The Gift of the Dragon (13 page)

“Sure, Ami, paraphrase yourself silly!”

“You turned silly off when you found my irony setting. The land that became Miami was first settled one thousand years ago by a Native American tribe known as the Tequestas. The Spanish arrived in 1566 and built a mission there the next year. Things didn’t really start happening there for many years after that, however, and it was often known as a promising wilderness. Then a freeze in 1895 killed most of Florida’s orange crop, yet spared most of the trees in Miami. A prominent landowner named Julia Tuttle extended a railroad to the port of Miami, and the city began to grow. Wealthy people built a millionaire’s row of beautiful homes along Brickell Avenue, overlooking Biscayne Bay. Later, some of these properties were converted into condominium towers, restaurants, and even universities.”

“What about this Harbor Tower?”

 
“In one of the best spots on Brickell, where the road curves eastward, on a circle of land projecting into the bay, there are half a dozen seaward-oriented towers. The most northern one is the coral-swathed Harbor Tower, and at its foot is the Harbor Tower Restaurant with a sweeping view of Biscayne Bay.” Ami’s electronic voice paused. “By the way, turn left here and then we will arrive at the parking garage you selected.”

Having left her car in the parking garage, Alice stood with the sea on her left and the tower on her right, in the shade of a roadside row of tamarind trees, and looked at the powder-black-framed revolving door to the first floor of the restaurant. Afraid that she would be searched, she also left her phone and most of her money in the car. She did still have Moore’s Centennial, and she had managed to find some .38 special rounds to fill its chambers at a store named Guns R Us in Fort Myers.
 

She worried that Guzman might know her face, either from a meeting she could not remember or from a photo Sara might have shown him. Taking no chances, she had dyed her hair blond and darkened her skin with a fake tanning solution the night before. She had also made her brown eyes sea-green with some inexpensive contacts she had found at a beauty salon in Coconut Grove. When she had left the store, the woman reflected in the glass doors no longer looked familiar.

“Here’s hoping Guzman doesn’t recognize me either,” she whispered and strode into the restaurant’s lobby. Gambling that Guzman did not know Sara was dead, yesterday she had texted the number from the Facesearch app with a short message: “Friend of Sara, have something for you. Meet at your restaurant tomorrow.” She was amazed to get a reply several hours later: “Seven PM, Deathanco Bar, above the restaurant.”
 

She had Ami google the name of the bar then and had found it to be situated on the tenth floor of the Harbor Tower, below a rumored twenty-four-hour poker room on the eleventh floor. She asked the uniformed doorman where the elevators were, and he pointed toward them.

Alice exited the elevator and realized the Deathanco Bar filled this floor. The elevator door put her right in the center of it. The mostly-occupied booths contained black onyx tables, and the low ceiling was rich, dark-veined wood. The inner walls were black also, with discreet, false candlelight fixtures every few feet. A circular smoked-glass window looking out over the sea formed the outer walls. She thought the designer must have been going for a mellow ambience where drinkers at every table could gaze out over the sea. Alice found it annoying as it made it harder to pick her target out from the crowd. She had made herself up to look older and stuffed her clothes to make herself look chubby. In this mostly thin and well-dressed crowd, it looked as though her work had achieved her goal because people looked through or around her.
 

As she moved around the bar, she saw him. He appeared to be alone, on the last stool before the gray granite-topped bar disappeared into a deeply-grained wooden wall, looking out the window. He had a deeper tan than in the picture from Moore’s, and in the darkness of the bar his hair appeared lighter, as if he had spent a great deal of time in the sun. Loose strands of hair framed a face that looked sharper, more chiseled than in the photograph. He had a white sports jacket on over a mostly unbuttoned cream-colored shirt and tan chinos. He nodded to the beat of the music. She noticed his eyes darting from one person to the next as he rocked about. Alice recognized the tune playing as one she had liked on the car ride over; when she had asked Ami its name, she had said, “Brokenhearted.” The beat-rich song seemed to give her target many excuses for moving his head.
 

She sat on one of the dark, round stools at the bar and watched him for a few minutes. Several people came up and greeted him, and he appeared gracious in return, but no one stayed long. She couldn’t see anyone guarding him. She did see several hard men with restless eyes in her circuit of the room. She guessed they were undercover, watching for trouble.
 

A large man in a shirt covered with bright-red and yellow flowers stopped and spoke jovially to Guzman. Alice couldn’t quite understand him over the noise of clinking glasses and the pulsing beat. The man touched glasses with Guzman and headed down the hall past him.
 

Alice moved in and sat down on the stool next to Guzman. As the song wailed, “Baby,” she looked the man in the eyes and said, loudly, “Hello, Tomas. I’m the one Sara sent.” His smile lit up his face, and Alice noticed his even, white, teeth.
 

“Ah, my mystery friend — how is our dear Sara?”

“She’s doing well,” Alice lied, “and sorry she couldn’t make it.”

Guzman grinned and looked left, then right, and pointed at his ears. “Well, we have much to discuss, my friend, but it is very loud here. I’ve a more private room. Would you mind if we went there to talk?” He motioned down the hall. “It’s just down this way.”

That fit her plans well, and Alice nodded. She gripped the revolver in her pocket.
If he is trying to get me into a vulnerable position, I am ready!
Getting the information she needed would be best done out of the public eye, in any event.
 

“Perfect!” He leaped from his stool and walked down the hall with Alice following. She did a quick visual sweep of the room, and no one seemed to notice the pudgy older woman following the handsome man down the hallway toward the restrooms.
 

They passed the doors to the restrooms. She noticed that a somewhat abstract painting of a man in a white suit marked the men’s room door, and a similar painting of a woman in a puffy dress marked the women’s room.
Cute,
she thought.
 

They arrived at the end of the hall at a final set of oaken double doors with brass handles. Tomas produced a key, unlocked and opened the doors, and motioned her to go in. She found herself in a large office with expensive furniture, looking out over the same expansive view of Biscayne Bay as the in the bar, except from this angle she could see the graceful span of the causeway to Key Biscayne and the islands behind it. A desk sat to one side of the office and, next to it, a leather couch and chairs with a rich look that promised a soft, buttery seating experience. A softly lit bar faced the couch, with burning candles giving off a coconut smell. Alice walked in and turned to face Guzman, who closed the double doors behind him and then turned to her again with his dazzling smile.
 

“Well, miss, you seem to know me, but I have not had the honor?”

“Ah, call me Lilly, Lilly Valero.”

The bag of goodies from Jenny had contained a driver's license with that name, so she could show him ID if he asked for it.

“Well, Miss Lilly, I apologize for this, but I must ask you,” Guzman’s smiling face suddenly changed to a mask of anger, and in his hand appeared a long, shiny knife, “who the fuck are you?”

Alice held her hands out and stepped back, not far, though, as the desk and the chairs limited her range of motion.
 

“Hold on, Tomas. Sara sent me to talk to you. I’m a friend.”

“Sara is
dead!
Murdered! Weeks ago! Now again, who are you?” Guzman jabbed the knife at her as he spoke.

Alice had enough of the knife pointing. She grabbed Guzman’s knife hand and pulled him forward, simultaneously sweeping her right hand diagonally in front of her and hitting Guzman’s arm between his wrist and elbow, sending the knife flying. She then straightened out his arm and raised it, hearing,
Control the threat,
in her head. She gripped his wrist tightly while she drove her right elbow into his ribs under his arm once. Then she stepped closer to him, raising her arm above his shoulder, and drove her elbow into the back of his head, stunning him. She continued the swing, bending Guzman forward as she slid her arm around his forearm, and grabbed her left wrist. This left Guzman bent over, and she brought him down to the floor with his arm twisted behind him.
 

Alice knelt beside him with his wrist locked solidly between her two hands and said, “Now, Mr. Guzman, from here I can just do more of this,” she twisted her lock a bit, “and break both your elbow and wrist. If you shout, you will be in excruciating pain, with broken bones.”
 

 
Guzman lurched upward and then gasped as Alice twisted her lock again. “Stop moving. Fractures at this joint do not heal well. Let’s not destroy your tennis game, Tomas. I just want some information from you. About Sara and Peter Moore.”

“Who the hell are you?”

“I’m Sara’s friend. I told you. She sent me to talk to you.”

“Bullshit! She’s dead.”

Alice twisted harder. “Okay, genius, how do you know she didn’t send me last month, and I’m just getting into Miami today?”

“Ow! Shit. I talked to her before she died. She didn’t say anything about sending a friend to see me.”
 

“She was shot right in front of me! The same shooter wounded me. I followed his trail to Peter Moore’s office in Tampa and found a photo there with you in it. Sara is dead. Chances are the killer is looking for you. I found you. The killer will, too. I’m looking for him, and when I find him, I
will
kill him. So you should help me find him. If you want to keep enjoying your bar and this fine office.” She felt him relax a bit then.
 

“How do I know you didn’t kill them yourself?”

“Them? I didn’t say Peter was dead.”
 

Tomas said so quietly that Alice strained to hear him, “He is. I saw him killed.”

“You were there?”

“No, we had a surveillance feed. I watched it over there.” He jerked his head toward his couch.
 

“Had?”

“It stopped working soon after Peter's murder. The killer must have disabled it.”

Tomas wrenched his arms, not as hard as before, but Alice could feel that if she relaxed her hold, he would break free and who knows what then. She decided to try a white lie.

“Look, Tomas, Sara talked about you.” She felt a change in his body as if he were interested.
Good move,
she thought.
 

“She said I should find you here and warn you, protect you from the killer. She said you could explain something she gave me.”

“If she knew you, if she was going to send you to me, why did she never speak of you before?”

“Sara kept many secrets. She kept them from me also. I’ve known her since she was young, but she didn’t mention you until the day she was killed.”

Guzman relaxed more.
 

“You’ve known her since
she
was young?”

Alice held her breath. Jenny said that Alice knew Sara as a child, but other than the scene from the night she died, Alice could not remember any of that—except for the stories Jenny told her while she recovered. “Yes, she grew up in Oregon, in Idanha, near Willamette Springs. I knew Sara there.”

At the mention of Idanha, a flyspeck of a town in the Oregon wilderness, Guzman relaxed further. “She talked about Idanha and Willamette.”

Alice released her hold. “We have the same problem, Tomas. Let’s work together.”

Tomas got up stiffly, retrieved his knife, and threw it angrily into the wall. It stuck point-first, vibrating. Then he turned to Alice and smiled.
 

“I’m sorry about my outburst, Miss Valero. Is it Miss?”

“Call me Lilly.”

“Fine. Well, I apologize. First Peter and then Sara. I have been wary of strangers.”

“I’d have thought you’d have guards.”

“I do. They are out there.” He gestured with his hand. He held out his cell phone. “I push this button to call them and this one to let them know I’m all right.” He pushed the second button. “They’d have been in here in a few minutes.”

“Why did you meet with me alone, then?”

“I must confess I didn’t think you were much of a threat. I see I was mistaken.”

“Don’t judge a book by its cover.”

“Yes, Miss Lilly, if you were a book on the shelf, I’d not take you for a story about a fighter. I see you better now. You’re in disguise.”

“I thought it’d be better to be overlooked than to be looked over.”

Guzman nodded. “Well, Miss Lilly, it’s happy hour. Our tradition here at the Harbor Tower is to drink to the sunset. Do you care for bourbon?”

I have no idea whether I like bourbon, but I do know that if you call me Miss again, I will hit you.
To be polite she said, “Yes.”

Guzman put some ice in two glasses and poured from an amber bottle labeled Knob Creek. “So, what happened to Sara?”

“She came to see me, and she gave me this.”

Alice pulled her necklace far enough out of her shirt for Guzman to see it and noted his widening eyes. “She told me to come find you here in Miami, and she was starting to say something more before she got shot.”

“She was shot? How was she shot? Forgive me for asking, but it’s important to me.”

“She got hit bad. The bullets must have been a… special kind. I was basically showered with her brains. Sorry, is that informative enough?”

“Yes, sadly it is.”

“Do you know who killed her?”

“I think I do. The same man who killed Peter Moore. An assassin named Callan Grant.”