by Scott, D. D.
I hugged my parents then returned to the table around which Roman, R and The Chief were gathered, reviewing some sort of document.
“So this is what Stanley and The Foz are really after?” I asked, knowing damn sure well it was.
Chapter Nineteen
The spot where our Long Tom was set-up was obviously not the only super deposit of aquamarines and Morganite to be had on the Witherspoon-Sol Larga land.
From the looks of the ancient map laid out on the glass case’s surface, there were two if not three others remaining.
Before I could ask about the history of the map, an alarm buzzer sounded. Its short, sharp blasts rocked me to my core.
“We’ve got company,” The Chief said, his large square jaw moving in very small, tensely calibrated motions.
“Operation Armadillo is about to commence,” R said, with a twinkle in his eyes that I knew didn’t bode well for our guests.
It couldn’t have been more than a couple seconds, while we all waited in silence, before a large screen came down from the ceiling of the vault. A live shot piped in of Stanley and Fosito being led through the tunnel right at us.
Interestingly enough, neither one looked the least bit frightened. Well, not any more than usual. As of late, due to his predicament, Stanley never looked less than green around the edges. And The Foz always carried himself with an aura that he wanted you to believe he had everything under control, even though he wasn’t quite sure he did.
You’ll have that when you surround yourself with snakes every bit as poisonous as you are.
“It’s time,” R said to my parents.
My parents both nodded then led me by the elbow as we all three followed Roman into a hidden room behind the largest case of aquamarines.
I turned around to see R crawling underneath the glass case table that the map was laid out on.
That left just The Chief and Grams in the room.
“R trusts Grams to finish this?!” I squealed.
“Just watch,” Roman said as he took my hand.
My mom sat down on one of the four chairs set up near the viewing glass, which was evidently a two-way mirror.
Maybe that was a good idea, I thought, leading Roman and my dad over to join her.
Grams took out a small computer from a drawer hidden in the side of the table.
“How long have you been setting all this up?” I asked, looking to Roman first and then to my parents, who all obviously knew more than me.
“A while. Just watch,” Roman answered.
I looked at my parents, who seemed a bit tense, but they also seemed relieved to just be at the end game of Stanley’s shenanigans.
While Grams fingers flew across her laptop’s keyboard, The Chief’s guards brought in Stanley and Fosito.
Damn, I hated Fosito.
Even the way he held his arrogant ass was enough to turn my stomach. I didn’t have a problem with arrogance if someone was smart, but dumb and arrogant put you squarely at the top of my shit list.
And that was The Foz…stupid and arrogant.
Stanley, on the other hand, was just plain dumb. So he wasn’t as far up on my list.
Then there was the fact that his wife was my mom’s best friend, and his daughter Ugenie had always been like a sister to me.
I squeezed my mom’s hand, knowing how hard Stanley’s betrayal had hurt her. And how tough a spot it had put her in with Myra, who still loved the guy, even though he’d made some really, really bad decisions.
That’s one thing about being a Witherspoon that few people understood. It wasn’t about the actions that people took against us, it was all about their motivations and intentions. If their intentions were pure, there was a good chance we’d forgive idiotic behavior. But if they weren’t, God help you.
I had a feeling Stanley just may be saved. The Foz, on the other hand, was about to be royally fucked.
The arrogant prick spoke first.
“If you’ll just make good on this deal, I’d appreciate it. My little friend and I don’t have much time,” he said.
“You’re going by my schedule now,” Chief Valente said, not so much as raising his voice even a smidgeon. “And surely I misunderstood. You weren’t insulting Stanley were you?”
Before The Chief could get an answer, Grams left her laptop and karate kicked Fosito hard right on the kneecap closest to her.
Fosito fell to his knees, doubled over in pain.
“There. Now you’re on his level,” she said, going right back to punching away at her keyboard.
I could tell The Chief was pleased with Grams’ performance.
“That woman has balls of steel,” my dad said, his bowl-full-of-jelly belly shaking as he chuckled.
God, I’d missed his laugh. With all this going on, there hadn’t been many occasions for that lately.
My mom laughed too and reached for my hand.
“You know, maybe there’s another way to do this, Fosito. You know I’ve never liked your plan from the beginning,” Stanley said.
“You don’t have a choice, you son of a bitch. You think I won’t make good on that promise regarding your precious Myra and Ugenie?” Fosito hissed the threat while leaning against the glass table to take weight off his injured knee.
“So all this time, Stanley was being blackmailed?” My mom cried out, and tears began to slide down her cheeks.
“I thought it might be something like that,” Dad said, putting his arm around her. “But we just couldn’t be too sure.”
“Will he be hurt?” I asked, not wanting Myra and Ugenie to suffer any more than they already had.
“Not if everything goes according to plan,” Roman said.
His arms were crossed while he rocked on his heels, which I’d come to learn meant the shit was about to big-time hit the fan.
“We’ll be taking that map now,” Fosito said, reaching his hand out to snatch it off the table.
“Not before you give us the code, you slimy bastard,” Grams said, peering over the tops of her bifocals.
“Blue Macaw. There, are you satisfied, you old bag?” Fosito asked through clinched teeth.
“You lie. You lie,” Grams said typing in the code then shaking her head to The Chief.
“You are even more of a stupid twit than I thought. Are you going to handle this or should I?” She asked, looking up at The Chief.
“It would be my pleasure, Grams. You just keep working on that code.”
“I already got it.”
“Well then, it looks like it’s my turn to contribute to our team.”
With a single nod of his head, The Chief’s two guards took hold of Stanley and were about to escort him from the vault.
Stanley turned around to face The Chief and Grams.
“I’m sorry. Please tell The Witherspoons I’m sooo sooo sorry. And please tell my wife and daughter how very much I love them.”
“I will,” Chief Valente said.
“What the fuck are you doing with him? I need him,” The Foz said, attempting to go after Stanley before he realized Grams had prevented that with her blow to his knee.
“You’re not going to need anything but some fresh air,” Chief Valente said then proceeded to tell The Foz the story of how the Sol Larga hunted armadillo.
While The Chief started the smoke rolling and tied Fosito to the table, R led my parents, Roman and I, and Grams too out of the vault’s private room, back through the tunnel, and to the elevator, where in just a minute more, The Chief joined us.
What a hunt.
Chapter Twenty
Following our armadillo hunt, we returned to our makeshift fishing camp. We reached the site just as the sun was beginning to rise.
I had no idea that while we’d been hunting, R and Roman had arranged to have Myra and Ugenie brought to the camp.
Their reunion with Stanley was bittersweet. I’m sure it was sweet to see him alive, but bitter at best to begin reconciling after all he’d done to our families and
friendships.
While they were trying to figure out if Stanley’s intentions were pure of heart enough to even consider forgiving him, Grams was seeking forgiveness for all her worldly sins.
Why now?
Because she was way waaay under the influence of beyond powerful Sol Larga herbal remedies.
Unbeknownst to us until we got back into our camp, while nailing Fosito’s knee, she’d twisted her ankle. She hadn’t said a word about her condition as she made her way back through the jungle. But when we arrived at camp, she damn near collapsed from the pain.
“Bones and resolutions…two things that break pretty easily at my age. So be careful there, Medicine Man,” she warned the Sol Larga’s medicinal healer.
“Ouch!” She squealed, pulling on the healer’s beaded and feather-dressed braid. “Bones and resolutions…”
She kept repeating her new mantra, as she faded in and out of consciousness.
“What are you giving her?” I asked, thinking it would be great if they could bottle some of that for future use.
Anything to get her to stop with all the Maxine-ism mantras.
Listening to the healer rattle off the ingredients of his potion, I was fairly certain she’d be out cold in no time.
“The mudslinging,” she mumbled, suddenly sitting straight up on the makeshift bed in the healer’s tent, “is finally over in Iowa.”
“You’re not in Iowa, Grams. You’re in Brazil.”
“Well, I think it was mud…kinda’ hard to tell. It may have been monkey poop.”
The healer just looked at me then waved some big ass leaf under Grams’ nose.
Boom! That did it. She was out.
On second thought, screw the bottled version. Maybe we could arrange to just bring back the healer and a bag full of his magical leaves.
Exiting the tent, and yes, feeling rather guilty about leaving the poor guy to take care of Grams, I headed back toward the fish-roasting jiraus, hungrier than I can remember being in a long time.
While I’d been helping tend to Grams, however, our camping crowd had grown.
I looked toward the smoking campfire then blinked my eyes twice. Surely the early morning sun or the prior evening’s events had me hallucinating. That, or I’d also inhaled too much of those all-too-powerful leaves.
Next to Roman, R and The Chief sat Bunny and Beefcakes and…
Six drag queens.
I’m not kidding you.
Here we were on a Brazilian Indian Reservation, in the middle of the Amazon Rainforest, and now our little fishing group included half a dozen drag queens.
And yes, I know what you’re thinking…
The kinda’ poles in our fishing camp were not the ones they’d be interested in.
I couldn’t wait to see what this was all about.
Chapter Twenty-One
I could totally imagine Bunny and Beefcakes hanging with a gaggle of gays, complete with all the cross-dressing drag queen drama.
Personally, on account of my former life, I had quite a few drag queens as clients.
And I loved them.
But drag queens here? With my Sol Larga friends? In the rainforest?
Then it hit me.
Of course!
They must have arrived early for this year’s Brazilian Carnival, which kicked off in mid-February. Just a couple of weeks away.
But we were two thousand miles from the heart of Carnival in Rio. So what were they doing around our campfire? And how did they get here?
There was only one way to find out and that was to join ‘em for breakfast.
I sat down in the spot Roman had saved for me and could tell by his dopey grin that he was enjoying our new friends.
I doubted he’d had too many drag queen friends in the royal mafia world he came from.
Although, who knows…maybe there are some queens who are gangsters too.
That could be fun.
Bunny spoke first, interrupting my Godfather of Queens revelry.
“I hope you don’t mind Beefcakes’ friends joining us,” she said, not seeming quite as pulled together as she usually was.
“Not at all, do we Zoey?” Roman asked, still seeming rather mesmerized by the plethora of bling glistening on the queens themselves, as well as their apparel.
I don’t know which shone brighter…their faux feather and glitter-dusted headdresses or the metal studded braziers covering their pecs.
“We’ve got a little problem that I hope you can all help us with,” Bunny began.
With that introduction, R sprung to his feet and began to pace around the circle in which we sat. I was sure he wasn’t playing duck-duck-goose, which had been my favorite preschool game.
“What kind of problem, dear sis?” He asked, stopping next to her then looking at her with a deep-felt concern taking over his once jovial mood.
I certainly didn’t miss the hesitation flickering through Bunny’s eyes. Her entire posture indicated she’d rather be doing anything else other than having this conversation with her brother.
She took a very deep breath, and I doubted it stemmed from Beefcakes’ training. She wasn’t at the gym. She was in the jungle surrounded by her family and friends.
“Vesuvius is missing,” she said, her shoulders at first rigid then dropping, deflated by despair.
And Bunny Winston never ever had poor posture.
Add to that, for the first time since I’d met R, he actually seemed rattled. And he wasn’t just slightly off kilter, but rather about to blow as if he himself were Vesuvius.
“You’re sure?” He asked.
“Now you see it. Now you don’t,” Bunny offered, attempting to find humor in what she and R obviously didn’t find funny at all.
“Since when?”
“I got a phone call last night from one of Dad’s associates.”
“You’re Dad’s associates are still living?” Roman asked R, a deeply confused and concerned look coming across his flawless Mediterranean-bronzed face.
“Not that I knew of,” R said, once more taking up his favorite pastime and pacing our circle of trust.
“Where was this associate calling from?” R asked.
“Key West,” Bunny answered.
She looked at Beefcakes next as if there was more they wanted to say but weren’t sure that they should.
“We’ll need to go at once,” R said, taking a seat next to Bunny and pulling her close to him.
From the looks of them huddled together around the fire, I wasn’t sure who was comforting who.
“We’ve got a villa in Key West, so we’ll make that our command post,” Roman said.
His voice was thick with concern but was still tinged with the disciplined sense of calm I was getting used to hearing when things weren’t as kosher as he’d like you to believe they were.
“I don’t expect you to get involved in this,” R said, still holding Bunny. “This is our family’s problem.”
“You are my family. So that does make it my problem,” Roman said without missing a single beat.
“And mine too,” I added, and I meant it with all my heart.
R was speechless, but words weren’t necessary to know what he was saying with every other part of him.
“Did somebody mention Key West?” Grams said, walking out of the medicine man’s tent looking as if she’d had one helluva rough night.
“What the hell? Damn! Did I ever wake up with frozen pipes this morning…yeah, I should probably get a little more fiber in my diet,” she said, waddling to our circle.
Remembering that particular Maxine comic was the next one on the tear-off daily calendar she kept on her at all times, I remained silent and rolled my eyes.
Knowing she was nowhere near short on fiber after all the medicinal leaves she’d huffed smoke from, I laughed all to myself.
“I know that I actually saw some flying reindeer this year at your parent’s house, Zoey, but I’d swear I’m under the influence of homemade moonshin
e in my eggnog again. Wow, do I have a monster headache,” she said, fanning herself.
And I didn’t think hot flashes were an issue for her at that time.
Yep. I recognized that little Maxine moonshine-ism too.
“So, getting back to Key West…did y’all decide I could be onto something and that our next adventure should be in Mel Fisher Country? I’ve even ordered myself a high-powered metal detector.”
“Grams, Mel’s work was done on the ocean floor of the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of Key West,” I said, still unable to figure out how she’d connected the dots of being in the Amazon Rainforest of Brazil to Mel Fisher’s Atocha treasure hunting.
“Duh. Yeah. Right. I don’t know what I was thinking with the whole metal detector thing. Although, maybe they make a submergible version. Yeah. I’ll have to check on that.”
She rubbed her hair-stubbled chin.
“So where’d you pick-up the trannies?” She whispered in my ear.
Thank the powers that be she’d whispered the question.
“They’re friends of Bunny and Beefcakes,” I said.
“Another big ol’ duh. With a name like Beefcakes, there’s bound to be a bunch of trannies not far behind. Fabulous! I love gay cross-dressing divas.”
And no. That time she didn’t whisper.
“So where you fellas from? Oh wait. Should we call you fellas or dolls?”
All I knew was that whatever she’d been smokin’ in the medicine man’s tent, I hoped there was plenty left for the rest of us.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Because we’d successfully stopped Stanley and Fosito’s gem smuggling operation for good, the Sol Largas were safe. Now that the stones that provided for their well-being were once again free from wildcat miners, their future was secure.
As Roman and I drove back to the Witherspoon Lodge to pack for our flight to Key West, I couldn’t help but worry about what was next for us.
However, for the first time, I wasn’t worried about us, as in “us” as a couple. We finally had that part figured out.