“No, not at all.”
“I’m glad to hear that.”
“So . . . it won’t be a problem?”
“No.” She smiled at me, then got up and went around to her side of the desk, to her computer. She clacked keys for a couple of seconds, and the smile remained, even seemed to grow a fraction. “Will hundreds do? Or smaller bills?”
The Parka Man hadn’t specified. “I think hundreds will be fine.”
Lumley straightened, beaming at me. “Then I’ll have Mr. Rodriguez call you Monday, as soon as the cash is together.”
“Monday?”
“Yes, it’ll take until then for us to get that much cash.”
Someone living in my belly inflated a balloon, painted the word “panic” on it, then let it go to ride the currents up to my head.
“I need it sooner,” I told Lumley.
Lumley began to look concerned again. “I’m afraid there’s no way we can do that.”
“Who can? There must be someone who can, right? I have the money, I have more than enough money.”
“Your combined balance currently stands at four million, six hundred and eighty-seven thousand, nine hundred and eleven dollars,” Lumley said. “That’s not the problem, Miss Bracca. We’re a bank, not the Federal Reserve. We simply don’t have that much currency here, in fact, we never do unless we know there will be a need for it.”
“Can I open an account at another bank?” I asked, trying to keep the balloon from going higher. “Do a wire transfer?”
“You misunderstand me, I’m afraid. It’s not us, it’s the amount. Any bank in the region will have the same problem. What you’re asking to withdraw is a very large amount of currency.”
It was Tuesday afternoon. If I believed Lumley, and I didn’t have a reason not to, then it wouldn’t matter where I went. I suddenly realized I’d have the same problem no matter who I banked with. Which meant that come Friday noon, I wouldn’t have the money, and I didn’t believe Parka Man would give me a reprieve. Clearly, he’d anticipated this problem, but not how long it would take; that was why he had given me the time. If four days later I still didn’t have the money, he wasn’t going to be happy, and his unhappiness would probably manifest itself by inflicting a lot of pain, and probably death, on Tommy.
The beating had looked so painful, the damage so much, and sitting in Catherine Lumley’s office, I saw Tommy again in my mind’s eye. All the times I’d wished him to suffer, and now that he was suffering, I felt sick.
Lumley was waiting for me.
“How much can you get me by Friday?” I asked.
“I’d say five hundred, perhaps six hundred thousand dollars.”
“Which?”
“Six hundred thousand,” Lumley said. “Yes, I should think that wouldn’t be a problem.”
“Then I’d like you to do that, please.”
“We’d be happy to. I’ll have Mr. Rodriguez call you as soon as your cash is ready.”
“Thanks,” I said.
“No,” said Lumley. “Thank you for banking with Four Rivers.”
Graham’s apartment was in the Pearl, and that’s where I headed next. During the last few months I’d been with the tour, he’d made a habit of traveling with cash, upward of fifty thousand dollars at a time on some legs. He’d kept it in his briefcase, used it to pay for incidentals and emergencies and shopping sprees, but mostly it was for travel. Cash was the best way to get around the paparazzi and their penchant for digging through credit card receipts.
There was no way he was carting four hundred grand around in his briefcase, but he’d know where I could get it.
I took Burnside across the river, back into downtown, then up toward Powell’s. The Heineken Brewery used to be on Burnside, this huge old brick building that had stood since the bad old days, when Portland was renowned by sailors the world over as “the worst port in the world.” But Heineken sold the property a couple years ago, and some developers bought it and promptly tore the whole thing down. Now there were expensive condos and yuppie health food stores.
Graham’s apartment was in an earlier iteration of the process, a twenty-odd-story collection of new apartments with an Art Deco feel. He’d bought it after Scandal, when it had become clear that Tailhook was staying together, and that he was part of the package. Prior to that, he’d lived exclusively in L.A., and he still kept a home there. He’d bought in the Pearl because it was considered the trendiest damn section of town, full to the popping with young urban professionals, all of them beautiful, all of them eager, and most of them looking for a date. Click had his place just a little farther north from Graham’s.
I parked the Jeep and hopped out, and there was a security guy at the desk in the lobby, and he wanted to know who I was visiting. I told him I was Miriam Bracca to see Graham Havers, and the guard got all flustered and begged my pardon and told me he hadn’t recognized me.
“It’s okay,” I said.
“Mr. Havers has some company there already, I don’t think it’ll be a problem if you head on up without me calling first,” the security guy said.
“If it is, I’ll tell him I snuck past you.”
Security Guy grinned like we’d just become the best buds in the world. “Cool. And if anyone asks, I’ll say I’ve never seen you.”
I laughed and he grinned even bigger, and then I got in the elevator and went up to eighteen. There was no one in the car and no one in the hall, and I rang the bell beside Graham’s door, and waited. There was no music coming from inside, which was strange, because normally when Graham was home, he was playing something, usually a new band, usually someone none of us had ever heard before.
Graham answered the door, looking like he’d had some rest and wasn’t planning on any company coming by. He was in purple Adidas workout pants and a white V-necked silk shirt, and he was barefoot.
“Mimserama!”
“Hey, can I come in?”
He threw a glance over his shoulder, into the main room, then reached a hand for my shoulder, to guide me inside. The gesture popped a sudden memory of the Parka Man’s gloves on my arms and face, and I stepped back without thinking. Graham looked confused, but before he could voice it I went past him.
“Guy downstairs said you had company,” I said. “I hope you don’t mind.”
“No, it’s not a problem. You’ve met them, I think.” Graham edged around me, leading down the hall and gesturing into the main room, where his lifestyle was plain for any and all to see. He had a wide-screen Philips monitor mounted on the wall, between two arched windows that looked out into downtown, and two huge Klipsch speakers at the far corners of the room. The stereo setup was NAD and multicomponent, each piece seated gently in a chrome cabinet. The space was open, with low furniture, all modular, all vaguely Danish.
Detective Marcus had been standing at one of the three CD racks, examining the titles. Hoffman was on the couch. Both now directed their attention to me.
Graham continued past, saying, “You guys know Mim, of course, talked to her already. They just dropped by for a few questions.”
He told the last to me, adding a little shrug, as if to say that it all seemed silly to him.
“Miss Bracca,” Marcus said. “Pleasant surprise.”
“You and me both.”
Hoffman didn’t say anything.
“I can come back,” I told Graham.
“No, we’re pretty much finished here,” Marcus said, before Graham could answer. “We’ll be going now. Thanks for your help, Mr. Havers.”
“Hey, anything to assist, you know how that is.”
“You’d be surprised what a minority you’re in.”