Welcome to Paradise

by Laurence Shames

  "And look where it got them," said Katy.

  "Not the point," said Squid.

  He did his anguished laps. Chop, impatient, started slapping his gun against his other palm. Al Tuschman's mouth went very dry.

  After a moment Katy said, "But we're the ones who did it."

  Squid said, "What?"

  "Mind if I get up?"

  She unfolded very smoothly, brushed coral dust from the backs of her legs. Slowly and deliberately, she moved toward the truck. With Squid right behind her, she climbed into the driver's seat, firmly wrapped her hands around the steering wheel. Then, through the vacant windshield, she called out, "Tusch—pick up the knife."

  The salesman rose on shaky legs, found Big Al Marracotta's blade against the pale, rough stones, squeezed the handle in his palm.

  Katy said to Squid. "Nice clear fingerprints." She pointed to Al's bloody shoulder. "Signs of a struggle. Stormy history with the deceased. Love triangle gone wrong."

  Squid did a crunching pirouette and thought it over. Then he jerked a thumb in the direction of the other corpse. "And Nicky?"

  "Showed up in the wrong place at the wrong time."

  Squid scrunched up his mouth. "Sloppy."

  "Hey," said Katy, "jobs sometimes have extra pieces, right? Besides, it's still easier to believe than what really happened."

  "That's a point," the bandy man conceded.

  "I ran these guys over," she said. "To save Tusch, who was fighting with the knife. Are we going to the cops?"

  Squid pawed the ground, swallowed deeply, pulled his ear. Finally he looked at Chop.

  Chop rubbed his stumpy neck, said, "I got nothin' against these people, long as they don't get stupid."

  Squid licked extra wetness from the corners of his mouth, said to no one in particular, "Would blow the symmetry, we waste the extra pieces."

  "Wouldn't be symmetrical at all," said Alan Tuschman. "Would be like both end tables on the same side of the couch."

  Squid told him to shut up.

  Feigning confidence, Katy got down from the truck. She tried not to let it show that she was trembling as she offered Squid her back.

  But he'd made up his mind. He didn't shoot her. He made a moist noise protesting all the world's rough edges, all the bumps and snags that mocked perfection. Then he put the pistol in the waistband of his pants and started walking toward the Jag.

  Chop seemed to remember something then. He opened the passenger door, reached into the glove box, and retrieved a crumpled piece of paper. He handed it to Al.

  Al couldn't read it in the moonlight.

  "Pick-up order from Sun Motors," Chop explained. "Driver's signature. Proves they came and got your car. They had it, they lost it, they owe you a new one. . . . Myself, I think it looks better in navy."

  He went around to the driver's side, climbed in, and started up the engine. Squid settled into the passenger seat and propped a bandy forearm on the window frame. "And get a different license plate," he said.

  Al nodded that he would, then moved close to Katy in the moonlight. The shih tzu wiggled among their ankles and wagged its tail. They looked at the car that was about to pull away, and the tableau, in some unlikely manner, suggested a reluctant parting of old friends.

  Almost sheepishly, Squid said, "Hey, no hard feelings, huh? Sorry ta fuck up your vacation."

  "Ya didn't fuck it up," Al Tuschman volunteered.

  "I didn't?" In spite of himself he sounded disappointed.

  "Just made it sort of different," the salesman from New Jersey said. He took Katy's hand, took it in the serious way, with all the fingers interlinked. "Made it more a mission, kind of."

  EPILOGUE

  "Poor Nicky" said Donnie Falcone as he hung up the pay phone in the social club on Prince Street and moved languidly back toward the table he was sharing with his uncle and their dying consigliere.

  "Stupid Nicky," Tony Eggs corrected.

  Donnie came forth with a rueful little laugh, gave his chin a squeeze. "Yeah, not the sharpest knife inna drawer" he said. "Pretty easy ta string 'im along." He sat down and reclaimed his glass of anisette. "Salud."

  Salud. Health. Carlo Ganucci's eyeballs were bright yellow and the skin of his neck was blue. Tony Eggs had kidney stones and his teeth were loose in their sockets. The two old men joined in the toast.

  Shaking his head, Donnie went on. "Right from the start, I knew that all I hadda do was give 'im advice th' opposite a what I really wanted. I tell 'im don't even think about takin' the market back, right away that's all he thinks about."

  "He wanted that job bad," Tony Eggs put in, and could not help smiling, showing mottled gums. "Ya shoulda seen the dumb fuck stomp his suit."

  "I tell 'im don't even think about goin' ta Flahda," Donnie said, "right away I know damn well he's goin'."

  Carlo Ganucci roused himself to say, "But howd'ya know who he was workin' wit' down 'ere?"

  Donnie laughed. "I asked him. Casual like. He tells me guy who does cars in Hialeah. Then it's no problem gettin' in touch through our people in Miami."

  Tony Eggs tugged at the fraying collar of his plain white shirt. "An' once ya got in touch," he said, "ya knew how ta get the best work from these people. One guy likes ta hijack trucks, ya let 'im grab a truck. Th' other guy has this thing, he wants ta do the job wit' seafood, ya let 'im do it wit' seafood. Ya motivated 'em good."

  "Didn't hurt," said Donnie, "that I paid 'em double what Nicky was."

  "Aaw, the money's overrated," Tony said. "Point is, you're a natural manager. This is why you're gonna do brilliant wit' the market."

  Donnie made an attempt at sounding humble. "I'll try, zio. Ya know I'll do my best."

  Tony Eggs patted his beloved nephew's cheek. "An' 'iss way," he said, "no one can accuse me playin' favorites. I tried two other guys. My fault they turned out ta be assholes? My fault they took each other out? Am I right, or am I right, Carlo?"

  The old consigliere smiled faintly at the intrigue. He blinked. It took him a long time to get his crinkled and translucent eyelids to roll back up again.

  "But here's one thing I still don't get," Tony Eggs resumed. "I know ya worked a deal wit' our people inna Catskills ta get inta that kitchen . . . but howd'ya poison the clams?"

  Donnie leaned in a little closer. "Raw chicken."

  "Raw chicken?"

  "Took a chicken," Donnie said. "Left it out a coupla days. Got that whaddyacallit, salmonella, going. Took a brush, stuck it up the chicken's ass, dabbed a little funky juice on all the clams. Simple."

  The old boss shook his head admiringly, showed his long loose teeth. "Salmonella. Beautiful." His nephew was the right guy for the job. He had no doubt of it. He raised his glass to the fish market's new regime. "Salud."

  "Salud."

  "Salud."

  *

  Katy liked the car in powder blue, so powder blue it was. Looked smart with the gray velour upholstery that, Al knew from his swatchbooks, went for twenty-eight, thirty bucks a yard. It was noon when they drove it off the lot in Miami, and they headed straight for the causeway to the Beach, still determined to have a day at least of real vacation.

  They parked on Ocean Drive. Stylish cafes on one side of the road, the endless Atlantic on the other. Nothing to do but eat and stroll and gawk at people.

  Katy unfolded smoothly, took a gulp of warm salt air. "Finally," she said, "I feel like a regular tourist."

  Al Tuschman leashed his dog and locked the car and looked back across his bandaged shoulder. No one seemed to be tailing him, no one fighting for his nickname or contesting the space he took up in the world. "Seems a little tame."

  "Tame's okay," said Katy.

  He thought about that, and about the life that he'd be going back to. The store, the diners, his garden apartment condo. "Yeah," he said. "I guess it is." He craned his neck at avenue and beach. "Eat or walk?"

  "Eat."

  They picked a nearby place for its mix of shade and sun, then settled int
o varnished wicker chairs that faced the sidewalk, ordered drinks and looked absently, distractedly at menus. New lovers. There was everything to say and it was frightening to have a conversation. Chitchat could sound too easily like making plans; plans came too close to being promises. So they silently held hands and people-watched. Models went by with portfolios. Gym-boys sported cut-off shirts that showed their waffled abs.

  After a while, Al got reckless. He'd been out of danger half a day and some element of risk was missing from his life. So he said to Katy, "What'll you do when you get back? About your apartment, stuff like that?"

  She shrugged, pushed her big sunglasses a little higher on her nose. "Move out, I guess. Find another place, a job."

  Al nodded. The nod was neutral, matter-of-fact, but behind it Al was communing with his newfound courage. The brave man didn't posture, didn't bargain. The brave man seized the moment. Blandly, looking half away, he said, "Ever spend much time in Jersey?"

  Katy understood that this was not a promise, that no promise was being asked for in return. Still, for new lovers the entire world was wet cement; the lightest stepping left its print. She looked at Tusch but was saved from answering by the waiter's arrival with their lunch.

  "Who's got the shore platter?" he asked.

  He put it down in front of Al. Half a lobster with a single claw outstretched. Curls of calamari piled up on lettuce. Six clams laid out in a gleaming arc.

  Al Tuschman looked at his new lover and just shook his head. "I can't believe I ordered that," he said.

  ####

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR— Laurence Shames has set eight critically acclaimed novels in Key West, his former hometown. Now based in California, he is also a prolific screenwriter and essayist. His extensive magazine work includes a stint as the Ethics columnist for Esquire. In his outings as a collaborator and ghostwriter, he has penned four New York Times bestsellers, under four different names. This might be a record. To learn more, please visit http://www.LaurenceShames.com.

  ALSO BY LAURENCE SHAMES—

  FICTION—

  Florida Straits

  Scavenger Reef

  Sunburn

  Tropical Depression

  Virgin Heat

  Mangrove Squeeze

  The Naked Detective

  NON-FICTION

  The Big Time

  The Hunger for More

  Not Fade Away (with Peter Barton)

  *

  IF YOU LOVED WELCOME TO PARADISE BE SURE TO CATCH LAURENCE SHAMES' NOVEL:

  The Naked Detective

  PART ONE

  1

  I never meant to be a private eye.

  The whole thing, in fact, was my accountant's idea. A tax dodge. Half a joke. A few years ago I made some money. Made it the modern American way: by sheer dumb luck, doing work I hated, on a silly product that only made life more trivial and more annoying. I took the dough—not a lot of dough, but enough to live on for the rest of my life if I wasn't an asshole about it—and moved full-time to Key West.

  I'd had a funky little house there for years. Wood frame, shady porch, tiny pool that took up most of a backyard choked with thatch and bougainvillea. Vacation house. Daydreaming about that place, the time I'd eventually spend there, got me through a lot of crappy afternoons in my stupid office up in Jersey. Now I wanted to really make it home.

  So I told my accountant to free up some cash. "I'm renovating. Building an addition."

  "You're putting in an office," he informed me.

  "Office? Benny, I'm retired."

  "Bullshit you're retired. What are you, forty-four?"

  "Forty-five."

  "Forty-five you don't retire. Forty-five you have a crisis and change careers."

  "There's no crisis, Benny. I'm putting in wine storage, a music room, and a hot tub."

  He raised his hands to fend off the information. "You never told me that," he said. "It's an office and it'll save you thousands. Tens of thousands. Plus your car becomes deductible."

  I made the mistake of keeping silent for a moment. Call me cheap. I shouldn't have even thought about it, but the idea of saving tens of thousands made me pause.

  "Become a Realtor," Benny suggested. "Everyone down there becomes a Realtor, right?"

  I'd dealt with Realtors in my life. "I'd rather shoot myself," I said.

  "Shoot yourself," he muttered, then started free-associating. "Tough guy. Humphrey Bogart. Hey, call yourself a private eye."

  "Don't be ridiculous."

  He quickly fell in love with his idea. "Ya know," he said, "there's a lot of advantages. Private corporation. One employee: you. You get a gun—"

  "Benny, cut it out."

  "—get a license—"

  "How you get a license?"

  "Florida?" he said. "Probably swear you haven't murdered anybody in the last sixty, ninety days."

  "Benny, I don't wanna be a private eye."

  He paused, blinked, and looked somewhat surprised. "Schmuck! Did I say you have to be a private eye? I said we're calling you a private eye. You'll get some business cards, put a listing in the phone book—"

  "Commit fraud—"

  "What fraud? You're committing failure. Look, the government allows three years' worth of losses. By then we've depreciated the work on the house, the car lease has expired—"

  Well, the whole thing was preposterous—and I guess I kind of like preposterous. Having an amusing thing to say at parties, occasionally in bars. Something incongruous and intriguing. So on my tax returns, at least, I became a private eye. Pete Amsterdam, sole proprietor, doing business as Southernmost Detection, Inc.

  That was two and a half years ago. I have a license somewhere in a drawer, and a gun I've never fired rusting in a wall safe. Until very recently, thank God, I hadn't had a single client. Three, four times a year someone calls me up, usually on some sordid and depressing matrimonial thing. I lie and say I'm too busy; for some reason the potential client apologizes and quickly gets off the phone, like I'll charge him for my precious time. My only worry has been that the IRS might come snooping around to see if I was legit. This has been a sporadic but uncomfortable concern, since, for me, feeling legit has never come that easy anyway.

  But in the meantime the house improvements came out beautiful, suited me to a T. I'm divorced. I live alone. I guess I'm a little eccentric. Mainly it's that I don't pretend to care about the things that most people pretend to care about. The news. What's on television. The outside world. I have a small, tight core of things that still can hold my interest; I arrange my life as simply and neatly as I can around those things, and the rest just sort of passes me right by. I like wine. I like music. I like tennis. After that the list grows pretty short.

  Must sound meager to people who live in places where everyone is busy and engaged and avidly discusses what's in the theaters or the paper. But Key West isn't like that. Key West is a place to withdraw to, a retreat without apology or shame. And you learn things from the place where you live. One of the things Key West teaches is that disappointment and contentment can go together more easily than you would probably imagine.

  So I've been more or less content down here. Tan, reasonably fit, generally unbothered. I do what I want and, better still, I don't do what I don't want. Which includes being a private eye. In fact, two and a half years into this fraud of a vocation, I'd practically forgotten I was listed in the phone book.

  Or I had until a few weeks ago, when the client I'd been dimly dreading came marching into my unlocked house, stormed past the wine room and through the music room, out the back door and around the little pool, to catch me naked in the hot tub and to turn my whole life upside down.

  2

  My hot tub is under a poinciana tree—except for the occasional falling pod, a perfect tree to have one's hot tub under. Its branches are bare in the winter, when you want the sun. In late spring it sprouts an astonishing flat-topped canopy of bright red flowers, and in the summer it is mercifully covered with
tiny leaves that cast an exquisite dappled shade. Now it was April and the milky buds were just starting to swell and ripen. I looked up at them and thought about my backhand. I'd played tennis that morning and had missed a couple of cross-court passing shots. Probably hadn't dropped my shoulder low enough. I closed my eyes and visualized the perfect motion.

  The jets were on, pummeling my lower back. The pump made a sound somewhere between a hiss and a roar. The dreaded client was standing right next to me by the time I heard her say my name.

  "Mr. Amsterdam? Mr. Amsterdam?

  I opened my eyes. Tiny chlorinated droplets got in them and made me blink. Through the blinking I saw her. A blonde, of course; it's always a blonde, right? Tall. Green-eyed, with a little too much makeup for the daytime. Coral-colored lipstick that was a shade too orange for my taste. The top of a frilly white bra beneath a loosely buttoned lime-green blouse.

  Apologetically, the blonde pointed toward the front door of my house. "I rang the bell," she yelled. "I knocked. The door just opened. I really need to talk to someone."

  By reflex, I began to say what I always said to the rare misguided souls who tried to hire me. But it was a little hard, while sitting naked in the hot tub in the middle of what, for most people, was a working day, to claim I was too busy. So I said nothing.

  "Please," the blonde implored. "A few minutes of your time."

  I looked at her. She had a face that held attention. Not delicate but candid and determined, unflinching even in her obvious distress. I felt bad that the noise of the jets was making her yell. On the other hand, the bubbles were the closest thing I had to clothing. I hesitated then figured what the hell and switched the pump off. It was a very Key West way to hold a meeting.

  "You're a private detective?" said the blonde. Her voice hadn't quite adjusted to the quiet, and it sounded very loud.