The Big Lie

by James Grippando

  Theo crouched low enough to look Tomlin straight in the eye, their noses just inches apart. “If you don’t stop lying, I’m gonna snap your little arms right off your body. You won’t have to worry about your precious Bentley gettin’ hit no more, cuz a man can’t drive if he’s got the arms of Venus-No-Elbows. That’s what I mean.”

  The accountant swallowed hard. “I told you,” he said in a voice that cracked. “I haven’t seen Dr. Perez in—”

  Theo grabbed him by the wrists, took him down hard to the concrete, and then dragged him to the opening between the Bentley and the Aston Martin in the next parking space. Before Tomlin could even react, he was facedown on the line striping. Theo burrowed his knee into the base of the accountant’s spine, immobilizing him. Then he jerked both of Tomlin’s arms up and backward like human levers, elevating his hands to a height that sent the proper message: Theo was serious about snapping off his arms.

  “Stop!”

  Theo elevated Tomlin’s wrists a few more inches. It was as easy as a beer tap in reverse, except that at this fine establishment, nothing flowed but tears.

  “Please, stop!”

  “Tell me what’s going on with Dr. Perez,” said Theo.

  “I can’t!”

  Theo raised the human lever another notch, which was more than Tomlin could endure.

  “Okay, okay!”

  Theo kept the pressure on. “Okay what?”

  “Just,” he said, gasping through the pain. “Follow the—”

  “Follow the what?”

  “Follow the . . .”

  It was beginning to sound like the familiar refrain in politics—one that Theo had heard before. “Money? Are you telling me to follow the money?”

  “No. Nanny.”

  “Huh?”

  “The nanny!” said Tomlin. “Follow the nanny!”

  “Don’t mess with me!” said Theo, and he jerked the accountant’s arms a little higher.

  “Ow, ow, ow! I swear, I’m not messing with you!”

  Theo eased off, but only a little. “What’s that s’posed to mean? ‘Follow the nanny’?”

  “The nanny from Colombia. The one that’s gone missing. They got her through Dr. Perez.”

  “Who got her through Dr. Perez?”

  “Senator and Mrs. Stahl! They got their nanny through Dr. Perez.”

  Theo wasn’t exactly sure what that meant, but he suspected that Jack would. He dropped the “lever,” Tomlin’s arms fell to the concrete, and the accountant breathed out, relieved. Theo dragged him to his feet, took the car keys from Tomlin’s pocket, opened the trunk, and shoved him inside.

  “His name is Leonard,” said Theo, meaning the security guard. “I’ll tell him to come find you.”

  He slammed the lid shut and left the keys on the bumper, dialing Jack on his cell as he headed for the stairwell.

  Chapter 60

  The night was young. The tortillera jokes were getting old, and the men weren’t talking literally about two women who make tortillas. For the first time in her life, Charlotte was somewhat glad she didn’t understand Spanish, at least not well enough to pick up slang. She was certain that Amanda was giving her the sanitized translation of whatever Paco and his drunk friends thought was so funny.

  “This is going to get bad,” said Amanda. They were still seated on the floor, against the wall.

  “How bad?”

  Amanda looked away. “They’re debating which one of us is in most serious need of a dick.”

  “Oh,” said Charlotte, and she realized it was decision time. She didn’t think they could win a gunfight, which was why she’d kept the secret to herself. But it was time to make Amanda aware of their ticket to self-defense.

  “How far away would you say that closet door is?”

  Amanda seemed puzzled by the question, but she answered. “Twelve feet.”

  “Take a very close look at the bottom panel.”

  Amanda’s gaze drifted across the room and landed on the three-panel door. She seemed to take Charlotte’s meaning, but just in case, Charlotte left no ambiguity as to what was hidden behind the bottom panel.

  “Twelve rounds. Nine millimeter.”

  Amanda nodded, and they sat in silence, thinking. Crossing the room without getting shot by Paco or one of his men wasn’t even half the problem. Job one was untying their hands from behind their backs.

  “Hey, tortilleras,” said Paco, staggering his way toward them from the kitchen counter. “Which one of you thinks she’s a man?”

  Amanda’s prediction as to the way things were headed seemed spot-on: this could only turn bad.

  “Stand up, chica,” he said to Charlotte.

  It wasn’t easy to do with her hands tied behind her back, but Charlotte used the wall to slide her way up to a standing position.

  Paco said something in Spanish to his men, which made them laugh so hard they nearly fell off their barstools. Then he spoke to Charlotte in English. “What you got in your pants, chica?”

  “More than you got in yours,” said Amanda, answering for her.

  Paco’s eyes filled with rage, and he kicked Amanda so hard in her ribs that she fell onto her side, groaning.

  “I’m talking to the pretty one,” he said bitterly. Then his attention returned to Charlotte, and he tugged at the waistband of her pants. “Now, let’s see what you got in there.”

  Charlotte had to think fast, and a mad dash to the closet door with her hands bound behind her back was not a plan, unless the plan was suicide.

  “Hey, Paco,” she said in a bedroom voice. “You ever watch two women make it?”

  He smiled, clearly liking the idea. In Spanish, he called across the room to his friends, and they howled with approval. Charlotte stayed with the plan and lowered herself to her knees. Amanda was still on her side, recovering from the boot to her ribs. With a quick glance at the closet door, Charlotte signaled what she was up to.

  “Face me,” said Charlotte.

  Amanda went along with it, rising to her knees and facing Charlotte.

  The drunks in the kitchen clapped their hands and whistled.

  “Closer,” said Charlotte.

  Amanda slid her right knee forward, then her left. Their bodies nearly touched. Amanda was the taller, and if they’d kept their eyes forward, Amanda could have kissed Charlotte on the bridge of the nose. But each kept her head turned sideways, Amanda looking up at the ceiling and Charlotte gazing down toward the floor. It was anything but a romantic moment, but it nonetheless reminded Charlotte that on their first kiss—their first real kiss, not the stupid one on a dare—Charlotte had risen up on her toes. Slowly, Amanda turned her head, and Charlotte felt Amanda’s breath on the side of her face. Charlotte did the same, lifting her gaze to meet Amanda’s, wondering if somewhere behind those beautiful brown Latina eyes, the same fond memory had been triggered by this bizarre and cruel situation.

  Charlotte looked away, toward Paco.

  “This is going nowhere with our hands tied,” said Charlotte.

  The drunks at the island were slapping the granite countertop in a rhythmic chant, as if at a soccer match. Paco blinked twice, apparently taking the problem under consideration.

  “You have to untie at least one of us,” said Charlotte.

  The chant from the kitchen grew even louder. Audience expectations were high.

  “We won’t disappoint you,” said Charlotte.

  Paco’s men were not to be denied, their chant almost a frenzy, their anticipation rising to the level of Captain Bligh’s drunken crew about to witness the Polynesian orgy.

  “Her,” said Paco. He pulled a knife from his pocket and stepped behind Amanda. With the other hand he drew his pistol from his belt and shoved the barrel past Amanda’s ear. As the muzzle settled squarely on Charlotte’s forehead, he whispered a warning to Amanda, his gaze locked on Charlotte’s eyes.

  “You try anything funny, I shoot your girlfriend in the face. How do you like that, flower lady?”r />
  Paco cut the rope, freeing Amanda’s hands. Then he withdrew the pistol, holding his aim straight at Charlotte’s head, as he stepped back to watch. “Let the games begin,” he said, and then he repeated it in Spanish, which prompted another round of shots and more hoots and hollers from the men in the kitchen.

  “Save yourself,” Charlotte whispered. “Just go for his gun.”

  “I’m not going to let him shoot you.”

  “He might miss.”

  “Yeah, and hit me.”

  Had the situation not been so dire, it could have made Charlotte laugh. Amanda was good at that.

  The men in the kitchen were growing impatient. The boo-birds emerged.

  “Just go for it,” Charlotte whispered.

  Amanda’s lips touched Charlotte’s, which turned the booing to cheers. It lasted only an instant.

  With the voyeurs’ rise of excitement, Amanda seized the moment. She shoved Charlotte to the ground, using Charlotte’s body like a fulcrum to propel her own body into a roundhouse kick that stretched all the way to Paco, taking his legs out from under him. Charlotte heard a “pop,” the sound of Paco’s ACL tearing away from the bone, as she instinctively tucked and went into a roll toward the closet. Paco’s gun clattered on the floor, followed by his cries of pain and the thud of his body landing like a sack of cement. Amanda was on him, and Charlotte was still rolling, as the crack of a single gunshot sent a spray of red spatter in Charlotte’s direction.

  “Amanda!” she shouted, fearing the worst, but at floor level she caught a glimpse of the exit wound in Paco’s head, the source of the forward spatter—good news, but there was no time to process it. The two men in the kitchen started shooting from a position of cover behind the granite-topped island. Amanda fired back several shots, and one of the men groaned—a hit, for sure. But bullets continued to fly, splintering the frame around the paneled door into pieces that rained down on Charlotte. She rolled right past the paneled door and took cover behind the couch. Two more shots rang out, and Amanda rolled alongside her, having come from the other side.

  The gunfire stopped.

  “Are you okay?” Amanda whispered, as she quickly untied the rope that bound Charlotte’s wrists. It seemed to take all her strength.

  “Yes, I’m—”

  Charlotte started to say she was okay, then noticed the burst of crimson soaking through Amanda’s shirt. Her shallow breathing, her whitening pallor, and the pain in her expression told Charlotte that the blood was not Paco’s.

  “You need a doctor.”

  “There’s one of them left,” she said, meaning Paco’s men. She handed Paco’s gun to Charlotte. “Take him out.”

  Amanda seemed to be moving beyond the pain, but Charlotte didn’t like the expression on her face.

  “Hold on, Amanda.”

  Amanda took a breath.

  “Don’t die,” said Charlotte. “I dare you.”

  It wasn’t much, but Amanda managed a little smile. It broke Charlotte’s heart to watch it drain away.

  “Amanda!” she whispered with urgency. She checked for a pulse. There was none.

  The crack of a gunshot stole her goodbye, a terrifying reminder of Amanda’s warning that “one of them” was left.

  Silence followed.

  Charlotte checked the magazine of Paco’s pistol. Seven rounds remaining, plus one in the chamber. Paco’s custom handgrip—a gold-plated image of the Santa Muerte with pearl-green resin inlay and set in silver—required some getting used to, but Charlotte could handle it.

  “Tortillera!” the man shouted from somewhere in the kitchen. More words followed, but all Spanish. Charlotte had no idea what the man was saying, but it sounded like he was negotiating.

  She was in no mood to compromise.

  There were friends back home, even members of her own family, who would have thought Charlotte had no business asking God for any favors. Charlotte said a quick prayer anyway. Then she sprang into action, rolling to her right, squeezing off four quick shots—pop, pop, pop, pop—as she crossed the floor from behind the couch to the closet door. In a blur of continuous motion, she yanked open the bottom panel, grabbed the hidden pistol, and continued firing into the island in the kitchen. The gap in time between the last shot fired from Paco’s pistol and the first shot from hers was virtually nonexistent, and she didn’t stop squeezing the trigger until she was almost out of ammunition.

  She listened.

  She heard a noise from the kitchen—a swiping sound, like someone sliding against the wall. A man—the one who was left—staggered from behind the island. One step, followed by a failed attempt at a second. And then he dropped to the floor.

  His body didn’t move.

  Neither could Charlotte. She lay there, and the gun simply slipped away from her hand. All the way across the room, in the entranceway from the foyer, lay a flower on the floor, one of the roses Amanda had brought her. Charlotte couldn’t look away from it, but suddenly she didn’t even have enough strength to hold her head up. She let the side of her face rest on the floor, her line of sight fixed on the flower. And the tears came.

  Chapter 61

  Jack took Theo’s call in the kitchen. Andie was in bed, Jack wanted to be, and he saw no reason not to wait till morning to “follow the nanny.” The call from Charlotte changed everything. The police and a team of crime-scene investigators were at her house.

  “I’ll be on the first flight tomorrow morning,” Jack said, and he advised her not to talk to the police until he got there. But Charlotte was tired of that game.

  “I’ve got nothing to hide. Not anymore.”

  Jack knew what she meant, but any client with three dead narcos in her kitchen had at least that many reasons not to talk to the police—especially a client who was already charged in another shooting. “Charlotte, you are physically, mentally, and emotionally drained. There’s no clearer case for self-defense than a home invasion until you say something to the police that could be taken the wrong way, or unless the police write down something you didn’t say at all. Tell them that you and your lawyer will sit down with them in the morning.”

  She acquiesced, and they said good night. Then Jack called Senator Stahl.

  The “Florida Electoral College Shootout” was already breaking news on television and the Internet. The senator was more than eager to speak to Jack and get the real story. Jack didn’t mention that his visit wasn’t about Charlotte Holmes. He definitely didn’t mention that Theo was coming with him.

  “You want to tell me how you finally got that accountant to talk?” asked Jack.

  Theo was driving, and Jack was in the passenger seat. “Nope.”

  “You didn’t bribe him, did you?”

  “I did not bribe him.”

  Jack was almost afraid to ask. “Did you threaten him?”

  “I did not bribe him,” said Theo.

  It was clear that when it came time to talk to the police, there would be no naming of the accountant as Theo’s source. But that didn’t change the strategy for purposes of the meeting with Senator Stahl.

  Gwen Stahl greeted them at the door. Her husband was on the phone, and she promised that he would join them as soon as the call ended. They gathered in the TV room, which overlooked the swimming pool. Jack and Theo took the matching club chairs, and Gwen was on the couch. Cable news coverage played on the flat-screen. The reporter claimed to be reporting “live” from the street outside Charlotte’s house. It was too dark for Jack to tell exactly where the media vans had gathered, but the yellow tape and swirling police beacons in the background confirmed that the house was a crime scene. The medical examiner’s van in the driveway, behind the reporter, suggested that it was the worst kind of crime scene.

  The senator entered the room, greeted Jack and Theo, then took a seat beside his wife.

  “I feel so terrible for Charlotte Holmes,” he said.

  “I’ll let her know,” said Jack.

  Gwen hit the mute button on the
remote so they didn’t have to talk over the breaking news from Tallahassee. “Is your client still in any kind of legal trouble?”

  It was not the kind of question Jack would normally address with any specificity, but it did provide the opening he wanted. “It all comes down to Dr. Perez,” said Jack.

  “Whether he was trying to buy her vote for my husband?” asked Gwen.

  “I don’t think there’s any question about the doctor’s intent,” said Jack.

  “Which I had nothing to do with,” said the senator.

  “Nor did my client,” said Jack. “Charlotte never asked for money, and she never agreed to do anything for money. The question is whether Dr. Perez will say something different. Assuming he ever comes back to Florida.”

  “Has anybody figured out where he is?” asked Stahl.

  “Not exactly,” said Jack.

  “Unless you have,” said Gwen. It was directed toward her husband, and not without frost in her tone.

  “That’s enough, sweetheart,” said Stahl.

  She accepted his rebuke and dropped the matter, but Jack chose not to let it go. “Is the suggestion really that out of line?”

  The senator chuckled. “How would I know where Dr. Perez has gone to?”

  “Maybe your nanny told you,” said Theo.

  Jack didn’t need the help, but he let the remark stand.

  “We don’t have a nanny,” said Stahl.

  “Theo meant your former nanny,” said Jack. But he didn’t play his hand yet on her connection to Dr. Perez.

  “Unfortunately, that’s a sad story,” said Stahl. “Yolanda was like family to us. She went back to Colombia and now, thanks to President MacLeod and his immigration policies, she can’t come back. It broke our daughter’s heart.”

  “Why did she leave?” asked Jack.

  “Why does it matter?” asked Stahl.

  Jack didn’t have anywhere near the information needed for cross-examination of a witness, but this was no courtroom, so he played it as best he could: he bluffed. “It’s all about the dots.”

  “The dots?”

  “Yeah. I’ve been very busy in the last twenty hours—connecting them.”