Octopus Alibi (38 page)

“Take it farther.”

“Let’s say someone from Remigio killed Steve Gomez to make sure the condo project would pass.”

“This is new territory,” said Lewis. “It sounds damn logical so far.”

“Marlow sees a chance to muscle into Remigio, or his boat wouldn’t be here. Find him, find the profit center. Find Remigio, find Gomez’s killer. We’re not solving shit standing right here. Downtown?”

“We?”

“Allow me the honor of delivering you.”

“To where?”

“Closer to where you can do your job. Yes or no?”

“My service pistol is locked up at my place, and I know they’re watching the house.” She turned to Polan. “Frank, you got a weapon I can borrow?”

Polan loaned her a new .40 caliber Smith & Wesson SW99. “Try not to use it near saltwater,” he said. He took a special cloth from a Ziploc bag, pretended to clean the piece, then handed the gun to Lewis. He’d rubbed off his fingerprints. “And don’t fire it if you don’t have to.”

*   *   *

Southbound traffic was a zoo. It took us two minutes to exit Spanish Main and hook up with the flow.

“Unique fellow,” I said. “More money than one man needs?”

Lewis checked out Polan’s pistol, practiced the safety, reloaded the clip. “He’s a generous host, but he guards his privacy. He wanted me to stay in that room under the house.”

“Makes it hard to get lucky.”

“He wasn’t really my type.”

The Pro-Realty office at Sugarloaf bugged me again, property for sale, and Bramblett’s instant decision to take his money and run. He might want to hurry. Blood on the walls hurts resale value. I flashed on a vicious attack in the hallway, and on Lewis’s remark Wednesday night that the place looked “too clean.” Mary Butler had said, “It was … as if I had already been there.”

The photographs in Naomi’s garbage were calling to me.

What else?

We crossed the Saddlebunch Keys. Lewis said, “This’d be a great patrol car if it wasn’t so smelly.” She began to talk louder to be heard above the exhaust roar. “I love the fact that it doesn’t have air-conditioning. Gives it character.”

“It’s a Shelby GT-350H,” I said. “The ‘H’ stands for Hertz.”

“As in ‘hurts your ass’? You’re more in touch when you feel each bump?”

“It’s a racing suspension.”

“So why the hell do you own it? You ought to—”

A hot-dogging Navy F-18 swooped above us as we hit the slow-down zone on Big Coppitt. Her words were lost to afterburner roar. How can a pilot describe the feeling of a ninety-degree bank at ten times the speed of a fast car?

Without slowing I whipped the steering wheel hard left. The Shelby cut the corner without sliding. In two seconds we’d turned from U.S. 1 onto 941, and our forward speed hadn’t dropped five miles per hour. I slowed, pulled to the side of the road.

The aircraft noise faded. Lewis’s eyes had a look of fear that gave way to glee. I was sure she admired the vehicle more than my stunt. We remained silent. We both knew the problem. We had great intentions, but no destination. Any speck of information would help.

I drove a quarter mile back to the Circle K on the corner. I fished under my seat and found a film canister full of quarters and dimes. I always keep a stash for phones, newspaper boxes, and parking meters. The pay box next to the entrance stairs was vacant. Any speck of info … I dialed Naomi’s number.

Ernest Bramblett said, “This place has a certain charm.”

“I agree with you, sir.”

“So I was thinking, I’d use my sister’s equipment, walk around town, take a few photos. Maybe even learn a little about my surroundings.”

“Great way to spend a Saturday afternoon.”

“Where’s her camera?”

“I found a cheap point-and-shoot,” I said. “The police have the negs and prints.”

“I’m referring to the bodies, lenses, and flashes I gave her years ago. By any chance did she loan them to you? I can’t imagine she gave them away.”

I thought about the prints I’d found in her office, the envelopes full of sharply focused pictures. “Was it thirty-five-millimeter gear, Mr. Bramblett?”

“All of it, Olympus brand.”

I cut the connection, dialed Duffy Lee Hall. I heard him answer, then drop the phone. He said, “Fuck, fuck … hold on … hello?”

“Duffy Lee…”

“Sorry, I’m in the darkroom. I dropped—”

“Stop talking, Duff. I’m in a hurry. I need an address, maybe from an old invoice.” I told him what I needed.

“Shit, Alex. I know I have it, but it’ll take me a couple minutes to close down and open up.”

“I’ll call you right back.”

I dialed Carmen’s number.

“My mama’s spacy these days,” she said, “but she has a perfect memory. Remigio was a gambler, ran bolita for years. His real name wasn’t Remigio. They called him that because that name was on his building, on Whitehead. He died years ago, and the building was torn down in the early Nineties. My mother never knew his name.”

I asked Carmen to look up Mary Butler in the phone book.

“Alex,” she said, “an FDLE agent was in the lane. I dated him four years ago. He told me you’d been charged with Obstruction of Justice.”

“Call Sam and warn him, okay?”

“Got it. Mary Butler on Chapman Lane.” She gave me the number.

Another call. Patience, I thought, she’s not too spry.

Eight rings later, Mrs. Butler picked up.

“This is Alex Rutledge.”

“Now you want stock tips, and you can’t have any. Or you want to buy my house.”

“I need to know about a man called Remigio.”

“That man, yes,” she said. “He was not a bad man, as Conchs went. He gambled like they all did that, but that man was true to his blessed wife.”

Grab for straws. “Do you recall anything about business associates, or his family?”

“They adopted a boy, raised him like I raised that Dexter. One morning that man Remigio’s wife didn’t wake up. One day after they bury that poor lady, old Remigio put a gun to his head. That odd one, that boy they raised, he wasn’t a smart boy. Now he works with my cop nephew, Dexter.”

“In what way?”

“He takes all them messy pictures.”

“Thank you.”

The greedhead got tired of messing with trivia, speculating on NASCAR collectibles. He had inherited the Remigio Partners shares and wanted his big payday. He had asked if I had worthless stock certificates for sale, then sold me Naomi’s photo gear. The stupid shit had tossed my art prints into Naomi’s trash.

A modus operandi echo: Cootie had snuffed his adoptive parents. Take it one step further. He’d have been in his early twenties when he’d debuted his canalside shotgun routine. He had killed Manuel Reyes Silveria, the Borroto Brinas founder and dreamer. Cootie had been planning this for half his life.

I dropped two more coins, punched up Duffy Lee’s number. He read an address. He was still talking when I dropped the receiver.

34

I
TOLD
L
EWIS TO
snug her seat belt, then tighten it more. I hauled ass over Big Coppitt, saw daylight, passed three cars in the double yellow, and hoped no one pulled out of the Mobil station. A life-sized Marilyn Monroe waved from Fred’s Beds and gave us a flash of blown-up skirt.

Let it hang out, Marilyn. It’s all the rage.

Finally, something in my favor. No Boca Chica speed traps. As I ran eighty-five on the four-lane around the Naval Air Station, I checked my dials. Water temp too high, oil pressure low. Bad time to grenade my engine. Pavement dips tried to launch the Shelby. I had a license to fly, I could chase F-18s in the touch-and-go pattern, climb to ten thousand and scope out Cuba.

I cranked up my window to cut wind noise. I still had to shout, condense my story. I spun the list of calls, spiraled the blame down to Cootie Ortega.

Bobbi Lewis went two thumbs up. “No holes,” she said. “I’ll buy it.”

I said, “How do we do this?”

“We don’t,” she shouted back. “Miss Mary Butler’s already called Dexter Hayes. He needs to salvage his rep. He’s on his way to Cootie’s right now. We hope he doesn’t go in alone. He’ll get his butt shot to Big Pine.”

“Mary didn’t like Dexter the cop. I say she won’t call, it’s just us.”

“Us? Fuck that. You don’t have a gun.”

I reached behind her seat, pulled out Sam’s .45, handed it over. I slowed for the bridge to Key Haven. Sun glare turned my windshield into a white wall. I checked the rearview. Still cool.

Lewis released the Para-Companion’s magazine. “Seven plus one,” she said. “You ever fire this?”

“I saw it the first time an hour ago. I think I hold tight and squeeze that skinny piece of metal.”

“You want to bet your life on it?”

Only if I have to.

Traffic forced me to slow on Stock Island. It’s hard to boogie on Saturday evening. My Shelby doesn’t do curbs and off-road excursions.

“You came up with a shitload,” said Lewis.

“Marnie did it, not me. If a story comes out, she gets it.”

“She can do my paperwork, too. First things first.”

I crossed Cow Key Channel Bridge, hit the left lane, found a hole. I blew the red light to a horn chorus and went south. The curb lane approach to Flagler is the worst pavement in America. I ran the fast lane until the instant I cut off a taxi and hung a right.

“We’re there in twenty seconds,” I said. “Plan?”

“We go in, shoot it out,” she said. “You got a hero hat in the car? Two Kevlars and a riot gun in the trunk?”

Sarcasm for a reason. I shut my mouth.

“I’d lose my badge if I took you in. I’d lose it if I went in without calling for backup.”

“What badge?”

“The one I might get back, if I do this right. Pull over.”

I slowed, skidded in next to a hydrant. Antifreeze steam filled the car.

“If I call before I’m on scene, they’ll order me off,” she said. “They’ll bust me before I can log the collar.”

“Who’s looking to salvage rep, now?”

She looked me in the eye. “Why do you want this?”

“For Naomi. So I don’t feel useless.”

“So die, then ask about useless.”

“Call it,” I said.

“We could be pissing into a thimble. Let’s drive by, look for his car, see if he’s home.”

I pictured the old Benz gleaming under a palm tree. I pictured Cootie force-feeding pills to Naomi, beating the life out of Steve Gomez.

“Maybe Dexter’ll show,” said Lewis. “I can go in with him. We can earn back our stripes together.”

My hot-dog driving had blitzed my brain. I’d forgotten Cootie’s house number, but I didn’t admit it to Lewis. Duffy Lee had said 1593 or 1953.

I turned onto Twentieth, went left on Eagle Avenue. A residential strip, well-kept homes, a few behind tall fences. The block was a long stretch. No number 1953. Next choice.

I slid the stop sign, dodged three kids on Razor scooters, then saw the dune buggy wedged between two tall trash containers.

I pointed. “Marnie told me that buggy was stolen from Oceanside.”

“Two against two changes our nonplan,” said Lewis. “I hate even odds.”

“Shit,” I said.

“My hero has second thoughts?”

“Look.”

“It’s a cluster fuck,” said Lewis. “Take a right and park.”

I turned, rolled a half block, and found a slot behind a boat trailer.

“Go find out,” she said. “Don’t take that weapon!”

*   *   *

The same gear, the cast of characters from the Whit Randolph ambush on Whitehead. Yellow streamers bordered by the FDLE van, Riley’s ME wagon, and county patrol cars up the ying-yang.

Liska stood next to his Lexus with a uniformed deputy and “No Jokes” Bohner in civvies. He watched me approach, regarded me like a town punk come to take abuse so I could hang with the cool guys. Cootie’s place was the ugliest house on the street. Two spindly palms, a scrabble of dry grass and gravel, cracked Cuban tile front steps. An antique AC box cut into the lowest eight panes of a jalousie front window.

Airtight, like Cootie’s alibi.

Liska had sweated through his striped polo shirt. He had been enjoying his day off. I smelled liquor behind the chewing gum.

“What brings you by?” he said. “It ain’t hit the news yet.”

How did he know that? The man had never been news sensitive before.

“I figured out that Cootie killed Gomez and probably Naomi, too.”

“Oh,” said Liska. “So you were coming by to talk it over with him?”

No answer would work.

“We got two down in there,” he said. “Lead poisoning, one shot apiece. One in a La-Z-Boy and one on a couch. You’ve been working with a freak all these years, Rutledge. Cootie had a Princess Di museum in a locked room. Boxes, books, and fifty pictures of her on the wall. Six are muff shots, obviously not legit.”

“Marlow the other victim?” I said.

“Oh, you’re well-informed. He was still wearing his red Broward County Sheriff Department shirt, and now it’s perforated. I would ask how you knew, but I don’t want to be disingenuous.”

“Marnie Dunwoody…”

“Right, and this time your buddy’s not going to skate. We found him on his porch, tying flies, chilled out like he had no problems in his world. We’re searching his house for a pistol with a silencer. He’s my guest at the county as we speak.”

They’d pegged Sam for revenge. What were the odds? “Does that make sense? Sam in there, and those men were sitting down?”

Liska studied the pavement, sniffed, exercised his Doublemint.

“How, in your mind, does a fishing guide turn into a murderer?”

“It’s not so big a leap, Rutledge,” said Liska. “The guide’s an old macho warrior, combat vet, slayer of sea life. He falls in love with his vigilante self-image. The vigilante on crusade doesn’t see his terminal actions as murder, but society does. I’m not high society, sir, but I represent its high interests.”

“You tell a good story,” I said. “Almost as if you were writing the news.”

“The public wants justice, and that’s my job description.”

“Does this mean you stop looking for anyone else?” I said. “Did you test Sam’s skin for gunpowder?”

He looked up, tapped his forehead. “I do it the old-fashioned way. Cranial forensics. Don’t hurry off to post bond. I’ll make sure he rides the metal bed straight to indictment. That tan jumpsuit looks just like his old fishing outfit.”