“Intriguing,” Sotello replied, “but will I have to put out to get the partnership?”
Gillingham laughed, and Sotello smiled at how pleasant her laughter sounded. She calmed down after a few seconds and took a last sip of her coffee. She left a few dollars on the table, and Sotello followed her out of the restaurant.
Chapter 2
Ramon
On the way back to his car, a man stepped out from between two buildings, where he had been waiting. He moved quickly to block their way, and Lynn gasped involuntarily. The man’s lean face housed two close together eyes, separated by a thin flared nose. The slash, which worked as a mouth for him, smiled crookedly at her. Although nearly six feet tall, his angular frame gave him an appearance of being taller. The tailor made pinstriped suit he wore would make someone think of a Wall Street shark rather than a drug dealer. His black hair looked as if it were brushed back and cemented into place.
“Hello Debbie,” the man said softly, in a voice reminiscent of what one would expect to hear if a snake, living in primordial ooze, were given voice. “I see you have a friend.”
“Mr. Bennet,” Gillingham said evenly. “You have been ordered by the court to keep a distance of one hundred yards from me. I can have you arrested.”
“Aren’t you going to introduce me, Ms. Gillingham,” Sotello asked.
She looked at Sotello with some confusion on her face, and then back at Bennet. “Mr. Bennet, this gentleman’s name is James Sotello. Mr. Sotello, this is Ramon Bennet.”
Sotello stuck out his hand. “Glad to make your acquaintance Mr. Bennet.”
Bennet looked at the proffered hand for a moment. He smiled at Sotello with perfect teeth. Bennet grasped Sotello’s hand, and two things happened. Gillingham saw, in the next split second, Ramon’s face lose its smile, and begin to grimace in pain. Sotello released his hand only a second after gripping it, but Bennet pulled his hand back as if he had stuck it in liquid lava. He rubbed his hand ruefully, and then pointed a finger at Sotello.
“You do not want me as an enemy, Sotello,” Bennet said, his smile back in place. “I can make things very difficult for you.”
“Why Mr. Bennet,” Sotello said easily, “I have no wish to make you an enemy. I’ve been hired by Ms. Gillingham to help her with legal matters within my expertise. I expect to be contracting with her to do some things she doesn’t wish to do, pertaining to skip tracing and such. Why would I wish to make you an enemy? You seem like an intelligent man, intelligent enough to know when his presence causes displeasure.”
“I’m warning you to stay out of this,” Bennet said, his voice raising an octave. “Find another employer, or you may be filling out a worker’s comp form soon.”
Sotello shook his head, sighing deeply. “Why, as much as I appreciate your input into my career moves Mr. Bennet, I will have to go on with what I have in mind with Ms. Gillingham.”
Bennet turned his ire back to Lynn, who had stepped back away from him. He pointed a finger at Gillingham, and poked it in her face, as he closed the distance between them. “You had better think twice about hiring this…”
His whole hand, including the pointing finger disappeared within Sotello’s left fist. Gillingham did not see even a flicker on Sotello’s smiling face, as Bennet cried out in pain, sinking to his knees on the sidewalk. Bennet kept trying to use his free hand to strike the vice, entrapping his other hand, but the pressure kept increasing until he stopped fighting and began to plead. Sotello bent down a little towards him, patting him down with professional expertise as he maintained his grip. He found a 9mm Smith and Wesson automatic in a shoulder holster, and a switchblade knife in his pocket. Tears had begun to form at Bennet’s eyes as Sotello finished his search. He had laid both weapons on the sidewalk near his feet. He glanced up at Gillingham.
“Would you be kind enough to call 911, and explain to them we have been accosted by an armed and dangerous man. Tell them we have him under control and are holding him for them.”
Gillingham nodded, taking out her cell phone and calling. Sotello bent down towards Bennet again. “I am going to ease the pressure a tiny bit on your hand so you can stand up again, Mr. Bennet, while we wait for the police. If you make even a slight move I feel threatened by, I will crush your hand instantly. Do you understand?”
Bennet nodded, and Sotello eased the grip he held Bennet with slightly. He helped him to his feet. They had begun to attract attention by the time the police arrived nearly fifteen minutes later. The squad car screeched to a halt next to them, and two black officers exited it with their hands on their weapons. When the officer, who had been driving, saw Sotello, he started laughing. He and his partner were almost as large as Sotello, but the driver outweighed him by at least eighty pounds, while his partner weighed fifty less.
“Look who we got here Jay,” the bigger man said, still laughing.
“Oh my God, Tank, is that really Jim Sotello, the scourge of Oakland, holding that citizen’s hand?” his partner asked rhetorically, as he had come up on the other side of Sotello.
“It’s me,” Sotello admitted smiling. “Just my luck to get you two. Ms. Gillingham, let me present two of Oakland’s finest, the big guy there is Tank Simmons, and his partner is Jay Watson. This is Deborah Gillingham gentlemen, a lawyer you may have seen around at the courthouse on occasion.”
“Hello officers,” Gillingham said in some confusion. “I’ve seen both of you before.”
“Yes,” Simmons said, looking at her closely. “I’ve seen you before. So, Councilor, what do we have here?”
“I have a restraining order against this man Mr. Sotello is holding,” Lynn answered. “He threatened us, along with violating the restraining order.”
Watson nodded as Sotello released Bennet into Simmon’s care. Watson looked at Sotello then. “You take those weapons off of him?”
Sotello nodded. “I’d bet he doesn’t have a permit for the auto, and the switchblade falls in the illegal category anyhow. The councilor here I am sure would like to press charges.”
Simmons handcuffed Bennet, who began to complain. “You have no right to arrest me. I happened to be walking here, and crossed paths with her by accident. They started making a big deal about it.”
“You must think my partner and I are dumber than a bag of rocks,” Watson replied, as he guided him to the patrol car’s rear seat. Simmons read him his Miranda rights as Watson loaded Bennet into the backseat. After they had Bennet situated in the patrol car, Watson began filling out an arrest form with the information Gillingham relayed to him. She agreed to follow them down to the station, and sign the full report in an hour and a half.
“Linda asked me about you the other day Jim,” Watson said. “When are you coming over and have dinner with us again? I’ll get Tank to come over at the same time, if I can get him to kick in fifty bucks to cover his eating expenses.”
“Why you…” Simmons spluttered. “You got nerve to dis me while inviting me to dinner at the same time. Well, how about it, Jim? I’ll bring my own food so this cheap weasel won’t have anything to whine about.”
“Sounds good to me, but you better check with Linda first before you go making plans without her permission, Jay.”
Simmons broke into laughter at his partner’s discomfiture.
“That’s cold, Jim.” Watson assumed a hurt look. “Are you saying I’m whipped?”
“Uh no, Jay,” Sotello replied, “but have you heard the old saying about if it walks like a duck, and it quacks like a duck, then…”
“Never mind you prick. I’ll talk it over with Linda and give you a call. Why don’t you bring the councilor here with you? Anyway, think about it. Me, and the hyena here, will see you over at the station in about an hour and a half. I don’t think we will have any problem putting this jerk away for a while. With him carrying illegal weapons, we may get the bail up to a point where he’ll have to stay inside until the trial.”
“I hope so,” Sotello said. “I could us
e some time to look into this guy’s background without worrying about his whereabouts. If he does make bail, will you guys give me a call?”
“Absolutely,” Simmons replied. “You think he has that kind of money.”
“I’m afraid he does,” Gillingham spoke up. “He had no trouble coming up with fifty thousand dollars bail on the drug charge I represented him on.”
“You defended this guy,” Watson asked.
“I’m afraid so,” Gillingham admitted. “This whole thing began shortly after. In my experience, his bail will be a lot less than fifty thousand; even with Mr. Sotello, and I, testifying to the danger of him being on the street.”
“Well, at least you will have a documented incident to substantiate your problems with this guy,” Simmons added. “The moron really made a blunder confronting you on the street like this. Let’s face it, he had to have been really obsessed to try something with this ugly character next to you.”
“Hello. I’m still standing here, Tank.”
“Yea,” Simmons replied, “and you still ain’t any better looking. I would not approach this woman, with you next to her, with three guys the same size as me. I believe the councilor really does have a problem.”
“It’s a relief to hear someone else say that besides me,” Gillingham replied. “As much as I hate to admit it, I was considering leaving the area.”
“Well, Tank and I better get moving,” Watson said. “We’ll have things ready when you both get there.”
“We’ll see you then,” Sotello agreed, as the two officers walked away and got into their squad car. He looked over at Gillingham as they drove away. She had been watching him.
“Do you believe me now, Jim?”
“I believed you before. This will probably turn ugly, so it will be that much more important for us to have this on his record. Tank had it right. No guy in his right mind would come after you in broad daylight, even if you were alone. Ramon really has gone around the bend. Let’s go pick up the weapons before we go over to sign the arrest report. We’ll hit the range right after we get out of the station.”
“I want to thank you for what you did.”
“I really didn’t have much choice, and he was armed. It would have been tough for us to even turn our backs on him and walk away. My experience with people like Mr. Bennet leads me to believe he will either all of a sudden come to his senses on his own, or he will do something to end up in prison, or someone will come to a violent end.”
“Meaning I will have to kill him?”
“How many of these domestic violence cases end in someone’s death?” Sotello asked. “Add in the actual cases of stalkers hurting the people they are obsessed with. You don’t want me to sugar coat this, so unless you wish to pull up stakes, and head for parts unknown, you’ll have to come to grips with the fact you may have to kill this guy. The police usually arrive on the scene in time to bag the body. We want the body they bag to be his and not yours. When do you plan to tell me the whole story on this?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean this Ramon looks like a lot of things, but a love sick puppy ain’t one of them.” Sotello watched a shadow cross over her face, and he knew some other link existed between her and Bennet. “Come on Lynn, the only thing I might do other than walk away would be to help you.”
The shadow, he had seen come over her face, changed to a cunning, predatory, slightly amused look. Her entire countenance changed, and he marveled at how easily she slipped out of the helpless victimized citizen, and into the cold, dangerous animal he had before him now. She smiled at him in an entirely new way. It reminded him of the visual interpretation of nails scratching across a blackboard. The hair stood up on the back of his neck, and he wondered if maybe Ramon should have come to him for help instead of this woman.
“Well lady, I guess I know your name, but maybe we need to start over on everything else,” Sotello said. “You have talent. I think you missed your calling. Not only do you act a part, you live it. You must be hell on wheels in the courtroom.”
“I do alright,” she replied, as Sotello watched the wheels spinning behind her frigid blue eyes. “What gave me away, if you don’t mind my asking?”
“First off, you assume I know what you have in mind, and why you have been giving me the performance of Vera the victim instead of telling me what you really want. When a guy looks like me, and a woman as attractive as you are starts coming on to him, if he has anything more than a double digit IQ, he begins looking for the strings which have to be attached. I thought there might be more to your relationship with your buddy Ramon, but I never figured you had dug up another personality just for my benefit. I am impressed.”
Gillingham nodded as she began walking towards the courthouse again, motioning for Sotello to join her. When he was walking along beside her, she looked up at him sideways with an even more calculating look.
“It would have worked in about ninety-nine percent of the cases,” Lynn offered. “Most of you male retards will jump at the chance, instead of asking questions, or giving me some lamo excuse like you’re old enough to be my father. Let me tell you Mr. Sotello, it never stopped my Father, so why would I have thought it would have stopped you. You have a point about your looks though. I had not expected some scarred up mook, who looks for hidden agendas every time a good looking woman comes on to him.”
Sotello laughed in appreciation. “No need to get nasty, Councilor. Just for general knowledge, what did you have in mind - get me into your house to take a fall for you, or whack this Ramon guy, and provide a logical cover for your little victim deal? Hell, you look like you could take Bennet without breaking a sweat. He must be the point man for a larger interest in you.”
“I use my brain so I don’t have to handle cheap little thugs like Ramon,” She snapped. “I did get him off a while back, but I do the same thing for a bunch belonging to the same group. I made a mistake, and dated the guy who owns the action around here. He has a mansion, servants, bodyguards, and a whole lot of money.”
“Sounds like someone saw the opportunity to make the big score, and put their poor little abused history behind them,” Sotello noted.
Gillingham whipped around, and took a step towards Sotello with murder on her mind. He had stopped with her, and now watched her with wary experience. “Dish it out, but can’t take it, huh?”
Her mouth clenched with the effort to keep from launching herself at him. She saw her reflection in his dark gray eyes. All semblance of a suave demeanor had vanished, and the man who watched her now would not hesitate in laying her out with the same skin covered vice he had brought Bennet to his knees with.
“You wouldn’t hit me would you Mr. Sotello?” she asked through tight lips.
“Gee Councilor, only hard enough so it would take them an hour to rejoin your head and neck,” Sotello replied.
“Don’t ever make light of my history. I was abused by…”
“Yea, yea, yea,” Sotello interrupted. “There are a million stories in the naked city. I had nothing to do with your childhood, and I could care less what kind of cover story you use as an excuse for your multiple personalities.”
Her face got a little darker, as if weighing how much damage she could do to him before he took clocked her. Good sense won out. She relaxed and turned away. Sotello began walking with her again warily.
“You’re alright, Sotello,” she said without looking at him.
“If we’re done dancing, maybe you would like to tell me what you have in mind.”
“Maybe you should just run away before you get in over your head.”
“More mind games? Why not just tell me what you wanted with me in the first place, and then let me know what you did to make all this necessary.”
“I wanted you to take a bullet for me if necessary, and kill whomever they sent to interrogate me,” she replied.
“And what pray tell would they be wanting to find out, and why not set up a sting with the police?” S
otello asked.
“They want to know where ten million dollars worth of cash and cocaine went,” Lynn replied. “The guy who I dated left my house one morning a few months back, just after I had gotten Ramon off on the drug charge. No one saw him again. They sent Ramon around to find out what happened to him.”
“So, your mark set you up to take the fall for him,” Sotello said. “Why haven’t they just taken you on a vacation in the desert? They could find out anything they wanted in a couple of hours.”
“Look, I got a restraining order out against that little weasel Ramon. The day after, he was in the back seat of my car with a knife at my throat. He told me if it were not in their interests for now to have me walking around, he would have made me into a lampshade. Like you said, the police will get there just in time to bag the body. They know I don’t know where the money and drugs are, but they want to keep their options open, because I had a relationship with Phillips. They…”
“Adrian Phillips,” Sotello asked in surprise. “The same Adrian Phillips who has his hand in on every local election in this area?” Sotello whistled. “I thought I read where he went on an extended trip to Europe.”
“That’s what everyone says in the background, but the IRS has set up shop in one of his offices. It seems my fiancée’s holdings will soon be auctioned off by the government.”
“Oh baby, this just keeps getting better. Your fiancée, huh? I take it since Ramon, and the people he represents, do not think you have the goods, they figure Mr. Phillips will contact you. They really are covering all their bases if they think that.”
“I tried to tell them. Adrian and I were seeing each other for a year, and I had no clue as to how much trouble he was in financially. I thought he was worth millions.”
“So he popped in for a night of the beast with two backs, before all hell broke loose, and then left you as the only clue to his whereabouts. What a guy. I like him already.”
“You son of a…” Gillingham started. Sotello was already laughing, as he walked along, and put his arm around her shoulders.
Sotello: Detective, ex-FBI, ex-Secret Service (DeLeo's Action Thriller Singles Book 1) Page 2