by Tom Lowe
As he rounded the end of the hall and stepped into the great room, he stopped. “Mother?” he said, dropping the banana at his feet. “Daddy, what happened? Did you fall?” Brennen approached his father just as Santana stepped out from behind an alcove.
“Greetings, my brother.”
Richard Brennen turned around to stare at a strange man with a pistol pointing at him. “Who are you?”
“I’m your brother.”
“Like hell you are!”
“I am. Our father is in denial, but he knows it’s true. True as the color of my eyes.”
Richard looked at the man’s eyes and then he looked at his father’s eyes. “Who is this? What’s this about? Some kind of half-ass blackmail? My opponent, Charlie Matthison, behind this?”
Santana laughed. “Half-assed blackmail? Come on little brother. I think larger than that. If I’d wanted to blackmail you, I could have sent these to your opponent.”
Santana ripped open the packet he was carrying, leafed out the eight-by-ten photographs, and tossed them in Josh Brennen’s lap. The old man lifted one of the photos. It showed his youngest son having sex with a man. He looked at another, the disgust building on his face after each picture. He threw the photos at Richard.
“You’re a damn queer!” he said, standing to face Richard. “My son, the man who came out of my loins, is a faggot.”
Richard started for Santana but stopped. “I was set up! The condo!”
Santana said, “Usually it’s reserved for heterosexual encounters, but I made an exception in your case, my brother. Cain and Abel. Guess who’s Abel?”
Richard turned to face his father. “I tried to tell you! You didn’t want to listen.”
“Listen! How can you justify this? Damn you to hell and back, Richard!”
Grace Brennen sat in her wheelchair, stoic, her mouth downturned, sad. She pressed the small control with a finger on her right hand and the wheelchair began going backwards. It crashed into a large porcelain vase, smashing it, and knocking over a houseplant. Josh Brennen got up, his heavy cocktail glass breaking on the marble floor. He hobbled over to his wife.
“It’s okay, Gracie. It’s gonna be all right.” Her breathing came in gasps, her head twisting with pain, lips mouthing monosyllabic words. “Your mama might be havin’ another stroke!”
Santana was amused. It was better than he imagined. He put the small pistol in his pocket and said, “The wealthy American family at its very dysfunctional best, but then again, father knows best. I was going to kill you, Papa, but that would be too quick, too easy and too final. This way you’ll be in pain a long time. Just like my mother from the first time you made her body bleed to the last time you bled her spirit.” Santana smiled, turned and left.
SEVENTY-SEVEN
The next day, late in the afternoon, I made Cuban sandwiches for Max and me. We walked down to my dock to eat. The river was tranquil, motionless as smoked glass. An anhinga swam less than fifty feet from me, bobbing in the water like a feathered torpedo. I thought about the investigation. The cloud wouldn’t part, I knew, until Santana was caught and prosecuted along with Davis, Ortega and Slater.
I scooted a paper plate over to Max. “Let’s eat.” She gulped down the meat and small piece of Cuban flatbread I’d cut for her.
I sipped a Sam Adams and watched the water bugs dart in circles. The river reflected a sky of cherry red clouds mixed with patches of blue. I heard the two-stroke engine before I saw the boat. In a few seconds, the small fishing boat came around the three-acre island in the center of the river. The boat’s pilot throttled back for about twenty seconds, then accelerated and came in the direction of my dock. Max barked.
“Max, it’s okay. Don’t scare off the locals.”
There was one person in the boat. As he came closer, I could tell he was middle-aged, deeply tanned. He wore black jeans and a black short sleeve shirt that was completely unbuttoned and not tucked in his pants. In the sun, I saw the flash of a gold chain around his neck. There was something else on his chest, but at the distance I couldn’t tell what it was.
Within thirty seconds, the boat was a dot around the bend, and the man dressed in black was gone.
* * *
The light on my phone was blinking. I checked the messages. “Sean, this is Lauren. I finally came up with a photo of Santana, at least we think it’s him. He’s got movie star good looks, with the eye of the tiger, so to speak. The Bureau found a picture in the Herald. Santana was with Congressman Lloyd Becker when Becker made the rounds during his campaign last October. Herald ID’d him in the cut-line as ‘Miguel Santana, local business man and philanthropist.’ I’ve e-mailed it to you. Please call me when you get this message. Oh, by the way, we’ve released the photo to the media.”
When I started to open my e-mail, the phone rang. It was Dan Grant. He was almost breathless. “Where the hell have you been?” he asked.
“A walk down by the river and then dinner.”
“A walk?”
“Yep. With Max. It’s quality time. Found a large spearhead in the roots of a willow tree blown over in a storm.”
“Look, O’Brien, here’s what happened in the world while you took your dog on a field trip. Security cameras in the Brennen mansion caught it all. Too bad those camera weren’t monitored by a service. Everything digitally recorded to computer hard drives. Our team is streaming the video to feds right now.”
“What happened?”
“Santana, he slipped in the Brennen house and confronted Josh Brennen. You can see the old man losing his shit when Santana and Richard Brennen had a little discussion about Richard’s apparent sexual persuasion. Photos on the floor of the scene show junior favored young men. The old man went ballistic. After Santana left the room, Brennen shot his son, and then he shot himself in the head. Did it in front of his invalid wife sitting in her wheelchair. He was so close to her when he shot himself, blood splatter hit the woman’s face and she couldn’t wipe it off. He fell dead at her feet.”
“Why would Santana go there? Can she speak at all?”
“Her stroke makes speech difficult. She managed to garble out something that sounded like, ‘Papa.’”
I could feel my chest muscles tighten. I said, “That’s it!”
“What’s it?”
“Josh Brennen is Miguel Santana’s father. The ostracized prodigal son returns. That helps explain Santana. I’m betting he’s the son of one of Brennen’s former workers, probably someone trafficked here, held as a sex slave. Could be a woman he abused, impregnated, and tossed out. In tossing her, he threw away any paternal responsibilities or traces to Miguel Santana.”
“Media will go nuts over this. They’re already swarming in packs from all the major networks, and from England and South America, too. O’Brien, you were right about Slater being connected to Santana. He tried to cop a plea, but finding the stripper’s body in the field with the others pretty much brought this around to Slater and Santana. Slater admitted he got sucked in because he was so over-extended at the casinos and gambling boats, and he was about to have his balls removed by guys with no sense of humor. He says Santana bailed him out and wiped the debt clean as long as he, Slater, was occasionally ‘on call’ for Santana. Of course, one call led to another and another. Soon, Slater was Santana’s enforcer in the rough and tumble world of strip club acquisitions and Internet porn. Slater’s willing to take a life sentence for Leslie’s murder if the DA drops charges in the strip club killing. Prosecutor is going full bore. Slater is looking at the death penalty. By the way, the sheriff is running unopposed.”
I was silent.
“You still there?”
“Now, we find Santana,” I said.
“Got any ideas?”
“He’s not where you think you’ll find him.”
“Between us, FBI and FDLE, we have major airports and bus terminals watched.”
“What about private airports or boat transportation? In an hour, he can be in Bimin
i off the coast of Miami. If terrorists can get in, Santana can get out. This has to be the biggest dragnet in the state’s history. Keep me posted.”
As I opened Lauren’s e-mail, I clicked on the attached photo. The picture was in color. I could see the yellowish eyes of Miguel Santana staring back at me. My mind flashed to the picture of Sandra Duperee’s cat in Jacksonville. I still hear his voice sometimes, I remembered her saying.
I called Lauren. “Got your e-mail.”
“The picture seems very anticlimactic after watching the video feed Volusia Sheriff’s office sent. Santana’s movements were so cat-and-mouse like with Josh and Richard Brennen.”
“Josh Brennen is Santana’s father.”
“Oh my God!”
“The night I was with you and received the call from Santana, you had a trace put on the call. Did you get a number? And was it different than the one I had? ”
“Yes and yes. But in light of all hell breaking loose right after that, especially since Santana left us that note in the condo, chasing a cell phone number seemed moot.”
“Can you find the number?”
“You know Santana’s either tossed the phone or certainly won’t answer your call, assuming he’s still in the country.”
“Do you have the number?”
“I’ve got it here on my desk.”
She gave me the number. I wrote it on the back of a boating magazine. “Thanks, I’ll call you later.”
“Sean, what are you going to do?”
“Extend an invitation to Santana.”
SEVENTY-EIGHT
I didn’t expect Santana to answer. Maybe he was watching his caller ID in some international airport. Maybe I’d have a chance to bait him before he stepped on a plane. I had to get it right. Had to play to something he couldn’t get or find for himself.
After one ring, the call cut immediately to a short beep and then into voicemail. I said, “Santana, this is Sean O’Brien. You said the next time we talked the words would be my last on earth. You wanted me to think about what I would say. I know what that is. My last words will be what your father told me about you. You want to hear what Josh Brennen really said about you, about your mother? To hear those words, you have to hear them from me. And, to do that, you have to come find me. If you don’t, I’ll go on television and tell the world why Josh Brennen turned his bastard son away.”
I hung up. Now what? You’ve sent out the invitation, O’Brien, and you’re all alone for the party.
I slipped the Glock in my belt and stepped out on the porch, Max following at my heels. The frogs and cicadas were chanting their nightly sonatas. I placed the Glock on the table next to the large spearhead I’d found. Joe Billie would appreciate it. Maybe it was one of those rare paleo spearheads he mentioned. I sat in the wicker rocker and Max jumped up on my lap. I scratched her head and watched a yellow harvest moon rise above the river in the east. I could hear a coonhound chasing something at least a half mile upriver. The bellowing carried across the water. There is the slight smell of wood smoke from somewhere in the Ocala Forest. Then the wind died, and the night grew darker as a cloud slipped in front of the moon.
I knew it was a night I wouldn’t sleep.
* * *
It was after midnight when I took Max outside to let her do her business. We walked around the house. I had the floodlights turned off. The guttural bellow of a bull alligator came up from the river. Although there was no wind, the mosquitoes weren’t biting.
Approaching the porch, I could hear my cell phone ring from the table where I’d left it. I ran to it, lifting it off the table next to the spearhead I’d found. It was Lauren.
“Don’t tell me you’re still at the office,” I said.
“Sean, are you alone?” Lauren sounded out of breath.
“I’m here with my favorite lady, Max.”
“Get out of the house!” she ordered.
“Why?”
“CNN ran a shot of Santana’s photo. A man watching in Daytona Beach recognized the photo and called us. The man works for Hertz. They use GPS to help track cars — lost or stolen. They have a tracker on the car that Santana rented. Hold on Sean. I’m on the other line with Hertz…”
Her breathing was quick. To the person on the other line she said, “What are the coordinates?” There was a pause and Lauren asked me, “Where exactly do you live?”
“St. Johns River Road, off Highway 44.”
“Sean, Santana’s car, a Ford Fusion, is less than five miles from your house.”
SEVENTY-NINE
“It’s okay, Max,” I said. “I’ll be right back. No barking.” I locked her in the house, shoved the Glock under my belt, and stepped out the screen door into the dark.
I tried to put myself exactly where Santana sat. I’d drive by the home, not too fast or too slow, see if lights were on, maybe a car in the drive. Then I’d return with the headlights off, park a good distance away, move stealthily under the cover of darkness, and enter the home. It was all about surprise.
But I wasn’t Santana. And I couldn’t be sure how he would plan the assault. If surprise was part of it, I’d already removed that element. I jumped up to a low-hanging limb of a live oak tree and pulled myself to a thick branch. I climbed another ten feet until I had an open view of the road from both east and west directions.
The moon was higher, the soft light almost beaming through the tree limbs. Shadows from the oaks connected like gnarly fingers interlacing across my yard.
A horned owl called out, its series of hoots traveling up from the river. The call seemed to come from somewhere near my dock. Horned owls always sound like they are chanting, who’s awake…me too. I wondered if it was the same owl that had captured the cardinal, the owl that had pointed me in the direction of Angela. If it was, maybe the bird would point me toward Santana.
The owl called out again, stopping after only two hoots. I’ve heard these owls often, and they always finish their statements. This one stopped in mid-sentence.
I saw the headlights in the distance, three-quarters of a mile away, coming toward my house slower than the speed limit. I touched the Glock and watched the car. The interior was too dark for me to make out whether Santana was behind the wheel.
It was a Ford. The driver kept the same speed while the car passed my house. But before the road began to curve, I could see the brake lights tapped.
The driver slowed and turned around. The headlights went off. The car moved stealth like, inching its way back toward my house. Within about fifty yards of my driveway, the driver pulled the car into a wooded area, state property.
There was no movement. I saw a tiny orange glow. The diver must have used the car lighter to light a cigarette. Why would Santana be smoking if he were about to kill me? Calm a nicotine itch? Something didn’t feel right. I dropped from the tree and stayed in the shadows to move toward the car. I stepped every few feet to simply listen. Nothing. Not a sound from a horned owl. Not even a sound from a mosquito. In less than a minute, I’d slipped up on the car and approached the driver from the rear.
The window was open. He was a silhouette in the moonlight. He tossed out the cigarette, the red ash sparking in the night. Dumb move.
I came up from a crouch and touched the barrel to Santana’s left ear.
“Put both hands on the wheel! Now!” I ordered.
Santana immediately lifted both hands to the steering wheel. I jerked open the door. “Get out! It’s over, Santana.”
“Don’t shoot, man! Who the hell’s Santana?”
A young black man was visibly shaking.
EIGHTY
I thought of Max alone in the house. I held the gun in the man’s face. “Don’t even think about lying to me. If you do, I’ll shoot you between the eyes. How’d you get this car?”
“Dude gave it to me!”
“What dude?”
“Don’t know his name. I work at Riverside Marina. Dude rented a boat today. He said he’d give me two hundre
d dollars to drive his car down this road at midnight and park right past that house back there. Said for me to keep the lights off, and about one o’clock he’d come meet me. I’d get another hundred, and he’d drop me back at the marina.”
“At one o’clock, you would have been dead and your body dropped right here.”
“What? The dude seemed real cool, man. Didn’t seem like no crazy sex shit.”
“His clothes, what color?”
“Lemme think…black…yeah black shirt and pants.”
I thought about the man in the boat I’d seen earlier. “Give me the keys.”
“What?”
“Give them to me.”
“No problem, man. What’s this shit all about?”
“Start walking.”
“It’s after midnight. I’m a black man walkin’ in dumb-fuck nowhere.”
“It’s the only way you will live though the night. Move! Walk the opposite direction from the house. There’s a crossroad five miles west.”
He looked at me, shook his head, and started walking west.
* * *
As I approached my home, I knew why the owl had stopped its night call. It had seen something. Something coming up from the river. I melted in the dark shadows next to the trees and crept down to my dock.
I almost didn’t see it. Tied up behind the weeping willow tree was a boat. I could tell it was a small boat. In the moonlight, I knew it was the boat I’d seen earlier.
Santana was at my home.
EIGHTY-ONE
I stayed in the dark of the tree line next to my property, moving closer to my house. I knew that locks would not keep Santana out. Where was he? On the porch? Hiding somewhere in a room? Or was he behind the next oak tree?
I stepped out from cover and started for the porch, and I was blinded by all of my floodlights. My backyard was like a Friday night high school football field.