The Perfect Fake Read online

  Praise for The Perfect Fake

  “Parker delivers a fresh plot...builds to a surprise ending.” —South Florida Sun-Sentinel “In addition to crafting an interesting, quick-moving story, Parker provides wonderful locales.”

  —Library Journal “Delivers the goods as the action shifts from Miami to London to Florence.” —Kirkus Reviews “Engrossing...fresh and compelling.” —Booklist “A lively novel.” —The News-Press (Fort Myers, FL)

  “Fans of Parker will read The Perfect Fake in one sitting.” —Midwest Book Review More Praise for the novels of Barbara Parker Suspicion of Rage

  “Top-drawer suspense.” —The New York Times

  “Allows readers a glimpse of the Cuba not seen by most Americans. Takes Parker to a new level...a strong political thriller.” —The Miami Herald

  “Razor-sharp portraits...riveting.”—Publishers Weekly Suspicion of Madness

  “Sizzling... smoldering suspense.”

  —Vero Beach Press Journal (FL) “Provocative...a solid, well-plotted tale.”

  —South Florida Sun-Sentinel “A creepy thriller ...very well told. I made at least half a dozen expert guesses during the story about the identity of the killer and never got close, a welcome change.”

  —St. Petersburg Times Suspicion of Vengeance

  “A cliffhanger till the end...rings with authority.” —The Stanford Herald “Intricate pacing, a multicultural portrait of Florida, fascinating yet fallible characters, and multiple surprise endings that actually startle.” —Entertainment Weekly

  “Once readers are pulled in by the intricate plot...they won’t want to skip a word. Her characters are complex and believable.” —Publishers Weekly

  “Believable characters with emotional depth and texture....A well-paced, compelling story.” —The Miami Herald Suspicion of Malice

  “Riveting....Connor and Quintana burn up the pages.” —The Orlando Sentinel “Malice should turn casual readers into fanatics; it’s undeniably Parker’s best.” —The Miami Herald “Parker captures the roiling politics of Miami, as well as its color, all the while delivering a tight suspense story.” —Chicago Tribune

  Suspicion of Betrayal “A fine combination of romance, cultural clashes, and police procedural, plus some razor-sharp portraits... riveting.” —Publishers Weekly

  “Tantalizing...a complex, riveting plot with engaging characters.” —Mystery News Suspicion of Deceit “Combines believable characters, local color, and politics with a gripping plot about friendship, family, and betrayal...[takes] the legal thriller to a new level.”

  —The Blade (Toledo, OH) “Parker knows how to steam up the pages.”

  —Montgomery Advertiser Suspicion of Guilt

  “A breathlessly paced legal thriller with a powerful punch.” —Publishers Weekly “The author deftly shifts puzzle pieces... while building tension to a slam-bang conclusion.” —Booklist Suspicion of Innocence

  “Barbara Parker’s prose is as swift and clean as the Gulf Stream, and just as powerful.” —James W. Hall “This sizzling page-turner will keep lamps lit late into the night.” —Publishers Weekly “Parker unleashes a resplendent cavalcade of multiethnic tanginess and richly drawn characters with...stylish flair.... Superbly plotted, with a sense of pacing to kill for.” —Boston Herald

  Also by Barbara Parker Suspicion of Rage

  Suspicion of Madness Suspicion of Vengeance Suspicion of Malice Suspicion of Betrayal Suspicion of Deceit Criminal Justice

  Blood Relations

  Suspicion of Guilt

  Suspicion of Innocence

  Th e

  Perfect

  Fake

  BARBARA PARKER

  AN ONYX BOOK

  ONYX

  Published by New American Library, a division of

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street,

  New York, New York 10014, USA

  Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.) Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

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  Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.)

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  Penguin Books India Pvt. Ltd., 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi - 110 017, India

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  New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.)

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  Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices:

  80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  Published by Onyx, an imprint of New American Library, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. Previously published in a Dutton edition. ISBN: 1-4295-4477-5

  Copyright © Barbara Parker, Inc., 2007

  All rights reserved

  registered trademark—marca registrada Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  publisher’s note

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party Web sites or their content.

  The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

  For James

  Chapter 1

  Through the tinted windows, the Miami club district slid away—purple neon, stucco colonnades, people jamming the sidewalks. In the backseat of

  the Escalade, Larry looked over at Carla. Her shoulders moved with the heavy beat of the music on the stereo, and a curve of blond hair swung across her face. She thought they were on their way to score some cocaine.

  Joe turned his SUV south through downtown, which was dead this time of night. The headlights shone on a soda can rolling across the street and metal gates over the stores. The temperature would drop below fifty by dawn. In the passenger seat, Marek turned around to watch Carla. He laughed and snapped his fingers to the music and watched the hem of her dress sliding up her bare legs.

  They went under the low overpasses of the expressways, a forest of concrete columns. Behind the chainlink fences, homeless men slept under tattered plastic tarps. Cigarettes winked in the darkness. A short bridge went over the river and came down on West Flagler Street. The big tires hummed on the grid. Marek craned his neck to watch two women staggering out of a Nicaraguan nightclub.

  Marek worked for the Russian, who had sent him over here. The first thing Marek had asked for when Larry picked him up at the airport was stone crab claws. After that, “Take me to South Beach. I want to buy a shirt at Tommy Bahama.” He had bought a dozen shirts and some silk pants, but he still looked like he’d just walked off a farm in Bulgaria.

  When Joe turned right into the industrial district along the river, Carla asked Joe if he was lost
or what. He turned off the stereo and told her it was just around the corner. Silent now, the Escalade went through the open gate of a chain-link fence topped with razor wire and then past stacks of lobster traps. The guard at the gate vanished into the darkness. Joe parked in the shadow of a two-story building, a former fish market. A hooded security light shone on faded red letters.

  Carla put her face to the window. “Where the hell are we?” Larry grabbed her purse and passed it between the front seats. She yelled, but Larry held her down. Joe said there was nothing in the purse. Marek turned around and told Larry to look for a wire.

  “She’s not wearing a wire.”

  “Be sure.”

  Carla’s cursing got louder when Larry felt down her

  back, around her waist. Larry said, “No wire. Satisfied now?” Carla leaned over and grabbed her purse from Joe. “I’m out of here.” She pulled on the door handle. “Joe, unlock the door!”

  Larry said, “Calm down, baby. We just want to ask you something.” The security light at the gate didn’t reach this far, but floods on the electrical transformers down the river gave enough light. She was shaking. He said, “I’m not going to hurt you. Just tell me the truth. Last Tuesday Joe walked into the Second Street Diner for lunch, and he saw you in the back with someone, a blackhaired Hispanic guy, late thirties. Do you remember that?”

  She put on a blank look. “Tuesday?”

  “That’s right. Four days ago. Who was he?” “Tuesday....Oh... him. He just . . . he comes in to

  eat. I guess he lives in the neighborhood or something.” “What’s his name?” Larry asked.

  “I don’t remember.”

  Larry slapped her twice before she could get her

  hands up. “Joe says you got in his car. What was his name?” Her voice was shrill. “I don’t know....Wait! Let me think! Manny!”

  “Manny what?”

  She peered out from behind her arms. “Suarez.”

  “Okay. Manny Suarez.”

  Carla’s tongue came out to touch her upper lip. “Son of a bitch.” She started crying.

  “Where did Manny Suarez take you?”

  “Nowhere. I had walked to lunch, so he dropped me at my apartment. Why are you asking me this? Who is he?”

  “He’s a cop. He’s with the ATF.”

  “What is that?”

  “Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.” She still looked blank. He said, “That’s the U.S. government. He’s a federal agent.”

  “Well, he didn’t, like, walk up to me and say, ‘Hi, I’m a cop!’ ” She laughed and looked at the others in the front seat. “Why would he talk to me? I don’t know anything.”

  “You only saw him that one time?”

  “Yes. I mean, except when he came in the diner sometimes, like I said.”

  Larry wanted to believe her. Carla wasn’t that smart, and he didn’t think the ATF would use a bimbo like this as an informant. On the other hand, the Miami Beach Police had arrested her for possession, and the case had gone away. But that didn’t necessarily mean they had given her to the feds.

  Turning around, Marek put his chin on the seat back, and his small, brown eyes studied her. “I think she is lying.”

  “Stay out of this,” Larry said.

  Marek raised his eyebrows. “Ask her again.”

  Carla laughed. “Larry, come on. I didn’t know who he was. What am I supposed to do, ask every guy who talks to me if he’s a cop?”

  “What did you talk about, you and Manny?”

  “Nothing. You know. Just . . . like, ‘Can I buy you a drink sometime?’ And I said I had a boyfriend. It was nothing.”

  “Did he ask you about Oscar Contreras?”

  “No.”

  Larry tried to get through the arms she held over her face. “Lying bitch.” He could see Marek watching, and it made him angry. She clawed at him. He pushed her arms away and put a slap across her face. She kicked wildly, scraping the leather seat with the heel of her shoe.

  “Hey! Hey!” Joe turned around. “Don’t mess up the car, man. Take her outside.”

  “Then unlock the fucking doors.”

  “I am! Get out!”

  Larry shoved the door open with his foot and dragged Carla across the seat. She landed on the ground and tried to twist away, but he had a good grip on her. The interior lights fell on the broken asphalt paving. Carla fought him, but he put a knee in her back.

  The wind brought a stink from the river: diesel oil, seaweed, rotting fish. Marek lit a cigarette.

  Larry leaned down close. “I gave you a chance to tell me the truth. I could throw you in the river. Nobody would look for you. Nobody would care. A piece of garbage, another whore, and Miami’s full of them.”

  She was crying.

  “Joe, get that rope out of the back.”

  “Okay! He asked me about Oscar, but I didn’t say anything, I told him I didn’t know anybody named Oscar.”

  “Did he ask you about anybody else?”

  “No. Only Oscar. Please. Please let me go.” She was begging now, tears dripping off her face. “I’ll leave. I’ll go back to L.A. I swear.”

  “You’ve been saying that for a long time.”

  “I’ll leave tomorrow. I’ll be on the first plane. I want to go home. Please.”

  “I don’t know, baby. I just don’t know.” Larry stood up and took his money clip out of his pocket, peeled off some hundreds. “All right. You’re leaving tomorrow, and if I ever, ever, see your face again, we are going to have problems.”

  Carla grabbed for the money, scraping it together quickly.

  Marek was behind her. When she stood up, he put an arm around her throat and lifted quickly. He jerked his arm right, then left. There was a dull cracking sound. As she fell, Marek caught her around the waist, and a sigh hissed out of her mouth. Urine flowed down her legs and splattered. Marek shifted his feet.

  “Coño,” Joe said.

  Larry stared. “Are you out of your fucking mind?”

  “She was going to talk to them,” Marek said. “Maybe already she was talking.”

  “She would have been gone tomorrow.”

  “Now is better. Now we are sure.”

  Exhaling a held breath, Larry turned away and ran a hand over his hair. His forehead was sweaty. Upriver the drawbridge at Northwest Twelfth began to clang, and lights flashed. A freighter was coming through.

  Marek picked up Carla’s arms and dragged her to the rear of the SUV. “I watch CSI: Miami on the satellite. I saw one show where they put a body in the Everglades, and it’s gone in a week. Amazing. You take her there. Burn the ID.”

  “I’m not taking my Escalade to the fucking swamp,” Joe said.

  “Open the door. Don’t worry, no blood to mess your Cadillac.” Marek laughed around his cigarette.

  Larry gave Joe a nod, and Joe opened the back door. Marek lifted Carla inside and folded her legs. Her hair was across her face. Marek threw a beach towel over her and closed the door. He looked around at Larry. “You said no one is looking for her. She was living alone?”

  Larry said, “With another girl. A roommate.”

  Smoke drifted through the mustache. “We should talk to this girl.”

  “Forget it. This isn’t East Romania.”

  “Croatia. She is working for you also, this other girl?”

  “I said leave her alone. You’ll be back in Europe in a few days, but I have to live here, and I don’t want the cops on my ass.”

  Joe kept his eyes on Marek but shifted closer to Larry, like he didn’t know what to do next. Joe had a pistol under the front seat, but against a lunatic like Marek, it wouldn’t be enough.

  Larry said, “Listen to me, Marek. There are some negotiations going on, a lot of money on the table. I myself have an interest, not directly, but an interest. So I’m telling you. Do not go after the roommate.”

  “She is your girlfriend?”

  “No, but if she disappears, questions will be asked. She works part-tim
e for a judge. A judge has connections. Do you understand? She won’t be a problem unless you make her one.”

  The mustache shifted like Marek was smiling under there, like what assholes he had to deal with. He shrugged. “Okay.”

  “Okay, then.” Larry picked up the bills that Carla had dropped.

  Turning around, Marek scanned the parking lot. He found a high heel and threw it toward the water. It floated, a small black dot moving slowly toward the bay. He put a foot on the seawall and smoked his cigarette. The ship came nearer, gradually filling the narrow river like a wall of rusty steel. One of the men on deck raised a hand toward the parking lot below them, and Marek waved back. The propellers splashed, and gradually the throb of the engines faded.

  Chapter 2

  When his number flashed over the check-in desk, Tom Fairchild folded the sports section, picked up his motorcycle jacket, and made his

  way through the rows of molded plastic chairs. He stepped over a man’s bare, skinny legs and swerved around a little kid banging an empty soda can on the grimy tile floor. His mother grabbed the can away, swatted the kid, and went back to her cell phone.

  Tom slid the numbered receipt under the glass divider. “Hola, Daniela.”

  “Hola, Tomás.” She drew a line through his name.

  “What’s up, girl?”

  “Not much.”

  “You’re looking good. Got a new boyfriend?”

  A smile put dimples in her round cheeks. “I wish.”

  She buzzed him in, only half an hour after he had arrived—a record. Several turns in the narrow, dirtsmudged corridor led him to Keesha Smith’s door, which was open. He stepped inside and saw bare walls and cardboard packing boxes.

  “What’s this?”

  Keesha turned around from the file cabinet with her arms full. She dumped the folders on her desk. She was a big woman, old enough to be his mother, with hair processed straight and swooping gold frames on her pinktinted glasses. “Morning, Tom. Move that box out of the way and sit down, if you want to.”

  He tossed his jacket over it. “They finally fired you?”

  She laughed. “No, I got myself transferred to the Tampa office.”