by Owen Parr
“I’ll go with you, if you don’t mind.” I turned to Patrick. “Why don’t you and Dom follow us? Then, we’ll have a car there.”
“Let’s go,” A. Rod said.
I asked, “Where is your partner?”
“Like the Sergeant said, we work in teams of four. Roger, my partner, is sitting at the airport waiting to talk to the pilot, Troy Melnick. My other two guys are parked at Melnick’s home and at Rob Silver’s home, one of the other pilots. No one has seen them or the other pilot, John Edwards, since yesterday.”
“Can you have someone check what vehicles they drive?”
“Sure, I can get someone to do that, but why?” A. Rod, asked as he got up and gathered the murder book under one arm.
“I just want to see if one of them has a Kawasaki motorcycle registered in their name.”
“You’re thinking the shooter of your tire is one of them?”
“I have a hunch, A. Rod. I have a hunch.”
22
Admittedly, I was surprised at the cooperation of these homicide detectives. Of course, as Billy Joel sang, I was in a New York state of mind, and these guys were not. I could only imagine the reverse—PI’s from Miami walking into an NYPD homicide division and asking to participate in a murder investigation. I think their first reaction would be, “Yeah, hold this.” You know what I’m talking about?
A. Rod could not be a nicer guy. He was late thirties, clean cut, well dressed, and meticulous for details, as I said before. We drove for about thirty minutes and arrived at the scene of the murder. Fortunately, the area of the field where the body was found was still cordoned off with yellow crime tape. A grid of the area was marked off in a large square of about forty yards, with smaller squares of about two feet each inside the perimeter. The grass was high, maybe four inches in some places, but it was all flat and easy to walk and inspect. From our vantage point, we could see planes landing and taking off from Miami Executive Airport.
“Did you guys go through the grid already?”
“We did yesterday. Nothing was found that could be tied to the murder,” A. Rod replied.
“What did they find?”
“Sure, an empty cheap lighter with smudge prints—nothing we can work with. An old used condom. Some golf balls and golf tees, likely from neighbors who come out here and practice.”
“Our vic was not sexually molested, was she?”
“No.”
“You didn’t find the bullet?” I asked again.
“I wish we had. It went right through her forehead and out the back of her head.”
“If she was shot here, then that bullet has to be here. Unfortunately, it’s probably buried in the dirt somewhere. Was there a lot of blood around her head?”
A. Rod looked at me. “I see what you’re getting at. If she was shot here, there’s got to be a lot a blood on the ground. The thing is, this dirt is porous. So, the blood seeped into the ground if she was.”
“Let’s excavate in the area where she was found. I can’t imagine the killer driving our vic here bleeding in the vehicle. Too messy. You see, if the reason she was killed was our visit to MarAir, then, this was a spur of the moment hit. Not very well planned. They just wanted to get rid of a witness.”
Patrick and Dom were right behind us as we approached the cordoned off area. I turned to face them. “Guys, start at opposite ends of the gridded area. Walk slowly and see if you find anything on the ground. If you do, don’t touch it.”
Dom asked, “What are we looking for?”
“There’s probably a bullet in this area,” I said, pointing with both hands to where her body was found, “but, start at the corners and work your way in. What you’re looking for is anything that doesn’t belong.”
As Patrick and Dom scoured the grid, A. Rod, crudely excavated the area where the head had rested with his gloved hands. As he did, we kept finding more and more blood that had, in fact, seeped down under the dirt. “Joey, she was definitely shot here. There’s too much dirt infused with blood for her to have been shot elsewhere. And, as I say that, this theory is consistent with the fact her khaki pants were smudged with grass on the knees. This poor girl was made to kneel before she was shot.”
I made a three-hundred-sixty-degree sweep of the area. There were no buildings within one hundred or more yards from this location. No witnesses, nothing. My gaze focused on both Patrick and Dom as they methodically inspected the grid. My phone buzzed. “Mancuso,” I said, not bothering to look who was calling.
“Agnes here, boss.”
“Hey. What’s up?” I said, walking away from the scene.
“I got some information on Joseph Petkovic. He’s the one who rented the caddy from SameDay Rentals.”
“Good. What about him?”
“Well, it turns out he works for a private investigation agency here in New York. Unfortunately, I don’t have any other information at this time.”
“It would be great if you could find that. Maybe you can dig deeper and see if they’re on retainer to anyone in the city. That would help.”
“I’ll keep digging, but at least we know your surveillance was most likely ordered from here. Maybe Mr. Drucker?”
“Possibly, but I doubt it…” I said.
“I got something here,” Patrick yelled.
“Agnes, I gotta go. Talk later.” I clicked off the phone.
Patrick was standing erect and pointing to something on the ground. Both A. Rod and myself made our way to him.
“What do you have?” I said as I approached Mr. Pat.
“Take a look.” He pointed to an object in the dirt.
A. Rod knelt next to Patrick. Carefully, he removed a tiny, shiny object from within the dirt. “It’s just an earring,” A. Rod said as he put it in his open palm. He didn’t sound excited.
“A coral earring with gold?” I asked.
A. Rod turned to me with a surprised expression. “Yeah, how did you know?”
“Patrick, what was Man-bun wearing in his left ear when we questioned him?”
“A coral earring,” Patrick replied.
“And, A. Rod, didn’t you say our vic had blood on her left fingers and hand?”
“She did,” A. Rod responded.
“Alexa Gould is—was—left handed,” I said.
A. Rod looked surprised, “Now, how could you possibly know that?”
I replied, “Yesterday, when we visited MarAir. I noticed that everything you can reach for, was on the left side of her desk. She had a calculator, her phone, and when she pulled out her purse from a drawer—”
“It was on the left side of her desk,” A. Rod finished my sentence.
Dom moved in close to look at the earring. “Our victim’s hands were not bound, right?”
“That’s correct,” A. Rod said.
I looked down at the spot. “So, Alexa ripped off Troy Melnick’s earring from his left ear before he shot her.” I was sickened by the vision of this innocent young girl being made to kneel right here and then shot on the forehead. “I’ll bet you when we find him, he’ll have a damaged left ear.”
“That is, if we find him. So far, he’s MIA.”
“We need to check the flight plan for the Gulfstream that MarAir has at Miami Executive. If we find the plane, we’ll find Melnick and the rest of the gang,” Patrick explained.
I added, “Possibly, but the flight plan is going to give us the stated destination. They can change course at any time. That Gulfstream has a range of over four thousand miles.”
“Wasn’t Saint Thomas where they supposedly held the girl?”
“Yes brother, why?”
“They may have a safe-house there, don’t you think?”
“Good point. If we find them there, they’re screwed, ‘cause Saint Thomas is part of the good old USA.”
A. Rod inserted the coral earring in an evidence bag. A closer examination would determine if there were traces of blood on it. I was sure it would be Mr. Troy Man-bun.
/> A. Rod put the bag inside his coat pocket. “If you guys are done here, let’s head to the airport. We can check on the flight plan.”
On our way there, A. Rod and I exchanged some small talk. He was a married man with two boys. His wife worked as a paralegal for an attorney’s office in downtown Miami. Like my Marcy, a daughter of immigrants, A. Rod was born in Miami from Cuban parents.
Once at the airport, and before walking in to check on the flight plan, I waited for Patrick and Dom. When they caught up with us, I said, “Guys, do me a favor. Walk in and go out to the tarmac area. Look around the buildings for anything that might help.”
“We’re on it, Joey,” Dom said.
The MarAir desk was empty, and according to the other workers in the airport, it had been empty since the day before. Roger, A. Rod’s partner, approached us. “Detective Roger Russo, you must be Joey Mancuso?”
“Hey, Roger, pleasure meeting you. No sight of our pilots, right?”
“None. And, the Gulfstream is gone since yesterday.”
“Did you check if a flight plan was filed?”
“Melnick filed a flight plan. Destination, Grand Cayman Island.”
“Cayman? Interesting,” I replied. As I said that, Dominic was walking back into the terminal area with Patrick.
Patrick, whose face looked like the cat who swallowed the canary, was holding out his iPhone. “Look at this,” he said, handing me the phone.
I looked at the picture he took. An orange Kawasaki. “You think this is the same motorcycle?”
“Flip to the right, check out the other photo.”
There it was, a close-up of the crossbones and the skull with a red bandana on its head, an earring in its left ear. I looked up from the photo, smiling. “This is the bike!”
“What’d you get?” asked Roger.
“Take a look,” I replied, handing Roger the phone. “This is the bike that the shooter used.”
“You sure?” asked A. Rod, looking at the photo from behind Roger.
“My wife saw the bike and noticed the decal in front of the Kawasaki name. This is the bike.”
“Let’s find out who owns the bike,” Roger said.
Father Dom replied, “We asked, and someone said it belongs to a John Edwards, who’s one of the pilots for MarAir.”
Roger, A. Rod, and I, glanced at each other. “Before we go, let’s see if we can get a description of Silver and Edwards.”
23
It was a cool evening in Miami. I wanted to sit somewhere and brainstorm our next moves. I asked, directing my question to A. Rod and Roger, “Guys, you want to get some dinner and plan our next move?”
A. Rod looked at Roger, who nodded. “We’re cool with that. What do you want to eat?”
“I don’t care what we eat, as long as we can find a place where I can enjoy a cigar and an adult drink.”
“I know a place. Follow us.”
We ended up at a nice Cuban restaurant with an outdoor sitting area with both adult beverages and good cigars. Everyone, except Father Dominic, selected a cigar, and we all ordered a drink.
After a few minutes of small talk, I asked, “Can we file an arrest warrant for John Edwards?”
A. Rod replied, “First thing tomorrow, we can. If we can locate him in Grand Cayman, we can have him extradited to Miami.”
“Yeah…” I began, “except he may not be in Grand Cayman. I’m thinking these guys—Melnick, Edwards, and Silver—may be in Saint Thomas.”
Roger let out a nice big puff of gray smoke. “Why Saint Thomas?”
I put down my cigar in the ashtray and took a sip of my twelve-year-old single-malt from The Macallan distillery. “Because that’s where they held Gavi. I think their flight plan was a way to throw us off their real destination. Or, maybe they stopped in Cayman, and then flew to Saint Thomas.”
“Tell me more about this kidnap,” Roger said.
I brought Roger up to date on how the whole thing started for us. I’d yet to share anything about the black-market antiquities smuggling, but, at some point I was going to have to lay the whole thing out for them. Maybe now was the time.
Dominic said, “Gavi Drucker could be an instrumental part of this. She could possibly tell us where she was held.”
“You’re right, brother, but her father is not going to let us anywhere close to her. I doubt she’s coming back to the university any time soon.”
A. Rod finally asked, “Do you know why she was kidnapped?”
It was time to come clean with these guys, assuming they asked the right questions. “Our working theory is that Gavi’s father, and his partner, who own an accounting firm, uncovered some illicit operations from one of their clients. The client, in turn, kidnapped Gavi to keep them quiet.”
“But, they let her go.” Roger sounded bewildered. “So, what keeps them from revealing the information now?”
“The fear that they can get to anyone in the family if they talk,” I replied.
“Was there a ransom paid?” A. Rod said.
“Originally, there was no request for ransom, but then through our research, we found that Aaron Drucker transferred two million dollars to a bank in Grand Cayman. The next day, she was on a plane back to New York.”
Dom added, “Which is why they may have flown to Cayman first. They picked up the money and left.”
“But, that contradicts the theory that kidnapping will keep the firm silent, doesn’t it?” Roger asked.
“You’re right,” I said, “but our tire being shot out, coupled with Alexa’s murder set in motion a change of plans. Right after that, the ransom was paid and Gavi was freed.”
“You think Melnick, Silver, and Edwards, are behind this?” A. Rod said.
I examined the long ash of my Padrón. “No, these three guys are simply actors. There are other people directing this play.”
“Does this working theory of yours include the type of information Drucker and his partner may need to suppress?”
I exchanged glances with Dom and Patrick. Since they asked the right questions, it was time to lay out the entire story. I owed it to these two detectives. “Look guys, these CPAs have three clients in Miami: a bank, an air cargo company, and an importer of antiquities. The Miami FBI is surveilling them. They have their own working theory, and that is that these guys are involved in a black-market smuggling ring. That fellows, is the big picture.”
“How the hell did you get involved in this mess?” Roger asked, shaking his head.
“It seems that all of our cases have a series of crimes woven into them. For some reason, nothing we get involved in is a simple solve. There’s always layers upon layers,” Patrick said.
A. Rod asked, “So, who is your client now? I assume you’re no longer working for Drucker, right?”
I smiled. “Our client now is Alexa Gould, the vic, and yes, Drucker was our client. Not anymore.”
“Well,” A. Rod began as he took the last sip of his Cuba Libre, “we don’t want to get involved in the big picture if the Bureau is on it, but we do need to find these guys. The murder is our case.”
I took a deep breath. “I would like to suggest a course of action. I think if we can find these guys and bring them back here, they will lead us to the bigger fish. Like my brother said, Gavi Drucker may have valuable information. Her father is not going to let us talk to her, but if you can get the Greenwich police to assist you in your investigation, they may be able to question Gavi. All we need from her is some clue as to the location of where she was held in Saint Thomas. Also, Gavi’s boyfriend, Carlos Alvarez may or may not have been part of the kidnap. He’s a local guy. We need to find out if something happened to him in Saint Thomas. I have the impression he became a victim too.”
A. Rod nodded. “We’ll do that. We also have the Kawasaki bike, which will confirm Edwards’s ownership. After we issue a warrant for his arrest, we’ll get a warrant to search Melnick’s, Edwards’s, and Silver’s home. See what turns up there.”
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br /> A. Rod’s cell phone rang. “Excuse me guys,” he said, walking a few feet away.
We waited for A. Rod to come back. “Guess what?”
“We have another dead body,” I said.
A. Rod’s eyes opened wide. “Our other two guys on the team found Troy Melnick shot to death in his home. A neighbor noticed their surveillance, walked outside, and told them he heard something like two shots in Melnick’s home yesterday. That gave them a reason to enter, and they found Melnick shot twice in the chest.”
“The neighbor didn’t report it?” Patrick asked.
“The neighbor thought it was a TV movie, or something.”
“That leaves us with Silver and Edwards,” Roger said.
“Are you sending someone to Saint Thomas?” I asked.
“I would if I had any clues to go on.” A. Rod shook his head.
“What are you guys going to do?”
I thought for a second. “Besides having a nice dinner now. I think we’re going to go fishing for the next two days.” I paused and turned to Father Dom. “Brother, have you heard of any good fishing spots?”
Dom smiled, picking up on my queue. “Yes, as a matter of fact, I hear the US Virgin Islands has some excellent fishing this time of year.”
Roger laughed. “Try not to piss off the authorities there.”
“That’s how we roll, Roger.”
24
Saturday
We arrived in Saint Thomas about ten in the morning. My plan, as usual, was developing. I like to call it evolving. Both Dom and Patrick knew better than to ask me. They just waited for the further evolution of my thoughts. On the flight, I picked up a little brochure from the seat pocket for Mr. Good Guy Limousine Service. Being a nice guy myself, I felt this could be a good match. They provided private yacht pickup, private jet pickup, and a bunch of other services with an emphasis on private. One service that caught my eye was executive protection. These nice guys offered everything, plus more, I’m sure.
Stepping out on the sidewalk, I asked a young man if there was a Good Guy rental location on premises. He pointed us to a parked black van a few feet away. Good Guy Limousine Service was written in big white letters on both sides.