Exploit (The Abscond Series (Book 1 of 2))

by Les Goodrich

  Having been raised on the ocean Dolph had a keen sense of direction; even on the open water he could usually point north, or more often west since that was where land usually was being a Floridian. Growing up in Florida had given him his bearings. Built them in. Land goes north and south. The ocean is to the east and once in it is deeper to the east. The way back to land: west. But in the Keys he always got turned around. That long slow curve to the west on the drive down just never felt like anything but south to him and once he got to the end south felt east and west felt south and he could never quite get used to it.

  “Look,” the captain said, “I guess I owe you guys an explanation.”

  “An apology,” Colin inserted.

  Alright alright. First of all I was wrong to troll in that shallow water all day. Thought you guys were tourist who wouldn’t know a cuda from a kingfish. I thought different when I saw you actually rig baits, but riggin baits ain’t fishin. Anyway I’ll give your money back minus fuel if you want it.

  Colin breathed deeply.

  You think we care about the money? I’m talking about attitude here. Dolph and I are two of the best you could get on this tub. All you had to do was steer. Still treated us like shit all day. Believe me I couldn’t care less but you brought it up. So either tell us your problem, or just admit that you’re an asshole and kick this thing in the ass and take us in. I got no time man.

  A stifled laugh slipped from Dolph’s nose and he agreed and asked the captain what the problem was without looking away from the clouds in the water to the west. Or was that north?

  “Okay here’s the deal,” Murphy suddenly composed and business-like.

  I own a marine supply warehouse in Miami. We sell marine electronics, fishing gear, some big game lures. Like that. Most customers are charter captains. You know the big sportfishing boats and the best gear. A captain runs it and the owners fly in and out. Them. But I sell to the captains. See those guys get a purchasing account to outfit the boats with and update stuff. I sell them discount electronics and gear, write them uptown retail receipts and they pocket the difference. I sell gear and they make out and the owners write it all off anyway so everyone wins. Get it?

  “Yeah we get it,” Dolph answered.

  “You steal radios and sell them to the hired help on the Seafood from Caddyshack. Great. So that makes you an angry old fisherman. Can we go now?”

  “First of all I don’t steal anything son,” Murphy patronized. “I buy. Buy and sell. And not radios. Marine electronics. Color radar. GPS plotters. Sat-Nav. Depth recording sonar. You know? Bottom machines like this one.”

  “So what?” interrupted Colin. “What’s the point? I know what electronics are. Are we supposed to feel sorry for you now? Get on with it.”

  “Yeah,” Dolph jumped in. “And I know what discount means to a Key West charter captain who sells marine electronics in Miami. What’s the point?”

  “There is no point boy,” Murphy said then drank down the last of his beer.

  One of my suppliers fell through on an order and I have to get this order filled because it’s already sold. It’s all I can think about. Id have to sell my sweet boat to fill it or lose my business and the boat after that anyway. Didn’t mean to cheat you guys over it or act shitty. It’s just business. Two businesses and one guy in the middle.

  “Well we appreciate it,” Dolph spoke before Colin could, “and no hard feelings. You gotta get skunked sometimes to appreciate catching fish.”

  Colin slid down the ladder with his back to it into the cockpit, got three more beers and climbed back to the bridge a hero. Dolph finally bummed the cigarette he had wanted all day from Murphy now that the captain was in a civilized mood. And the three fishermen, not quite friends but no longer enemies, cruised into port under the blinding sun that washed every color white. They talked as they made their way. Strangers separated by generation and life but relaxed enough by beer to find an almost friendly conversation about their one common interest: the sea.

  Chapter 9

  Thursday. Dawn. The Key West sun filtered through aqua curtains bathed the hotel room with pale blue light and woke Dolph slowly. For the first waking moment in a week he had no hangover. He rolled from bed in the same clothes he had worn fishing and he smelled like it. They had made it in just before sunset with words of going out but never made it. Salt crystals still clung to his arm hairs and yawning cracked his sunburnt lips. His salty hair left a sheen on his hands him scratching through it. His loaded toothbrush held in his mouth like a cigar he climbed into the cavernous blue tiled shower. He ignored the water conservation lecture plaque that hung (as it did in every hotel room from Miami to Mallory Square) to the side of the bathroom door, and stayed in the shower for thirty minutes.

  The running water brought back the sensation of rocking and he felt as if he were still on the ocean in the strangest and most real physical way that confounded logic and swayed his body from within as he stood in the shower. It was as if the water streaming down knew that it was the progeny of those limitless seas he had sailed over and that it had once been conjured from them into the towering white clouds that he had sailed under only to race down in rain like a million bright comets to swim through rivers and street drains and the lowest canal brakes to percolate the limestone into aquifers and in stone cold silent darkness flow with its brothers until man’s pipes and pumps and stations and plumbing did rain it again upon a confounded sailor who rocked in the shower and literally had to steady himself with his hands pressed flat on the blue tiled walls.

  Colin was on the balcony when Dolph finally came through the room, grabbed a tangelo from the wooden bowl of fruit on the dining table and joined him outside in the sun.

  “Morning,” Dolph nodded sliding the door shut behind him. “Well I think we made it.”

  “Made what?”

  “Made it through the week alive. You ready to head home?”

  Dolph peeled the tangelo and dropped pieces of rind into the top of a soaring cabbage palm that reached up to the bottom of the balcony.

  “Ya know,” Colin stared out over the water. “Cuba is right over there,” pointing with his chin.

  “That’s right,” Dolph mumbled chewing. “We’re closer to Cuba than we are to Key Largo. You know, Dad’s pilot says it’s beautiful. He supposedly flew Kennedy over a few times. Too bad we’ll never see it. What a mess, right?”

  “Well we could always slip over and off The Beard.”

  “Let’s slip over to the Rathskeller instead. Toast our last day in The Conch Republic before we head back to civilization. Shiny Ft. Lauderdale the neon nightmare.”

  “Sounds like a plan to me. It sucks we have to go back. Not that I want to live in Goddamn Key West forever. I mean I like it but man have they tourist trapped this place.”

  “Keeps its attitude though. That mystery.”

  “Shit.”

  “It’s real isn’t it? I mean you can see the attraction. Something.”

  Well you can be yourself and nobody cares. Which is fine as long as you don’t care that nobody cares who you are. Most tourists don’t get it but that makes it fun to offend them. I guess. Hell I don’t know. It’s an escape. But how many people can escape to here before it turns into what you’re escaping from only more expensive?

  “And Hotter.”

  “Damn it gets hot here.”

  “Damn straight.”

  Colin thought about it all. Or not and just looked toward Cuba.

  He breathed deep and exhaled long from pursed lips then spoke again.

  Every time I’m down here I realize how much I hate the whole progress thing. I just want to hop on a cargo ship and sail off to the Windwards. I bet it’s unreal there. Never been.

  “Can’t do that,” Dolph cautioned. “That would be irresponsible,” he finished and his friend agreed.

  They Smiled. They were thinking of their lives ahead after college and both knew there could be no tourist island escape from that machine
.

  They went inside, stuffed clothes into bags, checked out by phone and left through the back elevator to avoid the doorman and the valet.

  “I’m sick of tipping that valet,” Colin whispered walking from the side door into the parking lot. Whispering not to avoid being overheard but just whispering since he was leaving and his presence walking through the last of that hotel was just a transitory thing and he thought that he had probably paid the creepy valet guy’s rent for two months. He unlocked the trunk and put their bags in then closed it and looked over the car to the street beyond.

  “You wanna walk over?” Dolph asked and Colin said yes feeling to be sure he had his wallet.

  They crossed between cars to the sidewalk and Colin saluted the valet when they passed the hotel entrance.

  They crossed Duval and walked toward the Rathskeller Bar. It was a local pub that sold bootleg British Navy rum back in the days of governors and privateers. They passed 907 Whitehead Street where Ernest Hemingway lived with his third wife. And where, for six bucks, you could stumble over a hundred six-toed cats to see a typewriter that Ernest had never used and a room where he slept.

  They scouted their way under canopied trees that roofed the stone courtyard in front of the screened-in bar and flat round dry dinner plate sized seagrape leaves crunched underfoot. The wood frame screen door creaked when Dolph opened it, its coiled spring slamming it shut behind them with three decrementing slaps.

  The room was dark and still contrasted with the bright windy day outside. Cheap ceiling fans spun swiftly but seemed to move little air. The bartender, in his early sixties, sat behind the bar on a stool. His legs crossed he wore a gray fedora and flipped pages through an old issue of some fashion magazine and smoked a long slim cigarette.

  The only other person at the bar was a rotund gentleman in a white suit, white shirt and white tie who sat teetering on a barstool wiping sweat from his bald head with a white handkerchief.

  The boys walked past the portly man to a spot in the center of the long bar where a beam of sunlight from the doorway highlighted three barstools.

  “Two rum and OJ’s,” said Dolph moving a stool out and stepping on the faded brass foot rail to make the seat.

  The bartender looked up from his magazine and blew out a long thin stream of smoke to match his long thin cigarette.

  “Sure you don’t want something sweeter. I make a flawless Pina.”

  “I’m sure you do,” Colin said in a laugh.

  “A little early for that,” Dolph interjected with a smile. “Just two rum and orange juices please.”

  The barman spun on his heels and agreed that it was early and mentioned something about never knowing what time it was and pulled out a juicing press and two large honeybell oranges.

  “Nice,” Dolph said with sincerity.

  As the bartender squeezed juice into two rocks glasses with straight sides and thick clear heavy solid glass bottoms Colin turned to survey the collection of nautical artifacts decorating the driftwood walls.

  “Check that out,” he pointed to a vintage swordfish harpoon.

  Dolph looked back over his shoulder and saw the harpoon, wooden handle, coiled line hanging in loops, and the skillful Turk’s head line work that secured the spear end of the line to the metal shaft just ahead of the wooden handle.

  “Yeah too bad you didn’t have that yesterday,” he said.

  “Kiss my ass Stephenson. Oh that’s right. You did catch that gorgeous barracuda. Nice one. I wish I could—oh shit.”

  “What?”

  “Christ guess who’s in here,” Colin whispered turning back to the bar hiding his face and attempting to shrink himself by lowering his shoulders.

  “Who? Where?”

  “It’s that asshole Murphy. Behind me. That table in the corner. Don’t look. Don’t look.”

  “Oh shit it’s too late,” Dolph said through his teeth. “He sees me. Shit he sees us.”

  Captain Murphy half stood to lean his face from the shadows of his unlit corner table.

  Dolph nodded politely and looked back to Colin.

  “He’s waving for us to come join him.”

  “Jesus,” Colin took the drinks from the bartender. “I didn’t see his ass sitting back there.”

  “He’s been in here all morning,” the bartender conveyed, a disgusted tone. “Comes in every now and again. Handsome. Not very friendly.”

  “Well,” Dolph sipped his drink. “What do we do now?”

  “I guess we go over there but let’s make it short. Tell him we have to hit the road.”

  Dolph nodded and stood and the two left their spot at the bar to walk across the room to Murphy’s table.

  “Mornin’ boys. Have a seat. Please.”

  “Morning Captain. What are you havin’?” Dolph asked.

  “I never drink a drop before lunch. Unless it’s British Anjeo rum.”

  He pulled the cork from a bottle on the table and irrigated the ice cubes in his glass.

  “This is the only place that has it on the island. Is that what brought you boys in here?”

  “Well sorta,” Colin said sitting on the edge of a chair trying not to get comfortable. “We just stopped in for one last drink before we head out.”

  “Lauderdale,” Dolph said lighting a cigarette then leaning his chair back on its legs.

  “Lauderdale huh. Not far from my store in Miami. Say. Maybe we could help each other out. You guys wanna make some money?”

  Dolph let his chair slowly fall back to all four legs, starred at Murphy for a beat, stood up and said “I don’t think so.” Colin too began to stand.

  “Wait. Wait. I don’t think you understand. Give me a second. Just a second that’s it. Come on.”

  “All right,” Colin held his hand up for Dolph to wait. “What is it that we don’t understand?”

  “Okay,” Murphy put up his hands, squinted and nodded as he spoke. A gesture of sincerity that felt unnecessary.

  Colin sat back down. Dolph also but with a sighing reluctance and he leaned his chair back on its legs again.

  “You guys remember the shipment of electronics I was talking about yesterday?”

  “You mean the discount electronics?” Dolph’s voice whispered with sarcasm.

  “Yeah well just like I figured my delivery guy never delivered. Three different buyers had my ass for breakfast on the phone this morning. These are serious guys.”

  “So,” Dolph reasoned artificially. “You fired the delivery boy and you want us to do something about it.”

  “Close. The delivery guy skipped town on me with everything and I’ll pay you guys to replace it for me.”

  “Replace it yourself,” Dolph said, but not standing this time. Murphy went on.

  Look, you guys know your way around boats and gear I’m sure. All I want is top of the line stuff. The finest. It’s simple. I’ll pay you thirty percent of the retail value in cash for as much quality gear as you can get.

  Just the thought that they were sitting in a Key West bar talking about some shady scam made Colin’s heart race in a way he had never quite felt before. He began to picture himself in a gangster movie. He looked at Dolph and nearly wanted a cigarette but thought he might cough since he never smoked.

  “Now,” Murphy crossed his arms and leaned over the table. “Do you guys have access to any serious marine electronics?”

  Dolph thought he was implying their parent’s boats.

  “Yes,” Colin blurted out and Dolph kicked him under the table.

  Dolph knew his friend was excited by the whole thing. He knew neither of them gave a shit about the money. He knew he should get up and leave right then. Just say they weren’t interested, get up, grab Colin and walk out. Get up. But he did not. Instead he ashed his smoke on the floor and looked Murphy in the eyes.

  “I don’t understand exactly what it is you want from us,” he said but understood quite well. He also knew the more he could get Murphy to say, the more he could find o
ut.

  “Look,” Murphy spoke reaching into his shirt pocket. “This is very simple.” He took out a business card and a pen. “Here’s my card,” he said writing something on the back then sliding it across the table for Colin to pick up.

  Colin looked at the front of the card.

  “That’s my tackle store in Miami,” Murphy said pointing to the card in Colin’s hand with his forehead when he spoke. “If you decide to do it bring what you can to my store a week from today at that time.”

  Colin flipped the card over to see what was written on the back: five-thirty a.m.

  Murphy took a sip of his rum and leaned back.

  “If you decide not to, forget the whole fucking thing. No problem. The most I’d lose is a business card. No big deal.” He downed his drink and stood.

  “So I’ll either see you next Thursday or I’ll see you the next time you come down and want to go fishing. Maybe next time we’ll get a hook in that sailfish.”

  He winked at Colin, put down his glass and walked out of the bar. The screen door slap, slap, slapped shut behind him.

  “Smartass,” Colin said.

  Dolph went up and paid for their drinks. Colin was dragging along behind him; his thoughts slowed his walking.

  “Come on,” Dolph said. “Let’s hit it.”

  ***

  They left the bar and walked back to the car without talking. Dolph lit a cigarette when he got into the Aston and Colin said nothing. They pulled out of the parking lot and slid out of town. They crossed the Marina Bay Bridge without so much as a glance to the sailboats below. They turned on U.S. One and, in the detachment of morning, left Key West in their wake. Tranquil. Extroverted. Seductive. Disturbing. The only city in the world where the hookers were vegetarians and the Rastafarians were from Detroit disappeared in the rearview mirror—a delightful, terrifying little place.

  Chapter 10