Krewe of Hunters Series, Volume 5

by Heather Graham

  “Coffee? I’m still dreaming of getting something called sleep for part of the night,” Diego told him. “I’ll take a water, though.”

  Brett grabbed a bottle of water for Diego and made himself a cup of coffee. It wouldn’t keep him awake once he lay down to sleep, he knew.

  The two of them sat on the stools at the kitchen breakfast bar.

  “You know what struck me as odd?” Brett asked.

  “Besides dead men going around killing people?”

  “Barillo himself. He’s a shell of a man. Quite frankly, he looks weak in every way. How does a shriveled little man like that command such an empire? I think he has something, Diego, some kind of disease. I wish I knew what it was.”

  Diego shrugged. “Heart disease? Cancer?”

  “I don’t know, but it was interesting. The man with him was twice his size and plainly hostile, but Barillo shut him up effortlessly.”

  “Like The Godfather. There can be only one don until the don steps aside.”

  “Well, I doubt it will be one of the sons,” Brett said. “According to Bryant, there are three kids. Jeremy is going for his law degree. Apparently he’d like to go into politics, but I think his father’s reputation will put an end to those ambitions. Then there’s Felipe. Smart kid—he’s in anatomy or something premed like that. Anthony Barillo himself has a medical degree, not that he uses it now. Maybe everything Felipe does is to impress his old man, who knows. Then there’s the daughter, Cecelia. She’s about thirty and already has master’s degrees in two fields, I forget what, and she’s going for a third. It really is like The Godfather. He’s a major crime lord, but he wants his kids to be above reproach—like Michael Corleone. Of course, Michael would up being the one to take over the family. Maybe Barillo’s kids are starting to feel the pressure, too. The man who called me the other night said ‘my father.’ The guy tonight was too old to be either of the sons, though. Maybe it was his brother.”

  “Barillo’s brother?”

  Brett nodded. “Now that I think about it, it could be his youngest brother, Tomas. There were originally four brothers, but one died of natural causes and one died in a shoot-out. Tomas is the youngest, and Bryant thinks he’s being groomed to take over, not that Barillo has loosened his grip by a millimeter.”

  “Sounds almost like a royal dynasty. When Anthony Barillo is gone, it will be like, ‘The king is dead, long live the king!’ No wonder poor Bryant has been at it so hard all these years. They have to root out the whole dynasty if they’re going to have a real effect.” Diego yawned.

  Brett remembered that he’d roused his partner from a sound sleep and shook his head. “You want to just sleep here?” he asked.

  “No, that’s okay. I’d only have to get up early and go home to shower and change.” Diego indicated the old AC/DC T-shirt he was wearing. “They’ll frown on it if I come to work like this. I’ll take off and see you in a few hours.”

  “Thanks for the backup.”

  “You’d have my back, too, amigo,” Diego said.

  Brett saw him out to his car, and he didn’t head inside and lock up until Diego was out of sight.

  It was disturbing that Barillo had come to his house. Despite the job, agents didn’t usually fear for their own lives unless they were in armed pursuit; it just didn’t pay for criminals to attack them. Law enforcement never came after you with greater ferocity than if you killed a fellow officer.

  He set his alarms and double-checked that his Glock held a full clip before going to bed. His head was filled with questions and theories as he tried to sleep—and in the middle of every one he found himself thinking about Lara Ainsworth Mayhew.

  He thought about her eyes.

  And then her body.

  Her smile.

  And the way he had felt when she was so close to him in her swimsuit, nearly touching, when they’d been in the water and on the boat.

  She was still on his mind when he finally fell asleep.

  * * *

  He woke with a jerk, dreaming about Lara in a way he shouldn’t have, but his dream vanished as he came instantly alert, almost as if someone had poked him. Instinctively he reached out, ready to grab his Glock, though with the alarms set it should have been impossible for anyone to get in without him knowing.

  There was no danger. Even as he noticed the shadowy figure at the foot of his bed, he knew there was no danger.

  Maria Gomez was back, looking at him with eyes filled with sadness.

  Looking at him…and asking for his help without speaking a word.

  When she did speak, she said nothing new.

  “Miguel did it… It was Miguel, and yet it was not Miguel.”

  “I know, Maria,” he said, wondering if he was imagining things because he’d gotten so damned obsessed with this case. “Maria, I know he loved you. He never would have hurt you—not if he was himself.”

  The ghostly woman shimmered in and out of focus. And then she said, “Please. Please…”

  The first pale sliver of morning light seeped through the drapes. For one minute more, she was there.

  And then she was gone.

  * * *

  Lara thought it would be impossible to concentrate on her job, but throughout the morning she worked on the plans for the Sunday event, sending out emails to their members, replying to veterans who wanted to know what to expect, addressing their special concerns.

  She thought that Meg would be bored to tears, but she wasn’t; she was on her laptop the whole time, wrapped up in what she was doing.

  At about eleven-thirty they were interrupted when Lara received a call from the front; Sonia Larson was there to see her.

  “One of our sponsors,” she explained to Meg. “A major sponsor—she loves the place and donates heavily.”

  “Tax write-off?” Meg asked.

  “Well, it’s a tax write-off for everyone, but I’ve seen Sonia at the lagoons. She really does love the dolphins.”

  “You are talking Sonia Larson the fashion queen, aren’t you?”

  Lara laughed. “I think she’s more like a goddess. You’ll see.”

  Meg did.

  Sonia walked into Lara’s office loaded down with bags bearing her company logo. She smiled with genuine pleasure on being introduced to Meg and apologized because she didn’t have anything for her. “But I have a feeling this one shares,” Sonia said, beaming at Lara.

  Among many other things, she’d brought Lara a slightly daring bikini and matching lace-edged cover-up in a rich blue with just a hint of green.

  “Matches your eyes perfectly,” she said.

  “This is lovely. And I thank you so much. But I’m not sure I’m supposed to accept gifts like this,” Lara said. “And aren’t you supposed to be in Rio?”

  Sonia waved a hand in the air. “You’re not going to believe this, but they had to put the show back a week. It’s one of the biggest in the world, but Jean Paul Genet—the host, you’ve heard of him, yes?”

  Lara and Meg had both heard of him—yes! He had a makeup line, a perfume line, a clothing line and now he was designing yachts and cars.

  “Well, anyway, the man got sick. So they have postponed the show. It’s all right with me. My schedule is my own. So I’m here and able to bring you a few presents.”

  “And you’ll be here on Sunday?” Lara asked. “It would be wonderful if you can. The soldiers would be so thrilled.”

  “I will come,” Sonia promised her. “But you wear the bikini I brought you and they’ll be more thrilled with you.”

  Lara smiled. “Well, thank you. But we’re required to wear our regular wetsuits, and I’m not even sure I’ll be in the water at all. I’m media. The trainers are the ones who’ll work with the vets and the dolphins. You’re a celebrity. They’ll love seeing yo
u.”

  Sonia smiled. “I understand about the suit. And if you think I will do some good by being here, of course I’ll come. But for now I have a doctor’s appointment and my chauffeur is waiting.”

  “Is anything wrong?” Lara asked, worried.

  “No, no. I have an irregular heartbeat, so I see Dr. Treme for regular monitoring. I had to cancel my next appointment, but luckily he was able to fit me in today.”

  “Treme?” Meg said.

  “He’s the best down here,” Sonia said. She blew kisses. “I must go, but I will see you on Sunday.”

  As soon as Sonia left, Lara looked at Meg, frowning. “What’s bothering you about Dr. Treme?” she asked.

  “He’s the doctor who signed Randy Nicholson’s death certificate.”

  “Should we stop her?” Lara asked nervously.

  “No. He’s probably not guilty of anything. The man flatlined, and an entire group of medical personnel thought he was dead.”

  “But…?”

  “I’ll call Matt and Brett,” Meg said.

  “Perfect,” Lara said, jumping up.

  “Where are you going?” Meg asked her.

  “To stop Sonia. I’ll get her to postpone, tell her I could use her help thinking about next season’s gala,” Lara said. “Just to be safe.”

  Meg nodded. “A conspiracy of the unwitting,” she murmured.

  * * *

  Diego, Matt and Brett stood in the offices of the Diaz-Douglas funeral home, along with the entire staff. They went over the events that had followed the arrival of Randy Nicholson’s body at the mortuary. Every employee seemed equal parts stunned, scared and mystified. They’d been there for thirty minutes, and all they’d ascertained so far was that yes, the body had arrived. Many of the employees had seen it, but since the family hadn’t wanted embalming or an open casket, there had been no need for anything beyond cleaning and dressing the body, then laying it in the silk-lined coffin his children had chosen. That meant, as Mr. Douglas had explained, most of them had no actual contact with it.

  “All right,” Brett said. “Who prepared Mr. Nicholson for the coffin?”

  Carl Sage lifted his hand. “I cleaned and dressed Mr. Nicholson,” he said. “I laid him in the coffin, and I sealed the coffin. And I can tell you, when I did so, Mr. Nicholson was in it. Two of our ushers, Mike Bitter and Victor Menendez, helped me set it in place for the service. We also saw that it was transported from the funeral home to the cemetery. I’m telling you, they did not take the body, and neither did I.”

  “What about the night the body stayed at the mortuary?” Brett asked.

  “I was here until quite late, as usual, but I locked up when I left,” Carl said.

  “Anyone else? After closing, I mean,” Matt asked.

  “We were all here for a while,” Carl said. “The ushers leave first, but Mr. Douglas and Mr. Diaz were here for a while. And Mrs. Diaz,” he added. “When they left, I locked up and then went to my office.”

  “May I see your office?” Brett asked.

  Carl looked at his bosses. Both men nodded grimly.

  It was odd, Brett thought as Carl led him, with Diego and Matt, with Diaz and Douglas following, through the employees-only area, that while he’d attended many autopsies, he’d never been behind the scenes at a mortuary. They passed by the embalming room, where several bodies were in various stages of preparation.

  Somehow, he found this place sadder even than autopsy. In an autopsy, doctors worked to discover cause of death. To speak for the dead.

  While here…

  The soul was gone, but every pretense was taken to pretend the dead weren’t really gone. A makeup set on a tray sat by a stainless-steel gurney holding the remains of an older woman.

  No amount of makeup would change the fact that she would never look like herself again. The internal spark that had made her who she was had fled.

  They moved past the embalming room and stood in the doorway of Carl’s office. The small room held a desk, a computer, filing cabinets—the usual accoutrements of any office, although this one also held a collection of books on embalming, and the reconstruction and cosmetic preparation of bodies. There was also a thick book of Florida statutes on proper and legal burial procedures.

  But it wasn’t the office itself that interested Brett. It was the fact that the office was at the far end of the hall, near the funeral home’s receiving bay. But if the office door was closed, the bay doors could easily be opened and closed—and someone in the office would be none the wiser.

  “Do you keep your door shut when you’re in here?” Brett asked Carl.

  “Yeah. I turn on my music and do my paperwork,” Carl said. He seemed puzzled by their question.

  Matt walked to the end of the hall and the receiving doors. Diego closed the office door.

  “What’s going on?” Diaz demanded.

  “There are only five people with keys?” Brett asked him.

  “Yes, I told you. Myself, Jonathan, my wife, Carl and Jill,” Diaz said. “Why?”

  “Because I think someone opened that door and let somebody in, somebody who took Randy Nicholson’s body from the mortuary,” Brett said.

  “That’s just not possible.” Douglas sounded genuinely indignant.

  “I think it’s time we stopped cooperating and called our attorneys,” Diaz said.

  * * *

  The only way Lara could legitimately think of to stop Sonia from going to her appointment was to come up with something else for her to do, so she told her that Meg was crazy about her designs and really wanted to take her to lunch. It was a bit hard to persuade Sonia to agree, but in the end she agreed to reschedule her checkup for a second time. Given her semi-celebrity status, Dr. Treme’s office was more than happy to oblige.

  Lara raced back to brief Meg on her “role,” and then they joined Sonia outside. Her chauffeur drove them over the causeway to South Beach.

  The area had a character all its own, a faded elegance left over from the days of Sinatra and Al Capone, who had both spent time here. The hotels had weathered through the years, and the local kids had come in droves to ride waves that really weren’t there. High-class restaurants and nightclubs had been replaced by coffee shops and bagelries. Then a boom had hit. The old deco hotels had been recognized as the treasures they were, painted and spruced up, and high-end restaurants and clubs had made a comeback.

  The problem with the beach now was parking, but they didn’t have to worry about that, since Sonia’s chauffeur would drop them off, then come back for them when Sonia called.

  They opted to stroll along Lincoln Road Mall and choose a restaurant at random. Options were plentiful, along with shops, a movie theater, a bookstore—and dozens of dogs. The open-air mall was known for being pet friendly. All three of them were dog fans, and they stopped to compliment so many dogs that Lara was afraid she would be gone so long that she would miss a full afternoon of work.

  Sonia finally chose a restaurant, and of course she knew the owners. They were shown to a special table and offered a select champagne. Lara and Meg demurred—they were working—but encouraged Sonia to enjoy.

  Sonia, meanwhile, was delighted with the whole event. “Lunch with girlfriends! This is something I never get to do,” she told them.

  As they ordered and ate, Lara thought she understood why. Sonia was approached several times by people who wanted their pictures taken with her.

  Sonia explained that she always tried to be obliging when people recognized her. “I met Versace once when I was young. People loved him because he was always so available. He lived on the beach. He had breakfast at the News Café. He was a man of the people, and I want to be the same.”

  Lara realized that she really liked Sonia. The woman was a bundle of sincere energy. Glancing at Me
g, she knew that her friend was thinking the same. While Meg had always been hell-bent on her law enforcement career, Lara had intended to save the world through politics. Their friends hadn’t often been fashionistas.

  It wasn’t until they were almost ready to leave that Lara noticed Ely Taggerly having lunch with three other men in a dark corner of the restaurant. Ely was nodding vehemently as he spoke, making some kind of point. He was clearly aggravated. Lara hadn’t seen him angry before, but then she’d only seen him at Sea Life, and the facility seemed to have a calming effect on everyone.

  It wasn’t until Ely shifted in his chair that Lara realized one of the men he was having lunch with was Sea Life’s own Nelson Amory. Amory, too, looked annoyed.

  “Look who’s here!” Sonia said, noticing the men at that moment, and before anyone could stop her, she hurriedly swept through the restaurant to their table.

  As Lara quickly rushed to get ahead of the temperamental woman, intent on averting a potentially disastrous encounter if she could, she saw that the other men at the table were two of their other benefactors, Grant Blackwood and Mason Martinez.

  “Good afternoon, gentlemen,” Lara said breathlessly as Sonia came up behind her. “How nice to see you all together. Are you planning a new line of vitamins for dolphin health?” she teased.

  “No, no, of course not,” Dr. Amory said, rising. Lara was certain that he was drawing out his answer because he was thinking up a lie.

  “We’re all planning on being at your Sunday event,” Grant said. By then, all four men had risen.

  “And in the meantime, I’m trying to squeeze more money out of them for research,” Dr. Amory said.

  They were lying—she was sure of it—but why lie to her? Maybe one of them was trying to persuade Dr. Amory to leave Sea Life and work for him instead?

  Maybe later she would walk down to the education building and ask Dr. Amory straight out.

  “Well, keep squeezing,” she said cheerfully.

  “He’s pretty good at it,” Ely told her, smiling benignly.

  He always appeared to be the perfect gentleman, but Grady had told her once that even though they always saw him as kind and smiling, he was hell in a boardroom. He’d built his pharmaceutical company from nothing, and his scientists had done a lot of groundbreaking work with diseases like Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s.