Cooler Than Blood (16 page)

Dangelo’s chest rose and fell as he let his breath out. “You’re a presumptuous man.” I leaned back in my chair. “You assume,” he continued, “that I have knowledge of this girl and that I’ll work with you.”

“Neither of us has a choice if we want to meet our primary objective.”

He considered that for a moment, or perhaps he was thinking of his short game—I don’t know. He leaned in, and I did likewise.

“Of course this has all been hypothetical,” he said. “You want the lady, and I want the funds. Not my
half
—the entire amount. That’s the other party’s penalty, which”—he leaned back into his chair and spread his hands—“isn’t a bad sentence considering how these things used to be settled and still can be. You find my money, and I’ll ask around about Ms. Spencer.”

I leaned back into my chair. “You’re the victim of an inside job. There’s no way that I—”

He came at me across the table. “You don’t think we thought of that?” It was the first time he’d displayed any emotion. It could have been an act, but I didn’t think so. Someone had ripped him off 142K. That’s why Captain Tony had brought me directly to Dangelo. The big guys get the big problems. “It is
not
within my organization,” he continued, but his voice had geared down. “You find my money, and your troubles go away.”

“If you find it first?”

“I’ll help you find her, wherever she may be.”

“Where is she?” I leaned in fast. I was starting to feel like a damn rocking chair. Dangelo’s eyes held mine. He didn’t move; it was worth a try. I backed down. “I’ll take that deal,” I said, “with one provision. The young girl in the picture on your desk—she’s your daughter?”

He rotated his head slightly to the right. “Be very careful, Jacob.”

“Ms. Spencer is treated like her. No games. Do not drop her into one of your clubs or circle her with stiff dicks with no conscience.”

“This talk is not necessary.”

“I don’t take chances.”

“Nor do I.” Dangelo stood up. “Find my money.” He took a step and leaned over, his mouth hovering over my ear. He smelled of ham and aged Swiss cheese. “Look elsewhere, Jacob. It is not in my organization.”

I stood, and Garrett did likewise. I’m sure he’d rather play Whac-a-Mole with the bodyguards’ heads, pummel Uncle Joe into a confession, and hope that Jenny emerged unscathed. I preferred we try it slow and easy. No need to get another mobster on my bad side. In addition to the shootout on the beach, my actions to retrieve the Cold War letter had inadvertently put a Palm Beach Mafioso, Walter Mendis, huddled behind a legion of lawyers as he battled to avoid incarceration for human trafficking. I didn’t need more organized enemies; my sleep was already becoming increasingly broken. What if these people were connected? It could lead back to Kathleen.

While I had no reason to believe Dangelo, his associates, or Walter Mendis were on the same playbill as the cast on the beach, I had no reason to believe they
weren’t.

Dangelo stalked out the door, and Tweedles followed him. They discreetly returned our weapons outside. Kelly had never presented the check. I assumed Dangelo got a monthly bill. Maybe he owned the place.

“What do you think?” I asked Garrett after Dangelo had cleared the building.

“Discarded teapot?”

“I was trying to keep things loose and friendly.”

“Puddle of trouble?”

“Fine. Next time you talk, and I’ll kick chairs.”

“We played right into Dangelo’s hand. He hired us to find the money and will compensate us with Jenny. Do you think that’s really a good idea, working with a man we don’t know or trust?”

“We’ll find out.”

CHAPTER 26

Jenny

“O
uch? You get your big moment, take your best swing, barely nick the dude, and all you elicit is, ‘Ouch?’ Way to go, girl. You’re just impressing the hell out of me here.”

She’d taken to talking out loud. Why not? She told herself it was to make sure her vocal cords were still operational, but she knew there were other reasons as well.

When she had heard the rattle of the lock, she had planted her feet wide and held the strap of her spiked water bottle in her right hand by her hip. If she’d held it higher to start with, her angle would have been that much better. She’d grown weary of berating herself over that. When the door had opened, she’d swung up at the man with the inked arms. He danced his head like he’d played that game before and it was no biggie. One of the nails did manage to find its mark and create a stream of red, but the man had only said, “Ouch,” followed by, “Let’s go.”

“Pathetic, girl,” she said. “Pure, plain, pissy, pukey, pathetic. And now I’m sinking.” She blew out her breath. “Just going down.”

Jenny figured she was talking out loud as a mechanism to maintain her spirit and give a voice to hope. She wondered how many games her mind would conjure up in an attempt to shield her from reality, to keep her from sinking.

“Stay afloat. That’s the key,” she addressed her trepidation.
Like my daddy told me, don’t fear the water.
But those words stayed in her head, for Jenny kept her father deep inside, close and tight, and was unwilling to verbalize them with the world. Even an empty one.

She’d never understood why her father had insisted that it was good for the Trojan’s hull to get a good soaking. Not only a good soaking, Larry had impressed upon her, but it also was important for the boat to
remain
wet. Yet he would insist that she pump the water out once the gray floorboard had started to float.

“How,” she had asked her father one day while he treated the aluminum poles that supported the canvas top, for Larry Spencer couldn’t be on his boat without cleaning his boat, “can the water be good for her if too much will sink her?”

“She likes the water,” Larry had replied. “It swells her boards and keeps the rest of the water out. You see, she uses water to keep water out. It’s only when her boards aren’t swelled, when she’s not prepared for the water, that the water harms her. There’s nothing to fear about a little water being in a wooden boat. It needs it. Too little and too much are what’s bad.”

She paced.
I’ve got to embrace fear
, she thought.
Let it swell in me so it can’t hurt me, can’t sink me. Like the boat used water to keep water out, I’ll let a little fear in, just the right amount, and it’ll keep the rest of it out.
Don’t flu shots work that way?
She wasn’t sure, but she thought she’d read that someplace.

“I’ve got to stay wet,” she said. It came out in her best Mickey Mouse voice. She could always do a mean Mickey.
Welcome to Crack-up City
, she thought.
Everybody on the planet’s got a one-way ticket, and mine was punched early.

Jenny plopped into the leather couch. Her new room was a basement, and she hated basements. This basement had brick walls and a ceiling so high that she couldn’t touch it, even when she jumped. The floor was cluttered with a round table, high barstools, a glass display case, two cigarette machines, and a candy machine. The leather couch was larger than some of the trailers she’d seen people live in back in Ohio. In the corner was a toilet behind a hinged wooden door. Next to the door was a white sink the size of a small bathtub. A PVC pipe ran from it to a plastic drain cover on the floor. The floor around the drain was crusted with dirt, as the drain was a half-inch too high, and the water stagnated before reaching the top of the drain.

Jenny figured she was still in Florida. It had taken around an hour, maybe more, to get there. A city. Stop-and-go traffic near the end of the trip. A short man with fat muscles had blindfolded her.
Seriously,
she thought,
I’ve had enough of that for a lifetime.

Then the questions. The man with the inked arms, and now a white bandage plastered to his forehead, had launched them. “Do you have the money? Do
they
have the money? Are you sure? What did he tell you about the money?” She had answered, “No. Not that I know of. Why ask me if you don’t believe me? Already told you, and everybody who asks me—which is like half the frickin’ state—that he said he had two hundred eighty-something. That’s it, really. It’s
all
I know.
”

He had stood by the candy machine. “Tell me, girl—did you really do to him what they said you did?”

“Yes. I really did. Can I ask
you
something?”

“Sure.”

“How’d you get your teeth so white?”

“I brush three times a day.”

“Uh-huh. Can’t you let me go?”

“No.”

“You mad at me for taking that swing at you?”

“No.”

“Sure?”

“It was a good effort. I admire that.”

“Could you do something for me?”

“What?”

“I
really
miss my shoes. Can you get me some?”

“Maybe.”

“You gonna hurt me?”

A nervous no. He had shaken his head and thrown out an unconvincing laugh.

“Why not let me go? I won’t tell anybody anything. I promise.”

“That’s not my decision.”

“Even if I would talk, what would I say? I don’t know you…don’t even know where I am.”

“That’s not my decision.”

“How long are you going to keep me?”

“That’s not my—”

“I
promise
.
Please
, just let me go.”

“That’s not—”

“Okay. Okay. Jesus, I got it.”

“You’re a pretty girl.”

Pretty girls can do well in life, use their prettiness.
She’d said nothing but thought,
Is that even a word?

“Question for you, pretty girl…”

She remained silent.

“You were saying something—shouting—right before I entered the garage. What was it?”

“I don’t know.”

“Sure you do.”

“No, I don’t.”

He shrugged and walked up the stairs.

Forgotten.

Zach and Green Mask were clowns. Wannabes. But this guy? Calm. Composed. A quiet attitude that screamed violent indifference.

She paced in her new cage. Eight steps in one direction, eleven in the other. Not bad.
A real gymnasium,
she thought,
compared to my old digs.

“I’ve got to stay wet, stay in shape.” She hit the concrete, and her left hand landed on the ribbed surface of the drain. She started her push-ups but collapsed onto the floor after a failed second attempt.

Come on you, idiot! Get up! Too much water. Don’t let him scare you. Pump!

But all she could do was lie on the floor. She wanted nothing more in the world than to be able to stand, but there was nothing in the world to help her do that. She lay on the floor and looked at the sharp edge of the drain. She wondered how many tears she would need to cry to form a puddle large enough to drip over the raised edge. She scratched marks into the crusted dirt. She rolled onto her back and stared at the ceiling.

“Look at what happened to me, Puddles. After all I’ve ever dreamed about, here I am, talking to a ceiling and a stuffed duck.”

Pretty girl
.

Her body shuddered.

She punched out her breath. “Come on, Jenny,” she admonished herself. “You’d be an idiot not to be afraid. Deal with it, girl.”

She took a long, deep breath, her lungs expanding to capacity, and let it out slowly, as if she wished to deflate all the air out of her body. She closed her eyes and found herself back in the shower, the water swirling around the drain, Boone’s sorry ass walking out the door. She had lain there, in the fiberglass stall, the water growing cold, hoping for an epiphany. It didn’t come. Not that day.
I can’t go back
, she thought.
Back to a fetus curled up on the floor of a shower. I’ve got to take my stand. Have my vision. And I know what it is. I found it when I was up above the clouds.

Jenny stood, squared her shoulders, and stared at the piss-ugly couch.
It’s all so stupid
, she thought.
Stupid hope. Stupid words. Stupid life. Just say it. Say it, stupid girl. Say it and get it over with.

“There is a place I bring all of me, and it is undoubtedly the sea.”

CHAPTER 27

“S
lainte,” Morgan said, and raised his wineglass as the sunset charter sailboat,
Fantasea
, glided past on its return trip from the mouth of the channel. The rest of us took his cue and clanked our glasses together. We occupied the four chairs on the screen porch where we had just finished Morgan’s dinner of conch chowder and grilled hog snapper with spiced lemon butter. Everything was gone except the dirty dishes. Elizabeth Woolridge Grant’s voice floated out of the speakers and got lost in the salty, muggy air.

I had placed another call to Binelli and asked her to look into Joseph Dangelo. I wanted to know as much as I could about the devil I had just jumped into bed with. In my message, I told her about the missing cash. I had also called Susan and filled her in on what had transpired. She listened without comment then asked a few pointed questions about Dangelo that I couldn’t answer. She was relieved, which had surprised me. “It means she’s alive. I know you’ll find her.”

It came out with such childish innocence that I didn’t dare reply.

Magic
trailed
Fantasea
by two hundred feet. Passengers sat on her bow with their legs dangling over the side. A pair of dolphins surfaced, hands pointed, and voices carried over the water
. Magic
cleared the end of my dock, where my boat
Impulse
was suspended eight feet above the medium tide. She wasn’t happy sitting in her lift. She was made for the sea, not to float above its surface. Grady-Whites are tough boats; they welcome angry waters and tend to sulk when left unattended and unchallenged.

What kind of woman owns a Grady-White and wears a tight black dress?

“Jake?” Kathleen asked. The sound of her voice triggered a physical response, and I glanced at her.

“Yeah?”

“What are you thinking?”

“Just watching the sailboats.”

“Let’s take it sometime.”

“The sunset cruise?”

“Sure. I want to see what it’s like, being out there and looking in at us.”

“Whatever,” I said. The callous word came out with more sympathy for her idea than I possessed, for I had none whatsoever.

“I’ll go with you,” Morgan told her.

“Thank you,” Kathleen replied with a sharp edge of English propriety that was clearly aimed at me. “How are things on the front?” she asked me. She knew I was preoccupied and was willing to surrender the field to me. I wonder if I’m capable of a similar act of maturity. Sometimes it just seems beyond me.

“We’re stuck in the trenches,” I said. My neighbor Barbara’s side door slammed shut. I told her I’d get a new pneumatic closer for her, but I kept forgetting.

Kathleen asked, “No leads today?”

“We met a man we think has Jenny,” I replied. “We negotiated an agreement. We help him find the money, and he—if he has her—turns her over to us.”

“He’s holding her hostage?”

“Yes. That’s what—”

“Such a cowardly act,” Kathleen shuttered. “What kind of man would that be—a man who holds another man’s daughter as a hostage?”

Damn fine question. “Some small-time crook in way over his head.”

Garrett, who sat on the other side of Kathleen, looked away.

She said, “This hardly seems like something that—”

“Local scum,” Garrett said, keeping his eyes straight ahead at the red channel marker. On one side of the marker, the water ran thirty feet deep; on the other, the grassy sandbar was visible during low tides. I’ve witnessed a flotilla of boats get towed off the grass or wait for an incoming tide to rescue them. Slightly miscalculating one’s position, or ignoring the pulsating light due to ignorance or vanity, creates a vastly different outcome and experience

“Jake?” Kathleen said again.

“Yeah?”

“Wherever you are, it’s not here. I’m going to bed. Five-star dinner, Morgan. I’d never have the patience for your chowder recipe.”

“My treat,” he told her.

She rose and trailed her hand over the back of my shoulder as she slipped into my house.

“Cigar?” Morgan asked.

“Certainly,” I replied. He cut a pair and passed me one. I wondered whether the smell would retrieve Kathleen. She was a sucker for a great smoke. Garrett didn’t partake. Of tobacco or grapes. Or
Of Mice and Men.
I’d never seen him read a book. He read at least three newspapers a day—paper or on his tablet—but not a book.

“Small-time crook?” he asked as he waved smoke away.

“Local scum?” I retorted. I tapped my cigar on the edge of the Copacabana ashtray.

“You didn’t want her to know.”

“No need for her to worry. It’s doubtful there’s any connection.”

“And if there is?” Garrett asked. “Do we want to be the last to find out?”

“I left a message with Binelli,” I told him, deciding not to address his question. “Let’s see what she comes up with. The feds must have something on Dangelo.”

“Since when do we sit and wait for a phone call? It’s a stretch to believe we cross paths with the Outfit—or its brethren—two, possibly three times, depending on Mendis, and they never finger us for burying four of their own on a deserted beach.” He lowered his voice. “Even though we know Kathleen was never in possession of any damaging information about their operation, they don’t know that.”

That was pretty winded for Garrett. We had no reason to believe that Dangelo, Mendis, and the associates of Kathleen’s deceased husband were intertwined. His assessment, however, was spot-on. You’re pretty stupid if you think you can swim with the sharks without becoming their dinner.

“It’s a long shot that they’ve tied us to their missing hit men or”—I paused and took another draw and let the smoke float out of my mouth—“that they have any plausible reason to believe Lauren Cunningham was resurrected as Kathleen Rowe.” I flicked more charred tobacco leaves into the ashtray. “The question is whether we work our way up at his request or drop down in front of them. Make everyone else a day late, make them play catch-up with us.”

“Whatever is best for Jenny and Kathleen,” Morgan said.

I nodded. “If we don’t run this, they’ll run us. You saw the picture on Dangelo’s desk?”

“Even better,” Garrett said.

“How’s that?”

“Got a picture of her on my phone.”

“I didn’t see that.” I’d wondered why he’d had his hand in his pocket at Dangelo’s office. He never does that. Too vulnerable of a position.

“That was the idea.”

Garrett and I discussed our plan.

Morgan interjected, “If you threaten someone, don’t you have to be prepared to fulfill the deed?”

“No.” I said. “All parties understand. It’s like pointing nukes at each other. It doesn’t do any good if both sides launch.” I answered before Garrett gave his response, which would have been vastly different than mine. Not that, in the end, we necessarily disagreed. But I still chanted mental vespers to myself that I was someone other than who I truly was.

“That’s just on paper,” Morgan said. “That’s the rhetoric of men who sit around wooden tables and wear blue suits and talk about football games while sending young men into tropical jungles and sandlots in the name of democracy. Intellectuals who’ve never been at the tip of the spear. They’re arrogant men, the Achilles’ heel of the species.”

We were all a little winded. That was a political dissertation from Morgan. He had as little interest in politics as anyone I knew. He had as much interest in other people as anyone I knew. A boat came in from the Gulf, its outboards ripping the night.

“Point well made,” I said. In fact, I
had
brought too much heat when I felt Kathleen was threatened and in all likelihood
had
created much of our own problems. I tend not to dwell on such issues; denying failures makes me a happy man. “But”—I snuffed out my cigar—“you’re better off playing your own game, even poorly, than engaging in someone else’s.”

We said our good nights, and they went out the back door and around the fence to Morgan’s house. I crawled into bed with Kathleen, but I wasn’t even in the same galaxy as sleep. I got up and returned to the screen porch, but that didn’t work either. I dropped some ice cubes into a tumbler and floated them with Maker’s Mark. I went to the end of my dock and sat with my legs over the water. A dolphin blew off to my left; I wondered if it was Nevis. If Binelli didn’t call me early, I’d ring her during her morning coffee. I needed more information on Dangelo. Hadley III joined me, and we stared at the blinking red light. I thought of Garrett taking a picture of Dangelo’s daughter with his phone.

I wondered whether Dangelo had a picture of Kathleen on his phone.