"Richard."
Pierce extended a hand, but Richard swatted the air above it "Man, if you be here in jail awhile you gotta learn how to act. Make a fist, and go like this." They knocked knuckles a couple of times. "Now like this." They opened their hands and slapped their palms a couple of times. Pierce figured there was more to it than that, but Richard seemed to think that was enough for his first lesson.
"What happened to your wrist?"
"Fuckers cut me. They wanted blood. What they get you for?"
"Don't know. Probably murder."
The kid reappraised him, nodded. "Who'd you get?"
"No one. I didn't do it."
Richard grinned, flashing his teeth. "Yeah. I didn't escape, either." He laughed and punched fists with Pierce again. This time he jammed his forearm at him after slapping palms. Part three of the fraternal cellmate handshake, he thought, and walked back into the small cell—his crib. He laid down on the bench and stared up at the camera. It was going to be a long wait, no matter how quickly he got out of here.
An hour later, a couple of guards picked up several inmates for arraignment. Richard was one of them. He put on his shirt and, as he left, told Pierce he'd see him in the county detention center.
"When do I get my call?" Pierce asked the guard. "Just hang on. You get it as soon as these guys are out of here."
It was five to eleven when he made his phone call. He kept it short, explained what had happened, asked Gibby to arrange for a lawyer. He also told him to take his spare key, open his office, and find his address book. In it, he'd find Redington's phone numbers. "You've got to find him, Gib. He's my alibi."
"Jesus Christ, Nick," Gibby said for the third time. "Anybody else you want me to call?"
He thought a moment. "Yeah, if you can't find Redington, call Elise Simms. Her home and office numbers are in the same book. She may know where he is." He didn't know if she'd be any help, but it was worth a try.
"What about Raymond Andrews?" Gibby asked.
"Not yet." Andrews was his last option, his ace in the hole. If Redington didn't show up, he'd turn to Andrews. But for the moment, he hoped to avoid getting him involved.
He'd missed breakfast. Lunch was a salami sandwich, potato chips, and coffee. He devoured it and waited. He tried to rest, but couldn't get comfortable on the bench. Mostly, he paced back and forth in the cell, considering what had happened from every possible angle.
Finally, late in the afternoon, he was taken to a visitor's room. Gibby wheeled over to the doorway and greeted him, shaking his hand and clasping his forearm. Behind him, seated at the table, was a slight, dark-haired man in his middle to late forties. Gibby spun his chair around and introduced Carlos Rodriguez. The man nodded, smiled, shook his hand.
"My lawyer suggested Mr. Rodriguez because he has experience handling criminal cases, and —
"Because I'm Cuban. Like the victim," Rodriguez said, standing up and shaking Pierce's hand.
He looked Rodriguez in the eye. "I didn't kill Fuego. I want you to know that."
The lawyer sat back down, and Pierce took a seat across from him. "So far no one says that you have, Mr. Pierce. You haven't been charged with anything. The prosecutor's office can hold you for up to seventy-two hours. If formal charges haven't been filed, they must release you."
"You mean they might just be harassing me?"
"Not harassment. That's against the law. They are simply holding you as a suspect while the case is being investigated."
"It's harassment to me, because like I said, I didn't do it."
He turned to Gibby. His curly hair looked even wilder than usual, his eyes even bulgier. When they were partners, Pierce was called the sleepy guy, because of his droopy eyelids, and Gibby was the wide-awake guy.
"Did you find Redington?"
"He's gone. No one's seen him since yesterday afternoon, including Elise Simms."
"I'm not surprised. They set me up."
Gibby looked confused. "Why do you say that?"
"I think Simms is behind the whole thing and Redington is protecting her. She wanted Fuego killed because he was on to her. That's what I think."
Gibby shook his head. "I don't know if you've got that right, Nick. She was pretty upset when I talked to her." Upset about what?"
"About your arrest, about Fuego's murder, and about Redington's disappearance. She thinks he was kidnapped, and that Ray Andrews was behind it."
"Christ. She blames him for everything. I don't buy it. Besides, Redington was seen leaving his house with a suitcase."
"But if Redington didn't want to be your alibi, he didn't have to disappear. All he'd have to do was say you weren't in his office."
Pierce shrugged. "Maybe once I was out of the way, he had other business to attend to." Like turning up the second skull, he thought.
"What other business?" Gibby asked.
"Excuse me," Rodriguez said. "I don't think speculation will do any good right now. Let's wait until you are charged, and see about getting you out of here. Then we'll talk about your defense."
"You think they'll let me out on my own recognizance?" he asked.
"Mr. Pierce. This is a murder case. I can't be sure there will even be any bail."
Chapter 23
The sunbaked beach spread out in front of him, a mirage of seemingly endless sand, palm trees, and oil-slicked bodies. Several of the women within Thor's view from the veranda of the Sea Horse Hotel wore only string bikini bottoms. He watched with curiosity, but was aware of the irony. The only place on Miami Beach where topless sunbathing was tolerated was directly in front of a hotel known for its homosexual clientele.
The hotel bar was called the Sandscape because fifty yards or so from it, the sand rose in a dune that blocked the view of the ocean, and all you could see from here was a desert, a sandscape specked with near-naked bodies. He tilted his beer to his mouth and knocked back half of it. He was glad he was here, and not in Key West. Maybe Miami Beach was decrepit, but the place at least had some sense of class.
Key West used to have class, but he wasn't so sure anymore. He'd been there last month investigating a particularly violent Miami-based smuggling syndicate that was running an arm of its operation out of a boutique. He didn't have a name, only that the boutique was somewhere on Duval Street. Some help that was. Duval Street was one string of boutiques, broken, only by the occasional gallery, restaurant, or bar.
He and one of his investigators had looked for leads at several of the bars, including the unforgettable Kokomo Tiki, which that weekend was offering a "Caribbean-style luau." He'd joked with the bartender, telling him that next week they ought to hold a Caribbean-style dogsled race. At first he thought the guy didn't hear him over the pounding disco beat that was nothing more than a tape loop playing the same synthetic refrain over and over. The bartender heard him, all right; he just didn't get it. Instead, he asked Thor if he was looking for some snow. Bingo.
He looked at the man, smiled at his sidekick. He'd found the lead he'd needed, and now his underlings were doing business with the syndicate. Another major cocaine bust was imminent, but, of course, it wouldn't matter. New syndicates quickly replaced defunct ones. Same drug, new people. And sometimes even the same people, out on bond.
Key West had been tolerable for Thor mainly because of the tropical flora. It was a botanical paradise, an island arboretum, where exotic and bizarre growth was to be found literally at every turn. There were scheffleras with glossy leaves; gumbo limbo trees with peeling red bark that made them look sunburned; massive banyans with aerial roots as thick as his thighs. On one street were flaming blossoms of poinciana trees, on another the night-blooming cereus, a South American cactus that looked as if it belonged in a desert. And, of course, there were the palms, from bushy ones like the Canary Island date palm and the fan palm to the towering Cuban royal and the Iatania.
"Thor. There you are."
He bolted out of his chair as he realized that Odin was standing next to
him. He took pride in his ability to observe without being detected, and was himself rarely surprised by anyone. But he'd been lost in reverie.
"Sit down," Odin said.
"Would you like a drink?" Thor looked around for a waiter as Odin pulled up a chair.
"I've already told the waiter to bring me a spritzer." He grinned as he looked out at the beach. "Enjoying the view?"
"You bet."
He wondered whether Odin liked the view of the topless women on the beach, or whether perhaps he preferred to look at the handsome young men in tight shorts who stood at the bar. Odin had chosen the meeting place. Just as he'd chosen their names. He wondered how he would react if Thor called him by his real name. Probably not well. He'd consider it a deviant act, and Odin didn't tolerate rebels, at least not in his rank. That was why Gore was dead and Pierce was in jail.
The waiter placed the spritzer on the table and Odin carefully stirred it with his swizzle stick, taking his time.
"Thor, we're close now; I feel it in my bones. Very close. Are you ready?"
"What if we can't find the other one?"
"It's not a matter of looking. It's a matter of waiting. It won't be found until the appropriate time."
"That's what worries me," Thor said. "I don't think I'm going to hang on much longer. They're coming down on me. I can feel it."
Odin nodded. "I know. But don't worry. It'll be sooner than you think."
Chapter 24
The eye of the video camera seemed to follow Pierce as he paced back and forth in the cell. Who monitored it? Did Carver and Bellinger stop by to watch him? Did he look anxious? Neurotic? Guilty?
He stopped in front of the camera and peered up at it. He grinned. Then he continued to pace, until a guard in his early twenty with a Marine-style crew cut slipped his breakfast tray through the slot in the door. "For the guest of honor. Glad to see you're still here," he remarked, and walked away chuckling to himself, as if he'd just cracked a joke and Pierce had missed the punch line.
Breakfast was rubbery scrambled eggs, cold toast, and weak coffee in a plastic mug. It was every bit as bad as the night he'd just spent on the hard bench. He legs were sore and cramped. He'd been given a thin blanket and a pillow, but his back and neck felt bruised. Richard, his short-term cell mate, had been right about the light. It was never turned off, and as if that and the bench weren't enough to keep him from getting much sleep, he was wakened twice during the night by a guard on the boardwalk above the cells.
The first time, he'd bolted awake as someone called his name and a flashlight beam caught his face. He'd remembered where he was and thought he was getting out. He'd leaped up, but the guard just moved on without another word. He'd barely dozed off, maybe an hour later, when it happened again. He'd cringed as the bright light shone in his eyes and shielded his face. But this time, he'd just turned over and pulled the blanket, over his head.
"So how was the chow?" Crew Cut asked when he came by to pick up the empty plate.
"About like the bench. Why did they wake me up during the night?"
"Part of our services for the guest of honor."
Pierced listened to him laugh as he walked away. "Real funny guy," he muttered.
A couple of hours later Crew Cut said, "A call for you," holding up a telephone. "Thought you'd like to take it in your office. Just pick it up and say, 'Hellhole." Get it? Hellhole." Crew Cut cackled at his joke.
Pierce took the phone and sat down on the bench. The phone was a prison special—no dial, no buttons. He lifted the receiver, thinking it was Gibby.
"Yeah," he said.
"Nicholas?"
Aw, shit. It was Andrews. "Uh, Ray. Hi. I—uh . . . I guess you heard what happened."
"Tina called me last night."
"I was set up."
"I suspected as much. I can have a lawyer down there within the hour. I'll get you out."
"I've already got one, but he can't do much until they arraign me."
"You mean you haven't gone to court yet?"
"Not yet."
Andrews was quiet a moment. "I'd like to know what the hell's going on."
Pierce nearly laughed. "You're not alone there."
"Feel free to have your lawyer call me if you need any help. Just hang in there. I'm sure everything will get straightened out."
"Thanks, Ray."
Feel free, he thought as he hung up. He didn't. Not a bit.
Pierce smelled food. Lunchtime. The only way to tell time in here was by the rhythms and rations of the jail itself. He figured he'd been here at least thirty hours, and he still hadn't seen a judge. His life was on hold, and it seemed that the person on the other end of the line had forgotten all about him.
"Still alive, I see," Crew Cut said when he passed him his lunch of two hot dogs, potato salad, and milk.
"Still alive," Pierce repeated as the guard walked off.
He tasted the potato salad; it was the blandest he'd ever eaten. Forty more hours, forty-two tops, he thought. He wished they'd return his watch so he could check the time. He wished someone would tell him something. Get it over with.
Jangling keys. Pierce sat up and dropped his legs over the side of the bench. Maybe this was it, the arraignment.
"You know this is a special cell, Pierce," Crew Cut said, pointing at the camera as he unlocked the door. "And you're a special case."
"You guys really think I'm going to escape?"
"Yeah, sure. Escape through death. You're in the suicide watch."
Pierce remembered the bandages around Richard's wrist. "I'm not suicidal."
"Don't tell me about it. Tell the shrink. C'mon. He's waiting to see you."
"Jesus, now what?" he muttered.
He was taken to the same visitor's room where he'd seen Gibby and the lawyer. To his surprise, Redington was seated at the table. Redington, his ticket out of here.
"Where the fuck have you been?" Pierce hissed as he sat down. "You're my alibi, for Christ's sake."
Redington jabbed a finger at Pierce. "Don't talk to me that way," he groused. "Just listen. I've got a few things to tell you."
"Well, that'd be a great start, Professor."
Redington twisted the elastic band that held his half-moon glasses. He didn't look any different than he did in his office. He wore the same suit coat, and his white hair was tied back. The only thing missing was the thermos of hot water.
"I told Carver you were with me when your friend was killed."
"Good. Since it happens to be the truth. What the hell else did you tell him?"
Redington sat back and started explaining. About an hour after Pierce had left his office, he said, someone called and told Redington he'd be killed if he told anyone he'd seen Pierce that day. He left the office immediately and went home. He didn't know what it was about, but he figured it had something to do with the investigation of Loften's murder.
"My wife and I were planning on leaving in a few days for our place in the Smokies. It's very private; we don't even have a phone. We decided to leave immediately. The rest of that day and the next, I tried to blank out the incident. I didn't want to think about it, but, of course, it kept coming to mind."
Redington looked down at his hands as he continued. He said that he'd awakened this morning to feelings of guilt, knowing that he was not only ignoring something that could affect another person's life, but was allowing some unknown person to force him into hiding.
"Finally, my wife told me to go into town and call Elise and find out what it was all about. When I did, I was surprised by how concerned she was about me. She told me everything that had happened, and when I heard you were in jail and why I made up my mind to come back. My wife agreed, and insisted on returning with me."
His story, Pierce thought, sounded genuine. He told Redington he appreciated his willingness to help in spite of the danger. The old professor waved a hand, an impatient, almost deprecatory gesture. "I refuse to live in fear that something I do or say is going to get
me killed." He paused and glanced over his shoulder toward the door. Bellinger had just stepped in. He ambled over to the table as though he were just passing through and happened to see them.
He nodded to Redington, looked over at Pierce. "You're free to go, Nick. Just pick up your stuff at the desk. Everything except your gun, of course. Apparently, it was stolen from your car, then returned to set you up to take the fall. Sorry about the mistake. Happens to the best of us." He smiled and glanced conspiratorially at Pierce. "Even Mo Carver."
Surprise, surprise. And wasn't everyone friendly and helpful all of a sudden. He was suspicious, but didn't ask any questions. He wasn't about to push his luck.
On his way out, he picked up an envelope containing his billfold and a receipt that described his car. Then he heard the bad news. Swedie had been towed in as evidence and wouldn't be ready for him to pick up until tomorrow morning. Redington, who was standing nearby, offered to drive him home and said he'd get the car and meet him in front of the courthouse.
After he'd signed several forms, Crew Cut opened the gate to the cell block. "You stay alive now," he said, apparently still convinced that Pierce was suicidal.
"You, too," he replied, and headed for the stairs.
After sitting and sleeping on the hard bench, Redington's Volvo felt like the epitome of luxury with its comfortable leather seats and frigid AC. A smooth, quiet ride. Passing through downtown Miami had never been so enjoyable, and Pierce took a renewed interest in everything around him. He looked in the windows of the shops and at the street vendors and shoppers. They were young and old, mostly Latin and black, and he felt like a tourist rather than a longtime resident. For a change, he didn't even mind the long waits at the traffic lights. Redington remained mostly silent, allowing Pierce to enjoy his restored freedom and think about what he'd told him.
As they crossed Biscayne Bay, Pierce puzzled over the relationship between Elise and Redington. The more he thought, the more confused he felt. Redington had gotten him out of jail when he could've stayed away for his own safety. And now he was delivering him home. But he also knew that he was protecting Elise; he'd said as much. But was he protecting her from Andrews, or from the law?
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