Old Bones Never Die

by Lesley A. Diehl

  “I might like that,” she said.

  “Are you crazy?” I asked. “You’re an old … uh, you’re a senior …. You’re just fine without one.”

  “Eve’s right about that,” Nappi said. “I don’t recommend that people arm themselves, except in unusual situations.” This from a mob boss.

  “You mean ‘unusual’ like threatening a pawn shop clerk?” she asked.

  “No, I mean ‘unusual’ like an alligator invades your house. If you interrupt their search for a snack, they’re capable of doing bodily harm, but they don’t shoot back.” Nappi pulled into a parking place in front of the shop.

  Inside I was surprised to see Shelley behind the counter, but no Jerry.

  “Did Jerry cut out?” I said, thinking I’d have to get Nappi to talk to him. My threatening Jerry never accomplished much.

  “No. he’s back there.” She pointed to the room in the back of the store.

  I could hear Shelley’s sewing machine whirring away, and when I stepped into the room, I saw Jerry in front of it, humming to himself and pushing fabric through the feeder.

  “He’s quite good at it,” said Shelley, coming up behind me, “and he has a real design sense. I let him refashion a dress for one of the women this afternoon. He’s working on it now.”

  “Where did you learn to sew?” I was so shocked I could barely get the words out of my mouth.

  “My mother taught me. We were so poor when I was a kid that she had to make most of our clothes, curtains, even coats. She was a whiz, even doing work for others. I helped. Haven’t done it for ages.”

  Nappi walked into the room after me, and I heard him groan. “He’s ruined for Family work.”

  “Well, maybe not. He can alter your shirts and pants, even monogram your handkerchiefs. That handmade touch,” I said, trying to hold back a laugh.

  Nappi shook his head and left.

  “All done.” Jerry held up the dress he had been working on. It looked pretty good to me.

  I put my arm around his shoulders and walked him out into the hallway where no one could hear us. “As a reward for doing so well today, how would you like to help me tonight?”

  “I can if I finish the matching jacket to that dress.”

  What? This from the guy who was always so eager to be in on any adventure I cooked up.

  I held back what I wanted to scream at him and cleared my throat to calm myself. “And how long will that take you?”

  He scanned my face carefully, perhaps catching the note of anger in my voice. “An hour? Would that be okay? If not, I could come in early tomorrow to finish it. I don’t want to miss out on anything. I love the crazy stuff you do … I mean as long as it’s not too dangerous.”

  “That’s what you’ll be there for. To make certain I’m not in danger.” I laid out the plan for him.

  “Okay, but if I have to sit in the restaurant, I’ll have to order a dinner. Who’s going to pay for that?”

  I ground my teeth. “You’ll pay for it out of the money you earned at the store today.”

  He gave me a pleading look. “But it’ll take all I earned today. That place is pricey.”

  Any scheme where I involved Jerry always meant I had to fork over money. I wanted to tighten my grip on his shoulders and squeeze hard, but I stopped myself. He was right. He was doing me a favor.

  “Put it on your credit card, and I’ll reimburse you.”

  He grinned.

  I held up a warning finger before he could say anything. “But don’t order the most expensive dish on the menu and limit your alcohol consumption to a drink and a glass of wine. You’re supposed to be protecting me.”

  “Okay. It’s a deal.”

  I sighed with relief.

  “One more thing,” he said before I could leave.

  “We already shook on it, Jerry.”

  “That’s a place where a guy takes a date. I need a date.”

  Chapter 10

  The Jerry and a date scenario wasn’t going to happen, and I pointed out the reason why to Jerry.

  “I don’t think anyone is in danger, but I’m not going to involve some innocent woman and take the chance she gets hurt.”

  “But it’s okay with you for me to be in danger,” he said.

  “Yes,” I replied, and that was that.

  I chose to dress conservatively for the evening, a black sheath dress, sleeveless but with a boat neck. I had no intention of looking provocative and sending the wrong message to Danny Cypress. At seven thirty I pulled out of my drive with Sammy’s truck on my tail and got to the restaurant about ten minutes late, conveying, I hoped, the message that I was not overly eager for this rendezvous.

  My date appeared even later, at around eight thirty. I chose to wait for him in the bar area, not caring if the restaurant held the table for us or not. They did.

  He didn’t apologize or ask if he’d kept me waiting too long, but simply slid onto the barstool beside mine and ordered a martini.

  “I hope this dinner engagement isn’t interfering with something else, something more pressing for you, Mr. Cypress,” I said. I couldn’t help being sarcastic about his tardiness.

  “What? Oh, no. I got caught in traffic, that’s all.”

  Traffic? At this hour, on a week night? Hardly.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I watched Jerry being shown to a table in the dining room. Then, to my surprise, Nappi appeared and joined Jerry at his table. What was that all about? Ah well, Jerry would have company for dinner—not the company he hoped for, but company. They were seated in a far corner of the dining room.

  For someone who wanted to find out what I knew about possible evidence the police had found at the site where the bones were found, Danny Cypress seemed uninterested in pursuing the topic, or any topic for that matter. He appeared distracted, staring into space, acting as if he didn’t really want to be here.

  “Is there something wrong?” I finally asked, after he had gulped down his drink and suggested we be seated.

  “No, of course not. I’ve just got a lot on my mind. Busy day, you know.”

  “Your company must be concerned that the police will think they are responsible for stealing those bones,” I said, deciding I needed to move along the conversation.

  “Why should we do that?”

  “You know darn well why. If the bones are found to be Indian, then the whole construction site will be shut down. Now, however, there’s no way to confirm that. The company is in the clear.”

  I finally had his full attention.

  “It’s stupid to think that area would be a burial ground.”

  “Not really. The land once belonged to the Seminole and Miccosukee tribes. You should know that.”

  His face got red. I’d insulted him.

  “Of course I know that, but that’s not where we Miccosukees bury our people. We have our cemetery on our land in the Alligator Alley Reservation south of the lake, or there are private cemeteries. You’re good friends with the Egrets, so you should know that.”

  What a lovely evening this was turning out to be, trading insults as an appetizer.

  “It could have been an area used by the people hundreds of years ago and forgotten by the tribe in the last several hundred years.”

  “The bones weren’t that old,” he said.

  “How do you know?”

  After a moment’s discomfort, he smiled. “The foreman mentioned it.”

  “And he’s some kind of expert on dating bones?”

  Danny shrugged. “He could be wrong, I guess, but he’s been at this work a long time and has run into bones on other sites.”

  Really? I doubted that.

  “So, do the cops have any clues as to who took the bones?” asked Danny. His question sounded like casual curiosity, simply part of the conversation we were engaged in.

  “Tire tracks, I guess.”

  He stopped eating and looked at me. “Really. I would have thought it would be hard to isolate one set of t
racks from all the others around there.”

  Now it was my turn to shrug. “I don’t know how the cops do that stuff, but they do.”

  He looked amused, probably at my use of “stuff” to describe evidence.

  The remainder of our meal was spent chatting about his work as an attorney. He liked to talk about himself, and I encouraged him to go for it. Maybe he’d spill something that would tie the company to the removal of the bones.

  “I worked in Miami for a while, but decided to move closer to home. Mom and Dad like to have all of us children close by.”

  I’d done a little homework on his family. I knew his father ran large numbers of cattle on his ranch west of the Kissimmee River outside Sabal Bay. Two of his brothers worked the ranch with their father. Danny was the only one of the brothers who attended college and then went on to law school, although his younger sister completed two years of college before coming home to live as well. My research had turned up something interesting about a third brother, the oldest sibling in the family.

  “I understand your older brother left home years ago.”

  Danny squinted at me. “How do you know that?”

  “Frida told me. And of course, as you mentioned earlier, I’m friends with Sammy and Grandfather Egret, so you know how closely knit the tribe is when it comes to its members.”

  “Albert left some years ago—I don’t remember how many. I was still a kid. We heard from him once, but we haven’t had any news in the last ten years or so.”

  “That must be distressing for your parents.”

  “Yup.”

  “From what I heard, he was a pretty wild teen.”

  “Could we change the subject? Albert was a problem, always getting into trouble. In some ways, it’s good he left. He made life difficult for all of us.” He picked up the dessert menu. “They have killer cheesecake here.”

  Conversation lagged through coffee. Danny glanced at his watch several times, then excused himself from the table. “I have to make a call. Business.”

  Nappi got up from his table and walked past me, dropping a folded note beside my plate.

  It read, “Careful with this guy. He used to do legal business for a mob family. Handle him carefully.” It would have been nice if Nappi has told me earlier, not that I would have turned down the invitation to dinner. I guess Nappi thought the two of us looked too cozy tonight, and he was worried I wasn’t being cautious enough. I tucked the note into my purse.

  When Danny returned, he acted as if a burden had been lifted from his shoulders. “How about a nightcap at my place?”

  “I have a drive home, and I already have a glass of wine in me. I’m under the limit now, but there’s no sense in taking chances.”

  “Leave your car here. I’ll drive us to my condo, and you can stay the night. I’ve got an extra bedroom. I promise I’ll be a perfect gentleman … if that’s what you want me to be.” He gave me a come-hither look with hooded eyes. He was an attractive man, but not for me. Something about him made me uncomfortable. I’d have passed on his invitation even if Sammy hadn’t been in my life.

  “That’s an interesting offer, but no.”

  “Some other time then.” He said it as if it was a given. Such arrogance.

  He walked me to my car and backed me up against the door, then leaned in as if to kiss me. I turned my head.

  “You’re not like other women, are you?”

  “I guess not.”

  To my surprise he smiled. “I like that.”

  He left for his car, which was parked across the lot. I watched him go, thankful the night was at an end. I didn’t like him. He made me jittery. I wasn’t going to repeat the event; I’d pumped this well dry in any case. He wasn’t about to let down his guard again the way he had when he told me the bones were not that old. Although he covered his slip-up with a story, he knew more about the bones than he let on. The only way he would know the age of the bones was if he was involved somehow. How long had he worked for the construction firm as its lawyer? Questions whirled around in my head, but I had no answers, just the conviction that he was covering for the construction company. The only other thing I’d picked up from tonight was more an impression than specific information. It concerned his older brother. It was the only subject that made him uncomfortable. I’d ask Sammy and Grandfather for the whole story. As I watched his car pull out of the lot, I sighed. The evening was over, and I couldn’t have been more relieved.

  Seeing Sammy by his truck on the other side of the lot, I waved. He walked over with Nappi at his side.

  Sammy put his arm around me and hugged me close. “Are you okay? I saw his attempt at a goodnight kiss.”

  “Yes. Fine. Get in, and we can talk for a minute.”

  “How about we talk in my car?” said Nappi.

  That was easier than one of them having to struggle into the Mustang’s small backseat.

  “I hope there won’t be more dates with this guy,” said Sammy as I got into the back of Nappi’s SUV.

  I knew his comment was made not out of jealousy, but out of worry for my safety.

  “So how did you know Danny Cypress was mob connected, and why isn’t he anymore?” I asked Nappi.

  “The lawyer I introduced you to at lunch mentioned Cypress’ name. He did work for a Miami crime syndicate, but according to my lawyer friend, they found his work unsatisfactory.”

  “Did he say why?” Sammy asked.

  “Danny Cypress seems to have bouts of severe depression,” Nappi said, “and when he’s in one, he tends to drink a lot. You can’t trust secrets to a man who can’t hold his liquor.”

  “He seemed distracted tonight. He was off somewhere else most of the evening. His only genuine reaction was when I asked him about his older brother. That seemed to be a topic he was adamant I not pursue. There’s a story there, right?”

  Sammy nodded. “Grandfather told me most of what I know about the family. There were five children. The father married out of the tribe, a woman from Guatemala. All the boys in the family were wild when they were teenagers, drinking, riding around at night terrorizing other ranching families, driving off their cattle, staying out all night …. Eventually they all settled down. Two of the boys married tribal members and worked the ranch with their dad, and Danny went off to college. But the older brother? Albert was on his way to real trouble. First he started stealing other kids’ money; then when he was a teen, he started shoplifting from local stores. He robbed a convenience store and got probation, probably because of his dad’s standing in the community. A few months later, he broke into a home and took money, jewelry, and other valuables. He threatened the owner with a gun. I guess it wasn’t loaded, but given his thieving background, when he went to trial, his father had a difficult time convincing the judge not to throw him into a juvenile facility. It might have been a good thing if he had done some time. Next thing the tribe heard, he had left town. No one knew where he went.”

  “Danny said the family got a few letters soon after he disappeared, but he said they haven’t heard from him in years. I got the feeling the family is just as glad to be rid of him.”

  Sammy nodded. “Despite working as a lawyer for the mob, I guess Danny Jr. is the success story in the family.”

  “What about his sister?” I asked. “She did two years of college then came home. Why, to marry?”

  Sammy shook his head. “No. I understand the mother is very ill, and I think the daughter is caring for her. Danny’s mother was never very sociable. I heard she came to a few tribal events, but after Albert left, she stopped attending. I don’t think anyone has seen her for years. Grandfather drops by on occasion to see if there’s anything he can do, but he’s told the family is fine and is never invited in.”

  “Maybe he should pay her another visit,” I said. “I could come along.”

  At this suggestion, Nappi’s face darkened. “You should stay out of this, Eve. I’ve got a real bad feeling that something’s not right. Danny Jr. is
not a man to be trifled with. Don’t you think he’d be suspicious if you suddenly turned up, feigning concern over his mother? He’d interpret that as the ultimate in snooping.”

  “That’s what I’m known for.”

  “Not in this case. Leave it alone,” Nappi warned. Sammy nodded in agreement.

  “I know the construction company is involved in those bones disappearing. And I have proof.”

  Sammy’s eyes widened. “What kind of proof?”

  “Danny said that he knew the bones weren’t very old. Now how could he know that unless he moved them?”

  “That’s enough for me. Those bones have to be my dad’s. Maybe I should pay Danny a visit, and we can have a little talk.” Sammy’s face looked as I’d never seen it before: savage. It was the countenance of a warrior bent on revenge.

  I reached out to touch his hand. “Let me check something first. He said he knew the bones weren’t old because the foreman said so. Let me talk with him before you have your heart-to-heart with Danny.”

  His visage changed, softening into the kind and loving face of my Sammy.

  Nappi interrupted our moment. “Well, if you have to snoop, I recommend telling Frida what the foreman allegedly told Danny. Let her talk with him to find out if what Danny said is true. Frida would appreciate the information, Eve. It is her case, you know.”

  “You’re right, but she did ask for my help,” I said.

  “Help to find the watch,” Sammy pointed out.

  “It’s all the same case,” I insisted.

  “Look. Eve, if I can wait until Frida talks to the foreman, then you should too. Let her do what cops do. I’m not worried about confronting Danny, but I won’t risk alerting him to my suspicions and sending him off to disappear like his brother.”

  That sounded reasonable, the kind of thing I had little patience for. Maybe I could think of another way to talk to a member of the Cypress family without setting off alarms.

  Someone tapped on the window. I jumped. Only Jerry. I’d forgotten about him.

  “I thought you’d left already,” I said, rolling down my window.

  “I ran into a buddy as I was leaving the bar. If you don’t need me anymore, I’ll be on my way. And here’s the receipt for my dinner.” He handed it through the open window to me.