The Dark of Day (45 page)

Rick looked at her a while longer. “Good.”

Judy had apparently decided she liked Rick Slater well enough to say, “He's cheating on her. That's not why she called it off. She called it off because, basically, he's an asshole. I haven't told her yet about the other women, but I will. I just found out a couple of days ago from Harold Vincent. He was telling me about it.”

“The pornographer.”

“Well . . . yeah. And he was complaining about Billy Medina. A funny world, huh? C.J. met Billy in AA, and he's the reason she stopped going. After he quit, she quit. He was never any good for her.”

Rick was folding a napkin into a tight square. He'd heard that no matter how thin the paper, it wouldn't fold in half more than eight times. “Has he ever hit her?”

Judy showed some surprise. “No. If he had, I'd have known, trust me. Why are you asking me that?”

“No reason.”

“I'll tell you about Billy. He has a hotel and casino on Antigua, him and a couple of other guys. He wants to get into online gaming, that's why he hooked up with Harold, so he could learn about it, but after Harold taught him everything he knew, Billy would have nothing more to do with him. I mean, an upstanding citizen like Guillermo Medina does not associate
with pornographers, does he? C.J. wanted Billy to ask Harold about Alana, and he wouldn't do it. He's afraid the other investors of The Aquarius would find out he knows people like Harold Vincent, and they'd kick him off the team. They probably would. Billy wants to open a casino in The Aquarius when it's legal, and he thinks someday it will be. That's why he invested in it and threw money at Paul Shelby's campaign. Asshole.”

Rick folded the napkin six, then seven times. “C.J. told me that Billy introduced Alana to Harold Vincent. Is that right?”

Judy nodded. “Billy told her. There's a lot about Billy Medina that doesn't show on the surface. C.J. is finally starting to get it.”

The paper wouldn't go into a ninth fold. The muscles in Rick's forearms stood out. Giving up, he twisted the paper apart and tossed the pieces into his empty coffee cup. “What's she going to talk to Billy about? You said my case. What does that mean?” When Judy only looked back at him, he said, “I'm the client. You work for me, too, technically.”

She twirled a strand of hair around her finger, waiting for someone to walk by. “C.J. believes that Paul Shelby did it. You know. Alana went there to meet someone, right? C.J. thinks it was him, and they argued or she said she wanted money, whatever. C.J. told me how you can get to the property next door, and she thinks it happened there. Except how did Shelby leave afterward? Not in a taxi, because you have to wait too long that time of night. She thinks he called someone. His mother. They put Alana in the car and took off. What C.J. wants to ask Billy is, did he see Shelby leave? Or did Shelby just split and not say anything? You can tell a lot from a person's actions.”

“Alana was taken out in the back of Milo's limousine,” Rick said.

Judy shook her head. “C.J. doesn't think so.”

Even after listening to Judy Mazzio explain it, Rick wasn't convinced. No bloodstains in the backseat or the trunk. No hairs. Someone could have cleaned it. After she'd left, heading for the Beach with the statements, Rick got into his car and called Carlos Moreno.

Inez answered, and he got the frosty treatment for a minute before she relented and asked if he wanted to come over for dinner. “Gee, Inez, I'd love to but I have to go somewhere. Could you put Carlos on?” While he
waited, he heard a TV in the background, sounded like a weatherman showing where the band of thunderstorms would come through. Carlos picked up.

“Carlos, I need you to go into my files and get a phone number for me.”

 

 

Julio Sandoval had been Milo Cahill's masseur for five years. He was a wiry man with blue-tinted glasses and a narrow black beard. Rick had first talked to Julio about six weeks ago, getting a general sense of what it was like, working for Milo Cahill. Julio was quick to roll his eyes and dish the dirt. He couldn't be too picky about his clients, though. He and his wife were expecting a baby and needed the cash.

Julio had said, “I've been in this business for fifteen years, and I am very, very good. I am the only one who can work the knots out of Milo Cahill's back. He wants me over there almost every freaking day. I bring my table, but half the time Milo is never on it. Oh, Julio, would you run over to Epicure and pick up some steaks? I am a licensed massage therapist, and I have to put up with this shit? Julio, would you fix me some tea? Would you give Princess a bath? That dog. I've never hated an animal so much in my life.”

Rick got in touch with Julio and asked if he could come by. Julio said sure, but he didn't have much time. They were going out to a movie with some friends. “I'll come down to the lobby, okay?”

“You're lucky I'm here at all,” Julio said as he directed Rick to a corner away from the entrance. They sat on a bench done in turquoise vinyl. “I was supposed to be at Milo's tonight, but he cancelled. He has a business meeting, that hideous resort he's designing. He gave everyone the night off. He does that, cancels at the last minute, which is fine with me because he has to pay for it anyway.”

Rick said he wanted to ask Julio about the weekend that Alana Martin had disappeared. Had he been at Milo's house that Sunday and the few days after that? If so, had Milo asked him to clean the interior of the limousine? Had Julio seen anyone else do it? Maybe even Milo?

“I wasn't there on Sunday. I stayed home. I'd been out so late the night before, taking Milo to the party, I said fuck it, I am not coming over there today, and he said fine, don't.”

“You drove him to Medina's house?”

“Yes. He asked me, and I said not unless you pay me two hundred dollars. And he did! I called my wife. We had plans to go out, but she said take the money, fool. Milo has a room full of costumes, I kid you not, and he made me wear a black suit and a cap. I drove him to the party in that ridiculous car, ten miles to the gallon. Someone should throw a match into the gas tank. We got there about eleven o'clock. I couldn't just stop on the street and wait for Milo to get out, could I? No, I had to go around the circular driveway, under the portico, and jump out and open his door so he could properly greet his fans and admirers. He didn't want me to go in, of course, his
chauffeur.
How would it look?”

“You stayed with the car?”

“I parked it down the street and listened to my iPod. Milo didn't want the valets touching his precious vehicle. When Milo called me, I picked him up and took him home. He was whining that he needed his back massaged. He gave me another hundred bucks. I didn't get home until two in the morning. There was no way I was going to run over there again on Sunday.”

“Jesus Christ.” Elbows on his knees, Rick dropped his forehead into his hands.

After a while Julio said, “Is that all? I need to get back upstairs.”

 

 

Arching over downtown Miami on the Interstate, Rick had to turn on his windshield wipers in a light drizzle. As he turned more toward the west, he could see the thunderheads moving in, before the trees blotted out his view.

Ten minutes later, he was parking alongside the wall outside Noreen and Donald Finch's house in Coral Gables. He had a key to Paul Shelby's office that Noreen had asked him to return. As an excuse, it wasn't brilliant, but it would do.

Donald Finch opened the door holding a rocks glass. His sandy blond hair was rumpled, and his eyes were bloodshot. “Rick! Come in.” In the living room Finch put a hand on his shoulder. “I'm sorry about everything. It wasn't my decision to let you go. I hope you know that.”

“Absolutely. No hard feelings. Is Mrs. Finch around? I'll give her my regards. I have something to drop off.”

“She's upstairs. Do you want a drink?”

“No, thanks, I'm on my way home.”

Donald Finch walked to the bottom of the stairs and called up, “Noreen! Noreen, my sweet, you have company.” A muffled voice floated down. Finch said, “Richard Slater.”

The living room had some French doors on the other side that opened onto a wide terrace under a roof and, beyond that, a pool on the right and, straight ahead, one of the canals in Coral Gables that led out to the bay. Rick walked over to the doors and looked through. Raindrops were dot-ting the surface of the pool, and he could see slashes of rain against the darker water of the canal. The boat was up on davits, about a twenty-four-footer, with a cover tied over it.

Finch gestured with his drink. “They say it's going to rain all weekend. Good for the flowers, bad for my golf game.”

“I see you've got a boat back there. Do you fish?”

“God, no. Never liked it.”

“When was the last time you cranked the engine? You can't let them sit.”

“We don't. Noreen takes it out sometimes, just putt-putting around with our friends. Good party boat, actually.”

“She knows boats, does she?”

“Noreen can do everything. She can rope a calf. I swear. I've seen her.” Donald Finch took a sip of his drink. “My wife.”

“Mr. Finch, I'm curious about something. The night of the party at Guillermo Medina's house, when that girl disappeared, I had Mr. Shelby's Cadillac. How did he get home? I felt kind of bad leaving him there, but he said I could go.”

“Well, I don't know. Paul didn't say anything about it to me.” He looked past Rick and said, “There she is, my lovely, calf-roping bride.”

How long had she been standing there? Noreen Finch's platinum hair was swept back on one side, and her lips were a slash of red. She wore a white silk top and blue jeans with sequins down the sides. They didn't do much for her figure.

“Mr. Slater, I said you could pick up your check on Monday. We don't keep the checkbook here.”

He held up the key. “I wanted to return this. It's for the front door of Mr. Shelby's office.”

She didn't blink. He had noticed that about her; she rarely blinked her eyes. She came over and held out her hand, and Rick dropped the key into it. He said, “I was just asking your husband how Mr. Shelby got home from the party. Do you know?”

“What kind of question is that?”

“I feel bad about stranding him.”

“No, he got home all right, so don't you worry about it. Donald, I'm going to walk Rick out. Fix me a drink, will you?” She took Rick's arm and turned him toward the front door. “You're such a mystery to me.”

“I am?”

“You are. I never know what you're thinking. It would be nice to believe that people who work for us have some degree of loyalty, but it's not always that way. When you're in the public arena, in politics, there are always those who, for one reason or another, want to bring you down. That's a sad fact. I have a real good sense about people, and when my alarm goes off, I listen. That's why we let you go. I don't know who you are.”

She opened the door. “Let me save you a trip to the office. Your lawyer still owes us some money for the deposit we gave her, so you just tell Ms. Dunn to take your two weeks' severance out of that and send us what's left.”

 

 

The light in the left-turn lane on Twenty-Second was yellow when he got to it, red as he went through. The pickup truck behind him went through as well, not unusual for Miami. You couldn't proceed on a green light without first checking to see what idiot was running the red light.

The truck was a fairly recent Ford 150, black or dark blue. Rick would have ignored it if it hadn't kept a steady distance behind him, speeding up to make the light, then slowing not to come too close. The humidity had fogged his rear window, making it impossible to see the driver's face. Another vehicle came up close behind the truck. Its headlights shone through, turning the driver into a silhouette. Eyes on his rearview mirror, Rick studied the shape. The shoulders were wide, and hair hung to his collar. The rest of it was combed straight up. It made the top of his head look like a paintbrush.

“Hey, Dennis. What are you doing back there?”

When Rick reached the gate of his apartment complex, he kept on going and took a right onto
Calle Ocho.
The pickup fell back, and a car cut in ahead of it, but a few blocks later Rick saw it again.

billy came to the door barefoot, wearing loose straw-colored linen slacks and an unbuttoned long-sleeved guayabera that he might have just thrown on. His silver hair was damp from a shower, the comb marks still in it. The hair on his chest was black, and a heavy gold chain gleamed at his neck. He was beautiful, and from habit, or some fatal weakness, she felt pulled toward him like a moth to flame, and despised herself for it. Billy kissed her cheek, then stood back and took inventory of what she was wearing: pink crop pants and a white top with three-quarter sleeves.