Cheater’s Game (excerpt) by Paul Levine

“In Cheater’s Game, Miami lawyer Jake Lassiter tackles the true-to-life college admissions scandal. The drama begins when the car his nephew Kip is driving plunges into an Everglades canal. Kip has been tutoring high school students prepping for their S.A.T. exams. But, as Lassiter learns visiting Kip in the hospital, things are seldom what they seem.” — Paul Levine

CHAPTER ONE: Just Who Is This Boy?

“Mr. Lassiter! Jake Lassiter!”

Milagros Soto, a court bailiff, called out to me, her voice echoing down the courthouse corridor. More urgent than necessary, I thought, for my being three minutes late for a hearing.

“Hey, Millie. Tell the judge I’ll be right there.”

“Hearing’s cancelled. Why aren’t you answering your phone?”

“I turn it off when I’m in the courthouse.”

True enough. When I took the job with the Florida Bar, I started following rules I had always ignored.

“Get over to Jackson Memorial right away,” she said. “It’s your nephew.”

I froze, my chest crushed by dread, as if my lungs had suddenly filled with mud. “What’s hap . . .?” I couldn’t get the words out.

“I don’t know, Jake. Just get to the trauma center, now.”

Oh, Kip! Just when you’d turned your life around. Now what?

***

Fifteen minutes later, I was double-timing through the maze of Jackson Memorial, as Gloria Sanchez, a deputy administrator, filled me in. “I don’t know why, Jake, but your nephew told me not to contact you. He said you weren’t related.”

“Aw, jeez. I thought the kid had outgrown that.”

I’d known Gloria for twenty years, and she routinely gave me access to the inner sanctum of the trauma center so I could visit clients and witnesses, circumventing the rules. A while back, when her son was a junior at Coral Gables High, I got his marijuana possession charge dismissed. Pro bono, of course.

A sturdy woman in her fifties, Gloria kept pace, quick on her feet. She had probably traveled the circumference of the earth on the rock-hard tile of these chilly corridors.

“When EMS brought him in, I saw the name, ‘Chester Lassiter.’ I remember years ago you showed me photos of the boy. So proud of how smart the little fellow was. You raised Chester, right?”

I nodded. “He goes by ‘Kip.’ My half-sister named him ‘Chester’ after her dad. She was too busy jumping bail to catch the name of the kid’s father.”

Gloria led me into a room where Kip lay on his back, eyes closed, cervical collar around his neck, oxygen clips in his nose, tubes and wires sprouting from his arms and chest. Crimson scratches ran down both cheeks and across his forehead, and two black eyes gave him a raccoon look. A nearby monitor blinked with his respiration, pulse rate, and blood pressure.

In her professional tone tempered with motherly compassion, Gloria told me that Kip was in intensive care because that’s what they do with head trauma. The brain scan appeared normal, but that didn’t rule out a moderate concussion and a whiplash injury.

The headline: Kip had driven his car into a canal, and it was difficult to tell how long he’d struggled to get out of the shoulder harness and claw his way through a window. The trauma crew had pumped a small amount of slimy water out of his stomach. No water down his airway thanks to laryngospasms, the throat sealing the trachea. Good thing because water in the lungs can lead to pneumonia.

I walked to the bed and clasped Kip’s hand. Hundreds of times, I’d held him, hugged him, tousled his hair. I’d watched him grow. Taught him values. I’d marveled at his achievements and suffered at his stumbles. And now here he was, as helpless as the day he arrived at my home, my worthless half-sister shoving him out of the car. All his belongings—two filthy changes of clothes—stuffed into a Mickey Mouse backpack that looked as if Pluto had taken a dump in it.

Not a toy. Not a single toy.

He was nine with broomstick limbs, and no one had taught him how to throw or catch a ball, so we invented a game called “Ten.” I’d toss him a rubber ball. If he caught it ten times in a row, he’d get a prize. A milkshake or a comic book or a pack of baseball cards. Soon he could catch it twenty or thirty times without a miss, but we still called the game Ten.

When I’d come home from court, as soon as I walked in, Kip would say, “Let’s play Ten.” And by then, the phrase had taken on a meaning of its own. “Let’s hang out” or “Let’s watch a game” or “Let’s talk.” Our own private code.

Now, I squeezed his hand and whispered, “Hey little guy. I’m here.”

Kip didn’t respond.

“Give him a couple hours for the sedatives to wear off,” Gloria said.

Kip stirred and grunted in his sleep.

“Where exactly did the car go into the water?” I asked, thinking that Miami-Dade had hundreds of miles of waterways, a few not far from the hospital.

“In the Everglades,” Gloria said. “Just this side of Ochopee on a Water District road north of the Trail.”

That stopped me. “Way the hell out there? Who called 911?”

Gloria sighed. “I knew you’d ask, so I called the county. Male voice, a little agitated but not hysterical. Wouldn’t leave a name but gave a precise description of the location. GPS coordinates. They don’t get that very often.”

“Did the county pick up a tower location or the caller’s number?”

She shook her head. “Call was too quick. When your nephew’s awake, I’m sure he’ll tell you everything.”

I wasn’t so sure.

Kip stirred again, his eyes blinking, but he didn’t awaken.

“Did the paramedics recover anything from the car?” I asked.

“One of them dived in, but just to make sure no one was in the vehicle. All we’ve got now is what Kip had in his pockets.”

My look asked her a silent question, and her answer was to lead me to a room with two dozen small lockers. She used a master key to open one and handed me a plastic pouch containing a wallet and a passport, both still wet.

“Don’t let anyone see you and put everything back.” Gloria studied me a moment and asked, “Are you okay, Jake? I read in the paper that you’re in that concussion study. I hope everything works out for you.”

I mumbled my thanks, and she smiled at me. “You look like you could still play linebacker.”

“Ha! I still weigh 235, but it’s repositioned itself.”

She said goodbye and left, and I opened the passport and looked at the photo. Issued eleven months ago, a sly smile on Kip’s face.

But what’s this?

Five trips out of the country, five stamps, each with a little green turtle.

Cayman Islands, a British Overseas Territory.

All short trips, two to four days, including one last week.

What the hell!

Kip had never mentioned his travels.

I closed the passport and opened the wallet, which contained nine hundred eighty-seven dollars. Okay, that’s more than I carry around, but so what? Kip had a small business tutoring high school students for the ACT and SAT exams.

I then pulled out a Florida vehicle registration certificate, expecting to find the paperwork for his ten-year-old Toyota Camry. Gloria hadn’t mentioned the make of Kip’s car, and I just assumed it was his old clunker. What I found was the registration for a brand-new Tesla S.U.V., Model X with a personalized license plate, “EZ-1600.”

I drive a 1984 Cadillac Eldorado ragtop, so I’m a little behind the times. But just how the hell did Kip afford this high-tech, space-age vehicle? The Tesla title was folded inside the wallet, too. No lienholder, meaning no loan. He owned the damn thing free and clear.

As for the license plate, I knew the meaning of “1600.” That had been Kip’s score—perfection—on the SAT exam. So much promise. But then came the disaster his freshman year in college. An arrest, expulsion, and a humiliating trip home. And now what? The vehicle registration date was three months ago. I’d seen Kip several times since then. He had an apartment on Brickell, and on his occasional trips to my Coconut Grove house, he always was at the wheel of that old Toyota.

So, the kid who used to tell me everything now secretly buys a luxury vehicle with cash and goes to pains to make sure I don’t know.

I pulled Kip’s driver’s license out of its slot and studied the photo. Sixteen when it had been taken, and he looked about twelve. Straw-blonde hair falling into his eyes, a look of innocence, totally lacking in guile. I knew everything about him then. We had no secrets. So, was that him in the hospital bed or had space aliens taken over his body? Maybe all parents ponder that question one time or another.

So many threads that lead . . . where?

Who called 911?

I replaced the items in the locker and walked down the corridor toward Kip’s room. I would be there when he woke up. And we would talk.

Kip. This is your Uncle Jake. It’s time to get reacquainted. Let’s play Ten.