“Oh, there were plenty,” Jarvis cuts in. “Heady times for a lawyer, a lot of us made our names then.”
“Well this one was mostly in the UK. This bank that had been around for hundreds of years was caught funneling money into the Middle East. They were funding Saddam Hussein and Gaddafi, among others. Like, they turned out to be the Supervillain Savings and Loan.”
“A Savings and Loan is actually a different thing,” says Jarvis. Corbin cuts him a look. "Well, it is. No need to be inaccurate just to serve a metaphor."
“Riiight,” says Asia, rolling her eyes. "Anyway. So this bank ends up having to shut down after this, everyone pulls their money, they close in disgrace."
“Oh yes, the Wellington Trace bank,” begins Jarvis, then he clams up after another look from Corbin.
“That’s the one. It was big news, especially in Europe. Here, I imagine people in banking were all over it, but it didn’t hold the headlines for more than a couple of days. But I kept noticing that Charles Hamilton was often asked to comment. He’d be mentioned as ‘financier,’ rather that just saying he was head of Plymouth Rock Financial, which he was and is. That seemed weird.”
She shuffles the papers in her hand for a moment, then continues. "At about the same time, in the US, some of the money that had gone into Wellington Trace was found to have come out of Mexican drug cartels. So I was looking at some articles about that and found some statistics about spikes in drug traffic. When I started laying it out, I noticed that an Enid Brooks kept turning up, having gone on ‘philanthropic missions’ to ‘troubled border regions.’" Asia made air quotes as she talked. Those trips to help our troubled neighbors to the South always seemed to come right before those spikes in drug traffic."
Jarvis tries to cut her off but she holds up a hand and barrells on. “So. I decided to look into this group she claimed to be with, um,” she looks at the paper, ‘Sisters of Compassion.’ Sounds like nuns, right? But it’s not. It’s not affiliated with a church at all. In fact, it’s not real at all. It’s just a way for her to hand money over to these drug cartels."
“Can you prove this?” Jarvis manages to get in.
“Yeah,” adds Corbin, “that’s a pretty serious accusation.”
"I know. That’s why I’ve called you all together. So I see in the police reports in The Globe that there were police calls to the Hamilton’s address in Beacon Hill in this period. Three or four of them. But it doesn’t say why and there’s no follow up information. It’s just like they came by for a drink or something. But Miguel could get more."
“Miguel is her boyfriend,” I tell Corbin and Jarvis. “He’s a cop.”
Jarvis raises an eyebrow and nods at her to continue.
"So the police records were scrubbed mostly clean. You go back to those dates and it just says there was a call, no code, nothing. But Miguel knows a guy who knows a guy and he sends us the un-scrubbed record, dug out of the depths in Boston. Stuff that never got put into the digital system. Seems they were on to her and the state boys would show up at Casa Hamilton, threaten to contact the feds, and they’d leave again with a new weight room or a couple of new squad cars. This happened three times that we can find evidence for."
“It’s in writing? You can prove this?” Jarvis is on the edge of his seat.
Asia nods. “Yup.”
“Would this do the trick?” Corbin asks his lawyer.
“OH yes,” he says, the wheels turning, “if this checks out, losing a custody battle will be the least of their troubles.” Jarvis turns to Asia again. “Ms. Johnson, would you be free to come out to Boston for a couple of days?”
“I’m free as a bird,” she says, smiling.
I look at Corbin and he raises his eyebrows at me. His face is hopeful.
The mood at Domaine Chanterelle is decidedly lighter than it has been since we got back from New York. Corbin starts joining us in the pool again. We go to bed at the same time again, and do not go to sleep right away. The updates I get from Asia and Corbin gets from Jarvis continue to be positive. It looks like the Hamiltons will be lucky to escape jail time.
“You know, I’ve been thinking,” says Corbin, stroking my arm as we lay in bed, exhausted and happy, “I’d rather use this information to keep them away from Maeve, but not push it any farther than that.”
“What do you mean?”
"I…I know they’ve done terrible things, but I can’t feel good about sending someone like that to jail. There’s no evidence that they’re still involved in drugs or Mexican politics or anything like that. They’re not nice, but I don’t think they’re doing anything that means they should go to prison, you know?"
“Mmm, I guess. Just being really awful shouldn’t be jailable, probably.”
“Besides, pursuing this whole thing would mean a really drawn out court battle. I’m going to talk to Jarvis tomorrow, see what we can do. For all the crap they’ve been involved with, now they’re just two mean old people. They don’t deserve my daughter, but they don’t deserve to die in prison, either.”
“I think you might be nicer than I am, but you’re probably right. I just want to be sure she never puts her bony claws on Maeve again.”
“We are on the same page there.”
I drift off to sleep, warm in the arms of a really nice guy.
Chapter Eleven
“They want me to come to Boston.” Corbin’s pacing the kitchen, looking at his phone.
“Okay, when?” I ask, handing Maeve another banana chunk.
“Soon, but I don’t want to be away from Maeve right now. I feel like we need to keep our case strong.”
“So we’ll come along.”
“She’s barely back on schedule from the trip to New York. If we drag her back to the East coast and then back again, she’ll be back to square one. It isn’t fair to her.” He’s still staring at his phone as he tap tap taps.
“We could just keep her on California time for those few days.”
“No, I’m going to tell them to come to us. We are in the power position here and I think we can show that by making them come here. I’m sending a message to Jarvis right now, find out when he can make it. He’ll likely want Asia here, too. So can you check with her?”
“Sure! Anything I can do to help.”
He stops looking at his phone and comes over to me. Maeve grabs his arm with her banana covered hand as he leans in to me, but he doesn’t flinch. He plants a kiss on my forehead and says, "You have helped. You saved us. You made the call to Asia and you saved us."
I mean, obviously Asia did most of the saving, along with Miguel, but hey, who am I to throw away gratitude?
We get it all set up for two days from now. It’s moving faster than I thought, but the sooner we can put this behind us, the better. I really need to start thinking about the coming school year, anyway, and it’s nearly impossible with this uncertainty hanging over us.
When Corbin collapses into bed beside me, he sighs.
“What’s up?”
“My parents want to come out. They want to be around when we’re meeting with the Hamiltons and their lawyer.”
“That’ll be nice, I liked them.”
“They liked you, too, but now we have the whole ‘parents will see how I live’ thing going on.”
I sit up on my elbow and look at him. “What on earth are you talking about? It’s not like you’re living in a one room apartment, sleeping on a mattress made of pizza boxes. You have staff. This place is spotless.”
He chuckles. "Yeah, but I see it through their eyes. They’re going to be looking for what I screwed up."
“Corbin, are we even talking about the same people? I met your parents. I spent most of a week with them. They are not peering at you, searching for weakness so they can strike. That’s the Hamiltons.”
He wipes his hand down his face and looks at me with a sad smile. “You’re right. I’m sure much of this ‘Corbin is the fuckup’ stuff is in my head. And I’m sure I’ve let the Hamiltons get in my
head. Just kick me when I do it, okay? Feeling sorry for myself is not an attractive trait.”
"No, it is not. You need to rejoin the family you have instead of worrying about the one you had. Or thought you had."
He nods and pulls me to him. “What would have become of me, of Maeve, without you?”