The Alex Shanahan Series

by Lynne Heitman

  “Everything is fine. But I’m not in Miami on a vacation. Something has come up that’s of… of a personal nature, and I have to take care of it before I start work.” The words I had scripted for this conversation felt stilted. I felt evasive, and I felt him reacting to it.

  “Is it something I can help you with? Because I’ll be honest, if I can get you here on Monday, or even Wednesday, I would sure like to do it.”

  “I know. And I’m sorry to be dumping this on you at the last minute. I know you’re busy. If there was any other way—”

  “Okay, okay. Let me think about this.” I pictured him sitting at his desk with one hand around the phone and the other flat atop his head, the way he’d done a few times during the interviews. “I’ll have to cancel my trip this week, but I’ll… we’ll be all right. Are you sure there’s nothing I can do? I mean on a personal level.”

  I fell back on the flower print bedspread and draped my arm over my eyes. I felt guilty enough without his genuine personal concern. “No, really, everything’s fine, Paul, but thank you for asking.”

  “Then I’ll see you a week from Monday.”

  “Right. I’ll stay in touch and let you know if it’s going beyond that.”

  “If it does, Alex, then this becomes a more complicated problem.” Now his voice was taking on more gravity, and I felt the weight of his concern like a stone hanging from my neck. “I have to ask you, Alex, are you having… you’re not having second thoughts, are you?”

  “No. I’m still fully committed to being there, Paul.”

  “Good. That’s all I needed to hear.” He sounded relieved, and I felt queasy and I wasn’t sure why.

  We chatted for a few more minutes. He told me about the freak snowstorm that had moved in the night before. I told him about how it was 78 degrees in Miami.

  After I hung up, I stared at the phone for a long time. Eventually, I reached over and wiped my perspiration off the receiver.

  An hour later I was still emptying out shopping bags. I’d picked up the basic replacement gear—running shorts, T-shirts, khakis, a couple of polo shirts. I’d spent more time and money on my new pair of running shoes than I had on the marginally nice-for-the-price lightweight business suit. But then I knew I’d be spending more time in the shoes.

  When the phone rang, I hoped it wasn’t Paul Gladstone calling to be nice again.

  “Hello?”

  “I hear you’re looking for me.”

  “Who is this?”

  “Avidor. I have what you’re looking for.”

  At first the whole scene struck me as surreal. When I stepped off the elevator and walked onto the concourse, I saw a woman in the beauty salon next to the hotel getting a manicure. A party of four was raising a toast in one of the restaurants, and next door to them, passengers shopped for that last minute bottle of duty-free Armagnac.

  It was two-fifteen in the morning.

  I blinked at colors that seemed too vibrant and lights that were too bright. Everyone moved as if they’d been dosed with caffeine. Then I realized I was the one out of sync. I was at Miami International Airport, where time had no meaning. It may have been the middle of the night for me, but the people who moved through this global way station came and went from time zones all over the world.

  Bobby worked the night shift, mostly at the maintenance hangar, but he had agreed to take his dinner in the food court at Concourse F so we could rendezvous at the terminal. He was very clear he would be there no earlier than two-thirty and would stay no more than thirty minutes. But something told me not to be surprised when I rounded the corner and found him already settled in and halfway through his dinner when I arrived at two-twenty. He was at the Cafe Bacardi, a teeny restaurant with a massive bar long enough to warrant two television sets. They were both on and tuned to the same station, so we were treated in stereo to the hypnotic drone of a stock car race. Unless NASCAR ran at Darlington in the middle of the night, the few people scattered around the food court who were interested were watching a tape-delayed version of an earlier race.

  “Are you Bobby?”

  “The only people who still call me Bobby are from Boston.”

  “What do you want me to call you?”

  “I don’t care.”

  Bobby may have grown up with John and Terry McTavish, but he looked older. His hairline was receding and he had a thick, bottom-heavy shape that fit nicely into his plastic chair. He had buckled his belt one notch too far, bisecting a soft middle into two spare tires. His jittery eyes fixed on me briefly. It was long enough to see that his body may have been flaccid, but his eyes were diamond hard.

  “May I sit?” I asked.

  “Suit yourself.”

  I did.

  “I gotta set the record straight,” he said, “on Johnny McTavish. I know that’s why you’re here.”

  “How did you know I was here at all?”

  “We heard from Boston you were coming down. We heard about the bag. And Bic called and told me I should get this thing cleared up.”

  “Bic told you where I was staying?”

  “Is it a secret or something?”

  “No.” In fact, I’m thinking of posting my schedule on the web.

  “Terry sent you,” he said. “Am I right?”

  I didn’t know this man except by his lousy reputation among some good people. But even if I knew nothing about him, I didn’t want to give him any information he didn’t already have. “Who said anyone sent me?”

  “It was Terry. I know it was Terry.” He shook his head. “God bless him. He thinks I’m the devil himself. You’d never know I’d saved his life. You probably already heard that story, right?” He gave me another one of those quick-flick glances, and I knew he wouldn’t need much encouragement to tell me his version of events on that fateful day.

  “Someone may have mentioned it.”

  “I hear Terry’s whacked out. Gone off the deep end. Is that true?”

  I gave him a “beats me” shrug.

  “How’s Mae holding up?”

  “Mae is fine.”

  “I hope you’ll give her my regards. No matter what’s happened between us over the years, I still got a soft spot in my heart for the McTavishes. All of them.”

  His grin was so greasy, and not from the sub he was eating, it almost had me reaching for a napkin to wipe down his face. “If you’re so fond of them, why aren’t you taking Mae’s calls?”

  He laid his sandwich down. All the planes of his face flattened into somber concern. “Because I got nothing to say to her that will make her feel better.”

  “How about ‘My condolences. I’m sorry you lost your husband’?”

  “Believe me, anything I got to say about Johnny, she don’t want to hear. Terry, neither.”

  “Tell me. I’d like to hear it.”

  He pondered that request as he looked left, then made a big show of looking right. No one was within ten feet. Still, he dropped his voice and spoke without moving his jaw much, which made it tough to hear him. “The truth is Terry McTavish knows what went down with his brother. He just don’t want no one else to know. And if you’re a friend of Johnny’s, you won’t neither.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “Johnny McTavish was down here because of a drug buy.”

  “A drug buy? John McTavish?” I almost laughed out loud. “That’s an outrageous accusation, and you know it.” And now I knew how the police came up with their theory.

  “Listen to me. I didn’t say he was down here to make a buy. I said he was here because of one.”

  “Could you elaborate on that distinction?”

  “I said you wouldn’t like it, and neither do I, but here it is. Last Monday, I’m down at the hangar working the end of my shift, when I get a call. It’s Johnny.”

  “What time does your shift end?”

  “0700 hours, but I worked over that morning, so it must have been around 0900 when he called.”

  “What did he say?”r />
  “That he was getting on a flight and coming down to see me. I say what for? He says he’ll tell me when he gets here, to just be at the gate to meet his flight. So that’s what I did.”

  “You waited around at the airport for him? Until after two o’clock?”

  “I didn’t put in for no overtime, if that’s what you’re thinking. I don’t even get paid overtime. I did some paperwork and other things I’d been needing to do. I haven’t talked to the guy in years, right? I get a call out of the clear blue. I’m curious.”

  “How many years?”

  “Since I went to LA, which was four and a half, maybe five years ago. Besides that he’s done me a few good turns in my time. So he gets here and we go and have a cup of coffee. We’re talking about this and about that and so on and so forth and then he starts saying why he’s here. I’m listening to him and I can’t believe what he’s telling me, which is all about how his brother’s surgeries and all the litigation had put him in a financial bind, him and Mae. They even tried to sell that business of theirs—you know about that business Johnny and Terry got going on the side?”

  “The landscaping business.”

  “Only it turns out they owe more on it than it’s worth. So Terry, who figures he caused the whole thing anyway, he decides he’s gonna take matters into his own hands. He sets up a coke buy from a guy down here. Some connected guy. According to Johnny, it was a big shipment, a one-shot deal Terry was trying to do to get right, and get his family out of the hole he’d put them in. It’s not like he can really work anymore.”

  I looked more closely at Bobby Avidor. Those light blue eyes, at least what I could see of them, did not seem at all connected to the things that came out of his mouth. His gaze kept jumping around, which made it hard to tell if he was lying. Dan had said it best—John would sooner cut off his arm than deal drugs, and anyone who knew him knew that. But I wasn’t so sure about Terry. I thought about that display of anger back in Mae’s kitchen, and I felt a little less comfortable because what I did know was if Terry had been in trouble, John would have done anything to get him out. Anything.

  “If Terry doesn’t have any money, how was he going to pay for a shipment of coke?”

  “By providing the transportation. He was going to arrange to bring it up on one of our airplanes.”

  “How? He doesn’t even work for Majestic anymore.”

  “He has friends that do.”

  If Bobby had concocted this story, he’d been shrewd enough to take into account both character and circumstances. “Let’s say that was true,” I said. “Why would John have flown down here and told you all of this?”

  “Miami is a tough place if you don’t know your way around. And Johnny was not a person who was plugged into the underbelly, if you know what I’m saying.”

  “And you are?”

  He shrugged. “Being in Florida and working at the airport, he thought I might have heard some names I could pass along.”

  “Did you?”

  “I don’t know those kinds of people, and even if I did, I wouldn’t have put Johnny in touch with them. He’d be a babe in the woods in that crowd.”

  “What did you tell him?”

  “To go home and talk to Terry. And to tell Terry to talk to his priest.”

  I sat back, listened to the whining NASCAR engines, and tried to figure out what was wrong with this story, other than the fact that I didn’t like its teller. “Let me make sure I understand this. You say John flew to Miami on Monday. The two of you spoke here at the terminal. He told you Terry was involved in a deal to smuggle cocaine on a Majestic aircraft, and he wanted you to help him stop it.”

  “Which I didn’t do, because I didn’t know how to.”

  “Did you see him after that meeting?”

  “That was it. We shook hands, I went home, and I didn’t hear from him again. I assumed he went back to Boston. I didn’t even know he checked into a hotel.” He had an answer for everything, which meant either he was well rehearsed, or his story was true. “The police say you have an alibi for the night he disappeared.”

  “I was out with one of my buddies.”

  “I’m sure your buddy can verify your story.”

  “The cops already have, but you can talk to him if you want. I’ll give you his number.” He smoothed out a section of the butcher paper that had been wrapped around his sandwich. He took a pen out of the pocket of his short-sleeved shirt and wrote something on one corner. He ripped the corner off, folded it, and folded it again. Then he crumpled the rest of the paper into a tight ball that fit nicely into his fist. “By the way,” he said, still fingering the note, “I hear your bag turned up.”

  From anyone else but him, that would have been good news. “Where?”

  “Frisco.” He squeezed the ball of paper and released it “Don’t quote me on this, but rumor has it it’s coming in sometime later today. If it comes in before I leave, you want me to hold it for you? Maybe keep care of it for you?”

  “I’m sure baggage service will take care of it.”

  “Okay. But I wouldn’t want you being down here in Miami without the things you need.” He put the note flat on the table in front of him and pushed it toward me. That same well-lubricated smile slithered across his face. Before it had been equal parts chummy and patronizing. This time I saw hints of a third element—menace—and I saw it in his eyes, too. They were dull and mean when he finally settled his gaze on me. Whether he was lying about Terry or not, we were on different sides of some very tall fences. He knew it, too. I just wondered how far he would go to keep me on my side.

  “All’s I’m saying is if you don’t have everything you need to stay down here, it might be best for you to go back home.”

  “I appreciate your concern, but I can be very resourceful.”

  “That’s your call.”

  He pulled back his finger, leaving the note in front of me. I picked it up and started to unfold it, but was jolted by a screech of metal on gritty linoleum that cut right through the sound of the speeding race cars and touched off a shiver down my spine. It was Bobby pushing his chair back from the table in the most ear-cringing manner possible. “I don’t think,” he said, rising slowly, “we have anything else to talk about.”

  “We might.” I unfolded the scrap of paper and read the name he’d written.

  When I looked up to find him, he was already gone, walking away with one hand in his pocket and the other wrapped around the balled-up butcher paper. From the way he was sauntering, it looked as if he might be whistling.

  I almost went after him, but he wasn’t the person I needed to be talking to. That would be the person who had been with Bobby the night John died, the person he said would vouch for his innocence. That would be Phil Ryczbicki.

  Chapter Six

  ​“What I’m asking you, Dan, is whether you believe Terry would do such a thing.”

  I had Dan on the phone and the early news on the TV, and neither one of them seemed to have good news for me. On the screen—huge clouds of black smoke boiling out of the flames and into the tropical jet stream as more and more of the drought-cracked Everglades turned into fuel for the raging monster. On the phone—a connection that was as balky as Dan as he did everything but answer my question.

  “Where did you hear that?”

  “Your friend Avidor,” I said. “I saw him last night.” I checked the clock radio next to my bed. “Actually, it was more like three hours ago. He said John was down here to undo a drug deal Terry had set up.”

  “That cocksucker. That shit-eating, crap-spewing son of a bitch. It’s not enough he gets Johnny killed. Now he’s smearing the whole family. Jesus Christ, Shanahan. Jesus Christ.”

  “Then you don’t think it’s true. Thank God.” I sank down on the edge of the bed and, for the first time since I’d left Bobby, let myself feel tired. When I’d gotten back to my room, I’d pulled back the covers and tried to sleep. But the air conditioner had been too loud and the b
ed too soft. The pillows had been too flat—still were—and my brain would not stop working. What if it was true? What if John had been murdered trying to protect Terry from committing a felony? What if Terry went to jail? What would Mae do then? If it was true, what would I do?

  I realized we had lapsed into silence, unusual in a conversation with Mr. Fallacaro, especially after he’d had his first cup of coffee of the day. “Dan?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “Didn’t say what?”

  “That Terry would never do something like that.”

  I was back on my feet. “What are you talking about? You just said—”

  “Whether it’s true or it’s not, I don’t like fucking Bobby Avidor talking about Terry that way. The McTavishes are good people. The kid’s been through a lot. Tell me exactly what he said.”

  I found the remote control, which wasn’t hard because it was bolted to the nightstand, and turned off the TV. I could only deal with one crisis at a time. I told Dan what Avidor had told me. “Just tell me objectively, if Terry felt desperate enough and guilty enough, do you think it’s something he would do? I need to know what you really think. It’s important.”

  “I’ve got to be honest with you, boss. Terry’s different than he was before he cracked up on that motorcycle. I knew him pretty well when he worked out here, but since he got hurt, he’s been hanging around with some of the hard-asses in the union and all they talk about is how the company owes him, how we screwed him out of his benefits. If he ever gets up in the morning one day and forgets to hate Majestic Airlines, they’ll be right there to remind him. And the truth of the matter is Terry got screwed.”

  “Terry got a bad break, Dan. The worst, but—”

  “Just stop right there if you’re going to try to be rational, Shanahan, because Terry’s not exactly in a rational mood right now.”

  I pictured Terry trying to maneuver around Mae’s small kitchen with one good leg, one bad, and a cane. I remembered the look of bleak disappointment in his eyes, and the rage that had come off of him like a fever. “So what’s your answer, Dan? Do you think he’d set up a coke deal?”