Shadow Men

by Jonathon King

  While Billy checked more calculations, I used one of his office lines to call the Frontier Hotel.

  “Bar, can I get cha?” said the woman’s voice after eight rings.

  “Josie. This is Max Freeman, the tall guy who was in the other day meeting with Nate Brown?”

  “Yeah. I know who you are—always pullin’ trouble behind you.”

  “Yeah, well, I need to get a message to Mr. Brown, and he said you’d be able to contact him.”

  There was silence on the other end.

  “If he comes in, I’ll contact him,” she finally said.

  Right, I thought. Maybe next month. But what was I going to do?

  “OK, fair enough. If you contact him, can you give him this cell phone number and tell him to call me as soon as possible?” I read the number off to her, going slowly, pronouncing clearly, not knowing if she was even bothering to write it down.

  “OK?” I said.

  “OK. I got it. But I don’t think Mr. Brown ever used a phone in his life. He usually finds folks when he wants to find them.”

  “Yeah, I know. But these were his instructions, to call you, Josie, OK?”

  “He said me? By name?”

  “That’s right.”

  “OK, then. I’ll get it to him,” she said, and might have let some point of pride slip into her voice.

  “Thanks very much, Josie. I owe you,” I said, but hung up before she could ask me how much.

  I went back to the map. Billy had marked off mileage amounts along the roadway, and distances from recreation turnouts to the X’s.

  “It’s g-going to b-be very inaccurate,” he said, maybe not knowing, since he had never been in the Glades himself, how obvious the statement was.

  “You plan to say anything to the Mayes kid about all this?”

  Billy shook his head.

  “N-Not him. N-Not PalmCo’s people,” he said. “We keep it to ourselves and see wh-what we come up with. This way we keep it out of the p-press. No one knows what we’re after or where we’re l-looking.”

  I thought of getting my truck swept again by Ramón and his crew. I thought about the look of satisfaction on Nate Brown’s face when he’d ditched us into the mangroves and lost the helicopter tail.

  “You’re optimistic,” I said.

  “I’m a lawyer,” he responded. “It’s w-what I do.”

  I used his phone to page Richards and then rolled up a copy of our treasure map.

  “I’ll let you know when Brown gets in touch with me,” I said.

  “Good h-hunting.”

  I was in the truck trying to think of a good place to take a nap when Richards answered the page.

  “Hey. What’s up?”

  “Dinner tonight?”

  “You beat me to it, Freeman. Can we just have something at my place? I’ve got someone staying with me and it might help to have you there, you know, to give your perspective on things?”

  “Sounds like your friend in denial,” I said. “She too scared to go home now?”

  “You’re quite the detective, Freeman. Can’t talk now though, I’m in the shop. How about six thirty or seven?”

  “I’m there.”

  “Good.”

  My brain was feeling clunky from lack of sleep, too much alcohol and too much grinding. I drove south on A1A until I got to the entrance of a beachside county park, paid the seven dollars to get in and then found a quiet parking spot in the shade of a line of Australian pines. I rolled both windows down for a cross-breeze and then put my seat back. Within five minutes I was asleep.

  The squawk of a bird woke me, or maybe the yelp of a child, or the clatter of beach chairs being loaded into a car. It took me a moment to realize where I was, but then I banged my knee on the steering wheel and the quick shot of pain cleared my head. I checked my watch. It had been two hours. I climbed out of the truck and took a few minutes to stretch out the kinks in my back and the tightness in my hamstrings. Behind me the western sky was smeared in soft washes of burnt orange and purple. To the east, through the trees, the surf was slushing up onto the beach. I walked to the park rest room and stood at the sink splashing cold water into my face and finger-combing my hair. You’ll be quite the date tonight, Freeman.

  I took A1A down to Lauderdale, stopped at a doughnut shop, just for the coffee. I passed the spot where the Galt Ocean Hotel once stood, where Joe Namath made his outlandish promise at poolside that he would beat the Colts in Super Bowl III and then went out and did it. I made a special pass by the Elbo Room, the corner bar where spring break was immortalized in the 1960s. It was a cool and lazy evening, and I was in an unusually buoyant mood until I parked in front of Richards’s place and heard a harsh, guttural yell coming from the garden entrance at the side of the house. There were two unfamiliar cars in the driveway, a two-door Toyota and a black Trans Am with a spoiler on the back and an air-scooped hood. I was running the possibilities through my head when the man’s barking sounded again.

  “Goddamnit, Kathleen. I need to talk with you now! I know you’re in there!”

  I started up the driveway, shifting into cop mode, feeling the trace of adrenaline trickling into my bloodstream. Signal 38. Domestic disturbance. Worst and most unpredictable call a patrolman gets.

  I came around the corner and his back was to me. He was dressed in civilian clothes, jeans and a tank-top T-shirt. He had one arm over the top of the wooden fence gate to Richards’s backyard, searching, I assumed, for the lift latch that would unlock it.

  “Come on, Richards,” he said, taking his voice down a notch in volume but not in anger. “I know what the fuck you’re doing. Stay out of it and let her come out and talk, just talk.” He lowered his voice further and whispered, “you fucking bitch.”

  I took a few more quiet steps, set my feet and said, “Nice talk about a superior officer, McCrary.”

  His head twisted around like he’d been bitten in the ass and when he recognized me he slowly came off the fence and squared up.

  “This ain’t your business, P.I.,” he said, and I could see the muscles in his jaws flex. Here was something male to put his anger on, something he could understand.

  “I believe you’re trespassing, officer. Not a pretty charge to show up on a report to your sergeant,” I said, measuring the distance between us and moving just slightly to my right away from his dominant hand. I had spent too many years at Frankie O’Hara’s father’s gym in South Philly, first as just a kid in the neighborhood fascinated by what went on inside, and later as a sparring partner for the professionals who worked there. You never forget the fundamentals or the moves after they’d been punched into you by professionals.

  “And you’re just the kind of prick who’d write one up on another cop, aren’t you, P.I.?” I watched his hands flex at his sides and then curl into fists.

  “It might be a good time for you to relax a bit, McCrary, and take a walk. I think—”

  He swung with the right hand I was expecting, throwing his weight behind it and throwing himself off balance. The distance I’d kept made him reach and I slid behind the punch and chucked him with two hands in the shoulder to keep his momentum going. In the ring I would have fired an overhand hook into the back of his ear as he passed. But I just stepped back as his elbow went down on the hood of Richards’s car and he regained his balance.

  “You want to stick ‘assault on a civilian’ into the report, too, McCrary? You’re a real bright guy.”

  This time his hands came up in a real fighter’s pose and there was a calculated rage in his eyes. But like most amateurs, he carried his right fist too low, and a combination of calculated punches was already clicking in my muscles when I heard a metallic snap and the groan of hinges behind me. I saw McCrary’s eyes change.

  “You’re a solid asshole, McCrary. Back off! Now!”

  I took a step back out of his range and cut my eyes over to the sight of Richards, her 9 mm extended in both hands, the bead on McCrary’s chest.

 
; He opened his hands first, and then his mouth as he stepped back.

  “OK. OK. Shit. OK,” he stammered, and I watched the emotion flush out of his face.

  “You’re out of fucking control, Officer,” Richards barked, and McCrary nodded his head and showed her his palms. He was breathing hard. We were all breathing hard.

  “OK. OK. Look, I’m sorry,” he said, visibly gathering himself. But Richards did not lower her gun.

  “None of that sorry shit, McCrary,” she snapped back at him. “That doesn’t wash with me. You’ve assaulted two of my guests on my private property. I have already cut you way too much of a break by not calling this in and having you cuffed in the street. You will back off and leave the premises right now, and you’d better have a long, hard talk with your sergeant tonight, McCrary. Understand?”

  “OK. OK. Fine. Look. Just put the weapon down, OK? Look.…”

  “Now!” snapped Richards, cutting him off.

  McCrary may not have had a full appreciation for Richards’s limits, but I had witnessed her pull a trigger, and I had seen the result.

  “OK. OK,” he said, and this time he began to step back. I watched him nodding his head in acquiescence, but I also picked up a flicker of sharp light in his eyes. Richards lowered her gun but did not move as we watched him get into the Trans Am, back out and, maybe to his credit, or maybe not, pull away slowly and disappear down the street.

  Richards was now looking down at the ground, the gun hanging from her fingers.

  “How you doin’?” I said, and she looked up at me.

  “Just swell. You?”

  “A little wired,” I said. “You know, a little macho interruptus.”

  “Can’t let you boys have all the fun,” she said, but the joke was forced.

  “You think it was a good idea not to just have patrol come pick him up?” I said.

  “What? And have his boys come over and slap him on the back and tell him to chill and take him out for a few beers and make sure nothing gets written up?”

  There wasn’t much I could say. I’d seen it work that way myself.

  “No. I called his sergeant and then the captain. You start working up the chain of command and those guys aren’t going to swallow a black mark on their own jacket for the sake of some dipshit patrol officer.”

  “Yeah, well, you hope not,” I said, and that’s when she finally looked into my eyes and seemed to click over to who she was talking to and the background my father’s story brought with it.

  “You hungry after all that, Freeman?” she said, changing her voice. I followed her through the gate and relocked it behind us. When we walked through the back French doors, she quietly put her gun into a kitchen drawer and slid it shut. There were a couple of lamps lit deep in the living room and sitting on the couch with her legs curled up under her, clutching a pillow to her chest, was a woman with long, strawberry-blond hair. I balked at the sight and the memory that jumped into my head. Richards crossed the room and sat down beside the woman, and they talked softly to each other. I stood at the kitchen counter letting the remnants of the driveway adrenaline leach away and eyeing the automatic coffeepot in the corner. There were several boxes of Chinese food lined up and untouched on the counter.

  “Max.”

  I put on a pleasant face and walked out for introductions.

  “Max, this is Kathleen Harris.”

  “A pleasure,” I said, taking the woman’s hand.

  She stood and looked a bit taller than Richards, and bigger- boned, solid, like a basketball or lacrosse player. Her grip was surprisingly strong.

  “Nice to meet you,” she said, looking me directly in the face. Her eyes were red-rimmed, but she did not look away until she added, “I’m sorry about all that,” nodding her head to indicate the driveway. She wasn’t wearing any makeup, and there was a spray of freckles across her nose and cheekbones. Country girl, I thought.

  “Nothing for you to be sorry about,” I said, and left it alone.

  Richards warmed up the Chinese and I squeezed past her and made the coffee. The three of us then sat at the low coffee table in the living room, and I told Harris the impersonal side of my life as a Philly cop. We all ended up swapping stories about academy training, rookie assignments, embarrassments on the job and the various criminal sideshows we’d run into over the years.

  Richards told the story about the bank heist where the mastermind wrote the stickup note on the back of his own overdue electric bill and the cops were waiting at his house when he showed up with the loot. We were all shaking our heads over Harris’s “ass-man” story, about the Middle Eastern guy who was using a home remedy for hemorrhoids during the anthrax scare. When he showed up at the E.R with a bottle of white powder lodged up his rectum, the yet- unknown concoction of powdered laxative, talcum and baking soda had a dozen cops, hazardous material firemen and federal agents scrambling for hours. Harris was a smart cop, an intelligent, driven, strong woman. She was attractive enough to have dealt with men in social situations. She was experienced enough to have run into plenty of jerks. She forced you to kick out the false stereotype of abused women as so weak, mousy and dependent that they’d put up with it just to hold on to a man, even if he was a shit. The “just leave him” solution does not factor in the unknowable ways of the heart and each person’s understanding of love.

  When we were done eating, they gathered up the leftovers and I went outside to get my bag out of the truck. I shut off the overhead light in the cab as I went through the bag, unwrapped my Glock and snapped a loaded clip into place. I checked the safety and slipped the gun back in under a fold of clean clothes. I closed and locked the truck and then stood in the darkness, listening, checking both ends of the street. Everyone in this house had seen people at their worst under stress. No one knew what McCrary might do if he felt his back was up against it, if his career and his future were threatened. A lot less can kick a guy over the edge. I was thinking worst-case scenario again. It was a bad habit I wished I could kick.

  Back inside, Richards slid a videotape in and the three of us watched a movie called Meet Joe Black. Harris fell asleep on the couch at about the point where Anthony Hopkins’s millionaire was explaining life to Brad Pitt, who was playing the role of Death, and Richards punched the TV off. We went outside onto the patio and sat in the hammock. There was no breeze, and the smell of night- blooming flowers hung in the thick humidity. I could hear traffic moving along the streets in the general stillness, but chose to ignore it. Richards’s warm skin was against my own, and she was staring up into the night sky.

  “You think I should have had him arrested, don’t you?” she said.

  “I suspect it wasn’t just your decision.”

  “But you know what the brass will do.”

  “They’ll make him go to counseling, if they’re smart. Let the shrinks at him awhile, see if he can admit his control problem or whether he denies it.”

  “That’s it?” she said, and I was surprised by the snap of anger in her voice.

  “I said that’s if they’re smart. They could just fire his ass and put an angry guy with weapons training out on the street.”

  There was a sigh of concession from her.

  “What if he threatens her, or comes back at her again?”

  “Have him arrested, just like anyone else. He got his chance.”

  This time her long silence worried me. I lay back into the ropes and closed my eyes. Soon I felt her move and do the same. She curled against me, her hair smelling of shampoo.

  “Have you ever hit a woman in anger? I mean your ex-wife or a girlfriend?”

  I could tell the recent revelations about my father were still tumbling in her head.

  “The children of abusers becoming abusers themselves is not a blanket sociological axiom,” I said. “Sometimes it works the other way. The act is so repugnant that the witnesses to abuse grow up to loathe the very idea.”

  I felt her wiggle herself back tighter into me, and
even without seeing her face I could tell she was grinning.

  “OK, Professor Freeman,” she said. “But you still haven’t answered the question.”

  I put my arm over her waist and rested my wrist on her chest, the backs of my fingers against the soft skin of her neck.

  “No,” I said. “The answer is no, I never have.”

  We did not fall asleep for at least another hour.

  CHAPTER

  18

  It would be two days before I heard from Nate Brown. The bartender from the Frontier Hotel called at noon.

  “Mr. Brown says meet him at Dawkins’s dock at eight tomorrow mornin’. You know that’s over on Chokoloskee? Right?”

  “Yeah, I know. And thanks.”

  “How much do y’all owe me now, Mr. Freeman?” she said with humor in her voice.

  “I’ll talk to you soon,” I said, disappointed that she now had my cell number. I wasn’t sure which I was concerned about more, the guys from PalmCo tracking my calls or the Loop Road barmaid getting friendly.

  There was no trace yet of dawn in my rearview the next morning as I drove west. This time I used Alligator Alley, a straight concrete shot from the suburbs of far west Fort Lauderdale to their identical twins in Naples on the other side of the state. The Alley was the second gouge across the gut of the Everglades. It was constructed in the 1960s with better machinery, better technology, and supposedly better working conditions. It was the thirty-year span of intermittent carnage that gave the alley its reputation. Originally two lanes with nothing to break the hypnotic monotony of endless acres of sawgrass, head-on collisions were frequent and almost always fatal out here, where the sound of wrenching metal and screaming passengers was quickly lost in the silence. In the 1990s the state expanded the road. They doubled and separated the lanes, and acquiesced to the environmentalists by tunneling under the roadway to allow water and animals to pass through. Imagine the bonanza for the predators that would quickly figure out the migration flow of untold numbers of species forced to funnel through a ten-foot-wide passageway.