Walking Money

by James O. Born

  “’Cause he played baseball?”

  “Naw, man, street names aren’t always that obvious.”

  “Then why’s he called Pitcher?”

  “My man says we’ll know when we see him. Suppose to be some kind of reformed crack addict the CCR helped and now he runs the branch office.”

  Bema cranked the old car and shot out into traffic in search of the office west of the interstate in Liberty City.

  DOOLEY sank low in the seat, half out of embarrassment and half out of not wanting anyone to be able to identify him later. Not many white people traveled the smaller avenues of Miami’s Liberty City or Overtown. This old rust bucket didn’t attract any attention, but a white guy did. Dooley figured enough people had seen white Buicks that he didn’t need to add another piece to the puzzle for Mac Nmir or anyone else working on the bank robbery.

  Bema tapped his fingers to the beat of some rap shit as the car rumbled and rattled down Seventh Avenue.

  Dooley said, “I thought you’d listen to Latin music.”

  “I like all music.” He twisted the volume until the bass shook the cheap plastic door handles. “One day I’ll have a Corvette with a real sound system. And leather seats with a sunroof. Move out on my own. What d’ya think, Tommy, pretty sweet, no?”

  “Yeah, Rick, sweet.” But for now he was still in a shitty Camaro, so he ducked lower.

  The branch office for the Committee for Community Relief sat in the middle of a five-store strip mall on NW Sixty-second Street, across from the Scott housing project. Someone had painted “CCR” in white across the front window. Dooley noticed that all the stores were actually different community service groups. He figured no one else wanted an office with nothing but glass in the front to protect their valuables.

  Bema circled the building, then parked in the rear. Every space was open, making Dooley wonder if anyone was inside the beat-up little office. They counted three doors in and knocked at the unmarked metal back door. Dooley instinctively swiveled his head, checking for anyone hanging around. All clear.

  Bema knocked a little harder this time. The dead bolt turned and Dooley heard a male voice.

  “Why don’t you use the front?” A thin, light-skinned black guy stopped mid-sentence when he saw the two men. Instantly, Dooley understood the guy’s street name. He had ears like the handle of a water pitcher. They stood out three inches. The man’s light green eyes appraised them as he asked, “Who’re you?”

  Bema flashed his badge and shoved the man inside. Dooley followed him in, closing the door behind him. The back room was empty except for a desk and one chair. A doorway with no door led out to the open front room with no furniture.

  Bema kept backing up Hodges’s gofer until he bumped the chair and flopped down in a heap. His eyes were wide and bright as he looked from Dooley to Bema, then back.

  “What’s up?”

  “You Ebbi Kyle?” asked Dooley.

  “Maybe.”

  Dooley sighed. “You may think there’s more than one jig with green eyes runnin’ around, but I guarantee you’re the only one with ears like that. Now I’ll ask only once more: Are you Ebbi Kyle?”

  He nodded his head, keeping his attention only on Dooley now. He said, “I ain’t done nothing wrong. You can’t hold me.”

  Dooley said, “What gave you the impression you’re under arrest?” He smiled and looked around the bare office. “Tell me, Ebbi, what kind of work you do around here?”

  “Whatever the CCR needs.”

  “You mean whatever Cole Hodges needs.”

  “He my boss, yeah, I do things for him.”

  “Where is he now?”

  Ebbi looked at Dooley and hesitated, before shrugging.

  Dooley ran his hand down his face and said, “I told you that you’re not under arrest—I didn’t say that you could refuse to answer my questions.”

  Ebbi said, “I got rights and one of ’em is to shut up.”

  Bema cut in. “Tom, I think he needs to understand that this is not official so we don’ have to follow any laws.”

  Dooley nodded, and without hesitation grabbed Ebbi by both ears and slammed his head into the desk. Dooley cackled and said, “Those things are magnificent.”

  Ebbi looked up, shaking his head and wiping blood from his nose.

  Dooley went on. “I got rights, too. I got the right not to listen to your shit.” He stomped hard on Ebbi’s left foot, the old sneaker doing little to absorb the blow. Ebbi sucked in breath hard.

  Dooley said, “I got the right to know where that fucking creep Cole Hodges is.” He slapped Ebbi with a backhand. Dooley pulled out a knife.

  Bema said, “Not here, we don’t want a track back to Hodges. Let’s take him.”

  Without acknowledging his partner, Dooley scooped up the dazed man and hustled out the door. They crammed him in the backseat of the Camaro and sped off with no one noticing a thing.

  BILL Tasker sat silently in his living room. He’d placed himself on the edge of the couch about eleven that morning and hadn’t moved three inches in the last three hours. The house didn’t look too bad, considering what had happened. The FBI were the most polite cops he’d ever heard of. They even put the plates back in the cabinets properly. They’d gone through every drawer in the whole house and replaced everything just as carefully. Tasker could remember search warrants he had executed where they’d sawed through desks and drilled walls looking for cocaine or drug money. Thank God for little favors like neat cops.

  Tasker’s phone had been quiet that morning, clearly a testament to Tina’s ability to keep her mouth shut. He was afraid of an unending stream of questions but so far no one seemed to know about the FBI raid. That left only a few questions for Tasker to ponder: What would Mac Nmir do now? Indict him? Make a probable cause arrest? Now Tasker knew that this was no misunderstanding. Someone had clearly set him up. He couldn’t believe people really thought he was a murdering bank robber or that anyone would fall for cash planted in his grill, but then again he was learning new things about the FBI every day. This guy Mac Nmir even seemed pretty smart, but you can’t teach common sense, and Tasker suspected they didn’t even try at the FBI academy.

  The big questions facing him now were: Who would set him up, and why? He thought about all the guys he’d locked up over the years and there were a couple of possibilities. The cash probably hadn’t been planted until after the news story, so anyone might have seen it. The whole thing might have been a misunderstanding until someone had taken it a step further and planted the money.

  This CCR attorney, Cole Hodges, certainly had a stake in the cash. But why would he steal it if he had access to it anytime he wanted? Why would he frame a cop he’d never even met?

  Tom Dooley also figured in the scheme, but it seemed to Tasker that all Dooley had done was tell his side of the surveillance-on-the-bank argument. He probably hadn’t even meant anything by it, just said he knew Tasker was interested in the bank. He’d actually seemed sorry that day outside the task force. He also didn’t seem smart enough to carry out a plan like this.

  Tasker had to attack this problem. Clearly no one in an official capacity would help. He was stumped, and as a result had been quite content to sit on the edge of his couch half the day. He jumped at the sound of the phone, hesitating even to answer it. Finally on the fifth ring, he snatched up the portable.

  “Hello.”

  “Billy, are you okay?” asked a soft female voice.

  He paused for a second, making certain it was who he thought it was. He mumbled, “Yeah, I’m okay. How about you?”

  “An FBI man came around asking all kinds of questions.”

  Tasker recognized his ex-wife’s voice now. Calling her by the wrong name was one of many mistakes he’d made in their seven years of marriage. He cleared his head and asked, “What FBI man, Donna?”

  “He had a funny name and a nickname that didn’t suit him. A dark, cute guy, but I can’t remember his name.”

 
“Slayda Nmir? Mac?”

  “That’s him. What’s it all about?”

  “Didn’t he tell you?” Tasker asked, suddenly understanding how far this thing had spread.

  “He said you took some money from a bank.”

  “What did you say?”

  “I told him you wouldn’t take any money.”

  “Good, ’cause I didn’t.”

  Donna said, “I also said you wouldn’t take any responsibility, or initiative or control. Basically, I said you’re not a taker.”

  “Thanks, I think.”

  “This sounds worse than the whole Jack Sandersen thing. At least the FBI wasn’t involved in that.”

  “That’s the problem. The FBI wants someone in jail and they don’t care who. In West Palm, the state attorney really looked at the evidence and moved pretty quick.”

  “Billy, you’d tell me if you were involved, wouldn’t you?”

  “You were never sure about me the last time.”

  “Not at the time, but now I see it was a mistake to implicate you. What about this time?”

  “This is just a mistake, pure and simple. It’s got nothing to do with Jack Sandersen or anything else. The FBI just jumped to conclusions and someone is helping them jump.”

  “What’s that mean?”

  “Nothing.” He didn’t want people thinking he was paranoid as well as a criminal.

  “The FBI agent, Slayda, says you’re ‘evasive.’”

  “What’d you say to that?”

  “I told him ‘vague’ was a better word.”

  “Great. With you on my side, Donna, I’m sure I’ll come through this pretty well.”

  Donna took a breath. “C’mon, Bill, you have to know that this is a shock.”

  “Is this the first you’ve heard of it? You didn’t see it on the news up there?”

  “It was on the news? Like last time?”

  “Not really, just Channel Eleven and the Herald. But they reported that I’m a suspect. I got relieved of duty, too.”

  “Without pay?” The panic in her voice leaped across the phone line.

  “Don’t worry, I won’t miss any payments.” He paused to let her say that wasn’t her concern, but she remained silent. “How’re the girls?”

  “Good. They miss you.”

  “I want to see them soon.”

  There was silence on the line for so long Tasker forgot he was talking on the phone until, out of left field, Donna asked, “Are you seeing anyone?”

  Tasker hesitated and then said, “Not anymore.”

  Donna replied, “That’s too bad, ’cause you deserve someone special.”

  Tasker took a deep breath and said, “You’re right, I do.”

  DOOLEY kept facing the terrified man in the backseat during the ten-minute ride to the Miami River. Ebbi Kyle had hardly said a word once he realized this was not an official visit by two friendly law enforcement agents. Dooley didn’t like to hurt people. It gave him no thrill at all. But he had to find Cole Hodges as well as his money, and he didn’t care what he had to do to make that happen.

  “Where are we headed, Rick?” Dooley asked, turning his head to see some of the freighters pulled up the river.

  “Trust me, I know a place where no one will ever notice us and our friend,” Bema said, pulling the car down a rough, narrow road. He stopped next to a stand of Australian pines. The closest ship was still a couple of blocks away and it didn’t look like anyone wandered this way too often.

  Dooley worked to stand up from the low car, then reached in and hauled out Ebbi by his short, kinky hair. He dragged the young man to an old folding chair wedged in next to the trees and shoved him down.

  Ebbi took a second, then looked up at the two men standing over him. No one said a word.

  Dooley appreciated the quiet moment in his day, listening to the breeze blow through the thick pine trees overhead. No real traffic noise made it back here. He looked at Ebbi and said, “So, you startin’ to understand the nature of this interview?”

  Ebbi nodded.

  “Gettin’ back to the subject, where is your boss, Cole Hodges?”

  Ebbi said, “I tol’ you, man, I don’t know.”

  Dooley made a big show out of pulling out a Schrade Cliphanger knife and opened it with one hand. The cheap but sharp blade clicked into place and caused Ebbi Kyle to let out a short yelp. Then Dooley said, “Tell me what I want to know or I’ll make your birth certificate a worthless document.”

  Ebbi said, “Look, I don’t know. I swear on my mama I don’t know where Mr. Hodges is. He don’t check with me every day.”

  Dooley didn’t acknowledge the response. He reached over and grabbed Ebbi’s legendary right ear with his left hand and then brought the knife down in a long arc, slicing most of the top of the ear off. Dooley inspected his prize for a moment, then tossed it the ten feet into the swirling river. Within about two seconds, something swam up and grabbed the bloody ear, splashing as it disappeared below the surface.

  Ebbi didn’t know what to scream about—the pain or seeing his ear used as bait. Before he could say anything, Dooley brought the blade across Ebbi’s chest, opening his shirt and causing a line of blood to appear, then leak down his front.

  Ebbi gasped again.

  Bema calmly said, “You best tell the man what he wants. White guys can’t handle knives, he’s liable to cut you too bad for you to speak.”

  Ebbi’s green eyes looked like Fireking saucers. He touched his chest, checking his hand for blood, then his ear. “Dear Lordy, Lordy, Lordy, what are you doin’ this fo’? I been clean goin’ on three years now. I ain’t done nothing wrong.”

  Dooley said, “Yeah, you have, you haven’t told me where Cole Hodges is.”

  Ebbi, panting now, said, “He’ll kill me fo’ sure.”

  Dooley swung the knife again, severing the other ear cleanly. “And I won’t?”

  Ebbi didn’t have enough hands to stem the blood. “He stay over on Ninth Street, sometimes. He got the big condo on the Beach, too.”

  Dooley said, “He’s not at the condo, we been there. What do you think we are, idiots?” He reached down and took Ebbi by the chin, focusing him away from his wounds. “Now, where’s this place on Ninth?”

  “It’s an apartment we used for CCR workers who needed a place temporarily. Ain’t been nobody in it for a few months. Mr. Hodges, he tol’ me to call him there if there was any problems.”

  Dooley said, “Oh, this is a problem, Ebbi, this is a big fucking problem.”

  THIRTEEN

  RICK Bema had been skeptical of this whole plan, but it sure seemed to be coming together now. He still felt bad about ratting out Tasker to the FBI, but figured those assholes would never be able to make a case anyhow. That’d give him and Dooley plenty of leeway to spend their cash. Not that he’d quit his county job, he just wouldn’t hustle for overtime anymore.

  Now, with Dooley next to him, rattling on about how rich they were going to be, Bema felt pretty good. He had already told himself he had nothing to do with killing the little green-eyed crackhead with no ears. At most, he’d helped Dooley wrap some chain around his thin legs before they dumped him in the river. Bema wondered what had grabbed Ebbi’s ear when it had hit the water. He’d heard rumors that the river had piranha in it from all the rich South American kids flushing their exotic fish. Sorta like the alligators in the New York sewers. Maybe the piranha would eliminate any evidence of their interview with Hodges’s assistant. Bema didn’t know if the piranha stories were true or not, he just knew he hadn’t been in the water in the past two years.

  They parked down the street from Hodges’s hideaway. The Lincoln the CCR attorney had been driving was in a spot behind the two-story building. Bema felt good about the whole situation.

  Dooley, looking up at the apartment through a pair of binoculars, said, “What do you think?”

  Bema replied, “We check the apartment. Nothing to lose. He not there, we leave without trace, no? Someone is
there, we question them. He there, jack-fucking-pot, man.”

  “I agree,” Dooley said, shifting his bulk to squeeze out of the cramped Camaro. “I’m gonna nail that asswipe to the wall.”

  Bema didn’t say anything to cut into the man’s macho time. He just nodded and followed Dooley through a back door that led directly to the stairway to the two upstairs apartments.

  The door on the right had the letter C and the name Jackson under it. On the left was D, with no name. Dooley leaned his head against the door, listened for about thirty seconds. He looked up and shrugged his shoulders.

  Bema whispered, “What’s that mean?”

  Dooley replied, “I hear shit, but I can’t tell if it’s coming from inside.”

  “You’re too old to hear people in an apartment?” Bema shoved past him. “Let me try.” He placed his ear on the door for five seconds and, without notice to Dooley, stepped back and kicked the door hard. It only shifted, cracking along an inner seam. Bema threw his shoulder into it and forced the door the rest of the way, splitting it along the seam.

  The two men entered the three-room apartment quickly, scanning the living room with their pistols drawn and in front of them.

  Bema pointed to the TV that was on a news channel. “That’s what I heard.”

  Before Dooley could answer, a nude black man with a small potbelly but some decent shoulders, drying his head with the towel draped over his face, wandered out of the bathroom into the hallway connecting all the rooms in the apartment.

  Dooley swung his pistol wide and struck the man hard through the towel, knocking him off his feet. He thumped against two walls before settling on the cheap, thin, green carpet. The tan towel immediately stained red. As the man sat up slightly, Dooley laid into him again, striking him three times with his pistol before Bema intervened.

  Bema stood between Dooley and the bloody figure on the ground. “What’re you, man, crazy?”

  Dooley panted without answering.

  Bema continued. “Maybe we should at least make sure it’s our man, no?” He leaned down and jerked away the bloody towel. As soon as he realized it actually was Hodges, Dooley pushed forward and savagely kicked him in the ribs twice before Bema could stop him.