No Right Turn

by A. J. Stewart

  I headed for the guy in pink. He looked like a golfer. Tanned arms, polo shirt and a Miami Dolphins ball cap.

  “Fulsome,” I said.

  “What?”

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

  “What?”

  He was a confident-looking son of a gun, but even confident guys could get flustered when they had no idea what was going on.

  “Your good-for-nothing company is about to go under and you’re out playing golf?”

  “What?” he spluttered a third time.

  “You’ve got tens of millions in claims you can’t pay and you’re playing games.”

  He started to regain his composure. “Are you an investor? Look, I can assure you we can cover all legitimate claims. We know what we’re doing.”

  “You’re committing fraud, that’s what you’re doing.”

  “Look, pal, you better watch your mouth.”

  “I have a claim. Totally legit. You denied that.”

  “You’re a claimant?”

  “And then you tried to send me off on a wild goose chase to find someone to do something about it. Have you instructed your staff to deny all claims resulting from the hurricane? Because that would be highly illegal, Kent.”

  He started marching toward the green. He had completely forgotten he had arrived in a golf cart. “Let me give you some advice, pal. Keep your mouth shut. I hear any more from you and I’ll sue you for defamation. I’ll take everything you own.”

  “You’re already doing that, Kent. It’s called systematic denial of claims.”

  He stopped in the middle of the fairway. “Prove it.”

  “I intend to. You can’t tell me I’m not covered by hurricane insurance because it was a flood and then I’m not covered by flood insurance because it was a hurricane.”

  “Actually, I can.” He got a great big smug look on his face. “It’s called concurrent risk. And you should have read your policy.”

  “Is that how you’re going to handle Dale Beadman, too?”

  “Who?”

  “Dale Beadman, the NASCAR driver. One of your more high-profile customers, I’d guess.”

  “I know who Dale Beadman is. And his property wasn’t damaged. I checked.”

  “Nice that you’re so on top of your Palm Beach clientele.”

  He smiled. I thought about Ron and doing stupid things. I really didn’t think punching out all his teeth was such a stupid thing, but I held back anyway. I just slapped Angie Beadman’s insurance claim into his chest. His grin turned rapidly into a frown.

  “What the hell? What’s this?”

  “That’s a claim. From Dale Beadman. His car collection was stolen. Not a hurricane. Not a flood. Not a concurrent anything. Theft. Lucky for him, it’s insured. By you, you ingrate. For thirty million bucks.”

  Fulsome frowned at the papers but said nothing. His tan seemed to leave his skin and was replaced by a sickly pallor that I couldn’t help but enjoy.

  “How’s your bottom line now, Kent?”

  I strode away. I wasn’t sure what I had achieved. Maybe nothing. Maybe I’d learned that my claim was up a creek without a paddle. But at least I knew why. And I had delivered the documents as promised. I looked forward to seeing Kent deny that claim.

  I got about fifty yards up the fairway before I turned around.

  “And Kent? Just so you know. I don’t give up. Ask around the club here. I don’t give up. Ever.”

  I turned and left him there. I strode back around the green full of adrenaline and fury. Big guys holding it over little guys offended my sense of fair play. And it wasn’t just about me. There were going to be hundreds, maybe thousands of folks in worse places than I was who were going to be ruined by Kent Fulsome and his semantics. It was true, though. I was likely to be one of them. I didn’t have the money to fix my place. I might have to sell to my mystery buyer. I had a business. I had Ron and Lizzy to think about. But I wouldn’t give up. Not easily, anyway.

  I paced toward the clubhouse, and the guy in the yellow visor who had pointed Kent Fulsome out for me stepped into my path. I really wasn’t in the mood. He handed me a card.

  “I’m a lawyer,” he said. “You want to fight that guy, I’m in. And I don’t give up, either.”

  I nodded and waved the card in thanks, and he stepped out of my way and let me march away.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Ted’s Jazz and Social Club was a nondescript place behind a strip mall in Lauderhill. Lauderhill was one of those pockets of humanity in South Florida that had become an enclave for a particular group of people. Another name for it could have been Little Jamaica. The Jamaican flag hung from store windows, and the smell of allspice and jerk chicken permeated the air. There was even a cricket ground down the road.

  Danielle, Sally and I parked in front of a nail salon in the strip mall and walked down the alley between two stores. As usual, there were two old guys sitting on a sofa outside the club, chattering away at the passing wildlife. Both of them directed their attention toward Danielle. Sal and I could have been invisible.

  “Welcome, young lady,” said the one guy with the salt-and-pepper hair. He wore a pork pie hat and had a touch of the Morgan Freemans about him.

  “Thank you,” Danielle said, always humble before a compliment, even delivered by an octogenarian.

  “All the fine ladies come to Ted’s. Has always been so,” said the other guy. He had no hair at all but wore thick frames that must have had similar magnification to a microscope.

  “Buzz here?” I asked.

  “Oh, yeah. He’s in the back.”

  We stepped into the club. It was a sparse open space with bare floorboards and folding chairs set up around small wooden tables, with a bar at the back and a dark stage at the front. The stage was empty but for a small drum kit and a lone microphone.

  I ushered Sally in before me. He looked around like he had been transported to a place a long time ago in a city far, far away. I could see the memories were pleasant ones. He wasn’t remotely flustered by the fact that, other than Danielle and I, he was the only white guy in the room. Hell, maybe in the suburb. Color was not a big thing with Sal.

  Color was a big thing behind the bar. The bartender was concocting all manner of beverages in all the colors of the rainbow. Sal didn’t look quite so sure about that.

  “Miss Danielle,” called a woman in a red dress that made me think of the words bee bop. She floated over and offered Danielle an air-kiss.

  “Gabrielle, nice to see you,” Danielle said, before she was swept away to the bar. Gabrielle spoke over her shoulder as she went.

  “Buzz be in the back, honey.”

  I nodded and walked around the small gathering near the bar. I held up two fingers to the guy behind the bar and he passed me two bottles of Red Stripe. I handed one of the beers to Sally.

  “I thought you were gonna make me drink one of them fruity drinks,” he said.

  We clinked bottles and I led him down the side of the room to a door beside the stage. I pushed through into a corridor that led to another door. I pushed through the second door into a room that looked like the living room in a frat house. There were guys sitting on chairs and laying on sofas and leaning against the walls. They all had musical instruments of one breed or another. A guy kicked back on the sofa with a trumpet gave me a wide toothy grin as I stepped in.

  “Sax man,” he yelled, and he started laughing to himself.

  “Hey, brother,” I said. I looked at his sharp suit. “You’re dressed well tonight.”

  He nodded and looked over my chinos and palm tree print shirt. “And you got the big boy pants on.” He slapped a high five with the guy next to him. “You look like a man, brother.”

  I got various other welcomes and hi’s and such. Then a guy with a saxophone attached to a sling around his neck waved to me. “Miami, good to see you, man.”

  “You too, Buzz.” I stepped into the room, and Buzz saw Sal come in behind m
e.

  “Sally!” he yelled. Buzz dashed around the sofa and embraced Sally. “I can’t believe it, man. I haven’t seen you in forever.”

  Sally looked a little taken aback by the hug. “It’s good to see you, too, Buzz.”

  “Man, I can’t believe you’re here.” Buzz looked at me. “I can’t believe you got him here.”

  “He loves the crooners.”

  Buzz turned to the room. “Boys, I want you all to know Sally Mondavi. He’s my, well, he’s a . . . hell, I owe this man my life.”

  The guys all welcomed Sally, and he looked more and more uncomfortable in the spotlight. Buzz slapped Sal on the shoulder and looked to me. “I ever tell you what this man did for me?”

  He hadn’t, and I had a good inkling that Sally didn’t want to hear it recounted now. But I didn’t need the specifics. Whatever it was, it was something similar to what Sal had done for me, and plenty of others besides.

  “I been there,” I said.

  Buzz caught my meaning and let it go. “You been practicing?” he asked me.

  “I have. Before the storm, anyway. I’ve been working on that Billy Joel solo.”

  The guy on the sofa let out a howl. “Billy Joel. He’s a fine black man.”

  “Billy Joel’s a black man?”

  “Of course, brother. Just look at the cat’s eyes.”

  “Isn’t Joel a Jewish name?”

  “Black ain’t just here, brother,” he said, touching the skin on his hand. “It’s in here.” He pointed to his temple.

  I nodded. I could see what he was saying. It didn’t explain Uptown Girl.

  We were chatting with Buzz when a young guy in a black suit popped his head into the room. “There’s a guy here says he’s looking for Mr. Miami.”

  I glanced at Sally and then at the young guy. “Can you send him back?”

  “Trouble?” asked Buzz.

  “No. Just a little chat.”

  We waited for the guy representing my mystery buyer to come through the door. When he did he wasn’t wearing the same confident look he had when he’d turned up at Longboard Kelly’s. He looked like a guy who wasn’t in Kansas anymore. And I doubted this guy had ever been to Kansas. But he was a Latino living in South Florida. He could probably go months not seeing another person who wasn’t Latino if he wanted. Permanently swimming among fish just like him. Only now the fish weren’t just like him. I didn’t blame the guy; it was learned behavior. We’re taught to fear that which is different from us. We’re not born with it. As a boy, I had played Pop Warner football with Irish, Italians, Greeks, Africans, and Hispanics. There was even a kid who came from California. We were boys, we all loved football. That’s all I knew. They were my teammates, my brothers. We got into trouble at school together and we ran around the field in pads too big for us together. It wasn’t until later that I learned we were different. That my friend Robert wasn’t just American, he was African American. And that made him different in some kind of important way that my father could never explain. And then later still, they tried to tell me that his difference was something I should fear. They could never explain that to me, either. Why was it that I should fear a kid who was now a judge for the United States District of Massachusetts? I hadn’t gotten it then and I didn’t get it now. But I knew it was learned behavior and that I could use it to put this guy off kilter. That and other methods.

  “I never got your name?”

  He looked uneasily around the room. Lots of black faces. And Sally. He tried mightily to regain his composure, get himself back into character.

  “What do names matter?”

  “They matter on a contract of sale.”

  The guy shrugged, or maybe he had ants crawling on his neck.

  “I know you,” said Sally.

  I was surprised, but I shouldn’t have been. Sally knew most of the lowlifes around the traps.

  Sally took a step toward the guy. “You’re an actor.”

  I scrunched my brow at Sal. “An actor?”

  “Yeah, I’ve seen him. In Mexican soaps.”

  “Are you kidding me, Sal? When do you see Mexican soaps?”

  “Some of the girls in the check-cashing booth watch them. It’s not the most exciting job in the world.” He turned to the guy. “I’ve seen you, haven’t I? Telenovelas?”

  The guy tried to shrug humbly, but it came off as a spasm. I had pegged him as having movie star looks at our first meeting, and I patted myself on the back for my perception and insight.

  “I was in some shows. Did you see El Camino Secreto?”

  “I said I’d seen you,” said Sal. “I didn’t say I was a lifelong fan.”

  “You’re an actor?” I said, rhetorically.

  “I was an actor. There are not so many roles anymore.”

  The guy with the trumpet on the sofa said, “You could play that most interesting man in the world.”

  “I auditioned. They cast a younger guy.”

  “So what the hell are you doing bothering me?” I asked.

  “Now I am a driver. Sometimes I play other roles for my boss, you know, to stay sharp.”

  “So who’s your boss?”

  “I am not at liberty to say,” he said, dropping right back into character.

  Sal stepped forward. “Let’s let these boys warm up for their show.” He looked at me. “Is there somewhere private we can negotiate?”

  I led the way out the back and held the door open for the Mexican actor and Sal. As he stepped out, Sally picked up a phone book that was soaking up the excess water from a potted plant. There was a small courtyard behind the club where the band members could grab a smoke. The actor stepped into the middle of the space and I let Sal follow him down.

  Sal whacked the guy in the face with the phone book.

  He screamed like a schoolgirl, a high-pitched dog whistle of a noise, and then he cowered. He looked at me like there was something I could do. I had no idea what was going on. I had arrived with a plan, but that had gone up in smoke after the word telenovela.

  “Take it easy,” said Sally. He stepped to the actor and the guy nodded. Sally whacked him again.

  “Qué cabrón!” yelled the guy. Sally had slapped him on either cheek and red welts were spreading across his olive skin.

  “Um, Sal,” I said. “I don’t mean to interrupt.”

  “What?” he asked, like he was watching Jeopardy and I wanted to know what he’d like for dinner.

  “The guy was trying to buy my house, not murder my family.”

  “Did the city kick you out of your house?”

  “The county, actually.”

  “And did you find guys measuring up your lawn for a pool?”

  “Yes.”

  “And has this guy been upfront about who he works for?”

  “I don’t even know his name.”

  “So. Be cool. He’s an actor. They’re paranoid about their faces.”

  Sally turned back to the actor and made a show of rolling the phonebook into a tube, like a bugle or a truncheon.

  “Next one’s the nose, you get me?”

  The actor nodded hastily. This part was going horribly wrong for him.

  “What is your name?”

  “Domingo.”

  “Who do you work for?”

  “Juan Gotlieb.”

  “Juan Gotlieb?” asked Sal. “You mean his name is John?”

  “No. Is Juan. Juan Gotlieb.”

  Sal turned to me with an expression that said he just didn’t understand the world anymore, and then he focused back on Domingo.

  “Who is Juan Gotlieb? And why does he want to buy my friend’s house?”

  “He is a real estate agent.”

  “Okay. Why does he want Miami’s house?”

  “He’s a real estate agent.”

  “Are you saying he is acting for a client?”

  “Si.”

  “Who?”

  Domingo shrugged and shuffled his feet.

  “Domingo,
” said Sally, to regain the actor’s attention. He slapped the phone book into his palm like a schoolmaster.

  “I don’t know who is the client. All I know is he lives in Argentina.”

  “Argentina?” I said. “Why does he want my house?”

  “I don’t know, señor. He has the house next door. Maybe he wants more space.”

  “Domingo?” said Sal.

  “I think his wife bought the house. For investment, si? They get it for retirement, and for when they come to America for shopping.”

  I said, “I’ve never seen anyone there.”

  “He found out it does not have a pool. He thinks every house in Florida must have a pool. So he won’t come to it.”

  “So they want my place to put in a pool?” I asked.

  Domingo nodded.

  “Did you call the county to come and put the no habitation notice on my door?”

  He shuffled his feet and glanced at Sally and the phone book. “I did it.”

  “You did what?”

  “Put the notice. We know the building guy, so I pay him and he gives me the paper and I stick it on your door. Sorry.”

  “The inspector didn’t even visit my house?”

  “No, señor.”

  Sal looked at me to confirm if I had anything more to ask. I shook my head.

  “You can go,” Sal said.

  Domingo edged around us like we were dragons. He got to the door near where I stood.

  “What was your client offering for my house?” I asked him.

  He told me.

  “Get out of here, Domingo. And make sure I don’t see you again.”

  “Except on TV.” He smiled, and he jumped in through the door before Sally could smack him one last time.

  We went back in and Sally returned the phone book under the plant and we left the band to prepare. Danielle was at a table with another couple, at least two drinks in. We refreshed ours and I introduced Sally. The guy at our table was fascinated when Sally told him he had seen Sammy Davis Jr. at The Sands in Vegas.

  We kicked back and watched the band file out, and the small crowd applauded and the band burst into Mack the Knife and the crowd went ballistic, like they had all been born during the war and had grown up with this music. The only one who had was Sally, and while he didn’t go ballistic, he seemed to enjoy it all the same. The band was superb as always, and the guy on the mike should have had a recording contract.