“What happened to the last forger?”I ask.“Nolan said it was classified.I assume that means he met a grisly end?”
Jagger’s face tightens and he flat-out ignores the question.“Tell me what you’re planning,” he says.“Maybe I can help.”
I release a sigh.He’s trying to protect me.Insulting, considering how synced we’re becoming.
“I’m marking everything.Variants in the watermark.Ink composition.Micro-features.Some only visible under UV.”
When he nods, I carry on.“They want twelve documents marked.Different transactions.”
“Good spread,” he says.“Strengthens the RICO angle.”
I shift my weight and push the issue a little harder.“So, about the last forger?”
For a moment I think he’s not going to answer, but this time he yields—and when he does, I almost wish I hadn’t asked.
His eyes shift to the swamp, then back to my face.“He’s somewhere at the bottom.”
Nineteen
Jagger
The Mississippi glints dull silver under the floodlights as I gun it past the old port road.Last pickup handled, last lie sealed in ink.One more delivery completed—next stop, Sin City.
Marquez was so pleased with the insurance paperwork Adena forged for the clinics that he dropped a duffel bag stuffed with cash through one of the usual channels.No electronic trail.No questions.Spending money for Vegas.
Adena may not want to go shopping with Valentina, but she’s going to have to.Marquez will expect her to act like any other cartel girlfriend, dripping with everything dirty money can buy.If she doesn’t spend, he’ll doubt her motive.And greed is the only motive he understands.
Traffic bottlenecks along Tchoupitoulas, trucks and tankers backing up the whole stretch of road.It takes me twenty minutes longer to reach Adena’s place, long enough for the storm to roll in off the river and spit a light rain that slicks the asphalt.
I park beside her Harley and climb the stairs, helmet under one arm, bag of money under the other.The vague trace of her coconut body oil laces the air before I even reach the door.
Across the kitchen table, copied Bible pages are spread out, her handwriting threaded through the margins.Another silent message.
In the bedroom, a drawer slides shut.I call out before she comes out firing.“It’s me.”
“I’m packing,” she calls back.“Give me ten.”
I drop my helmet onto the table and glance at what she’s left for me.Two verses are underlined.
Matthew 10:28 — Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul.Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.
Isaiah 1:18 — Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow.
The woman isn’t giving up.
I trace a finger along the edge of the paper.She doesn’t know half of what’s waiting for us in Vegas.
In New Orleans, the lies are spread thin—different fronts, different players.In Vegas, they all converge.
Marquez, Ortega, Valentina—all of them under one roof, watching each other for cracks.Ortega’s idea of a good time isn’t a show—it’s chaos wrapped in champagne.
Private tables, high rollers, dancers who don’t ask names.The kind of place where money and sin trade hands without a word, and nobody looks too closely at what’s really being sold.
That’s the thing about convergence.
It always ends the same way.
Someone bleeds.
