by Joe Curtis
“Please sit down,” he said, motioning to the chair across from him. She sat down obediently.
“We are now set up for the shipment,” he said in a hushed tone, sitting up and looking into her eyes. It was all business, no more pleasantries. “The diamonds are stuffed in South African artifacts, which are packaged in wooden crates. There are only about a dozen crates, so you should just have to take a midsized plane.”
“Size doesn’t matter to me,” she said boldly.
Shark noticed this and stared hard at her.
“Fine. You will leave tomorrow in time to get to Port Nolloth for dusk. Hector and three more of my associates will accompany you.”
“Hold on,” she said loudly, slamming her arms on the table. Several players at neighboring tables looked up. Realizing she was too loud, she said softly, “I didn’t know I was going. I had plans.” She was lying about the plans. She was just nervous about being with Shark’s henchmen and having to travel to such primitive parts of the world.
Shark smiled.
“Now you know. When boss lady goes, all the employees act better. Right?”
Mary Catherine cursed him under her breath.
“Fine. If that’s what you want.”
“That is what I want. When you get there, go directly to Ayize. He will have the merchandise—and give him this.” Shark pulled out a thin metal suitcase and placed it on the table. “Don’t open it. You probably guessed what’s inside.”
“Of course—I’m not stupid,” she said, fiddling with her right ear—a nervous habit, and a sign of her greed.
Shark noticed it and added, “Don’t try to steal from me, Mary Catherine. Hector will be watching, and he doesn’t mind killing an old lady.” He paused. “After he tortures her.”
Mary Catherine could feel the blood rise to her face.
“I have no intention of stealing any of your dirty money and filthy—”
“Hold on, Mary Catherine. Remember—you’re a lady,” he said. “And one other important note. This is some of your investment money also.” This made her seethe, but she controlled herself. Years ago, Mary Catherine and Shark had met at a benefit for Little Havana’s art league. She’d just lost her husband and was lonely. The handsome, charming Cuban had swept her off her feet. Soon they’d become close friends, and she found herself learning about his secret business and becoming a key investor in his dreams. In the last six months, she’d spent many nights awake, wishing she’d never met the snake.
“Why do I have to carry the money?” she asked.
“Simple—I don’t trust Hector either,” he said. “So you will be watching Hector and Hector will be watching you. If one of you messes up, one of you will get hurt.”
Mary Catherine reached for the suitcase.
Shark grabbed it with his right hand and said, pointing a finger at her face, “Remember—Hector will be watching you.”
Mary Catherine said nothing, just stared coldly at Shark. She stood.
“Hector and my associates will meet you at the airport at 8:00 a.m. Do not be late.”
Without replying, she turned around and walked away. Shark watched her leave the park, unaware a bounty hunter was trying to take him down.
Chapter Seven
As he drove to the Care Ambulance Service headquarters, Bob thought about his private investigation course and decided he should have studied harder. He remembered thinking at the time, It’s just a minor. When will I ever need to know anything about investigating?
“Wrong,” Bob screamed out loud.
After he deposited the check, Bob’s plan was to drive to the Care Ambulance headquarters to get a feel for the place. There was one problem that he kept turning over in his mind: How was he going to get in the inside? Surely they wouldn’t just let him waltz right in—especially if what Mary Catherine had said was true.
His thought was interrupted when the newspaper on his front seat was swept to the floorboard when the wind caught it. Looking at the paper, Bob grinned.
“I’m going undercover,” he said aloud. “They won’t let Bob the bounty hunter in, but I bet they’ll let Bob the freelance journalist in.” He laughed and started singing “Secret Agent Man.” It blended in nicely with the Hispanic music coming over the beauty queen’s radio.
Bob pulled up to the impressive three-story building. To say the least, he was impressed. Glass all but covered the front face of the building, with accents of dull orange. The front lawn was manicured and dotted with palms. Even the parking lot looked like it was newly striped, and the pavement was black with no oil stains.
Nice place, Bob thought, inspecting his surroundings. On the way there, Bob had stopped by Circuit City and bought a small recorder, pens, and notebook so he could at least look the part of the writer. With that in hand, he made his way through the front doors to a beautiful receptionist.
“Hi, welcome to Care Ambulance Service. May I help you?” the receptionist said from behind the mahogany counter. She was blond and tan. When she talked, she showed gleaming white teeth. Bob thought she belonged in Hollywood rather than Miami.
“Yes, you may,” he said, smiling. “I’m Bob McKaren, a freelance journalist, and I’m doing a story on non-profit medical organizations. I’d like to include Care in the piece.”
“Wonderful,” she said gleefully. “Let me get you our public relations officer. Her name is Lauren Welch.”
“Great,” he said as the receptionist began dialing the number.
In a few moments, Bob could hear the click-clack of heels coming down the hall. Lauren Welch was an attractive brunette that stood a hair over five feet, with a classic public relations smile. When she reached Bob, she extended a hand whose nails were well manicured. Bob quickly stood and introduced himself.
“Hi, I’m Bob. I’m writing an article about—”
“Clara told me over the phone, Bob,” she said, interrupting forcefully. “I have about thirty minutes available to give you a tour and answer any questions you may have.”
“That’s sounds fair enough,” he said, returning a fake smile.
“Let’s get started with a tour. There’s not much, except for our twenty-four-hour call room and bookkeeping, but I believe it will give you a good idea of what we’re all about,” she said, turning and starting off. Bob had no choice but to follow.
“We’ll see what you’re all about,” he murmured under his breath.
Lauren turned her head.
“Excuse me?”
“I was just talking to myself. You know—mental notes.”
“Oh yes—I do that all the time,” she said with a laugh. “This is our call room. Blah, blah, blah. This is our data storage room.”
Bob noted the location of the room, thinking it could be useful in gathering evidence against Shark. When they reached her office, she asked Bob to sit down while she got coffee and made a few phone calls. Bob noticed there were no personal pictures on her desk—no husband or children—and she wore no wedding band.
“Um, all right,” Bob said, rubbing his chin. He shook his head and muttered under his breath, “Come on, Bob—concentrate. You don’t have time for love right now.”
“Talking to yourself again?” Lauren said, back with coffee sooner than he’d expected.
Bob sat up straight.
“Uh, oh, yeah—more mental notes.”
“I see,” she said. She placed a cup of coffee with creamer and sugar next to him and walked around her desk to sit down with her own cup.
“Thank you—I missed my cup this morning,” Bob said.
“No problem. We try to accommodate as best we can. Ask away,” she said.
Bob hadn’t thought about any questions except about the crash, and he knew he shouldn’t start with those, or he’d raise suspension.
“Okay, let’s see,” he said, flipping through the blank pages of his notebook. “Do you mind if I record our conversation?”
“That’s fine. Wouldn’t want you to mess up any quo
tes,” she said jokingly.
“Right. How long have you guys been in business?” he said finally.
She answered the question with precision, along with ten or fifteen others. Bob was proud of himself. He thought he actually sounded like a journalist. After the initial questions were finished, he knew time was getting short because Lauren was starting to look at the wall clock.
“Just one or two more questions,” he said.
“That’s fine.”
“Care Ambulance Service has been in the news as of late.”
“Yes, we have,” Lauren said, a serious expression on her face now as she launched into a finely honed PR statement. “We at Care Ambulance Service are saddened by the loss of one of our employees and have taken every step to assure the public and our customers that this kind of incident will not happen again.”
“Did the driver have any previous traffic violations and arrests? Any past history with drugs?”
“No,” she said shortly.
“I read that he committed suicide in jail. Is that true?” Bob asked.
Lauren reached over the desk to Bob’s recorder and turned it off.
“I think our time is up, Bob.”
“By my watch, we have three more minutes.”
“Our time is up. Would you like to be shown out?”
“No, I believe I can find my own way,” he said, picking up his recorder and putting his notebook in pocket.
“You have a nice day, Bob.”
“It’s south Florida, Lauren. That’s not hard to do,” he said, walking out.
Bob reached the beauty queen. He sat there for a few minutes, going over in his mind what just happened. She was definitely hiding something, he thought. The queen cranked up after the third try, and he drove out the parking lot. Next stop: the Miami Police Station.
As Bob pulled out of the parking lot, Lauren was watching from her window. With a rusty old car like that, she thought, the nerd hasn’t published many articles.
***
Mary Catherine, Hector, and three other of Shark’s associates left a rain-soaked Miami International Airport on Tenish 4, an Airbus 300. Hector breathed a breath of relief. They were still on schedule with only a relatively short delay, considering the rain sweeping in from the tropical storm.
Tenish 4 was a medium range passenger plane converted into a cargo plane. At one time, the 222-inch diameter circular fuselage seated eight passengers across. Now it was mostly gutted and wide enough to hold two LD3 cargo containers side-by-side. The passengers were comfortable in a space right behind the pilot and copilot. The plane used the same basic engines and major systems as the DC-10 and had a cruising speed of nearly mach 1. This would be the longest trip Tenish Packaging had made by far. The exhausting trip with two layovers would not bother Mary Catherine. She’d specifically assigned two of her best and most trusted pilots to this flight.
“I wish you were younger,” Hector hissed, looking over Mary Catherine. “This is such a long flight, and it could be so much more interesting if the sight of an old woman didn’t sicken my manhood.” His three associates laughed and agreed with Hector, who was now rubbing his bushy mustache and showing his nicotine stained teeth.
Mary Catherine unbuckled her seatbelt, and with all the feminine wiles she could muster walked seductively to Hector, surprising him and his associates. Their catcalls added to the heat of the moment. She bent down till she was just a few centimeters from his face. That close she noticed his blackheads and oily skin and could smell and taste his stale breath.
“Hector.”
“Si, mi puta,” he said to muffled laughter in the background, the pilot and copilot looking nervously over their shoulders.
“When you were born, your mother should have put you in a sack and drowned you like the dog that you are.”
Laughter erupted like a volcano. Hector’s pals grabbed their stomachs and slapped each other on the back, and the pilots gave each other high fives. Hector’s blood drained out from his face as Mary Catherine turned around and seductively walked back to her seat. She hadn’t felt so good in years. She wore a coy smile for the rest of the trip, and Hector hardly said a word.
***
Bob’s mind was working overtime. While driving to the police station, he started mentally going over the interview. There were a few things that didn’t add up. First, the newspaper article said somebody stole the ambulance and was thrown in jail. Lauren failed to mention that. Also, while he’d heard of prisoners committing suicide in jail, the fact that the guy was connected to a drug lord set off alarms in Bob’s head.
“Very strange,” he said aloud, keeping his eyes on the road. He liked what he was feeling. All his senses were working together, trying to figure out a puzzle that had disturbed so many lives. Bob sped up. He was excited; this was adventure like he’d never experienced before.
***
It was a twenty-minute drive from Care Ambulance Service to Shark’s mansion. That worked out for Lauren. It gave her time to go over the entire interview and get her facts straight before seeing her boss. He didn’t like when one of his employees would call to see him and be only half ready to share information. She turned her Audi into Shark’s driveway and stopped at the gates. They were nearly twenty feet tall. Each gate had a shark with its mouth open at a visitor in the middle. She rolled her window down and waved at the camera. The gates creaked open, and she drove through. It was a long, winding driveway with thick twenty-foot greenery on both sides that created a canopy over the road. This provided more privacy from snoops on the highway and in the air, and if he had to bail suddenly the thick mass of shrubs and vines made a perfect cover. Lauren finally pulled up to the mansion with its adobe front and large, perfectly aged wooden doors. The driveway culminated in a circle whose pavement turned from asphalt to cobblestone, with a huge fountain in the middle. It was an angel whose hands were raised to the heavens, with water coming out of her palms to flow down her body and into the pool, which was filled with colorful oriental goldfish. Coming around the circle to the front of the mansion made Lauren feel as if she were on an ancient road in Europe. She exited her car, and the gardener greeted her with a nod as he raked the grass. The perfection of the manicured lawn made it look like an emerald green carpet that ran along the front of the house and accentuated the tropical bushes that dotted the lawn. Lauren returned the nod and noticed the side arm that he wore. He must have noticed Lauren’s eyes scanning him, and with a wink he patted his Glock.
A tall, middle-aged Hispanic women greeted her at the doors and bid her to come in with a warm smile. Lauren didn’t know the woman’s name, but she’d seen her many times on previous visits.
“This way. Shark has been expecting you,” the woman said in broken English. She turned, and they walked down the hall by ancient works of art—mainly pottery in this section of the house. Lauren followed closely, inspecting the woman and realizing she resembled Mary Poppins from the old Walt Disney movie. She suppressed a laugh.
Mary Poppins showed her to the room where Shark was waiting. It was deep in the mansion, and because of the mahogany lined walls it was dark. Aside from the bit of light that leaked between the thick drapes in front of the windows covering the back wall, there were two Tiffany lamps—one on a coffee stand next to a large leather sofa, and the other on the opposite side of the room, which was dominated by an expansive book shelf. He was leaning against a huge dark red desk covered with ornately carved sharks and dragons engaged in an endless battle of survival. He was dressed all in white in a natural fabric. His shirt was loosely buttoned.
“Hello, Shark,” she said
“Darling—it has been too long.”
“It was just yesterday,” Lauren said through a smile as she walked to him and put her arms around his waist. She leaned in to kiss him on the neck, but he stopped her.
“Wait. Tell me about the journalist,” he said, turning his head away from her. That was Shark—business first, pleasure later, whenev
er he had time for it.
“Okay,” she said, patting him on the chest. “His name is Bob McKaren. He said he was a freelance journalist writing a story about non-profit medical facilities like ours. I wasn’t suspicious until he started asking questions about Jeremy. I cut him off and sent him away.”
“You say his name was Bob McKaren?” Shark said, thinking over all the names of his enemies.
“Yes, that was his name.”
“And he just showed up without an appointment?”
“Yes.”
“Silly, silly girl,” Shark said, shaking his head as he flexed his hands into fists. Lauren started to back away from him. She’d seen this before.
“I’m sorry, baby,” she said, hands in front of her as if trying to deflect blows that might come.
Shark glared at her.
“I will take care of this. Just be sure I am notified immediately the next time our journalist friend shows back up at Care Ambulance Service.” Shark dropped his hands. She closed her eyes, knowing she wouldn’t be punished this time for any wrongdoings.
***
Bob entered the police station like a man on a mission. The last episode was fresh in his mind, when he was the butt of jokes. The front desk was manned by an obese twenty-something college fraternity member who called every visitor dude. He was working part time at the station to pay for his fraternity dues and the associated perks.
“Yeah, dude. Can I help you?” he said, looking up from his portable play station as he toyed with his black curly hair.
Bob smiled, realizing he was about to use the lad’s ignorance against him.
“Yeah, I’m from the Miami Herald,” he said in a hurried, tense voice. “I’m here to pick up the police report that Officer Elroy pulled for me.” Officer Elroy was the precinct’s head records keeper. Bob knew he worked days, Monday through Friday.
“Uh, let me see if he left the report on this desk,” frat dude said while shuffling through the mess of papers that had accumulated. “No, nothing here for the Herald.”
To make life harder for the kid, Bob pressed him.