Deal’s call to his bookkeeper in Miami brought both bad news and good. The good news was that the trustees of a bankrupt development company for whom Deal had constructed a strip mall in South Dade had finally issued a check for his final payment, a year to the day after he’d finished the job. The bad news was that the automated payroll system they’d just had installed had run amok: Somehow $14,000 in checks had become $1,400,000. Luckily the mistake had been spotted before he’d turned his men into millionaires, but the replacement checks would have to be cut by hand and Deal’s signature would be required on each.
“No way can I get up there tomorrow, Bernice,” he told the bookkeeper.
“Who tells them they don’t get paid?” Bernice replied, her voice nonchalant.
“Sign for me,” Deal said.
“That would be forgery,” Bernice said.
“You’ve done it before.”
“For petty cash.”
“What’s the difference?”
Deal heard some tapping noises and the whir of an adding machine. “About thirteen thousand, eight hundred, and forty-two dollars,” she said.
Deal sighed. “I trust you, Bernice. Sign the checks, will you?”
“I could clean you out, you know. You’d come home to nothing.”
“It wouldn’t be the first time,” he told her. “If you do it, go somewhere nice. Find yourself a man.” Bernice had celebrated her sixty-second birthday last month. She’d been married once, but it had ended sometime before the Beatles had played the Sullivan show.
“Did you ever watch Psycho?” Bernice asked.
“Sure,” Deal said.
“Then you know what happens to thieving women,” she said.
“Only in the movies, Bernice.”
“You need to get back to Miami,” she said. “I don’t like the way you sound.”
“I sound fine,” he told her.
“Mrs. Suarez called from the concentration camp, by the way. She said to tell you everything was fine. She wanted you to know that she and Isabel will be released sometime next week.”
Deal smiled. Mrs. Suarez was his tenant in the Miami fourplex he still called home. About Bernice’s age, she’d played surrogate grandmother for his daughter all her young life. The two of them had been dragged along to a New Age spiritual center cum fat camp by his ex-wife, who was “concerned” about their daughter’s weight.
“This is a crucial time in a young woman’s life,” Janice had told him.
“Isabel is ten,” he’d said.
“She’s gaining,” Janice insisted. “She’s ten pounds over normal.”
“And an inch taller.”
“She’ll like it there.”
“At fat camp?”
“That’s not what it’s called.”
“What difference does it make what they call it?”
“They learn how to eat properly, that’s all.”
“Isabel already knows how to eat.”
She ignored him. “She’ll enjoy it,” she continued. “They swim, they hike, they ride horses…”
“Clydesdales?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Great big horses for the big fat kids.”
“Are you going to fight me on this? We’ve agreed on two weeks’ vacation each with Isabel. You’re free to take her wherever you like…”
“Who’s going to be with Isabel while you’re in the sweat lodges?”
“Mrs. Suarez has agreed to come along. She’d like to lose a little herself.”
“I’ll bet,” Deal said.
“You don’t have a clue about women, John. You like to think you do, but you don’t.”
“I’ll grant you that much,” he’d told her wearily, and the matter had been settled.
“Are you still there?” Bernice was asking. “I told you Mrs. Suarez called…”
“I got that,” Deal said. “I was just thinking about something.”
“I think it’s time you got back up here,” the bookkeeper repeated.
“Next week,” Deal told her. “Before Isabel gets back. I promise.”
“There was a man in here looking for you,” Bernice persisted. Deal thought he detected something in the bookkeeper’s tone.
“A client?”
“He suggested as much, but he was a tight-lipped sort. He didn’t want to talk to anyone but you.”
“You tell him I was in Key West?”
“I didn’t tell him anything,” the bookkeeper said. “I didn’t care for him. I explained that you were out of town and that if he wanted to leave his card I’d have you get in touch.”
Deal sighed. “So give me his name and number.”
“He didn’t leave it. He said he’d be back.”
Deal rolled his eyes. “Well, I’m sure he will. Give him the Key West number if he turns up again.”
“That I’ll do,” she said.
“And you’ll sign those payroll checks?”
It was the bookkeeper’s turn to sigh. “If you really want me to.”
“I trust you with my life, Bernice,” he told her.
“Then you’re a damn fool,” she said. She’d hung up before he could say good-bye.
***
Following his conversation with Bernice, Deal turned his attention to some of the paperwork for the project he was involved in at the eastern end of the island. He might be having trouble getting his last piling properly set, but compared to the political hoops he had to jump through to move a project along in Miami-Dade County, this undertaking had been a breeze.
It hadn’t hurt, either, that Deal had been willing to pick up the pieces of an unraveling project that the Key West city fathers feared might wind up in the wrong hands. Following the untimely death of Franklin Stone, the original developer of the property, several of the larger Florida developers, including one multinational firm, had made overtures to step in. But because the development encroached upon a wetlands nature preserve, the commissioners bowed to growing public pressure and agreed to keep Deal, Stone’s original choice as builder and the “homegrown” candidate, on board. Nor had it hurt, of course, that Terrence Terrell, Dectra Software magnate, for whom Deal had meticulously restored a pair of historically significant bayside properties in Miami, had weighed in on his behalf. In any case, the job was his now, and Key West was beginning to feel more and more like home.
Part of the pleasure surely had to do with the fact that Deal was operating out of the shadow of his father’s legacy. It was the first major project that he’d assumed outside Miami and, as he’d suggested earlier to Russell Straight, might well constitute a turning point in his dozen-year struggle to resurrect the business he’d taken on when there had seemed nowhere else to go.
If it were not for the fact of his daughter’s ties to Miami, he thought, his life might easily segue to “The Rock,” as some locals referred to Key West. But meantime, Isabel still had vacation time from school coming. She could spend her two weeks with him down here in the beachside apartment he rented, and after that, he would simply continue to manage the commute.
The thought of Isabel’s visit prompted him to set aside the permitting sheets he’d been checking and start a list on a lined tablet. “Stuff for 2nd Bedroom,” he jotted down. “Kids’ sheets, bedspread…cartoon characters?” He paused. Maybe Isabel had outgrown such childish things. He scratched out “cartoon characters” and wrote in “something girly…ask clerk.”
“Girly?” He stared at what he’d written, then scratched it out again. What was happening to his brain? Maybe Mrs. Suarez would have some suggestions, if she didn’t come back from the Southwest a New Age convert, that is.
He heard a tapping at the door to his office, then, and glanced up, surprised to find the young woman from the survey and title-search company standing there. “Sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“That’s okay,” Deal said. He put hi
s pencil down. “I must have spaced out. I didn’t hear you come in.”
“I used the inside stairwell,” she said, shrugging. “The door wasn’t locked.”
Deal nodded. “I guess I forgot about that. I haven’t been in here much.”
The girl turned and glanced over her shoulder into the outer office where an empty desk sat. “You don’t have a girl,” she said, turning back to him.
“I’m working on it,” Deal said. “The truth is, we’re not really that busy yet.”
She nodded. “You’re the one putting up the Villas Cayo Hueso, out by the airport, right? The place Franklin Stone was going to build before he got killed?”
“That’s right,” Deal said.
She shook her head. “That’s a big job,” she said. “I’d say you’re going to need some office help.”
He smiled. “Are you applying?”
She shook her head. “Oh no, that’s not what I meant. I was just saying”—she gave him a smile of her own—“I couldn’t leave downstairs, anyway. That’s my boyfriend’s place.”
“Ah,” Deal said, lifting his chin in understanding.
“Somebody’s got to keep things going until he gets back.”
“Gets back?” He couldn’t help but steal a glance at those long, tanned legs. The nails at the ends of her toes glistened like ripened berries.
“From Raiford,” she said, with a toss of her hair. “He got caught out in the Straits with a load of square grouper.” She paused, noting Deal’s expression. “That’s Conch for marijuana,” she added.
“I’m familiar with the term,” he said.
She gave him a speculative look. “Ray Bob Watkins,” she said. “Maybe you’ve heard of him.”
“Afraid not.” Deal shook his head. Watkins Title Services was the name stenciled on the windows downstairs, he recalled. Somehow he’d never imagined anyone named Ray Bob in charge.
“It was a major setup,” the young woman in his doorway was saying. “A friend begged him for a favor and then ratted to Customs. Now Ray Bob’s doing three to five and his buddy is walking around scot-free.”
“Ray Bob must be pissed,” Deal offered.
She lifted one of her shapely brows. “I wouldn’t want to be that guy when he gets out,” she said.
Deal nodded. He willed his gaze up from those long and slender legs, only to find it settling on the inviting plane of her chest. Matching dimples at her breastbones, he noted. A gold chain bearing what looked like a miniature diamond-studded conch shell trailing into a dark furrow of cleavage. He had a sudden picture of Ray Bob snarling in his cell, rattling the bars with both his hands and feet.
“I didn’t mean to lay all that on you,” she said.
“Hey…” Deal said, turning his palms up to show it was okay.
“The truth is, I did have something of a proposition for you.”
Deal considered a rejoinder or two, but he’d never been a rejoinder kind of guy, not when it came to women. He found himself simply nodding, as dumb as Og, the cave-man hunter.
“I was just thinking,” she continued, “since things are slow downstairs and all, and you’re bound to need some help…” She gave a shrug that squeezed her shoulders together and deepened the furrow between her breasts, sending the conch shell into solid darkness. “What we could do is let people come up here through the downstairs entrance. I could even answer your calls and stuff. I wouldn’t charge much, and it’d give me something to do, you know?”
Deal considered it briefly, long enough for the image of Ray Bob prying apart the bars of his cage to coalesce in his mind. “That’s not such a bad idea…” He broke off then, staring into the earnest gaze before him. “What’s your name, anyway?”
She laughed, a tiny, embarrassed sound. “Angie,” she said. “Angie Marsh. I guess I should have mentioned that.”
“You just did,” Deal said. He rose from his chair then and came around to the front of his desk.
“I’m John Deal,” he said, extending his hand. She reached and shook briefly, a dry strong clasp that suggested better than Ray Bob deserved.
“Pleased,” she said.
“Me, too,” he said. He could smell the faint hint of her perfume now and wondered if it had been wise to leave the protection of his desk. “I appreciate your coming up, Angie. I’ll have to think about it, though. I mean, this is just a place to hang my hat right now, really.”
She nodded, but there was a hint of disappointment in her eyes. “Sure,” she said. “It was just a thought. If you change your mind, you know where to find me.” She finished with a bright smile and turned toward the outer office. “I’ll still keep an eye on things,” she added. “No charge.”
Deal gave her a smile back. “I appreciate it,” he assured her. He tried to keep his eyes off her retreating backside, but it was a brief, unsuccessful effort. Any one of the dozen thoughts racing through his mind would have sent Ray Bob vaulting the twelve-foot, razor-wire fences of Raiford.
He walked to the door of the inner stairwell and watched her descend the carpeted steps, her silhouette a graceful, ever-shifting assemblage of curves and angles against the brightly lit landing below. She turned at the bottom and gave him a wave. Deal waved back, waiting for her to disappear before he closed and locked the stairwell door. Something of what Ray Bob must have felt when his cell door clanged shut ran through Deal as the stairwell bolt shot home. The only difference, he reminded himself, was that he was the one operating the lock.
***
He spent the rest of the afternoon trying to keep his mind on the heat and energy calculations the engineers had drafted for the first of the structures at Villas Cayo Hueso, and away from the various fantasies the visit from Angie had planted. Though the structures that would make up the development were framed of block and steel-reinforced concrete, capable—in theory, at least—of withstanding Category V hurricane winds in excess of 150 mph, Deal had tempered Franklin Stone’s original Mediterranean-inspired plans somewhat, replacing the outer finishes of stucco and red barrel tiles with a weather-resistant clapboard siding and bright tin roofing more in keeping with the indigenous architecture of the island.
It was a bit more expensive, but no less durable, and so what if it meant that the cost of materials and the increased air-conditioning load would cut into the profit margin by all of two percent? This was his project, now, not Franklin Stone’s, and it was likely to be standing a long time after he was dead and buried, too. He wouldn’t be able to take the two percent to the grave, either.
He closed the calculations file and leaned back in his desk chair, pleased at the feelings of self-righteousness that had stolen over him. He would never have chosen this career, no doubt about it, would never have willingly started down the pathway that was darkened by the colossal shadow of Barton Deal. But fate had guided him here, regardless, and maybe, just maybe, he was beginning to find real satisfaction in what he did.
He wasn’t sure how his old man had felt about his work. By the time Deal had been old enough to wonder about such things, Barton Deal had already ascended far beyond the plane of sharing his innermost feelings with his only son. It simply wasn’t the sort of conversation that larger-than-life figures carried on. His old man had a million aphorisms, of course: Build ’em to last, boy. Never soap your nails. Measure twice, cut once. Pound and pray.
Maybe he had loved his work at one point. But as for what was going through his father’s mind—the last years of his life, at least—Deal had little clue. Just because your old man built things for slimeballs doesn’t make him a bad person, Vernon Driscoll had told him once. Wouldn’t it be nice to think so.
He shook off the thoughts and checked his watch to see that it was almost six. He’d have to hurry out to the site if he wanted to catch the crew supervisors before they went home. But he’d asked Russell to give him a call if there were any significant developments, and chances were they’d already be gone. If the b
oss was off the job, who’d be fool enough to stick around late?
He tossed the calculations file onto a stack that threatened to topple and stood up to stretch. Maybe he ought to reconsider Angie Marsh’s offer, he thought, glancing at the various piles that mounded his desk. Either that or convince Bernice to come down from Miami for a week to get things in order.
He walked into the outer office, stealing a glance at the locked stairwell door. He felt a little twinge of shame, locking a pretty girl out of his office. She was just a person come to see a man about a job, he told himself. He’d sleep on the notion, see how her “proposition” sounded in the morning, he thought, then went out the door, shaking his head at the lurid thoughts that had leaped instantaneously into his mind.
Chapter Six
He was a couple of steps down the outdoor staircase, still preoccupied with his unruly thoughts, when he saw the figures poised at the landing below. Deal stopped, his hand on the rough-grained railing, trying to reconcile the image of the two men staring up at him with any version of Key West life he was familiar with.
The man in the lead was silver-haired and tall, wearing a dark silk three-piece suit and a maroon tie. He stared up at Deal from behind a pair of stylish, tiny-lensed designer sunglasses, his chin tilted high as if to improve his aim. Behind him was a shaved-headed man who made Russell Straight look small, a portion of his bulk hidden beneath a loose-draped guayabera shirt.
“Mr. Deal?” the man in the suit asked, his voice as smooth as a radio announcer’s.
“That’s me,” Deal said, still poised at the top of the stairs. He glanced out at the street where a Town Car with smoked windows was angled carelessly at the curb.
“How glad I am that we’ve caught you,” the man said in a tone that affected great relief.
“I’m afraid you didn’t,” Deal said. “I’ve got a job to check on. I’m already late.”
The man in the suit didn’t budge. “Would that be the Villas project, Mr. Deal? The property Franklin Stone had acquired out near the Salt Ponds?”
Deal hesitated, glancing at his watch again. “If there’s something I could help you with, maybe we could talk out there. I’d like to catch a couple of my men…”
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