He said his group – ATU, or Artists Trust Union – would handle the major balance of ALIAS’s earnings that up until that point had been kept in a trust fund because he was a minor. The guy spun wild tales about potential earnings and even hooked ALIAS real good about being able to invest in a private island in the Caribbean. This all sounded like complete 101 con horseshit to me, but then again, I’m not fifteen years old. He exploited every facet of ALIAS’s teenage dreams and paranoid fantasies about Teddy and Malcolm ripping him off.

But the true genius in the plan was that this guy really had to do little work. ALIAS had to break into Teddy’s office and get the bank account numbers for the ALIAS money market account. Mr. Thompson – bless his heart – acted as his legal guardian (with just a little maneuvering or forgery) and siphoned every bit of cash from the fund that was earmarked for the kid when he turned twenty-one.

I told him that I’d start with the owners of the building and look for any short-team leases he probably did not sign. I asked ALIAS more about the woman from the club and the secretary. The club girl was hot. The secretary had a big butt.

“Why an island?” I asked. “Where did that come from?”

“Shit,” he said as we climbed back in the Gray Ghost. The smell of a warm rain mixed with exhaust and heat from the asphalt.

“You sure no one else could’ve seen them?”

He shook his head.

“No one ever came with you? Took a phone call? Vouched for these folks?”

“No one,” he said. He turned the bill of his Saints cap backward and slumped into his passenger seat.

“I’ll have to talk to your friends,” I said, spitting the Bazooka out the window. The gum had lost its taste and I reached for a fresh piece.

“Do what you got to, man,” he said. “My friends got heart.”

He pounded his chest two times and raised his chin into the wind cutting from the road.