The Borzoi Killings by Paul Batista Read Free Book Online Page A

college kids. We don’t make any real money when our clients are punks and kids. You can get to the rich guys. They love you, I know it, I’ve heard all about it. I can start to sew it up out here. And we both get big.”
    On the table in front of Juan was a sleek iPhone Brad Richardson had given him. The only other cell phones he ever had were the single-use disposable ones Oscar gave him each time Juan went downtown to the clubs.
    Oscar picked up Juan’s iPhone. He manipulated it as rapidly and deftly as a teenage girl, found Juan’s number, and entered it in his own contacts list. Before standing, he said, “I’ll give you a call.”
    Five days later Juan Suarez made his first delivery. It was to Trevor, the man who had held Brad Richardson’s hand at the party. Trevor lived in a pretty carriage house on a quiet back street in Southampton Village. Juan had no idea his first client would be Trevor. Oscar had simply given him an address, a large order, and a time for the delivery.
    “Lordy,” Trevor said, embracing Juan at the door. “What a wonderful surprise.”
    Juan hesitated. “You live in a nice place.”
    “You’re welcome here any time. Why don’t you stay for a little while?”
    “Not today. I have to get to Water Mill.”
    “Busy, busy boy,” Trevor said, taking from Juan the plastic Duane Reade bag in which Juan had carried two shoe boxes.
    “Thanks,” Juan said. He smiled at Trevor. He didn’t want to antagonize a customer because word of that might get back to Oscar Caliente.
    “I’ll be in touch soon,” Trevor said.
    And then briefly, glancingly, he kissed Juan’s lips.
    Juan stepped back but didn’t flinch. Trevor could not gauge this handsome, exotic man’s reaction. Juan was cool, motionless, waiting. Finally, he said, “The money.”
    “Of course.” Trevor picked up a brown envelope on a table next to the door. “This is for you.”
     
     
    In the back seat of an Audi driven by a man he knew only as Jocko, Juan counted the two thousand dollars in hundred dollar bills that were in the envelope. He had just earned three hundred dollars for five minutes of work. And this was just the first of four drops on this hot night.

7.
    Joan Richardson was with Senator Rawls at the party for major donors to the Metropolitan Museum of Art when her cell phone, deep in her purse, started vibrating. Attended by three hundred people, the party was closed to the public. The grand museum was suffused with soft, flattering light. Torches burned. On the mezzanine above the entry hall a tuxedoed quartet played Boccherini, Mozart, the Beatles. Because of the sounds of the voices and the music, she could barely hear the ringing cell phone. She was reaching for her second fluted glass of champagne, as was Senator Rawls. She ignored the cell phone. She knew it was Brad Richardson because the ring—the steel guitar portion of the original James Bond theme—was unique to him.
    Hank Rawls had spent the entire afternoon at her Fifth Avenue apartment. For hours they had touched each other everywhere, licked each other, and had sex on her bed, in the kitchen, and in the room-sized shower before they dressed for the party. But at this glamorous party they hadn’t even touched hands.
    Within thirty seconds of the first ringing, her cell vibrated and rang again. More than a hundred miles away in East Hampton, Brad was being more persistent on the cell phone than he had been in years. It rang as many as six times while she and the Senator spoke with the aristocratic, perfectly dressed, dulcet-voicedPhillipe de Montbello, who for twenty-five years had been the director of the museum. He was more a connoisseur of fund-raising than of art. He made a donor feel as if he were granting a favor by accepting the gift. Again she ignored the faint, persistent ringing from her sequined purse.
    As soon as de Montebello glided to a group of people that included Bill Clinton and Caroline Kennedy, Joan made her way to the