Hot

by John Lutz

“A few bruises, some abrasions on his ankles, from where he mighta been tossed around on the rocks before he died. Or he coulda been in a fight before he drowned.” Wicke shook his head sadly. “The kid was a runaway, but at least he had a family cared enough to claim the remains. His mom and dad. They were plenty broken up, too. Obviously cared a lot. Maybe the poor kid coulda got his life straightened out eventually.” Wicke lifted a pencil between his stubby fingers, then let it fall and bounce on the desk. A gesture of frustration, seen more and more in the War on Drugs. “Narcotics are a goddamn curse from hell on this country, burning up the young folks.”

  Carver agreed. Plenty of older folks were burning, too. No one seemed to know how to extinguish the fire. “Who found the body?” he asked.

  “Couple of tourists from Atlanta, out jogging one morning and saw it floating in shallow water near shore. No clothes on it, so we were puzzled about identity at first. Then the parents read in a Miami paper about the kid being found, and drove down and identified and claimed the body.”

  “The boy was from Miami?”

  “Yeah. He’d run away before and been mixed up with drugs. Thirteen, Jesus! Anyway, the parents’ names are Frank and Selma Everman. You want their address?”

  “Yeah, I think I’ll talk to them.”

  “I don’t see what any of this has to do with Henry Tiller getting run over.”

  “It might have to do with Walter Rainer,” Carver said, “which might have to do with Henry being in the hospital.”

  “The drug angle?”

  “Sure.”

  “I’m not naive, but I can’t see Rainer involved in drug trafficking.”

  “He’s got a boat and is within easy turnaround distance of the Mexican coast.”

  “There’re thousands of people like that in Florida,” Wicke said. “Even me.”

  Carver smiled. “You’re lucky Henry doesn’t suspect you.”

  “I am at that,” Wicke said, “since he’s got a persistent peckerhead like you working for him.” He wrote down the names and address of Leonard Everman’s parents on a memo sheet headed “From the Desk of Chief Wicke” and handed it to Carver.

  Carver folded it, slipped it into his damp shirt pocket and thanked the chief.

  “Anything else?” Wicke asked wearily.

  “No,” Carver said, standing up. “I better get outa here before my milk sours.”

  Wicke gazed at him strangely as he limped out. You meet all kinds in this work, the look implied.

  Wasn’t that the truth?

  12

  A FEW MINUTES before five o’clock, Beth arrived. Carver was sitting in the shade on the screened-in porch, drinking a beer, when he heard tires crunching in the driveway and her white LeBaron convertible pulled into view and parked behind the Olds.

  She didn’t notice him on the porch as she got out of the car, placed her hands on her hips and glanced around. Standing next to the LeBaron with its top down, she seemed even taller than her five feet, ten inches. She was wearing Roman sandals, loose-fitting khaki shorts, a baggy sleeveless blouse, and had a wildly colored bandanna wound around her head to keep her hair from getting mussed in the convertible. After the long drive in the wind and heat, any other woman would have been a mess, but Beth seemed to be modeling a trendy look for a high-class fashion magazine. Would she gaze haughtily into the distance?

  She wrestled her bulky Gucci suitcase from the backseat of the car and lugged it up onto the porch. When she saw Carver, she looked surprised for a moment, then let the suitcase rest at her feet.

  He smiled and said, “Want a beer?”

  “Sure.”

  He limped past her into the cottage. When he came back out on the porch a few minutes later carrying two Budweiser cans and a glass, she’d dragged a nylon-webbed aluminum chair over next to the yellow metal glider and sat down in it. Her long dark legs were crossed at the thighs; they looked fantastic. So did the rest of her. She was a woman who froze glances and inundated minds. His glance, his mind, anyway. He gave her the glass and one of the beer cans, then sat down in the glider and watched her pour beer, tilting the glass to achieve a precise head of foam.

  He looked out through the screen at her mid-size convertible. Nice wheels, but nothing like when she was chauffeured around in a stretch limo when she was married to Roberto Gomez. She never seemed to miss the luxury of her life with the late drug lord, maybe because early in her own life she’d learned to exist without it. She’d finally found out who and what she was, and wanted out of Gomez’s world. With Carver’s help, she’d made it.

  “Drive straight down?” he asked.

  “Yeah, the wind felt good.” She sipped her beer, somehow avoiding a mustache of foam. “That the place needs watching?” she asked, motioning languidly toward the Rainer estate and the Miss Behavin’ riding gently at its dock. Perspiration gleamed on the well-defined but gentle angles of her cinnamon-hued face, lending her a sculptured air of nobility. In the colorful bandanna, she looked like a cross between a Zulu queen and British aristocracy.

  “That’s the place,” he said.

  “Can’t make out much from here.”

  “That’s okay. I scouted out a place closer in where we can observe most of what goes on outdoors, and maybe see in through the windows. I put together a blind like duck hunters use.”

  She took a long swallow of beer and looked around at the dense foliage beyond the screen. “Well, I brought mosquito repellent. Anything particular we’re looking for over there?”

  Carver told her everything he’d learned since arriving on Key Montaigne.

  “Must be dealing drugs,” she said when he’d finished.

  “I’m not so sure,” Carver said. “Maybe your background makes you think drugs are more pervasive than they are.”

  “Hah! Don’t you listen to the drug czar in Washington? Half the country’s high, other half thinks it’s a tragedy but don’t wanna pay to do anything about it. Drugs are everywhere, Fred, that’s what I think.”

  “You were close to it,” Carver said.

  “Part of it.”

  “Okay, part of it. So you see drugs everywhere.”

  “Hmm. You saying the drug czar don’t know shit?”

  “I’m saying that. Takes a former addict to know about drugs. They’re the only ones who really know.”

  “You’re right about that,” she said. “But what you told me, and that big-hulled boat sitting over there, it all smells like a dope operation. And I’ve got a nose for them, no pun intended.”

  “It probably is drugs, but I don’t wanna see it that way without knowing for sure. You bring the night-vision binoculars?”

  “Sure. Brought your gun, too. And the extra rounds of ammunition. It’s all in my suitcase.”

  “Why don’t you unpack, then we’ll take a drive and I’ll show you the town?”

  She stood up with elegant slowness on those long, long legs, then bent from the waist and kissed him on the lips. He tasted the salt of her perspiration.

  “Let’s keep our priorities straight,” she said. “Unpacking’s third, driving into town’s second. Know what’s our first priority?”

  He was sure she didn’t really want to play a guessing game. Neither did he. He got up from the glider and went with her into the bedroom.

  It was seven o’clock when they drove into Fishback in Beth’s LeBaron. After a two-minute familiarization cruise around town, they went into the Key Lime Pie. The air-conditioning had lost its battle with today’s heat, and the restaurant was uncomfortably warm. The ceiling fans ticking and rotating overhead seemed only to rearrange the heat. The seats of the booth where Carver and Beth sat were sticky and soft to the touch, as if the warmth might be dissolving the mottled red vinyl upholstery. They studied the dinner menu. Carver noticed it was identical to the lunch menu only with boosted prices. At least dress was optional.

  “Ain’t cheap,” Beth remarked.

  “Consider the atmosphere,” Carver told her.

/>   “Humph. Atmosphere’s hot, what it is.”

  Carver glanced around the restaurant. Customers sat at about half the tables. Florida had a nasty fundamentalist religious streak in it, and occasionally he and Beth had run into trouble because she was black. But apparently there was enough tourism on Key Montaigne for an interracial couple not to be all that remarkable, and no one seemed to be paying much attention to them. Carver was glad. Beth could get combative over that sort of thing.

  Fern wasn’t on duty. A scrawny young waitress who looked overheated enough to drop took their orders and plodded back to the kitchen.

  Carver noticed that a hugely fat man had moved onto one of the bar stools visible through the archway and was staring at them. He was average height but easily three hundred pounds, with gray hair neatly framing a puffy yet symmetrical face. A hundred pounds ago he must have been handsome. Oddly enough, he looked quite cool, wearing a cream-colored unstructured sport jacket and a white shirt open at the neck to reveal a thick gold chain. His pants were a blue so pale they were almost white, and he was wearing immaculate unlaced white tennis shoes. Carver imagined that with all the weight he carried, he had foot trouble. His expression was neutral, but there was something calculating about his intense blue eyes, as if they had a life and intelligence all their own and were assessing him and Beth. His back was to the bar, and one of his elbows was propped on the smooth mahogany to help support him on the stool. A highball glass was miniaturized in his bloated free hand, his wrist resting on his knee.

  Beth noticed him, too. She said, “Who’s the fat guy eyeballing us?”

  Carver said he didn’t know.

  Beth said, “Hope he ain’t the leader of the Fishback chapter of the Ku Klux Klan.” Uh-oh. Was she pumping up some anger?

  “He’s probably an equal-opportunity ogler,” Carver told her, trying to head off trouble.

  “I dunno. All he needs is the white hood to complete his ensemble.”

  The heat-plagued waitress arrived with the Budweiser Carver had ordered, and Beth’s mineral water. Carver was glad to see her. She set the glasses on the table and said, “Lord, but it’s hot in that kitchen.”

  “Bet it is,” Carver said.

  “Wouldn’t you know they got me baking pies?”

  “You happen to know the big fella at the bar? The one in the white jacket?”

  She took a quick glance in the direction of the bar, which was all that was necessary, considering the size of the subject. “You must mean Mr. Rainer.”

  “Walter Rainer?” Carver asked.

  “Uh-huh. He’s a well-to-do gent, lives in a big fancy place out on Shoreline. Don’t come in here very often.”

  Beth said, “Maybe it’s an occasion.”

  The waitress looked at her curiously but said nothing. Instead she wiped her arm across her forehead and trudged resignedly toward the swinging doors leading to the hell that was the kitchen. With each step her rubber soles sounded like wet kisses on the heat-softened composition tiles.

  “So that’s our man,” Carver said. He suspected Rainer had been apprised of his actions, and come into the Key Lime Pie so he could have a look at the troublemaker staying in Henry’s cottage.

  “Man’s got eyes like a pig that can reason,” Beth observed.

  “Spoken like a communications graduate.”

  Rainer continued to study them dispassionately until the waitress arrived with their food, then he turned back toward the bar and hunched over his drink. The material of his tent-sized jacket stretched tautly across his shoulders as he raised his glass to sip from it.

  Carver had the tuna steak again, the meal he’d had for lunch yesterday, only the more expensive evening version was decorated with parsley. Beth had blackened redfish with a salad, baked potato with sour cream, and several huge buttered dinner rolls. Her metabolism made dieting no concern of hers.

  After dinner they had coffee and key lime pie. With the first bite, she licked her lips and arched her eyebrows in surprise. “This is really good! Better’n any pie I ever had in Key West.”

  “I wouldn’t take you someplace served lousy food,” Carver told her.

  “Well, that’s a subjective point of view.” She forked another large bite of pie into her mouth, chewed and swallowed with enthusiasm. “One thing, with Walter Rainer here, we probably don’t need to be watching his place.”

  “Probably not,” Carver said, “but don’t forget Davy and Hector. They do the muscle work.”

  “I can see why,” she said, glancing at Rainer’s corpulent form overflowing the bar stool. “Shame to let yourself get that heavy.”

  Carver thought that was easy for her to say; she could probably eat whale blubber and it wouldn’t show up as fat. But he didn’t feel like an argument, so he kept quiet. Beth could be difficult. The late Roberto Gomez had found that out in a big way.

  “What’s the plan tonight?” she asked.

  “I drive up to Miami so I can talk to the drowned boy’s parents tomorrow. You use the infrared glasses and set up surveillance on the Rainer estate, particularly the boat dock.” He ate the last bite of his pie, savoring it. “Rainer’s seen you with me, so be extra careful. Don’t stray from your vantage point with the idea of working in closer for a better view. These people are as bad as the folks you met when you were with Roberto.”

  She nodded. “That’s what I was trying to tell you earlier. Don’t waste energy worrying over me, Fred. You know I can do whatever’s necessary.”

  He did know. Doing what was necessary, no matter how difficult, was what she was all about. It was what had enabled her to escape from an opulent but corrupt existence she knew was consuming her soul like cancer. Other women would have given up, drifted on the currents of cash and stayed with the animals that were Roberto and his associates. But Beth had fought and thought her way out of the slums of Chicago long before she’d met Roberto. Not giving up was her religion. Carver’s, too. Which was why they got along so well. They gave each other room. They had to. But at times they could work together almost as beautifully as they made love, obsessive personalities sharing an obsession.

  The sun was still blazing well above the horizon when they left the restaurant and crossed the baking street to where the LeBaron was parked. Half a block down from the car was a dusty black van with tinted windows. Now it was wearing a Florida license plate. Davy was leaning against the van, the faithful servant waiting for his master to come out of the bar. He nodded to Carver and smiled. The smile reminded Carver of the shark in the observation tank at the aquarium.

  Beth noticed Davy and her body stiffened. She didn’t have to ask who he was; she recognized evil when she saw it, and Davy wore it like a disease he took pride in.

  Carver was relieved when the van didn’t follow the LeBaron as they drove out of Fishback.

  But then it wasn’t necessary for Davy to follow. He knew where to find them.

  13

  CARVER SHOWED BETH the foliage-concealed vantage point from which she could maintain surveillance of the Rainer estate. He didn’t have to familiarize her with the army-issue infrared binoculars for night vision; she’d used them before. She knew the tools of her late husband’s trade.

  After leaving her with the night glasses, her spray can of bug repellent, and a thermos jar of black coffee, Carver got in the Olds and started for Miami. He drove north on Route 1 until well after dark, and checked into a Days Inn on the outskirts of the city.

  In the morning he ate a leisurely breakfast in the motel restaurant, then he sat on a concrete bench outside in the shade, smoking a Swisher Sweet cigar and reading USA Today. The world’s problems were plainly visible in colorful bar graphs that suggested solutions might be equally as simple. He wished he could reduce the swirl of questions on Key Montaigne to a similar graphic display. Maybe it was in fact possible; maybe he should buy some crayons.

  When he figured it was late enough, he drove the rest of the way into Miami to see Frank and Selma Everman, the
drowned boy’s parents.

  The address Chief Wicke had given Carver turned out to belong to the Blue Flamingo Hotel on Collins Avenue in South Miami Beach. It was an area of old art deco buildings being renovated to comprise what the developers were ambitiously describing as the “Florida Riviera.” Lots of pastel stucco and rounded corners, garish neon signs and neo-Egyptian decor of the sort seen in late-night TV movies from the twenties and thirties. An Al Capone/King Tut ambience. Carver thought that when it was finished, when the seediness had disappeared to leave only the reborn art deco essence, the Florida Riviera would be impressive indeed. Right now, the Blue Flamingo was still on the seedy side of that gradual gentrification.

  It was a twenty-story building that, true to its name, was pale blue. Its peeling wooden window frames badly needed a coat of paint. But there were new tinted glass double doors beneath an ornate entrance arch with flamingos in bas-relief. Or possibly they were some sort of Egyptian bird. Carver limped through the doors and felt the welcome coolness of the lobby.

  The interior renovation hadn’t caught up with the building’s exterior. The lobby floor was yellowed square tiles that long ago might have resembled veined marble. There was a long wooden counter with fancy brass bars beneath a cashier’s sign. More brasswork ran along the front edge of the counter, broken only here and there to allow room for the registration book to be signed and money or credit cards to pass from hand to hand. The lobby furniture was gray, overstuffed, and threadbare. So were the two old men slouched in armchairs and gazing wistfully out through the entrance glass at the brightness of Collins Avenue and long-ago youth. The potted ferns in the lobby were artificial and looked as if they thrived on dimness and shunned the light. Like the old men. Probably the Blue Flamingo was still primarily a residence hotel, catering mostly to retirees without the money to play out the last act of their dwindling lives in anything like luxury.

  Both men glanced emotionlessly at Carver as he limped across the lobby to the desk, as if between them they’d seen about everything and he was nothing new. The desk clerk was potbellied, middle-aged, had greasy black hair that looked dyed, and an ugly mole beneath his left eye that made Carver think of cancer. He noticed Carver and said, “Be with you in a sec,” and finished leafing through what looked like invoices while Carver leaned against the desk with his elbow near a placard that said, visit our FLAMINGO LOUNGE!