The Devils Punchbowl

“Dogfighting,” says Kelly. “That'’s what I think. It’s Po’s passion. He’s a famous breeder of Japanese Tosas, and he definitely fights them on a circuit.”

“You think Sands picked up the taste for it there?” Carl asks.

Kelly shakes his head. “My gut tells me Sands grew up around it.

Specialized knowledge about the sport would have got him noticed by Po.”

Caitlin says, “I found a lot online about dogfighting in England and Ireland, going back centuries.”

Kelly nods sagely. “Let’s rewind a few years. Before Sands arrived on the scene, Edward Po had a younger brother named Yang, who died of cancer. Yang Po was a Christian, a Baptist converted by Scottish missionaries, and he ultimately married one of their daughters. Yang had a daughter named Jiao—half-caste, white blood. Very hot—in pictures, anyway.”

“I met her,” I say. “She’s striking, all right.”

Caitlin cuts her eyes at me. “Is she part of whatever’s going on here?”

“I think so, yeah. That'’s the vibe I got.”

“That'’s interesting,” says Kelly. “Because Yang Po had no involvement in his brother’s casinos or any other criminal activity. He was a professor—a

law

professor, if you can believe that. Edward, on the other hand, was neck-deep in every racket you can run in China, and that’s saying a lot. He’s since exported a lot of his operations to the U.S. and Europe, as well. What’s important for us is that Edward Po promised his dying brother that he’d not only take care of Jiao, but shield her from the sinful lifestyle. And he tried. He sent her to Cambridge, in fact. But when Jiao returned to Macao, she naturally fell for Sands, the Irish bad boy, much as her uncle seems to have done. Po hoped she’d grow out of it, but when she didn't, he told Sands to get out of town or else.”

“Or else what?” asks Caitlin.

“If Sands left China without Jiao, he’d get a nice severance package and the highest recommendation. If he stuck around or tried to take Jiao with him, they’d sever his genitals from his body, then his head from his neck.”

Caitlin’s eyebrows arch with interest, if not surprise. “So what did he do? Jiao’s here now. Did Sands risk the reprisal and take her with him?”

“He’s not the type to cave to threats,” I say.

“Depends on who’s doing the threatening,” says Kelly. “The IRA thinks they know something about torture? Trust me, you have to go to Asia to learn about pain. Sands had seen Po’s organization

from the inside, and he knew what would happen. He did exactly what the boss wanted. He left the girl

and

China. Anyone want to guess where he went?”

“Land of opportunity?” prompts Danny McDavitt.

“You got it. Las Vegas, to be exact. With Po’s recommendation, Sands got a top security job with the Palm Hotel group. Turned out his ambition was to own a casino himself. I think that’s what Sands was doing with the niece in Macao, trying to marry into the business. Fast-forward a few months, and enter Craig Weldon, a Los Angeles entertainment lawyer who liked to hang out at the Vegas Palm. Weldon owns a sports management agency, and he had the same dream as Sands, to own a casino. The difference was, Weldon had the money to build one. That'’s how Golden Parachute was born. They made a simple plan to go into secondary markets—like Mississippi—and beat out the competition. They wanted to clean up out in the sticks, then return to Vegas as conquering heroes ten years later. Not a bad plan. But while they were putting all this together, Jiao showed up in Vegas. Couldn’t stay away. True love, and all that. Now, did Sands try to send her back to China? Did he ask her to stay? We don'’t know. All we do know is that Po didn't send an unlicensed surgical team to castrate Sands. He let the Golden Parachute get completely unfurled, ready to catch wind, and then…”

“What?” asks Caitlin.

“He stole it,” says Walt. “Right?”

Kelly smiles. “Lock, stock, and barrel. This is speculation, but probably very close to what happened. Right before Sands and Weldon applied for their license, Po showed up and said, ‘Hello, Jonathan, my faithful servant. I appreciate all the legwork, but Golden Parachute Gaming is about to become a subsidiary of Po Enterprises, Ltd. Unofficially, of course.’ And what could Sands do but grin and bear it? He knew he wouldn'’t live five minutes if Po decided otherwise. So, Po’s name went into the five-percent silent-partner pool as a token investor, but in reality, the bulk of the money that funded Golden Parachute was his. Craig Weldon became a figurehead, either bought off with massive payoffs or scared into silence. Chinese gangsters are pros at both. California still has Triad-affiliated youth gangs who can enforce whatever the higher-ups want. Forget Sands and Quinn—Craig Weldon owns a lot of L.A.

real estate, and an L.A. youth gang could permanently fuck up his portfolio with one weekend’s arson and vandalism.”

I wait for Kelly to go on, but he seems to have come to the end of his story. “So Golden Parachute is actually owned by a Chinese billionaire?”

“That'’s what my employers think.”

“Does the U.S. government know that?”

“That I don'’t know.”

After digesting this, I say, “What do you think Sands’s real position is with the company? Does he even have an equity stake?”

Kelly shrugs. “Whatever his title is, he might as well be chief cook and bottle-washer. He’s under Po’s thumb. It’s like he never even left Macao.”

“Except he has the girl,” Caitlin points out. “Jiao.”

“How happy did he look to you?” Kelly asks me.

“Not very. Which brings us to the question I’'ve been asking since Tim Jessup first came to me. What the hell is Sands really doing here? And is he doing it on his own, or for Edward Po?”

“Your father told me about Jessup’s theory,” Kelly says. “Sands

could

be stealing from the city to try to make his own pile. Get a stake and haul ass, with or without the girl. But is he that stupid? The world’s not big enough to hide from Edward Po. If that’s Sands’s plan, he’s a moron.”

“He’s no moron. The opposite, in fact.”

Kelly stands and begins doing dips between two crossbars on the poles supporting the deer stand. His triceps flex like those of an Olympic gymnast. “So,” he says, “whatever game Sands is playing with his accounting, he’s doing it on orders from Po. Or at the very least, with Po’s blessing.”

“That brings us back to my original question. Why risk a gaming license worth hundreds of millions of dollars to steal a few hundred thousand, or even a few million, from a small town in Mississippi? Edward Po can’t be that stupid.”

“He’s not,” Walt Garrity says in the tone of someone who knows.

“Are you familiar with Po?” Kelly asks.

“Not by name,” says the old Ranger. “But from what you'’ve said so far, I think I’'ve got the picture. Po’s Chinese organized crime, right?”

“Right.”

“If he has U.S. operations, they’ll involve human-smuggling, prostitution, possibly drugs, and definitely money laundering.”

“Right again,” says Kelly, looking slightly surprised.

“I wondered about money laundering,” I think aloud.

“Casinos are tailor-made for it,” Walt explains. “Casinos are just banks, really, without all the pesky regulations. Wherever you have casinos, you have large-scale money laundering. The feds have passed a lot of regulations, but there’s so much money to be made, crooks can bribe casino employees to ignore them.”

Caitlin says, “Would the profit be enough to tempt someone as wealthy as Po?”

“It’s not a matter of profit,” Walt says. “Not the way you think of it. The biggest problem any criminal has is what to

do

with his profits. Take drug dealers. Cash money weighs more than the product they sell. Cash is one big pain in the ass. A guy like Edward Po needs hundreds of legitimate businesses to lay off all the cash he takes in. Maybe thousands, if he’s that big in China. Import-export firms, currency exchanges, car dealerships, you name it. But casinos make the best laundries. Casinos and online gaming sites, based offshore.”