25
Ethan said, “What I’ve learned is that Denton Ferrelli has a history of smelly financial deals, and he always has help from organized crime and corrupt politicians. Like he brokered around five billion a year in deposits into savings and loans all over the country. But first he got an agreement that the S and Ls would lend the money to people he named. Every one of them was somebody with the Mafia.”
My eyes got big at the word Mafia, and Ethan smiled grimly.
“Like they say on the street, Denton has connects. Not just with the mob but with a lot of politicians. Dirty money goes into a bank or a savings and loan, comes out clean through unsecured loans, and goes into the pockets of crooked politicians. Then they use their clout to help the people who bought them.”
“What about Leo Brossi?”
Ethan held up two fingers squeezed tightly together. “Denton and Brossi are close. A few years ago, Leo Brossi got a Miami bank to loan him four million dollars with nothing but his personal guarantee as security. On the day the loan was finalized, Brossi loaned the same amount to a real estate company owned by Denton Ferrelli and Wayne Black.”
“The same Senator Wayne Black who was playing golf with Denton when Conrad was killed?”
“The same, only he wasn’t a senator then. Now get this: Ferrelli and Black used the money to buy a building in Miami’s prime financial district. They never paid a dime on their loan from Brossi because their deal with him only required them to repay the loan if the cash flow from the building was sufficient to cover it. They claimed it wasn’t, so Brossi then defaulted on his four million bank loan.”
“But how—”
“Money talks, Dixie. It speaks in a very loud voice. The bank sued Leo Brossi. It also sued the Ferrelli and Black real estate company. But because of some political maneuvering, the FDIC stepped in and arranged a highly unusual settlement whereby Ferrelli and Black only had to repay half a million and Brossi didn’t have to pay anything. To sweeten the settlement, Ferrelli and Black got to keep the building.”
My brain cells were groaning from the strain of trying to follow slippery financial deals involving millions and billions. My brain was more acquainted with numbers in the hundreds.
Ethan leaned over the table. “Dixie, you shouldn’t be going around asking questions about Denton Ferrelli or Leo Brossi. Those guys play dirty, and they play for keeps. You’re nothing but an annoying insect at their picnic, and they’ll smash you without a second thought.”
“They’ve already tried to smash me.”
“Me too. Now that Stevie Ferrelli won’t be taking Conrad’s place, Denton is putting pressure on the other board members. He wants to kill the plans for the circus retirement home, and I’m fighting him. That means I might as well have a bull’s-eye painted on my back. I’m not a big name in the legal world, but Denton can make it so I won’t even get work doing simple wills.”
I was sure what he said was true, and there wasn’t a thing I could say to make it less depressing. We tossed our empties in an open trash can and ambled back to the vet’s parking lot.
As I got into the steamy Bronco, I said, “Thanks for the coffee, Ethan, and for the shoulder.”
“Anytime.”
“Next time I hope I won’t need the shoulder.”
Surprise registered in his eyes. “Me too. See you, Dixie.”
I had my engine running before he was in his car, and my heart was doing a tango. What the hell was wrong with me? Last night I’d realized I was attracted to Guidry, and now I’d just given a not-so-subtle notice to Ethan Crane that I’d like to get better acquainted.
As I pulled out of the lot, I muttered, “Get a grip, girl. Next thing you’ll start having fantasies about cucumbers and zucchini.”
Back at Mame’s house, I examined the urine-stained rug in the study and decided it had to be cleaned by professionals. I called a company and made arrangements to meet them Monday morning. I washed Mame’s food and water bowls and stacked them on a pantry shelf. I put her collar and leash on the top shelf of the hall closet. I vacuumed up russet dog hairs. I took the opened bag of organic senior kibble and a box of Jubilee Wafers to pass along to another elderly dog client. When—or if—the Powells returned, it would be to a house that showed no visible signs that Mame had ever lived there.
I locked the door behind me and headed south on Midnight Pass Road, retracing the zigzag route I’d taken earlier but this time visiting cats and birds. It was after eleven when I finished with the last cat and drove down the tree-lined drive to my apartment. Exhilarated after last night’s storm, the treetops were filled with songbirds and parakeets chirping their heads off, and every seabird in the area was drawing exuberant circles and loops in the sky.
When I came around the last bend, I saw Guidry’s car parked beside the carport. I pulled the Bronco into its slot and started toward my stairs, then detoured to the wooden deck when I saw Michael and Paco and Guidry sitting at the table. I expected them to be celebrating Paco’s success, but all three men wore strained faces. Actually, only Guidry and Paco looked strained. Michael’s face was thunderous. Something was up. The air was crackling with it, and whatever it was had made Michael mad as a stuck bull.
I gave Paco a big smile. “Good job this morning.”
He took the praise like a dog. A nod, a smile. No preening, no aw-shucks-it-was-nothing silliness.
I said, “Too bad Brossi wasn’t there when you made the bust.”
“He was supposed to be, but somebody slugged him yesterday and broke his nose. He was home with an ice bag.”
I met Guidry’s gaze and felt my face grow hot with remorse. My little escapade yesterday had allowed Leo Brossi to escape arrest this morning.
Guidry said, “He’ll be taken in, don’t worry.”
Paco gestured toward their coffee mugs. “Want some coffee?”
“No, I want food.”
Like a gladiator hearing the call to battle, Michael was instantly on his feet and headed toward the kitchen.
Paco looked at Guidry and tilted his head toward the back door. “Let’s go inside.”
I went ahead of them to the kitchen. I was a good hour beyond my limit of going without breakfast. Whatever Paco and Guidry had to tell me would have to wait until I’d had something to eat.
Michael was already slamming food from the refrigerator to the cooktop, laying paper-thin slices of ham on the grill and topping them with Gruyère cheese, grilling a split croissant beside them, and somehow with a few moves putting it all together and flipping it on a plate next to a slice of honeydew melon.
Paco and Guidry cast covetous looks at my plate, so he did the same for them and then for himself. Paco poured a round of coffee for everybody, and we all sat around the butcher-block island and ate like hogs. I was surprised that Guidry knew the trick to eating a sandwich that oozed melted cheese, but then I remembered he was from New Orleans. Probably had a French nanny who made him croque-monsieurs when he was still in diapers. Probably wore pure linen diapers too.
Once my stomach was reassured, I said, “You guys have something to tell me?”
Michael’s face darkened, and he got up and started putting food away with a vengeance.
Guidry said, “We picked Gabe Marks up for questioning. He said he does odd jobs sometimes for Leo Brossi, but he denied knowing Denton Ferrelli. Also denied trying to run you down with his truck. He said you’re a crazy woman who shot at him when he went to his girlfriend’s apartment. He didn’t deny using Scoline to capture alligators, but he has a valid Florida Alligator Harvest Permit, and, like he said, most everybody who handles alligators has some drugged darts. We couldn’t hold him.”
Three pairs of eyes were watching me, Michael like a statue by the sink. Nobody asked if it was true that I’d shot at Gabe Marks, just as nobody had asked if I was the person who had caused Leo Brossi to be home with ice on his face last night. I was stuck with being the only one who knew for sure I’d done both those things.
I said, “I can’t prove it was Gabe Marks who tried to run me down in the parking lot. I can’t prove he put snakes in my apartment. I can’t prove he was the one driving Conrad’s car or that he shot drugged darts into Conrad and Stevie. But I know Denton hired Gabe to kill them, and I know he wants me dead. Denton is a respected man with important political connections. He has powerful mob connections. If Gabe doesn’t kill me, Denton will have somebody else do it.”
Nobody spoke. Nobody argued with me.
I said, “It’s hopeless, isn’t it?”
Guidry said, “Nothing’s ever hopeless, Dixie.”
That wasn’t true, and we all knew it. Some things are flat-out hopeless, and there’s nothing anybody can do about it. The kitchen seemed very still and quiet. The clock on the wall made faint clicking noises as the second hand moved. Sunshine streamed through the bay window facing the shore, and dust motes shimmered in the golden light. In that peaceful moment, it seemed incongruous that death could lurk nearby. But death is always lurking. The question isn’t if death will ultimately win but how we will face it when it does. I thought about how gracefully Mame had dealt with the hopelessness of her situation, how fearlessly she had gone to her last moment. Perhaps that’s why pets exist—to teach humans how to die.
I said, “What would it take to nail Denton Ferrelli for murdering Conrad and Stevie? Or for hiring Gabe Marks to do it?”
“A confession. A detailed account of how they did it. Details we could corroborate.”
“What if you caught one of them trying to kill somebody else?”
Guidry narrowed his gray eyes in a suspicious look. “Then we’d arrest him for attempted murder.”
“What if the somebody else was wired? What if the somebody else cleverly got a detailed account of how Conrad and Stevie were killed? And what if you rushed in and saved the somebody else before he actually killed her?”
Michael slapped the refrigerator door and glared at me.
Guidry said, “The somebody else would have to be pretty stupid to set herself up like that.”
I pushed my coffee mug away and rested my forearms on the butcher block. Everything suddenly seemed crystal clear to me. I just had to explain it so they understood it. Especially so Michael understood.
“If Gabe Marks isn’t locked up, and soon, he will kill me. Even if he is locked up, Denton will find somebody to kill me. Or he may do it himself. Denton is a psychopathic monster who enjoys hurting people. Gabe is a dumb thug who enjoys hurting people. Separately or together, they are determined to kill me, and they will. Even if I ran away, Denton has the contacts and the power to track me. He thinks I’m a danger to him, and he’s determined to shut me up.”
Michael turned away and stood motionless with his hands braced on the countertop, every hard line of his body saying he knew what I was saying was true and that he could not bear it.
I said, “Look, I’m not the shrinking violet you think I am. I know how to handle a gun, I know how to handle myself in a fight. So why not use me? Why not let Denton get to me? You have a whole fucking SWAT team that could swarm him the minute it sounded like things were getting too hairy. It would work, Guidry. It may be the only way to keep me alive.”
Michael said, “No! Goddamn it, no!”
Paco said, “I don’t like it either, Michael, but she’s right. It may be the only way.”
Guidry said, “I never thought you were a shrinking violet.”
“Well, okay, how about it?”
He looked at Michael. “Michael would have to be okay with it.”
Michael said, “Then it’s never happening. Never.”
He lasered us all with a look of sheer despair, and I got up and put my arms around him. Michael has taken care of me since the first time our mother left us when he was four and I was two. He kept me safe then, and for the rest of his life he’s felt that was his sacred duty. I could feel his strong heart pounding under his shirt, and I knew he was feeling utter anguish at not being able to protect me now.
I said, “I have to do this by myself, hon. It’s the only way. And I won’t be alone. Guidry and his guys will be close by. It will make it a whole lot easier if you have faith in me, if you believe I can do it.”
“Shit, Dixie.”
“I know.”
He gave a gigantic sigh and squeezed me close. “Guidry, you son-of-a-bitch, if anything happens to her—”
Guidry got up and rapped his knuckles a couple of times on the butcher block, like a ritual to ward off bad luck.
“I’ll get the stuff you’ll need. I’ll be back later.”
He went out the door without closing it behind him. I watched him cross the deck to his car and back out. The world looked different now, because I had moved to a new place in it.
Good or bad, I had taken a step in a new direction, and there was no going back.
26
I went up to my apartment, but I was too keyed up to nap. I took a long shower. I dressed in clean shorts and sleeveless top. I put on clean white Keds. I switched on the TV and saw Leo Brossi leaving the police station with his attorney while reporters yelled questions at him. His nose was taped and one eye was swollen almost shut. A newscaster said Brossi claimed he’d banged into a cabinet door the day before, but the newscaster didn’t sound as if he believed the story. I felt a little better about punching Brossi.
I entered pet visits in my client notebook. I made invoices. I returned all the calls that had to be returned. I went to the kitchen and looked out the window through the belled iron heart. I went back to the office-closet and looked up Denton Ferrelli’s address in the phone book and wrote it down. That made me feel efficient, as if I’d confirmed an important detail.
I still had several hours before I made my afternoon rounds, and I felt like somebody all dressed up with no place to go. I finally couldn’t stand it anymore and went downstairs and pulled the Bronco out of the carport. I wanted to see where my enemy lived. One of them, anyway.
Until a few years ago, a drawbridge connected the mainland to Bird Key, Lido Key, Casey Key, St. Armand’s Key, and Longboat Key. But people who moved here to escape the fast pace of big cities objected to the slow pace of waiting for the bridge to open, so now we have a span of soaring concrete. Who knows, one day the people who came here to escape concrete wastelands may grow impatient with the water around the keys and demand the waterways be paved over.
I passed the exit to Bird Key, which has the feeling of a tropical gated community, and Lido Key, home of Mote Marine Laboratory and Pelican Man’s Bird Sanctuary, both places where dedicated volunteers work to rescue injured wildlife. On St. Armand’s Key, I slowed for pedestrians around the fashion circle, then turned onto John Ringling Parkway. The New Pass Bridge spilled me onto Gulf of Mexico Drive and Longboat Key, where buildings that look like public libraries are really the homes of multimillionaires. Longboat Key has a gulfside beach where sea oats wave in the breeze, but it isn’t open to the public like Siesta’s Crescent Beach. To enjoy the sand on Longboat Key, you have to buy a house or a condo. Otherwise, the Longboat Key Police Department will arrest you for trespassing. At least the people who named the streets had a sense of humor—boat lovers can live on Sloop, Ketch, Schooner, Yawl, or Outrigger. Golfers live on Birdie, Wedge, Chipping, or Putter.
At Harbourside Drive, I turned to skirt the bay, scanning the sleek boats slipped at the Longboat Key Moorings. One of those boats belonged to Denton Ferrelli. The Longboat Key Golf Club has two courses, one harborside, and one inland. The clubhouse of the harborside course was less than a hundred feet away from the dock. I imagined Denton coming into that dock after killing his brother. Perhaps the lipstick he’d used to draw the leering grin on Conrad’s face had been tossed into the sea. I imagined him mooring his boat and ambling over to play golf with his friends.
Back on Gulf of Mexico Drive, I began watching for Denton’s street. It was one of the older streets edging the bay, where normal people used to live in normal house
s. Now those normal houses are being bought up and bulldozed to make room for megamansions in which two or three people count their money or plan where their money will go when they die or whatever really rich people do when they’re alone. Denton’s three-story gray stucco edifice squatted at the end of the street like a leering gargoyle. A black iron gate spanned a driveway that curved to a garage somewhere behind the house. I could see open air at the back, but tall stucco walls ran along both sides of the lot. Only boats and fish would be looking at them, but Denton and Marian Ferrelli were taking no chance of being seen inside their house.
I drove past the end wall and over the curb to park beside the wall where I thought I would be out of view. The builders had spared an ancient banyan tree there, in a thick green copse of palmetto fronds and potato vines. From the car window, I could see the third-story roof and the side of a second-story deck that was probably above the garage. Part of the deck was covered with a blue canvas awning, and the rest was caged with ribbing that rose to the third-story roof. Too hot now, but probably a pleasant place to sit early in the morning and late in the afternoon and watch sailboats and dolphins on the bay. I got out of the Bronco and eased the door shut, then walked between the stucco wall and the rooting banyan branches toward the back of the lot.
An old mango tree at the far end of the wall emitted a pungent odor of rotten fruit, and I could hear the scurrying of fruit rats as I approached. Careful not to step on any of the mushy mangoes on the ground, I slipped under the overhanging branches and stopped behind the tree’s thick trunk. A rat the size of a cat leaped past me with a mango in its mouth, giving me a red-eyed glare as if it thought I had come to steal its booty.
Cautiously, I angled my head so I could see the back of the house, but all I got was a view of a five-car garage and the pavement in front of it. All the garage doors were closed. Above the garage, the deck shimmered in the afternoon sun. A blue-and-white-striped table umbrella made an occasional movement from the sea breeze, but that was the only sign of life. No doors slammed, no car motors started, no music or conversation sounded. With Reggie’s keen senses, I was surprised he wasn’t barking at the fruit rats. Or at me. But maybe he wasn’t here. Maybe Denton had taken him someplace else. I didn’t want to think about the someplace else he might have taken him.
Duplicity Dogged the Dachshund Page 21