Found: A Matt Royal Mystery (11 page)

“You’re not a cop.”

“No, but J. D. Duncan is.”

“Explain to me about how I’m going to go to the hospital.”

“It’s like this, numbnut. I’m going to royally kick your ass.”

“Royally, huh. Is that a pun?”

“Yep.”

He laughed again, and I saw it in his eyes. He was about to move. I took a step toward him and kicked at his groin. He was faster than I expected and turned his hip just enough that my foot bounced off it. He moved toward me again, coming faster. I sidestepped and threw a flat kick toward his knee. He danced backward, taking an end table and lamp with him. I missed completely. He grinned. “Tell me about that hospital again, Royal. While you can still talk.”

This wasn’t going well. He was big and strong and quick. Maybe he’d earned those muscles without the help of drugs. I reached around to my back and pulled the pistol from its holster. I shot him in the shoulder. He
stepped backward with the impact and then shook it off and came at me again. The bullet had done no more harm that a horsefly’s bite. But it made him mad as hell.

He was moving fast. I fired again, this time at his right knee. He took the bullet and lifted his weight off the wounded leg. He let out a bellow, sounding like I imagined a wounded elephant might. He kept coming. I fired again, taking out his left knee. That slowed him, put him down, and damned if he didn’t keep coming, crawling toward me with his powerful arms, dragging his legs behind. I kicked him in the face and barely dodged out of the way as he tried to grab my leg. Blood and mucus spurted from his nose. I’d need to have the carpet professionally cleaned. He was stopped for the moment, his face showing the pain from his shoulder, both knees, and his nose.

“Look, Tony,” I said. “The EMS people will come and take you to the hospital. But if you keep coming, I’m going to shoot you in the head, and it’ll be the medical examiner’s people who come to take you to the morgue.
Capisci
?”

He lay his head on the floor, then raised it and looked at me with the most terrifying hatred I’d ever seen. “Okay. I’m done for the day, but this ain’t over, Royal.”

“It is for you.” I pulled my phone from a pocket and dialed 911, identified myself, and told the operator to send police and rescue personnel to my address. I hung up and sat on the sofa, my gun trained on the wounded giant.

There was quiet in the room except for Tony’s labored breathing. He was tough, maybe the toughest man I’d ever met. Those knee shots would have had me screaming in pain. He didn’t even moan.

I heard sirens in the distance, getting closer. Three vehicles coming my way. I heard them turn onto my street and come to a stop in front of my house. The first man through the door was Officer Steve Carey, gun drawn. “Don’t shoot,” I said. “I’m the good guy.”

J.D. came running in, her pistol in her hand, a look of fear on her face. Steve said, “He’s okay, J.D.” She put her pistol back in its holster as she grabbed me in a bear hug. “Thank God,” she said. “I was on my way here when dispatch called me about your 911 call.”

Steve was standing over Tony, who seemed to have gone into hibernation. He lay quietly, sucking up the pain, showing us how tough he was. “Who’s this guy?” Steve asked.

“His name’s Tony. Works for Sal Bonino.”

“The Mafia guy?”

Tony grunted. “There’s no such thing as the Mafia.”

“He prefers ‘organized crime,’” I said.

“I want a lawyer,” Tony said.

“What you need,” said Steve, “is a doctor.”

“Get me a lawyer.”

The paramedics arrived, two of them pulling a gurney with a medical bag sitting on top. They began to check Tony’s vitals, splinted his legs, and got him ready to transport.

Steve pulled a card from his pocket and read Tony his Miranda rights.

“I know all that shit,” said Tony. “Now get me a lawyer.”

“All in due time,” said one of the paramedics as they got Tony onto the gurney and headed out the front door. “We’re taking him to Blake,” said the other paramedic, referring to a local hospital.

My front door opened again and Chief Bill Lester walked in. “You all right, Matt?”

“Yeah.”

“Looks like you’ll need a new lamp and a carpet cleaner. What happened?”

“Wait a minute,” said J.D. “We’re going to need a statement. Might as well do it now so he doesn’t have to keep repeating things. You okay with that, Matt?”

“Sure.”

J.D. went to her car and returned with a digital recorder, put it on the coffee table, and took me through everything, beginning with my meeting with Ben Appleby, the P.I.

The night was cooled by a fresh breeze blowing down the bay, chasing the last vestige of warmth left by the day’s sun. The palm trees bordering the pool at J.D.’s condo complex stirred in the currents of air. She and I were sitting on her sunporch, the sliding glass doors open to the night, enjoying the quiet that had descended upon us with the darkness. She was sipping a glass of white wine, and I was working on my second bottle of Miller Lite.

“You think Joy will be able to get that mess out of my carpet?” I asked. I’d called my friend Joy Fitzpatrick who owned a professional cleaning service and tidied up my house once a week. She came right over and did whatever she did with chemicals I didn’t want to know about. She said that I should stay off the carpet for a couple of days until everything dried.

J.D. nodded. “She’s good.”

“Yes.”

“How’s the beer?”

“Fine. How’s the wine?”

“Good.”

“You’re quiet tonight,” I said.

“I’m pensive.”

I was quiet for a moment. “What exactly does that mean?”

“It means I’m thinking, wistfully.”

“About what?”

“About what might have been.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Matt, when I got the call from dispatch today telling me you needed an ambulance and cops, a part of me just closed down. I don’t know
exactly what I was thinking, but I was seeing a future without you. It lasted only a moment or two, but it was terrible. I know it was selfish. I thought you were hurt or maybe dead, and all I could think about was my life without you.”

“That’s not selfish, J.D. If the person you love dies, he’s out of it. He’s either in an afterlife or oblivion. Whichever, he’s okay. It’s the one left behind who grieves, who has to face each day alone, who stares down across the years and knows life will never be the same.”

“You’ve been there. When Laura died.”

“Not in the same way. We’d been divorced for a long time, but I still loved her. When she died, a part of me died, too. But not a big part. She hadn’t been in my life for several years. I’d gotten used to living without her, and I knew I was responsible for her leaving, for divorcing me. If something happened to you, I’m not sure I could go on. Maybe it’d be time for me to hang it up and see what’s on the other side.”

“Matt, promise me that if something does happen to me, you won’t give up. Life is too precious.”

“I guess it is. And besides, who’d look after Logan and Jock if I checked out?”

J.D. smiled. “Well, there’s that. You just take care. There are a lot of Tonys out there. And I’m afraid Bonino’s people will want some revenge for what you did to their buddy today.”

“What are we going to do about dinner?”

“I’ve got chicken potpies in the freezer.”

“That’ll do. Why don’t you tell me what you found out today about Katie? Then we’ll eat.”

I was intrigued by J.D.’s story. The police theory on the death of Katie hung together well and Bert Hawkins’ reservation about the DNA was too little to change any minds. Except mine and J.D.’s. We had the photograph of Katie. Either she was alive, or somebody had gone to great lengths to make us believe she was. We couldn’t come up with any reason why someone would do that. But, at the same time, we had no reasonable explanation as to why somebody would want the world to think Katie was dead.

My phone rang. Jock. “Matt, where are you?”

“I’m at J.D.’s. Are you on your way?”

“I’m sitting in front of your house.”

“Come on over. I’ll explain things when you get here.”

“Be there in a couple of minutes.”

I hung up and looked at J.D. “Jock’s here.”

“I’m glad. He might have a new perspective on what’s going on around here. He can stay in my guest room.”

“I hope he’s okay.”

“How’d he sound?” she asked.

“Fine. But you never know. It’ll depend on how rough his last few weeks have been.”

“If you guys need to be alone, I’ll go bunk in with Marie Phillips.”

“Logan’s probably already there. A threesome?”

She looked at me. Pensively, I think. Then, “It’s a thought. But I can also use her guest room.”

“Good idea. Logan’s heart probably couldn’t handle both of you.”

Her phone pinged. She pulled it out of her pocket, hit a couple of keys, looked at it, and handed it to me. The tiny screen was filled with another picture of Katie Fredrickson.

Jock was tired. He’d flown from Rome to Atlanta, cleared customs, and flown into Tampa, rented a car, and driven the sixty miles to Longboat Key. He preferred large airports to small ones like Sarasota-Bradenton, because of the anonymity they offered. He walked through the door, hugged me and then J.D. “Good to see you guys,” he said.

He was dressed in black trousers, a black silk T-shirt, black socks, and black shoes, his usual traveling ensemble. He swore he wasn’t trying to make a fashion statement, but that black hid all the food stains he’d acquire during a long trip.

Jock was my height, six feet, and had the wiry build of a runner. He’d lost most of his hair while still in his twenties and his bald head was set off by a fringe of black hair. His skin was deeply tanned from the many days he spent in the sun chasing our country’s enemies, his face wrinkled by laugh lines, his eyes dark and penetrating.

“Glad you’re here, Jock,” I said. “You might as well get your gear. We’ll be staying here for a couple of days.”

“Oh? J.D. get tired of your dump?”

“Well,” she said. “Sort of. His carpet is a little messed up right now.”

Jock had a quizzical look, but stood silently waiting for an explanation.

“I shot a guy in my living room,” I said.

“What?” The puzzlement turned to concern.

“A guy named Tony wanted to break some of my bones, so I shot him. Three times. This afternoon.”

“Talk to me, podna.”

“Sit down, Jock,” said J.D. “I’ve got chicken potpies in the freezer. You hungry?”

“Starving.”

“I’ll put the pies in the oven. Want something to drink?”

“I’m fine for now,” Jock said.

We sat and I told him everything I knew about the past three days. J.D. would chime in occasionally and fill in blanks in my narrative. When the pies were done, J.D. served dinner on the sunporch and we ate as we talked. Jock asked, “Do you think Katie’s picture is a hoax?”

“No reason to think that,” said J.D. “We’ve talked about it, but neither of us can come up with a reason why anyone would want to jerk us around.”

“Who is this guy Bonino?” asked Jock. “You said he was the local Mafia. Do you have any idea how he might be connected to Goodlow’s murder?”

“None,” I said.

“Then there must be some other reason he’s having J.D. followed.”

“I think it may be more than that,” I said. “I think this P.I., Appleby, was trying to intimidate her in some way.”

“What makes you think that?” asked J.D. She looked at Jock. “This is the first time I’ve heard this.”

“Think about it,” I said. “He was parked near my house at two in the morning. He didn’t recognize my name when I met with him. He must have known you were there and anybody with half a brain knows that the Longboat cops aren’t going to let a strange person in a strange car stay on the key that time of the morning, much less one parked on a residential street. This guy’s no dummy. He knew you’d be told about him.”

She was quiet for a moment. “Maybe he was waiting for me to leave so he could follow me.”

“At two in the morning?” I asked.

“If he didn’t know I spend a lot of nights with you, he might have thought I’d leave after you’d had your way with me.” She was smiling.

“Well,” I said, “you do have a reputation for one-night stands.”

She threw a napkin at me. “You may be right, Matt. Maybe he’s trying to put me on edge. He certainly wasn’t very subtle when he was following me on GMD. He should have known I’d make him.”

Jock looked at me. “Maybe the whole reason the P.I. was following J.D. was to set you up for the beating Tony was supposed to give you.”

“But remember, Appleby didn’t know who I was.”

“He wouldn’t have to,” said Jock. “He just went where he was told to go.”

“Why go to all that trouble?” I asked. “He could have just shown up and beat the hell out of me.”

“What message would that have sent?” asked Jock.

I was stumped. “None, I guess.”

“And, what message did you get from his attempt on you?”

“Not to interfere,” I said.

“Interfere with what?” Jock asked.

I thought about that for a minute. “It had to be something J.D. is working on. Tony’s boss didn’t want me to get involved in whatever it is.”

Jock turned to J.D. “What are you working on?”

“Other than a couple of car burglaries, nothing but Goodlow’s murder.”

“And Katie’s disappearance,” said Jock.

J.D. sat back in her chair. “How could that be?” she asked. “Nobody knows about that except Matt and me.”

“And the Basses,” said Jock.

“They don’t know about the pictures,” I said.

“But you went to see them,” said Jock. “Maybe somebody knows about that. It wouldn’t be hard to tie the facts together, J.D.’s relationship with Katie and your relationship with J.D.”

“Why would the Mafia be involved in a year-old disappearance?” I asked.

“Who knows,” said Jock. “What was in the picture you just got from Katie?”

“It was nothing,” said J.D. “Just a picture of her with a building in the background. I sent it to my computer if you want to look at it.”

“I don’t think she would have sent a picture that didn’t have some meaning,” I said. “If it did come from Katie.”