Miami Noir (10 page)
“Don’t worry,” I said. “No toll booth photos.”
“That’s a healthy chunk of change, Clancy. How will you spend yours?”
“A Yamaha piano. I can’t decide between baby grand or upright. I’ll stash the rest and trickle-spend. You?”
“That’s a coincidence—Yamaha. I’m going to order a 225 four-stroke for my workboat. Replace that Johnson someone stole a lifetime ago.”
“You think he did it?”
“I figure a five-year gap between our ages, maybe six.” Duane popped open his beer. “I’d sure like to know who it was, but it wasn’t him.”
W
hat aren’t you telling me?” Victoria Lord demanded.
Jeez. Her grand jury tone.
“Nothing to tell,” Steve Solomon said. “I’m going deepsea fishing.”
“You? The guy who got seasick in a paddle boat at Disney World?”
“That boat was defective. I’m gonna sue.” Steve hauled an Igloo cooler onto the kitchen counter. “You may not know it, but I come from a long line of anglers.”
“A long line of liars, you mean.”
The partners of Solomon & Lord, Attorneys-at-Law, stood in the kitchen of Steve’s bungalow on Kumquat Avenue in Coconut Grove. The place was a square stucco pillbox the color of a rotting avocado, but it had withstood hurricanes, termites, and countless keg parties.
Unshaven and hair mussed, wearing cargo shorts and a T-shirt, Steve looked like a beach bum. Lips glossed and cheekbones highlighted, wearing a glen-plaid suit with an ivory silk blouse, Victoria looked sexy, smart, and successful.
“C’mon, Steve. What are you really up to?” Her voice drizzled with suspicion like mango glaze over sautéed snapper.
Steve wanted to tell his lover and law partner the truth. Or at least, the partial truth. But he knew how Ms. Propriety would react: “You can’t do that. It’s unethical.”
And if he told her the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? “You’ll be disbarred! Jailed. Maybe even killed.”
No, he’d have to fly solo. Or swim solo, as the case may be.
Steve pulled two six-packs of Heineken out of the refrigerator and tossed them into the cooler. “Okay, it’s really a business meeting.”
Victoria cocked her head and pursed her lips in crossexam mode. “Which is it, Pinocchio? Fishing or business? Were you lying then or are you lying now?”
For a tall, lanky blonde with a dazzling smile, she could fire accusations the way Dan Marino once threw the football.
“I’m going fishing with Manuel Cruz.”
“What? I thought you were going to sue him.”
“Which is what makes it business. Cruz wants to make an offer before we file suit. I suggested we go fishing, keep it relaxed. He loved the idea and invited me on his boat.”
So far, Steve hadn’t told an outright fib and it was almost 8 a.m. Not quite a personal best, but still, he was proud of himself.
For the last five years, Manuel Cruz worked as controller of Toraño Chevrolet in Hialeah, where he managed to steal three million dollars before anyone noticed. Teresa Toraño, a Cuban
exiliada
in her seventies, was nearly bankrupt, and Steve was determined to get her money back, but it wouldn’t be easy. All the computer records had been erased, leaving no electronic trail. Cruz had no visible assets other than his sportfishing boat. The guy didn’t even own a house. And the juiciest piece of evidence—Cruz fled Cuba years ago after embezzling money from a government food program—wasn’t even admissible.
“Just you and Cruz, alone at sea,” she said. “Sounds dangerous.”
“I’m not afraid of him.”
“It’s not you I’m worried about.”
Victoria punched the
record
button on her pocket Dictaphone. “Memo to the Toraño file. Make certain our malpractice premiums are paid.”
“You and your damned Dictaphone,” Steve complained. “Drives me nuts.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. It’s so…”
“Organized?”
“Anal.”
Victoria pulled her Mini Cooper into the Matheson Hammock Marina, swerving to avoid a land crab clip-clopping across the asphalt. The sun was already baking the pavement, the air sponge-thick with humidity. Just above a stand of sea lavender trees, a pair of turkey buzzards flew surveillance.
Victoria sneaked a look at Steve as he hauled the cooler out of the car’s tiny trunk. Dark, unruly hair, a slight, sly grin as if he were one joke ahead of the rest of the world. The deep brown eyes, usually filled with mischief, were hidden behind dark Ray-Bans.
Damnit, why won’t he level with me?
Why did he always take the serpentine path instead of the expressway? Why did he always treat laws and rules, cases and precedents, as mere suggestions?
Because he has more fun making it up as he goes along.
Steve drove her crazy with his courtroom antics and his high-wire ethics. If he believed in a client, there was nothing he wouldn’t do to win. Which was exactly what frightened her now.
Just what would Steve do for Teresa Toraño?
They headed toward the dock, the morning sun beating down so ferociously Victoria felt her blouse sticking to her shoulder blades. The only sounds were the groans of boats in their moorings and the caws of gulls overhead. The air smelled of the marshy hammock, salt and iodine and fermenting seaweed. The fronds of thatch palms hung limp in the still air.
“Gimme a kiss. I gotta go,” Steve said, as they stepped onto the concrete dock. In front of them were expensive toys, gleaming white in the morning sun. Rows of powerful sportfishermen, large as houses. Dozens of sleek sailing craft, ketches and sloops and schooners.
“Sure, Mr. Romance.” She kissed him lightly on the lips. Something seemed off-kilter, but what? And what was that pressing against her through his shorts? Hadn’t last night been enough? Twice before
SportsCenter
, once after
Letterman
She sneaked a hand into his pocket and came out with a pair of handcuffs. “What’s this, the latest in fishing tackle?”
“Ah. Well. Er…” Gasping like a beached grouper. “You know that store, Only Sexy Things?” He grabbed the handcuffs and slipped them back into his pocket. “Thought I’d spice up the bedroom.”
“Stick to cinnamon incense. Last chance, loverboy. What’s going on?”
“You’re fucking late,
hombre!
” Manuel Cruz yelled from the fly bridge of a power boat tied up at the dock. He was a muscular man in his late thirties, wearing canvas shorts and a white shirt with epaulets. A Marlins cap was pulled low over his eyes, and his sunglasses hung on a chain.
The boat was a sportfisherman in the sixty-foot range, all polished teak and gleaming chrome. A fly bridge, a glass-enclosed salon, and a pair of fighting chairs in the cockpit for serious deepsea fishing. The name on the stern read:
Wet Dream
Men, Victoria thought. Men were so one-dimensional.
Buenos días
, Ms. Lord.”
She gave him a nod and a tight smile.
“Let’s go, Solomon,” Cruz urged. “Fish are hungry.”
Steve hoisted the cooler onto the deck. “Toss the lines for us, hon?”
She leveled a gaze at him. “Sure, hon.”
Victoria untied the bow line from its cleat and threw it up on the boat. She moved quickly to the stern, untied the line, propped a hand on a piling crusted with bird dung, and leapt aboard.
“Vic! Whadaya think you’re you doing?”
“Going fishing.”
“Get back on the dock.”
She smiled and pointed toward the growing body of water that separated them from land.
“You’re not dressed for fishing,” Steve told her.
“I’m dressed for your bail hearing.” She kicked off her velvet-toed pumps and peeled off her panty hose, distracting Steve with her muscular calves, honed on the tennis courts of La Gorce Country Club. “Now, what’s with the handcuffs?”
Steve lowered his voice so she could barely hear him above the roaring diesels. “You remember Solomon’s Law number one?”
Oh, that. Steve’s personal code for rule breaking.
“How could I forget?
If the law doesn’t work…work the law
“In the matter of Manuel Cruz, the law isn’t working.”
“What’s that?” Cruz asked, eying the cooler on the deck.
“Brought beer and bait,” Steve said.
“What for? I got a case of La Tropical and a hundred pounds of shiners and wiggles.”
All three of them stood on the fly bridge. Twin diesels throbbing, the
Wet Dream
cruised down Hawk Channel inside the barrier reefs. The water was green felt, smooth as a billiard table, the boat riding on a plane at thirty knots.
Cruz ran a hand over the polished-teak steering wheel. “I come to this country with nothing but the clothes on my back and look at me now.”
“Very impressive,” Steve said, thinking it would be even more impressive if Cruz hadn’t stolen the money to buy the damn boat.
Cruz winked at Victoria, his smile more of a leer. “You two want to fool around, I got clean sheets in the master stateroom.”
“Sounds lovely,” Victoria cooed. “Want to fool around, Steve?” Her smile was as sweet as fresh-squeezed
guarapo
, but Steve caught the sarcastic tone.
“Maybe after we catch something,” he said pointedly.
“Heads and A/C work, faucets don’t,” Cruz said. “Watertank’s fouled.”
Steve studied the man, standing legs spread at the wheel, a macho pose. A green tattoo of a scorpion crawled up one ankle. On the other ankle, in a leather sheaf, was a foot-long Marine combat knife. It looked like the weapon Sylvester Stallone used in those
Rambo
movies. Out here, it could be used to cut lines or clean fish.
Or gut a lawyer planning to do him harm.
They had just passed Sombrero Light when Cruz said, “So here’s my offer,
hombre
. The Toraño bitch gives me a release with a promise never to sue. And vice versa. I won’t sue her ass.”
“I don’t like the way you talk about my client,” Steve said.
“Tough shit. I don’t like Fidel Castro, but what am I gonna do about it?”
“Your offer stinks like week-old snapper.”
“You sue me, what do you get? A piece of paper you can wipe your ass with. I got nothing in my own name, including the boat.”
Steve looked right and left to get his bearings. Off to port, in the direction of the reef, he spotted the fins of two sharks heading toward strands of yellow sargasso weed, home to countless fish. Red coral just below the surface cast a rusty glow on the shallow water. To the starboard was the archipelago of the Florida Keys. From here, the island chain was strung out like an emerald necklace.
“Let Vic take the wheel a minute,” Steve said. “I want you to see something.”
Cruz allowed as how even a woman lawyer could keep a boat on 180 degrees, due south, and followed Steve down the ladder to the cockpit. Just off the stern, the props dug at the water like a plow digging at a field. Steve opened the cooler, reached underneath the ice, and pulled out a two-foot-long greenish-blue fish, frozen solid. A horse-eyed jack.
“Great bait, huh?” Steve held the fish by its tail and let it swing free. It had a fine heft, like a small sledgehammer.
“Already told you, I got shiners and wiggles.”
“Then I better use this for something else.” Steve swung the frozen fish at Cruz’s head. The man stutter-stepped sideways and the blow glanced off his shoulder and sideswiped an ear. Steve swung again and Cruz ducked, the fish flying free and shattering the glass door of the salon. Cruz reached for his knife in the ankle sheath and Steve barreled into him, knocking them both to the deck.
On the fly bridge, Victoria screamed, “Stop! Both of you!”
The two men rolled over each other, scraping elbows and knees on the planked deck. Cruz was heavier, and his breath smelled of tobacco. Steve was wiry and quicker, but ended up underneath when they skidded to a stop. Cruz grabbed Steve’s T-shirt at the neck and slammed his head into the deck. Once, twice, three times.
Thwomp, thwomp, thwomp.
Steve balled a fist and landed a short right that caught Cruz squarely on the Adam’s apple. The man gagged, clutched his throat, and fell backward. Steve squirmed out from under, but Cruz tripped him. Steve tumbled into the gunwale, smacking his head, sparks flashing behind his eyes. He had the sensation of being dragged across a hard floor. On his back, he opened his eyes and saw something glistening in the sun.
The knife blade!
Cruz was on his knees, knife in hand. “
Pendejo!
I oughta make chum out of you.”
“No!” Victoria’s voice, closer than it should have been.
Steve heard the clunk, saw Cruz topple over, felt him bounce off his own chest. Straddling both of them was Victoria, a three-foot steel tarpon gaff in her right hand.
“Omigod,” she said. “I didn’t kill him, did I?”
“Not unless a dead man grunts and farts at the same time,” Steve said, listening to sounds coming from both ends of the semiconscious man.
He shoved Cruz off and stood up, wrapping his arms around Victoria, who was trembling. “You were terrific, Vic. We work great together.”
“Really? What did
you
do?”
“Come on. Help me get him up the ladder.” Steve pulled the handcuffs from his pocket. “I want him on the bridge.”
“What now? What insanity now?”
“Relax, Vic. In a few hours, Cruz will be dying to give back Teresa’s money.”
Steve had played fast and loose with the rules before, Victoria thought, but nothing like this.
This is scary. And in the eyes of the law, she was dirty too.
This could mean trading the couture outfits and Italian footwear for orange jumpsuits and shower shoes.
With one wrist handcuffed to the rail at the rear of the bridge, Cruz had been berating Steve for the past twenty minutes.
“Know what, Solomon? She hits harder than you do.”
“Mr. Cruz,” Victoria said, “if you begin to feel dizzy or nauseous, let me know. Head trauma can be very dangerous.”
“What about
my
head?” Steve demanded.
“It’s impervious to trauma. Or reason.”
The
Wet Dream
was planing across the tops of small whitecaps when Steve said: “Take the wheel, Vic. Keep it on two-zero-two.”
“Please,” she said, irritated.
“What?”
“‘Keep it on two-zero-two,
please
.’”
“A captain doesn’t say ‘please.’”
“Maybe not Captain Bligh.” Victoria slid behind the wheel, thinking perhaps she’d hit the wrong man with the gaff. She still didn’t know where they were headed, and Steve’s behavior was becoming increasingly bizarre. He had the beginning of a lump on his head, and blood trickled from his skinned elbows and knees.