by Rick Outzen
The flat-screen TV over the bar broadcasted the local news without sound. Nobody paid attention—a good thing since the video showed the Save Our Pensacola protesters marching outside my office.
Assistant State Attorney Spencer was interviewed, too. The station displayed my photo in a small box in the upper right-hand corner. It was an old picture. I don’t think they were announcing I had won a Pulitzer.
When I looked back to my laptop, a shadow crossed my table and Theodore Ware sat down across from me.
“Mr. Walker, did my niece take good care of you?” he inquired in a deep and gravelly voice, folding his huge hands on the table.
“Yes, Maya has given me everything I need,” I said pointing to the half empty bucket of beer. “Please drop the mister and let me pay for the beer.”
He ignored my request. “I saw the news report on the television in the kitchen.”
I shrugged my shoulders. “Nothing I haven’t handled before.”
He affected a good-natured laugh, but it was affected. A huge man, with a gray beard and a weather-beaten brow, Theodore didn’t smile. He asked, “Who cracked your skull?”
“Unhappy readers.”
Theodore smiled finally. Shaking his massive head, he said, “You just can’t stay out of trouble.”
“Life isn’t a popularity contest,” I replied. “I’ll be fine, just need some time to collect my thoughts before my next interview.”
“And you need somewhere to hide out for a couple hours,” he said as he waved for Maya to refill my bucket. Then he added to her, “Have the cook fix a big bowl of red beans and rice for Mr. Walker. Bring him a plate of collards and cornbread, too.”
“Maya, I better switch to tea,” I said. “I’ve got an important interview later.”
Theodore nodded his approval. After Maya walked away, he said, “No one will mess with you here. Give me your keys, and I’ll move your ragged-ass jeep behind back.”
He came from a way of life that was good-natured but had to be practical. History had proven that both a laughing nature and prudence were necessary for survival.
“Thanks.” I fished out my keys, more than a little relieved.
“Let’s move you to my office off the kitchen. You can stay there as long as you need.”
For the next few hours, I wrote, monitored the blog, and ignored my cell phone that vibrated repeatedly. Of course, the food was fantastic. I even sampled the fried chicken and apple cobbler. To keep myself from falling asleep, I reread the bid Hines gave the city for the maritime park.
I started searching on the internet for JW Safety Consultants. Nothing. None of the other proposals had listed a safety consultant. I googled the post office box and zip code. They were the same as the post office box used by Jace Wittman’s real estate company. “JW” stood for Jace Wittman.
In Theodore’s kitchen office, another huge flat-screen monitor hung on the wall. The screen displayed six boxes that showed different views of inside and outside of Five Sisters taken from the video surveillance system. While working on my laptop, I found myself occasionally glancing at the screen, checking on the parking lot, kitchen, dining area, the bar, hostess station, and cash register.
There was no sound. My phone vibrated. Gravy’s number appeared on the screen. I didn’t answer it. A few minutes later, Gravy texted.
“The state attorney has a warrant for your arrest,” he wrote. “Where are you? I can come get you and maybe avoid you being booked if you come clean with them.”
I replied, “I need until the morning. Tell Spencer I will call him later tonight.”
“Too late for negotiations. Frost has the warrant and has men out looking for you. Being inside the city limits won’t deter him.”
Shit.
Gravy wrote, “Only if I can take you to Spencer within the hour do you have any chance.”
I wrote, “I got this but thx.”
I looked up to see two deputies walking into the restaurant. They appeared to be demanding to see Theodore. Their stances were combative and confrontational, which meant they must have found my car hidden behind the restaurant.
Outside, I saw another patrol car pull up, cutting off any chance of slipping out the back door. As I started to pack up my laptop, Maya rushed into the office.
“We need to get you in the tunnel,” she said while pulling back a throw rug on the floor and opening a trapdoor that fit seamlessly into the wood floor. “Here’s a flashlight. This leads to Miss Bonnie’s house across the street. Uncle Theo wanted you to talk with her anyway about your story. She will let you use her car.”
I didn’t have any quips to fire back. All I could manage was a real “thank you” as she slammed the trapdoor behind me and I climbed down the ladder to the tunnel. I heard her moving chairs on top of the rug.
The tunnel was narrow, only about five feet wide. The floor was dirt and the walls cinder block. The flashlight shone just bright enough to see five yards in front of me. I expected a rat to run in front of me any minute. None did.
I had heard stories about how the Prohibition raids of Five Sisters seldom had any arrests of politicians. There were rumors of a tunnel, but I could never get Theo to admit to anything. He would only smile, grab me a beer, and ignore me like he never heard the question. I thought the tale was another Pensacola urban legend.
When I climbed up the ladder at the end of the tunnel and opened the trapdoor, I was in a food pantry. A little boy wearing a Lakers jersey sat at an island in the middle of the kitchen. He looked up from his bowl of tomato soup. Not saying a word, he motioned his head towards the living room.
A little woman sat on the edge of a worn couch. She wore a thin paisley robe over a white nightgown. Her skin was nearly translucent.
“Miss Bonnie, I’m Walker Holmes,” I said awkwardly, as any man would do who had just walked out of a pantry. “Thank you for letting me use your tunnel.”
“I know you.” Waving a bony hand at me. “You’re that crazy white man who owns that little paper that stirs up all that trouble,” said Miss Bonnie. She gasped to catch her breath as she completed the sentence. “Don’t ever smoke. I used my inhaler an hour ago and can’t use it again for another two hours.”
“Can I get you some water or anything?”
“You got a cigarette?” she cackled, coughed, and pointed for me to sit down in a worn armchair. “Nah! I’m just pulling your leg. That’s Theo’s grandson in the kitchen. His job is to make sure I don’t smoke and only drink one glass of sherry before I go to bed. I pay the little hustler a dollar to get a second glass without him telling his grandfather. I think that boy has mo’ money than any of us.”
She sighed as she tried to get comfortable on the couch. “Don’t ever get old, Mr. Holmes.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said. Out her window, I saw the cruisers down the street. Checking my watch, I had a little less than an hour before I had to meet Pandora Childs.
“I’ll let you use my car,” she said. She’d caught her breath. Her voice steadied. “Theo thinks you’re some kind of hero. Heroes are destroyed in this town. You know that, don’t you?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
She spoke her mind. She had earned the right. She shuffled on the sofa, looking around at first for something and then faced me.
“Why did they kill my baby?” she asked. I saw tears had run down her cheeks.
“Ma’am?”
“Why did they kill Sue, my baby?”
“Miss Bonnie, are you talking about Sue Hines?” I asked stunned.
She pulled out a crumpled tissue from the pocket of her robe and nodded her head as she wiped the tears.
“No one killed her, Miss Bonnie,” I said, trying to be comforting.
“Those boys did it. As sure as you and I are sitting here, those boys killed my baby. I raised her from the crib until she married. Those boys might not have done the deed, but they drove her to it.”
The “little hustler” peeked in from the kitchen. H
e brought her a box of Kleenex and some sherry in a juice glass.
I gave him a dollar as Miss Bonnie wanted me to do. He took it silently, expecting the bribe. I heard him turn on the television, the squeak of shoes and cheers from an NBA game came from the kitchen.
“My baby never forgot her Momma Bonnie. Bought me that TV in the other room. My Sue loved me.”
“What boys are you talking about?” I tried not to sound too urgent. “Bo and Jace?”
She took a dainty sip of her sherry and savored it before she nodded her head.
“She was disgusted with both and that young girl. She didn’t like Mr. Jace and Miss Julie moving into her home. The daddy ignored the girl, and she spent too much time with Mr. Bo,” said Miss Bonnie.
After another sip, she said, “I’m thinking my Sue uncovered something, and the burden was too much for her to bear.”
“What kind of something, Miss Bonnie?”
“I don’t know.” She shook her head. “My baby tried to love on the girl, but she wouldn’t have none of it. Not healthy having a young girl running around the house dressed like they do now days.”
“Ever see Mr. Hines do anything inappropriate?”
She shook her head. “I don’t spend that much time in their house anymore. Mostly my Sue would stop by here every now and then.”
“What do you know about Celeste Daniel?” I asked.
“White girl that died when them boys were in high school?”
It was my turn to nod.
“Oh. That was a bad time. Jace went off to live with some relative for the summer before he started college. Bo went to Europe with his grandparents. Germany, France, Spain, and other places I can’t remember. Nobody ever wanted to talk about the Daniels girl.”
Miss Bonnie finished her sherry. “It’s time for me to sleep. The keys are by the back door. Don’t race the engine. My fool nephew did that and flooded it. It’s an old girl too, you know.”
And with that, Miss Bonnie shut her eyes. I’d been dismissed.
When I got to O’Riley’s Pub, Navy and Marine pilots packed the place, attracting an assortment of women trying to attract their attention. Half a dozen or so University of West Florida coeds were celebrating a friend’s acceptance into graduate school. Their designated driver, a freshman in their sorority, sipped a coke through a straw. Two Marines were begging them to try Fireball shots.
A few older women, most likely nurses from nearby West Florida Hospital, were dressed in jeans and tight tops and drank bourbon and cokes at the bar. They toasted their babysitters and shouted to the Marines that they liked Fireballs.
It was karaoke night and a DJ was passing out black binders to the tables. I already knew what to expect. Most of the guys would pick country songs because they could kind of talk their way through them. I knew I would hear Garth Brooks’ “The Dance” at least seven times in the next two hours if I hung around the place. The women would choose Pink or Miranda Lambert. When they got really drunk, it would be “Wild Thang.”
I ordered a Bud Light to be sociable, kept an eye on the door, and fought off the urge to drive my pen through my eardrums. While nursing my beer and listening to a sailor do Johnny Cash’s “I Walked the Line,” a text came across my phone: “This is Pandora. Come out to the parking lot.”
She must have been spooked. Either that or she hated Garth Brooks. When I walked out, a set of car lights flashed near the edge of the parking lot. I saw her silhouette in the front seat. This was getting a little ridiculous, I thought as I headed her way.
My cell vibrated again. This time Jim Harden texted, “Childs found dead this morning in Tenn. Condo owned by Hines.”
I felt a thud on my skull. As I passed out, I thought, There went my stitches.
32
Slap. “Wake up.”
Slap. “Wake up.”
Slap.
A male voice crept into my head, vaguely familiar, but I couldn’t focus enough to connect a name to it. Each hit was a little harder. Trying to will my eyes open, I braced myself for the big one. He didn’t disappoint me.
Shaking my head, I opened my eyes to find Jace Wittman looming over me, all sixty-six inches. He didn’t put his weight behind the slaps, thank God. To him, they were light taps, but my head begged to differ. I caught a whiff of diesel fuel. The room swayed as it came into focus. I was on a boat.
Ropes bound me to a metal chair in the middle of a cabin on Hines’ Sea Ray Sundancer 400, on which we had celebrated his Patron of Florida Culture award six months earlier. My chest, arms, and legs were strapped tightly. My ribs screamed for relief. I couldn’t clear my head.
A small female form sat on a white row of cushions to my left near the glass door that opened to the stern. By her sat a man with a tall glass in his right hand and his left arm around the girl.
“Please, that’s enough, Daddy,” said a young voice coming from the couch. Julie Wittman’s bright red hair came into focus. Neither alarmed or frightened, she sounded very unemotional. Was she medicated or drunk?
“Yeah, Jace, I think you have Mr. Holmes attention,” said Bo.
The boat rocked, forcing me to swallow Five Sisters’ red beans and rice that wanted desperately to reappear. The bile burned my throat.
“You don’t look so good,” said Jace chuckling. With his face inches from mine, I smelled bourbon on his breath. Fighting the urge to vomit and still trying to clear my head, I assessed my predicament. The boat was drifting. We were the only four people on it. Hines had a pistol on his lap. I steeled myself and looked into Wittman’s eyes.
I smiled and said, “Beep.”
He backhanded me, toppling the chair. I hadn’t moved my head quick enough to dodge the blow. I felt his ring rip my cheek and saw stars and maybe a few planets. He said, “You think this is funny, you son of a bitch?”
Blood ran down my cheek. My eyes teared from the pain. I didn’t say a word, not sure how my voice would sound.
Bo handed Julie the handgun and helped his brother-in-law right the chair. I smiled again.
“Jace, calm down. Mr. Holmes wants to get your goat,” Bo said. “We have things to discuss with him.”
Red-faced, Wittman jabbed a finger in my chest. I couldn’t avoid wincing.
“I hate this prick,” he said. “He never lets up.”
“That’s what you like to hear, isn’t it, Walker?” said Bo as Jace retrieved his drink from somewhere behind me. “You love being in people’s heads, don’t you?”
“I wrote with no malice towards you or your brother-in-law,” I said, hoping my voice sounded steady. My Mississippi drawl became more pronounced when under pressure, which gave each word an extra syllable. “I hate his politics, not him.”
“I am my politics,” Wittman yelled. “Dammit, don’t you understand anything?”
“Why are we here?” I said, looking at my bonds. “Isn’t this a little overkill, Bo?”
He shrugged his shoulders. “Maybe.”
“What is this about?” I said.
Jace moved to sit on the white couch on my right. I was positioned on the wooden deck between them. The moon reflected on the Gulf in the row of windows behind his head. Wittman’s belligerence had waned, replaced with smugness.
He said, “Your newspaper is sinking fast. Your advertisers are bailing. You’ve bounced checks with your staff and vendors. Your shareholders are ready to cut their losses. Next week, your bank is going to call in your loan.”
“Nothing new, been there before,” I said, not sure how confident I sounded.
“We can make it all go away.”
“How?”
Hines said, “You move on to another story. Let the petition drive run its course without any interference—”
Jace added, “Who gives a shit about a Yankee and his baseball team?”
They were tag-teaming me, forcing me to turn my head back and forth as if I was watching a tennis match. I heard my brain rattle with each swivel.
Stringing
them along, I said, “What’s in it for me?”
Hines flashed his winning smile and said, “New advertisers and money to pay off your vendors and the bank. Consider it a gift that the IRS won’t ever discover.”
Maybe I should have told them that I needed time to think about their offer, but I couldn’t avoid asking, “What about the Arts Council trial?”
Hines’ smile froze. “My lawyers are cutting a deal with the state attorney. I’m providing testimony against Pandora Childs, the real thief.”
“But Childs is dead,” I said.
His eyes bore down on me, willing me to shut up.
“What?” asked Wittman. “When? Where? We had no idea where the bitch was hiding.”
“No details. You slugged me before I could follow up on a text.”
Wittman pulled my phone out of his windbreaker. “What’s your password?”
I gave him the password. It wasn’t the time to worry about my privacy.
When I did, Jace read Harden’s text and put the phone back in his pocket. He took a big swallow of his drink. “Bo, you said she probably was hiding out in the Bahamas or some other Caribbean island.”
He slurred the word “Caribbean.”
I said, “Not hardly.”
“Shut up!” said Hines, backhanding me. Somehow the chair didn’t topple over. Through sheer will power, I kept it upright.
He said to his brother-in-law, “He’s lying, Jace. Trying to pit us against each other.”
Wiping his eyes and running his hands through his thick hair, Wittman said, “The bastard is just screwing with us. Right, Bo?”
I tasted the blood running from my nose. The metallic flavor pushed me to continue. I spit it out.
“Jace, why do you think I was at O’Riley’s?” I asked. “I was there to meet Childs. I got a text from—”
“I said shut up!” shouted Hines. He hit me with his fist, knocking the chair over. I lost consciousness.
When I awoke, I was on my side still tied to the damn chair. I heard Hines and Wittman yelling at each other outside. Their words were indecipherable through the glass door.