Assumed Identity (1993) (26 page)

That was all the sentiment Buchanan could allow. He took the keys, lifted his suitcase, grabbed a small, red, picnic cooler off the counter, and nodded as Doyle opened the door for him.

Ninety seconds later, he was driving away.

Chapter 15.

The small, red, picnic cooler contained an apple and two bologna sandwiches on a white, plastic tray. A lower tray contained ice cubes. Beneath that tray were a hundred-thousand dollars in hundred-dollar bills. In the dark, driving, Buchanan glanced toward the cooler on the seat beside him. Then he checked for headlights in his rearview mirror to see if he was being followed.

He'd received the cooler and the money that afternoon while he was parked at a stop light on his way back to Doyle's. The money was in response to a call that he'd made from a pay phone immediately after returning from his conversation with Bailey. The colonel had told Buchanan to wait at the Bon Voyage office until three o'clock and, when he drove away, to leave his passenger window open. At the stop light, a motorcyclist had paused, pushed the cooler through the open window, and driven on.

Now, his pulse quickening, Buchanan parked at the crowded mini-mall on Pine Island Road. Beneath hissing sodium lights, he carried the picnic cooler to the pizza shop and stood to the right of the entrance. Customers went in and out. A delivery boy drove hurriedly away. Scanning the night, Buchanan waited. This time, Bailey made contact exactly when he'd said he would.

'Is your name Grant?' a voice asked.

Buchanan turned toward the open door to the pizza shop, seeing a gangly, pimply-faced young man wearing a white apron streaked with sauce.

'That's right.'

'A guy just called inside. Said he was a friend of yours. Said you'd give me five bucks if I relayed a message.'

'My friend was right.' Buchanan gave the kid the five dollars. 'What's the message?'

'He said you're supposed to meet him in twenty minutes in the lobby of the Tower Hotel.'

Buchanan squinted. 'The Tower Hotel? Where's that?'

'The east end of Broward Boulevard. Near Victoria Park Road.'

Buchanan nodded and walked quickly toward his car, realizing what was ahead of him. Bailey - afraid that he'd be in danger when he showed himself to get the money - intended to shunt Buchanan to various places throughout the city, carefully watching each potential meeting site for any indication that Buchanan had not come alone.

Bailey's instincts were good, Buchanan thought, as he checked a map in his car and steered from the mini-mall, heading toward his next destination. The truth was, Buchanan did have a team keeping track of him. Their mission was to follow Bailey after the money was handed over and to try to find where he was keeping the video tape, the photographs, and the negatives, especially the ones depicting Buchanan on the yacht with the colonel, the major, and the captain. The colonel had been very emphatic about that point when he'd hastily returned Buchanan's phone call. The images of Buchanan with the colonel had to be destroyed.

As Buchanan headed east on Broward Boulevard, he again glanced in his rearview mirror to see if he was being followed. He looked for Bailey, not the team that was keeping track of him, for there was no way he could spot the team, he knew. They had a way to follow him and later Bailey that permitted them to stay far back, out of visual contact, and that method was the reason Bailey's protective tactic, no matter how shrewd, wouldn't work. Bailey would never see the team at any of the potential rendezvous sites. He could never possibly detect the team as they followed him after he received the money. No matter what evasion procedures he attempted, he would not be able to elude them.

Because they didn't need to keep him in sight. All they had to do was study an audio-visual monitor and follow the homing signals they received from a battery-powered location transmitter concealed within the plastic bottom of the small picnic cooler that contained the money.

Friday night traffic was dense. Amid gleaming headlights, Buchanan reached the glass-and-steel Tower Hotel two minutes ahead of schedule. Telling the parking attendant that he would probably need the car right away, he darted inside the plush lobby and found his jeans, nylon jacket, and picnic cooler being sternly assessed by a group of men and women wearing tuxedos and glittering evening gowns. Sure, Buchanan thought. There's a reception going on. Bailey found out and took advantage of it. He wants me and especially anyone following me to be conspicuous.

Used to being inconspicuous, Buchanan felt self-conscious as he waited in the lobby. He looked for Bailey among the guests, not expecting to find him, wondering how Bailey would contact him this time. The clock behind the check-in counter showed twenty after nine, exactly when Buchanan was supposed to.

'Mr Grant?' a uniformed bellhop asked.

Buchanan had noticed the short, middle-aged man moving from guest to guest in the lobby, speaking softly to each. 'That's right.'

'A friend of yours left this envelope for you.'

Finding a deserted corner, Buchanan ripped it open.

At quarter to ten, be at the entrance to Shirttail Charlie's restaurant on.

Chapter 16.

Three stops later, at eleven o'clock, Buchanan arrived at the Riverside Hotel on Las Olas, a street that seemed the local equivalent of Beverly Hills' Rodeo Drive. From information in the terracotta-floored lobby, he learned that the hotel had been built in 1936, a date which was very old by Fort Lauderdale standards. A few decades before, this area had been wilderness. The wicker furniture and coral fireplaces exuded a sense of history, no matter how recent.

Buchanan had a chance to learn these facts and notice these details because Bailey didn't contact him on schedule. By twenty after eleven, Bailey still hadn't been in touch. The lobby was deserted.

'Mr Grant?'

Buchanan looked up from where he sat on a rattan chair near glass patio doors, a location that he'd chosen because it allowed him to be observed from outside. A woman behind the small reception counter was speaking to him, her eyebrows raised.

'Yes.'

'I have a phone call for you.'

Buchanan carried the picnic cooler to the counter and took the phone from the receptionist.

'Go out the rear door, cross the street, and walk through the gate, then past the swimming pool.' Bailey's curt instructions were followed by the sudden hum of the dial tone.

Buchanan handed the telephone back to the receptionist, thanked her, and used the rear exit. Outside, he saw the gate across the street and a walkway through a small, murky park beside the swimming pool, although the swimming pool itself was deserted, its lights off.

Moving closer, enveloped by the shadows of palm trees, he expected Bailey's voice to drift from the darkness, to give him instructions to leave the money on a barely visible poolside table and continue to stroll as if he hadn't been contacted.

The only lights were ahead, from occasional arclamps along the canal as well as from a cabin cruiser and a houseboat moored there. He heard an engine rumbling. Then he heard a man call, 'Mr Grant? Is that you over there, Mr Grant?'

Buchanan continued forward, away from the swimming pool, toward the canal. He immediately realized that the rumbling engine belonged to a water taxi that was temporarily docked, bow first, between the cabin cruiser and the houseboat. The water taxi was yellow, twenty feet long with poles along the gunwales supporting a yellow and green, striped canvas roof. In daylight, the roof would shade passengers from the glare and heat of the sun. But at night, it shut out the little illumination that the arclamps along the canal provided and prevented Buchanan from seeing who was in there.

Certainly there were passengers. At least fifteen. Their shadowy outlines were evident. But Buchanan had no way to identify them. The canvas roof muffled what they said to each other, although their slurred rhythms made him suspect they were on a Friday-night round of parties and bars.

'That's right. My name is Grant,' Buchanan said to the driver, who sat at controls in front of the passengers.

'Well, your friend's already aboard. I wondered if you were going to show up. I was just about to leave.'

Buchanan strained to see through the darkness beneath the water taxi's roof, then stepped onto the gangplank that extended from the canal to the bow. With his right hand, he gripped a rope railing for balance while he held the picnic cooler in his left and climbed down a few steps into the taxi. Passengers in their early twenties, dressed casually but expensively for an evening out, sat on benches along each side.

The stern remained shrouded by darkness.

'How much do I owe you?' Buchanan asked the driver.

'Your friend already paid for you.'

'How generous.'

'Back here, Vic,' a crusty voice called from the gloomy stern.

As the driver retracted the gangplank, Buchanan made his way past a group of young men on his left and stopped at the stern, his eyes now sufficiently adjusted to the darkness to see Bailey slouched on a bench.

Bailey waved a beefy hand. 'How ya doin', buddy?'

Buchanan sat and placed the picnic cooler between them.

'You didn't need to bring your lunch,' Bailey said.

Buchanan just stared at him as the driver backed the water taxi from between the cabin cruiser and the houseboat, then increased speed along the canal. Slick, Buchanan thought. I'm separated from my backup team. They couldn't have gotten to the water taxi in time, and certainly they couldn't have hurried on board without making Bailey suspicious.

Now that Buchanan's eyes had become even more accustomed to the darkness, the glow from condominiums, restaurants, and boats along the canal seemed to increase in brightness. But Buchanan was interested in the spectacle only because the illumination allowed him to see the cellular telephone that Bailey folded and placed in a pouch attached to his belt.

'Handy things,' Bailey said. 'You can call anybody from anywhere.'

'Like from a car to a pizza parlor. Or from a water taxi to a hotel lobby.'

'You got it,' Bailey said. 'Makes it easy to keep in touch while I'm on the go or hangin' around to see if extra company's comin'.' Bailey lowered his voice and gestured toward the cooler. 'No joke. That better not be your lunch, and it better all be here.'

The other passengers on the boat were talking loudly, obscuring what Bailey and Buchanan said.

'There's no more where that came from,' Buchanan murmured.

Bailey raised his bulky shoulders. 'Hey, I'm not greedy. All I need is a little help with my expenses, a little reward for my trouble.'

'I went through a lot of effort to get what's in this cooler,' Buchanan said. 'I won't go through it again.'

'I don't expect you to.'

'That definitely eases my mind.'

The water taxi arrived at a restaurant-tavern, where a sign on the dock said PAUL'S-ON-THE-RIVER. The stylish building was long and low, its rear section almost completely glass, separated by segments of white stucco. Inside, a band played. Beyond the large windows, customers danced. Others strolled outside, carrying drinks, or sat at tables amid flowering bushes near palm trees.

The taxi's driver set down the gangplank. Four passengers got up unsteadily to go ashore.

At once Bailey stood and clutched the picnic cooler. 'This is where we part company, Crawford. Almost forgot, I mean Grant. Why don't you stay aboard, see the sights, enjoy the ride?'

'Why not?' Buchanan said.

Bailey looked very pleased with himself. 'Be seein' you.'

'No. You won't.'

'Right,' Bailey said and carried the picnic cooler off the water taxi onto the dock. He strolled across the colorfully illuminated lawn toward the music, 'Moon River', and disappeared among the crowd.

Chapter 17.

Thirty minutes later, the water taxi brought Buchanan back to the Riverside Hotel. He wouldn't have returned there, except that he needed to retrieve his suitcase from the trunk of Cindy's car. The car was parked on a quiet street next to the hotel, and after Buchanan placed the keys beneath the driver's floor mat, he carried his suitcase into the hotel, where he phoned for a taxi. When it arrived, he instructed the driver to take him to an all-night car-rental agency. As it happened, the only one that was open was at the Fort Lauderdale airport, and after Buchanan rented a car, he drove to a pay phone to contact Doyle and tell him where to find Cindy's car. Next, he bought -a twelve-pack of beer at a convenience store, drove to a shadowy, deserted street, poured every can of beer over the front seat and floor of the car, then tossed the empty cans onto the floor, and drove away, keeping all the windows open lest he get sick from the odor of the beer. By then, it was quarter after one in the morning. He headed toward the ocean, found a deserted park next to the Intracoastal Waterway, and smashed the car through a protective barrier, making sure he left skid marks, as if the car had been out of control. He stopped the car, got out, put the automatic gearshift into drive, and pushed the car over the seawall into the water. Even as he heard it splash, he was hurrying away to disappear into the darkness. He'd left his suitcase in the car along with his wallet in the nylon jacket he'd borrowed from Doyle. He'd kept his passport, though. He didn't want anyone to do a background check on that. When the police investigated the 'accident' and hoisted the car from the water, they'd find the beer cans. The logical conclusion would be that the driver - Victor Grant, according to the ID in the wallet and the car-rental agreement in the glove compartment - had been driving while under the influence, had crashed through the barricade, and helpless because of alcohol, had drowned. When the police didn't find the body, divers would search, give up, and decide that the corpse would surface in a couple of days. When it didn't, they'd conclude that the remains had been wedged beneath a dock or had been carried by the tide out to sea. More important, Buchanan hoped that Bailey would believe the same thing. Under stress from being blackmailed, fearful that Bailey would keep coming back for more and more money, Crawford-Potter-Grant had rented a car to flee the area, had gotten drunk in the process, had lost control of the vehicle, and.