Die Laughing: 5 Comic Crime Novels

by Steve Brewer

  “Grisby claims he had Sanders covered with a shotgun and they were just waiting for the police, when Sanders suddenly went for his gun.”

  “Doesn’t make sense,” Nash said.

  “Neither does Grisby shooting him twice. Sort of like bombing Nagasaki after hitting Hiroshima.”

  The pieces weren’t fitting together. The key to the case was finding out what actually happened between Sanders and Grisby just before the shooting. But Nash couldn’t have seen anything from the channel. Neither could Bobby from the seawall. So far, it was Grisby’s word against a dead man’s.

  “Anything else, Gerald? Anything else I need to know?”

  Nash glanced around uneasily, as if someone might be eavesdropping. “There’s one thing I haven’t told you. It wasn’t just the three of us. We had a boat, a big-ass Bertram with a saltwater tank. It was anchored a half mile outside the gate. A two-man crew. They were supposed to bring the dolphins on board in canvas nets.”

  Steve didn’t get it. “Once the dolphins were through the gate, why not just let them swim free in the Bay?”

  “Because they might go back up the channel to the park.”

  Meaning the dolphins liked it there, Steve thought. Spunky and Misty probably figured they’d been comped at the Four Seasons, and then along come these yahoos who want to force them to work for their supper. “Who the hell are the two guys? And where are they now?”

  Nash shrugged. “Sanders hired them. I never knew their names.”

  Nash finished his sorry story. When the cop cars came screaming from Virginia Key toward the park, the two guys panicked and took off in the Bertram. The dolphins swam God knows where. Passion must have headed to Crandon Park Marina, where she ditched her Jet Ski. And no word from her since.

  Steve mulled it over.

  Passion missing.

  Sanders dead.

  Two nameless guys from the boat running loose somewhere.

  And Gerald Nash left alone, facing life in prison.

  Steve didn’t know if his client was guilty of murder, but he surely could cop a plea to stupidity in the first degree.

  Ten

  NO MORE WAYWARD BREASTS

  Driving south on Dixie Highway, Victoria couldn’t wait to tell Steve the news.

  She’d been deputized and had a badge and gun to prove it.

  Specially appointed Assistant State Attorney for the 11th Judicial Circuit, in and for Miami-Dade County, Florida.

  There’d be a story in tomorrow’s paper. With more to come.

  It was just what Solomon & Lord needed. A high-profile trial. And a winner. Felony murder was a piece of cake for the prosecution. In most murder trials, the state must prove the defendant intended the harm. Not so in felony murder, where “strict liability” was the rule. If Gerald Nash committed a felony and Sanders died as a result, Nash is guilty even if he didn’t intend to cause an injury, much less death, and even if he did not, as a matter of fact, cause the death.

  Draconian, maybe. But hey, that’s the law.

  They’d have new cases rolling in. Big cases. They could drop some of Steve’s old clients. When Steve had first told her he defended personal injury cases, he never mentioned the lap dancers at The Beav. His arguments on motion calendars could be so embarrassing.

  “A man who buys a lap dance assumes the risk that he’ll suffer whiplash from an enhanced and wayward breast.”

  No more wayward breasts, she decided.

  State v. Nash could solve multiple problems. There’d be a steady flow of checks. Okay, not a fortune, but state employment would solve the current cash-flow crunch. And when those new clients rolled in with big retainers, her professional life with Steve would be easier, too. No more scraping up leftovers in the bargain basement of the courthouse. No more ads on bus benches: Solomon & Lord. Hablamos Español.

  Now Victoria cruised south past Coral Gables and headed toward Kendall. Her destination was Sunniland Park, where Steve had taken Bobby for baseball practice. She felt the buzz that comes with good news and high expectations.

  She’d moved in with Steve six months earlier, not without some doubts and fears. Her mother, Irene Lord, known as The Queen to friends, family, and Neiman-Marcus salesclerks, hadn’t approved of Steve on many grounds. The Queen’s multicount indictment was divided evenly between finances and status. Steve didn’t make enough money. He didn’t belong to the Opera Guild. He had a habit of being thrown in jail for contempt. And you’d have to mug Steve to get him to the Sunday night seafood buffet at the country club.

  At first, her mother tried to persuade Victoria not to live with Steve. Her advice had a quaint feel to it. “A man won’t buy the cow if he’s getting the crème fraîche for free.”

  The Queen’s attitude changed once Steve helped her when a con man fleeced her out of a bundle. “If Stephen makes you happy, dear, that’s good enough for me.” That was as much of an endorsement as The Queen could muster, and it would have to do.

  There’d been the problems of their different professional styles, of course. But living with Steve had been easier than Victoria expected. She had no real complaints, though she wondered why it was necessary for the TV to be tuned to ESPN twenty-four hours a day.

  Steve had been caring and considerate. Bobby was positively loveable. Victoria spent as much time with the boy as possible and had clearly become a welcome substitute for his abusive mother.

  So with the car radio tuned to the all-news station, and the lead story about the shooting at Cetacean Park, Victoria smiled to herself as she pulled into the parking lot of the baseball field.

  Yes, these were good times. And Steve was going to be so proud of her.

  SOLOMON’S LAWS

  3. When arguing with a woman who is strong, intelligent, and forthright, consider using trickery, artifice, and deceit.

  Eleven

  LOVE THE MAN, HATE THE GRIN

  Steve wanted to punch out the fat guy in the yarmulke but figured that wouldn’t help Bobby make the team.

  “We don’t steal bases,” Yarmulke Guy said.

  “What do you mean, ‘we,’ Rabbi?” Steve replied.

  “I’m not a rabbi, Mr. Solomon, and you know that. Are you ridiculing my spirituality?”

  “Heaven forbid,” Steve said with as much irony as he could muster.

  The Beth Am Bobcats were practicing at Sunniland Park, and Steve was desperately trying to make his point without pissing off Yarmulke Guy, the team’s coach, whose real name was Ira Kreindler.

  “There’s no league rule against stealing bases,” Steve said.

  “I adhere to a Higher Authority.” Kreindler looked skyward, either toward heaven or the overhead Metro-rail tracks, Steve couldn’t tell which.

  “God doesn’t want my nephew stealing second base?”

  “We’re talking ethics. Robert can advance to second if a subsequent batter earns a hit or if the defense makes an error. But stealing?” Kreindler made a cluck-clucking sound.

  Kreindler ran a wholesale meat business when he wasn’t fouling up the synagogue’s youth baseball team. His blue-and-white trucks, Kreindler Means Kosher, could be seen double-parked in front of glatt delicatessens in North Miami Beach. Around his neck he wore a golden chai that must have been chiseled from the mother lode, heavy enough to hunch his shoulders. He had a major-league paunch hanging over his plaid Bermuda shorts, and while he might have been able to slice brisket with speed and precision, Steve doubted he could run from first to third without a pit stop.

  “You know I played some college ball, Kreindler?” Steve gestured toward Dixie Highway. The University of Miami was less than five miles straight up the road.

  “Of course I know. You’re Last Out Solomon. You were picked off third base to end the College World Series.”

  Which is when Steve considered punching the guy out, before concluding it wouldn’t set a good example for Bobby. “I was a lousy hitter. But I could run, and once I learned how to study the pitchers, I led the
team in stolen bases.”

  “You stole bases because you could?” Kreindler asked.

  “Of course.”

  “So you believe kol de’alim gevar. ‘Might makes right.’ ”

  “I believe in maximizing every kid’s potential. I also believe in winning, and I’m not gonna apologize for it.”

  “Do you really think Robert’s up to this sort of thing?” Kreindler said.

  “Stealing bases? Sure, once I teach him.”

  “Playing ball. I mean, with his problems . . .”

  “So that’s it!”

  “The other boys can be so cruel. Calling Robert a ‘spaz.’ That sort of thing.”

  “Then it’s your job to straighten out the little punks.”

  “How?”

  “Shake ’em by the throat. Make ’em run laps. Teach them a sense of decency.”

  “Surely, Mr. Solomon, you know it’s more complicated than that.”

  “Not for a real coach. You’ve gotta kick some kosher ass, Kreindler.”

  They were standing on the clipped green grass of the outfield. The Bobcats were practicing their fielding, resulting in numerous ground balls trickling between spindly Jewish legs. Deep in right field, as far from harm’s way as possible, Bobby picked dandelions. The boy had been moping all day. It hadn’t sunk in at first, Steve thought. But when Bobby realized that Spunky and Misty were gone, that there was no way to find them, the pain tugged at his heart. Steve had hoped baseball would take Bobby’s mind off his lost pals.

  Ten minutes earlier, Steve had been teaching his nephew the fine points of base stealing. With a right-handed pitcher, watch his heels. If he lifts his right heel before the left, he’s throwing to first. If the left heel leaves the ground first, he’s throwing to the plate.

  That’s when the Kreindler, bald spot covered by his yarmulke, his nose smeared with sunblock, shades clipped onto his glasses, waddled over to instruct Steve on ethics.

  If Steve hadn’t missed the league organizational meeting, maybe he’d be the Beth Am coach. Unfortunately, he’d spent that night behind bars, in a holding cell, a little matter of ordering pizza and two six-packs of beer for a jury deliberating a DUI case. Not that Steve minded an occasional contempt citation. One of the first things he’d told Victoria was that a lawyer who’s afraid of jail is like a surgeon who’s afraid of blood.

  Just then, as Steve was thinking about Victoria, he caught sight of her, walking toward him along the first-base line. Long strides with those tennis player legs. She wore a green silk blouse and a white skirt and Versace shoes of white, green, and red, sort of like the Italian flag. Steve had been there when Victoria bought the shoes. She’d nearly gone for a brand called “United Nude,” which the salesclerk boasted was “a sculpture, not a shoe.” Both pairs looked as comfortable as walking on broken glass.

  She carried a red leather handbag, a Hermès Birkin. Steve wouldn’t have known a Hermès Birkin from a kosher gherkin, but Victoria seemed overjoyed when her mother gave her the bag. He didn’t understand what the fuss was about until Irene Lord said it had been a gift from a French gazillionaire she’d met on the Riviera, and that the damn thing had cost fifteen thousand dollars. Steve could understand spending that much on a flat-screen, high-def TV with surround sound, but a handbag? There was so much about women that completely bewildered him.

  Victoria waved at Bobby, who now sat, cross-legged, talking to an egret that had landed in the outfield. Steve told Kreindler they’d discuss baseball ethics later and trotted toward the woman he loved, intercepting her at the first-base bag. She tossed both arms around his neck, and they kissed. Not a howdy, how are you kiss. Deeper. A wanna jump your bones kiss.

  “Wow,” he said.

  “I have great news.”

  “Hey, me, too, Vic.”

  “Got a new case. A big one.”

  “Likewise.”

  “That shooting at Cetacean Park,” she said. “I’m going to prosecute.”

  “What?” He couldn’t have heard her correctly.

  She couldn’t have said “prosecute.”

  They were defense lawyers. They represented the persecuted, the downtrodden, the occasionally innocent.

  Prosecute? She might as well have said, “I’m going to become a prostitute.”

  “Pincher’s conflicted out,” Victoria babbled on. “I’ve been appointed.” She reached into her ridiculously expensive handbag and flipped out a badge, embossed with a gold star. Special Assistant State Attorney. “The guy you caught. Gerald Nash. He’s being charged with—”

  “Felony murder. I know. I’m defending him.”

  That stopped her. But only for a second. She blinked and said, “No way, Steve.”

  “He retained me this morning. Without a retainer. But still, he hired me.”

  Victoria chewed at her lower lip. “So what are we going to do?”

  “Easy. You’ve got to withdraw.”

  “Why me?”

  “Because it’s my case, Vic. I got there first.”

  At home plate, Ira Kreindler was hitting fungoes to the outfielders, or trying to, but mostly he dribbled soft grounders down the foul line.

  “You’re a witness,” she said. “You can’t represent the defendant.”

  “Two cops saw me grab the guy and arrested him on the spot. My testimony’s not needed.”

  “Did you hear Nash make any statements against interest?”

  “If I did, I sure as hell wouldn’t tell you.”

  In the outfield, a pop fly headed toward Bobby, who staggered under it, waving his arms like a drunk chasing a butterfly. The ball plopped into and out of his glove, bounced off the top of his head, and dropped to the ground. Bobby rubbed his head and spun around 360 degrees, looking for the ball.

  “Nice catch, spaz!” Rich Shactman yelled from center field. He was the best player on the team, a powerfully built slugger, a kid who looked like he’d been shaving since kindergarten. Steve itched to tell the punk to lay off Bobby, but part of growing up is learning how to handle bullies, so he kept quiet.

  Turning back to Victoria, Steve said, “I’m gonna have to pull rank here.”

  “Rank?”

  “I’m the senior partner.”

  “We’re equal partners.”

  “But I’ve got seniority. Rank and grade. If this were the army, I’d be the general.”

  “If this were the army, you’d be court-martialed.”

  “So, tell me this: When you opened that fancy bag of yours just now, was that a gun I saw?”

  “What about it?”

  “Are you going all Thelma and Louise on me?”

  “Every prosecutor gets a gun.”

  “You’re talking like this isn’t a one-case deal. Like you’re planning on some permanent changes.”

  “Would you just relax, Steve? I’ll be back as soon as the case is over. Think of the publicity I’ll get. This gives us a chance to upgrade our clientele.”

  “Nothing wrong with the cases I bring in.”

  “Really? What about Needlemeyer versus Needlemeyer? The kid suing his parents for being ugly.”

  “Not just being ugly. Passing on the genes.”

  “That’s what I mean. Junk cases, when I can win a murder trial.”

  “You mean lose a murder trial, because if I’m defending, it’s gonna be talking cockatoos all over again.”

  “You planning to take a dump on my sleeve?”

  “Anyone who steps into court against me risks utter and total humiliation. You know that.”

  “Now you’re threatening me?”

  “Just telling it like it is, cupcake.”

  “Cupcake? You’re really trying to piss me off, aren’t you?”

  “Why would I do that, sweetie?”

  “Because you think I’ll lose my cool. You think I’ll say nasty things about what a bastard you are. Then I’ll feel guilty and apologize. After that, I’ll have no choice but to withdraw from the case and let you have your wa
y.”

  “You think I’m that clever?”

  “I think you’re that devious. But it’s not going to work.”

  Steve didn’t reply. He grinned at her, as if he’d just filled a straight on Fifth Street, and she held nothing but a pair of cracked aces.

  ***

  Love the man, hate the grin.

  I do love him, Victoria reminded herself.

  But I hate that lopsided, wiseass, gotcha! grin.

  Daring her to try a case against him. Hauling out the memory of birdshit on her jacket, thinking he could intimidate her. But she saw right through him.

  “You’re scared, aren’t you, Steve?”

  “What?”

  “You’re scared of a powerful woman. So you’ve got to swing your club like some caveman.”

  “You’ve been reading Maureen Dowd again, haven’t you?”

  “When we go out to dinner, why do you always pay?”

  “I don’t. I put it on the firm credit card. You’re paying half.”

  “But you insist on using your card. Why can’t I put it on mine?”

  “What difference does it make?”

  “Are you playing dumb or are you really that obtuse?”

  “Is there a third choice?”

  “You maintain control by whipping out that card. MasterCard becomes your penis.”

  “That’s your second dick metaphor in the last minute. Are you horny?”

  “Ha!”

  “Because you’re a little flushed. Or is it that time of month?”

  She took a deep breath and reminded herself, yet again, that she loved this man, no matter how aggravating he could be. “Last bastion of male chauvinism, attacking our reproductive system, as if it makes us weak. When, in fact, it’s your Y chromosome that makes you the weaker sex.”

  “You have been reading Maureen Dowd.”

  “It’s an evolutionary fact. The male chromosome is losing genes. Men are losing their potency, but you still try to act like Genghis Khan.”

  “What are you saying? You want to go off the pill?”