Octopus Alibi (39 page)

“Where’s Dexter Hayes?”

“Drinking beer. Or back at work, trying to diminish his father’s crimes by logging successes. He found them and called it in. At least he didn’t try to cowboy. He brought his SWAT boys for backup, but he got here too late. None of the neighbors heard shit. Dexter took his city people home when FDLE grabbed command.”

“No one saw your perp?”

“Good use of lingo, Rutledge. It doesn’t matter that no one saw the perp.”

“Cootie killed Gomez and Douglas,” I said.

“Elvis had lunch at Blue Heaven,” said Liska. “Stay in town awhile. We definitely need to chat.”

“Chatting’s good,” I said. “Almost like getting mugged by state agents.”

“Push me,” he said. “Go ahead.”

“I can’t, Liska. You’re towing too much baggage. Maybe you should quit the sauce and start smoking again. You used to be a good detective. Now you’re a politician. Why fuck with the truth when headlines are waiting?”

Billy Bohner started for me, but Liska held him back.

I headed for my car.

Liska said, “Your chum’s gonna ride the upstate chemical sled in about four years. Maybe they’ll let you take pictures.”

*   *   *

I got back in the Shelby. Bobbi Lewis was soaked in sweat. I started the engine, began driving toward North Roosevelt. “Cootie and Marlow,” I said. “They grabbed Sam Wheeler for it.”

“How do you see it?”

“Cootie got mad and shot Marlow. Before he died, Odin got Cootie.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

I thought it through, to convince myself. Sam was my best friend, flaws and all, but bumping off criminals is over the edge. I finally hit the snag in Liska’s logic.

“He didn’t do it,” I said. “Sam’s no splash artist. He had no reason to kill Cootie. His beef was with Marlow. Even with his head warped, it’d be some other way, like out at sea. But Cootie, too? No damn way.”

“Okay,” said Lewis. “I’ll buy that. Common sense wins the war.”

“Where to?”

“Your house,” she said. “The balloon’s deflated, and nothing’s solved. I need to use the toilet and the shower.”

“Where’s your Celica?”

“Back at Frank Polan’s. He owns a rental house four doors down from his place. It’s in the carport. Did Liska connect Cootie to the mayor?”

“I suggested it,” I said. “He wised back.”

“I could be Sam’s detention facility roommate by morning. I trust you have beer.”

I cut north on White. Our mission had deflated, but my mind was still doing eighty-five in a fifty-five. A double murder was a small mind’s revenge, and the puzzle still had pieces that didn’t fit. With the tension drop, the pieces, one by one, fell into place. Cootie had been watching a stock car race in the police station, so he couldn’t have shot Whit Randolph. His alibi was golden. To a rational person, it was too golden, too solid.

For five days Dexter had fumbled. He had picked his battles poorly, been hot and cold like Bobbi Lewis had been. But Dexter was not a stupid man, as evidenced by his bringing the city SWAT group to Cootie’s.

Why hadn’t he thought beyond the obvious?

Lewis said, “Your face looks like a boat propeller.”

“Sam didn’t shoot them,” I said. “Cootie and Marlow didn’t take turns shooting each other in the head. Someone else was there.”

“Expand.”

“Follow the money,” I said. “Who benefits with Cootie gone?”

“Other shareholders, Cootie’s relatives … Oh, shit. Do you know where she lives?”

“Love Lane. Marnie came through with that, too.”

*   *   *

I hurried down Southard, in the poor visibility of dusk. Just past William Street, Lewis pointed. Dexter’s Caprice, illegally parked. Dexter had thought a step further, had figured it out, too.

“We go in guns drawn,” said Lewis. “Assume Dexter’s not in there. We explain about Cootie and say we’re there to protect her. Make no big deal, but keep your piece in your hand. Keep looking around, as if at any moment a bad man could jump out of a closet. Because a bad man might.”

I pulled into Love Lane. A heavy man blocked us. “No parking.”

Lewis showed her badge. “It’s Saturday,” she said. “I don’t have a radio. Do us a favor, call 911.”

The man looked thrilled, as if deputized, put on a mission.

We hurried around Yvonne’s Acura, hit the porch. The door was half-open. Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone” played softly next door.

“One last thing,” said Lewis. “This is nut cutting. Caution’s a bad bet.”

She pushed the door. We could see straight through the house, out the French doors, into a tiny backyard. Yvonne was raking leaves with frantic motions and crying.

I scanned the yard, a tropical paradise in spite of itself. Deep burgundy crotons, overgrown yellow hibiscus, unkempt magenta bougainvillea. A garden by mistake, awash in dead sea grape leaves. A four-foot chain-link fence drooped around it all, pulled down by vines. A broad tarpaulin was spread open, with raked leaves piled on it. I saw sudden movement to my left. A blue-green lizard prowled the top grate of an AC fan unit. Careful, buddy.

No Dexter.

Yvonne looked up, quit scratching at the bricked patio. Her eyes were bloodshot. Her upper lip gleamed with snot and sweat. She had pulled back her hair with an elastic terry-cloth band, but ran her hand across her head to push back imagined loose strands. She didn’t react to our being huffed up, guns in hand. She began to converse as if she’d expected us all along.

“My girlfriend lives on Eagle,” she said. “She called me. Cootie’s dead.”

Yvonne dropped her rake, bent down, clutched a wad of dead leaves, and dropped them on the open tarp. She took the rake again in hand, and picked at clutter behind two rocks.

“We heard about Cootie,” said Lewis. “Please accept our sympathy. Did you know that your cousin had inherited Remigio Partners’ stock?”

“Cootie was such a groveler, messing with his trivia. He dreamed he could live like a prince. That stock was worthless.”

“It was,” said Lewis, “as long as your husband was there to vote down the Borroto Brinas project.”

I heard a sharp clicking noise behind me. I leveled my pistol. The lizard had tumbled into the fan, had been chopped to bits. Another hunter lost to the hunt.

Where was Dexter?

Yvonne raked a small stack of leaves toward a larger pile. Deliberate, dutiful in working off energy, sublimating her grief.

“When did you come out of shock?” said Lewis. “When did you realize that your cousin killed your husband?”

Yvonne glanced up. “I don’t think I heard you right. Cootie Ortega lived in a dream world. He sat in his ugly house and stared at pictures of the dead princess and jacked off, for all I know. He wanted the big time, being rich and important, but he could barely cook a microwave supper. What makes you think he killed Steven?”

“Cootie wanted to run the new art museum,” I said. “He was a very bad blackmailer, but he was good at murder.”

“Blackmail who?” said Yvonne.

“Here’s one possibility. He went to Naomi Douglas and your husband. He threatened to expose their affair if he didn’t get the museum job and a vote in favor of Borroto Brinas. It’s my guess they laughed in his face, which was worse than not getting rich and not getting that job. So he got even. However it happened, greed drove him to murder.”

The air-conditioning unit cycled off. The neighbor’s music had stopped, and quiet filled the yard except for a faint, pulsing, whistling noise that I couldn’t place.

“You figured it for Cootie the day it happened,” I said. “Maybe you didn’t want your husband dead, but there was no going back. You also knew how cousin Cootie would benefit, and those millions would come to you if he was dead, too. But Whit Randolph screwed it up, didn’t he?”

“Who?”

They’d been seen walking together, arguing.

“Exact wrong answer, lady. Randolph talked to Teresa Barga,” I said. “With enough facts, he guessed your deal, or came close enough to do his own blackmail, didn’t he? You had to remove his complications by removing him. You had Cootie follow him for a few days to learn his schedule. Today was your big day, and Randolph never made it to lunch at the Turtle Kraals.”

“Fuck off. I’m tired of your face.”

“Take a good look,” I said. “Maybe it’ll bore you to death. It’d be a less messy way to die than how you snuffed Randolph. And once you did that, there was no reason not to shoot your cousin and a Broward cop you didn’t even know.”

Yvonne scowled but almost smiled.

Shit, I thought. Everyone was drawn to the riches. Odin Marlow had worked for Borroto Brinas, had come to town to squeeze big cash out of Cootie, and Yvonne probably knew him from years ago. Finding Marlow at Cootie’s house was pure convenience. Killing him had fit perfectly into her plan.

The faint whistle pulsed again.

Lewis looked for it. “We’ve got a snake in here somewhere.”

Yvonne reached down to the pile of leaves. She raised a weapon, swung it toward the tarp.

Lewis and I shot Yvonne Gomez at the same time. The bullets knocked the woman into an Adirondack chair, killing her instantly. Her gun clanked to the bricks.

Lewis yanked the tarp off Dexter Hayes. His face was ashen, his eyes rolled back. The hole in his shirt explained the whistle. Bobbi rolled him to check his back. No exit wound. She jammed her thumb into his chest to keep air in his lung.

Sirens filled the island, all inbound.

“Don’t assume those are for us,” said Lewis. “Call 911. Say ‘Officer down,’ and ‘Trauma-Star Helo.’” She bent to begin CPR.

I had to dial Yvonne’s phone with my left hand. I wanted to like hell, but I couldn’t let go of the gun.

35

A
T
5:45
A.M. THE
next morning, I got a call to pick up Sam on Stock Island. The island was asleep. No hint of sunup, no other cars on the road, four on-duty cop cruisers gathered around a camper in Albertson’s parking lot.

I had left my Shelby Mustang outdoors all night, a bad slip, the first time ever. I had remembered it as I fell onto my bed, but had been drained from hours of interviews and let it slide. Car theft ranked low on my impact scale after having pulled that trigger.

Sam was standing in the detention center parking lot, chatting with a female deputy, airing jail stink out of his clothing. I knew the outprocessing had begun at four
A.M.
, but he looked rested. I suspected he had slept more than I had.

“Couldn’t face another taxi.” He shut the car door and settled in.

That was all the conversation we needed.

Before I could find reverse, Chicken Neck Liska stopped his Lexus next to us. He’d lowered his passenger-side window. His raised index finger asked us to wait a minute.

“Fuck him,” whispered Sam. “Let’s go.”

Almost as if Liska could read our minds, or hear my transmission go into gear, he backed the Lexus in a quarter circle to block my departure. He got out, walked to my window, and peered across at Sam. “I owe you something of an apology,” he said.

“Sounds tentative,” said Sam. “Like you either don’t mean it, or you got other ammunition.”

“Every piece of paper with your name on it will hit the shredder by eight
A.M.
The past is history, and history doesn’t excite me.”

“What does?” I asked.

Liska took a moment, during which I figured he judged the consequences of punching out my lights. Then he surprised us both. “I’m excited by being a better cop and a piss-poor politician. I may have to start smoking again.”

“Hold on to your gains,” said Sam. “You can buy votes but not health.”

Liska cracked a grin. “Am I one percent forgiven?”

Sam said, “You’re a hundred percent right about history.”

*   *   *

I took Sam home and drove to the lane. I found Bobbi Lewis sitting on my porch.

“I couldn’t sleep,” she said. “I came into town for breakfast at Harpoon Harry’s, but I knew I’d blow lunch in public if I tried to eat.”

I got a towel from the house, marched her to the shower, then left her alone. I searched the kitchen until I found a peppermint candy to toss on the pillow, turned back my bed, and made my second trip to Stock Island.

Teresa appeared to know that I was there as a friend, as an ex-lover. She still wanted me to hold her hand, to look in her eyes and not at the bubble of gauze that ran from her forehead to her left shoulder. Neither of us knew what to say, so we sat silently until nurses came in to make checks. One offered a tray of food that wouldn’t satisfy a small bird. When Teresa’s mother arrived, I left. At the information booth I was told that Dexter Hayes, in the ICU, couldn’t have visitors. He’d been upgraded to serious condition, so I should check back in two or three days.

*   *   *

I needed more sleep, but Bobbi was out solid on my bed, in the sleep of the weary, the victorious. She had found one of my bed-only T-shirts, one that said
GET YOUR STUFF TOGETHER
.

I gathered up Naomi’s camera gear, delivered it to Ernest Bramblett, and escaped after minimal conversation. From there I went to Harpoon Harry’s where I saw no one I knew.

Sipping coffee, waiting for my omelet, I overheard two people talking about Bloody Saturday, as the
Herald
had tagged it. One man said, “Screw that big-city crap. For once the
Citizen
got it right. That black cop is gonna survive, and the city’s better off with the bloodsuckers dead.”

*   *   *

On Monday morning, Jack Spottswood called the Miami FDLE to discuss our surrender procedure. The call was passed to Red Simmons. He informed us that, as promised, so long as Sam and I minded our own business, all charges were dropped. Simmons had seen the initial FDLE Crime Analysis on Mayor Gomez’s murder. Motives still were hazy, but they confirmed what we already knew. Cootie’s city-owned Taurus, which was a year newer than the mayor’s identical Taurus, was missing its trunk mat. Blood had dripped into the rear fender wells. The investigators felt that Gomez had died of head injuries while being transported in Cootie’s trunk.

*   *   *

I went home to a waiting phone message from Detective Bobbi Lewis. She had called from Grand Cayman Island.