Skin Tight (43 page)

“No gag this time,” Christina requested. “I promise not to scream.”

“But you'll talk,” said Chemo. “That's even worse.”

Since the morning he had kidnapped her from the hotel on Key Biscayne, Chemo had said practically nothing to Christina Marks. Nor had he menaced or abused her in any sense—it was as if he knew that the mere sight of him, close up, was daunting enough. Christina had spied the butt of a revolver in Chemo's baggy pants pocket, but he had never pulled it; this was a big improvement over the two previous encounters, when he had nearly shot her.

She said, “I just want to know why you're doing this, what exactly you want.”

He acted as if he never heard her. Maggie handed Christina a small cup of Pepsi.

“Don't let her drink too much,” Chemo cautioned. “She'll be going to the head all night.”

He turned on the television set and grimaced: pro basketball—the Lakers and the Pistons. Chemo hated basketball. At six foot nine, he had spent his entire adulthood explaining to rude strangers that no, he didn't play pro basketball. Once a myopic Celtics fan had mistaken him for Kevin McHale and demanded an autograph; Chemo had savagely bitten the man on the shoulder, like a horse.

He began switching channels until he found an old
Miami Vice.
He turned up the volume and scooted his chair closer to the tube. He envied Don Johnson's three-day stubble; it looked rugged and manly. Chemo himself had not shaved, for obvious reasons, since the electrolysis accident.

He turned to Maggie and asked, “Can they do hair plugs on your chin, too?”

“Oh, I'm sure,” she said, though in fact she had never heard of such a procedure.

Pinned to the bed like a butterfly, Christina said, “Before long, somebody's going to be looking for me.”

Chemo snorted. “That's the general idea.” Didn't these women ever shut up? Didn't they appreciate his potential for violence?

Maggie sat next to Christina and said, “We need to get a message to your boyfriend.”

“Who—Stranahan? He's not my boyfriend.”

“Still, I doubt if he wants to see you get hurt.”

Christina appraised herself—strapped to a bed, squirming in her underwear—and imagined what Reynaldo Flemm would say if he came crashing through the door. For once she'd be happy to see the stupid sonofabitch, but she knew there was no possibility of such a rescue. If Mick couldn't find her, Ray didn't have a prayer.

“If it's that videotape you're after, I don't know where it is—”

“But surely your boyfriend does,” said Maggie.

Chemo pointed at the television. “Hey, lookie there!” On the screen, Detective Sonny Crockett was chasing a drug smuggler through Stiltsville in a speedboat. This was the first time Christina had seen Chemo smile. It was a harrowing experience.

Maggie said, “So how do you get in touch with him?”

“Mick? I don't know. There's no phone out there. Anytime I wanted to see him, I rented a boat.”

A commercial came on the television, and Chemo turned to the women. “Jesus, I don't want to go back to that house—enough of that shit. I want him to come see me. And he will, soon as he knows I've got you.”

In her most lovelorn voice, Christina said to Maggie, “I really don't think Mick cares one way or the other.”

“You better hope he does,” said Chemo. He pressed the towel firmly into Christina's mouth and turned back to watch the rest of the show.

 

 

ON
the morning of February eighteenth, the last day of Kipper Garth's law career, he filed a motion with the Circuit Court of Dade County in the case of Nordstrom v. Graveline, Whispering Palms,
et al.

The motion requested an emergency court order freezing all the assets of Dr. Rudy Graveline, including bank accounts, certificates of deposit, stock portfolios, municipal bonds, Keogh funds, Individual Retirement Accounts, and real estate holdings. Submitted to the judge with Kipper Garth's motion was an affidavit from the Beachcomber Travel Agency stating that, on the previous day, one Rudolph Graveline had purchased two first-class airplane tickets to San José, Costa Rica. In the plea (composed entirely by Mick Stranahan and one of the paralegals), Kipper Garth asserted that it was Dr. Graveline's intention to flee the United States permanently.

Normally, a request involving a defendant's assets would have resulted in a full-blown hearing and, most likely, a denial of the motion. But Kipper Garth's position (and thus the Nordstroms') was buttressed by a discreet phone call from Mick Stranahan to the judge, whom Stranahan had known since his days as a young prosecutor in the DUI division. After a brief reminiscence, Stranahan told the judge the true reason for his call: that Dr. Rudy Graveline was a prime suspect in an unsolved four-year-old abduction case that might or might not be a homicide. Stranahan assured his friend that, rather than face the court, the surgeon would take his dough and make a run for it.

The judge granted the emergency order shortly after nine o'clock in the morning. Kipper Garth was astonished at his own success; he never dreamed litigation could be so damn easy. He fantasized a day when he could get out of the referral racket altogether, when he would be known and revered throughout Miami as a master trial attorney. Kipper Garth liked the billboards, though. However high he might soar among the eagles of Brickell Avenue, the billboards definitely had to stay. . . .

At ten forty-five, Rudy Graveline arrived at his bank in Bal Harbour and asked to make a wire transfer of $250,000 from his personal account to a new account in Panama. He also requested $60,000 in U.S. currency and traveler's cheques. The young bank officer who was assisting Rudy Graveline left his office for several minutes. When he returned, one of the bank's vice presidents stood solemnly at his side.

Rudy took the news badly.

First he wept, which was merely embarrassing. Then he became enraged and hysterical and, finally, incoherent. He staggered, keening, into the bank lobby, at which point two enormous security guards were summoned to escort the surgeon from the premises.

By the time they deposited Rudy in the parking lot, he had settled himself and stopped crying.

Until one of the bank guards had pointed at the fender of the car and said, “The hell happened to your Jag, brother?”

 

 

PERHAPS
it was the euphoria of the legal triumph, or perhaps it was simple prurient curiosity that impelled Kipper Garth to drop by the Nordstrom household during his lunch hour. The address was in Morningside, a pleasant old neighborhood of bleached stucco houses located a few blocks off the seediest stretch of Biscayne Boulevard.

Marie Nordstrom was surprised to see Kipper Garth, but she welcomed him warmly at the door, led him to the Florida room, and offered him a cup of coffee. She wore electric-blue Lycra body tights, and her ash-blond hair was pulled back in a girlish ponytail. Kipper couldn't take his eyes off the subject of litigation, her breasts. The exercise outfit left nothing to the imagination; these were the merriest-looking breasts that Kipper Garth had ever seen. It was difficult to think of them as weapons.

“John's not here,” Mrs. Nordstrom said. “He got a job interview over at the jai-alai fronton. You take cream?”

Kipper Garth took cream. Mrs. Nordstrom placed the coffee pot on a glass tray. Kipper Garth made space for her on the sofa, but she moved to a love seat, facing him from across the coffee table.

Kipper Garth said, “I just wanted to bring you up to date on the malpractice case.” Matter-of-factly he told Mrs. Nordstrom about the emergency court order to freeze Dr. Graveline's assets.

“What exactly does that mean?”

“It means his money won't be going anywhere, even if he does.”

Mrs. Nordstrom was not receiving the news as exuberantly as Kipper Garth had hoped; apparently she could not appreciate the difficulty of what he had done.

“John and I were talking just last night,” she said. “The idea of going to trial . . . I don't know, Mr. Garth. This has been so embarrassing for both of us.”

“We're in it now, Mrs. Nordstrom. There's no turning back.” Kipper Garth tried to suppress the exasperation in his voice: Here Rudy Graveline was on the ropes and suddenly the plaintiffs want to back out.

“Maybe the doctor would be willing to settle the case,” ventured Mrs. Nordstrom.

Kipper Garth put down the coffee cup with a clack and folded his arms. “Oh, I'm sure he would. I'm sure he'd be delighted to settle. That's exactly why we won't hear of it. Not yet.”

“But John says—”

“Trust me,” the lawyer said. He paused and lowered his eyes. “Forgive me for saying so, Mrs. Nordstrom, but settling this case would be very selfish on your part.”

She looked startled at the word.

Kipper Garth went on: “Think of all the patients this man has harmed. This
alleged
surgeon. If we don't stop him, nobody will. If you settle the case, Mrs. Nordstrom, the butchery will continue. You and your husband will be wealthy, yes, but Rudy Graveline's butchery will continue. At his instruction, the court file will be sealed and his reputation preserved. Again. Is that really what you want?”

Kipper Garth had listened intently to his own words, and was impressed by what he had heard; he was getting damn good at oratory.

A few awkward moments passed and Mrs. Nordstrom said, “They've got an opening for a coach over at the jai-alai. John used to play in college, he was terrific. He even went to Spain one summer and trained with the Basques.”

Kipper Garth had never heard of a Scandinavian jai-alai coach, but his knowledge of the sport was limited. Oozing sincerity, he told Mrs. Nordstrom that he hoped her husband got the job.

She said, “Thing is, he can't tell anybody about his eye. They'd never hire him.”

“Why not?”

“Too dangerous,” Mrs. Nordstrom said. “The ball they use is like a rock. A
pelota
it's called. John says it goes like a hundred and sixty miles an hour off those walls.”

Kipper Garth finished his coffee. “I've never been to a jal-alai game.” He hoped she would take the hint and change the conversation.

“If you're playing, it helps to have two good eyes,” Mrs. Nordstrom explained. “For depth perception.”

“I think I understand.”

“John says they won't let him coach if they find out about the accident.”

Now Kipper Garth got the picture. “That's why you want to settle the lawsuit, isn't it?”

Mrs. Nordstrom said yes, they were worried about publicity. “John says the papers and TV will go crazy with a story like this.”

Kipper thought: John is absolutely right.

“But you're a victim, Mrs. Nordstrom. You have the right to be compensated for this terrible event in your life. It says so in the Constitution.”

“John says they let cameras in the courtrooms. Is that true?”

“Yes, but let's not get carried away—”

“If it were your wife, would you want the whole world to see her tits on the six o'clock news?” Her tone was prideful and indignant.

“I'll speak to the judge, Mrs. Nordstrom. Please don't be upset. I know you've been through hell already.” But Kipper Garth was excited by the idea of TV cameras in the courtroom—it would be better than billboards!

Marie Nordstrom was trying not to cry and doing stolidly. She said, “I blame that damn Reagan. He hadn't busted up the union, John'd still have his job in the flight tower.”

Kipper Garth said, “Leave it to me and the two of you will be set for life. John won't need a job.”

Mrs. Nordstrom wistfully gazed at the two sturdy, Lycra-covered cones on her chest. “They say contractures are easy to fix, but I don't know.”

Kipper Garth circled the coffee table and joined her on the love seat. He put an unpracticed arm around her shoulders. “For what it's worth,” he said, “they
look
spectacular.”

“Thank you,” she whispered, “but you just don't know—how could you?”

Kipper Garth removed the silk handkerchief from his breast pocket and gave it to Mrs. Nordstrom, who sounded like the SS
Norway
when she blew her nose.

“Know what I think?” said Kipper Garth. “I think you should let me feel them.”

Mrs. Nordstrom straightened and gave a stern sniffle.

The lawyer said: “The only way I can begin to understand, the only way I can convey the magnitude of this tragedy to a jury, is if I can experience it myself.”

“Wait a minute—you want to feel my boobs?”

“I'm your lawyer, Mrs. Nordstrom.”

She eyed him doubtfully.

“If it were a burn case, I'd have to see the scar. Dismemberment, paraplegia, same goes.”

“Looking is one thing, Mr. Garth. Touching is something else.”

“With all respect, Mrs. Nordstrom, your husband is going to make a lousy witness in this case. He's going to come across as a selfish prick. Remember what he said that day in my office? Bocci balls, Mrs. Nordstrom. He said your breasts were as hard as bocci balls. This is not the testimony of a sensitive, caring spouse.”

She said, “You'd be bitter, too, if it was your eye that got poked out.”

“Granted. But let me try to come up with a more gentle description of your condition. Please, Mrs. Nordstrom.”

“All right, but I won't take my clothes off.”

“Of course not!”

She slid a little closer on the love seat. “Give me your hands,” she said. “There you go.”