"Did you tell your sister that there was a map to $150 million in the book?”
"Hell no! I didn't tell anybody. You think I'm stupid?”
“How do you know she didn’t find the map?”
“Because in all these years, she hasn’t shown up with an excess amount of money. And Lord knows she needed it at times.”
“I still don’t see how you could forget where you buried it?” I said, incredulous.
“I gotta be honest with you. There are a lot of the ’80s that I don’t remember. Plus, I got the shit kicked out of me in prison, and I think I lost some data,” he muttered, tapping his noggin. After a pause, he said, “I’ve been going to every estate sale, flea market, and second-hand shop for 40 years now, looking for that book. My notes were cryptic. It wouldn’t mean anything to anyone else. If I find that book, I’ll find the money. Then I can pay the ransom.”
“There’s gotta be some way to spark your memory,” JD said.
“I’ve tried everything. I’ve been to hypnotists, psychologists, psychics. Nothing has helped. I’ve meditated, dropped acid, taken mushrooms, and gotten shit hammered numerous times. Nothing has jogged the slightest recollection. That data is missing. Permanently deleted.” Mickey exhaled. “But I know the money is out there somewhere.”
“Are you sure your sister doesn’t have it?” I asked.
“If she does, she ain’t telling.”
“Why is that?”
“‘Cause she’s dead.”
“Oh, sorry.”
“What about the owner of the storage facility?” JD asked.
“That was the first guy I talked to. He had no clue who bought the book. He just sold off the items and took the money. He’s dead now, too. I didn’t kill him. Would have liked to. That place got turned into condos.”
“We’ll start searching the islands one by one,” I said. “Maybe something will come back to you.”
“You think I haven’t been to every last one of them? I brought metal detectors, lidar, all kinds of shit. Found a lot of junk. A few Spanish doubloons here and there. No treasure. No money.”
“Let’s take a different approach,” I said. “If you had to hide $150 million today, where would you put it?”
“Half the problem is, what the hell do you do with it? You can’t start spending it. You’ve got to launder it. Get it into the system. Then I’d probably buy bitcoin with it.”
“That doesn’t really help us.”
“You’d have to find a secure place to stash it as you worked on getting it laundered. I’d put it somewhere remote. Hard to access. Someplace nobody would stumble across it. I wouldn’t keep it lying around the house. Too much of a target. Can’t put it in a bank vault. A storage unit is an option, but I don’t feel comfortable with a padlock on 150 million bones.”
“What comes to mind?”
Mickey thought about it for a long moment. “Shark Fin Key. There’s a tidal cave. I’ve looked there before, but I haven’t really explored it all. It’s a technical dive and a lot of bull sharks. I don’t advise diving there. The cave is only accessible at low tide or with scuba gear.”
“Maybe we should give it another look,” JD suggested.
“That’s a sizable amount of money,” I said. “You couldn’t just hide it anywhere.”
“Exactly,” JD said.
“Also, I hate to bring this up, but the first thing we need to establish is that Kendra is still alive.”
Mickey’s face tensed with dread.
My phone buzzed with a call from Isabella.
I swiped the screen and answered. “Tell me something good.”
