The Everglades - Chapter Twenty-Five

25

For weeks Ynez and Viktor worked closely together. Legal bills mounted, and were paid; without hesitation. Funds ostensibly generated by a plumbing supply business outweighed logic. The young lawyer possessed dubious concerns about front-facing corporate structures. She never truly knew sources of millions of dollars in legal fees. Ynez unwittingly participated in illegal activities that brought drugs, women, and children into Miami; satiating pleasures of financial elite.

At Viktor’s insistence, initial meetings were conducted at his seaside estate. The first few gatherings resonated overtones of muted sexual innuendo. Meaningless banter possessed energy contrary to attorney-client relationships.

News came of the tragic death of an undercover officer working Vice. Telephoned accounts of the murder interrupted the second meeting at Viktor’s home. The man had been blown up while participating in a drug deal; beneath an I-95 overpass. CIA assets and undercover cops never received public burials. Doing so threatened exposure of living associates.

The officer was however known to Viktor and Ynez, but only by a pseudonym in court documents; evidence filed in the second generation German’s human trafficking case.

Once news came of the detective’s death, Viktor brought out a magnum of Dom Pérignon; offering a toast.

The young associate became confused. The man’s death shouldn’t stop the state’s case. Her naïveté prevented Ynez from realizing deaths served multiple purposes. Leverage against others, veiled threats, were equally valuable in stymying prosecution. It was the manner in which business was conducted by those possessing a criminal bent. Setting the wheels in motion to affect blackmail, or murder, took less time than assembling stacks of cash to pay legal fees.

Innocence prevented Ynez from considering Viktor and his family hired the hitman who affected their case.

The topic of sex was overtly broached for the first time. Viktor suggested the man’s death was reason to celebrate carnally.

Ynez assessed her client as nothing more than a disgusting pig; a necessary evil. The offer of sex was politely rebuffed. The beautiful and determined lawyer developed the skill without offense; or creating hindrance to success.

Viktor never questioned his attorney’s legal skill. Overriding desires of encountering her sexually resonated beyond work’s cessation at each meeting’s end.

The young woman’s focus on legal matters never wavered.

Her defendant treated legal filings as nuisances. Viktor knew he’d never experience the inside of a courtroom.

Not until the death of the case’s second investigating officer, did Ynez suspect foul play. Not coincidentally, when news arrived the couple worked at Viktor’s seaside estate, the man became aroused. Intensity of desires matched the energy it took to murder another human; consumptive and rapacious. Ynez became the target of the criminal’s craving.

Viktor approached the beautiful barrister as she sat at an umbrella covered table, adjacent his pool. The man held his erect, yet small, penis through his pants.

“Now that this case is effectively over, we can get down to pleasure,” the man exclaimed.

“I think we still need to focus on the case until it is officially dismissed.”

“It’s going to be dismissed.”

“How do you know?”

Viktor laughed as he shook his head. “We control the courts.”

For the first time, Ynez felt threatened. From that point forward, all meetings between attorney and client were conducted at the firm’s downtown office.

Life began to make sense to Ynez; why things never got better for the strata of society indifferent to wealth. It was those who embraced eternal life. There was no sense of justice emanating from those more fortunate. No duty to society existed. Everything was geared toward acquiring more. Criminality wasn't suppressed; it was stoked. Like chasing tails, those who sincerely hoped for change were occupied by careers; concluded only by death.

To what end?

Ynez wanted her life to mean something to the only one who mattered; God. Men repeatedly let her down. Universal benevolence, as she’d witnessed on Earth, never had.

Ynez wasn't certain of her plan. Of that which she became convinced; destructive levels of evil existed. She’d associated closely with them. Being on the inside offered opportunities to strike blows against evil’s machinery.

No matter how hard she tried, Ynez Figueroa realized she’d never escape an existence defined by family.

The attorney’s bond with God became intensely retributive.