Too Much Stuff (7 page)

One hour was still one hour. There was time to do a little investigating and I took advantage of it. Maria offered to drive, handed me an extra helmet, and with a throaty roar from the engine she shot out of the parking lot like a bullet, full speed ahead toward Dr. Malhotra’s Vein Care Center. It took all of about fifteen seconds for me to realize I should have stayed at Pelican Cove.

The lady raced through traffic, moving at breakneck speeds as I hung on tight, dangerously close to touching off-limit areas of her body. She’d lean to the left, lean to the right, slipping between cars, and there were two or three times I thought we were going to lose it altogether.

As we pulled into the parking lot, I’d felt the hot stinging Florida sun burning my wind-whipped face. When we stopped, the roaring from the Harley engine still rang in my ears.

“You’re sure this is where the old hotel was located?” I shouted. I couldn’t hear anything.

A white stucco building fronted the narrow highway, three dark windows and a door the only breaks in the plain vanilla
surface. Two signs hung on a rusted metal post planted in the parking lot. The first was a weather-beaten wooden sign that simply said V
EIN
C
ARE
C
ENTER
. Below that hung a much larger plastic sign with raised letters.

J
AMES
O’N
EILL
O
RTHOPEDIC
S
URGERY
S
PECIALIZING IN
T
OTAL
J
OINT
R
EPLACEMENT
S
URGERY

“I’ve always been told that this was where the Coral Belle was located.”

I checked my watch. James would be free in about fifty minutes. I could go inside, ask a few questions, and I’d still make it back to pick him up when they released him. I knew James didn’t want to spend any more time than he had to at a sheriff’s office.

“I’m going to go in. See what they know.”

She lifted her denim-clad leg, dismounted, and smiled at me, still flirting. If I was about five to ten years older—

“You’re still not going to tell me what you’re looking for, are you?”

“I will. Right now. I will tell you exactly what we’re looking for. But, I don’t think you’re going to like it.”

“Really?” Excitement in her voice.

We’d already lied to her about the plumbing business. And we hadn’t been entirely truthful about our search.

A noisy truck rolled by about twenty feet from us, followed by an old Chevy with a really loud muffler. I could smell the exhaust.

Give her the partial truth. It was the best I could offer. “Mary Trueblood asked us to find out what we could about her great-grandfather. One of the last places she can trace him to is right here, at the site of the Coral Belle Hotel.”

“And you were pretending to be plumbers in disguise? Why? Because you were looking for family history? I don’t think so.” She put her hand on my arm, a plea for the truth. “Because you were looking for a great-grandfather? Was that the reason you
lied to me?” She folded her arms over her ample chest and smiled at me. “Skip, don’t insult me, please. I’m already deeper into this thing than I want to be, and I don’t even know what this thing is.”

She had me.

“Seriously, Skip—”

I shrugged my shoulders as I walked up to the door and entered, not bothering to hold it open for her. I didn’t tell lies well.

The doorway opened into a spacious waiting area, with a sparkling white ceramic floor and a desk that would have been worthy in a brand-new Holiday Inn. At least a Holiday Inn.

A curt voice asked, “Can I help you?”

An Asian girl in a white smock and shoulder-length coal-black hair sat behind the reception desk, never looking up, working her keyboard at 120 words per minute.

“Do you have any history on this building?”

She looked up, disdain apparent on her face.

“History? I’ve been here six months. Does that qualify as history?”

It honestly didn’t. “Is there someone here who can take me back to nineteen thirty-five?”

Maria Sanko appeared beside me, punching her elbows into my rib cage. She obviously wasn’t happy that I’d shut the door in her face. And that I wasn’t sharing the entire story with her.

“Doctor Malhotra would probably know the history of the property.”

“Can I talk to him?”

“I’m sort of busy here.” Evidently not happy with my request, she looked back at her computer screen, and I gazed around the empty waiting area. She didn’t seem that busy to me.

“Ma’am, I’ve driven quite a ways. I’m searching for the history of a relative. I would sure appreciate it if—”

“Oh, all right. I’ll see if he has any time.” She waved her arm at us. “I suppose you can have a seat.”

We did.

Dr. Malhotra walked out about five minutes later, a distinguished Indian-American guy with brushed back salt-and-pepper hair, a neatly trimmed graying beard and mustache, a dark complexion, and a white doctor’s coat.

“Hello.” A slight accent.

He studied us with a stern look on his face. “How can I help you? Veronica said you wanted some history on this building?”

“Yeah. I’m looking for the history of a relative back in the thirties and I think this property may play a part in that history.”

“I started this practice in 1999. But the building has been in my wife’s family since maybe the late forties, early fifties.”

I glanced around at the opulent interior with expensive-looking chairs and sofas, ornate wooden coffee tables, and elite magazines like
Forbes
and
Island Life
lying around. The vein business and orthopedic surgery must be very lucrative.

“Doctor,” Maria smiled at him, “I’m Maria Sanko. I’m a realtor here in Islamorada.”

He nodded.

“Is this the property where the Coral Belle Hotel used to sit?”

He folded his hands in front of him.

“You’re the third person to ask that in the last month.”

“Really?” We both said it together.

“Really.”

“Is it?” I needed the answer.

“No.”

“Oh.” I knew I sounded disappointed. This would have been so easy. The hotel foundation would be here, we bring a shovel at night and—

“Do you know where the Coral Belle was?” Maria kept digging.

He nodded his head. “It was on the water. The property right behind this building, right across the old highway. Next to the Ocean Air Motel.”

“What’s on that property now?”

“Nothing.”

Waterfront property with no development?

“There’s a boat dock there. That’s it. You can see that from the water or the beach at the Ocean Air.”

“So we can walk back there and—”

“It’s fenced and locked.”

“The empty property, right?”

Again he nodded his head yes.

“Well, do you know who owns it?”

“I do.” He’d folded his arms across his chest, staring at me.

“Great. If you could just give us a name—”

“I own it, my friend. Now, unless you’d like to make a medical appointment with Veronica, I’m going to ask you to leave.”

With that he spun around and walked back into the offices.

Maria gave me a questioning look.

“Well. That went well.”

James was waiting in front of the station when I pulled up in the truck. He got in the on passenger side and didn’t say a word.

“We’re going to take a trip down to a motel on the beach. There’s a property there you’re going to find interesting, James.”

He was biting his lower lip, staring straight ahead.

“Want to tell me what happened?”

“No.”

“Hey, bright side. You’re free and we’re still employed. I checked with the front desk. They’re comping us a second room. We both get a room and one’s got a kitchenette. Pretty cool.”

He didn’t smile.

“We’re moving up in the world, James.”

Turning left just before The Vein Care Center clinic, we crossed Old Highway and pulled in at the Ocean Air. Motel apparently wasn’t the appropriate word. The sign said Ocean Air Suites. A forty-something guy with short hair and an earring stood on the white porch, watching us get out of the truck. Slowly walking to the oil-guzzling truck, he approached me.

“We were thinking of maybe staying here sometime in the next couple of months. Thought we might check the place out.”

He kept staring at us.

“So, I wondered if we could just maybe take a quick look at the beach down there? Just a quick look.”

He nodded. “You understand it’s for guests only?”

“Just going to look. We’ll be right back.”

“Okay, then.” He didn’t sound happy about it. “You see it, then you come right back, you hear?”

James and I walked down the shell-covered path, heading toward the ocean. In the distance I could make out several wooden deck chairs and a tiki hut with a grass roof.

“So what are we going to see?”

I pointed to my right, where a tall metal fence ran the entire length from the road to the water. Trees, orange-flowering bougainvillea, and high grass blocked any view of the property next door.

“We’re hopefully going to get a view of that property.”

“And why are we doing this?”

“We might want to come back some night this week and bring a shovel.”

James’s eyes opened a little wider. “So, you found it already.”

“I did.”

“Pard, that’s great.” He punched me on the shoulder.

“Property is owned by a doctor on the Overseas Highway. Not a very pleasant guy. He keeps it under lock and key.”

“What’s so valuable?”

“Don’t know.”

We reached the beach, a little point of sand that stuck out into the water. An older, heavyset couple was sprawled out on two chairs, lathered in lotion, their tiny suits covering far too little. She was bright pink and the guy with socks and sandals was pasty white. European, for sure. I’d seen it before. The sun was
bright, and I figured the guy’s white skin would be red soon. Except for his feet.

Walking farther to the edge, we could look back into the fenced-off grassy ground.

“Dude, there’s nothing there.”

A wooden boat dock reached into the water. Other than that, there was grass. Grass and more grass. The lot was vacant, fenced in on all four sides. Three sides were covered in trees and lush flowering plants, the waterside free of vegetation, but the fence ran all the way to the water’s edge.

“Why do you keep a vacant property locked up?”

I stared out at the sky-blue water, then back at the empty land. There was no boat at the dock.

“Picnickers? Kids? I mean this would be a great place to drink a six-pack, make out with your girlfriend—”

“Maybe go skinny dipping?”

“So you put up a sign that says private property. No need to put up a major security fence.” It seemed to make no sense.

“A sign would be a lot cheaper than this fence, that’s for sure.”

“Time to vacate the premises, boys.”

I spun around and there was the guy with the earring, perched on a white electric golf cart. Electric. A silent approach.

“I told you, we were just looking.”

Glancing down at the seat beside him I saw a nickel-plated revolver. Just lying on the white vinyl. A subtle threat, or else he was going to do some target practice with the dolphins.

“Move it. Guests here pay for this privilege. Understand?”

It was a spit of land, with no ambiance, no personality. Hardly worth the price.

The golf cart guy sat there, waiting for us to make our move.

“No problem. I don’t think we’ll be making reservations today. Okay?”

“We have no problem with gays, but you two are an exception.”
He paused for a moment and just as I got ready to say something, he said, “Okay?” We walked back toward the truck, James kicking the occasional big piece of shell.

“Gays?”

“Everybody is trying to push your buttons today, James. Just settle down.”

“Sons of bitches seriously thought I might have had something to do with that Weezle guy. They thought that I would have killed someone. I mean what kind of a person would just automatically assume that—”

“James, you were not cooperating.”

“You think? When the first question out of their mouths was, ‘Did you kill the man in your room?’”

I hadn’t realized they would be that blunt.

“Hey, you’re free. They couldn’t make that connection because it didn’t exist. And by the way, that’s another thing I found out.”

“What?”

“The dead guy. It wasn’t Jim Weezle.”

“What? There’s no question, is there? We both recognized him from the Yellow Page ad online, right?”

Flipping the keys to James, I opened the passenger door and climbed up into the white beast.

“I thought so. But the name with the body is Peter Stiffle.”

“Stiffle?”

“That’s what Big D says.”

“Big D?”

James started the engine and it coughed several times before catching. Glancing in my side mirror I saw the cloud of oily smoke as James pulled away.

“Big D is—was—Maria’s boyfriend. He’s one of the cops who was at the Cove.”

He backed up, and we headed back to the highway.

“You know, I was gone one hour. I watched my time very carefully.”

“And?”

“In that time, in one hour, you learned that Maria has an ex-boyfriend named Big D, you learned that the dead guy was Peter Stiffle, you met a doctor you’re not too fond of, and you found the location of the old Coral Belle Hotel.”

“I did.”

“Why do you need me along, pard? You’re a one-man detecting machine.”

I smiled, looked out the window, and that’s when I saw the red flashing light in the side mirror.

“Did you cut somebody off? Change lanes with—”

“There are no lanes. Damn it, Skip. These guys aren’t going to leave me alone.”

“We knew who you were, because you had that black paint spatter on your truck. Easy to identify.”

James said nothing through the rolled down window. The dark look on his face and his rhythmic heavy breathing gave it all away.