Once a Thief (Gentleman Jack Burdette Book 3)

by Dale M. Nelson

  No one did.

  Not one of the other eighty-six athletes that he later learned were getting these funds illegally asked anyone anything.

  NCAA came down hard on the school, banned them from the Orange Bowl—which was going to be a “Catholics vs. Convicts” rematch—and cut a bunch of scholarships the next season. Demetrius heard about that and he started getting nervous. What’d he do wrong? A guy in the admin office told him to sign some paper, he signed some paper and then got some paper. Then the Athletic Department dropped the hammer. Worse, everyone should’ve have known it was wrong and known better than to take it. Said they had to show some tough love. Demetrius learned that the scholarships they’d cut were on incoming freshman, so he figured he was safe. Then the AD told him he wasn’t a Cane anymore. Said they knew he took the money and he was cut from the team, and that he should’ve known better.

  Demetrius noticed they didn’t kick out any of the first stringers. “Accountability” went as far as the second string. If you were expendable, you were held accountable. You started, you skated.

  Demetrius declared his eligibility for the ’96 Draft. He knew he needed another year, a real shot, and a big season if not the thousand yards that Demetrius believed he was capable of. Instead, he declared for the draft when his circumstances forced him to and it cost him. Demetrius went in the fifth round to Jacksonville. The NFL didn’t care about Pell Grants. He made it through training camp and made the roster, but again he never started. Two years later they traded him to the Bucs. He was excited, at the time, because his former classmate Warren Sapp was on the team. Sapp would look out for him, put in a good word with Coach Dungy, get him some reps. Demetrius rode the bench for the first half of the 1998 season and then got moved to the practice squad to free up a roster spot. They said he needed to be a bit faster, hit a bit harder. Work out, run a bunch, see what happened the following training camp.

  So Demetrius hit the weights hard. Three, four hours a day sometimes. Then one of the trainers asked him if he wanted some help. Guy said his girl worked in one of these athletic performance clinics, and they had drugs that made you stronger. Still had to put the work in, get your reps, but these drugs, they’d help. Like steroids? Dawes had asked him. No, the guy said. NFL was probably going to make it legal in a year or two. Problem was with the lawyers, the trainer told him. Only thing is, Demetrius had to pay him in cash and had to keep it quiet. But it’s legal? Yeah, of course it is. Demetrius asked him if he should run it by coach first. The trainer asked him that if coach knew he needed a little kick, would that help him make the team?

  Demetrius started taking the stuff and he got big. Fast. Put on another twenty pounds or so, half-second chunks start falling off his sprint times. He was going to make it. Summer of ’99, NFL announced a doping probe. Players were juicing. Bucs announced their own investigation. The trainer, the guy that sold Demetrius the shit and talked him into it, flipped on him. Told the coach it was Demetrius’s idea, and he only did it because he needed the money. Dawes got cut, and the team could tell the League it was in compliance.

  No team would touch him after that.

  He drifted.

  Sold cars for a while, but not new ones. From his lot in South Tampa, he could always see the top of Raymond James Stadium over the single-story skyline. See the pirate ship in the end zone. Last thing he needed was to be reminded of that every day. He tried other work, nothing stuck. He tried out for the Arena League, CFL, NFL Europe, even the XFL for the hot minute that was around. Nobody bought because he was a juicer. He bounced around and eventually found his way back to Miami.

  He started breaking into homes—something he'd done in his youth—when things got really lean and Demetrius wasn’t making ends meet. Any ends. At first, he was just doing it until he could get on his feet. He took the seminar to help him decide what he wanted to do, and figured that everybody loves a pro athlete and he could sell anything because of it.

  At the Selling for Profit! seminar the guy talked a lot about finding your niche. That’s when it hit Demetrius. He knew enough about breaking and entering that he could appreciate the benefits of a home security system. He also knew, from reviewing statistics, that most middle-class homeowners in the area didn’t have one. That was his niche.

  The people of Coral Gables, though, didn’t particularly seem to agree.

  Demetrius always thought he was charismatic. Never had a problem talking to people. He always thought he was going to get a commercial deal after his playing days were done, maybe call plays on ESPN. But for some reason, old white retirees weren’t interested in security systems sold by a large, intimidating black man.

  Demetrius made his way back to his car, which by now would be a furnace, and decided to try one last house. A few houses down from where he parked, Demetrius walked up a driveway to a squat mid-century rambler in the shade of a live oak lording over the front lawn. There was a novelty sign hung next to the front door painted to look like the side of a ship. It said: “SS HARRIS - WELCOME ABOARD!” Demetrius pressed the doorbell, inhaled once and then remembered to take his sunglasses off and clip them to his shirt. An elderly white woman appeared at the door. Demetrius smiled professionally.

  “Good morning, Mrs. Harris?”

  “That’s right,” she said amiably.

  “Ma’am, my name is Demetrius Dawes and I run Home Security Solutions. As you might have guessed,” he favored her with a short laugh that was just charming enough, followed by a wink that was letting her in on the joke, “we’re a home security company. Now, may I enquire if the Harris family already has a home security solution? I didn’t see a sign out front.” He said this in the playful, “tsk-tsk” kind of way.

  “Oh, we don’t have anything like that,” she told him, smiling back behind a pair of huge glasses. “My son Warren stops by once a week or so. Makes sure I keep all of my bingo winnings,” she said, and winked back at him.

  “That’s nice, Mrs. Harris, I’m sure he takes great care of you.” Demetrius flicked his glance into the house. “Now, Mrs. Harris, were you aware that home invasions and burglaries are now the most common form of property crime here in the Miami-Dade area …” Demetrius went back through the crime statistics, none of which were even remotely true.

  “Oh my heavens,” Mrs. Harris said. “Well, now I’m certainly glad we’ve got our Warren.”

  “I’m sure you do, ma’am, but do you think that Warren might feel a little more comfortable knowing that you were protected round-the-clock by a state-of-the-art home security system? Especially considering the statistics I’ve just shared with you.”

  The back of Demetrius’s neck was starting to blaze, despite the shade. Weatherman said it was going to be ninety today with all of the humidity. Demetrius always sweated like all hell once he got heated, and he carried a spare couple of golf shirts in his car just in case his own biology overpowered the moisture-wicking fabric technology.

  Mrs. Harris listened patiently while Demetrius explained the values of a home security system and described the numerous threats to her and her husband’s safety without one. Finally, she asked him, “You sure do look familiar. Have I seen you on television?”

  “You may have, ma’am. Are you a football fan?”

  “Did you play?” She asked in that almost-bashful way people got in the presence of celebrity.

  “I sure did. I played tailback at the U in the nineties and was drafted by Jacksonville in 1996. I played there for a couple years and was traded to Tampa, then I got hurt.” Demetrius heard her say, Oh your poor dear, before the words even formed in her mind. He shot another look into her house. It had all the knick-knacks and septuagenarian artwork you’d expect, pictures of grandkids, wedding photos, old guys on boats with fish. Demetrius was about to offer her the free, in-home security estimate, but he knew that she wasn’t going to buy anything from him. She’d want her Warren to come over and check it out first. Demetrius could tell from the pictures that Warren had the
kind of job with air conditioning and neckties, and he’d be an expert in everything. Demetrius didn’t need that kind of hassle.

  “Mrs. Harris, I’ll be in the area for a few more hours. I was wondering if there were any of your friends or neighbors that you think might benefit from a free, in-home security consultation?” Demetrius looked back over his shoulder to casually reference the neighborhood, and something caught his eye. The home across the street was an old Spanish house, definitely built before the mid-century turnover on this block. It looked like there might be a second floor, but it was hard to tell because of a massive tree with Spanish moss hanging off it that obscured the view. Now that he thought on it, you wouldn’t see this place driving by on the street. It was set back with a long front lawn, then a hedge row between the lawn and the front of the house. Four tall palm trees were spaced evenly in the front yard with clusters of large plants around their base, all of which served to obstruct the view from the street. Demetrius turned back to her, aware that he’d been staring.

  Mrs. Harris told him, “Oh, I love that old house. Built in 1925. The Cleary’s owned it for years, renovated the entire thing top-to-bottom about ten years ago. Then Gladys, she fell and hurt her hip something awful on those steps. They moved up to the Villages around Orlando a few years ago. Had to sell the place. Mr. Sanchez lives there now. Bought it, oh, four years ago.”

  “Mr. Sanchez?” Dawes asked.

  “Yes, he lives alone,” Mrs. Harris said in a sad tone. “I think he must be a widower. Keeps mostly to himself, when he’s home, that is. Travels a lot. I’m not sure what he did as a career, but I heard that he was doctor or something.” Then she gave the sweet, ringing grandmotherly laugh reserved for old ladies. “He must’ve done pretty well for himself to be on vacation all the time, and I don’t recognize his face, so he wasn’t in pictures.” When the laughing fit was over she added, “Such a sweet man.”

  Demetrius thanked her for her time and said maybe he’d leave a card in Mr. Sanchez’s mailbox. When Mrs. Harris closed the door, he trotted across the street, up the drive and through the break in the hedges to the covered front door. Or, he would have. When he approached the house, Demetrius saw that there was indeed a second floor which appeared to be just one large room, probably the master bedroom. Problem was, the entryway was below that room in an enclosed courtyard, sealed by an antique-looking iron gate. He tried the handle, but it was locked. He did notice a small, shield-shaped sticker next to a thin vertical window beside the front door. It read, “Vantage Security.” Demetrius grinned. There was no such company. One of the first things he learned in this business was that some people used stickers of nonexistent security companies as a deterrent.

  Demetrius took a couple of steps back to take in the house in its entirety. Now that he could see it up close, it looked like a small, Spanish castle. The windows were all tall, square at the bottom and rounded at the top, and grouped in threes. On the ground floor, they all appeared to have horizontal wooden blinds, which were closed. Demetrius looked around. He didn’t see any external security cameras or sensors. He looked back to the street, it was quiet. No cars, no foot traffic. He was largely blocked from the street. Demetrius pulled out his phone.

  He had an idea.

  He dialed Manny Diaz.

  PROPER VILLAINS: CHAPTER 3

  Sipping a Cubano, Manny Diaz sat in an old metal chair in front of the place that his uncle ran in Little Havana. The chair belonged to the cafe. He’d been asking his uncle to get rid of these damned things for years but he never did it. Said it cost money. Manny tried to tell him, customers don’t want to sit in this broken-ass chair. His uncle, Guillermo, told him the only people that come here are regulars and they don’t care about the goddamn broken-ass chairs. You know what kind of chairs they’d have in Cuba, he’d ask Manny? None, because they’d all be in prison.

  Madre Dios, you can’t reason with this guy. Manny took another sip of coffee and tried to adjust his sitting position, knowing that it wouldn’t make any difference no matter where or how he occupied that broken-ass chair. He’d buy Guillermo new chairs if he thought the old man wouldn’t absolutely erupt over it. Manny sighed and finished his coffee. He hoped he didn’t get any rust on his ass. These were new pants.

  Manny had spent the morning the way he usually did, sipping coffee and sitting outside the coffee shop, eating a breakfast sandwich that he got from somewhere else. Guillermo only had pastries in the morning and his sandwiches weren’t that good anyway—Manny’s dad had been the chef in the family. But Guillermo learned how to make a pretty decent Cubano and where in the hell else was Manny going to spend his time? Manny wore the aforementioned new chinos that were probably now ruined by his uncle’s broken-ass chairs, a blue silk camp shirt, slip-on sneakers, and what the rest of the world called a “Cuban Fedora” but Manny had always known as a “hat”. His uncle religiously wore flip-flops, even in the rain, and always prodded his nephew how come he only ever wore shoes in this heat. Manny always said it was because he just liked the goddamn shoes and to get off his case. Uncle Guillermo couldn’t be made to understand— because he’d never had to run away from anything.

  Above Manny was the thick awning that covered the entire sidewalk. His uncle complained about needing to repaint the faded red concrete, cracked and chipped from years under the uncompromising Florida sun and driving rains of hurricane season, but Manny liked it the way it was. Gave it character and made it look authentic. Besides, cleaning up the exterior would be a kind of false advertising once someone walked inside. Manny looked up the street. Most of the shops and cafes of Little Havana were brightly painted in yellows, blues and greens. You could often hear street music playing, and at all hours of the day the delicious smells of Cuban cooking and strong coffee wafted out onto the street, masking the mix of tropical and ocean odors. Manny loved Little Havana. The old guys, guys like his uncle that had grown up in the old country, talked about Little Havana wishing it was like Cuba before that cabrõn and his brother took over (invariably, one of them would then spit on the floor at Castro’s mention). Manny didn’t understand their nostalgia. Castro had the country since the fifties and drove it off a cliff, but most people weren’t that much better off under Bautista. Why would you feel so patriotic over a place that was never good to you? They could keep it, far as he was concerned. Little Havana had everything—good music, good food and plenty of women.

  Manny was born in Cuba, and they’d come here when he was three. His mother died in the crossing. He was raised by his father, a petty criminal, and his Uncle Guillermo, her brother. They hated each other, Manny’s uncle and his dad, but they remained as a kind of family for reasons Manny would never understand. Guillermo didn’t think that a petty thief was worthy of his sister, and Manny’s father, Pablo, didn’t think Guillermo’s opinion was worthy of him. Pablo Diaz was a secretive and sullen man, and Manny rarely saw him happy. But he was a good father, as far as Manny was concerned. Pablo taught Manny how to fish off a pier, how to play cards, and how to drive a car (when Manny was eight, no less). Pablo did the best that he knew how. It was never good enough for Guillermo and the two of them would argue most nights after Manny had supposedly gone to bed. Pablo died when Manny was ten. He’d never had steady work when they were in America and the only job Manny ever knew his father had was being a thief. Pablo tried to keep it from his son and Manny knew he was ashamed, but that didn’t stop Guillermo from telling Manny how his father actually made his money.

  Manny never heard the whole story, even all these years later—whether his father was stealing a car and unaware of the drugs inside it, a classic wrong place/wrong time scenario—or if it was more deliberate. Either way, Pablo stole a car from a local gang, and it had a couple bindles of cocaine in it. This was in the eighties, at the very zenith of the cocaine decade and in the drug’s American capital. Those bindles were worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. The gang found Pablo quickly and killed him to send a message. When the d
ispassionate Miami-Dade homicide cop broke the news to Manny, he said, “Looks like he stole drugs from the wrong people.” He said this by way of explanation to a ten-year-old Manny of why his father was dead. That was that, guy didn’t even say he was sorry. Manny learned to hate cops that day. Often thinking back on that police officer’s words, he oddly found himself wondering whether there was a right person to steal cocaine from.

  His phone rang.

  Manny looked down at it to make sure Flash Madigan wasn’t harassing him again. Manny had tipped him off to a jai alai game a couple weeks back, one that he’d managed to fix, and told him to bet on it. Manny owed the guy a favor and this seemed like a good way to pay it off. He’d found out a few days before the game that the cops figured it out somehow, and the fix was off. Manny guessed a bookie talked, those guys were like fucking wet napkins with secrets. He called everybody that he could think of that he told but ... he forgot to tell Flash. Dude was most likely out a couple of bills. Flash wasn’t a big gambler, so he probably just threw a few large on it looking for some fun money. God knows he burned through it fast enough with that boat of his. To say nothing of his wardrobe. Manny didn’t know how he got the nickname, “Flash”, but he was sure it had something to do with appearance. Anyway, Manny would take care of him somehow. Flash was a good dude. Manny just didn’t want the hassle right now.

  The screen said the call was from Demetrius Dawes. Dawes was also a good dude and Manny liked him. They’d worked together, off and on, for years. Saw each other socially a few times, but Dawes didn’t drink, didn’t listen to anything Manny considered music, and he didn’t fish, so there wasn’t a lot they had in common. On top of all that, Dawes was always trying to get Manny to go to the gym with him, offering to train him. For what, Manny would always ask? Demetrius would look at him dumbly for a bit, like he didn’t get the question. Manny tapped the green phone icon and held the thing up to his ear. “What’s up, chief?”