Valentino Pier (Rapid Reads) (6 page)
For the first few years, Gulliver shared the tips with the police. Then he stopped. Keisha’s murder was still officially an open case. But even a dead cop’s case is pushed to the bottom of the pile when the trail is cold. The first detectives on the case were now both retired. Gulliver had hoped the detectives who took over would see something the others hadn’t. Fresh eyes can be good. Nothing came of it. It wasn’t that the cops didn’t care. They did. Everybody cared. There was just nothing new.
Gulliver had to confess that he himself wasn’t as tireless in chasing down leads as he had been. At first, there was no lead he wouldn’t follow. No lead he wouldn’t push the cops to follow. Once he got his PI license, his carry permit, his knife and fighting training, there was no place he wouldn’t go to track down a lead or a suspect. It was a good thing his job paid him well. He had spent a lot of time and money traveling all over to talk to people. He had even gone to Alaska to talk to a retired cop who had worked in Keisha’s precinct for a few months. But, like all the other leads, it came to nothing.
That cop had some crazy theory about a secret plan inside the NYPD. A plot to do away with cops who refused to join a secret society. It turned out that the guy had a very bad record. That he was trouble no matter where he went. He had been transferred fifteen times in twenty years. He had been on medical leave many times. And it wasn’t hard to figure out why. He was crazy. When Gulliver talked to other cops who had worked with the guy, they all laughed.
Nuts
.
Paranoid
.
Schizo
.
Loony
.
Bonkers
.
Cuckoo
.
Wack-job
.
Out there
, was how they described him.
In the last year Gulliver had lost heart. And he had been so busy with his own cases. He knew Keisha would be okay with that. She’d always wanted him to shed his bitterness. To make a life for himself the way she had. He’d wondered what Keisha would think of Mia. That’s what got him started looking at his old files on Keisha’s murder. And then there was Detective Patrick. It was amazing that of all the detectives in the NYPD, it was Patrick who caught the Ellis Torres case. That happens in life sometimes. Things come together by accident.
So when Gulliver got back to the loft, he took out his old Keisha files. He felt many things. His heart sank at the huge size of the pile. It was nearly as tall as he was. And that wasn’t even counting the things he had stored on his computer. Thousands of tips. Hundreds of interviews. All of it leading nowhere. Then deep sadness as he recalled identifying Keisha’s body. The horror at the sight of what the bullets had done to her. Then happiness as he recalled how much they had loved each other. It was always the two of them against the world. Then swelling pride for what his sister had done with her life.
He began looking through the files. One by one. What he noticed was that then-Patrol Officer Samuel Patrick’s name came up a lot. Not in a bad way. Almost ever+. ed he saidy cop in their precinct had said that Sam Patrick and Keisha were friends. That they were close. Even the psycho in Alaska had mentioned that Keisha and Sam were close.
Gulliver hadn’t paid any attention to that before. It made sense. In the past, he hadn’t been looking for cops Keisha liked. Not her friends. Not the ones she got along with. No. He had been looking for the ones she didn’t like. The ones who gave her a hard time about being black. About being a woman. About being too heavy. About being too tough. About not being tough enough. Yes. When this case was done, he would have to sit down with Detective Patrick. If for no other reason than to be reminded of what was so cool about his sister.
Lost in the files, Gulliver let time slip away. He barely had time to shower and dress before Mia arrived. Only she didn’t get there.
Tick…tick…tick.
All of his clocks were digital, but he swore he could hear the seconds ticking into long minutes. Again he went through a bunch of feelings. Let-down. Anger. Worry. He began to beat himself up for having hope. It never failed. Why did he let himself hope? It always ended badly. Then, at 8:12, his house phone rang.
It was Mia. But something was wrong. He felt it even before he heard her voice. And when he heard her voice, there was no doubt.
“Gulliver, listen,” she whispered. Her voice was tense. She sounded out of breath.
“Mia! What’s wrong?” he shouted into the phone.
“What were you and Dr. Prentice talking about before? About the Department of Agriculture?”
“What’s that got to do—”
She cut him off. “Please, just answer.”
“Remember the other day when you called? When you told me Dr. Prentice needed to see me as soon as I could get there?”
“Sure I do,” she said.
“Well, he wanted to talk to me about some dead bugs he found on Ugly. He said they were rare and that they only came from India. He said he would have to report it to the Department of Agriculture.”
There was a moment of silence on the other end of the phone. Then, “Something’s not right, Gulliver. I do all the paperwork for those kinds of reports and—”
“Maybe he just called them,” Gulliver said.
“If he called, I would still have to do a report. He never asked me to do it. And I’m pretty sure he didn’t call them.”
“Listen to me carefully, Mia. Has anything been going on lately that’s weird or different in your office?”
Again there was quiet on the other end of the phone for a moment. “Dr. Prentice has been very tense since his divorce.”
“When was that?”
“A few months ago,” Mia said. “He lost a lot of money in the divorce. He even told us he might have to close the office down and join someone else’s practice.”
“But he didn’t close the office. Do you know how he’s been able to keep it open?” Gulliver asked.
“All I know is that my paycheck doesn’t bounce,” she said.+ir t88as
“Okay. Anything else weird? I mean in the last few days.”
“He has been really jumpy. Very quick to shout. Maybe that’s because of the accident.”
“Accident!” Gulliver had raised his voice. “What accident?”
“The other night, Dr. Prentice screwed up his car. He said he was swerving to miss a dog. He hopped up onto the sidewalk and scraped the entire side of his car. It’s in the shop.”
“But what’s wrong with you? Why aren’t you here? Why do you sound—”
“After I heard what you and Dr. Prentice were talking about, I knew something was wrong. I decided to come back to the office and look around. I have keys. I knew if I told you what I was doing, you would have told me not to.”
“You’re damn right. Get out of—”
“I found something,” she said. She was breathless again.
“What is it?”
“Cash. An entire f ile drawer full of bundles of—”
Mia stopped talking, but she didn’t hang up. Gulliver heard a file drawer slamming shut. Heard footsteps on a tile floor. Then, “Mia, what are you doing here after hours?” It was Dr. Prentice, and he didn’t sound happy.
“I had a date tonight.”
“Yes, I heard you and Mr. Dowd talking.” Gulliver could hear them. The sound was muted. Maybe Mia had dropped the phone into her bag. Maybe she was holding the phone behind her. “But that doesn’t answer my question, Mia. What are you doing here?”
“I was having second thoughts,” she said. “I decided I didn’t want to go out with him. But I left his card here. I wanted to call to tell him. I’m not the kind of person to just ncared the pupp
G+ouiother direction
ulliver left his house phone off the hook. He knew that as long as Prentice didn’t find Mia’s phone, there was a chance to save her. Once he was in his van, it took him less than three minutes to get to the vet clinic. Too late. They were gone. Gulliver knew what his next move was. He would call Detective Patrick. Patrick could use Mia’s phone to track her. But just as he was about to use the van’s cell-phone hookup, he got an incoming call. It was from Mia’s phone.
“Dowd. I think you know who this is.” Dr. Prentice’s voice echoed in the van.
“Yeah. I know.”
“Okay then. I think you know I have something you want.”
“Don’t hurt her. You hurt her and I’ll—”
“You’re in no position to threaten me, Dowd. Just do as I say and maybe we will all come out of this in good shape. Maybe.”
That was a lie and Gulliver knew it. But he didn’t have much choice other than to play along. To stall for time. One way to do that was to be silent. So he sat there, waiting for Prentice to get antsy. As he waited, he quietly flipped up the lid of the van’s console. He reached in and got out one of the spare cell phones he kept on hand. There were times he gave phones to informants. Or to runaway kids to call their parents. He had never thought he would need one for something like this.
Prentice got tired of the silence. “Dowd! What are you up to?”
“Nothing. Waiting for you say something.” Gulliver spoke as he texted. He sent the text. And said a silent prayer that the person he’d sent it to was there to receive it.
“You’re being watched. So don’t do anything stupid.”
Gulliver didn’t know whether Prentice was telling the truth. It didn’t matter. The van’s windows were tinted darker than was legal. When you’re a PI, you have to be able to watch people without being seen. The windows on his van let Gulliver see out. Seeing in was not so easy.
“I’m short. Not stupid.”
“Mia will stay alive as long as that stays true. Keep the phone line open, and I’ll give you directions,” Prentice said.
“Put her on the phone. I want to know she’s alive.”
“Don’t give me orders, Dowd. She’s alive.” As if on cue, Mia moaned. “You’re going to have to take my word for it,” Prentice said.
“Where are we going?” Gulliver asked.
“I’m not stupid either, Dowd. The directions will be step by step. You’ll know where you are going when you get there. Get on the Gowanus Expressway and head to the Belt Parkway East. Remember. You break this phone connection, and Mia is dead.”
“I got it.”
As Gulliver drove he looked out to his right. He saw a container ship passing under the Verrazano Bridge. As he continued east, he saw a line of ships waiting to enter New York Harbor. Something clicked for him, seeing those ships. All at once things began to come together. To make sense.
He thought about Mary Shea’s shrieking banshees. He thought about [ar t88asEllis Torres saying that screaming had woken him from sleep. In his head he heard the macaw squawking. He recalled how the area at the back of the warehouse smelled like giant kitty litter. How Ahmed had said that the dock behind the warehouse had been used.
“The cops think this is about smuggling drugs,” Gulliver said to Dr. Prentice. “But it isn’t about drugs at all. It’s about exotic animals.”
There was silence from Prentice. Then, “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Just shut up and keep driving. Get off at the Flatbush Avenue exit that leads into Brooklyn, not to Rockaway.”
Gulliver had no intention of shutting up. “Mia told me you’re an expert on exotic animals. It all makes sense now. I spoke to a witness who said she heard a truck rumble down Ferris Street. She also said she heard shrieking late at night. Like banshees, she said. I dismissed her too quickly. But when Ellis Torres told me the same thing…”
“Shut up, Dowd. You’re coming to the exit.”
Gulliver got off the exit. “Sure, it was animals. That’s why class="tx" ai
F
ive minutes later Gulliver was driving through the gates of the Kings County Yacht Club. The club was in the Mill Basin section of Brooklyn. Mill Basin, where the cops had found the car the big man used to escape. It was a well-to-do area that had access to Jamaica Bay and the Atlantic Ocean. In another month the club would be busy. People would be getting their boats ready for warm weather. But now the club was deserted. Only two other cars were in the parking lot.
Prentice told Gulliver to park his van. To get out and walk to dock number 112. Gulliver did as he was told. He didn’t like walking into a spot like this. A strange place. In the dark. He was dealing with a man who had a lot to lose. Gulliver didn’t know if Prentice was armed. And Prentice had Mia.
Gulliver didn’t know much about boats. He didn’t have to. But it was clear that the boat at dock 112 cost a lot of money. It was at +. That anurzleast forty feet long. The name painted on her was
El Condor
. It figured. He could hear the low purr of the boat’s motor.
Gulliver’s stomach knotted up as he got closer to
El Condor
. It wasn’t Dr. Prentice waiting for him on the deck. It wasn’t Mia. It was the big man. The one with the light blue eyes. The one who had tried to smother Ellis Torres. And the look on the big man’s face wasn’t friendly. Why would it be? Gulliver had thrown a knife deep into the man’s back. And there was something else. The big man was holding a MP5 machine pistol.
Gulliver stopped in his tracks. He was at the end of the dock. Thirty feet behind the aft end of the boat. He took a few steps back. This put a smaller boat and a tall post between himself and the big man.
“Why do you stop?” The big man had a German accent. “You will come here.”
“I will not come anywhere,” Gulliver shouted back. “I want to see Mia and Prentice on the deck.”
“Little insect. You do not give orders.”
Gulliver now wished he had thrown the knife through the big man’s left shoulder. Right into his heart. If he had one. Gulliver doubted Prentice would have been so bold if this big guy were dead. He thought about taking a shot at the man. He decided against it. Both the MP5 and his Sig were 9mms. The problem was that the MP5 could shoot hundreds of rounds a minute. As good as the Sig was, it could not compete with that.
“How’s your shoulder feeling, Franz?” Gulliver called to him.
“I am not Franz, insect. I should have made you dead in the room of the hospital for what you did.”
“And I should have thrown the knife through your neck. So we’re even, Franz.”
“I am not Franz! I am Hugo!” the German was shouting when Prentice came on deck.