Cash Landing by James Grippando

to shoot himself. “I’ll be right back.”
    Ruban went down the hall. The door was closed but unlocked. He went inside, not sure what disaster to expect, but the room was neat and tidy—just the way a doting Cuban mother would keep it. No coke mirrors on the dresser. No pornography on the walls. Not so much as a hint of dust on the windowsill or nightstand. The bed was made with military precision. Ruban went straight to it and flipped the mattress. Benjamin Franklin was staring back at him through the vacuum-sealed packs. Ruban had marked each pack with a dollar value on the night of the divvy. Ruban did the quick math on Jeffrey’s stash, gathered it up, and went back to the living room.
    â€œFour hundred thousand,” he said as he laid the packs on the coffee table. “Your brother burned through a million-plus in one week.”
    â€œThat’s not possible,” said Savannah.
    â€œAdd it up.”
    She didn’t bother. “Maybe he stashed more somewhere else.”
    â€œWhat about it, Beatriz?” asked Ruban. “Any more excellent hiding places besides the mattress?”
    â€œMaybe ask El Padrino,” she said. “I think Jeffrey gave some for him to hold.”
    â€œWho’s El Padrino?” asked Ruban.
    â€œHis godfather,” said Savannah.
    â€œI know what el padrino means. Who is he ?”
    â€œCarlos Vazquez,” said Savannah.
    â€œWhere does he live?”
    â€œNo sé ,” said Beatriz. “Jeffrey is the only one in the family who stays in touch with him. The rest of us . . . no.”
    â€œShould I even ask why?”
    â€œHe became a priest,” said Beatriz.
    â€œYou cut him off because he became a priest?”
    Savannah squeezed the excess water from the washcloth into the bucket at her feet, careful not to drop what remained of the ice cubes. “A Santería priest.”
    Ruban had seen Santería in Cuba, and it was still practiced in certain parts of the Afro-Cuban immigrant community in Miami. A Hialeah group had successfully defended the right to conduct animal sacrifices, all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. To Ruban, the killing of chickens, doves, and turtles to provide spirits the nourishment needed to possess priests during rituals was more voodoo than religion.
    â€œJeffrey gave his money to a Santería priest?” he asked, incredulous.
    â€œFor safekeeping,” said Beatriz.
    Ruban stared at the vacuum-sealed packs on the table. Four hundred thousand dollars. If they added it to the half million of Jeffrey’s money that was buried in the yard, they were close to the ransom demand. But paying the full amount made about as much sense to Ruban as giving it to a Santería priest.
    â€œBrilliant,” said Ruban. “Just brilliant.”

Chapter 15
    S avannah wanted lunch, but with $400,000 in the trunk of the car, Ruban refused to stop. He dropped her at the dry cleaners and drove straight home. Jeffrey’s stash fit inside the leftover PVC pipe. He sealed it up, gave the liquid cement a minute to dry, and buried it in a foot of sand beneath the patio tiles in the backyard.
    Under the mattress? He gathered up his tools and shook the sand from his shoes. You gotta be kidding me, Jeffrey.
    Ruban put away the tools in the garage and went to the locked cabinet in the TV room. His gun collection was short one Makarov semi-automatic revolver, the Soviet Union’s standard military and police sidearm for forty years, which Pinky had brandished at the airport warehouse, and which now lay at the bottom of the Miami River, never to be seen again. Ruban had other Russian weapons, but if he was going to “lay low,” it was best never to leave the house again with anything Russian made: it seemed likely that at least one of those security guards had managed a good enough look at Pinky’s Makarov to peg its origins. Plenty of non-Russian choices remained. He grabbed a Glock