even if Markowitz didn’t know, Lex had little doubt he’d be watching him right now via the security camera in the elevator,
especially after the little incident on the stairs. And he’d be checking Lex’s credentials, asking himself why a federal agent was visiting Mercedes Epstein.

It occurred to Lex, as the elevator bell dinged on the penthouse floor, that either way, Markowitz probably felt safe. Because he had no idea that Lex had recognized him or even could. After all, Lex had not been able to describe his mother’s assailant to the police all those years ago. All he had was the memory of a voice. But no one understood just how indelibly that distinct voice had been burned into his brain.

The doors slid open, and Lex stepped into the penthouse lobby.

A butler showed him into a living room with elevated ceilings and a massive wall of tinted glass that overlooked the Las Vegas Strip below. The decor was all done in shades of cream and white. Even the orchids were white, the only contrast being the glossy black Chinese vases that contained them, and the black granite bar in the corner.

Mercedes was standing at the windows, her back to him as Lex entered the room. She was dressed in cream as if to match her decor—a sleek image of matriarchal elegance.

“Lexington,” she said, looking out the window. “I was hoping you’d come.”

For a second Lex was at a loss for words. No one had called him Lexington since his mother—and then the Lucky Lady.

She turned slowly, smiled, holding out her hand. “It’s so good to see you. Take a seat. Can I offer you something to drink?”

He ran his tongue over his teeth, stepped forward. “No, thank you. What do you mean you were hoping I’d come?”

“We have so very much to catch up on.”

“I beg your pardon?”

She nodded. “I understand, it’s confusing.”

An unspecified tension tightened like a wire around his chest. “I came to see your husband, Mrs. Epstein. But Frank
Epstein was not available, so I was hoping you’d help me out by answering a few questions.”

She raised her elegant brow. “Is it a federal matter?”

“A personal one.”

She looked at him for a long time, something strange and unreadable in her features, something that made him real uneasy. “What is it that I can help you with?” she said finally.

“Did you once know a young woman, a croupier, by the name of Sara Duncan?” he asked. “She would have been working at the old Frontline Casino around the same time you were there.”

Several beats of silence thickened the air.

“Please,” she said, very quietly. “Will you sit?”

Lex glanced at the virginal cream sofa, the matching chairs. “I’d prefer to stand—this shouldn’t take long.” He didn’t like the look in her eyes, the unease he was feeling. Something big was coming down the pike here, and he had no idea what it was.

She walked to the bar counter, moving smoothly on impossibly high heels. She reached for a bottle of mineral water, uncapped it. “I knew Sara,” she said as she poured a glass. “What do you want to know about her?”

“She was my mother.”

Mercedes put the glass to her painted lips, sipped slowly, eyes intent on his. She set the glass down, a small chink of crystal on the black granite surface of the counter. “No, she wasn’t, Lexington.”

“I…excuse me?”

“Sara Duncan was not your mother.”

He stared at her blankly.

She inhaled. “I’d really prefer you to sit, Lexington.”

“Right about now, I really don’t want to sit.”

She nodded, turned away from him, looked down on the activity on the Strip thirty-three stories below. “It’s been such a
long time, so much in between. A lifetime really.” She paused. “I had a one-night stand, Lexington. Just over thirty-five years ago.”

Roman Markowitz had called Frank Epstein immediately upon encountering Special Agent Duncan in the private elevator. Epstein’s driver had rushed Frank back to his hotel. He now sat in his private viewing room, watching the video feed into his own penthouse apartment. Markowitz stood at his side.

“You think he recognized you?” said Epstein, eyes glued to the monitor.

“Not a chance. He has no idea who I am.”

Epstein nodded his head. “Keep it that way.”

“How do you want to play this?”

Epstein studied his beautiful wife. “Let’s hear what she tells him and see how he reacts. We’ll take it from there,” he said quietly. “What happened the other night with the tail on the Rothchild heiress by the way?”

“We lost her in a car chase. Someone else was following her. Caused the freeway pileup.”

“You see who it was following her?”

“Negative.”

“Interesting,” Epstein mused.

“What does your one-night stand have to do with Sara Duncan?” Lex wasn’t sure he wanted to hear what was going to come out of Mercedes Epstein’s mouth next.

She ignored his question. “It was a crazy, impulsive and very dangerous thing to do, because I had recently married Frank, and Frank was a very, very possessive man.” She was quiet for a few seconds, staring down at the tiny cars far down in the street. “I’m sure you know the rumors about Frank in those days.”

She spun round suddenly. “I fell pregnant that night, Lex
ington. And do you want to know what the irony is? The irony is that Frank has always been unable to sire children. As much as I needed to hide the affair, I couldn’t even begin to think of passing off my baby as his. And I couldn’t get rid of my unborn child. It was not in me to do so.”

Nausea rose in Lex as the meaning behind her words burrowed into his brain. “Who…did you have this affair with? Who was the father of your child?” His voice came out hoarse.

“A man by the name of Tony Ciccone. He worked for Frank. He was—”

“I know who he was.”

Pain twisted into her features, and her eyes glimmered. “Tony told me to get rid of the child. He said Frank would murder us both if he found out, and I believed him. But I could not go through with an abortion. I…” Her voice hitched. “I…I just couldn’t.”

Lex didn’t trust himself to speak.

“So I arranged to go on an extended tour. I was a dancer back then, and Frank was very busy with a major project at the time and wanted to keep me happy. He’d have given me the world if he could. He has given me so much—”

“The baby?”

She moistened her lips, nodded. “I timed my tour so that I could carry my child to term, and I gave birth in secret, where Frank wouldn’t find out.”

“A boy.”

“Yes,” she said quietly. “And I named him Lexington.” Her eyes misted over, and her voice grew thick. “I named him for my hometown in Kentucky because I had a desperate need to root my son with some part of myself, my history, before I had to give him away.”

Lex ran his hands over his hair. Feeling hot. He needed air. He needed to get the hell out of this place. He didn’t want to
hear what he was hearing. Didn’t want to believe it…couldn’t process it. “I…I am that son.”

She nodded. “I entrusted you to Sara Duncan’s care.”

“You
gave
me to Sara Duncan?”

“She was a good person, Lexington. And she needed the kind of money that Tony and I could give her to do this for us.”

He closed his eyes for a moment. This woman was trying to tell him that he—a federal law enforcement agent—was the son of one of the most notorious and violent gangsters in the country? That
she
was his mother?

Right about now, he needed a drink. No, he needed to get blind freaking inebriated. He needed to smash something. Disbelief, anger—he couldn’t even articulate what—was building like a Molotov cocktail inside him. But he remained rooted to the spot. It was like watching a train wreck, the train wreck of his life, and he couldn’t tear himself away.

“Tony Ciccone is—”

“Your father.”

He swore. Violently.

“Lexington, I know this must—”

He held up both hands, palms out, keeping her at bay, not wanting to hear more, yet compelled to stay and hear it all. “Just…just give me the facts, keep it simple.”

She had the audacity to look hurt. “Tony went ballistic when he found out I refused to terminate my pregnancy. He had a terrible temper, and he was convinced Frank would tear him apart limb by limb with his bare hands. I was afraid of Frank, too. As much as I love him, he can be a fearful man when crossed. But I do love him, above all else—”

“Please, Mrs. Epstein.” Lex couldn’t even call her by her first name now. “The facts.”

“We paid Sara handsomely to take you as a newborn and to register you as her own child in Reno. She feigned preg
nancy while I was away on tour, making herself look progressively advanced. It was a policy of Frank’s that no visibly pregnant women could work his casino floor, and Sara caused a scene over it, as we had planned, and got herself fired. She then left for Reno, where we delivered the baby to her.”

“
The
baby,” he said, almost inaudibly.

“You.”

“And then?”

“And then Sara had enough money to buy herself a house and to raise you on her own. We continued to pay her a monthly stipend, cash, organized by Tony. Non-traceable, of course.”

Apart from the pale-blue Cadillac that came like clockwork to their house.
“Who brought her the cash each month?”

“Jackie Winston, a man in Tony’s employ.”

“Did this Jackie Winston work for Frank Epstein as well as run personal errands for Tony Ciccone?”

“Why do you ask?”

“Just answer the question.”

“Yes, he did work for Frank, but Tony put Jackie on a separate payroll as well. Frank didn’t know this. You see, Tony was trying to coax several of Frank’s men over to his side at that time. Frank and Tony were in a battle over…certain things in their…business relationship.”