Nickel City Storm Warning (Gideon Rimes Book 3)

by Gary Earl Ross

  “Ooh whee!” Hellman said. “I’m real sorry ‘bout that, Officer Stokes, but I’m just funnin’ with my friend here. After all he done for me, the least I can do is tease him.”

  “You got a strange idea of friendship.” Stokes straightened to his full height.

  “You know, I wouldn’t expect you to understand, but lemme tell you who this fella is.” Shifting his gaze from the CO to me, he exhaled with a smile, halitosis wafting toward me. “This fella used to be a cop. In fact, he’s the reason I’m here. His name’s Gideon Rimes. Now what was it Old Roscoe Mulkins used to say ‘bout him ‘fore he died? He thought it was so funny. Oh, right!” He nodded, eyes narrowing in undisguised contempt. “CO Stokes, meet the man who cluster-Glocked my innards.”

  “What?” Stokes blinked and looked at me.

  “Shot me up so bad I gotta wear a bag.” Hellman touched his left side, gingerly, his eyes fixing me where I sat. “Killed my cousin too.”

  “You killed a woman for her car. We caught you both by the body, and your cousin opened fire. My partner—”

  “Oh, boo hoo! He crippled your pal fair and square,” Hellman said. “Weren’t no kids round, I’d show you how I gotta clean this bag ‘cause these people here don’t keep no good medical supplies.” He turned to the CO. “So ‘scuse me if I’m hard on him. We got history.”

  “Least you’re alive,” I said. “My partner passed away about a year after he moved to Arizona, but he did okay in his wheelchair. I’m pretty sure he didn’t think about you.”

  None of this was true but Hellman didn’t need to know that.

  Hellman chuckled. “But I bet he thought a lot about Marv.”

  “Excuse me, but why are you here?” Stokes asked me. “You may need to leave.”

  “A few weeks ago a cocky young SOB tried to beat me to the ground with his bare hands. He came up to me on the street and told me he had a message from Jasper here.”

  “That’s a damn lie!” Hellman’s washed-out face began to darken.

  “Lower your voice,” Stokes said, modeling appropriate volume.

  “That’s a damn lie,” Hellman whispered.

  “Tell the next guy you send not to try it alone,” I said. “Tell him to bring a couple of other guys, maybe a weapon.”

  “I didn’t tell that fool to kill nobody.”

  “What fool?” Stokes said.

  “Joey!” Hellman sounded agitated. “He’s sayin’ I sent Joey Snell to kill him and promised him fifteen thousand dollars. Everybody knows I ain’t got that kind of money.”

  “Kid who got out awhile back? That dumb bastard tried to kill this guy barehanded?”

  “Yeah!”

  “Joey came up to me outside my gym,” I said. “Figured I was tired after my workout. He swung on me and I beat him so bad I broke his arm and fractured his skull.”

  Another lie floated as a test balloon.

  “Damn! So that’s what you were talking about.” The CO frowned at Hellman. “I wasn’t trying to listen but I couldn’t help hearing bits about an older man and some kid.”

  I sat back and looked up at Stokes. “Three questions then?”

  “Sure.”

  “Did you hear me mention a sum of money?”

  He thought for a moment. “No. I heard you say big money once or twice.”

  “Not fifteen thousand. So when was the first time you heard the name Joey Snell?”

  “Just now, from Hellman.”

  “That don’t mean nothin’,” Hellman said, fidgeting. “That suit from the DA’s office asked me them same questions a couple weeks ago. That’s how I knew it was Joey who went after you and how much he claimed he was gonna get if he killed you.”

  “Last question,” I said to Stokes. “Did you hear me at any time say someone tried to kill me?”

  He shook his head and looked at Hellman. “The kill talk started with you, inmate.”

  I tapped the tabletop to get Hellman’s attention. “Do you remember what you told the DA’s investigator about Joey?” I glanced over at the attorney-client conference rooms. That interview would have taken place in one of them.

  “Yeah,” Hellman said. “I told him I didn’t tell nobody to—to go after you.”

  I laughed. “His notes have you saying you didn’t know, and I quote, that wimpy little shit. Today you said you couldn’t remember meeting him. I bet this gentleman here knows you and Joey were close.”

  Stokes nodded.

  “Joey’s going back inside for assault, but he’s not coming here,” I said. “The DA’s office will be back to interview anybody close to you. Individuals you hang out with. Groups, like the white power people. Anybody else you might be intimate with.” I paused. “Joey cried when he learned you lied to him. But you probably don’t give a damn.”

  “You are a nigger piece of shit,” Hellman said, climbing to his feet before the CO could tell him to stand. “Swear to God, one of us shoulda kilt the other that day.”

  “I’m just giving you fair warning. If you’re trying to get people to hurt me when they get out and promising them money you don’t have from a wife who never existed, I think CO Stokes would agree everybody you talk to should know you’re a broke-ass bachelor.”

  Smiling, Stokes nodded. “I could mention that in front of the right people.”

  “But if you’re offering money to kill me, the DA will file murder for hire charges.”

  “Life with no chance,” Hellman said as the CO gestured him toward the door. “What else can he do to me? But if I was you, I’d be careful. A cold world out there, my nigga.”

  As I walked to my car, I was relieved Hellman hadn’t reacted to my lies. The attack had not made any TV newscast. The Buffalo News had carried a brief account in the local section the day after, but I figured Jasper wasn’t much of a reader. That he seemed unaware of my loved ones, or of Larry, Corey and the gun, left me reasonably confident he’d had no contact with Joey either. Also, it was unlikely he would go after a dead man in Arizona. But none of that meant he wouldn’t try to send somebody after me again, a different way.

  Five miles away from the prison I turned left onto Route 20. The farmland began to look more like spring and the afternoon sky brightened. I told Siri to dial Jimmy’s cell. The sound crackled through my car’s speakers. He picked up on the second ring.

  “Hi, G! What’s up?”

  “Just thinking about you guys,” I said. “Been awhile since I heard your voices.”

  “Well, we have been gone for six weeks.”

  “How’s Virginia?”

  “Beautiful,” he said. “Spring is everywhere here but it’s not as hot as Florida. I’m sitting outside right now with a whiskey sour in my hand and a plate of snacks.”

  I pictured Jimmy in sunglasses and a polo shirt, his biceps stressing the short sleeves, his wheelchair beside a patio table, his gray-blond hair alight from the sun.

  “But I miss my pool,” he added. When the insurance, lawsuit, and retirement dust settled after our shootout, Jimmy had included a year-round lap pool among the necessary renovations to his home. Swimming was his main form of exercise. “I got in some pool time in Florida but not enough.”

  “Does your hotel have a pool?”

  “Yes, but it’s outside and their lift is covered.”

  “It’s still too cold!” Peggy Ann called from the background, joining my mental picture, her dreadlocks covered by a straw hat and her muscular brown legs crossed at the ankles on a lounge chair. “Hi, G!”

  “All right, I’ll put you on speaker,” Jimmy said.

  “Hey, Peggy Ann,” I said. “How’s LJ?”

  “Doing fine when we last saw him, a couple of days ago,” she said. “He’s got this weekend off and Yvonne’s coming to see him. We’ll all spend time together then.”

  “How’s his training going?”

  Jimmy laughed. “Oh, man! He gets his mind blown every day. Smart as he is, he is learning so much more. He hasn’t looked so much like
a kid since he was one. He’s not just a computer whiz here, and he loved the Hogan’s Alley tactical training. Hey, you ever been to Quantico?”

  “No,” I said. “I toured the Hoover Building a long time ago, in my CID days.”

  “Quantico is amazing. All the shit they have makes me want to get back in the game.”

  “Okay, Ironside,” Peggy Ann said.

  “Still coming home next week?” At Darien Center, I turned right onto Allegheny, the road to Six Flags Darien Lake, which had opened for the season a few weeks earlier.

  “Nope,” Jimmy said. “I got a pretty lady with me and a tricked-out van that can just about drive itself. Business has been good enough we can afford to stay closed for another month or two. Hell, who am I kidding? LJ has worked just as hard in my business as me but now he’ll be working for the FBI. We could sell it, Peg. Retire for real. Get an RV.”

  “You’d be miserable,” I said as Peggy Ann laughed. “You need something to do.”

  “But I also needed this extended vacation. After LJ gets his next training schedule, maybe we’ll go back down to Florida for a couple more weeks. Or out to California, with a stop in Las Vegas. We like the Venetian. I guess we’ll be home around the beginning of July. Unless you need me back to put something together for whatever you’re working on.”

  “No, things are quiet. But I have a bodyguard gig in a few weeks. I might need something for that, maybe a micro-cam for the corridor outside the protectee’s hotel room. Maybe a couple earbuds and their power units.”

  “Well, you got a key. Next time you check on the house, look in the storage drawers on my worktable. They’re all labeled. You want anything, take it and leave a note.”

  “Will do. Thanks.” I glanced to my right as I passed the theme park to see cars rising and falling on the tracks of various roller coasters. With my windows closed and phone engaged I couldn’t hear screams of delight, but I still smiled. “California, huh? What about Arizona?”

  “Never cared for it. Dry like Vegas but not as much fun. Why do you ask?”

  “No reason. Have a great time, guys. Give LJ a hug for me. And Yvonne.”

  “Hang on, G,” Jimmy said. “How’s Bobby?”

  Jimmy and Peggy Ann were readers who kept up with local news online. They’d read of my dustup with Joey. But the Temple Beth Zion incident had got much more coverage.

  “Finally himself. Playing Ellington and Motown too loud. Going out to his meetings. He’s giving a guest lecture on Richard Wright and James Baldwin next week.”

  “Glad to hear it. They ever find who did it?”

  “They haven’t, Jimmy, but I’m working on it.”

  “What about the guys who attacked you?” Peggy Ann said. “You said two pled out.”

  “The last one copped to gun possession. A felon facing his own extended vacation.”

  “Good,” Jimmy said. “They ever figure out why those dickwads came after you?”

  If I hadn’t been driving, I would have closed my eyes and taken a steadying breath, as I did every time I parked outside Jimmy and Peggy Ann’s house. But I had to keep my eyes on the road, even if my vision blurred a bit. Feeling was indeed the price of living but Phoenix and I, along with Mira and Bobby, had agreed weeks ago that sometimes ignorance was necessary Novocain. Jimmy didn’t need to know who had sicced Joey on me.

  “No,” I said after a moment. “Just one of those things. They saw us coming out of the Chophouse and figured we had money.”

  “It is expensive,” Jimmy said. “Would’ve been smarter to mug you on the way in.”

  12

  Friday evening I called Pete Kim to ask if he was free Monday morning to tour the hotel where our protectee would be staying. Before the walk-through, he told me, we needed to discuss more than we had in our two previous calls. He invited me to join him and his father at Sahlen Field the next afternoon to see the Buffalo Bisons play the Louisville Bats.

  “My old man played amateur ball in Korea,” Pete said. “Left field. He promised his father he’d go to medical school if and only if he didn’t make it into the KBO.”

  “If KBO is Korean for MLB,” I said, “I assume they had no shortage of left fielders.”

  “Nope. But the good old doc still loves the game—the majors, Triple-A, even Little League, where I spent a few years in Purgatory myself.”

  “What promise did you make?” I asked.

  “None. Some promises are deadlier than their alternatives. I stuck it out till a coach told him I should think about badminton.” He chuckled. “Even without me playing for the Dodgers, baseball’s about the only thing that makes Pop smile these days. Give him a couple of hot dogs and a beer and we can discuss whatever we want while he zones into the game.”

  At the retirement dinner the steel-haired Dr. Kim, shorter and thinner than his son, had been the picture of a dour octogenarian—slow, stiff, quiet, deferential despite a frown that looked like another wrinkle in his face. But at the game, he was different. He seemed younger in his blue Bisons cap. He jumped up to clap every time the home team got on base, whipped off his glasses as if in disbelief when the umpire made a bad call, often pivoted and in an accent that delighted them called for fans behind us to cheer. By the third inning he had downed two hot dogs, a box of popcorn, cotton candy, and Dippin’ Dots ice cream.

  He smiled, even when no one was looking.

  “Told you,” Pete said when I nudged him and pointed. “He’s been in a world of his own since we got here. He won’t know I’m here till he really needs something.”

  Off and on throughout the game, Pete took notes as we discussed Drea Wingard’s forthcoming week in the Nickel City, from her unannounced arrival at Buffalo Niagara International to the number of times her name was listed in the draft conference program I’d got from Rory Gramm to the dates and locations of every other appearance she would make. The week before, I would visit each venue to take interior and exterior photos, interview the person in charge about security, and make suggestions or, if necessary, demands. An hour or so before each event, I would return to each location and check it for signs of changes.

  “If something’s different?”

  “Cancellation, period,” I said. “I don’t care if it’s a bookstore or the university.”

  He nodded. “Knowing they’ll lose money should keep them all on their game.”

  One of us would be with Drea at all times. Pete would be in charge of both door-to-door officers from Weisskopf anytime I was away checking appearance sites. Or on a break. We would take turns monitoring computer-based surveillance equipment I would hide in the corridor and other areas of the hotel.

  “I understand the suites have two bedrooms and a pull-out sofa,” I said. “Drea gets one bedroom. The other’s yours. I’ll take the pull-out. Also, I’m thinking of putting a Brink’s security bar under the doorknob and attaching a battery-powered alarm. That way we can all sleep at night and anybody trying to get in will wake us. During the conference, we can alternate taking an hour break sometime during the day, once the publisher’s people come. For her other appearances when the conference isn’t in session, we can stay in the suite and order food until it’s time to go out.”

  All three of us would wear lightweight body armor, tailored to look inconspicuous. Ours would match black slacks and look like regular vests beneath the sports jackets that covered our shoulder holsters. Drea would have a white sheath designed to be worn under loose-fitting tops. I had made a recommendation, but the Weisskopf guys were responsible for their own armor. Outside the suite, all five of us would maintain contact through a closed-circuit earbud system. Drea’s control unit would be shut off only when she gave a speech.

  “How weird is it?” Pete said after the seventh-inning stretch. “Somebody wants to kill a writer when fewer people are reading books?”

  “Not when you consider the kind of people who are after her.” From my jacket pocket, I took out a new paperback copy of In the Mouth of the Wolf and
handed it to him. “This was published last year. It’ll tell you all you need to know.”

  By the top of the ninth Dr. Kim had put away enough beer to make four trips to the men’s room, with Pete accompanying him on the fourth because he seemed unsteady on his feet. When the game ended with a two-run victory for the Bisons, two of the three homers for the Bats, and no foul balls arcing into our section along the first-base line, Dr. Kim climbed to his feet and turned to me. Still smiling as he stuffed his refuse and program into a plastic bag he pulled from his windbreaker pocket, he said, “You are a very thorough man, Gideon. Very thorough and very careful.”

  “Pop?” Pete said.

  “If my son must do work like this so soon after retiring, carrying his gun again to protect people, I am pleased he is doing it with someone like you.” Then he looked at Pete and gave him a faint nod before turning back to me. “Though sometimes I think he saves his defiance for me, Peter is a good policeman and very careful himself. I am confident he will not disappoint you.”

  Pete and I exchanged a look of surprise.

  “Pop?” Pete said again.

  Dr. Kim shrugged. “I needed to tell you that.” Then he patted his belly. “Now what I really need is food. Let’s go down to Seven-One-Six. Dinner’s on me.”

  I looked at Pete, who grinned.

  “Be glad it wasn’t a double-header, or we’d be on our way to busting a gut at the nearest buffet.”

  13

  “So who are we here to see again?” Pete said, buttery flakes of his croissant falling to his plate as he took another bite.

  It was the first Monday morning in June but in sports jackets, open-collar shirts, and khakis, Pete and I looked more like casual Friday. We were seated on stainless steel chairs at a ceramic-topped table in the Breakfast Brasserie, in a corner of the four-story glass-fronted lobby of the Torrance Towers Hotel and Event Center. Foot traffic was heavy, but ambient noise faded, like smoke, upward into the vast space. The upper two-thirds of the columns that supported the shopping concourse above us and five additional stories of convention space and luxury suites were covered with mirrored tiles. With marble floors gleaming, tall potted trees everywhere, an indoor waterfall splashing over faux rocks, and direct and reflected sunlight, the lobby was warm and scenic—one Hollywood sound loop of exotic bird calls away from being a tropical movie set.