The Four Corners of the Sky

by Michael Malone

  They sat a while longer.

  Raffy sipped his coffee, nodding in thought. “Okay, here is my plan. You go to the bank in Cuba and get the jewels with the passwords. We put the jewels back in the Queen and we trade the Queen to Diaz for your papa’s debt.” He looked at her sadly. “Or maybe we trade the Queen to Diaz for your papa himself if that s.o.b. has got him for ransom.”

  “But if Diaz had Dad, wouldn’t he call you or—”

  Suddenly Raffy saw something behind her. Whatever it was made him fling loudly out of his chair, flipping it over. He ran, stumbling past crowded tables, weaving around waitresses as he headed for the kitchen doors. There he collided with an enormous bald waiter with a walrus moustache. With surprising dexterity, the waiter swung a large tray of fried eggs and hash browns out of Raffy’s path. Raffy slid between the kitchen doors.

  Looking around for the cause of the Cuban’s abrupt flight, Annie spotted Dan Hart as he moved toward her through the crowded restaurant.

  Chapter 46

  The Bride Came C.O.D.

  The detective made his way through the tables of noisy breakfasters. Maybe it was the blue of his cotton shirt that made Annie feel as if a wave were about to roll over her. When he took off his sunglasses, his eyes added more blue. Reaching her table, he stopped and shook his head in reproach. “You couldn’t wake me up?”

  “No,” she told him. “Nobody could. How’d you find me?”

  “Got your messages. Saw your rental car out there.” He pointed toward the window with a steel courier case he held. It was the case she’d hidden under her bed when she left. “So, do you know your dad wasn’t Coach Ronny Buchstabe?” he asked her. “Coach Ronny was eighty-six and married a hooker in her twenties and had a heart attack.”

  She was hoping he hadn’t seen Raffy. “Ah. Yes. Thanks.”

  Dan swung the case in the direction of the kitchen doors. “Rafael Rook had another appointment all of a sudden?”

  She shaded her eyes from the sun that was glinting in the big window behind him. “Rook? That was just some man hitting on me.”

  He righted the knocked-over chair and picked up the broken coffee mug. “Looks like you had a strong reaction.” Sitting across from her, he placed the case on the seat beside him. “You’re actually a pretty convincing liar. But Rafael Rook is peeking out of the kitchen doors at us right now.”

  She glanced behind her, and in fact Raffy was undeniably standing with his head stuck out of the doors. She said, “Hey, come on, give that poor guy a break, Dan. I told him you’d intercede for him. He just wants to help out my dad.”

  “Everybody just wants to help out your dad. You included. Well, I’m officially off the case.” Dan blew a flamboyant good-bye kiss in Rook’s direction. “So vaya con dios, Rook.”

  She rubbed at her temples. “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome. You look like you’re seriously hung-over.”

  She nodded. “I said I wasn’t much of a drinker.”

  He looked solemn. “Annie, there’s something I‘ve got to tell you.” Her heart sped: what if he were going to say that their being together last night had been a terrible mistake? Instead he reached for her hand and kissed her fingers. Relieved and preoccupied with the feel of his lips on her fingers, she nodded. “One. You know your dad stole a car from Golden Days?”

  She shrugged in an uncommitted way.

  “Also.” He pulled a police bulletin printout from the pocket of his jeans. “My partner just took this off the MPD feed.” The gist of the police wire was that a stolen vehicle, a 2000 Lexus SUV, had been recovered from Biscayne Bay after crashing through a guardrail on the causeway. Inside the car were certain personal effects. There was no body in the car but fingerprints on the driver’s license had identified the driver as John Ingersoll Peregrine, who was currently wanted for questioning in three states, including Florida. He was presumed drowned. “You don’t look surprised,” Dan added.

  Annie asked if the effects included her father’s wallet. After glancing through a two-page document, Dan said yes, the wallet was there with Peregrine’s driver license in it. She asked what the wallet looked like. The description didn’t resemble the wallet her father had shown her in the hospital. “Were there old photos of me in it? Baby pictures?”

  He checked the list. “Nope. No photos in there.”

  Annie smiled. “Then he planted the wallet and he’s not dead.” Odd how sure she was that he would always keep those pictures of her in his wallet.

  “But there were a couple of IDs. Plus $280 in cash.” Dan handed her the report.

  Looking over the list, she let her eyebrow arch. “You think my dad had IDs in his own name? No way.”

  Rubbing his unshaved cheek, Dan studied her face. “You’re saying he dumped the Lexus and swam off? The thought did occur to me.” Grinning, he ran his fingers through his curls. “I sure hope Melissa kept up her car insurance. It was her Lexus.”

  Annie laughed. “I heard that rumor.”

  He set the metal case on the table between them. “Okay. This morning I wake up with your dog but you’re nowhere to be found. So I’m taking a shower and I hear the dog bark. There’s no one in the room when I get there but the door’s wide open. I see this metal case lying in the middle of the floor.”

  “In the middle of the floor?” Her first thought was that Rafael Rook had robbed her before showing up at Rest Eternal.

  “So now you’re surprised.” He swiveled the case on the tabletop. “Is this where you kept La Reina Coronada?”

  Annie spun the combination to 2506 and popped open the latches. The Queen of the Sea was no longer inside. In its place, there was a note in printed capitals on Dorado stationery that said “IOU $1,000,000.”

  Annie slapped the lid shut. “Goddamn it. My dad took the Queen.”

  Dan looked at her with skepticism. “You and your dad and Rafael Rook—who just peeked out of the kitchen again—you’re in this whole scam together, aren’t you? You’re pulling a sting?”

  She laughed. “On whom?”

  “On me, for one. Don’t con me.”

  She raised her eyebrow. “Ditto.”

  Dan waved for a waitress. “I’m starving.” He took a piece of Annie’s toast, which he ate with a grimace. “Cardboard. Also, did you know your husband checked into the Hotel Dorado last night and was there looking for you at one in the morning?”

  She asked who’d told him that.

  “Juan Ramirez. Relative of Rook’s. He’s the piano player in the bar.”

  “That man should have his own talk show.” She felt her neck flush. “Did ‘Juan’ tell you Brad was in there hitting on your ex-wife?”

  “Melissa would hit on a mannequin if he wore nice enough clothes. I guess your husband would too.” Dan opened his arms in a comic gesture. “God’s speed and God bless.”

  “Please stop calling him my husband,” Annie sighed, rubbing her head. She was thinking that she’d been an idiot to promise Brad not to sign any divorce papers for a month; she didn’t want to have to admit to Dan that she’d done so. “I’ve really got a hangover.”

  “That’s no excuse. If you’re not divorced, you’re married.” He chewed on a piece of bacon from her plate. “If they told you this was bacon, they lied. Me, I’m officially legally divorced. Trust me, Annie, you’ve got to pull the trigger.” He tasted her scrambled eggs and made a face.

  When their waitress paused at their table with a pot of stale coffee, Dan asked her if their eggs came from chickens.

  She was too tired to joke. “Yeah, probably.”

  “Go find out where the chickens came from.”

  “Wise guy.”

  Dan pointed out the window. “Uh oh. There goes your friend Rafael. Looks like the Feds are picking him up.”

  Annie stood to look outside. A stolid man wearing a tropical shirt was strong-arming the disconsolate Rafael Rook through the steamy-hot asphalt parking lot while a thin man in a straw porkpie hat trotted ahe
ad to open the side door of a white van. Dan pulled her back to her chair.

  She resisted him. “I want to tell Raffy I’ll get him a lawyer.”

  “Yeah, looks like he’ll need one. Don’t worry. I’ll call somebody. He’s safer with the FBI than with Diaz picking him up. You should know, the Feds want me to bring you in too.”

  “I don’t think so.” She watched as the FBI men placidly lowered Rafael’s head into the van. His hair worked loose from his glossy black ponytail when he struggled against them. The agent in the straw hat walked over to the restaurant, tapped on the window, and gestured at Dan to come outside.

  A frown narrowed Dan’s eyes. It was like a fast cloud hurrying over the sky, graying the blue for an instant. “That’s the agent that grilled me about your dad. If I’m not back in ten minutes, call this number. My partner.” He pulled a card from his wallet. “Okay, now I need you to put on a show. Right now.”

  She looked at him suspiciously.

  Dan turned his back to the window. “It’s for your dad. I want you to act as if I’d just made you really really angry. I mean it. Slap me.”

  Immediately she slapped him hard in the face.

  He rubbed his bright-red cheek. “Damn, you’re fast.”

  “Don’t ask for things you don’t want.” She raised her hand again.

  He grabbed her wrist. “I’ll remember that. Now wait here. Trust me.” He hurried outside. “We’ll get you out of this.”

  “Out of what?”

  As she watched from the window, Dan approached the FBI agent, listened to him talk for a few minutes, then walked with him to the van and vanished inside its side door.

  Ten minutes later, Annie lost patience and hurried from the log-cabin restaurant; she was crossing the parking lot toward the van when Dan hopped out of it and grabbed her by the arm, leading her away. “Hang on. I worked something out. You’re going to Key West for questioning.”

  Annie was taken aback. “I’m not about to go to Key West!”

  “This isn’t an invitation you can RSVP. If you don’t believe me, get in touch with your Commander Campbell in Annapolis. FBI’s already talked to him.” Reaching his vintage truck, he tilted his head in the direction of the white van. “Okay, keep acting. Righteous indignation. Look unhappy.”

  “This is not an act.” She shoved hard at his chest. Old angers surged in her. “Are you lying to me? Raffy told me not to trust you!”

  Dan caught her hand, holding it tight against him. She could feel his heart. They stood that way for a minute, hearing their own breath.

  He looked at her fiercely. “I mean this, trust me. I just heard something from my partner. Somebody in MPD spotted your dad about an hour ago. You want him back?”

  Annie stared at him, then at the van. “He got away from them?”

  “Yes, but that’s not going to last. They are real serious.” Dan touched her shoulder softly. “And he’s not well, Annie. My partner heard on the street your dad’s seriously sick.” Did she want to make it possible for her father not to spend the last months of his life in prison? If so, she had to trust Dan. Did she believe him?

  There was nothing to go on, thought Annie, except his eyes. Clarity, careful thinking, wise decisions—these were the habits of her life. But, somehow deeper than any thought she could fashion was the beat against her palm of his heart.

  Near them, a thin teenaged boy was loudly and dexterously shoving shopping carts into a silver chain. Racing them into motion, he stepped gracefully onto the back of the last cart and rode the clattering train he’d created across the asphalt, passing the white van when it pulled out of its parking spot. The boy’s leg stretched out behind him like the god Mercury, flying faster and faster.

  “Yes.” Annie nodded. “Help me.”

  Dan grabbed her arms. “Okay. Here we go. I said I’d bring you in. So let’s do it. Make it look like you’re arguing. Fight me. But for Christ’s sake, don’t slug me again!”

  She let him push her into his truck just as the van drove slowly past them. She saw, in the passenger seat window, a flash of Raffy’s sorrowful face.

  ***

  Chamayra was waiting for them in the Dorado lobby, where her tight shiny orange Capri pants and turquoise La Loca T-shirt was in noticeable contrast to the loose taupe linens of the hotel guests.

  “This is all your fault,” she shouted as they walked toward her. It was hard to know whether the accusation was at Annie or at Daniel or both. “Golden Days was my best shot at not dying a waitress and now I’m out on my ass. So gracias! Plus I lose the first man I met this year not a fuckin’ druggie beating up on Wife Number Four!” Chamayra did a rapid dance of rage. “So you get Raffy out of Dade County jail pronto pronto pronto!” She had begun at so intense a pitch that she had no place to go but the physical, which is where she went, jabbing Dan in the collar bone with her short strong fingers.

  Snatching her hands out of the air, he pulled them together and to her shock kissed them. The surprise calmed her. “Baby,” he told the quivering woman, “you take a deep breath. I didn’t put Rook in jail and I can’t get him out. My ass is as fired as yours. But I will try to get him out, if you’ll just have a little faith. I will try.” He pointed over at Annie. “Meanwhile, what about her?”

  Chamayra glared. “What about her? Her daddy stole that Lexus and got me fired. And why didn’t you tell me Ms. Skippings was the Melissa you’ve been bitchin’ about for two years?”

  He put his arm around Annie. “Annie just heard her dad went off the causeway into the bay in Melissa’s car.”

  She gasped. “Shit, I saw something about that on the news! I didn’t know it was Raffy’s Jack.”

  “Well, I don’t hear any sympathy. Come on, Chamayra, where’s the Love sign? First things first.”

  The young Latina woman gave a great shuddering sigh that shook her short frame. Reaching out, she hugged Annie brusquely. “He’s right! Danny, you’re right. I’m out of line. Anybody’s daddy checks out like that, it’s primo.”

  Annie felt the woman’s embrace, her short sturdy arms pressing against her and she realized in that moment curiously enough that she’d never before let herself feel the physical presence of other people when they touched her—to shake her hand, to kiss her cheek, to rub her shoulder. Now she let herself actually feel Chamayra’s sympathy. It was as true as thought. “Thank you but I don’t think my dad was in the car,” she told her. “I think it’s all a con.”

  “What else you gonna think?” the waitress said kindly. “Can I do something?”

  Annie impulsively hugged her back. “Could you possibly keep my dog Malpy till tomorrow night?”

  Without hesitation, Chamayra said, “Sure.” She held out her hands at different distances. “How big’s this dog?”

  “Little,” Dan assured her. “Cute. Friendly. Wait right here. We’ll be right back with him.” He explained that Annie had been ordered to appear at the naval base in Key West and Dan was going to drive her there.

  “If they’re sending you to Kuwait? Tell ’em no fuckin’ way. What did I say to my brother Luis?” asked the waitress. Angrily she crossed her arms, lifting her breasts. “I go, ‘Luis, don’t enlist!’ Now he’s got one leg.” She followed them to the elevator. “And Danny, soon as you find Raffy, you gonna call me, right? You got my number.”

  “I’m gonna call you.”

  “You call me.”

  “I’ll call you.”

  When Annie thanked her profusely, Chamayra made her imaginary Love sign in the air.

  ***

  In the hotel room, Annie quickly packed, while Dan spoke with his former partner at the police department. The Peregrine case, the detective told him, had not only been taken over by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, other government agencies were also involved now, for unknown reasons. Rafael Rook was at this moment being transferred out of Miami to Sigsbee Naval Base in Key West. Meanwhile, the partner said, word was there was a mob contract out on Rook. T
hat Feliz Diaz’s people had offered fifteen thousand dollars cash for Rook’s right hand, so no doubt the musician’s leaving Miami was a good thing.

  As for Jack Peregrine’s whereabouts, some people in MPD seemed to believe that the con man had really drowned while trying to escape from the submerged Lexus SUV. But Dan’s partner had confirmed the rumor that a cop had spotted Peregrine today at a bus station. By the time this officer had called in the ID, Peregrine had given her the slip.

  “His specialty,” said Annie.

  “Soon as the FBI hears he was spotted, there’ll be a mega-search.”

  There was a sharp rapping on the hotel room door. Holding Malpy, Dan motioned for her to keep quiet. After a check through the peephole, he yanked the door open.

  Brad Hopper stood in the hallway, carrying a soft leather briefcase with the Hopper Jet logo on it. Shocked to see not Annie but Daniel Hart standing there, Brad made a series of faces, widening his mouth, squeezing his eyelids, apparently unable to assimilate the coincidence that the anonymous, annoying businessman whom he’d flown in his jet on the Fourth of July from Emerald’s Destin Airworks to St. Louis was the same man who was now standing in the doorway of his wife’s Miami hotel room.

  Eventually Brad stopped trying to make sense of the disjunction and simply shouldered his way into the room. “What’s up, A? I’ve been looking all over hell and—” Thought caught up with him. “What the fuck is this guy doing in your room?”

  “Brad, calm down.”

  Malpy flew out of Dan’s arms at Brad, snarling madly.

  “Get that dog away from me!”

  Annie scooped up the Maltese, grabbing his muzzle. “Malpy, be quiet!”

  Brad pointed a rigid arm first at Dan, then at the young woman he still thought of as legally his. “You know who this is? This is that businessman your bud D. K. made me give a ride to, back on the Fourth, the guy I flew from Emerald to St. Louis!”

  Annie zipped up her packed bag. “Yes, I know that. Brad, I am really sorry but I can’t explain it all now, there’s no time. I should have called you but things are crazy, my dad’s disappeared again—”