Gagliano,Anthony - Straits of Fortune.wps (21 page)

"You said you were going to double-cross your father," I said. "How were you going to do that?" "Williams had her apartment bugged," Nick said. "He heard us talking." "About what?" "Vivian and I were going to get squeezed out of the money. That much was for sure. We could see it coming, so we made a side deal with Matson. We'd get him all of Father's papers, not just those about how to make Morphitrex. We wanted a flat fee: three million apiece. Duncan and Matson agreed to it. They put the money in an escrow account in the Cayman Islands. All we had to do was deliver. After you left to sink the yacht, Vivian called me on the phone. That's when Wil- liams heard us talking about how we'd pulled it off. He said he was going to kill both of us. He almost caught us, too--at a restaurant. We had to run out through the kitchen." "I lost my cell phone," Vivian said. "That man can run." "For the first time, I agree with Williams," I said. "I'm thinking of killing you both myself. A small loss to the world you'd be, I might add." "It was Harry who taught me how to hack into Father's computer," Nick said. "He knew a lot about computers." "So I guess the whole thing with that juicy little video was just your father's way of softening me up," I said. "I guess it worked." Nobody said anything. "Are you sure it was Williams who killed Matson and Duncan?" I asked. "And one more lie, and somebody's going to have a long walk back." There was an extended silence. As a cop I had come to know that breed of silence well, the silence of someone who has hit the wall of lies and who is too tired or too scared to think of any new ones. We were in Sunny Isles now, still heading north. I could smell Rascal's Deli before I could 180

see its sign. It was calling me like a cup of coffee on the midnight shift up in Harlem, far away in another life. The Thunderbird Hotel summoned me sweetly from the east side of Collins as we sailed by. The sign said they even had a swimming pool. It was about all a tired man could ask for in this life. "Williams killed both of them," Vivian said from a place I had wandered away from. "Then he dragged me back and made me confess the whole thing to Daddy, about selling the other drugs to Matson. He took my computer and all my files. He wanted to get rid of any of Daddy's research I may have stolen. Then he got hold of Nick's computer and did the same thing." "Let me guess," I said. "You'd made backup files, prob- ably on a disk or CD. Right? You were still in the game. What happened? Williams found out about it?" "It was my fault," Nick said glumly. "I thought I had hidden them well enough, but Williams found them. He caught me and held a cigarette lighter under my palm. He asked if Vivian had her own set of files. I had to tell him. That's why he's after her now." "So," I said to Vivian, "let me guess again: You've got your own little stash of stolen research. Williams found out about that, too, but he hasn't managed to locate it yet. Is that it? Tell me this: What were you planning to do with it? Your two partners are both dead. What good is that stash now?" "I don't know," Vivian said. "All I know is I'm the one who brought the deal to Daddy, and I'm going to get my fair share. Besides, Matson introduced me to a lot of his friends. Maybe one of them can help me." She edged closer to me on the seat, so that her thigh pushed up against my own. "Maybe you can help us, too." I let that one ride. But it gave me an idea. "Where's the stash?" I asked. 181

The car got quiet again. I made a left turn, pulled into the rear of an all-night gas station with a well-lit minimart, and killed the headlights. "Tell me where the disk is or I feed you both to Williams." "You wouldn't do that to me," Vivian said. "I know you wouldn't." "Not to you," I told her. "But your brother back there is another story. I'm sure he's got Williams's name saved on his cell phone, and I'm also sure Williams will be very glad to see him again. What do you think?" "Even if I tell you where it is, what are you going to do with it?" Vivian asked. "Go into business for yourself?" "Don't worry," I said. "I'll cut you both in. I'm not greedy. But neither of you is equipped to go up against Willy Boy alone. I am, and you know it. You need an enforcer. Come on. We're wasting time, and I'm getting tired." "Can't we stop someplace?" Vivian asked plaintively. "I haven't slept since you went out to sink the boat. Just for a little while?" "Not until you tell me where you hid your father's stuff," I said. "That's the deal." "It's back at the house," she said. "Where?" Nick asked. "In my room." "Okay," I said. "That's enough. Let's crash. In the morn- ing we'll head out to the mansion. All three of us, just like one big fucking family." Ten minutes later we walked into the overly lit but nearly empty lobby of the Holiday Inn in Hollywood Beach. I knew the clerk on the midnight shift. He was a big, soft-spoken man-child named Casio Davis, whose father had paid me five grand a few years back to help his son get ready for the marines. I had to refund the money, though. The work we 182

did by day, young Casio undid by night at the drive-through window of a Popeyes fried-chicken place. There are a lot of miles in Miami, but not as many as there are calories in a couple buckets of extra-crispy. The father wanted me to keep the money, but I gave it back to him anyway. Despite the fact that it was off-season, the hotel, which was under partial renovation, was full, but Casio managed to squeeze a pair of rooms out for us. No one spoke on the elevator. We emerged on the sixth floor and walked along a hallway still littered with building debris and smelling like fresh paint. The deal was we would have to be gone before the day crew showed up in the morning; otherwise Casio might be out of a job. "I'm staying with you," Vivian announced, slipping her arm through mine as though we were on our way to the prom. I didn't say anything. I was too tired to think. The thought of a bed with or without Miss Patterson in it was more than enough for me. I just wanted to close my eyes and wake up in another life. Nick didn't seem to enjoy the pros- pect of being alone very much, but there were limits to my concern about that. He went into his room, and I heard him put the latch on. He had good reason to be afraid. He'd seen Williams plowing through those hard boys back at Embers, and his dreams would be less than serene. Our room was down the hall. The moment I saw the bed, I went for it as if it were the last bed on earth. I heard Vivian talking behind me, but her voice began to dissolve as I stretched out and closed my eyes. The glow from the lamp on the nightstand should have kept me awake, but I didn't even have enough energy left to shut it off. Sleep reached up for me through the mattress like a warm hand coming out of the ground, and I gave myself to it unreservedly. Then the light was off, and I felt Vivian against me, breath- ing into my ear like a cat anxious to be fed. She began undo- 183

ing my shirt, and I told her to just let me sleep, but I didn't push her hand away. There was no need to be nasty about it simply because I was three-quarters dead from exhaustion and needed rest far more than anyone had ever needed sex in the whole history of the world. She had lied to me, betrayed me, and nearly gotten me killed. It was enough to make a man bitter. I was bitter. I was bitter as hell. She was tugging my shirt out of my trousers; her hand felt like a roving but- terfly fluttering against the hairs on my chest. Soon I began thinking that there were times in a man's life when he has to let bygones be bygones, so I kicked off my shoes and began to cooperate with the situation. "You'll sleep better if you let me relax you," she said. "I have been under a lot of stress lately," I told her. "Lie back, Jack," she said I found that fairly easy to do. After a second I sat up on my elbows and watched her black hair slide down my stomach like a retreating wave. I reached down and got a fistful of it and lifted her head. Her eyes were already as glazed over as they'd been in Matson's little movie. A thought came to me. "You're on it, aren't you?" "What?" "The Morphitrex." By way of answer, she moistened her already moist lips with her tongue and lowered her head, and I left her to her work. After a while she straddled me like a cowgirl and began to surge back and forth, her dark hair whipping around like the shadow of a condor. I held on to her hips for dear life and wondered if she was still human. I was afraid she might actually turn into something else, and I wasn't sure I wanted to be under her when it happened. She grabbed the top of the headboard and rocked and screamed and howled like a thunderstorm trying to rip itself free from the sky. Time passed. There was a pool of sweat at the center of 184

my chest, and Vivian was making soft swirls in it with her index finger. The room had cooled off, and the sheets were warm and luxurious against my back. It would have been a fine way to end the night if only the day preceding it had been different. There's something about having the cops after you that puts a damper on things. "The drug," I said. "How does it work?" "I don't know. It's the weirdest shit I've ever taken, weirder even than peyote or mushrooms. It's like it listens to you. It knows what you want. You want something to speed you up, then that's what it does. If you want to chill out and look at a brick wall, then that wall will be the most beautiful thing in the world. I'm telling you, Jack, the stuff is unbelievable. Even Williams has taken it. I only use it for sex." "I never thought you needed any help." "Not with you, but even so, it just makes everything more intense. You're not complaining, are you?" "What does Williams use it for, to grow back his hair?" "Strength, endurance. He told me once that it was the best drug he's had since Vietnam." "Maybe they can use that for the advertising campaign." "There won't be one. It will all be word of mouth. That's the way ecstasy got started. The next thing you know, it's worth twenty dollars a pill--more, once people realize what it's like." "I guess this would be a good time to talk about money," I said. "What do you have in mind?" Vivian asked. I ignored her question. I was almost enjoying myself. "Williams will catch on eventually that the Colonel has been squeezed out of the play, and he won't like it very much. Also, he knows I'm alive now. He won't like that either, which means he'll be coming after all three of us. I'll prob- ably have to kill him. I'll have to be compensated for that. 185

I've gone through a lot of trouble for your family. It's time for the payoff." She tensed up at that, but only for a moment. She'd told me once that her entire body was a G-spot, but the only one I had never probed was the one in her bank account. It was the one place she didn't accept visitors--especially those there to make a withdrawal. "How much do you want?" she asked. Her eyes were bright as coins. "Well, there's the fifty grand you still owe me for the dead-body removal. We'll have to double that because of Mr. Duncan, of course. But as the new enforcer in this little operation, I'll have to be an equal partner. I get a third of the profits. What do you say to that?" She kissed me. "Jack," she said, "there's hope for you after all." "More than you think. Roll over. It's my turn on top." THREE

I AWOKE JUST BEFORE DAWN and got dressed in the dark. I was still tired but felt fairly close to form. Then I woke Vivian. She turned over onto her back and blinked her eyes, and I recalled that, like most night stalkers, she was not a particularly pleasant person in the morning. She sat up in bed and looked around. "Where are we?" she asked. "Up in Hollywood. The Holiday Inn. Your brother's down the hall." "What time is it?" "About five-thirty." She noticed then that I was dressed. "Where are you going? " "Not just me. You, too. We're going to the mansion to get the disk." 188

"It's not on a disk," she said after a yawn. "It's on one of those little portable hard drives." "Whatever. We're going to go find it. Get dressed." "It's too early. Come back to bed." "Get up." "What about Nick?" she asked. "Let him sleep. We'll pick him up on the way back." "I need a shower," she said. "I smell like sex." "Later. Hurry up." "You're worse than Williams." "I need to be. You're worse than us both." I sat on the edge of the bed and watched her dress, which was nearly as much fun as watching the reverse. It didn't take her long; she traveled light: a pair of black thong pant- ies, no bra, and the black party dress so incongruous in the innocent morning light. Vivian watched me watching her and smiled like the succubus she was. She reveled in her body the way a rich man revels in gold. The smooth skin, the breasts like minarets on a mosque, the fluted ribs lined now with shadow, now with light, the flat belly with just a trace of muscle visible. The black dress went on over her head, and she moved her hips from side to side as it slid over her ass. Maybe she's right, I thought. Maybe it is too early. It was Sunday morning, and the traffic heading south was light. The sun, in a haze of cirrus clouds, rose slowly, red-eyed and sluggish in the east, as though unsure whether daylight was worth the effort. Vivian begged me to stop for coffee, so I pulled in to the same gas station where I'd stopped the night before and got one of those giant-size cups full of java while Vivian half dozed in the front seat of the car by one of the pumps. We made Sunset Beach in twenty minutes. A sleep-de- prived young guard in a uniform with a gold braid looped around one shoulder stepped out from his little box, in which 189

a small TV set was flickering on a counter next to a thermos. He walked over to the driver's side with his clipboard in front of his chest, leaned down, pen in hand. "Hey, Seth," Vivian said. "Long night?" "There's no other kind, Ms. Patterson. Not for me." "You don't happen to know if Williams is home, do you?" she asked. "Haven't seen Mr. Williams in two or three days, not since your father left." "Thanks, Reggie," Vivian said, her eyes twinkling the promise of a time that would never come. "Do me a favor, okay? If Mr. Williams should come by while we're here, give me a call at the house, would you?" "Sure." "Thanks, I really appreciate that," she told him. I was just about to hit the gas when Reggie thought of something else. "Hey, I forgot to tell you: Three guys came by here last night." "Who?" I asked. Seth looked annoyed. He'd been speak- ing to Vivian. Still, he answered anyway. "They didn't say, but they looked kind of official, if you know what I mean. I told them nobody was home." "They look like cops?" I asked. The guard eyed me skeptically. He was wondering who the hell I was to be asking him questions. Vivian picked up on it. "This is my bodyguard," she said. "They might have been," Reginald said. "They had that look. Oh, and yeah, they left you a card. Hold on." He stepped back into the guardhouse. Vivian and I ex- changed glances. The sun was more cheerful-looking, having thrown off its white cloak of clouds. I took a sip of coffee. Reggie came out, reached across my body with 190