The 24th Letter ((Mystery/Thriller)) (22 page)

“Miami Beach Marina, off Alton Road.  Thanks, Lauren.  Please hurry.”

#

FIFTEEN MINUTES LATER, Lauren Miles drove slowly through the Miami Beach Marina parking lot.  She saw O’Brien approach in a Jeep.  He pulled up and lowered the window.  “Thanks for coming, what do you have?”

 “We managed to read some of Spelling’s letter.  The first sentence or two he says he’s sorry for his life, makes amends, and says he was in the condo parking lot that night to score some cocaine.  We lost the best imprint as he was identifying where he hid the knife.  A Florida city that has the first two letters beginning with an S and a T.”

“St. Petersburg would be the largest.”

“But there are six others, including his old home, Florida State Prison in Starke.  I have a list for you.”  She handed O’Brien the slip of paper.  “Here, too, is your recorder and dubs of the Russo confession.   Spelling’s letter is in this package.  I’m going to the airport to send it to Quantico.  We’ll see if they can get a better read.”

“Lauren, I really appreciate what you’re doing.”  He touched her shoulder.

O’Brien’s cell rang.  It was Detective Dan Grant.  “Dan, do you have anything?”

“One of our deputies found Lyle Johnson’s body.  Pretty nasty, Sean.  It’s the best intent to make it look like a suicide that I’ve ever seen.  There is GSR on Johnson’s hand.  The perp nailed Johnson in the right temple.  Probably reloaded with a round after he’d killed Johnson.  I’m betting he held Johnson’s hand to the pistol grip as he fired a shot into the sky.  If it weren’t for the circumstances, Johnson’s connection to Spelling, this

would be written off as a suicide, considering Johnson’s martial strife and debt load.  How are we going to catch somebody this good in the time Charlie William’s has left?”

“Begin by seeing who Lyle Johnson spoke with before he was killed.  See if he placed a call to Jonathan Russo.”

SIXTY

District attorney Stanley Rosen finished a tenth lap in his backyard pool.  He climbed out, toweled off, and stood by his terracotta tile wet bar to mix a vodka and tonic.  As he squeezed a fresh lime in the drink, he saw something move to his far left.

“Hello, counselor,” O’Brien said, opening the screened pool door and stepping onto the Mexican-tiled patio.

“What are you doing here, O’Brien?”  Rosen sipped his drink.

“I have an audio tape of Jonathan Russo admitting to stabbing Alexandria Cole eleven years ago.” 

“Did you have to assault Russo to get it?”

“Those media reports aren’t accurate.” 

O’Brien pressed the play button on the small tape recorder.  His voice came through the speaker:
“
I won’t cheat the state out of its right to lock you away, Russo, so I’ll dial 911, but before I do…tell me, did you kill Alexandria Cole?  The truth!”

“All right!”
screamed Russo. 
“All right!  I killed the bitch!  That what you wanted to hear?”

Rosen said, “What did you mean, ‘right to lock you away?’” 

“I wanted Russo to admit his guilt in the Alexandria Cole killing.”

Rosen sipped the drink. “First we have to indict Russo.  If he’s found guilty—”

“You can use his admission to request a stay.  Buy me some time, Rosen.”

“Why?  Doesn’t mean I’d get one.  Besides, like I told you in my office, a place where we ought to be having this discussion, I’m not going in front of a jury to reopen the Cole case unless I have solid proof—real evidence—that I feel will result in a conviction.  This screaming match between you and Russo won’t stand up.”

“Maybe not, but a stay will give me time to find what you need.”

“Find what?”

“The murder weapon for starters.  FBI’s running tests on a piece of paper that was directly beneath the page that Sam Spelling used to write the confession.  We couldn’t find Spelling’s letter on Father Callahan’s body, but we believe we can find the knife in a matter of days.”

“Even if you find it, O’Brien, you don’t know if there’s anything on it.  Could have been wiped clean.”

“Maybe, but we don’t know until we run tests.”

“You won’t know that until you find it.  Until then, I’d appreciate it if you leave my property.  And the next time, make an appointment.”  Rosen turned and walked over to a chaise lounge and sat down.

O’Brien said, “Alexandria Cole was murdered.  In the last two days, three people who knew the ID of the killer are dead.  The last one was a prison guard who overheard Spelling’s confession to Father Callahan.  They just found his body.  Shot in the head.  Close range.  I think Russo’s hired a pro.  And now Charlie Williams has thirty-five hours to live.  They’ll remove him from his cell and take him to a death watch cage less

than fifty feet from the death chamber.  You have a chance to postpone it for a few days.  If I can’t find evidence, at least you tried to save an innocent man’s life.”

“Twelve people agreed Williams killed his girlfriend in a fit of jealous rage.  You helped convict him, remember?  And nothing you’ve said to me or have shown me changes that.  If you aren’t gone in ten seconds, I’ll have you locked up.”

“I can admit my mistake.  You won’t even consider the fact you’re making one.  But consider this, counselor, you’ll be just as guilty as Russo if Williams dies.  If I find the proof after Williams is dead, you can tell the media why you did nothing to stop it.”

O’Brien walked to his car parked on the side of the palm-tree-lined street.

Rosen knocked back the rest of his vodka, picked up the cell phone by his chair, dialed a number, and said, “This is district attorney Stan Rosen, I understand there’s an APB out for Sean O’Brien.”  He paused.  “O’Brien just left my house, on Monroe Terrace.  Looks like he’s in a green Jeep and heading south toward Collins.”

SIXTY-ONE

The female police dispatcher sat in front of a darkened console at police headquarters, looked at the LED grid map of Miami Beach and keyed her radio microphone, “Airborne, unit three.”

“Unit three.”

“Need the bird for an aerial recon in the vicinity of Flamingo Park and Collins.”

“Ten-four.”

“Subject vehicle is a green Jeep.  Two ground units are in the area.  Subject is considered armed and dangerous.  ID, Sean O’Brien, forty-three year old W.M.  Knows the area well.  Formerly with Miami-Dade homicide.”

“Be airborne in three minutes.” 

As the two helicopter pilots suited up and left the building, one said to the other, “Let’s go round up Dirty Harry.”

#

O’BRIEN LOOKED IN HIS rearview mirror, driving east on 11th street.  He assumed that Rosen had made a call to MPD.  O’Brien cut off of 11th onto a side street and drove slowly down the street until he saw a house with a for sale sign in the front yard.  The grass was in need of mowing and the curtains were gone from the windows.  O’Brien pulled in the driveway, shut off the motor, and sat.  He lowered the windows and listened.  He heard the ticking of the cooling engine, the chant of a mockingbird in the

tree, a tennis racquet serving a ball, and the howl of sirens.  O’Brien lowered the window a little more.  The unmistakable sound of a helicopter was coming his way.  He started the Jeep and pulled farther up the driveway, under the cover of a massive banyan tree.

A minute later the helicopter flew directly over him, the prop wash causing a few leaves to spiral down off the tree and land on the Jeep’s hood and windshield.

He opened his laptop, found a signal and keyed in a name:
Tucker Houston, defense attorney, Miami, Florida. 
He scanned a biography.  Houston retired nine years ago.  Lived in Coconut Grove.  O’Brien set the GPS for the address, backed the Jeep out of the driveway, and headed in the opposite direction from where the posse was going.

In less than five minutes, O’Brien was approaching MacArthur Causeway.  A traffic accident blocked an intersection causing O’Brien’s Jeep to become part of a parade going nowhere.  He couldn’t back up, go right or left.  Stuck.

They were just pulling the sheet over the biker’s face as O’Brien was coming into the intersection.  He purposely avoided looking directly at the officer who was waving cars around the scene.  As O’Brien passed, he glanced up in his rearview mirror.  The officer had stopped the cars behind him and turned to look at O’Brien’s Jeep.  He tilted his head toward his left shoulder, keyed the mic, and began speaking.

“All units, the subject’s Jeep just drove around a ten-sixteen at Euclid and Eighth.  Looks like he’s heading for the Mac Causeway.”

O’Brien knew he’d been made.  He pulled off Euclid, cutting through a Seven-Eleven lot and onto Poinciana Boulevard heading north.  He pushed the Jeep to ninety as he weaved through traffic.  He heard sirens.  Dozens of cars.  He knew the taser and sniper squad would be among them.

O’Brien slammed on his brakes and cut down a street lined with banyan trees.  He drove north on Collins, cutting through the parking lot of the Haulover Golf Course.  He pulled into a strip mall parking lot.  A grocery stock boy was ending his shift.  The teenager walked through the lot and opened the door to his green Jeep, turned on the air conditioning, and called his girlfriend on his cell as he waited for the Jeep to cool.

O’Brien drove on through the lot, the sound of sirens in the distance.  He whipped into a Mobile gas station and headed behind the building to a covered automatic carwash.  O’Brien shoved eight quarters in the slots and drove his Jeep inside the carwash, stopping when a red light flashed.  In seconds, the wash began.  Even with the sound of water all around him, O’Brien could hear the MPD helicopter circling nearby.

#

THE SWAT TEAM surrounded the green Jeep in the parking lot. The teenager sat in his Jeep, rocking to his loud music, and talking to his girlfriend on the phone.

“Put your hands in the wheel!  Do it now!” shouted the police command over the bullhorn.

The teenager swallowed nervously and said to his girlfriend, “Shit!  I’m surrounded by cops!  They’re pointing guns at me!  Call my mom!”  

#

O’BRIEN LEFT THE CAR WASH and tore out of the lot toward Collins Avenue.  His cell rang.  It was Detective Ron Hamilton.  “Sean, I’ve heard the noise on the radio.  You have to turn yourself in!  It can all be explained.”

“You know as well as I do that it can’t be explained quickly.  I’d be held, then go for a bond hearing.  In the meantime, a good chunk of time that Charlie Williams has left on the planet is gone.  For his sake, I can’t afford to come in.”

“You can’t afford not to!”

“Volusia SO found a body, the prison guard.  Name’s Lyle Johnson.  He was assigned to watch Sam Spelling.  Whoever killed Spelling and Callahan, killed Johnson.”

“You think it’s Russo?”

“I think it’s one of his hired guns.”  

“We found that girl you were with at Club Oz.”

“Is she okay?”  O’Brien almost knew what Dave was about to tell him.

“One of our detectives went over to Barbie Beckman’s house.  First time, she wouldn’t come to the door.  Second time, we entered with a warrant.  Found her on the bathroom floor.”

“Is she alive?”

“Barely.  She’s at Jackson Memorial.  And she’s in bad shape.”  

SIXTY-TWO

O’Brien maneuvered the Jeep around double-parked cars at Jackson Memorial Hospital, found a place at the farthest end of an employee parking lot to park.  He pulled on a baseball cap and sunglasses before he got out of the Jeep.

#

            O’BRIEN LIGHTLY KNOCKED on the door to room 215.  There was no answer.  He opened the door.  The name on the door said Elizabeth Barbie Beckman, but the woman in the bed looked like a mummy.  Her face had been so badly beaten the swelling had forced her eyes closed.  The lumps were the color and shape of dark plums.  A knot on her head was the size of a lemon.  IVs ran into both arms.  One arm was in a cast.  He saw dried blood in her left ear canal.

            O’Brien stepped to the bed.  The woman’s breathing was quick and shallow.  He looked at the monitors.  Her heart rate was fast, even in her sleep.  She made small whimpering sounds, like a puppy might utter.  Her body jerked as if she was trying to shake out of a bad dream.  O’Brien leaned down, his lips near one of her ears.  “Barbie, this is Sean O’Brien.  Can you hear me?”

            There was no movement.  No flutter of the eyes.  Nothing.  O’Brien thought she may be in a coma.  He said, “Barbie, this is Ken, how are you feeling?”

             A soft moan, the words trying to rise to the surface.  She managed to open her right eye.  The entire white of her eye was dark red, the look of a moldy strawberry.  

“Ken,” she mumbled.  “You’re here…”

“Barbie, who did this to you?”

“He hurt me so bad,” she whispered.  Her eyes filled with water, the tears spilling out of the swollen corners and soaking into the gauze.

“Who did it?”

“They’ll kill you…”

“Barbie, who hurt you?”

She sobbed and said in a raspy whisper, “Carlos Salazar.”

“Russo’s guy—”

“Please, don’t…they’re part of the mob…soldiers…life means nothing to them.”

O’Brien held one of her hands, careful not to touch the IV.  “Listen to me, no man has the right to do this to you.  Do you understand?”

“I’m so scared…he hurt me so...”

O’Brien used his thumb to wipe away the tears from her right eye.  He leaned down and kissed her forehead.  “I’m going to help you.”

She tried to smile.  Butterfly stitches in her swollen lips prevented it.  She managed to say, “In my English lit class I read about poetic justice…you know like some Shakespearean play where good beats evil.”

O’Brien smiled.  Barbie continued, “Kind of poetic justice that I’m in the same hospital where they brought Jonathan Russo.  I read in the paper that they brought him here.  You, sort of, put him in the hospital.  And one of his guys did the same to me.  I don’t understand it though, if good beats evil, then why am I here?”