Family Counsel (The Samuel Collins Series Book 2) (14 page)

Something wasn’t right.  It was 5:00 a.m., and I had been lying in bed wide awake for two hours.  The rain had let up but there was a
continuous drip, drip, drip from the roof outside my window onto something
metal. It was irritating the hell out of me. 

Several things were going through my head, but nothing added
up.  We’d talked with the Faker for over an hour after our initial skirmish. 
At first, I’d had to keep reminding myself that it was Felicia who had
kidnapped him and not the other way around.  She’d brought the stranger into
her home; he hadn’t busted his way in to rape and pillage.  He was the innocent
victim in the ordeal.  Under the circumstances, his reaction had been perfectly
natural.  In fact, if I’d been abducted from my hospital bed and awakened in a
strange place, I could only hope that I’d have the wherewithal to grab a
kitchen knife before I set out to meet my captors. 

Yet, even after the middle-of-the-night discussion, I still
didn’t know squat about the guy.  Information flowed like a fountain when it
came to Felicia’s brother.  If I could get the guy to testify, cleaned up, he’d
make a great witness.  But the guy clammed up completely when it came to
talking about himself.  Rafael Mendoza was a veritable mystery man. 

What bugged me the most was, why was he checked into the
hospital under an alias, or for that matter, why was he checked in at all?  I’d
asked him point blank and he had changed the subject with no explanation
whatsoever.  Yet I didn’t get the feeling it was anything sinister, but maybe
something he was embarrassed about.  Drug or alcohol rehab maybe.  He seemed
like a decent guy, maybe even someone I’d hang with under different
circumstances. 

Something else bothered me too.  The guy acted almost like he’d
been sprung from the pen; like he hadn’t been on the outside world, or that
he’d been cooped up, isolated from the real world for too long.  He’d gone
outside in the storm, arms outstretched like Jesus himself, as if it was the
first time he’d ever seen rain.  But presumably, unless Mendoza had been
involuntarily committed, he could have walked out of the hospital any time. 
Except that he’d been so heavily sedated that that wasn’t an option.  And
judging from his deconditioned state, he hadn’t been up and around much for a
while.  He tired easily, notwithstanding his size. 

And to top it off, Rafael Mendoza, for all his bravado seemed almost
paranoid.

“Who else knows I’m here?” he’d asked, after Felicia had filled
him in on his abduction.  Then, with a flair for the dramatic, he’d sworn us
all to secrecy, “for your own protection” he had declared.  Maybe he’d been
incarcerated too long, or maybe he was just a little nuts; but in the end I
decided that as long as he didn’t sue my ass for aiding and abetting in his kidnapping,
I had no intention of broadcasting his whereabouts, except maybe to Niki
Lautrec.  Rafael Mendoza was a potential witness in Felicia’s possible lawsuit;
he was an ally.

I’d had a case a couple of years earlier where someone got to
one of my witnesses  and I lost the case because of it.  The woman’s knowledge
of my client’s circumstances had come to light just before we went to trial.  I
interviewed her and got all the ammunition I needed for a victory in the case. 
But when she took the stand to testify, she told the jury a completely
different story than the one she had told me days earlier.  And I hadn’t gotten
a statement in writing from her to contradict the veracity of her own
testimony. 

I decided if I wasn’t sleeping, I should be working.  I
rummaged around the house for a pen and paper and reconstructed what Mendoza had told me of Felicia’s brother in the form of an affidavit:

My name is Rafael Mendoza. I am above the age of 18, and I
am legally competent to execute this Affidavit.

I would presume that the statement was true until I found
otherwise.

On or about (date), I was admitted to Serenity, a private
hospital located in Franklin County, five miles west of Harmony, Texas, for (reason for admittance). I met Jackson Whitaker when I was residing at Serenity Hospital.  The two of us shared a room for approximately nine months until the
time of his death. 

Jackson
had suffered a football injury when he was 18
years old and he was left a quadriplegic. When I arrived at Serenity, he had
already been there for 9 years. On or about (date), Jackson became extremely ill. 
He was moved out of our room into an intensive care unit where he died of
pneumonia three days later.

I heard a door creak and Max wandered out of Felicia’s bedroom,
dragging his blanket. 

“Hey, Max.  How’d you sleep?”  He curled up in my lap and rested
his head against my chest.

“Dood.”

I hugged him and kissed the top of his head.  “I’m glad someone
did.” We sat that way for several minutes then I said, “How ‘bout we change
your diaper and find something to eat?  Are you hungry?”

Max nodded.  I carried him through the house in search of the
diaper bag, and finally found it back in the room where we’d started. 

“Let’s get this thing off.”  I took off his diaper and went to
set it down, but something was different.  It was light as a feather. I picked
it back up and inspected the thing. 

“Max, I think you’re dry,” I said in disbelief.

“Lemme see!”

Max gave me his full attention and together we gave the thing a
closer inspection.  With modern technology it’s hard to tell, so I actually poked
my finger into the diaper. 

“I think you’re dry!” I repeated.  

If someone had told me a year ago that I’d be poking around in
a diaper, I’d have laughed my ass off, but I took it one step further. I stuck
my nose right into the guts of the diaper and took a whiff. 

“Max, you’re dry!” I exclaimed.  I gave him a bear hug.  “Congratulations!
That’s great!”  I spread open the diaper and placed it in his hands.  “Take
this in and show Mommy that you woke up dry!”

He held the diaper out in front of him like it was a royal
crown, and walked into the room where Maddie was sleeping.  I stood in the hall
outside the doorway, listening for her reaction.

“Mommy.”

“Uh huh,” she said sleepily.

“Mommy,” Max repeated.

I could hear the bed squeak as Maddie sat up.  “Hi, sweetie.”

“Mommy, smell this.”

“Ewwww!  No way!  I’m not going to smell that nasty diaper.”

Or not
.  “He woke up dry!” I said from the doorway.

Maddie’s jaw dropped open.  “Oh my Gawd! You woke up dry?  Oh,
Max, that’s great!  What a big boy!”  She scooped him up on the bed with her
and rolled around with him.  “Hey, let’s go tee tee in the potty, you want to?”

“And can I pull da stwing?”

“Absolutely!”

And just like that, my kid was potty trained.  As it turned
out, that was the only good thing that happened all day.

It took hours to get through to Niki Lautrec, and when I
finally did, he confirmed what I already knew:  until the storm let up, there
was no way to get a helicopter in to rescue us.  And according to the report on
the weather radio, that wasn’t going to happen anytime soon.  In the meantime,
we were stuck in the farmhouse with a waning supply of milk and diapers for
Morgan, and growing boredom on the part of the boys, including me.  Mendoza hadn’t emerged from bed again since the night before, and it was almost 4:00 in the afternoon.  Felicia the nurse – that one still blew me away – said that it was
normal coming off the drugs to be tired, that he needed his sleep. And she
didn’t seem concerned that the guy had slept for 12 hours straight.  I was
almost wishing he’d wake up, just to vary the mix a bit.  It wasn’t that I was
actually bored.  It was the fact that I was stuck there and that I couldn’t
leave if I wanted to, which made me want to escape all the more. 

Finally, Oliver and Max had had as much as they could take of
the farmhouse, so we covered ourselves with big garbage bags and made a run for
the barn to do some exploring.  We were playing on a haystack when Maddie
arrived in a bright yellow rain cape. 

“Niki needs you to call him,” she said, and she produced my
phone from underneath the cape.

“Right now?”

“He said it was important.”

Niki answered on the first ring and he didn’t sound happy.  “Rafael
Mendoza.  It’s not Rafael de la Fuentes Mendoza?”

“I don’t know.  He just said Rafael Mendoza.”  I was afraid to
ask, but I had to.  “Why?  Who is Rafael de la Fuentes Mendoza?” 

“Have you ever heard of 
La Gente
?”

“
La gente
?  I think it means
the people
in
Spanish.”

“Yeah, but I mean the group,
La Gente
.  An underground
organization.”

“You mean like the mafia?” I said skeptically.

“If you want to call it that, yeah.  I guess comparable to the
Mexican Mafia. Drugs, prostitution, smuggling.  Rafael de la Fuentes Mendoza’s
family is connected to
La Gente
.  Rafael disappeared two years ago after
the execution-style murder of a very successful prosecutor in San Antonio who
had just secured the death penalty for someone associated with the organization.”

My heart was pounding through my shirt.  “Are you telling me
the guy’s a murderer?”

“No, no, no,” he said, obviously sensing my anxiety.  “But from
what I can piece together, I think he may have been a witness.  He disappeared
without a trace before the police could talk to him.”

“So he checked himself into the hospital under a fake name to
hide?  That doesn’t make sense.”

“No, it doesn’t.  His family has connections.  He wouldn’t have
had to do that.”

“Maybe it’s not him,” I said hopefully.

“Maybe not.  But I think you need to find out.  I’ll get a
photo and text it to you.”

“How old is the guy?” I asked.

 “Thirty-five.”

“Great. It’s gonna be him.  I can tell you right now.”

“What’s the weather doing there?”

“Pissing down rain.”  I jumped off the haystack and kicked a
rusty old can.  “This sucks!”  Maddie looked at me disapprovingly.  I turned my
back to her.  “Get me the hell out of here, Lautrec!  I’ve got some fucking
mafia fuck sleeping across the hall from my wife and kids!”

“Yeah well, right now, you’re safer with him than in a
helicopter,” he said pragmatically.  “If it looks like the rain is going to let
up even for a couple of hours, that should be enough time to come in and get
you.”

“All right.  Call me if you come up with anything else. 
Anything.”

“I will.  Hang in there, Collins.”

“What was that about?” Maddie asked.

“It seems there’s a Rafael Mendoza, a Rafael de la Fuentes
Mendoza, that’s connected to some crime family.  Some organization called
La
Gente;
like the mafia.  The guy disappeared a couple of years ago, supposedly
after witnessing a prosecutor’s murder.”

“The
mafia
?  Is it the same guy?” Maddie asked.

“I don’t know.  But I’ll tell you what; I don’t like you and
the kids staying under the same roof with the guy.”

“Maybe it’s not him.  And besides, there’s no crime in being a
witness.  It’s not like he killed the guy, right?” Her imagination clicked into
action.  “Maybe he’s in witness protection and that’s why he was at the
hospital!  He was hiding.” 

Yes, my wife is a natural blond.  “They don’t hide people in
hospitals, Maddie.  And I doubt they sedate to the point of oblivion people in
witness protection.”

“I guess you’re right,” she admitted.  “What should we do? 
Should we call him on it?”

“I don’t think so.  Not yet.  With any luck we’ll be out of
here tomorrow. Maybe he won’t wake up ‘til we’re gone.”

“From what I’ve seen in the movies, I don’t think they kill
indiscriminately.  The mafia, I mean.  As long as we don’t make him mad or
anything, I’m sure we’ll be fine.”

She wrapped her arms around my waist and I hugged her.  Her
hair was damp and it smelled like flowers. 

“Are we going to tell Felicia?” Maddie asked.

“Let’s wait.  Niki has a photo.  If it’s not the same guy, it
won’t matter anyway.”

“I think she likes him.”

“What’s to like?  She doesn’t even know him.”

“Just a feeling.”

I tried to forget about the mafia don while the four of us
played in the hay barn for the next hour.  When the rain finally slowed down
from torrential to cats-and-dogs, we made a run for the house.  Oliver had gone
straight to the bathroom and he came out yelling, “Dad! There’s a raccoon in the
bathroom!  Hurry!”  He raced in and grabbed my hand and pulled me out of the
kitchen.  “Hurry!  It’s big.”

I had no idea what I’d do with a raccoon; I don’t even know if
they bite.  But to be on the safe side, I grabbed the broom.  Oliver led me to the bathroom and pointed into the trashcan. 

“There! See it?”

I cautiously peered into the trashcan and inspected its
contents.  “What the hell?”

“You owe me a quarter.”

I was about to poke it with the broom handle when Felicia called out from the hallway.  She was standing there with some guy.  He was a tall,
good-looking Hispanic man, with brown eyes and short slicked-back hair.  He
looked like Andy Garcia.  The first thing I wondered was where he’d come from. 
The road was impassable.  But then I figured he must have come from the
foreman’s house.  He smiled congenially, and I shifted the broom and offered
him my hand. 

“Samuel Collins.”

“Rafael Mendoza.  How’s the ear?”

“Rafael . . .?”  It took a second for comprehension to sink
in.  “Whoa!  What happened to the . . .” The shock rendered me speechless,
groping for words.  I motioned to his clean-shaven face.  “The hair,” I said
stupidly, it finally dawning on me what was in the trashcan.  He
did
look like Andy Garcia – in
Goodfellows
.  It was no doubt an omen.