Head Games

by Thomas B Cavanagh

I thanked Igor and asked him to keep me posted. Then I stepped out into the parking lot, where the pink light of dawn was breaking over the tops of the palm trees. I squinted at it for a moment before turning away and climbing into my truck. As I cranked up the ignition, I thought to myself, I ain’t dead yet, Igor.

  CHAPTER 19

  I tried calling TJ’s cell phone again, but got his voice mail. As before, I chose not to leave a message. Next I called his cousin Eddie, using the number Arlene Sommerset had left on my answering machine. He wasn’t home either. I decided against leaving a message for him, too, figuring he was on the lam and not returning calls. A voice mail from me would probably just drive him further underground.

  I then called George Neuheisel’s office number, knowing it was too early to reach him there. Counting on it, in fact. I left a message, informing him that I was well aware of the start date of the concert tour and that the “status” was that I was still looking. Click.

  I turned my truck out onto the interstate and headed for the south end of International Drive, down past Sea World, but not quite to Disney. That was where Eddie’s best friend lived, according to the message left by Arlene. I figured that if Eddie was crashing at this pal’s apartment, hiding out, the odds were good that he’d actually be in residence at 7 a.m.

  I found the apartment complex, a decent enough place called Harbor Bay. It was populated primarily by hourly service workers from the theme parks and surrounding hotels and restaurants. Young adults, scraping by, putting on happy faces for the paying tourists.

  The friend’s name was Milo. I walked up to his second-floor apartment and knocked loudly. There was a long silence. I knocked again and heard rustling on the other side of the door.

  “Hey, Milo!” I shouted. “Open up.” No response. I pounded on the door again. “Milo!”

  A muffled voice in the apartment called back, “Dude, it’s seven in the morning!”

  “C’mon, Milo. Open the door.”

  “Who the hell are you?”

  “Somebody you need to talk to. Be a good boy. Open up.”

  “Like hell,” Milo said, still through the door. “I know a goddamn cop when I hear one. Go away. I ain’t done nothin’.”

  “Milo, don’t be like that. I just wanna talk.”

  “Fuck you. I’m clean.”

  “Milo…”

  “No! Go away!”

  I sighed. “It’s about Eddie.”

  A long pause.

  “Eddie who?”

  “Gimme a break, Milo. This has nothin’ to do with you. Just open up. I’ll ask a couple of questions and be on my way. I swear.”

  “Ask your questions through the door.”

  “That’s not polite, Milo. Look, you’re a good friend. I respect that. But if you really wanna help Eddie, you’ll open the door.”

  “Right.”

  “Eddie’s in some trouble, Milo. You probably know I’m not the only one lookin’ for him. But I’m the only one who wants to help. I’m not gonna arrest you or him or make any trouble. I just need to talk. That’s all. Now, c’mon. Open the door.”

  There was another long pause followed by the click of the dead bolt. The door opened an inch and Milo poked his face out. He was a little shorter than me, with mocha skin and thick, loosely dreadlocked hair. He was shirtless, wearing only a pair of striped boxers.

  “I need to talk to him,” I said.

  “He ain’t here.”

  “Uh-huh.” I leaned on the door and shoved my way into the apartment.

  “Hey!” Milo shouted. “Dude!”

  I moved quickly through the darkened living room, stepping over crumpled clothes and strewn pizza boxes. Past the kitchen and into the short hall. The master bedroom on the right was a disgusting pigsty, but no one was in it. I saw a big Ziploc baggie of marijuana next to some used socks on the dresser and a bong on the floor half-filled with dirty water.

  I stepped into the master bath. The gray buildup on the tub made my lip curl. I recoiled, but not so far that I missed the pile of clothes in the corner. I poked at them with my toe and thought they looked an awful lot like the sweat suit I’d last seen Eddie Sommerset wearing. The clothes stank with mildew and were still damp.

  Milo was in the bedroom when I emerged from the bathroom.

  “You need to leave. Now.”

  “Where is he, Milo?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “When did you last see him?”

  “Why should I tell you?”

  “Because it’s the right thing to do. Believe it or not, it’ll help Eddie. Besides, if you do, maybe I’ll forget about that huge bag of pot in your room. That’s a quite a stash. Maybe enough to make a dealer charge stick.”

  “Come on, dude. You entered without a warrant. It’s inadmissible.”

  “No. You opened the door. Invited me in. You shouldn’t have done that.”

  “Asshole.”

  “Where’s Eddie?” I said.

  “He left. I don’t know where he is. I swear to God.”

  “When?”

  “Yesterday morning. Dude took my car.”

  “What kind of car?”

  “Dodge Intrepid. Black.”

  “Where’d he go?”

  “How would I know?” Milo sighed. “He was scared. I seen Eddie in trouble before, but this time he was really scared.”

  “What was he so scared of?”

  Milo shrugged. “Who knows? With Eddie, it coulda been anything. My guess is that he owed money. Eddie gambled. A lot.”

  “On what?”

  “Anything. But mostly sports.”

  Sports … There was no place legal in Orlando to place sports bets. A few years ago, if that was your jones, you would have had to get friendly with an outfit like the one run by Juan “the Don” Alomar, which I’d busted up. Somebody had obviously filled Orlando’s bookmaking vacuum.

  “Who does Eddie place his bets with?” I asked.

  “That ain’t my scene, dude. It was Eddie’s deal. I got my own problems. I hadn’t heard from him in a month or two when I get this call the other day. Wanted me to pick him up in the middle of a killer thunderstorm and let him hide out for a while. I said okay. He did the same kinda thing for me once. But, if this is serious, big-time trouble, I can’t afford to get involved. One probation violation and I’m back in the joint.”

  “You know Eddie’s cousin, TJ?” I asked.

  “The singer? Nah. Never met him. But Eddie tried to call him while he was here. Don’t think they hooked up, though.”

  I looked Milo in the eye. “You being straight up with me, Milo? On everything?”

  “I don’t want no trouble, dude.”

  “Alright. If Eddie comes back, you call me at this number. You might be saving his life.” I wrote my cell number down on a piece of paper and turned toward the front door.

  “Uh, dude, what about my stash?”

  “What stash?” I said.

  * * *

  My brain gears were churning as I drove over Sand Lake Road to Eddie’s apartment. Was TJ’s disappearance related to Eddie’s trouble? Eddie seemed pretty desperate to get in touch with his cousin.

  Eddie lived in a nasty apartment complex on Oak Ridge Road called Tudor Court. It was a series of low-slung, two-story buildings with flat roofs, bars on the windows, and filthy tan paint peeling from the cracked stucco. A lone palm adorned one side of the entrance drive. A withered stump adorned the other side. The palm was yellowed and thin and, amazingly, seemed unable to cast any shadow whatsoever. Weeds sprouted through the cracks in the asphalt.

  I parked in front of Eddie’s building. As I swung open the truck’s door, I caught a flash of black in the side mirror. Turning, I saw a black Dodge Intrepid parked behind me. I sauntered over and peeked inside. Nothing visible or identifying in the seats. However, the rear bumper sported a green decal declaring the owner a Harbor Bay resident.

  I hiked up the bowed metal steps to the second floor of the building
. The pungent smells of curry and garlic enveloped me as I made my way down the exterior balcony that served as a front hall. I reached Eddie’s door and knocked.

  No answer. After another moment, I knocked again. I peered into the front window, but couldn’t see through the closed horizontal blinds. I knocked again. Silent as a tomb.

  “Eddie?” I called. “Eddie! I’m here to help. I’m the guy who helped you the other day on I-Drive. Open the door.” Still no answer. “I can help you find TJ!”

  I figured if anything would get him to respond, it was that. But there was no answer. He was probably squeezing himself out the bathroom window right now. Not sure what to do, I placed a hand on the front doorknob. Even this early in the day, the scuffed metal was already hot.

  I turned the knob, and surprisingly, the door opened.

  With all the blinds closed, the apartment was dark. And hot. The AC was obviously off. I immediately doubted that Eddie was home. After just twenty minutes in Arlene’s garage the other day, I was ready to expire. Eddie wouldn’t be able to take an extended stay in this oven.

  I made a quick pass through the apartment, which didn’t take long. It was unoccupied. I opened the fridge. Checked the expiration date on the milk. Eddie had until tomorrow to finish his quart.

  I rifled through the kitchen drawers, looking for an address book, a Post-it, a scrap of napkin with a note on it. There was nothing. Just a few ketchup packets from McDonald’s and a pencil with the lead snapped off.

  A similar search in the one bedroom and bathroom also yielded nothing. I found the Intrepid’s keys hidden among the junk mail and crumpled laundry on his dresser. I took them back outside and opened the car. The interior contained a few fast-food wrappers on the floor and a pack of opened cigarettes in the cup holder. Inside the glove compartment was a small, black cell phone. I wondered if it was Eddie’s or Milo’s. Probably Eddie’s. I picked it up and slipped it into my pocket. After cooking in the car, it was way too hot to hold at the moment. I’d figure it out later.

  After confirming the trunk was empty, I closed up the car, returned the keys to the dresser, and got into my truck. With one last glance around for the blue Mustang, which was nowhere to be seen, I pulled out of the Tudor Court apartment complex and headed downtown to Global Talent.

  * * *

  For such a big, hulking guy, George was acting like a baby. He was scared shitless of Eli. And he wasn’t alone. The whole Global Talent office had an uncool vibe, everyone stressed, no one safe from Eli’s wrath.

  The biggest contributor to Eli’s black mood was the continued absence of his most popular band member with only one week left before the start of the concert tour. The new album hit the shelves in a few days. A lot of money was at stake, and all of it was in jeopardy.

  George said nothing as Eli grilled me on the progress of my search. All I told him was that I was getting closer, but hadn’t spoken directly to him yet. Eli wasn’t happy. George looked like he might lay an egg in his shorts.

  I checked in with Miguel, who was getting final adjustments to his concert wardrobe. He hadn’t heard from TJ yet either.

  On the way out, George reminded me that he was the one who’d brought me in, vouched for me. If I blew it, he was gone. He couldn’t face going back into a squad car.

  I nodded and told him I was still working on it, although I had pretty much abandoned hope of TJ actually returning to the band. Hell, I just hoped he hadn’t killed himself yet.

  In the truck, I tried calling TJ again with the same fruitless result. I pulled out into traffic and drove home, Mustang-free.

  When I came in, I saw Jennifer on the couch, removing her shoes. She was wearing a red T-shirt and a mall nametag, having just arrived home from work.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, remembering how early I’d left. “Did you need a ride?”

  “Nah,” she said. “Cam was still here when I had to leave this morning, and my friend Julie gave me a lift home.”

  “Short day?”

  “Yeah. Bill just wanted someone for the lunch rush.”

  “What’s that?” I said, pointing my chin at a cardboard box next to her purse on the dinette table.

  “Dunno. It’s for you.”

  “Oh, yeah?” I wandered over and peered at it. It was a regular brown cardboard cube, like what might be purchased at a mail-supply store, about the size of a standard hatbox. Written in black marker on the side was my name. No address. “Someone leave this outside the door?”

  “Nah. Some guy at the mall gave it to me.” Jennifer kicked off her sneakers.

  “Some guy? Who?”

  She shrugged. “I dunno. A guy. Said he was your friend. I figured you were expecting it.”

  I pursed my lips and touched an upper edge of the box with an index finger, turning it a half inch. Not too heavy, but something was definitely in there.

  “What’d this guy look like?” I asked.

  “Jeez, I dunno. He was just some guy. An older guy. Like your age.”

  “Jennifer,” I said, starting to get a bad feeling. “Think. What color was the guy’s hair?”

  She sighed in annoyance. “Dark hair. Black, I guess.”

  “You see what he was driving?”

  “No. He gave it to me in the food court, right before my shift was over.” She crossed her arms. “So? What’s in it? Why the third degree?”

  A queasy feeling was in the pit of my gut like an elevator dropping too quickly. I knew what was in the box.

  “Dad?”

  I turned my back to Jennifer, blocking her view of the table. I used her keys to pop the tape and lifted the cardboard flaps.

  I was right, of course.

  Within the box was a large Ziploc freezer bag. And inside the clear plastic bag was the neatly severed head of Eddie Sommerset.

  CHAPTER 20

  “So why you? It your birthday or somethin’?”

  Detective Salvador Diaz grinned at me with a crooked yellow smile. He had a solid, stocky frame, and the shoulders of his thin dress shirt pulled tightly when he leaned forward onto his knees. His eyes were inky black and hard.

  “I honestly don’t know,” I said. We were in my living room, me on the couch and Diaz on my recliner. The crime-scene techs were wrapping up, the cardboard box and its grisly contents having been removed about twenty minutes earlier. There wasn’t much for the techs to do, since this wasn’t much of a crime scene. But, there was no denying I’d found a human head on my dinette table, and everyone had to go through their motions.

  “Aw, c’mon, Mike,” Diaz said, sitting back and affecting a sardonic smile. “You were on the job all those years. A detective. A couple tours with MBI. You tell me you don’t have a guess why somebody picks you to get the boy’s head?”

  “I didn’t say that. I just don’t know anything for sure.”

  “Now we gettin’ somewheres.”

  “What about my daughter?” I said, looking at the closed door of Jennifer’s room.

  “She’s fine. Detective Crowley is with her.”

  Both Diaz and Crowley were from the Orange County Sheriff’s Office, not the Orlando Police Department. Although my address says Orlando, my apartment sits just outside the city’s jurisdiction in unincorporated Orange County, giving the sheriff’s department control over the homicide. If the headless corpse that Igor showed me this morning turns out to be, as I suspect, the rest of Eddie Sommerset, an epic turf battle is on its way. With the body found in the city limits and the head found in the general county, the case was bound to be a political football.

  Since Diaz and Crowley were Orange County, I didn’t know them and I couldn’t leverage much of my local law enforcement reputation to get a break. I knew a couple of the county guys from MBI assignments, but none were currently in my apartment. I had informed the partners of my own background.

  When they arrived, Crowley and Diaz had split up to get independent statements from both me and Jennifer. Standard procedure.

&nbs
p; But Jennifer was pretty upset. Upon realizing that she had been carrying around a human head—the head of TJ Sommerset’s cousin, no less—she kind of freaked. I got her mostly calm by the time the uniforms showed up. But when Crowley pulled her aside, Jennifer gave me a look of such abject terror that I was momentarily paralyzed. I told her to relax. Everything would be fine. She didn’t do anything wrong. Just tell the truth.

  Crowley appeared to have a gentle touch. As a woman, she was probably better equipped to handle a distraught fifteen-year-old girl than Diaz or some other male detective. Even me. This wasn’t a sexist observation. This was a fact. Most guys I knew in this line of work were a little jaded and unfazed by a few teenaged tears. I suspected that Crowley would at least refrain from browbeating her.

  “I want to see her,” I said.

  “C’mon, Mike,” Diaz said. “You know how this goes. We can’t have you talkin’ to each other until we get your full statements.”

  “I won’t talk about it. I just need to see that she’s okay.”

  “Mike…”

  “I’m not talking at all, to you or anybody, until I know she’s okay.”

  Diaz pursed his lips at me and finally sighed, waving a beefy hand at Jennifer’s door. I rose and knocked on it, swinging it open before anyone inside could respond.

  Jennifer was sitting on her bed. She was dry-eyed, but a few crumpled tissues littered the comforter. Crowley leaned against the desk. The detective looked to be in her midthirties, with dull, straw-colored hair cut shoulder-length. A few wisps of gray had popped up, and she had apparently made no attempt to hide them. She turned her head to me inquisitively.

  “You okay?” I asked Jennifer. She nodded. “You need anything?” Jennifer shook her head. I looked over at Crowley.

  “I’m just taking a statement, Mr. Garrity,” Crowley said. “Give us a few minutes and we’ll be on our way.”

  I nodded. Lingered for a beat. Looked over at Jenn. “If you need anything—at all—you let me know. Even if you’re not done yet, okay?”

  “Okay,” Jennifer said in a small voice.

  Crowley offered a reassuring smile and nodded for me to close the door. I did and returned to the couch.