Miami Noir

by Les Standiford

  McKool hesitated a second. “Twenty.”

  “Deal. But I need your help with something right now…”

  Less than ten minutes later he was there, with Cartouche. They quickly surveyed the scene. “Fine mess, Bobby,” McKool said, as he tossed me his keys.

  I pulled the keys to the T-bird from my pocket, pulled off my apartment key, then handed them to McKool. “She set us both up.”

  “Chicks can be that way,” McKool said.

  Cartouche bent over, felt Rebel’s neck for a pulse. “Mort,” he said. Then he checked Dmitri and shook his head. “Il n’est pas tout a fait mort.”

  “She’s dead. He’s not quite dead,” McKool translated for me. “This costs me. Rebel filled some seats.” He thought a moment, then made a small flick of his finger across his throat.

  Cartouche took a handkerchief from his pocket and picked up the pistol, stuck the barrel in Dmitri’s ear, and pulled the trigger, then handed McKool the gun.

  “He was near-dead anyway, and now he can’t mention your name before he goes,” McKool said. He stuffed the gun in his pocket. “We’ll dispose of the bodies. Go home and get rid of those clothes.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Come before gin tomorrow,” McKool said. “We’ll do the car titles and talk.”

  I got the gas from the T-bird’s trunk, then drove the Explorer home. I disconnected my apartment’s smoke detector, threw my clothes in the bathtub, poured in the last of the gas, and burned my bloody clothes to ash. After making sure not a speck of fabric remained, I washed the ash down the drain, then stood under the shower until the hot water ran out, and fell into bed without even bothering to dry. I missed my T-bird.

  Sunday afternoon, after a fitful sleep, I knocked on McKool’s door. The peephole darkened, and Cartouche let me in. Lilith stood at the stove making dinner for the crowd to come, and one of the dealers, Lefty Louie, sat at a poker table making up decks.

  “Step into my office,” McKool said, and we went into one of the back rooms. He handed me the local section of Sunday’s Herald, opened to page five. A story halfway down the page read:

  POLICE SUSPECT RUSSIAN MOB HIT

  Two dead bodies were found early Sunday on a bus bench off Brickell Avenue, near S.W. 10th Street. Dmitri Ribikoff, a Russian national in the U.S. on an expired visa, had been brutally beaten and shot in the head, execution-style. The victim was a distant cousin of Russian oil oligarch Sergei Petrov, and a spokeswoman for Miami PD said Russian organized crime might be responsible. Police are withholding the name of the other victim, a woman in her twenties, shot through the heart and also badly beaten, pending notification of her family.

  “They won’t find any family,” McKool said. “She had nobody.” There was a gentle tapping on the door. “Come.”

  Lilith stuck her head in. “Luckbucket and Bumper are here.”

  “We’ll be right out,” McKool said. He handed me a manila envelope full of hundreds rolled in rubber bands. I didn’t need to count it, knew the twenty grand was there. “You understand you owe me,” he said. “And last night never happened.” He signed the title to the Explorer and handed it to me with the pen.

  “Never happened.”

  “Make it out to Jean-Luc Cartouche.”

  I looked at him, puzzled. “Cartouche? Why?”

  “He wants it. I’d rather he have it and me want it. Ready for gin?”

  I signed the title over to Cartouche. “Yeah.” Who knew wanting and having were so complicated?

  We stepped into the main room, where Bumper and Luckbucket sat leafing through back issues of Card Player. Luckbucket’s was opened to an article by Roy Cooke headlined: Some Hands You Just Don’t Play!

  Life is like the game, I thought. It’s supposed to be the fish who play the trap hands.

  “Let’s gamble,” Bumper said.

  McKool turned to Lefty and said, “Shuffle up and deal.”

  And that’s exactly what happened.

  PART IV

  Chasing the City

  SWAP OUT

  BY PRESTON ALLEN

  Miami-Dade Correctional Center

  How’d the phone call go?

  She ain’t much of a wife no more. Tha’s for sure.

  You’re inna joint. Whaddaya expect?

  I’m inna joint one day. Less than one day.

  One day, one hundred days, it’s all the same ta them out there.

  It ain’t like I’m in prison.

  It’s all the same ta them out there. Out there is Miami. Here is here.

  It ain’t like I’m even guilty.

  What you ain’t is, you ain’t out there. Tha’s all that matters ta them.

  We been married eighteen years. I was her firs.

  Her firs what?

  Firs, ya know, firs lover.

  Oh. A virgin. Tha’s nice. I didn know they made them anymore.

  I doubt she even hadda boyfriend before me.

  Well, aleast tha’s what she told ya.

  Whaddaya talking about? She was pure.

  I’m not gonna argue with ya. You say she wuzz pure, then she’s pure in my book. All I’m sayin is ya never really know with women.

  Well I know, I can tellya that. My Merly was pure.

  Merly. Tha’s a nice name. Kinda like my wife’s name. Kerly.

  Your wife’s name is Kerly?

  My wife’s name wuzz Kerly. She’s dead now.

  I’m sorry.

  Yeah, me too. She wuzz a beaut. She woulda been a old lady now, but she wuzz the greatest gal in the world.

  Wuzz she pure when ya married her?

  Ya want me ta smack ya?

  Want me ta smack ya back?

  The trustee said, Ya got in a cheap shot this mornin, don’t forget that. Had I been looking, I woulda nailed ya.

  You wuzz sayin about Kerly.

  Greatest gal in the world. It’s becausa her that I’m inna joint these las fifteen, what, sixteen yearsa my life. They gave me life for it, but I got good behavior and extenuating circumstances, believe it or not, and they knocked a bunch of em off. So I got only six more ta do if I keep my nose clean and help out the guards, and I’m doin em here in the county instead of up at state where I was for ten, what, eleven of em. Up at state wuzz tough, I’m not kiddin ya. You don’t wanna go there.

  Nah. I don’t wanna go there. Kerly. Some coincident. Ya killt her, huh?

  Nah. I killt the guy what killt her.

  Hoo. Hoo. Tough.

  You don’t know tough. He wuzz my best friend.

  Hoo. Tough. What happened?

  See, there wuzz these two beautiful girls we met at the fair.

  Hoo! The fair. How corny can ya get? Hoo!

  It wuzz the fair. Tha’s where we met em. Kerly and her sista Pearly.

  Hoo! Hoo! Go on, finish it. Hoo!

  I’m tryin hard not ta smack you.

  Hoo! Hoo! Go on, finish it before my lawyer gets here. I wanna hear this. Hoo! Kerly. Pearly. Hoo!

  Then shut up and listen. We met em at the fair, me and my best friend Jasper. Don’t laugh. Don’t laugh.

  Jasper. Hoo! Hoo!

  For me and Pearly it wuzz love at first sight. She wuzz the most beautiful girl I had ever met. We started a talk, and we hit it off, we had so much in common.

  Pearly? But didn’t ya say—?

  Yeah. Pearly. And Jasper, well he kinda got stuck with Kerly, who was cute in her own way, but nothing like her sister. Pearly had the long legs, blond hair, bluest eyes, perky breasts. The whole package. The other one, Kerly, she wuzz short, first of all, and her eyes wuzz dark, her eyebrows kinda thick, and she had more of a, how do you say, boyish body. Okay, she wuzz flat-chested. But still, she was pretty, and it seemed to me she wuzz a nice match for Jasper, who was not the tallest guy in the world and what with this nose that was kinda like a chopped-off carrot and these permanently red cheeks like they paint on a doll. Me, I wuzz the jock. Played baseball. I wuzz in good shape back then. Girls said I wuzz a hunk,
though I didn pay it no mind, you know how it is. So there we wuzz at the fair, don’t laugh, and I’m thinkin I’ve jus met the woman I’m gonna spend the rest of my life with, and Jasper comes over to me and he whispers to me, It ain’t working, man. This girl I got is a dud. She’s not my type. Let’s swap. I want the tall one. And I sezz to him, I sezz, I kinda like the tall one. I’m not swappin. But I wuzz the jock, and his old man owned the bank, and my old man worked for his old man, so you know how it is.

  Nah. I don’t know how it is.

  Well, I’m kinda shamed ta say it. He paid me twenny bucks ta swap out with him.

  Twenny bucks?

  That wuzz a lot. It usually cost him five to swap out with me. See, the best girl always went for me, and then he’d have to pay ta get her. It’s terrible, I know, but tha’s how it wuzz. I dunno whether he wuzz usin me or I wuzz usin him, but tha’s how it wuzz. So anyway, it took some working on em, but finally we made the girls agree to the swap, and I got stuck with Kerly, the short dark one, who I had wanted all along.

  You sly dog!

  What can I say, I like girls who are dark and boyish-looking. The blond, voluptuous thing is way overrated. Plus, now I had twenny bucks and I could show her a good time. What a night we had. I fell in love with her on the spot and aksed her to marry me that night. God I loved that girl. God I loved her. And it worked out for Jasper and Pearly too. Pearly kinda fell in love with his money, and with him too I guess. A few weeks after Kerly and me got hitched, Pearly and Jasper did the same thing. It was great. I wuzz his best man. He wuzz mine. I nevah made it big as a baseball player, but the scholarship money got me and Kerly through school, and then we came back to town and worked at the bank, which Jasper was in charge of because his dad had retired to play golf and chase young girls, you know how it is. We wuzz married like ten years before the trouble started, but it had been brewing so long I feel stupid I didn notice. Me and Kerly, well, she got pregnant seems like ever’year. We ended up with four kids. Three girls anna boy. They’s all grown up and got they own kids now. I love ever’one of em. Jasper and Pearly? Well, she was like the Holy Bible says, barren. She couldn have babies. Now that I’ve been inna joint so long and so many cons have told me they stories, I realize that most crimes is committed because of either ya hate someone too much or ya love someone too much.

  So, because this fella Jasper couldn have babies, he killt your wife? Sounds ta me like he’s crazy.

  Well, crazy is the other reason people commit crimes. People commit crimes because they hate too much, they love too much, or because they crazy. But Jasper was not crazy. See, at one point he called me into his office and aksed if he could sleep with Kerly—

  Hoo! Welcome to the crazy nut house.

  Well, tha’s what I thought too, but there wuzz a method to his madness. See, this wuzz like ten years into our marriages, and the trouble had been brewing but I wuzz jus beginnin to notice. He was my boss, so I was careful how I answered him, but he wuzz also my best friend and my brother-in-law, so I figured I could have a little bit of slack with him. I aksed him if he wuzz outta his mind wantin a sleep with my wife. What the fuck, right? He explained that lots of people did it. Especially when they wuzz friends, and practically family, like we wuzz. Plus, he said, that I would get to sleep with Pearly. A swap out like inna old days. But jus for sex—no lovey dovey allowed. This is how he explained it.

  Is that when you killt him?

  Nah. That came later. I said to him, I sezz, Come on, Jasper, wha’s the real deal here? Level with me. Jasper said, It’s like this, you must know by now that Pearly can’t have babies. I’m sure Kerly told you. Women talk and they’re sisters, so I know that you know. There’s no point in lying about it. What I want is for you to lay offa Kerly’s sweet, fertile puss for a while and let me take a stab at it. She’ll get pregnant, and you guys’ll arrange for me and Pearly to adopt the baby. I wuzz stunned. Stunned. I wanted a smack him, but I wuzz jus stunned. I said, No! He said, Think about it. I said, Hell no. We ain’t kids no more. This ain’t no swap out. He said, Think about it. Think about all that I do for you. Think about Pearly’s puss, which I know you do. You gotta wonder what it woulda been like ta be with the pretty one. I’m a fair guy, I’m giving you a crack at the pretty one. This way it’ll be good for both of us. I said, No! He said, The girls have already talked about it and Kerly agrees. I said, No! And when I get home I’m gonna talk with Kerly and straighten her out on this here thing, talkin about this kinda crap behind my back. There’s a goddamned sanctity in marriage, and this goes way beyond it. She oughtta know betta. He said, I’ll pay you. I’ll pay you lots of money. I said, Hell no! And then I smacked him. Twice.

  Hoo. Hoo. Did he fire you? I bet he fired you.

  I quit. And me and Kerly sold our house and moved upstate to another bank, where we got jobs. After a while, things calmed down between us. I mean, we had been best friends. I mean, he hadda know that what he had aksed me was too offensive for even friends. To sleep with my wife? To get my wife pregnant? And the way he had said it, Lay offa that sweet, fertile puss. Who wuzz he to be getting so familiar with the goings on between a husband anna wife? There’s a sanctity to marriage. He hadda know that I had good reason to be upset. To be outraged. But eventually we started a talk again, sorta like the old days. Of course, it would never really be like the old days again. Then three years later he and Pearly adopted a set of twins, a boy anna girl, and aksed us to be godparents. Fool that I am, I thought all wuzz forgive and forgot. So when Kerly got sick…and she needed that kidney, and her sister offered, offered she did, to give hers, I didn think nothin of it. Kerly and Pearly had a unique blood condition. The doctor said there wuzz only one in a hundred million could donate a kidney to Kerly. With odds like that, how lucky she was that her sister was making the offer. And then the offer wuzz withdrawn. We got word that Pearly’s doctor had detected a condition she had, a form a arthritis that attacked kidneys. In other words, the odds were pretty good that in a few years one of her kidneys would become sick and she would be dependent on the remaining one. In other words, it wuzz against the law for someone who is at risk for a future kidney disease to give up one of her kidneys that she may come to need later. So Pearly did not give up her kidney. Kerly got onna waiting lis for the one-in-a-hundred-million donor. Kerly died waiting on that kidney to come.

  Hoo. Hoo. Sad.

  Yeah. We had the funeral. Jasper came up to me and hugged me like a best friend should. And Pearly came up afterward and said, I shoulda give her that kidney. I shoulda give it. She wuzz my sister. I shouldna listened to Jasper. Jasper? I said. What does he got to do with this? She said, Don’t tell him I told ya, but he loved me so much, he forbid me to give the kidney. He wuzz afraid somethin would happen to me on the operating table. He wuzz too afraid to lose me. Jasper? But nah. I had that letter from the doctor. I ran home and got out the letter Pearly’s doctor had sent us. I read it and I reread it. When you know someone, you know someone. There wuzz one line in it that went somethin like the kidney being a fertile ground for disease. I kept lookin at that word fertile and I knew what Jasper had done and why…

  Hoo. Hoo. You awright?

  Nah. I’m not awright.

  What he done to you wuzz wrong.

  Maybe I wuzz wrong. Maybe I shoulda let him sleep with her. He wuzz my friend and he wanted kids and couldn have em. Maybe because I loved her so much my mind was closed on this point.

  Hoo. Hoo.

  So I aksed him to go fishing a month later. Jus me and him, like inna old days. I took him down to the Keys. It wuzz night. I pulled into a dark spot along the road where I’d left a marker pointin out the place where I had dug his grave. I took out the gun and stuck it in his ribs and I took outta flashlight and showed him his grave. He started a cry. Said he wuzz sorry. Real sorry. Said he’d pay me a lot a money if I didn kill him. I told him ta get outta the van. He said, No. I shot him in the shoulda and told him ta get outta the van or I’d shoot him like
that a little piece ata time. He wuzz howlin and howlin, he didn like pain, tha’s why he had nevah played sports, but he didn get outta the van neither. I shot him again in the other shoulda this time. He howled and finally got outta the van. He wuzz beggin me and pleadin as I pointed him to the hole with the flashlight and the gun. He said, You know you’re not gonna get away with this. Too much blood in the van. They’ll check the van. You can never get all the blood out. You gotta know that. I said, I don’t expect ta get away with it. I figure Pearly will send the cops afta me when I get back and you ain’t with me. But they ain’t nevah gonna find your body. I want you gone forever like Kerly’s gone forever. He pleaded one more time. Got down on his knees. Said he’d give me a blowjob if I promise to let him live. I shot him in the face, and he tumbled into the hole. I shot him again to make sure he wuzz dead. He wuzz my best friend. I didn want him to suffer. It took me like a hour to cover up the hole. Then I got back inna van and drove to the hotel room we had rented in the Keys and lived there for a week.

  And then?

  Then I went home. The police came. There wuzz court, and I told em what I had done and why. Then I got life in prison, but now I’m here cause of my good behavior.

  Hoo. Hoo. Tough.

  Shit yeah. Tough.

  Wuzz it worth it?

  Shit yeah. I’d kill him again if he rose from the dead.

  Hoo. Hoo.

  THE NOIR BOUDOIR

  BY LYNNE BARRETT

  Upper Eastside

  On a warm Tuesday morning in late October, the tail end of the hurricane season, I sit in my car outside the Delphi and pretend I’m on stakeout: a honed tedium. Eight years retired, but you never stop being a cop. I sip coffee and look at the grand old apartment building, long ago converted to condos, recently rehabbed. The pressure-cleaned Sphinxes at the entrance cast sharp Sphinxy shadows, and fresh green awnings ripple up the front in the eastern ocean light as they must have in the Delphi’s heyday. I think of all the stories the place could tell.