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All night laundramats are the way to go. It isn’t a crowd that is prone to calling the cops or even reading the paper. He’d ditched the car he’d stolen in New Orleans about a mile away. Shoplifted a pair of sunglasses, a ball cap and a box of hair dye at a grocery store. The laundramat had a deep sink which had come in handy for dying his hair while going through the dryers to find a change of clothes. He’d already popped the token machine to get the bills out of it. Wasn’t enough to put him up in a flop but it would work to get a meal. And if things work right he’d find a place to crash before the night was done. There might be half a million people in Miami but there are six million in the Metro area. Finding Lisa in this hay stack would be impossible if he didn’t have a few clues already. Even as a kid, she’d had her nose stuck in a book. And she liked money. Being poor sucked and living in a household with a mom working two jobs had driven that point home. She’d been in Gainesville going to school to be a nurse. He wouldn’t have to go door to door just hospital to hospital.

Lisa and Georgie have the place to themselves, well themselves and the house computer. Lisa had suggested a game of pool.

“I’m really not good at this game.”

“It’s okay we won’t bet. It’s better than playing by myself.” Lisa counters. She finishes the rack and nods at Georgie letting her take the break. She waits until Georgie breaks and then moves to take her shot. This could take a little while since Georgie had spread the table out. She calls her shot and then asks. “So how did the date go with Steve Johnson last night.”

Georgie is slow to reply. Lisa takes her shot dropping the 3 and looks up at Georgie. “It was... interesting. I’m not used to guys offering to skip dinner and just getting room service.”

Lisa scratches and then start laughing. “He didn’t!”

“He’s very straight forward really. He flat asked me if I put out on the third date.” Georgie lines up her shot and drops the ball cleanly. It’s when she had to start doing bank shots and putting some english on the cue that she started messing up. This is just straight lines without angles.

“So... do you?”

“No. I don’t count. Sometimes it’s a darn long spell. Couple times it was the first night I met the guy. Which really ends up being messier than waiting and getting to know someone first.”

“Tell me about it.” Lisa mutters. “Don’t get me wrong. Morgan is great. But really. My drama meeting his drama-- if we really would have been thinking about things would have been different.”

“Probably not.” Georgie shakes her head. “Sonny, Morgan’s dad, was pretty much known for his... fertility. He looked at someone funny and they ended up pregnant.”

“And you think that Morgan inherited the power penis?”

Georgie winces. “You know he’s my nephew. I used to babysit him when I was home from college. I can’t talk about him that way.”

At the Heat training facility all the guys are taking advantage of the weight room and available trainers to get season ready. They are doing summer ball which is basically showing off for the management why they should be the one getting the minutes or breaking into the starting five. Pete is in his own office which is more a cubby. He does the research on players to find out who is going be the next big acquisition. He knows there are guys just like him all over the league. Guys who spend a lot of time on the road studying players from high school.... hell junior high to see the potential. He also did a lot of traveling all over the globe to check out the players abroad. The goal is to find the perfect guy that nobody else is looking at. By the time it gets to the lottery the Heat normally place high enough in their division that their chance of getting a top pick is pretty well nil. Unless of course, they are willing to bankrupt the team for seasons to come. It isn’t just getting what they want, it’s making sure that their division rivals don’t get their pick either. His job is just as fraught with political moves as the blocking they did on other teams’ acquisitions. It’s fine line of finding the talent, investigating the players the coach or worse the owner had their eye on and give them the facts without hurting anyone’s feelings or losing his job.

Talent moved from team to team, there are only a few players considered franchised that are identified solely with a team. It’s not like in years past with Magic Johnson and the Lakers or Michael Jordan with the Bulls. The money is too ridiculous. It’s also part of the game, sticking the opposing teams with a big guaranteed contract on a player who hadn’t proved their worth. The back office has less of a gypsy quality to it but not by much. The further up the food chain the more likely that you’d get booted out to make room for another or satisfy the fans need for a change. Piss off the coach or the owner and you’d be packing your office, if they let you pack the office rather than sending someone to do it for you. Right now he has an advantage over some of the other guys, he could still get out there on the court and play some pick up with the talent. He’s good but knows his knee would never hold up to a season, hell it probably wouldn’t hold up a month.

“Hey howzit going.” Johnson says from the doorway after a perfunctory knock on the door. “Coach cut us loose. Wanted to know if maybe you wanted to get nine in.”

Pete looks at the bonus baby and shakes his head. This is one of those political situations where it would be better to keep the bonus baby happy than to finish reviewing the discs. He looks at the stack of discs on the floor behind his desk that needed to be reviewed and sighs. “You got the rest of the foursome picked?”

“I can get a couple of guys.” Johnson says eagerly.

“Yeah, do that. I’ll call for a tee time and wind up what can’t wait.”

“Forty five minutes?”

“If I can get a tee time in an hour. Gimme a call to let me know.”

As soon as Johnson is clear, the secretary comes in. “Guess this means you’re going to be working from home until what ten, eleven?”

“Closer to midnight or one.” Pete sighs. “I love my job. I love my job.”

“Yeah. I can tell.” The secretary comes over and drops a folder on his desk. “Italy, Spain, Lithuania, Shanghai and finishing up in Perth before heading back to Miami. I used your frequent flyer miles to upgrade you to first class for the leg room.”

“Thanks. Hopefully if I can get through these discs I’ll have you setting me up for some more frequent flyer miles that I can turn right around and give back to the team.”

“Well you’ve got to get it done before Summer Olympics next year. Then everyone is going to see what is out there.” The secretary reminds.

“I know.” Pete waves her off. “Let me clear the decks.”

“I’ll call and get you a tee time.”

“You’re an angel.”

“Remember that at bonus time.”

The office was starting to get oppressive with the looks from White and the other partners. Never mind he was still bringing in twice the business as the next closest associate he wasn’t bringing in his own family business... in their opinion. The opinion being that it was family business– which is not what he claims or feels. Turns out that White had gone to law school with Dara Jensen and never received the top grade when in the same classes. White had connections who eased him into this firm. Dara Jensen joined a the DA’s office in what White had considered a podunk town in upstate New York. Now Dara is doing the Karinen and CSMC business and her name is listed first in the firm she’d founded and White is listed sixth, and that is only because there had been deaths in front of him. Little did Morgan know he was walking into a grudge match decades in the making. He doesn’t have a lunch meeting and he’d even brought his lunch but he really needed to get out of the office. He tells his secretary in Spanish where he is going to be. Just the fact that he’d told her in Spanish has her nodding.

Arriving at his favorite lunch spot he takes a deep breath and tries to relax. If he had to do another 5-6 hours at the office without a break he was probably going to create an attorney version of going postal.

“Is this seat taken?” Javier inquires breaking into Morgan’s mental attempt of walking down from the clock tower.

Morgan sighs but then frowns. “Is there any word on Macon?”

“No, and this is troublesome. Se habla espanol?”

“Si.”

Javier switches to Spanish. In this restaurant only the bus boy or maybe the cooks would be able to understand. Course that is also an assumption so he keeps his voice low anyway. “Baby has been in New Orleans now for more than a week. This is plenty of time for Macon to arrive even if he had to do switchbacks on his transportation to dodge the police. She will stay for maybe another week but then will have to try something else. There is no sign of him in Tarpon Springs either but this we expected. Anders makes no secret of his security measures around his mother. Macon going after Doreen would be suicide.”

Morgan nods. “And Macon went to Gainesville first, not Tarpon Springs.”

“Si.”

“Why is he so focused on Lisa? Why not Anders? He’s the one that testified.”

“On Baby’s orders.” Javier rushes to say. It’s an exception to the snitch rule. Rule one is Whatever Baby wants and Baby had wanted Anders to testify. “This I do not know. Who can know the mind of a madman?” Javier shrugs.

Morgan leans back in his chair and waits until after the waiter leaves with orders for the specials for both for both of them before he leans back in. “He’s had years to study Anders, to study Baby. If he wanted Baby he’d have already showed up or he would have tried to get her up in Port Charles. Or gone after Baby’s daughter.”

Javier winces. “Fancy is never alone always with family or guards. And the paparazzi is also always present. The security is not as thick as with Doreen but it is there. And Fancy is young but she trusts the hair on the back of her neck.”

“So Baby isn’t the target. Even Anders isn’t. He’s after Lisa.”

“We agree.” Javier nods. “I think we also agree it is more important to protect Lisa than to stick this pig. Even if it takes longer.”

Morgan winces. “I don’t think that Lisa would agree but I do. Lisa will be increasingly vulnerable over the next 6 months because of the pregnancy and the baby. It’s also impossible to maintain vigilance as time goes on.”

“Yes, and no.” Javier nods. “Of course I’d rather have Macon dead rather than on the run to come back later.”

“I have a property in Venezuela.”

“I know. If there is no contact in two months it may be a the best scenario for both Lisa and Doreen. But we still do better with no one knowing about you and Lisa.”

Morgan slowly nods. “I want to buy the house.”

“Excuse me?”

“The house across the canal. It’s in the CSMC portfolio. CSMC is another way for Macon to track Lisa. If he gets as far as Miami he’s going to look at CSMC assets– looking for places where you’ve hidden her.”

“No one at CSMC would ever....”

“It’s a matter of public record. He could go down to the courthouse and run a trace on all the CSMC properties.”

Javier winces. “Of course. I should have thought of this. The house predated Lisa moving in.” He picks up his phone and makes a phone call to Mouse up in Port Charles.

“And make me a good deal but a real one because I’m not selling the house back to you when this is over. I want you guys there until this guy is caught but then I want you out too. I don’t like living in a fishbowl.”

“Did you hear?” Javier asks Mouse and then Javier nods in Morgan’s direction. He takes a folder out of bag that is at his feet and writes a number on it. He nods again this at whatever Mouse is saying and then hangs up. “You caught him half asleep but his brain is always working. Mouse says this amount. He says tax value minus family discount. You have money in a joint account still. He will hold it as collateral until your financing is arranged but the transfer will happen within 24 hours.”

“But...”

“He will bury the transfer.” Javier slides the folder across the table. The conversation is on hold as their food arrives and until the server leaves. “I am not as rigid as Baby about conducting business over lunch. There is another matter.” Javier indicates the folder, pointing at it with his fork.

Morgan opens the folder.

“Those are the names of the top ten users of the Port of Miami. Not the ships or cargo companies but the companies bringing product.... legal product into Miami from abroad. By each company is a name. This is a person who would be receptive to a phone call from you. This is not a guarantee. It is a meeting. It is up to you to decide what you want to discuss with each if only the chances of the Dolphins this fall.”

“Did my sister tell you to do this?”

“No.” Javier shakes his head. “Baby she looks at the big picture. For me Miami is the big picture. I will go if she tells me so, but I like it here. Mouse told me about you when I took over Miami. He says you’re good and mean when needs be. You keep your hands clean but aren’t afraid to use your fist to make a point.”

Morgan winces. “That was once and I should have handled it differently.”

“No. Maybe you should have never been the situation but once in it... you handled it as needed.” Javier counters. “You did more to clean up the problem than filing a lawsuit or having the college intervene would ever have done. Those Universities they sweep things under the rug to protect their precious reputations.”

“What happened?” He knows there is a story there.

“My little sister. Went to a school not in a CSMC town. I find out when her grades drop from straight A’s to D’s and F’s. The university put her on academic probation or suspension or something. This is not like her. So I went to see her. To see for myself. If I could have burned down that school...” Javier shakes his head.

“Is she alright?”

Javier makes a so-so motion with one hand. “I called Mouse for counsel because I really wanted to burn the place down. He arranged for Kiki to be seen by Cameron Lewis. He is the same doctor Baby sent her own daughter. Mouse advised waiting, to allow him time to research just a few days. It was very hard.”

“I’ll bet. Somebody messes with my little brother...”

“Then you understand. Finally he got me the names of the people who hurt my sister– the bully but also the people in campus security that did not protect her. The ones in the health center that did not report her attack as required by law. Baby believes in the law.” Javier sees Morgan’s disbelief. “It’s true. She always gives them the first shot. If they cannot take care of their business then she does, then we do. We were on conference call and the first thing she asked after hearing the whole story was if the cops were going to be able to clean up the mess.”

“Three months later, because you said you knew from her grades. With no supporting evidence from the health center or the campus security. Any immediate police involvement...”

“No.”

Morgan winces. “Her vs. Him. Criminal law is not my thing. But that’s a tough one.”

“I can deal with bullies.” Javier declares. “I can make sure the punk pendaho never lays hands on another woman. I can make sure he never lays hands on anyone ever. I can make it so that every time he looks in the mirror what he is stares back at him.” Javier grins and breaks just a little bit from the anger of the story. “There are sometimes skills of little value that become useful. Mirror writing. He lives. He’s probably even had plastic surgery to remove the message on his forehead but it’s still there. And he knows it. Kiki would have been in bad shape according to Dr Cam by what happened to her but she would have been better if she would have had the support that is her right. If she would have been treated with respect by The University. You took on a University and forced them to live up to their responsibilities. I like you.”

“I wasn’t thinking right or wrong when I was kicking that guy’s ass.”

“Maybe not. But like me there is the short term accounting and there is the long term vengeance. My true vengeance was on those sworn to protect my sister who did not fulfill their oath. The ones that set Kiki down from the school but wanted her to transfer those Ds and F’s to her next school. We may not have been able to win in court. But my sister got her respect.”

“Good.” Morgan nods abruptly.

“I know you want nothing to do with CSMC. Baby likes you separate as well. It creates less conflict with your uncle at the homeplace. But there may be a situation or a person that I send to you in the future. Someone that may be CSMC but who will need your counsel. I hope you will not hold it against them that they are CSMC.”

“I don’t do criminal work. It avoids a lot of conflict between my uncle and now Baby too.” Morgan’s tone is wry.

Javier nods. “I know. If it is not international business then it will be some who doesn’t need as much a lawyer but a strong advocate. The information I gave you is not a down payment, favor or retainer for this counsel in the future. I will only send you situations that you will have no problem speaking for, and to.”

Pete and Steve Johnson had picked up fast food on the way back to the house. Pete has wondered for the last hour how he had ended up bringing the rookie back to the house. He’d even been blunt and told the guy he had work to do that there were a ton of discs he had to get through. Johnson had actually perked up at that and told him he loved watching tape and suggested picking up some cuban, a six pack and doing a marathon.

Lisa had provided the popcorn.

The only one that had been really immediately helpful was Georgie who had requested House set up a spread sheet and take down the comments. Pete had not believed it at first but after the first disc had become a fan of House’s work. Sure it would need cleaning up and editing but it was nice to be able to just read off the guy’s stats comment on the disc and move on without having to jot down notes or be distracted from the disc to type into a computer. And House took down everyone’s comments about the player and initialed their comments so that Pete could tell later who had made what observation.

Steve actually settled down once watching the discs. He’d been doing this kind of stuff since he was eight. His mama told stories about the doctor exclaiming at his size when he was born and tell her that she had a future NBAer on her hands. His dad and uncles had heard the same and made sure that his first presents were all hoop related. He’d been pretty much living and breathing basketball all his life.

Georgie raises a brow at some of his comments. The cocky goof is not in the building. She watches Pete’s face at some of Steve’s comments when the disc started and had seen the nod and then the really in depth conversations. She lets House run the spread sheet but it’s real evident when a player is of interest and one is not. She goes over to the computer and starts doing her thing on the players that seem to be worthy of more research.

And that is what Jacques and Morgan walk in on. House had told them everyone was in the study. From the door Morgan looks at his study– Pete and Steve are at opposite ends of a couch with the best view to his big tv. Lisa is on the floor between the two of them snacking on popcorn, ginger ale and if he wasn’t mistaken some tapas from his favorite mom and pop place. Georgie is at his desk with her nose buried in the laptop.

“Hey.” Lisa looks over at the doorway. “I tried to save you some but it was really good. We might have to send you out for seconds. Pull up a plate.”

“Should you be sitting on the floor?”

Lisa laughs out loud. “Very comfortable and closer to the food. I don’t need the forklift yet.”

Morgan starts to say something and wonders if he will end up digging himself a hole so just smiles and grabs a plate.

Jacques goes over to Georgie and looks over her shoulder. “You’re doing backgrounds?!”

“Eh the five minute kind.” Georgie admits. “Just on the ones that those two agree on. And then if anything pops it’s more of a dig here rather than really digging. Then linking it to the spread sheet that House is doing.”

Steve notices Jacques starting a conversation with Georgie and gets to his feet. He comes over to the desk. “How things going over here? I’ve been a jerk right watching tape...”

“No, not at all.” Georgie counters. “You and Pete are working. That comes first.”

“Why don’t you and I go out to the cuban place and pick up another round.” Jacques suggests to Georgie.

Georgie looks from one guy to the next and does an internal wince. This never happened to her. How in the hell did Maxie handle it all those years. Hell still. This is probably a really bad idea. “Sure, we’re taking requests– anything anyone wants.”

“I’ll go with you guys.” Steve offers.

“Work comes first.” Georgie repeats firmly. “We’ll be back in about forty minutes.” She shuts down the computer and heads out with Jacques after taking note of the dishes called out.

Steve is head is definitely not into watching tape now and Pete can tell. He pushes pause on the disc and announces to House. “Hey house we’re on a ten minute break. You give us the heads up?”

“Of course, Pete.” John Mahoney’s voice announces through the tv speakers.

“I have got to get me one of those.” Steve mutters.

Lisa to break the tension looks over at Morgan. “And how was your day?”

Morgan shrugs. “Well I bought a house over lunch.”