The Quick Adios (Times Six) (Alex Rutledge Mystery Series)

by Tom Corcoran

  “Are you here because the plane crash might tie in…”

  Steffey held up both hands to stop me. “Justin Beeson didn’t want you dead. We determined that he knew about your law enforcement work before he hired you. He knew your rep for being good, for helping to solve several crimes. If he was part of a conspiracy, a plot to kill his ex-wife, he wouldn’t want you at that scene. No killer in his right mind would invite you along. I have no doubt that you complicated things for Amanda’s murderer.”

  “I can’t believe my reputation carries beyond a ten-foot circle.”

  “Well it does,” said Steffey, “and… I don’t mean to blow breeze out of your sails, but your photo expertise offered Beeson credibility with the IRS. It allowed him to write off that first flight.”

  “He expensed the plane because of me? The bastard said that?”

  “He stressed that he needed your artistic input. The second flight, he needed your truthful and respected testimony. He paid for the air charter as a defensive move.”

  “Artistic input, my ass. I’m a frigging tax deduction. Also, for what it’s worth,” I said. “Just before we hit the water, Rodney Sherwin, the pilot, said, ‘If I don’t make it and you do, kill Beeson for me.’”

  “Whoa,” said Detective Steffey. “I’ll definitely follow up on that. He didn’t provide a basis for that threat, by any chance?”

  “He mentioned Beeson only once, before we took off. Said he was afraid to fly, and that tied into something Anya told me the night before Amanda’s body was found. She said a friend of his had died in an air crash thought to be sabotage.”

  “So maybe he was the target, is that what you’re saying?”

  “I’m saying only what you just heard, detective. I’m not a cop and it’s not up to me to make assumptions.”

  He glanced at Beth, then at me. “I have another question to ask.”

  “Why are you suddenly looking at me like I have ten previous convictions?”

  “And why,” said Beth, “are you acting like you want me to leave the room?”

  Steffey made calming hand movements. “You don’t have to answer my question, and if right now is a bad time…”

  A low-calorie Miranda warning if I ever had heard one.

  “I’ve got all evening, apparently,” I said. “You’re welcome to discuss anything in front of Beth. Go for it.”

  “Little kink up in Bradenton, which I’m sure you can easily explain. You told me yesterday that Luke Tharpe owned a Ram pickup, right? Said you saw it the morning Amanda Beeson’s body was found.”

  “That’s right. It’s dark green.”

  “We appreciate your letting us know about that truck. Problem is, we found your fingerprints inside and outside of it.”

  “Did you find that clump of clothing alongside I-75?”

  “You bet. A pair of cut-off shorts and a sweatshirt. We figured they belonged to one of the bums that live back in those woods. But they were Tharpe’s. He told us that he kept extra work clothes in a locker at Beeson’s auto shop. Said he wondered why they were gone. So we wondered if you maybe had…”

  Beth was looking back and forth between us, not understanding a bit of it.

  “Right you are, detective,” I said. “I did borrow Tharpe’s truck that morning. He arrived at 23 Beeson Way when I was out on the road trying to take photographs. I asked if there was a ladder inside the building. He drove over, brought one back to me, then he left me his truck. He walked back to the building so I wouldn’t have to carry the ladder all that way.”

  “Kind of what he said, Rutledge. Glad we settled that.” Glenn Steffey relaxed a notch or two, but he didn’t look convinced.

  Beth said, “How did the clothing get tossed by the road?”

  Steffey smiled, shook his head. “The shorts had flecks of foam sealant stuck to them, which ties into our murder scene. We think the killer dropped them there, possibly to implicate Tharpe. While Mr. Rutledge’s attention and insight have been a great help to us, we have no idea who the bad guy might be.”

  “I saw something in Key West just before I left,” I said to Steffey. “I don’t know if this has anything…”

  “What sort of thing?”

  “The human sort. Anya Timber’s twin sister Sonya.”

  “Damn, said the detective. “Are they identical?”

  “Damn near,” I said. “She got into an SUV that I saw Luke Tharpe driving two days ago. I didn’t see the driver this morning. I mean, for what it’s worth…”

  “It joins the stack of meaningful yet useless clues we have assembled so far.”

  “Could I ask a question?” Beth said, then asked it before either of us responded. “Why did a grand jury need Alex’s testimony?”

  “Formal verification,” said Steffey. “In his photos of the crime scene there was something different from what my scene team found.”

  “I didn’t know that,” I said.

  “Well, it may be meaningless,” said Steffey, “but they will open your photos in a program that will show the exact moment you pressed the shutter button for each shot. All you’ll have to do is acknowledge the fact that you took the picture.”

  The nurse ducked in the door long enough to say, “Wheelchair departure, got to go by the rules. Your limo will be here in five, if you want to get dressed.”

  “I brought the Manatee County voucher for your hotel tonight,” said Steffey. “Maybe you can arrange for a rollaway bed to save you all some money.”

  “Which hotel?” I said.

  “We usually use one near our offices but, with the shift in your itinerary, I put you in the Holiday Inn a quarter-mile up the road. There is, however, one more topic to discuss, a result of a talk I had today with our mutual friend, Fred Liska. There is a man who would like a few minutes of your time. He’s in a Starbucks about four minutes from here. Sheriff Liska said that it may clarify a lot of things for you. I’ll show you how to find the place, but it doesn’t concern me, so I’ll roll on up the road. Your friends, Mr. Wheeler and Detective Watkins, are welcome to join you.”

  “Give me a few moments with Beth,” I said. “See you in the lobby?”

  Steffey didn’t want to go, but he did.

  Beth checked the hallway to make sure, then turned back to me. “What?”

  “Blow job.”

  “Pardon me, Alex?”

  “Please kiss me on the forehead one more time and help me get dressed.”

  “I certainly will do that,” she said. “Then I will call Chicken Neck’s private cell number and verify this clarification malarkey.”

  An orderly who looked like a recovering car thief pushed my wheelchair to the hospital lobby. The first person I saw was Edwin Torres in his brown UPS uniform, the mechanic from Justin Beeson’s auto shop. He stood and walked toward me.

  “You were on the news an hour ago,” he said. “I wanted to come wish you well.”

  “That’s great, Edwin, but you force me to ask. Why do you give a shit?”

  Torres looked at the orderly and Beth then flung his arms wide. “You didn’t treat me like scum. Most folk, they look at my neck tat, check out my mud-color uniform, they think I’m a dirtbag. That morning what’s-his-face found Amanda’s body, you talked to me like I’m a human. So I came to tell you in person because I think my phone is bugged. I think I’m being followed, and Beeson is trying to set you up. For what, I don’t know. Why do I think that? I’m not sure. But I’ve seen that nasty-ass choo-choo come down the tracks a few times in my life.”

  “Thanks, Edwin. I’m glad you caught me before I left the hospital.”

  He turned to leave. “Be seein’ you.”

  “Can I give you a few bucks for gas?” I said. “Or you can put it toward that GT-350 you want to own.”

  “We’re okay right now, Alex Rutledge. I may come to you for car-buying advice in a few years. For now, we’re slick.”

  21.

  Saturday night in a riverside Florida town, twenty miles fro
m the Gulf of Mexico, the mid-fifties in January and damp enough to soften your bones. I had been given pain meds, but a few aches began to fight their way through. After the antiseptic sting of hospital air, it felt great to inhale the poisonous diesel fumes of a passing bus. Seven hours earlier I had wondered if I would ever catch another deep breath.

  Beth Watkins and I rode with Detective Glenn Steffey in his Manatee County unmarked Impala, and Sam Wheeler followed us into downtown Fort Myers in his compact rental car. In deference to my supposed injuries, Beth sat up front, allowed me room to stretch out in the rear seat. The car’s interior colors were a combo of green, brown and gray—like the puke-proof carpeting in airport walkways. Its stale upholstery smelled of body odor, aftershave, mildew, fast food, and hair tonic.

  We rumbled over slick modern bricked streets until both drivers found parking spots on Broadway, then regrouped and entered the Starbucks at the corner of First. A man in the seating area stood, waved us over, tapped his tablet screen on the table. He looked to be in his late-forties, just under six feet, with thick salt-and-pepper hair, his face taut and tanned as if he lived full-time in Florida. He moved like he stayed in shape, and he smiled like a man who kept secrets and had plenty.

  “Max Saunders, FBI,” he said, extending his hand. Beth and Steffey accepted his greeting while Sam and I fumbled to arrange chairs around two tables that Saunders had pulled together.

  Beth had called Sheriff Chicken Neck Liska and verified Steffey’s claim that this meeting would “clarify” things for me. But, if anything, Saunders’s self-introduction had slammed me with confusion. While Beth was a law officer, a member of the club, I couldn’t imagine why Sam Wheeler and I might be made privy to FBI matters.

  Saunders asked if we wanted coffee. I wanted to walk back to the car. Sam gave me a look I knew. He agreed with my misgivings.

  The agent started with me, no surprise. “Understand you’ve had a rough day, Mr. Rutledge.”

  “More or less got my blood pressure checked,” I said.

  “Naturally, we’re working with the FAA on the aircraft sabotage. We think that someone wanted to kill you.”

  “Arrest Justin Beeson,”said Beth.

  “Probably not,” said Steffey. “Agent Saunders and I have discussed the fact that Beeson had no interest in Alex’s being dead. Also, he simply had no opportunity to set it up.”

  “I disagree,” I said. “There are at least three possible co-conspirators whom I’ve seen in Key West over the past couple of days. I wouldn’t know about their access to the plane….”

  “We’ll work on it when we get back,” said Beth Watkins.

  Agent Saunders looked her in the eye. “Yes, I’d be willing to bet you’ll make the first arrest in the Keys.”

  A barista arrived at the table with a tray full of selections that Max had ordered ahead of our arrival. Lattes, regular and iced coffee, plus several bottled drinks. She placed the tray on our table and departed.

  Beth twisted the cap off a green tea. “What else do you know about my future actions, Agent Saunders?” she said.

  “That remark was pure speculation, detective,” said Max, attempting a tone of assurance. “It’s just a hunch. I’m not holding hard info, or holding out in any way, believe me.”

  “Why would I not believe you?”

  Max let her question slide and turned to Steffey. “Were you going to stick around for the rest of this, Glenn?”

  His inflection made the question sound like “It’s time to go away.”

  Surprised, Steffey mumbled something about being due back in the office. He made sure we knew our way to the Holiday Inn, explained that only one room was covered, but that Manatee County wouldn’t quibble over a surcharge if we requested a rollaway bed for Sam. Looking deflated, Glenn shook hands all-around and left the coffee shop.

  Max said nothing until Steffey was gone, then turned to me. “Mr. Rutledge, I’ve been asked to provide you and Ms. Watkins some background on a case we’re team-pursuing with Pinellas, Polk and Monroe Counties. The FDLE is facilitating, but we’ve asked our local colleagues to assume day-to-day ops so that our hand won’t be tipped. We don’t want the operation’s prime managers to suspect that both we and Homeland and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police are on to them. They might fold their tents, kill anyone who could testify against them, and vanish into Paraguay or Bolivia.”

  “This mess started with drugs?” I said.

  He shook his head. “Nothing so glamorous, but its low-profile nature may be its brilliance. They’ve been methodical and, because of that, long-lasting. I was being facetious when I mentioned Paraguay and Bolivia. We’re dealing with a small but efficient check theft ring working primarily out of Toronto with links to six states. In Florida, they operate in Largo, next to St. Petersburg, Bartow in Polk County, and in Key West. They’re pretty slick and they’ve been slowly, carefully growing. The only reason we’ve been able to get close to them is luck. But we’re almost there.”

  “Is this about Emerson Caldwell?” I said. “Our dead Canadian in Key West?”

  Saunders splayed his hands like a politician asking for patience. “Stay with me here, Mr. Rutledge,” he said, then knocked back an espresso before he continued. “Our first break was to bust a man from Largo in a suburban Tampa bank this past July, cashing a stolen check. He told us that he met his only contact, Herman, at a card game in the back room of a Madeira Beach restaurant. During a play break, Herman took him aside, pitched his offer, and the fellow went for it. Herman gave him two checks to endorse and cash and told him that was the tip of the iceberg. He met Herman four days later, handed over the wad of money. Herman rewarded him with fifteen percent of the cash. After that Herman called him on throwaway cell phones and met him in coffee shops like this one. Our contact would give him all of the cash from the checks, then Herman would hand back twenty percent and a few more checks. Our contact was forging and cashing two checks every week. It was adding up, but so was the risk. They warned him to play by the rules if he got caught. Keep his mouth shut, do his jail time, and get paid a reward when he walked out of prison. He plain didn’t believe the last part.”

  “Surely someone’s missing some money by now,” I said.

  Max Saunders shook his head. “We’re talking millions, though it’s only a couple hundred thousand so far in Florida. The crack in the wall is enough to worry the tax and regulatory agencies. This group is clipping relatively small payments made by large American companies to residents of Canada. Those disbursements were already written off the books of the corporations. If someone up north missed a check, they might have been issued a replacement, or they never missed it either. We don’t know. The red flags are waving because they can pull it off without scrutiny—they think. We believe it’s about to escalate.”

  “Okay, back to Herman.” I said. “Sorry I interrupted.”

  “When the man from Largo told us his story, we asked him to keep on working for them. We also managed to get a picture of Herman meeting him up in St. Pete. We passed that picture around to our agents and caught a break two weeks ago when one of them saw Herman meeting with Ocilla Ramirez in a Key West bank parking lot, of all places. A goddamn bank parking lot. Only his name wasn’t Herman in Key West. As you guessed, it was Emerson Caldwell.”

  “How did you identify him?” said Beth.

  “He was driving a rental car, a Toyota Corolla. We traced the tag. He checked it out in Miami under his own name, but gave a fake address in St. Petersburg.”

  According to Wiley’s earlier text message, I thought, Fonteneau also had given a St. Pete address when he rented the bronze Hyundai. Had they used the same fake location?

  “Surely you followed him in Key West,” I said.

  “Unfortunately, Caldwell knew the island’s back streets better than the team that tried to keep up with him. The rental was never returned, and the leasing company has reported it stolen. We did, however, make progress. By tracing Caldwell’s calls and ema
ils, we found that his name was Walter in Macon, Georgia, and Arthur in Savannah, and Howard in Monroeville, Alabama.”

  “Did he stay in Key West after that meeting?” said Beth. “Go back to his condo?”

  Max shook his head. “We think he returned to his Tideline apartment before we learned that address. Someone used the security entry key pad in his condo that day. He didn’t log on to his computer nor did he take it with him. We think he drove or got a ride out of town. The tag on that Toyota Corolla didn’t pop up on any of the Florida Turnpike toll gates south of Miami.”

  “Where was Caldwell getting all these checks?” I said.

  “The Mounties have narrowed it down to a dozen possibilities, seven post offices in Ottawa and another five in Montreal. They think the inside bad guys have found a way to detect the magnetic ink on checks inside envelopes. They haven’t figured out where the checks go when they leave their post offices, or how they’re crossing the border back this way, but they think they’re close, too. We still need to find the black hole. No one knows where the cash went once it was delivered to Caldwell.”

  “Did Ocilla bring Greg Pulver into the scam?” said Beth. “Is that why he’s dead now?”

  “Nope, that’s not it. When we discovered her part in the check scam, he was already working for her, cleaning houses. He had no part in the check scam. With Monroe County’s help, however, we enlisted his assistance.”

  “You set him up,” I said.

  “Brought it on himself,” said Max.

  Beth looked disgusted. “What was he arrested for?”

  “Trying to score two pounds of weed on Ramrod Key.”

  She said, “Liska oversaw the bust and the flip?”

  Max shrugged and nodded. “We requested that he monitor things.”

  “You turned Greg Pulver so he could report back on Ocilla,” I said, “and he was murdered. Did no one on your team foresee the possibility?”

  “We warned him,” said Saunders. “He didn’t see any danger and he wanted the dope distribution charge to fly away.”