Stairway to the Bottom - a Mick Murphy Key West Mystery

by Michael Haskins

  Pauly stood there, fudging around, wanting to say more, but uncomfortable. “Anything I can do to help?”

  “Help what?”

  “You have to want Alexei.”

  “Yeah, I do.”

  “What can I do?”

  “I need another Sig. The last two are in the water somewhere.”

  “Done. What else?”

  “Any idea where Alexei is?”

  “Russian mafia rumors.”

  “What are they?”

  “Alexei’s people are cutting a deal with a Mexican cartel to distribute their product in Eastern Europe,” he said. “It would be a lucrative deal, so he won’t be too far away from the negotiators.”

  “Keep me informed.”

  “You’re going to need help.” He looked at the hallway. “Norm in?”

  “I think so.”

  “Count me in too. You know it will be bloody. Alexei has layers to go through before you get to him.”

  I laughed and it felt good, even though it was the devil’s laugh. “In that case you’d better bring extra magazines with the Sig.”

  Chapter 73

  Pauly left and Norm came back with my sandwich and one for himself. I was hungry, but my eyes were bigger than my stomach and he ate half of mine too. It seemed as if a nurse came in every half hour, but it was my imagination. I think confusion helped keep me from thinking about Tita. Hate filled my waking thoughts as I planned my revenge, but I still hadn’t dreamt. I wanted to settle scores for me because Norm’s words were true, nothing would bring Tita back. Revenge was the driving power behind my wanting to get well.

  I thought a nurse shook me awake to ask if I wanted a sleeping pill. Yeah, the hospital policy has them do that. Or maybe they woke me to make sure I was alive.

  Doctor Carpino stood over my bed. “I had to come back.”

  It took me a minute to realize she wasn’t a dream. “Sit up,” I said in my half-awake-half-asleep mode. She’d dealt with enough patients to know what I meant and slowly the bed moved into a sitting position.

  “I told you not to mess up my work.” Her words came lightly, her nose wrinkled, and I think I smiled.

  “Sorry,” I said.

  “Norm said it wasn’t your fault.”

  “Good of him.”

  “He worries about you.” She sat on the side of the bed. “How are you feeling?”

  “Like a steamroller ran over me.”

  “Almost did, I hear.”

  “Almost.” I pointed toward the I.V. bag. “Pain meds?”

  “Yes and some antibiotics. You’ll be urinating blood for a while and you’ve more damage inside than before.”

  “When I was in the shack my insides felt like scrambled eggs.”

  “You know you’ve ruined my next few breakfasts,” she said. “How do you feel?” She tapped her forehead. “Up here?”

  “They didn’t hit my head,” I said. “My nose and eye, yes, but not my head.”

  “Your brain feel like scrambled eggs too?”

  I knew what she meant. Maybe she was a shrink. I huffed a brief laugh but even with the pain meds, it hurt.

  She saw the look on my face. “Hurts when you laugh?”

  I nodded, trying to catch my breath.

  “I’ll try not to tell any jokes.”

  “Thanks,” I whispered.

  “The priest was here when I arrived,” she said. “Strange fellow.”

  “My friend.”

  “Yes. He’s worried about you too. Norm and a priest.” It was her turn to stifle a laugh. “Never would’ve put those two together.”

  “They don’t always get along.”

  “I wonder why? But they share concern for you.”

  “I’m getting better, ain’t I?”

  She tapped her head. “Why does someone with your education often resort to talking like a street-wise person?”

  I hunched my shoulders.

  Doctor Carpino waited a minute and when I said nothing she went on. “I know about Tijuana.” She looked for my reaction but got none. “Why aren’t you in mourning?”

  “You’ve been talking with Norm,” I said.

  “A number of your friends, but Norm’s known you the longest.”

  “He was with me in Tijuana.”

  “Yes, that too. He said your reaction back then was expected, since you were close to the woman.”

  “I killed her,” I said.

  “It was an accident.”

  “The bomb was no accident.”

  “You didn’t know the woman would be there.”

  “Water under the bridge, doc.”

  “What about now? Norm said you’ve been calm. Angry but calm. When will you let go and get the anger out?”

  “When I kill Alexei.”

  She got a hard look on her face. “That it? Kill Alexei and all will be right with the world? With Murphy’s world?”

  “The world’s never been right,” I said. “But it will be more balanced when I’m done.”

  “When you get your pound of flesh?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Then what? Are you going to live in her house?”

  “I can’t think about that, right now.”

  “Can’t or won’t?”

  “Doc, what’s with the questions? You trying to analyze me?”

  “Doing my job. You need help physically and mentally to get better.”

  “You think I’m crazy?”

  “I don’t know. Do you?”

  “I’m focused. If I wasn’t…”

  “Go on.”

  “I need to do this. I have to get well and find Alexei. It keeps me focused.”

  “Keeps you from mourning.”

  “Keeps me from thinking, from remembering…”

  “From breaking down?”

  “That too. Later, there’ll be time for that.”

  “Who are you doing this for?”

  Her comment was not unlike Norm’s earlier, Tita wasn’t coming back no matter what I did or didn’t do.

  “I have a hole inside.” I tapped my chest. “An emptiness. Someway, somehow, I am responsible for her death. She told me the other day my life is one successful failure and missed miracle after another. I know this won’t change anything, can’t change anything, but it will help fill the hole and then I can move on.”

  “No boat, no house. Move on to what?”

  “To whatever’s next.”

  “Lots of space there. No thoughts of tomorrow or dreams?”

  “None. One purpose.”

  “You’re a determined individual, Mr. Murphy. Luckily, you have friends and you should listen to them.”

  “Listen to them or do what they say?”

  “You’re a smart person and not because of your education, maybe in spite of it, so I’m sure time will heal your body and mind. Give it time, Mr. Murphy. Go back to Norm’s and heal. Get better.”

  “You leaving?”

  “For now. But I’ll see you again.”

  “It’s always a pleasure.”

  “I asked you a few things that had to make you angry. Why didn’t you show that anger?”

  “Anger is a negative emotion and I don’t have time for negativity. And I knew you were baiting me.”

  Her nose wrinkled as she stood. “Take time to heal Mr. Murphy.”

  She walked away without waiting for me to answer. Maybe she was smart too and knew whatever answer I came up with would be a lie because I found myself without answers.

  I feel asleep soon after but woke feeling strange, out of place.

  Padre Thomas stood in the shadows at the end of my bed, still in clerical clothing and clutching rosary beads.

  “Praying for Tita?” I said but the words sounded muffled.

  He shook his head. “For you now.”

  I had to listen carefully to hear his words. “I can hardly hear you.”

  “I pray for Tita’s soul each morning and night,” he whispered. “Now I’m praying you w
ill make the right decision and move on with your life. I’m praying you’ll not turn into what you hate.”

  “I won’t.”

  “You kill in cold blood, you will.”

  Did he hear that from the angels?

  “There are things I have to do, Padre Thomas, and prayers won’t change that.”

  “I pray they do.”

  “Don’t waste your prayers on me then.”

  “Prayers are never wasted. Tita sent me because she can’t cross back. ‘Let it go, Mick.’” It sounded like Tita’s voice.

  I sat up in bed, startled. Padre Thomas wasn’t there. I lay in a dark room and stared toward an empty hall. I had dreamt the visit, but it seemed so real. Her voice sounded so real. I drank from my cup of water and looked around. The dreams were coming.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered to what I couldn’t see. “I need to do this. Don’t waste your prayers but please forgive me.”

  I felt foolish speaking to ghosts and wondered if my dream was the same kind Padre Thomas had when he talked to the angels. I lay awake in the dark room, hearing the beeping from the monitor that assured me my heart was working, and focused on my revenge so I wouldn’t have to think of Tita or turning into what I hated. I should have died with her on the Fenian Bastard because living was a lot harder than dying.

  About the Author

  Michael Haskins lives in Key West, Florida and is working on the sequel to “Stairway to the Bottom” and rewriting the third, and last, of his ‘lost manuscripts.’ He is on the board of the Florida chapter of Mystery Writers of America and a member of the International Thriller Writers.

  To find out more about the manuscripts and the author, check out www.michaelhaskins.net.