Blood Orchid

by Stuart Woods

  “You a cop?” Ham asked Grant as they walked toward the Dolphin lobby.

  “Nah,” Grant said.

  “Then how come you’re packing?”

  “Seemed like a good idea,” Grant said, grinning.

  “Well, yeah,” Ham said.

  Holly led the way into the lounge and looked around. Empty. The reception desk was unmanned. Holly unholstered her gun, and Grant and Ham followed suit.

  “I’m going to the ladies’ room,” Ginny said, “and I’m not coming out until the shooting stops.” She headed off.

  “Grant, will you check the pilot’s lounge, down that hallway? Ham, you come with me.” She led him through the front doors and out into the parking lot. “There,” she said, pointing at Marina’s little Ford. “That’s hers.”

  The two approached the car with caution and checked the inside. The driver’s door was unlocked.

  “Better check the trunk,” Ham said.

  Holly found the trunk release and heard it pop open. She walked to the rear of the car, her heart in her mouth, lifted the trunk lid, and looked inside. A spare tire, nothing else. Holly looked around the lot for a red Explorer but didn’t see one.

  “What do you think?” Ham asked.

  “I don’t know what to think,” Holly said, heading back inside. She got out her cellphone and was dialing Marina’s number when Ginny came out of the ladies’ room with Marina following.

  Holly walked over and hugged her. “I’m so glad you’re all right,” she said.

  “Mama and Tía Rosita are not all right,” Marina replied.

  “I’m so sorry, Marina.”

  “It was Trini, wasn’t it?”

  “Probably. How did he know where you were? Did you tell anyone?”

  “It had to be Pedro,” she said. “He must have known more than I thought.”

  Holly didn’t tell her that Pedro was dead, too. She was upset enough already. “I’m going to take you where you’ll be safe,” she said, “and my policemen will protect you.” She led Marina outside toward the Saratoga.

  “An airplane?” Marina asked. “I’ve never flown in an airplane.”

  “It’s fun,” Holly said. “Ginny is a great pilot. And I want you to meet my father, Ham, and my friend Grant.”

  Marina solemnly shook hands with everyone.

  Holly and Grant sat in the rear seats with Marina, and Ham sat in the copilot’s seat. Marina seemed nervous at first, but she soon relaxed and watched as the lights of the Sarasota-Bradenton area grew scarce, giving way to the lights of small towns and farms. She said nothing for the remainder of the flight.

  Finally back at Grant’s house, they gave Marina some soup.

  “Why did Trini do it?” Marina asked.

  “Because he’s a mad-dog killer,” Holly replied. “The police and the FBI are looking for him everywhere right now, and they’ll find him soon.”

  “I don’t have any clothes,” Marina said.

  “We’ll get you some new ones tomorrow,” Holly replied. “You look tired; would you like to go to bed now?”

  Marina nodded dumbly.

  Holly led her to Grant’s spare bedroom and got her settled, then came back downstairs.

  “What a beautiful girl,” Grant said.

  “She’s had more than her share of heartbreak in the past week,” Holly said. “I don’t think she’s feeling very beautiful now.” She went to the phone and called the Sarasota police.

  “Lieutenant Brower.”

  “Lieutenant, it’s Holly Barker.”

  “Hello, Chief. We’ve worked our crime scene; two dead, as you reported. Looks like executions; he used a nine-millimeter.”

  “Any sightings of Rodriguez?”

  “Not a thing. Where’s my witness?”

  “Asleep. You can talk to her on the phone tomorrow, unless you’d like to come to Orchid Beach.”

  “It’s a woman?”

  “The daughter of one of your victims and the niece of the other.”

  “You’re satisfied she had nothing to do with their deaths?”

  “Yes. They went to Sarasota to hide from Rodriguez. Somehow he found them, but Marina was at the grocery store when the shootings took place.”

  “I faxed the FBI in Miami the report, since you said they wanted Rodriguez, too.”

  “That was the right thing to do. I’ll call you tomorrow morning, and you can talk to Marina Santos.”

  “Thank you. Good night.”

  Holly hung up and went to bed, happy to have Grant to sleep next to.

  45

  Holly took Marina to her office the following morning. She put her in Hurd Wallace’s empty office, called Lieutenant Brower in Sarasota, and put Marina on the phone with him. She gave instructions to check the dead Russian’s prints against the INS database, then faxed the photograph of his tattoo to Harry Crisp. Then she called in a policewoman, who was in civilian clothes, and gave her some money.

  “I’ve got a witness in Hurd’s old office; her name is Marina Santos. I want you to take her out to the outlet mall and buy her enough clothes for four or five days.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” the woman said.

  “I want you to go armed. Someone is trying to kill her, and although he’s unlikely to look for her at the outlet mall, you should be alert.” She gave the officer Trini Rodriguez’s description. “It may not be him; he has friends.”

  Holly introduced the two women and let them get on with their shopping trip.

  Hurd Wallace, slightly itchy in his new uniform, drove slowly around the Blood Orchid property, taking in everything. Two houses were in the early stages of construction, and others were being renovated, with workmen going in and out. The golf courses were beautiful, he thought; he didn’t play golf, but maybe it was time to take up the game, since membership in the golf club was part of his compensation package. As he passed the ninth hole, he saw Ed Shine playing with a Hispanic man, who seemed never to have played before, and Ed waved him over.

  “How’s it going, Hurd?”

  “Everything’s fine, Mr. Shine.”

  “Call me Ed; everyone does.”

  “We seem to be in good shape, Ed.”

  “You meet your new employees?”

  “Yes, one’s on the gate, and the other is back at the station, manning the phones.”

  “When is your first golf lesson?”

  “I haven’t scheduled anything yet.”

  “Start soon; the pro is bored rigid.”

  “I’ll do that, Ed. See you later.” Hurd drove on past the empty tennis courts, then turned and went out to the airfield. A King Air twin turboprop, belonging to Shine, was the sole aircraft parked there. Then, as he watched, a business jet came whistling in and landed on the six-thousand-foot runway. A large van bearing the Blood Orchid logo drove up, just in time to meet the airplane as it taxied in. Hurd saw a group of four men, all accompanied by rather flashy women, disembark and be greeted by the salesman. They all piled into the van, while the airplane’s crew stowed their luggage in the rear, then they drove off, just another group arriving to hear Ed Shine’s sales pitch. They’d be put up in the guest cottages and would, no doubt, be on the golf course by mid-afternoon.

  Hurd drove back to his office and parked the Range Rover. One of his two officers sat, his feet on the desk, obviously talking to a woman. Hurd pushed his feet off the desk to get his attention, and the officer put his hand over the phone.

  “Yeah, what is it?” he asked irritably.

  “Hang up the phone; you’re at work.”

  “I’ll call you back, baby,” the man said, then hung up.

  “Not from the office, you won’t,” Hurd said, “and not from a patrol car, either. Talk to her on your own time; right now, you’re at work.”

  “There isn’t any work,” the man said.

  “Then find a broom and sweep up,” Hurd said, going into his office. The man had a point, he thought; the golf pro wasn’t the only staffer who was bored rigid. He
looked out his window at the shop across the street, where a truck of goods was being unloaded. This was the first of the shops to be reopened, and Hurd had not met the man who ran it.

  He got up and went across the street, introduced himself to the man, whose name was Carter.

  “What sort of shop are you opening?” Hurd asked.

  “Jewelry,” the man said, setting down a carton on a showcase and lifting out a number of trays filled with diamond earrings and bracelets.

  “Looks expensive.”

  “You better believe it,” Carter said. “That’s the way Ed wants it.”

  “You know, we’re a little underpopulated here so far; it may be a while before you have some customers.”

  “Hurd, my first customers are already here,” Carter said, nodding at the group approaching the shop. The people who Hurd had seen get off the jet walked in and started shopping immediately, forcing Carter to open more cartons.

  Hurd left them to get on with it and went back to his office. He had nothing else to do, so he started setting up a file system, one for each property on the place. It took him less than an hour, and when he was finished, he had nothing to do. He picked up the phone and called the golf club.

  Holly found Harry Crisp on the other end of the phone.

  “Afternoon, Harry,” she said.

  “Hello, Holly.” His cold sounded a little worse. “Where did you get this tattoo you sent me?”

  “From the guy who came to my house with pizza and tried to kill me,” she said. Somebody came into the room and handed her a report on the man’s fingerprints. “And his prints were on file with the INS.”

  “What’s his name?”

  “Alexei Bronsky. He emigrated to the States less than a year ago, supposedly resides in New York.”

  “What else do you have on him?”

  “Just his prints and the tattoo. The ME said he might have been a boxer at one time; there was evidence that he’d taken one or more beatings, although he looked like the kind of guy who’d be delivering them. What did you get on the tattoo?”

  “This is really weird,” Harry said. “D.C. had only seen one other like it, also on a dead guy. They traced it back to a special branch of what used to be the KGB, a branch that was devoted to rough stuff. Your dead guy was probably not a very nice person.”

  “That was my impression when he was shooting at me,” Holly replied. “You get anything yet on the background of Pio Pellegrino?”

  “Nothing yet,” Harry said. “I’ll let you know.”

  Harry didn’t sound very convincing.

  “Harry, you’re not holding out on me, are you? Remember the two-way information highway?”

  Harry ignored her. “I got the report from Sarasota about the double homicide.”

  “Yeah. We’ve got to get Trini off the streets or we’ll be wading in blood.”

  “I’ve got Lauderdale, Miami, and the state police all over it,” Harry said. “We’ll pick him up soon.”

  “Harry, how did your tail lose Trini after I called you in?”

  “They, uh, just lost him; the guy’s good.”

  “How does a red Explorer just vanish?”

  “Holly, let it go, will you? I’ll talk to you later.” He hung up.

  Holly had the distinct feeling that the two-way information highway was running in only one direction again.

  46

  Holly arrived back at Grant’s house to find Grant and Marina having a drink in the living room. Marina was wearing her new clothes, but she still seemed very subdued.

  “You look very nice,” Holly said, pouring herself a bourbon and sitting down.

  “It’s a very nice mall—big discounts,” Marina said. “Holly, what am I going to do about burying my mother and my aunt?”

  “There are certain procedures the Sarasota police will have to go through before the bodies can be released,” Holly said. “It will probably be a few days. Do you know of a funeral home in Lauderdale?”

  “Yes, the one that buried Carlos,” Marina replied. “They were all right.”

  “You might want to call them and put them in touch with the Sarasota police, so that they can bring the bodies home.”

  “All right, I’ll call them tomorrow morning.”

  “Remember not to tell them where you are.”

  “I’ll give them my cellphone number,” Marina said. She set down her drink. “If you’ll excuse me, I’d like to go and have a nap before dinner.” She rose and went upstairs.

  “So, how was your day?” Holly asked Grant.

  “Okay,” he replied. “And yours?”

  “Less than okay. I’m getting the distinct impression that Harry is holding out on me again.”

  Grant looked uncomfortable but didn’t say anything.

  “He and I supposedly had an agreement to share information,” she said, “and it’s not happening. I tried to talk to him about the background check on Pio Pellegrino, and he cut me off and hung up.”

  Grant stared at the ceiling and sighed.

  “What?”

  “I’m trying to think of a way you could have found this out, other than from me.”

  “Find what out?”

  “You’re going to have to keep this to yourself, Holly; if Harry should find out . . .”

  “Grant, what are you talking about?”

  “Pio Pellegrino’s real name is Pietro Falcone; his father kept his old name, Ignacio. He was known in New York as Iggy the Finger.”

  “Iggy the Finger? That’s colorful. What does it mean?”

  “If Iggy wanted a guy taken out, he would point his finger at him and wiggle his thumb, like the hammer on a gun. He always smiled when he did it, but the guy who got the finger got dead.”

  “Why did they change their names?”

  “Iggy was high up in the New York mob, one of three or four top guys. He got off on a murder rap about four years ago and just faded into the wallpaper. We finally stopped tapping his phones, it got so boring. Then he just dropped off the map.”

  “What about Pio?”

  “His daddy’s boy. He had a clean sheet, but he was a main go-between for the old man. They disappeared together. A year or so later, Pietro opens the restaurant in Miami, and he has a success. Nobody made him and the old man for a while, and when we did, we figured they were retired.”

  “And how long has Harry known about this?”

  “From the beginning.”

  Holly felt as if someone had kicked her in the stomach. “You mean, he knew who Pio and the old man were before I told him about them?”

  “Yes.”

  “That miserable son of a bitch. Why wouldn’t he tell me?”

  “I guess it’s just Harry’s natural reticence,” Grant said.

  “Well, it’s obvious from the connection with Trini Rodriguez and the hiring of Carlos Alvarez that they’re both into something,” she said.

  “Well, yeah.”

  “Does Harry know what it is?”

  “Not really.”

  “Do you?”

  “I have my suspicions, but I can’t talk about that.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because it pertains to what I’m working on in Orchid Beach, and you know I can’t tell you about that.”

  “Grant . . .”

  “Listen, Holly, I’m trying to help you out here, but I can’t tell you more than that.”

  “Grant . . .”

  “All right, one more thing: Trini is a registered FBI informant; has been for a couple of years.”

  “You mean, he’s working for Harry?” Holly asked, astonished.

  “It’s not like that; he’s not an undercover agent. He’s just a guy on the street who gets paid for information.”

  “Well, I’m relieved to hear it. Do you think that his status as a snitch has kept Harry from busting him?”

  “Maybe, when all this started. Right now, Harry wants him off the street as bad as anybody.”

  “I don’t belie
ve this. I’m busting my ass trying to figure out stuff that Harry already knows but won’t tell me?”

  “It’s the nature of the beast, Holly. I told you before that the Bureau likes to know more than everybody else, and it doesn’t like sharing.”

  “You know,” Holly said, “I would really like to just bow out of this whole thing, except that I can’t, because Trini Rodriguez is trying to kill me and that poor girl upstairs.”

  “Believe me, I know how you feel, but whatever you do, don’t let Harry find out that you know what you know, or I’ll be an undercover seal on an ice floe in Alaska by this time next week.”

  “All right, Grant, but you will try and help me not to get killed because of something Harry didn’t tell me?”

  “I’m not going to let you get killed,” he said, kissing her on the cheek.

  “Okay, but you’re answering the doorbell from now on, while I hide under something.”

  “Okay, deal.”

  “And try and do a better job than you did with the pizza guy.”

  She went and poured herself another drink. Sobriety was not in the cards for this evening.

  “First time I’ve seen you have more than one drink before dinner,” Grant said.

  “First time I’ve needed more than one,” Holly replied.

  47

  The following day, Holly worked listlessly, hungover and depressed, a bad combination. Just before lunchtime, she got a phone call.

  “Hey, Holly, it’s Ed Shine,” he said.

  “Oh, Ed, it’s good to hear from you.”

  “How about dinner tonight?”

  “Thank you, Ed, but I’m tied up.”

  “Sounds like I’ve got competition.”

  “Well, maybe.”

  “How about lunch; you free?”

  “Sure.”

  “Come on out to Blood Orchid; meet me at the clubhouse, and I’ll show you what my new chef can do. Then we’ll play some golf.”

  “Oh, I don’t think I can take the time for golf, but I’d love lunch.”

  “Half an hour?”