Tampa Star (Blackfox Chronicles Book 1) (24 page)

Thoughts of going after the yacht were dismissed when Char’s kid warned him that he would aim the M24
0B right at his head and see if he could separate it from his body if he drew the life boat within range. Sally had to give it to him—
the kid was one tough motherfucker—he wished he had a few soldiers like him back in Providence; he would have been running the family.  Other problems presented themselves—Handley had failed him for the last time. 

Based on what he told Sally about his actions at Fort
DeSoto, he had been made and the cops would be looking for him. He would be incentivized to implicate Sally to save his job or worse, save him from a jail term. 

The loss of Groves, in debt to him for over two hundred large, meant that Sally would own another bar. He would pay off certain officials for permits and then make it a Strip Joint, bring in some premium
cooze, encourage hand-jobs, blow jobs and fucks in the Champagne Room and sell it off in a couple of years for a small fortune—it was a winning formula he had used before.

But the task at hand was what to do with Handley.  He would need to kill him quietly—he had some drugs in the house—
Oxycontin he took from a dealer that owed him money.  He would drug him enough to make him sleep then finish him, drag the body out to the boathouse and chop him up. It was grizzly work, but something Sally was well familiar with.

When he was an up and comer in the Providence branch of the
Patriarca family, he chopped up three bodies in one night—a dancer named Snowflake and two of her male friends that took offense at the way Sally treated her. They exercised a fatal lack of judgment and tried to defend her honor and rob him at the same time.  Shit, good judgment among punks in P-town was like honor among whores—non-existent.

Sally killed and dismembered them one at a time so those waiting could watch the process and know what was coming. He needed no such ostentatious display with Handley—the cop just needed to disappear.    

After a forty-five minute boat ride, Sally made out the lights of his dock and made a beeline for it. He arrived at the dock, expertly cut the engine, coasted in and glided up against the edge of the dock.

Handley was less than useless— Sally had to move him out of the way to find the line to tie off the boat.  He helped Handley out of the boat and supported him while they struggled through the back door to Sally’s house.  He
didn’t mind helping him at all—Handley was so weak it would make his job all the easier. Sally was already figuring he would use his Cushman golf cart to move the body out to the boat house.

***

Eddie had gotten a call as soon as the Tampa plainclothes officer on surveillance recognized two figures through the boom mounted night vision camera—a short fat man was struggling to help support a much larger figure walking to the back door of Sally’s mansion.   

“Might be your man
,” the cop told Eddie over the phone—“it looks like the tall guy is hurt.” Eddie was still finishing up at the crime scene on Fort DeSoto, but figured he could leave the rest for Ryerson to finish up. 

It had been a trying evening for the young detective—sort of like trial by napalm, but he was handling it. They had finished the photographic work, the corpses had been examined and were now with the M.E and all the ballistic evidence had been recovered—they even found tire tracks on the beach that indicated that Marilyn had indeed seen a DUKW being used as an amphibious getaway vehicle.

Eddie left Ryerson to finish up and headed over Code Two, but it really wasn’t necessary as the Tropical Storm kept all but the most foolhardy off the highway. Given the road conditions, Eddie figured it would take about a half hour to get to Sally’s McMansion.  

***

Sally left Handley on the couch in the living room and then went in search of the Oxycontin.  It was hidden in a fake bottle in his wine cellar and it took a while to find the exact one.  He returned to the kitchen, crushed up a hand full of tablets and put them in a glass of his most expensive brandy—figuring the cheap cocksucker would more readily accept a drink if he knew it came from a $400 dollar bottle. As an afterthought, he went to his gun case and took out a small .380 Walther PPK semi-automatic pistol—just in case.

Handley was sleeping when Sally brought the drink to him. Never one to miss an opportunity, Sally climbed on top of the man straddling his arms, opened his mouth and poured the liquid into his throat. Handley coughed and choked, but Sally clamped his hand over his mouth and around the back of his neck so he couldn’t spit out the poison. Handley coughed a few times and then swallowed the liquid.  Sally got off of him.

“What did you give me?”

“Just some medicine, calm down, I’m trying to take care of you.” Handley pushed both fingers down his throat to make himself vomit. Sally panicked, pulled out the .380 semi-automatic and pointed it at Handley.

“Take the fingers out of your mouth Handley, let the medicine do its work,” he said in a soothing tone of voice.

“Fuck you, Sally, you’re poisoning me! I can taste the oxy on the back of my tongue.”

Sally sighed audibly and advanced to within a few feet of where Handley stood, attempting to vomit. So little of this operation has gone according to plan, thought Sally sadly—he pulled the trigger four times, striking Handley in the chest and upper arm. Handley remained on his feet, so Sally fired twice more, this time striking Handley in the face.  He looked at Sally with shock and fell to the floor.

“Shots fired,” the plain clothes cop yelled into the radio, just as Eddie had entered through the driver’s door. They both unceremoniously bailed out of the surveillance van and took off at a run toward the front door of Sally’s house. It was made of heavy oak reinforced by iron and there was no way they would be getting through it without a battering ram.

They ran to the back door, found it unlocked, and burst inside, their weapons out and ready. 

Sally stood in front of the crumpled body of the corrupt cop, the Walther still smoking from the six rounds he fired. 
The proverbial smoking gun
, thought Eddie ironically.

The Tampa cop pointed his weapon at Sally and yelled “Police! Drop the weapon!” but Sally stood frozen—as if mesmerized. 

“You know, at one time, going to prison was no big deal for a mobster like me; good food, booze, shit, even broads if I wanted. But, not now, they took all that shit away, now I would have to live like a regular mooch, locked up like an animal.  I’m too old for dat shit—I mean, who wants to die in prison?”  Sally turned slowly, began to raise the weapon and point it at the Tampa cop. 

For the first time in his career, Eddie used his weapon in the line of duty—he fired twice, the Tampa cop three times; four rounds struck Sally. The gangster’s weapon had been empty, but the threat was there—Sally decided to commit suicide by cop rather than go to

prison. Eddie finally got his man—although it was not the way he intended to.

He spent the rest of the morning at Tampa Police headquarters answering lots of questions from detectives with their Internal Affairs and Organized Crime units. The Pinellas County Sherriff was there to lend support, but this was more a celebration than an interrogation. The OC guys were thankful beyond words—they chipped in and bought a bottle of bourbon for Eddie and the other cop just to say thanks.

Their Captain told Eddie that even in his semi-retired status—Sally Boots was suspected in numerous unsolved cases involving everything from being the brains behind a local armored car heist to traffic in illegal weapons and even getting a cut of the money paid for hand jobs in the back of the numerous local jerk parlors. The captain also mentioned they would be putting both Eddie and the Tampa plain clothes cop in for a Medal of Valor.

Because it was an officer related shooting, Eddie was taken off active investigations until the Shooting Inquest could clear him. The Sheriff told Eddie to take a couple of days off on the department and offered to buy Eddie breakfast to soften the blow of the routine suspension, but Eddie had expected it; there was no way to surprise Eidetic Eddie—if he heard it once, he knew it for life.

It was 10 a.m. on a rainy morning when he was finally released to return across the bridge to Pinellas County. He was exhausted, but he had a plan—a glass of Blanton’s very rare bourbon that he had just received as a gift, a good cigar and a long soak in his hot tub with his beautiful blond house guest.   He was sure that would put him as close to right as was possible given all that had transpired over the last few days.

They pulled into the Marco Island Marina at
11 a.m.   Michael left Char to coordinate repair of the wind screen, hitched a ride from the Marina’s runner to a car rental agency and rented a fire truck red Ford Mustang. He visited four separate gold dealers to cash in about $39,000 in gold coins, $10,000 being the minimum that entailed mandatory reporting to the I.R.S.

“Beautiful coins, Mister Groves.  Mind if I ask you were you got them?”
one of the dealers asked.

“Not at all, my grandmother passed recently and she left them to me in her will,” replied Michael with an appropriate look of sadness on his face.

“So sorry for your loss,” said the dealer with a perfunctory strained look. 

Michael then headed to the local Publix. The yacht had a subzero and plenty of storage, so he loaded up on dry goods, meat, beer, wine, a few bottles of bourbon and vodka. He figured they could catch fish, but bought some shrimp to cook for their evening dinner. He headed back to the marina and used a cart to transport the goods down the dock to where the boat was moored. Char was on the stern watching a new name being painted over the old. Michael advanced to his side and looked overboard.

“What do you think?”

“Good as Gold, I like it,” replied Michael. 

The painter finished and Char told Michael to give him two hundred bucks.

“Oh no Sir, there is no need to pay me, it will appear on your final invoice.”

“I know, but I want you to do me a favor,” replied Char.  

The windscreen was being shipped overnight from the Hatteras factory in New Bern, North Carolina and was expected to arrive by 8 a.m. The glass man needed an hour to do the install, so they could be on their way by nine, if their luck held. 

***

Eddie took a couple days off.  He and Carla spent most of their time moving from the Hot Tub to the bedroom, with occasional
detours to the kitchen—they both could never remember being so happy. The Sheriff called him in the morning of his third day of suspension and told him he had been cleared.

“Get your ass back to work,” was how he put it—the old man having a problem expressing sentimentality. 

In the old days he would have gone fishing and drinking, with emphasis on the latter, but now with Carla in the picture, he had to cut back on the booze as he wasn’t getting any younger. Still, it was a great time and he arrived back at work ready for just about anything. 

The voicemail message left for him came from an alleged marijuana smuggler caught short in the storm that had pulled his boat into the mangroves around the Tampa Bay Estuarine Ecosystem, a large estuary and conservation area on the south shore of Tampa Bay. While he sheltered among the mangroves, he witnessed a most amazing sight.

“Detective Doyle, this is Tomkins Principal, you gave me your card about a year ago,” the message began. Eddie immediately remembered the man— he was a smuggler Eddie questioned in a case involving a Pinellas County Sheriff’s deputy allegedly shaking down local marijuanistas.

Tomkins did not fit the usual stereotype of a marijuana smuggler.
He was in his mid-twenties, clean-cut and clean shaven, thin, due to a macrobiotic diet, bespectacled and normally dressed in high priced Columbia outerwear—as it’s breathable, he would explain.

He was born a bastard, the offspring of a high school principle with the first name of Tom and a teenage waitress off her birth control. She was never to learn his last name, but she knew his occupation—
High School Principal. Tomkins, therefore, was named after his father.

He graduated with a business degree from Florida State and suddenly found himself jobless, with almost one hundred thousand dollars in debt.  He turned a sideline business of selling marijuana to friends into a very lucrative full time job. 

Tomkins had originally sought out Eddie as the deputy had attempted to shake down one of his deck hands for protection money after he was arrested for a DUI with half a pound of herb concealed in the trunk of his piece of shit 89 Chevy. That investigation eventually led to the termination and arrest of the deputy.  While sheltering in the mangroves in a Boston Whaler,
with what Eddie assumed was a load of high grade Mexican marijuana
, the smuggler had witnessed what he could only described as a firefight between a yacht and a low lying tank like vehicle. Eddie texted the guy’s Smartphone with a hyperlink leading to a webpage devoted to a DUKW.

“That’s it,” replied the smuggler.  

Eddie asked if he could describe the yacht and any damage to it. It turns out the guy was saving up to buy a particular make of yacht and that was so interesting about the incident; it was the exact same model  he wanted to purchase; a 2004 Hatteras 80, replied the smuggler.  Business must be good, thought Eddie as he started calling marinas looking for a Hatteras 80 with a bullet damaged windscreen.

At 11:00 a.m. he left the office, drove across the bridge for an appointment he scheduled with troopers from the Florida State Police’s Marine Unit at their Bradenton Office. 

After a two hour search, they found the Duck, barely afloat with at least a dozen large holes in its hood.  Written on the front was “Mitch’s Duck Tours, St. Pete Beach” and then underneath in smaller case letters; guaranteed to get you wet!  The troopers called a heavy duty wrecker to pull the derelict vehicle from the bay. 

***

Marilyn had returned to duty just the day before, the gash to the back of her head required eight stitches to close, but staying at home was not for her and Eddie asked her for a favor.  She found the trailer easy enough as there was a bright yellow amphibious motor coach parked in front. Amphibicoach was written on the side in chrome cursive lettering.

Mitch had all the right answers; the Duck was stolen from outside his trailer the night before the storm, probably by some kids—probably not, Marilyn explained.
The Amphibicoach was a long term lease that he rented in anticipation of an insurance payment in order to continue earning.

“When did you report it missing?” 

“Seven thirty p.m.” he said, conveniently leaving out that it occurred right after he struck a deal to help recover the long buried loot. Marilyn was suspicious, but her questions were

g
oing nowhere, her stitches ached and she figured she had fulfilled her promise to Eddie.

“
One last thing, Detective,” Mitch offered.

“Deputy,” she corrected, “but perhaps someday.” 

“Here is a card good for a free ride for you and your boyfriend,” he said, not seeing a wedding ring.

“That would be a gratuity,” she said.

“It’s worth less than fifty bucks, so it should be alright,” he protested.

“OK, then, thanks.”

“You still promise to get me wet?” she asked playfully.

“Huh?” Replied Mitch—rendered suddenly speechless. 

“I mean, the coach is fully enclosed, so…do you still promise to get me wet?” she said pointing to the advertisement for the tour posted on the wall in back of him.

“I am sure we can work something out,” he managed to reply.

Marilyn smiled, “Just fucking with your head, old timer,” she said as she stepped out of the trailer. Mitch put his feet up on the desk leaned back in his chair and laughed.

***

It should of have occurred to Eddie sooner, but having an eidetic memory didn’t necessarily mean he would always analyze something and come up with the right answer—there were hundreds of marinas in Florida that could replace a wind screen, but there was only one Hatteras factory and it was in North Carolina. It took him exactly five minutes to get an answer to his question—the Marco Island Marina ordered a windscreen for a Hatteras 80 Yacht two days ago. 

“Yeah, it was here a day ago, left yesterday morning for Mexico,” the maintenance manager answered.

Eddie asked about the stated cause of the bullet damaged windscreen and then said out loud, “Pirates? In the Caribbean?”  Then he said it to himself “Pirates of the Caribbean” and immediately felt stupid.

Eddie figured he was beaten, but he still had to know. “Do you know the new name of the yacht?”

“Yeah, it’s written on the work order; Tampa Star, said the manager, and then added as an afterthought, wasn’t there an ocean

liner that sunk back in the seventies with a similar name?” But Eddie didn’t hear him— he had already dropped his phone.  

***

The Good as Gold headed due south towards the west coast of Cuba, thinking they would stop in Havana for a few days before island hopping through the Caribbean. And then, who knows?