Loitering with Intent sb-16

by Woods, Stuart

  “Thank you, Gigi,” Stone said. “I seem to have recovered, and if not, I know a doctor who can help me.” He kissed Annika on the ear. “Where are you from, Gigi?” he asked, changing the subject.

  “I’m from Coral Gables,” she replied.

  “And what did you do before you were married?”

  “Oh, lots of things,” she said. “I sold real estate, I sold boats, I started a couple of small businesses. I was even a private investigator for a while. That’s how I met Evan.”

  The waiter interrupted them to present a huge crown roast of lamb, which, apparently, was the wedding feast. Everyone applauded and then, when the lamb had been served, began eating.

  “Have you spent your whole career as a lawyer?” Evan asked Stone.

  “No, I was a police detective, which is where Dino and I met; we were partners.”

  “Are you still a cop, Dino?” Gigi asked.

  “I certainly am,” Dino replied.

  “Dino is the lieutenant in charge of the detective squad at the Nineteenth Precinct, on the Upper East Side of New York City,”

  Stone explained. “That’s how we both knew Tommy Sculley, who moved down here when he retired.”

  “Sculley seems like a good guy,” Evan said.

  “He is,” Stone replied. “We hadn’t seen him in years, until we came down here looking for you.”

  “Well, I’m glad you found me,” Evan said.

  “By the way,” Stone said, “you should see somebody right away about investing the proceeds of the sale; you’re losing a lot of interest every hour you wait.”

  “My grandfather is already dealing with that,” Evan replied.

  “He’s been heavily into investing ever since he retired from the company, nearly twenty years ago, and he’s done very well. He just has more to play with now. He’s put me on an allowance.”

  “I hope he hasn’t been too strict with you,” Stone said.

  “No, very liberal. And I don’t have to mow his lawn to earn it, the way I used to.”

  Stone laughed. “I used to have to sweep out my father’s woodworking shop every day to earn mine.”

  Annika, who was sitting next to Evan, reached for the bread basket and knocked over Evan’s champagne, some of it into his lap.

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” she said, half rising and bending over to use her napkin on the spill.

  There was a sound of breaking glass, and Annika fell sideways into Evan.

  Stone turned and saw blood on Evan’s jacket. “Gun!” Stone yelled.

  “Everybody down!” He threw himself at Annika and Evan, while on the other side of the table Dino got Gigi to the fl oor. Stone lifted his head and looked out the shattered window behind him but saw no one. He turned his attention to Evan, who was covered in blood. “Somebody call 911 for an ambulance and the police!” Stone yelled, as he reached to pull Annika away from Evan. He couldn’t believe that Evan had, once again, been the target of an assassin. Then he realized that the blood on Evan’s jacket was not Evan’s. It was Annika’s.

  51

  DINO PUT HIS head up and caught a glimpse of a motorcycle turning the corner from Simonton Street. “Motorcycle!”

  he yelled, pointing. He got a glimpse of a black helmet, before the machine disappeared down the block.

  Stone tossed him the car keys. “Go!” he yelled. “I’ll call Tommy!”

  Dino ran, as Stone grabbed his cell phone. Evan was giving Annika CPR.

  Dino got out of the restaurant in time to see the bike turn left at the next corner. He leapt into the rental car, which was parked in front of an antiques store across the street, and burned rubber. He was turning the corner when his cell phone rang. “Yeah?”

  “It’s Tommy. Where are you?”

  “The motorcycle turned left a block from the restaurant.”

  “Elizabeth Street?”

  “Yeah, that’s it,” Dino said, checking the sign at the next corner.

  “Now he’s turning right on that busy street, what is it?”

  “Eaton.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I’m going to block the bridge from the island,” Tommy said. “I’ll call you back as soon as I’ve given the order.”

  “Okay.” Dino slapped his phone shut and made the turn onto Eaton, scaring the life out of a woman trying to cross the street. He could see the motorcycle, three or four blocks up the straight street, passing cars with abandon. His phone rang again. “Yeah?”

  “I’ve got two cars on the way to the turnoff for U.S. One. Anybody leaving the island has to go that way.”

  “The bike is red, looks Japanese,” Dino said. “I can’t get close enough for a plate, but he’s wearing a green windbreaker and a black helmet. He’ll be at the entrance to the Navy base in a few seconds.”

  “I’ve got another car headed to the intersection of Eaton and Roosevelt Boulevard,” Tommy said. “I’ve told them to ram him, if possible.”

  “He’s past the Navy entrance,” Dino said, “headed toward the bridge over Garrison Bight, where the sports fi shermen dock.”

  “My car is at the light he’s coming up to,” Tommy said.

  “I’m closing in on him just a little,” Dino said. He whipped around a car and jammed the accelerator to the floor as he ran up the bridge. He had to slow for a curve after leaving the bridge, and he looked up to see the intersection ahead. A police car on the other side of Roosevelt was plowing through the intersection as the motorcycle reached it. The rider braked, slid sideways, then regained balance, missing the cop car by inches. He turned onto Roosevelt and accelerated.

  “Your guy at Roosevelt missed him,” Dino said. “He’s headed up the boulevard now, and he must be doing eighty. Your car is backing up to get onto Roosevelt.” Dino turned on his flashing caution lights and began using his horn.

  “Don’t kill yourself or anybody else!” Tommy said. “We’ll head him off at the pass.”

  Dino eased off and got stuck behind a line of traffic. Ten seconds later, he was in oncoming traffic, blowing his horn over and over.

  Now he was free and up to ninety miles an hour. He saw the bike make the curve to the right. By the time he got to the turn, he was in the wrong lane again, signaling for a left turn onto U.S. 1. He made the corner with a great screeching of tires and saw two cop cars blocking the bridge. The motorcycle was on the sidewalk, getting past them.

  “Shit!” Dino yelled, slamming on his brakes. He held his badge out the window, blowing his horn, but he had to come to a complete stop. “That’s the guy!” he yelled at the two policemen, who were watching the motorcycle disappear down the road. The cops dived into their cars and got them turned around, then Dino was bringing up the rear of a procession, as the two police cars headed up U.S. 1.

  “Tommy,” Dino yelled into the phone, “the bike got past the cops on the bridge, and he’s headed north.” Then, as they passed a wide street forking to the right, Dino thought he caught a glimpse of a motorcycle down that road, turning a corner. He put his car into a four-wheel drift and made the fork. What the hell, he thought, the cops have got the main road covered.

  Dino was still driving fast, but he slowed at every corner, looking for the motorcycle. Then, a quarter-mile down the road, he saw it, lying on its side in the gutter. Two small boys were standing over it, looking at it. Dino slammed on his brakes, reversed and turned into the street.

  He got out of the car and ran over to the motorcycle, which was still running. That, he supposed, was what was fascinating the two boys. “Kids,” he said breathlessly, “did you see the rider get off?”

  They both nodded.

  “Which way did he go?”

  They pointed down the street.

  “Is he on foot?”

  “Naw,” one of the kids said. “He got in a car and drove off.” He pointed at the rubber the man had left behind.

  “Straight down the road?”

  “Naw, he turned that way at the corner,” the boy said, pointing right
.

  “What kind of car?”

  “Ford,” one kid said.

  “Toyota,” the other said. They began to argue.

  “Shut up!” Dino said. “What color?”

  “Black,” one said.

  “Green,” the other said.

  “Shit,” Dino muttered to himself, running back to his car.

  “Tommy,” he said into the phone, “you still there?”

  “Yeah,” Tommy said.

  “The bike took a right at a fork in the road.”

  “I know where that is.”

  “He took another right, abandoned the bike and took off in a car, turned right at the next corner. He could be headed back toward Key West.”

  “Holy shit!” Tommy yelled. “Call you back.”

  Dino went back to the motorcycle and turned it off. There was a long leather scabbard buckled to a knee guard. His phone rang.

  “Yeah?”

  “We’re searching the whole island now,” Tommy said.

  “The bike is . . .” Dino looked for a street sign and gave him the name. “It’s got a scabbard for a rifle strapped to it. Get somebody out here; there may be prints.”

  “Right,” Tommy said, and he hung up again.

  “Listen to me, kids,” he said, showing them his badge. “Don’t you touch that bike, and don’t you let anybody else touch it. More cops will be here in a minute.” He gave each of them a ten, then he got back into his car and turned around.

  There was no point in continuing his search, since he didn’t know what he was looking for. He drove back to the Marquesa restaurant. As he reached the corner he saw a pair of EMTs wheeling a gurney out into the street. Nobody was holding an IV bottle over her, and the sheet was pulled over her head. He went into the restaurant and found Stone, sitting on a bar stool, talking into his cell phone. Stone hung up. “That was Tommy. They’ve lost the son of a bitch,” he said. “They’re setting up another roadblock at the Seven Mile Bridge, but he could be back in Key West now, or on a plane.”

  “Annika?” Dino asked.

  “The bullet went in here,” Stone said, pointing to a spot over his left ear, “and came out over her right eye. She had a pulse for a couple of minutes, but I lost it. The EMTs said there was never a chance.” Stone slumped over the bar. “Now what do I do?” he said, disconsolately.

  52

  STONE WAS STRETCHED out on his bed, half asleep. Dino had contacted Annika’s sister, who was on her way to Key West, and he was now on the phone, making arrangements with a funeral director whom Tommy had recommended.

  Stone felt as if he had been beaten up—stiff and sore and slightly nauseated. He sat up and put his feet on the floor and his head in his hands, then he got up, went into the bathroom and vomited. He wiped his face with a cold washcloth and went out to the porch. Dino and Tommy were sitting there.

  “How are you feeling?” Dino asked.

  “Lousy, but we have things to do.”

  “Everything has been done that can be done,” Dino said. “Go lie down.”

  “I can’t,” Stone said. “There’s more to do.”

  “What?” Dino asked.

  “We’ve got to keep Evan alive,” Stone said.

  “He’s okay for the moment,” Tommy said. “Dino and I are both carrying, and you should be, too.”

  “That’s not what I’m talking about. Dino, did you hear my brief conversation with Gigi in the restaurant, right before the shooting?”

  “I heard her apologize for hitting you over the head, that’s all.”

  “I asked her where she was from, what sort of work she did before she met Evan.”

  “I didn’t hear that part, I guess.”

  “She said she had sold real estate and boats and that she had started a couple of small businesses. She also said she had been a private investigator for a while, and that’s how she met Evan.”

  Dino stared at him. “You’re thinking . . .”

  Stone nodded. “All this time we’ve been trying to connect the dots, trying to figure out who had motive and the connection with Manny White, and we forgot about Gigi.”

  “Well,” Dino said, “she’s certainly got motive now, and if she worked for Manny . . .”

  “If she knows Manny well, she’d know about his little sideline,”

  Tommy said.

  “I think we’re all on the same page now,” Stone said. “Except Evan.”

  “And the guy’s still out there,” Tommy said. “And so’s Evan.” He nodded toward the walkway.

  Stone looked up to see Evan coming down the walk, and they pulled up another chair for him.

  “How are you feeling?” Evan asked Stone.

  “I’m all right.”

  “I want to tell you how sorry I am,” Evan said.

  “Thanks,” Stone replied, “but I’m afraid you’ve got more problems than I have.”

  “You think he’ll try again?”

  “Yes, but there’s more to it than that.”

  “What else?”

  Stone took a deep breath. “Have you ever heard of Manny White Investigations?”

  “Yeah,” Evan replied. “Gigi used to work for them.”

  “Evan, all three of us knew Manny White when we were on the NYPD, years ago.”

  “I never met the guy,” Evan said. “Gigi quit after we met.”

  “We think Manny White was the middleman who hired the guy who shot you last time.”

  “That’s quite a coincidence,” Evan said.

  “There are more coincidences,” Stone said. “We think he also sent the man who killed your father. The bullets from your shooting and his are a match; they were fired from the same gun, and when Tommy gets back the ballistics report on today’s shooting, we think there’s going to be another match.”

  “This is bizarre,” Evan said.

  “There’s still more,” Stone said. “The first person to come under suspicion for both shootings was your grandfather.”

  “That’s ridiculous.”

  “Probably so, but he was the only one with a fi nancial motive for both shootings. Or at least he was at the time.”

  “Who do you suspect now?”

  “There’s only one other person with both a motive and a connection to Manny White,” Stone said, then waited for it to sink in. There were clearly wheels turning in Evan’s head, then the penny dropped. “No, that’s crazy.”

  “Think about it,” Stone said. “Killing your father gave you a much larger share of the proceeds from the sale of the business, didn’t it?”

  “Yes, but Gigi would have had no claim on that.”

  “Not then,” Stone said, “but she was planning ahead, and now things are different. I haven’t read your will, but I’m just guessing that Gigi is the principal benefi ciary.”

  Evan stared at him. “She’s the only benefi ciary,” he said.

  “When your father tried to have you killed she must have been very angry.”

  “She was. Very.”

  “So she called Manny White and arranged for Warren to be killed.”

  Evan was looking at his feet and shaking his head.

  “And when the two of you were married and you signed that will . . .”

  “Where is the will?” Evan asked.

  Stone got up, went inside, got the will from his pocket, came back to the porch and handed Evan the envelope.

  Evan stared at it but said nothing.

  “I know how hard this is,” Stone said.

  “No, you don’t,” Evan snapped. “I wish you’d never told me this. I would rather have . . .” He trailed off.

  “You’d rather have remained fat, dumb and happy and let her have you killed?”

  “It would have been easier,” Evan said.

  “No, it wouldn’t have. You’d have figured it out eventually, but with that shooter still in Key West, he might have gotten to you before you did.”

  “She couldn’t have done this,” Evan said.

  �
��Evan, how many people knew where you were having your wedding lunch today?” Dino asked.

  Evan thought about it. “Just the people at the table and the JP,” he replied.

  “And whose idea was it to have the lunch at the Marquesa restaurant?”

  “Gigi’s.”

  “And who chose the table by the Simonton Street window?”

  “Gigi,” he replied.

  “I think you’ve just narrowed the list of suspects,” Stone said. Evan tore the will into small pieces.

  “I’m afraid the will doesn’t matter anymore,” Stone said.

  “Why not?” Evan asked.

  “Because there’s a marriage certificate. The JP would have fi led it, and you’ll be mailed a copy. Under Florida law, she stands to inherit everything you have.”

  “I just can’t believe this,” Evan said, shaking his head.

  “If not for Annika’s move toward you at lunch, Gigi would now be a very rich widow.”

  “Can you prove all of this?” Evan asked.

  “No,” Stone said.

  “If you’re right, this guy is just going to keep coming after me, isn’t he?”

  “Yes.”

  “What should I do?”

  “First, let me find you a Key West attorney and file for an annulment.”

  “How long will that take?”

  “I don’t know, perhaps several weeks.”

  “And what am I going to do for that time?” Evan asked.

  “Well, for a start,” Stone said, “don’t consummate the marriage.”

  “What else?”

  “Only one person can connect Gigi to the shooting today,” Stone said. “So we’ve got to find a way to persuade Manny White to tell us everything.”

  “How are you going to do that?” Evan asked.

  “I don’t know,” Stone said, “but you can’t go back to your cottage. We’re going to have to move you to someplace safer.”

  Tommy spoke up. “My department has a little house we use to stash witnesses sometimes,” he said. “I could take him there.”

  “Where’s Gigi at the moment?” Stone asked Evan.

  “She went for a walk.”