Agent with a History (6 page)

“How’s that?” I asked.

He pointed to a chair and I saw a vest draped
across the back of it. It was a bomb vest complete with hand held
detonator.

“Thank God he got plugged before he had a
chance to use that thing!” The other detective said while shaking
his head.

“Thank you detectives. Let me know what you
find out about him.” I said courteously, before I left the
room.

Going to the street again I turned to Sal. I
could see that he was taking his partners death very hard. “Sal, I
have to go on a trip to see someone concerning this case.”

He shrugged and said, “When do we go?”

“We don’t. I need you to stay here and man
the fort. If anybody asks about where I am tell them I’m tracking
down a lead in the case. If I drive through the night I should be
able to be back here by tomorrow afternoon.”

Sal looked like he wanted to object, but he
could see my mind was made up. “At least tell me where you’re
going?” he said pleadingly.

I looked away from him for a moment before
looking back and he seemed a little shaken up by the hell he must
be seeing in my eyes. “I’m going to see my father.” I pulled a
scrap of paper out of my pocket and then the pen out of Sal’s shirt
pocket. I wrote down my father’s address and handed the paper to
Sal. “If I’m not back in 48 hours send the cavalry in to get my
body.”

He looked from me to the paper and then back
again, “You’re serious aren’t you?”

“Deadly serious Sal. It’s why I have to go
alone.”

Sal shook his head, “I don’t understand?”

“I know you don’t and I’m sorry I can’t
explain better right now, but this has to be done or I wouldn’t be
doing it, of that I can assure you!”

“What does your father have to do with this
case?” exhaled Sal in frustration.

I looked away. “It’s complicated. He may have
nothing to do with it or he may have everything to do with it. I
have to go. Don’t’ tell anyone about my father.”

I started walking away, but Sal interrupted,
“Where on the island? The note doesn’t say?”

“That’s because he owns the whole island.” I
said over my shoulder as I headed back to my apartment.

I slammed the door shut and locked it. My
eyes caught my bed in the open room apartment, but I denied myself
the comfort of going to it so I could fall apart and mourn my
friend.

I had never fully appreciated how integral
Rafftery had become to me in my life and now that he was gone there
was such a gaping hole left behind. I pushed away a tear and strode
over to my closet and ripped the doors open roughly.

I yanked hung up clothes out and threw them
on the floor as I leafed through them. None of what I wore day to
day was going to fit the picture of how I must appear to my father.
I was coming to the end of the line when I hesitated on a
sundress.

It had been an impulse buy two years ago. I
had actually been going to take a vacation and rent a beach house,
but a double homicide involving celebrities had intervened and I
hadn’t gone. I’d forgotten I still had the dress.

Its bright color and summer charm was the
last thing I wanted to put on right now, but it was just right for
what I needed. I stripped down and slipped it on over my
undergarments and then realized I needed a different kind of bra
for this dress. I switched it and checked my hair in the mirror; it
was one of my saving graces. I never had to do a thing to it. I was
lucky that way. given the struggles so many women of my color had
to go through with their hair. I could thank my mother’s Italian
blood coming through for that luxury.

I put makeup on, which I rarely, if ever,
did. It wasn’t that I didn’t like it; it was just that it didn’t
really fit in with the world I worked in. There, I was ready. Oh, I
wished I was ready. I knew I looked good, but the way I felt inside
reminded me of the scared young girl I had once been, when I had
left the island the first time. One last thing to do. I went to the
kitchen and pulled the stove out from the wall. I reached behind it
and pulled out a key that had been placed on a magnet there.

I held the key in the palm of my hand hating
it and yet grateful for it right now. It was time to go. I looked
around my humble little home. This might be the last time I saw
this place, but I felt no remorse in that, as it had never really
felt like a home anyway, just a place to stay.

I closed the door and locked it behind me. I
walked out onto the street and several men’s heads turned. I hailed
a taxi and three tried to stop, almost causing an accident. I told
the driver where I wanted to go, while letting him get his look at
me without rebuffing him.

It took a while to get there, but when we did
the cabby asked with concern, “You sure you don’t want me to wait
for you miss?” He asked as he leaned down to see me though the open
passenger window.

I smiled, “No, but thank you.”

I watched him leave and then glanced around;
nobody else appeared to be around. I turned to the battered garage
door of an even more battered looking warehouse. I slid the door up
all the way after I unlocked it. Everything was just where I had
left it.

Two years ago my father had found me and he
had tried to buy my affection as he did with all his many children,
but I hadn’t wanted any of it and this was only the second time I
had seen the stuff. Boxes full of dresses worth thousands of
dollars each and never worn, jewelry and hand bags and pretty much
all a girl could ask for was crammed into the space. There was
probably a quarter of a million dollars worth of merchandise
sitting in this old garage.

I really should just drop the stuff off at a
Goodwill or something so somebody could get some use out of it.
About a quarter of a million was what the car probably cost too.
That was what I had come for. Not much was going to make me feel
better right now, but speed might. I just hoped it would start
though. The keys lay on the seat.

The interior lights of the car’s rich
interior lit up. That was a good sign, hopefully there would still
be enough battery left to start it, assuming the mice hadn’t chewed
the starter wires off or the gas had gone bad. I turned the key and
without hesitation the convertible came alive with a husky purr.
The car was brand new and had only had five miles on it.

I allowed myself to experience a little
anticipation of the open road ahead, as I slipped it into gear and
eased out on the clutch. I pulled it out of the garage and almost
left the garage door open thinking it would be best to just leave
it so and give some lucky street person a break and let them find
the stash and benefit from it.

I stopped the car and got out to close the
garage door and relocked it. If I let the street people or hoodlums
in this area have the stuff all I would be doing is feeding their
drug habits and other addictions. I didn’t need that on my
conscious too.

I pulled away from the run down area and
thankfully traffic seemed to open up for me and I was soon driving
free out on the open road as the sun started to dip below the
horizon.

In that moment it would have been nice to
just keep driving and leave everything behind. Start over somewhere
else.

It was an over powering feeling, but I
stifled it. Rafferty deserved everything I could do to see that
whoever had ordered the hit was brought to justice. It was a long
way to North Carolina and I didn’t have a lot of time, so I let the
needle rise hoping the patrol cops were off eating a donut
somewhere.

The man at the ferry looked at me and then
shrugged, “I hope you know what you’re doing lady. That island
ain’t the friendliest by all accounts, but you’ve paid me more than
enough to take you there.”

“Thank you.” I said getting out of my
car.

I walked to the railing of the small ferry
and stared out at the waters of the sound ahead and the offshore
islands that dotted the outer coastline of the Outer Banks.

It took a little over an hour to get to the
little ferry dock on the island. There were no buildings, just the
dock. The ferry man opened up the gate and I walked up to him.

“Will you wait for me?” I asked.

The ferry man looked uncomfortable and looked
like he was about to say no. I reached out and touched his arm
lightly, “Please!” I begged softly. He looked down and then back
up, as if he was weighing me in the balances.

Then finally he spoke, “You look like a nice
girl. I can’t imagine why you would want to come here!” He seemed
to be waiting for an answer, so I told him the truth.

“A friend of mine was killed. I think I may
be able to find out from someone on this island who it was who
killed my friend.”

“Lady, the people that killed your friend
could be on this island!”

“I know, I won’t ask you to wait long, just a
few hours, please?”

He sighed and slapped his pant leg hard
disgustedly. “All right, I’ll wait for you for two hours only, but
not here. I’ll wait offshore and if I see you drive up alone, I’ll
come back.”

It wasn’t like me, but I reached out and
hugged the old man. The man patted me awkwardly on the back in
return.

“Take care of yourself honey!”

The road twisted and meandered around the
island’s topography. There were no houses or signs of habituation
other than the black asphalt road I traveled on. After five minutes
of driving I rounded a sandy knoll and there it was on the steepest
part of the island, my father’s version of the white house, only
this mansion was probably larger.

It had to be to house my father’s many
children. Not to mention grandchildren and probably a few greats by
now. My father was one of those super rich tycoons that nobody knew
about. A Bill Gates without the recognition, which is how he liked
it.

I couldn’t vouch for how honestly gained Bill
Gates fortune might be, but almost to a penny I would say my
father’s wealth was the product of thievery, extortion, blackmail,
drug running, human trafficking, swindling, and the list went on.
What I wanted to know was, had my father added international
terrorism to the list of sins for which he was responsible for?
Everything within me wanted to stop the car and turn around from
this place I had escaped from, but I kept driving, my hands white
knuckled on the wheel.

I wished I had a gun, but having one was more
likely to get me killed in this place than not having one. There
was the problem of what I would do with a gun too. I’d probably put
a bullet in my father’s brain without a moment’s hesitation. They’d
kill me, but I would die doing the world a favor.

I pulled up at the gatehouse with its massive
rod iron gates. Men, my half brothers, armed with submachine guns
stepped out from the gatehouse and spread out around the car. My
father had a lot of enemies and rarely, if ever, left his island
fortress anymore.

I rolled down a window at the approach of one
of the men. He stared at me for a second and I saw the moment when
he recognized me.

“Lisa?” He said with evident surprise.

“Hello Marshawn. Can I go through?”

He ignored my question, “Why would you come
back here? Don’t tell me you’ve come to do us all a favor and kill
the old he-bull.”

I met his gaze without blinking as I
responded, “I wasn’t intending to, but if I have to it could become
a possibility.”

His face broke into a big grin. “Welcome back
sister.”

He straightened up and waived his arm. They
opened the gate as he walked around the front hood of the car and
opened the passenger side door to slide in beside me. The
submachine was casually pointed at my side.

“What’s the matter Marshawn, don’t you trust
me?”

He laughed. “I don’t trust any of my
siblings, but for you I will make an exception.”

He angled the gun barrel away from my side by
a couple of inches.

“How trusting of you dear brother. Where is
our patriarch of this sordid tribe of sinners?”

Marshawn just grinned, “South lawn.”

I pulled the car up under the massive portico
and got out. I disregarded the stares of playing children and
adults alike and walked through the lavishly landscaped surrounds
of the massive palace on the hillside.

A tall form of a man stepped into my path and
I halted. It was Rocco. I hated him perhaps most, second only to my
father.

“Well if it isn’t the detective come home for
a family visit, or have you come for some other reason? How I
wonder?”

I fought to keep my eyes from straying to the
snakes head tattoo on his cheek, but it was hard not to, which was
its purpose. He had approached as he was talking and I didn’t see
the knife in his hand, until he was dragging the point of it up my
dress only to pause the point of it over my left nipple through the
dress. He pressed on the knife and it hurt.

It only helped to jog my memory as to what
the sheer horror of growing up in this place had been like.

“I see you haven’t changed any for the better
over the years Rocco. Now go play with your little toy somewhere
else and get out of my way!”

He smiled and pressed a little harder on the
knife, but I didn’t move. He removed the knife with a show of fake
gallantry and stepped to the side of the path giving me a half bow.
I stepped past him half expecting to have my throat slit or the
knife rammed into my back, twisted and then broken off, but the
strike didn’t come and I continued on down the path.

My nipple hurt! I glanced down without
appearing to do so and was glad for the orange and red material of
the dress I had worn. It helped to hide the little spot of blood
that had seeped through my bra. If that was the only injury I came
away from this place with I would be extremely lucky.