Florida Firefight (13 page)

Two pointers roared at Hawker from beneath an old blue Chevy pickup. Hawker stopped and held his hands out for inspection. The pointers sniffed him, urinated on the tires of his Monte Carlo as if in warning, then stalked back to their beds beneath the truck. The dogs looked healthy: good coats, clear eyes, and they carried the right amount of weight. Hawker took it as a good sign. McKay obviously still cared about something.

“Out back!” yelled a voice. “Out here by the boat. Come around.”

Boggs McKay kneeled on the deck of a forty-plus-foot wooden crabber. The wheelhouse was built forward, with VHF and loran antennae mounted above. He was working on one of the two stern-mounted winches, grease up to his elbows.

He looked up as Hawker approached and shook his head. “I told you on the phone I didn't want to talk to you.”

As on the phone, something in McKay's voice told Hawker just the opposite—he did want to talk. He did want to help. But it was going to take some prodding. The right kind of prodding. Hawker remembered what Buck Hamilton had said about Boggs McKay not following anyone anywhere.

“I'm persistent,” said Hawker, smiling brightly. “You have to give me that.”

McKay nodded and said nothing. He was a heavily muscled, middle-size man in his late thirties. His hair was cropped short, redder than Hawker's, and you could see the stomach muscle patchwork beneath a thin layer of fat. He had kept himself in shape.

Despite the grease and sweat, McKay had the studious, intelligent face of a college student grown older. Hawker could picture the way he must have been as a businessman: a good handshake, an honest smile and fierce, predatory eyes that must have made his competitors wince and his employees jump. Hawker decided he wasn't the kind of man who could be manipulated. He didn't try.

“You know why I'm here, Boggs. You probably even know what I'm going to say. So tell me: are you going to play deaf and dumb all afternoon, or are we going to talk?”

Boggs McKay turned from his work and surveyed Hawker with a pair of searing blue eyes. Hawker didn't intimidate easily, but McKay was coming as close as anyone. Hawker realized that a man like McKay would have to test him before he was about to make any commitments.

McKay stood, grabbed a towel and jumped down onto the dock, wiping his hands. His eyes never left Hawker. The width of his shoulders made him look deceptively short. He walked down the dock to the yard, then stopped an arm's length away, eye to eye. “You're right,” he said sharply. “I do know why you're here. I've heard all about the great James Hawker. You're the one who stood up to the Colombians—a few of them, anyway. You're the smart Yankee businessman who bought the Tarpon Inn, and now you're trying to show us dumb Southerners how to get back on our feet again, right?”

Hawker smiled calmly. “I've only met one really dumb Southerner since I've been here, McKay—you.”

Boggs McKay took a quick step forward, and when Hawker didn't back away, he stopped. The tough-guy facade fell away, leaving a sly smile. McKay began to laugh, softly at first, then louder and louder, like a dam breaking, tears rolling down his face. Hawker got the impression McKay hadn't laughed in a very long time. He knew why. The computer had confirmed Buck Hamilton's story about McKay's kids being killed by a drunken driver and about the broken marriage. Life, Hawker knew, could be one nasty son of a bitch. And bastards stupid enough and selfish enough to drive after drinking had done more than their share to prove it.

McKay had needed his time as a hermit, the long months alone, seething and healing both. But there has to come a moment when a person broken in spirit decides to throw open the doors of his hermitage. If he doesn't, honest mourning takes on the odor of human rot.

Hawker was betting that McKay sensed it was his time to return to the world of the living.

“Gawddamn, gawddamn,” McKay said in his thick Southern drawl, still convulsed with laughter. “We're out here like two boys on the playground, seeing who'd back down first—and you wouldn't budge, by damn! Honest to god, Hawker, I pulled that on a government inspector a few years back, and he liked to piss his drawers. But not you! Hell, you're not only as ugly as me, but you're just as mean, too—” The words were lost in another gust of laughter.

“Does that mean you'll talk?”

Boggs McKay wiped his eyes with the greasy towel, sobering. “What do you have in mind, Hawker?”

“You know what I have in mind—the Colombians. One more year like the last one and there won't be any town called Mahogany Key.”

“And why should I care about that?”

“Because it's time you started caring about something, Boggs.”

Boggs McKay was silent for a long while. He ran a hand through his short red hair and flung sweat to the ground. Flies buzzed in the January sunlight, and chickens scratched in the sand. Finally he looked at Hawker. “Do you have some kind of plan?”

“I do. But the plan needs a leader.”

“That Sandy Rand was a good girl. We used to date some in high school. She could make a man laugh till he couldn't stop.”

“I didn't know her long, but I liked her,” said Hawker.

McKay nodded, as if affirming something within himself. “I don't keep beer, but I've got iced tea inside. Bring those charts or maps or whatever you've got in your hand and come on in. We'll talk.”

It was well after five before Hawker finished his meeting with Boggs McKay, but Chief Ben Simps was still at the little two-room police station, waiting.

The place was painted a dingy yellow, and it smelled of stale cigars. There were file cabinets, a locked gun case, a National Crime Information Center teletype and a one-man cage.

“You're late, Hawker,” said Simps. He had stood up quickly when Hawker entered. He looked nervous.

From a sack Hawker took two of the seismic disks and put them on the metal desk.

“What are those? Hey—what are those things, anyway? I'm not planting any bombs, damn it—”

“They're not bombs,” Hawker snapped. “You don't need to know what they are. You're going to take them to Medelli's boat tonight. You're going to hide one on the deck. Put it under the canvas of one of the Whalers. The other you're going to hide in the head. A boat that big has to have a vanity in the head. Stick it under the vanity.”

“But what if I can't get on the boat—”

“Then hide them in the bathroom and the living room of the main house.”

Simps was sweating. His heavy face glistened. “But Christ, what if they catch me? You don't know those guys—”

“And once you've hidden them,” Hawker interrupted, “get the hell out of town. Take a cruise, drive to Miami—I don't care.” Hawker turned to leave, then stopped. “And one more thing, Simps. If you double-cross us, we'll find you. You can't run far enough or hide well enough. There's nothing I hate more than a crooked cop, Simps. I'll find you myself and kill you.”

Hawker slammed the door behind him and didn't look back.

sixteen

Hawker returned to his cottage. The west coast of Florida was losing its daylight, and a dusk chill blew off the bay.

He set water to boiling for tea and stared at the phone, willing it to ring.

He was eager to receive the call from his Mafioso friend, Louis Brancacci.

When the phone didn't oblige, he stripped his clothes off and walked naked to the shower. The linoleum was cold.

He lathered, rinsed, then steamed for a while. When the teakettle whistled, he roughed himself dry.

Hawker pulled on a pair of soft gray tropical-worsted slacks and an oxford shirt with blue pinstripes. He hadn't brought enough socks, and he was glad the one washed pair left was the satin-soft wool. Hawker decided he wouldn't bother with the Hebrides tweed jacket until he caught the midnight plane out of Miami.

Graeme Mellor was wiping the bar when Hawker entered. “I haven't seen you that bloody well dressed since your first day in town,” he said with a grin. “What's the occasion? The big town meeting tonight?”

Hawker took a seat and swallowed part of the beer Mellor had drawn. “Who told you about the meeting?”

“Logan was in here first. Then about ten minutes after he headed for the kitchen, Winnie came looking for you. Like I told you, word travels fast in this town. They both knew.”

Hawker picked up a pad and wrote his supper order on it. He ripped the sheet off and handed it to the New Zealander. Mellor squinted at it, reading through his wire-rimmed glasses. Hawker noticed a small purple bruise on his cheek for the first time.

“How'd you get that?”

Mellor touched his cheek. “This?” He winced as if it hurt. “I was in here late last night, going over the books—they look better, by the way. The books look much better. Well, I was drinking a beer or two while I worked, and I guess I must have had a pint too much.” He laughed and held up his hands. “Fell down the damn steps as I was leaving. Bashed my face and tore my bloody pants to boot.”

Hawker laughed with him—outwardly. Inwardly he was suddenly suspicious. Maybe Logan hadn't been lying. Maybe he had been telling the truth when he said he hadn't killed the Colombian.

Hawker snapped his fingers. “Say, I think I'm going to change that supper order.”

“You don't want the broiled pompano? It's awfully good baked in the brown paper bag like Logan does it.”

“Naw, I think I'll have lobster. Three nice tails, say.”

Mellor gave him a perplexed look. “We're out of lobster; you know that. It's way past season.”

Hawker shook his head and winked at him. “I'm pretty sure I hid a dozen or so away in the old walk-in freezer. You know, for a special occasion. I've got to drive into Miami tonight for a meeting with some travel agents in the morning, so I guess this is special occasion enough. You help Logan look for them. You'll find them.”

Mellor shrugged and headed for the kitchen. The moment he was gone, Hawker went to work. It was just a hunch, but more than once a hunch of his had saved a life.

Someone had done a very sloppy job of hiding them. It took him all of two minutes to find the first: a candy-color transmitting device with a single thin-wire antenna. The bug had a small magnet on it. It narrowed Hawker's field of search. They had to be attached to metal objects. He found two more before the creak of the kitchen door announced Mellor's return.

Mellor came out, slapping his arms as if he was freezing. “I swear there are no lobster tails back there, James. We both looked until we 'bout froze our bloody balls off. Logan says you owe him a drink. He says he's going to have to sit on the stove for an hour or two before he can use the restroom. He says even then he's going to have to goose himself in the ass and grab his plumbing when it jumps out—”

“I get the general idea,” said Hawker, laughing despite himself. “Tell him I'll take the pompano. And I'll buy him his drink. Oh, and Graeme?” Hawker watched the New Zealander's eyes carefully. “Were you planning on holding tonight's meeting in the bar?”

He grinned. “You know how thirsty fishermen get when they talk. We can use the extra business.”

“Have there been people in the dining room all evening?”

“Yeah. It's getting so the kitchen is pretty busy.”

“Let's give the local boys a chance to see how we've fixed up the place. Hold the meeting in the dining room, okay? Besides, we don't want anybody drunk. This meeting is too important.”

“Sure,” said Mellor. “I hadn't thought of that.”

Hawker watched the New Zealander return to the kitchen. As he sipped at his beer, he wondered who had planted the bugs: Mellor, Logan—or Winnie Tiger.

Hawker didn't see the Colombians enter the bar, but he saw Mellor's face change. His eyes widened and he grimaced. “Holy Christ,” he whispered. “Someone let the animals loose.”

There were two men coming through the doorway. The first was a small man, snake thin, in his late thirties or early forties. His black hair was greased back, and his narrow mustache was as shiny as his hair. He wore a white sports coat with a dark shirt and white tie. A cigarette protruded from the swarthy Latin face, making him squint. His neck and wrists were adorned with gold jewelry, and he carried a leather briefcase.

But it was the man behind him who had made Mellor grimace. He was one of the biggest human beings Hawker had ever seen.

It was the mulatto, Simio.

Simio's head was curiously elongated, like a football, and sat flush on his shoulders as if he had no neck. His face was saffron color, and he had tiny, gun-barrel-size eyes that were a chalky albino blue. The white pullover shirt strained against the sheer mass of him. His biceps were as large as most men's thighs, and his sledgelike fists hung almost to his knees. He had to duck slightly to get under the door, and his shaved head barely cleared the ceiling fans. He had to be close to seven feet tall. The expression on his face was that of a pit bulldog trotting toward a fight—half snarl, half grin.

“You want me to go get some help?” Mellor whispered nervously.

“Logan might be handy to have around.”

“Hoo! After that freezer business, he's going to really be pissed off about this.”

“What about a gun? Isn't there a gun behind the bar?”

Mellor rolled his eyes. “To kill that monster, you'd have to hack his head off, then hide it.”

“Thanks.”

The snake-thin Colombian swung the briefcase onto the bar. Simio stood directly behind him, his albino eyes blinking with reptilian frequency.

“My name's Medelli,” said the smaller man in a thick Spanish accent. “I understand the place is under new management. Who's the owner?”

Graeme Mellor pointed and said quickly, “He is.”

Hawker smiled. “That's right,” he said. “I'm the new owner. What can I do for you?”