“It could be a long wait,” Beth said. “We should pick up some food and water.”
“To go,” Howard confirmed.
“And I have to,” Sara added.
Chapter Twenty
The lake house was eerily quiet in the darkness.
“You taking the Rover?” Bruce asked.
“Oh, yeah, and drive it right past the crime scene where they’re looking for it. Did your mother drop you on your head?” Rhodes asked contemptuously.
“No, but she hit it a few times.
“Not enough. You lived.”
“Hah, hah.” Bruce said it but wasn’t laughing.
“Look, I should be back with the boss by midnight. You think you can handle him until then?” she said, jerking a thumb in Samuel’s direction.
“How about I kick him a few times in the back just to make sure?”
“That would be just brilliant. Leave a few more unexplainable marks. Just babysit him, moron.”
Bruce balled his fist.
Rhodes countered by reaching for her gun.
Bruce stormed off to the liquor cabinet.
It was just past one in the morning when the black Ford Expedition turned off the main road in Pinnacle Point onto the lake road.
Walter chuckled. “Y’all ever think you’d see me in a Ford?”
Rhodes smiled. “A Cadillac, maybe.”
“Won’t nobody ever suspect it’s me, not even our own people.”
“Dusty will never believe it, that’s for sure.”
“You always call him Dusty? Never dad? Poppa?”
“It works better this way.”
Walter leaned back in the seat, considering her words. After a few moments reflection, he asked, “Y’all get everythin’ cleaned up?”
“There’s no trace. No tracks. No cell phones. Just …” Rhodes didn’t want to tell him.
“What?” Walter insisted.
“Dumb-ass used my name. Thought it was cute to flash the badge and then call me ‘Agent Rhodes.’”
“That boy ain’t one brick shy of a full load, he’s two. ‘Fraid he’s become a liability.”
Rhodes hit a switch above her sun visor. The front gate swung open. The Expedition passed through. The gate closed. The SUV stopped. Walter grabbed her hand before she could turn off the engine.
“Listen here, darlin’, y’all goin’ ta have ta take an extended vacation. Might be a few years ‘fore this all calms down. Y’all right with that?” Walter asked.
She nodded.
“Now I got friends in a certain Central American country. Good friends, y’all understand? Up in the mountains. Beautiful country. Lush, waterfalls, fruit trees.” Apprehension slid into the tone in his voice. “But it’s isolated. Protected. No reason for any visitors ta come sneekin’ around, friendlies or unfriendlies.”
“I can handle it, Walter,” she said firmly.
He let go of her hand. “Good girl. Take this.” He handed her a small, zippered leather pouch.
“What’s this?”
“That’s a present for our guest from my friends where y’all are goin’.”
In the kitchen, Walter asked, “How is our guest?” He peered into the darkened living room, looking for Samuel.
“Out cold on the porch,” Rhodes answered. She unzipped the leather pouch. “Dumb-ass caught him trying to signal or something with a lamp. Slammed him upside the head.” Inside the pouch was a syringe and a small bottle of a milky substance.
“Going to leave a mark?”
“More than likely.” She zipped the pouch, tucked inside her jacket.
“Shoot!” Walter kicked a chair, grabbed it before it could crash to the floor. “Where’s the boy now?”
“Keeping an eye on our guest.”
“All right, here’s what y’all are goin’ ta do. Out there in the canal? There’s a breedin’ ground for gators. Shoot him first so’s there won’t be no flip-floppin’ in the boat. Then dump him. Can y’all handle that?”
“I might need some help getting him into the boat.”
“All right then. Do it.”
Rhodes walked to the porch. She momentarily studied Samuel, sprawled facedown, his head twisted toward the living room. She shifted her stare to Bruce. “He still out?”
“Yeah, guess I hit him harder than I thought,” he said apologetically.
She dropped a bottle of Aleve next to Samuel’s head.
“What’s that?” Bruce asked.
“Picked it up before I got Walter. Thought he might need it with his back and his face. Guess not. Come on. I need a hand.”
“What about him?”
“Does he look like he’s going anywhere?”
As the pair walked off the porch, Samuel cautiously opened one eye. He was afraid to move his head but he could see their feet moving away from him. His face hurt. Bruce had over-estimated the force of his own punch. Samuel had recognized Walter’s voice even though he hadn’t clearly heard all the words between him and Rhodes. It hurt to reach the bottle. It hurt more to open it. He downed one pill and closed his fist around the bottle.
Rhodes led the way out the main door, down the grass to the back of the house. She opened a pair of doors underneath the porch. “Give me hand,” she instructed.
She and Bruce pulled a metal rowboat from storage onto the grass. Walter stepped out of the shadows. “This will do,” he said.
“Jesus!” the surprised Bruce exclaimed. “You scared the shit out of me, Boss.”
Walter sniffed the air. “I don’t think so.”
Rhodes smirked. “Bruce is a little jumpy.”
“Bruce?” Walter queried. “I thought his name was Neil.”
“Bruce is his undercover name,” Rhodes explained, trying to look serious.
Walter shrugged, not understanding the joke, not caring to understand it.
“We going to feed him to the gators anyway?” Bruce asked.
“Y’all catch on quick,” Walter said. “That’s exactly it. Feed him to the gators.” He looked past Bruce to Rhodes.
Pfft!
Bruce’s knees fold. He falls face-first at Walter’s feet. Rhodes tokes a step toward the body. She fires another shot to his head with the silencer fitted pistol.
Walter grabbed Bruce under his arms. He strained to lift him to the boat. “’Bought half-way up the canal there’s a channel ta the left. Go down a ways fore ya dump him.”
Rhodes struggled with Bruce’s legs. Dead weight is always harder to move than live. “Are you sure the gators will finish him?” she asked. “I mean completely?”
Walter heaved the upper body into the boat. “There’ll be a dozen of them fightin’ over his carcass ‘fore you can say Jiminy Cricket. ”
Rhodes tossed the legs over the side. She and Walter shoved Bruce’s posterior after the rest of him.
She lifted an oar partway from the boat. “It’ll take me awhile with these.”
“There’s an electric motor and battery under the porch,” Walter said. “I’ll give you a hand.”
The canal entrance was hard to find in the dark and took longer than Rhodes had expected. Not knowing the lake, she had to hug the shoreline. The electric fishing motor wasn’t built for speed. When she did find it, she nearly overshot.
Turning into the canal, she had a sense of foreboding. It was darker here than on the lake. Trees overhung it. Spanish moss draped from branches like long ghostly fingers reaching for her. Without the artificial dredging, this would be a swamp. She strained to see if there were snakes hanging from branches, hidden in the moss, ready to drop into the boat and attack her. The occasional light from a house on either side of the canal only added to the mounting fear. Each time she glanced at a light, it temporarily cost her her night vision. Deeper into the canal there were no houses, no lights. The surface of the water was perfectly calm. In the thick darkness, it was difficult to tell exactly where the water met the banks. Twice in the narrow waterway she bumped into submerged cypress st
umps. Twice she turned to the left thinking she was at the channel only to discover dead ends.
At last she found it. The channel turned left, then cut back at an angle to the canal. A little ways in she sensed she was not alone. She turned off the motor. Silence.
Bruce’s body seemed to weigh a ton. She struggled with it, getting him to the bow, trying not to rock the flat bottom boat, being extra careful to maintain her balance. She couldn’t see them or hear them but she knew with certainty that the gators were there, waiting for a midnight snack. She had no intention of transitioning from killer to killed.
Once Bruce’s shoulders cleared the bow gunnel, it went easier. His head was under water but his dead weight kept his body from slipping smoothly into the black water. She placed both his legs against her shoulders and shoved. He hit the water with a splash that was followed instantly by a series of loud splashes, so many that they overlapped in a terrifying crescendo.
For a moment, his body floated face down. Then soulless dead eyes and huge teeth lunged at it. All around, alligator tails whacked the water. Between the darkness and the fury of the attack, it was impossible to count how many gators were on him.
Rhodes started the engine and cautiously backed the boat up the channel. Something nudged it! She reached for her gun but there was nothing, no second hit, no gaping gator mouth, just the quiet hum of the motor and the rapid beating of her heart.
Walter stood over Samuel, examining him, then nudge his shoulder with his boot.
Samuel groaned involuntarily with the pain caused in his back by the slight movement.
“Y’all back with us, there Sam?” Walter asked.
“If you can call it that,” Samuel struggled to say, his face still on the floor. He feared the further pain it would cause if he were to roll over to face his tormentor.
Walter squatted down next to him. “Don’t worry, old son, it’ll be over ‘fore you know it.”
“You going to feed me to the alligators?” Samuel asked. He regretted his choice of words instantly. He had let Walter know more than he should. He tried to diffuse his error. “Or arrange another car accident?”
Walter considered the questions. He stood up slowly. His knees were getting old, losing their flexibility. “Oh, nothin’ that drastic, Sam. I tried ta do it the easy way. Tried twice. I don’ usually give a man a second chance. But, shoot, Sam, I like you.”
“Twice?” Samuel twisted his head slightly to get a better look at his captor. He winced with pain.
“Why, y’all don’t think that bag of money them boys found at the rail station dropped from heaven, do ya? I figured there be enough there to at least start a good scandal, at least big enough ta knock y’all outta the race. Shoot, y’all bein’ so tight-knit and all, what with you still havin’ my check and your own daughter a snoopy reporter.” Walter shook his head. “Sometimes y’all jest cain’t count on people ta do what’s expected.”
“Bruce! When I didn’t cash the check right away, you had him plant the cash at the rail station. You won’t get away with it,” Samuel said defiantly, trying hard not to move, not to cause himself pain and thus diminish the sincerity of his words with involuntary grunts or groans. “The FBI and the Secret Service take killing a United States senator very seriously.”
“Why shoot, Sam, we don’t need ta kill y’all. We just need ta keep y’all here till after the debate. When Rhodes gets back, she’s goin’ ta give y’all a little boost of somethin’. Make y’all’s mind do all sorts of shenanigans. Why y’all won’t know what’s real from Sunday.” He bent over slightly and whispered sinisterly, “They tell me the effect ain’t permanent but I can’t swear to it. They goin’ ta find y’all stumblin’ around on some country road half outta your mind. Folks won’t know what part of whatever y’all tell ‘em is true or jest pure fantasy. Hell, y’all might not know.”
He laughed a rolling belly laugh as he walked back into the living room to the liquor cabinet.
Samuel struggled to turn onto his back. The pain wasn’t quite as severe. The Aleve was making a difference. “Tell me something,” he called to Walter.
Walter, sipping a bourbon and branch water, returned to the lanai. “What would you like to know, old son?” he asked.
“My head’s a little fuzzy. I’d like to get it straight just once, even if I might not remember it later.”
“Me and Martín Czeiler, I’m guessing?”
“Yes.”
“Shoot, Sam, everyone in Florida knows. It’s just you boys up in Washington got the blinders on.” He squatted down just to get in Samuel’s face. It hurt his knees too much. He pulled a lawn chair next to the mattress. Samuel had to shift slightly to see Walter’s face clearly. The pain was worth being able to judge the truthfulness of Walter’s words.
“Martín come to see me,” Walter went on. “He didn’t say but I expect it was at Senator Ramirez’s suggestion. Wanted to see if we could make some kind of arrangement, something mutually financially beneficial.” He pulled out a cigar. He took his time lighting it.
After a couple of puffs, one of which sent smoke into Samuel’s eyes, Walter said, “I didn’t see an upside for me. Shoot, run rail from the airport to the hotels and theme parks? That’d be two-thirds of my business. High-speed to Miami? We run buses to the ports. Just didn’t see any compromise that made sense. Told him so. He wasn’t too happy about it. Guess he’s used to getting’ his was down there in Little Cuba.”
Samuel blinked back the water in his eyes from the smoke. “So the two who were shot, Carlos and the girl?”
“Martín’s people. You fooled us goin’ to the wrong beach. Took a while to sort it out. They grabbed you fore we could.” He blew a smoke ring. “But they couldn’t keep you.” He stood, smile a wide Texas grin, walked back to the living room enjoying his drink and cigar.
Chapter Twenty-One
Jane awoke with a start. She sat straight up in bed, her head moving side-to-side, searching. Nothing, no one. She turned on the bed lamp and dialed the phone.
In the car, Sara’s cell phone rang. Howard heard it. He wiped the sleep from his eyes. Sara’s head was on his shoulder. It rang again. He gently pushed her away to get at her phone.
“Hello,” he answered softly.
“Howard?” Jane asked. “Is Sara with you?”
“She is right here. Hang on.” He gently rocked Sara back and forth.
Her eyes opened, wondering. “What?” she asked.
“Your mother,” he said, handing her the phone.
“Mommy?” Sara asked into the phone.
“I know where your father is,” Jane answered.
Sara bolted upright. “Where?”
“He’s in a house on the lake.”
“We pretty much know that, Mommy. We’re watching several possibilities.”
“No, listen to me. The house is on the lake.”
“How do you know?”
“I saw him walk into the water. He walked off a deck or a porch directly into the lake.”
“Mommy, what are you talking about? You saw him?”
“In a dream. Only it was very real. And then.” Jane stopped talking.
“Then what, Mommy?” Sara demanded.
“Then a voice told me, ‘Get him, now!’ Sara, you have to find your father before it’s too late.”
“Mommy, you were just dreaming.”
“No! It was more than that. It was Henry. I know that voice. Do you understand me?”
“Mommy, now you’re scaring me.”
“Your father is scared. He’s all alone and something terrible is about to happen if you don’t find him now.”
“All right, all right. We’ll find him,” Sara promised.
“Call me the minute you do.”
“Yes, Mommy.”
Sara clicked the phone off. “We’re watching the wrong house.”
“How do you know?” Howard asked.
“Mommy just told me. It’s the one on the lake.”
&
nbsp; “How does she know?” He tried to hide it but disbelief was in his voice.
“She knows,” Sara said with conviction. “Women’s intuition. It’s my daddy. We’re going to the other house. I’ll call Beth.”
Howard reluctantly started the car.
“What time is it?” Sara asked as she concentrated on punching Beth’s number.
He looked at the dash clock. “Just past four.”
Darkness was beginning to give way to light behind the hill on the town side of the lake when Rhodes drove the boat onto the shore at the back of the house. She dragged it onto the grass. She was calmer now. The adrenalin had come and gone.
Walter was waiting for her inside the living room. He handed her a scotch, neat. She swallowed half the glass with one swig; she sipped the rest.
With a great deal of effort and pain, Samuel had managed to turn on his back. He couldn’t see them but he strained to hear all that he could.
“You were gone a long time,” Walter said. “Everythin’ go all right?”
“It’s done,” Rhodes answered.
“Completely?” Walter asked.
“I didn’t wait around to find out,” she replied. “There must have been twenty, maybe thirty all trying to get at him at the same time. I doubt there’s a piece left by now.
“Twenty or thirty?” There was a hint of disbelief in Walter’s tone.
Rhodes finished her scotch. She looked him straight in the eye with a fierceness. “You want me to go back and count?”
Walter laughed. “No, darlin’. I believe ya. But now we got a problem.”
Walter strolled to the deck, stepped over Samuel, and looked toward town. The sun was rising quickly. The town was still shrouded in the shadow of the hill but the lake was nearly completely lit. The sun itself was hidden behind a flat cloud that floated like an island in the sky. Walter marveled at it.
“I declare,” he said, “Looka here.” He pointed at the island cloud. “Never seen one like that before. I believe they have some of the most spectacular clouds in Florida that I’ve ever seen anywheres. Some of them stacked up like piles of biscuits rising to the heavens.”
Mid-Life Friends and Illusions Page 20