The Complete Troy Bodean Tropical Thriller Collection

by David F. Berens

  “Hey,” Troy whispered, waving his hand at the man. “Don’t go in there, buddy.”

  The man did not react. Troy tried a little louder and when Maury finally noticed him, he smiled, pulled a dollar bill from his pocket and dropped it next to Troy.

  “I’d give you more, sonny,” the old man said, “but that wouldn’t leave enough for my bourbon.”

  “I’m not a bum,” Troy said, but Maury had already opened the door and walked in.

  Another hostage. So much for subtlety. He pushed himself up as fast as his knee would allow, jerked open the front door, and ran inside expecting the blast to take him down at any second.

  10

  Mission Accomplished?

  The old man, Maury, was still hobbling down the center aisle when Troy rushed in. He bumped the man sideways, shoving him into an aisle for cover. He grunted, and fell against the Cabernet. He might have a bruise, but that was better than a gunshot wound.

  To his left, Holly sat, unbound, on the counter next to the cash register. She was flipping the pages of a Guns and Ammo magazine and smacking gum loudly. To his right, between the rum and tequila, still tied up, lay Olga and Denny. They were alive and looked mostly unharmed. Both saw him and began to try to yell, but their mouths were covered with duct tape.

  “Hey, cowboy!” The kid was suddenly standing there pointing the shotgun at Troy. “How the hell did you get outta there?”

  Troy wasted no time. He pointed the Desert Eagle at the kid.

  “Drop it,” he said. “You might get a shot off, but I’m gonna put a hole in your head so big, you’ll be able to swallow a bowling ball before I go down.”

  “Dude, you won’t be shootin’ nobody with your stomach blown in half.”

  Troy didn’t move. He gently moved his finger and the trigger made a soft, squeaking sound. “You’ll probably get one shot off, but at this range, and with that short of a barrel, you might get me and you might not. My odds with this high-powered beauty are much, much higher. Are you a gambling man?”

  The kid’s resolve faltered and Troy saw his confidence slipping away. He dropped the gun. Troy used his foot to kick it away and it slid under an aisle.

  “Good choice, kid.” With a swift right cross, he put the kid down on the ground, his eyes rolling back in his head. The straw cowboy hat fell from the kid’s head and Troy picked it up.

  He glanced over at Holly as he placed it back on his head. “Hey. Little help here? Get me something to tie him up.”

  Looking slightly annoyed, she tossed her magazine aside, and slid off the counter. She disappeared behind into the back of the store behind the stacks of empty boxes.

  Troy knelt down, careful to keep his gun pointed at the kid, and helped Denny sit up. The man was wriggling around, trying to yell through the duct tape. Troy took the end of the tape and yanked. Denny yelped in pain, but then nodding at their unarmed captor said, “the girl, she’s in with him!”

  “In with him?” Troy asked. “What do you mean?”

  He reached over and pulled the tape off of Olga’s mouth.

  “The girl is now working with him,” she hissed. “She has betrayed us. You must shoot her and save us.”

  Troy tossed the Desert Eagle to the side. “Yeah, about that. See, the thing about the gun is … it’s empty. I had two bullets and I used those to get out of the—”

  A racking sound from behind interrupted him. He turned to see Holly aiming the sawed-off shotgun he’d kicked under the aisle at his chest.

  "Didn't find anything to tie him up with. But I did find this killer cotton candy blow pop."

  “What happened? You decided murderer would be better than dancer at the Red Garter?”

  He saw her bottom lip quiver around the sucker and her eyes glistened.

  "He offered me a chance to cash in on the old dude who owns this place. And you know, with my mama's condition and all...I could get her a new large intestine with that money."

  Troy remembers the cash back in the safe and things start to click into place. His mind starts racing.

  "What if I told you I know the combination to the safe?"

  The kid, still lying on the floor, but beginning to wake, starts cackling with laughter. "Yeah, right. Old man Earl never told nobody the numbers to that thing. Rumor has it there's fifty grand or more of cold, hard, backroom cash in there."

  "It's more like a hundred."

  "Well, alright, let's do this." the kid said, grabbing the shotgun from Holly.

  He pointed the gun at Troy, then at the door. "Let's go open it. Holly, keep an eye on the hostages, if anyone moves, shoot 'em."

  "With what? You got the gun."

  Momentarily, a flustered look crossed the kid’s face. But he recovered and grabbed a tactical style flashlight from a box near the cash register and tossed it to her.

  "Here. If anybody moves, just whack 'em with that."

  11

  Open It

  They rounded the corner and entered the office again, the kid shoving the shotgun in Troy’s back. When they crossed the threshold, he jabbed it hard sending Troy stumbling into the dark, smelly room.

  “Open it,” he demanded.

  Troy caught his balance, his knee protesting the awkward movement. He turned to face the kid.

  “Nope.”

  The kid’s face went through a range of emotions ranging from shock, to anger, to bewilderment.

  “What do you mean, ‘no?’”

  Troy folded his arms across his chest.“I know you’re kind, kid,” he said. “But—”

  “Don’t call me a kid,” he said, interrupting Troy. “It’s Jimmy.”

  “Of course it is.”

  For a split second, Troy thought the kid might shoot him. “What I was sayin’, Jimmy, is that you’re stupid.”

  The kid’s eyes went wide, but Troy soldiered on without waiting for any more reaction.

  “You’ve committed a murder for money. That’s just about the dumbest thing you could’ve done. The authorities are gonna find somethin’—a microbe, or a hair, or a DNA sample—and they’re gonna know you’ve done this. You probably have a record, don’t you?”

  Jimmy nodded, his shockingly red hair flopping down over on his forehead. It made him look young. Troy had a moment of sympathy for the boy, but he had killed a man.

  “You can’t get away with this. Too much evidence.”

  He didn’t know what to say to that, but soon, fear ebbed into anger. “Well, I’ll just kill every single one of y’all and then there won’t be any witnesses.”

  “Now, now, just hold on a second and hear me out.” Troy held up his hands. “I’ve got a deal for you. There’s a whole lot of money in there. Money you can use to get far away from here.”

  Jimmy’s eyes darted to the safe and back. “Like Mexico? Or Vermont?”

  “Sure, kid,” Troy said. “But I ain’t gonna open it, until you let those people go.”

  “What if I just blow your leg off?” he said, pointing the gun at Troy’s lower half.

  “I know this is hard to believe,” Troy said, “but I’ve seen far worse than you. Back in Afghanistan, I saw things that would make your nose hair curl. I’m not afraid. If you have the guts to do it, I’m still not opening that safe. But if you’ll let everyone back in that store walk out of here, I’ll tell you the combination.”

  Jimmy’s face showed the internal battle going on inside his head. But eventually, it seemed the promise of riches and an escape plan won out.

  “Alright, done. Open it.”

  “Not until I see ’em walk out of there.”

  “Okay, okay. Let’s go.”

  The kid pointed toward the door. Troy remembered the last time he’d walked from the dark room out into the light and he formed a plan. As they stepped out into the bright light, Jimmy pulled the hat off Troy’s head.

  “And I’m keepin’ this, too,” he said. “I make a much better cowboy than you do.”

  Counting on the blinding
light and the momentary distraction of the hat, Troy dropped to his knees—sharp pain erupting from the likely torn tendons—planning to spin around and take the gun from this little piece of—

  "Hey you!"

  It was Holly’s voice, coming from the right.

  Troy watched as Jimmy turned toward her and as his eyes adjusted, he saw her swinging the flashlight at him. But the kid saw it coming and grabbed it and jerked it out of her hand—it wasn’t exactly a home run swing. With a ferocious backhand swing, he hit Holly hard in the face with the flashlight. She crumpled to the ground, her nose dripping with blood.

  Troy slowly lifted himself up, his palms in the dirt. The kid was leaning over Holly, looking like he might hit her again.

  "Two-faced bit—”

  Troy's hands closed around the chain that had been holding the door shut. He whirled around, swinging the chain at the kid's feet. Completely surprised, Jimmy’s legs flew out from under him. The flashlight skittered out of his hand, but amazingly, he held onto the shotgun.

  Troy grabbed him by the throat, hoping to choke the kid into unconsciousness, but the kid raised his foot and slammed it into Troy’s bad knee.

  If it wasn’t torn before, it is now, Troy thought, reeling from the mountain of pain shooting up his leg. He rolled back away from the kid, but not before he kicked again, hitting Troy in the jaw. He fell backward, the breath knocked out of him, the hat flying off and toppling away in the dirt and gravel.

  Troy crawled to the building and pulled himself up into a sitting position, with his back to the wall. The kid raised the shotgun, pointing it at Troy’s head.

  "Happy Holidays, asshole."

  12

  Merry Christmas To You, Too

  The nanosecond between a trigger pull and feeling a gunshot wound is not enough time to have any kind of normal thought. What Troy thought was, dangit, I’m gonna die without my hat.

  But the loud bang that Troy had expected never came. Instead, it was more like … a click.

  He opened his eyes. He hadn’t realized he’d closed them.

  The kid was in shock. He was staring at the gun. He pulled the trigger again. Click. He shook it violently and clicked it a few more times. Troy wasted none of the rest of the split second between the click and the kid’s utter disbelief at what was happening. He pushed his back on the wall scooting himself up, at the same time grabbing the barrel of the gun. He swung hard at the side of the bewildered kid. The shotgun connected and this time, it was a home run swing. He crumpled like a sack of potatoes.

  “Merry Christmas to you, too,” Troy said, tossing the gun down at him.

  And then the adrenaline surge went out of Troy and he knelt back to the ground next to Holly, who was in and out of consciousness. In a feat of strength he didn’t know he had, he lifted her up and limped with her back into the dark poker room. He laid her down on the couch.

  Her eyes fluttered and opened for a second. She reached into her pocket and pulled out two unused shotgun shells. “See, I was only fakin’.”

  He couldn’t help but smile a little, even though his jaw still felt like a tractor-trailer had crashed into it.

  “Ambulance. I’m gonna go call an ambulance,” he mumbled heading back out into the sun.

  He limped around the corner and pushed through the glass door. Denny, Olga, and Maury—the mechanic—were untied and huddled around an old style telephone on the counter. Denny was tapping the disconnect button furiously.

  “I got him,” Troy held up a fist triumphantly.

  “Fantastic,” Denny said, his lips in a tight, white line. “Now when I get a line out of here, I’ll get the police to haul the both of them to jail.”

  “No, Denny, you don’t understand. She helped me. She took the shells out of the kid’s—”

  “That girl helped him tie us up and she’s going to jail for accessory to murder.”

  Troy grabbed the phone out of his hand, jerked it off the counter and threw it against the back wall. It smashed into a sexy calendar of beautiful women holding various bottles of sparkling wine coolers.

  “What in God’s name are you doing?” Denny demanded.

  “She let you go. She stole the shells from that maniac's gun or he would've shot us all."

  "She is still going to jail and why are you defending her so much? Were you in on this too?" Denny said, stalking around the counter, picking up the pieces of the phone.

  After Denny gave up on the broken phone, Troy relayed the events that had transpired behind the building and that Holly was in bad shape.

  “She needs medical attention.”

  “Well, cowboy, you just smashed the only phone we’ve got.”

  “You can use mine,” a voice said from behind them.

  Troy turned to see the old man holding out a cell phone. “You mean, you had that the whole time and didn’t…”

  Maury was unfazed. “I just forgot I had it on me. Happens when you get to be my age.”

  Troy smacked his hand to his forehead.

  “Maury, would you call 9-1-1 for us?”

  “Surely.”

  The police arrived so fast, Troy wondered just how close they had been the whole time. They questioned everyone and took statements while the crime scene crews and the coroner cleaned up the mess. Troy told them exactly how it had gone down, including the part about Holly saving his life by stealing the kid’s shotgun shells.

  The man named Earl Heskett was the owner of the liquor store and had been a generous benefactor to several of the local charities, including the annual gift exchange for children from disadvantaged homes in the area. He always dressed as Santa and gave out toys during the Christmas ball at the police station.

  “So, I guess we'll have to get a new Santa this year. Won't be the same without Earl. He always donated the most presents of anyone in town.”

  “I’m sure you’ll find someone,” Troy said.

  “Hey, dude.” Denny tapped Troy’s shoulder and pointed out the window. “That old guy got the bus up and running again. I guess we’re off.”

  Troy opened his mouth to say something, then seeing Denny’s now excited, joyful, even cherub-like smile, his silvery-white hair, and a white stubble beginning to pop out on his chin, he closed it again.

  Seeing Denny for the first time, one of the officers suddenly got an idea. “Say, fella, are you from around here? Maybe you could grow that beard out and…”

  Troy didn’t hear the rest, but he would find out later, that the widowed Mrs. Heskett was no longer interested in owning the liquor store without Earl around to run it. She agreed to sell it to Denny for a downpayment of twenty-five thousand dollars and a percentage of sales until she passed.

  Denny would grow a fantastically thick, white beard and the local children would indeed get presents from Santa that year.

  Troy would also read in the paper that the safe—which he had left open the whole time—had been emptied and no evidence of the money had ever been found.

  And last but not least, he would hear that no sign of their captor—the wannabe cowboy—would be found either. He had simply vanished along with one of the straw hats hanging over the counter … but that is another story altogether.

  Epilogue

  Gone, Baby, Gone

  Troy walked around the building, limping on the knee that he was sure was ruined, wondering how the ambulance had gotten away without checking him out, and saw that the scene had already been cleared. There was no sign of Holly, the crime scene techs, the coroner, or anyone else for that matter. He opened the door to the poker room and saw that it was empty.

  Maybe Holly got treated and got back on the bus, he thought. He stumbled back out toward the parking lot and the running bus. But when he climbed on and slumped down heavily in the seat in front of Olga, who was resting behind closed eyes, he saw that Holly was not on the rumbling Greyhound.

  He glanced over at the seat she had been sitting in before the bus had broken down. And there it was, his
hat—the Outback Tea Stained straw cowboy hat he’d lost in the fight with Jimmy—resting upside down, dusty and crumpled. He reached over and picked it up, slapping the dirt off with his hand.

  A wad of hundred dollar bills, five to be exact, fell out with a yellow sticky note attached to them.

  It read: I'm sorry, but large intestines are expensive. Merry Christmas, TF.

  He cocked his head to the side. TF? And then he remembered Holly’s proposed stage name, Tess Fenway.

  “Happy Holidays to you too, Tess,” he muttered, tucking the bills into his pocket, wondering if he’d ever see her again.

  Maybe I’ll stop in at the Red Garter when I get back to the Keys, he thought... or maybe not.

  THE END

  Gator Wave

  An Excerpt from A Troy Bodean Tropical Thriller #8

  1

  A Foul Gator

  Approximately two hours before the coldest August dawn Islamorada had seen in twenty-two years, Matteo Caparelli hiked into the mangroves wearing an exquisite lavender, V-neck sweater his father had bought him for Christmas last year. He had known it was a gift meant to infuriate his mother—the newly-divorced Jackie Caparelli. And based on the colorful kaleidoscope of swear words she’d used when she had watched him open the box, Matteo thought it had worked like a charm.

  Dante Caparelli would have been horrified to see his son tripping through the spongy, sucking marsh in the fifteen-hundred dollar Tom Ford Classic cashmere gift. But Matteo—Matty to his closest friends—would never make it back to hear the disappointment in his father’s cigar-cough-hack laden rebuke. That was to say nothing of the way the slippery, tepid mud was oozing into his crocodile Salvatore Ferragamo loafers like an over-poured Wendy’s frosty. Yes, Dante would have been furious, if Matty hadn’t been mucking along toward an untimely—if not gruesome—end.