Quarterback Trap (A Carlos McCrary novel Book 3)

by Dallas Gorham

  In a few seconds Pistolet Pisarczik came in. Both hoods wore tuxes. Nothing but the best for Vidali’s employees. I wondered how good their health plan was. Did they have dental?

  I moved closer to the door to widen my viewing angle.

  Vidali strode across the marble floor. A twenty-something woman with honey-colored hair clung to his arm. Look up the definition of “arm candy” in the dictionary, and you’d see her picture. Her red dress was slit to the hip on one side. Her cleavage went all the way to her waist in front. Every head in her vicinity, both male and female, turned to look. She was that kind of woman. I knew from Vidali’s file that she wasn’t his wife. She leaned on Vidali like she was half-drunk, or maybe stoned. I felt a little sorry for her.

  I figured Vidali had a handyman, a housekeeper, and maybe a cook. Ordinarily they would be at the mansion, but with it being Saturday night and Super Bowl weekend, they probably had a few days off. So the mansion should be empty. With Vidali, the mistress, and both hoods at the party, the burglar alarms at his mansion would be armed. I remembered Vidali’s mansion had a sophisticated alarm system. It would be almost impossible to crack.

  I decided to wait for Vidali’s group to leave the party and go back to his place. He would turn the alarms off to go inside. That’s when I would go in. I would use a door on the other side of the house—a door he didn’t use often. Most people don’t turn on their alarms until they go to bed. If Vidali slept with a window or French door open, he might not turn them on at all—or maybe only the alarms on the ground floor. Worst case, I would have a window of opportunity several minutes long when the alarms were off.

  ###

  I pulled the curtains over the windows of the SeaRay’s cabin. Enough light from the marina’s dock lights leaked through to see without the interior lights. I changed into my sneaky clothes like I had before.

  I studied the Mango Island map by flashlight. 176 Mango Drive lay a half-mile away as the crow flies, three-quarters of a mile via the shortest cart path. But someone might see me if I took the path. I decided to follow the golf course from the seventeenth tee, which was closest to the marina, all the way around to the third hole.

  The security patrol passed the marina. I had at least five minutes before the next patrol came by. It was time to roll.

  I opened the cabin door. Grabbing the gear bag, I walked up the dock, not too fast and not too slow. I passed the harbormaster’s office, crossed the cart path, and disappeared into the darkness between two mid-rise condo buildings. The golf course lay on the other side.

  The hole diagram on the seventeenth tee said 484 yards, par 4. I would wind my way 5,400 yards down the fairways to Vidali’s house—walking three miles to get one-half mile. I told myself the exercise would do me good.

  Chapter 51

  I hiked through the sea grapes, bottlebrush trees, and oleanders down the rough of the sixteenth and fifteenth holes to where the cart path crossed a street. The street was deserted. I sprinted across and scurried between the condos on the far side to the fourteenth green. At the street between the eleventh and tenth holes, I spotted another security patrol. I lurked under a copse of sea grapes for him to pass. I waited in the bushes for another patrol between the sixth and fifth holes before I crossed the final street.

  My objective rose in the gloom across the fairway. Two hours since I’d left the Caribbean Clubhouse. Vidali should be at the party.

  I had studied the house plans on the county property appraiser’s website and the aerial photos on Google Earth. The master suite was upstairs at the back, overlooking the golf course. Of the eleven bedrooms, seven were downstairs. Downstairs rooms had one or two sets of French doors. French doors are easy to open. The downstairs had a thick bougainvillea hedge for privacy. The best downstairs views were from the four bedrooms that opened onto the pool deck. The three bedrooms on the side away from the pool had patios with wrought iron tables and chairs with deep blue cushions and matching patio umbrellas. Those patio rooms were the least desirable. They would be the last ones anybody would use. That’s where I would make my entrance.

  I hid under the same sea grapes that Snoop and I had hid under a few nights before. I surveyed the scene for a few minutes. Home, sweet home. Thank goodness there was a gap in the bougainvillea hedge. The house and gardens had been totally dark the last time I’d been there. This time the lights over the patio doors were lit. They cast a cone of light on the French doors and the patios. The major trees had landscape lights turned on that had been dark when we’d been there before.

  I hoped the lights meant that Vidali was “in residence,” as the Queen called it in Britain. That wouldn’t necessarily mean he was home. If he had left the party early and beat me back to his house, then I was screwed. I fired up the thermal imaging camera and scanned the rooms I could see. They were empty.

  I threaded my way through the bougainvilleas to the mansion’s north side. Each of three guest rooms had a recessed light in the soffit above the French doors. I scanned the rooms through the doors. Nobody was home. I breathed a sigh of relief.

  I grabbed a wrought iron chair from the patio set and placed it under the light fixture. Standing on the chair, I grasped both sides of the frame and pulled it down. The corrosion on the retaining springs cut the night with a screech that would have awakened a zombie inside. I held my breath and looked through the French door, willing the room behind to remain dark.

  It did.

  I’d dodged a bullet on that screech. I hoped I wouldn’t have to dodge a bullet for real later.

  Reaching around the rim of the fixture, I unscrewed the light bulb. It was hot, even through my rubber gloves. I tossed the light bulb into the bushes.

  I had to move the chair over to the eight-foot French doors to scan the top. I retrieved an electrical current sensor from the canvas gear bag and passed it around the edge of the French doors. I found burglar alarm contacts at the top of each door. The indicator light glowed amber in the darkness as it passed across the transmitters. When Vidali turned off his alarm, the indicator light would go dark.

  It took a while to pick the lock on the French doors. I pressed down on the pistol-grip doorknob to make sure the door was unlocked. Carrying the patio chair back to its table, I sat in the dark and watched the cart path in front of the mansion through a gap in the front hedge. An hour later, Vidali’s personal electric cart passed the gap. Show time.

  I pulled the current sensor from my pocket. This time I knew the exact location of the alarm contacts, so I didn’t need the chair. Standing on tiptoes, I held the sensor near one contact. Its amber light glowed. With my other hand I held a stethoscope against the window. I heard a thump, maybe from the garage door closing.

  I watched the amber indicator until it went out. I stowed the current sensor in the gear bag. I stashed the bag in the bushes and tugged the straps on my armored vest tighter.

  I took a deep breath.

  Chapter 52

  I eased the French door open and slipped inside. A sliver of light from the hall showed under the bedroom door. I locked the outside door and shined a dim flashlight around the room. Something smelled a little off.

  I sniffed again. It was the same after-shave I smelled when Orsinati and Pisarczik shot up my office. The room had a lived-in vibe. It had furniture like a guest room, but somebody lived here. The flashlight beam fell on a picture of Pistolet Pisarczik and a woman on the nightstand. I had to hide.

  I glanced around the room. Pisarczik would visit the bathroom, maybe take a shower. The closet was out for the same reason.

  My gaze fell on the ornate king-sized bed. It was a cliché, but that was the only option. I dropped to the floor and slipped under the bed. I double-checked my phone to make sure it was off.

  I lay in the silent darkness for maybe an hour. The ceiling creaked three times as someone walked across the room above. Various doors opened and closed. Faint water sounds came through Pisarczik’s open bathroom door as the pipes carried so
und from around the huge house.

  Rubber-soled shoes squeaked their way down the marble hallway. Someone was coming. The knob clicked and the door swung open, sending a shaft of light across the Persian rug by the door. I was lying on a similar rug that the bed was centered on. It felt like silk through my rubber gloves. The door closed and a lamp on the round pedestal table came on. A switch by the door must have controlled it.

  One shoe squeaked on the parquet floor as Pisarczik stepped onto the rug.

  The bed slats were a foot off the floor. I raised my head a little.

  Pisarczik walked across the carpet and sat in a leather chair next to the round table. I heard the clunk of his gun on the table. The leather creaked as he removed his black Rockport dress shoes, then his formal black socks. He walked barefoot to the closet. The light came on when he opened the door. I heard the clothes hamper lid slap when he tossed in his dirty clothes.

  If he had been a woman, it might have been exciting to listen to him undress. As it was, it was chilling to be that close to a mob assassin and be unable to move if he discovered me. I scooched closer to the center of the bed.

  In a few minutes he closed the bathroom door. A minute later the shower came on.

  Time to boogie.

  I slid from under the bed. The crack under the door showed a light. I pressed my ear to the panel and listened. Nothing.

  I stepped into the hall and looked left and right. The hall began at the marble entrance foyer and stretched maybe fifty yards to the pool deck in back.

  Since Pisarczik was in the room I had just come from, Orsinati should be in another room on the north side. I took a few steps toward the back of the house. The door crack of the rear guest room was dark. That didn’t mean anything. Orsinati could already be in bed. I decided to booby trap all three rooms.

  A set of five decorative tables stood against the walls between the three guest room doors on the north and the four doors on the south. Each table held a Chinese brass gong in a carved jade support. I held one gong to keep it silent and set the piece on the floor. I grabbed one end of the table and tested its weight. Solid oak, too heavy to lift alone. If I tried to pull it across the floor, it could make a noise. Instead, I placed the Chinese gong assembly smack in front of Pisarczik’s door. I did the same maneuver with the other gongs, blocking all three doors on the north side. I didn’t think that Vidali’s thugs would rate a poolside room, but I had two more gongs available. I used them to block two of the four rooms on the pool side of the hall. Couldn’t hurt.

  At the bottom of the stairs, I turned off the hall lights. The same switch turned off the upstairs also.

  I waited for my eyes to adjust to the darkness. I drew my Glock and climbed the stairs.

  Chapter 53

  The double doors to Vidali’s master suite were locked. I held the flashlight in my mouth as I pulled out my lock picks. It was easier to pick than the outside door had been. I eased the sitting room door open, all the while praying the hinge wouldn’t squeak. It didn’t. I locked the doors behind me. The bedroom door stood open and a faint light came through the French doors from outside. The scent of perfume, aftershave, incense, and something else I couldn’t place wafted across the room. Too late, I recognized the smell—dog.

  Two dogs began to bark simultaneously in the bedroom. Loud enough to wake the dead—or bodyguards in the bedrooms below.

  By the time I ran across the sitting room and into Vidali’s bedroom, he had turned on a bedside lamp, rolled out of bed, and was stumbling naked toward the closet. I knew from the mansion’s building permits that Vidali had done extensive work upstairs after he bought the place. He would have fitted out the closet as a safe room to protect him from either a home invasion or a hurricane. I couldn’t let him reach there. In three steps, I caught him, tripped him, and kicked the pistol from his hand. The gun hit the plush carpet soundlessly and bounced a few feet away.

  The Pomeranians kept yapping.

  I locked the door between the sitting room and bedroom.

  Vidali’s honey blonde, or should I say “blond honey,” sat up in the middle of the bed, naked as the day she was born. Her legs stretched out in front, still spread where Vidali had been a moment before. She was a natural blond. She stared at me, eyes wide, as if she was trying to figure out where Vidali had gone all the sudden. And who the heck was I? Satin sheets lay piled in a heap at the foot of the bed and spilled onto the floor. Scented candles shimmered on the chest of drawers and the two nightstands. Just the thing for a romantic tryst.

  I pointed at her. “You. Quiet the dogs now, or I’ll slit their throats. Ask your boyfriend sometime how he feels about someone who would slit a dog’s throat.” Vidali’s eyes widened when I said that.

  She struggled to sit straighter. Her eyes wandered the room until they focused on the dogs. She made kissing sounds. “Come here, babies. Come here.” She extended her arms toward the dogs. When she patted the bed beside her, her perfect breasts didn’t move. They pointed straight at me; the best that Vidali’s money could buy. She’d sold her soul to the devil. “It’s all right, babies. Come to Mama.”

  The bed was high and the dogs were small. They jumped onto an upholstered set of small steps beside the bed, then up to the top. They made themselves comfortable leaning against their mistress’s legs, one on each side. She stroked their heads peacefully and stared in my direction, not quite focused.

  “Who the hell are you?” Vidali sat on the floor, eyes focused like lasers on the barrel of my Glock.

  If I was right about the dogs’ barking, I had maybe a minute before Vidali’s reinforcements arrived. Keeping the Glock pointed at him, I moved across to the French doors and opened them both. The balcony beyond had patio furniture. The night breeze came in from the balcony and stirred the sheer drapes.

  I didn’t want Miss Nude Mango Island to get hurt. “Miss, you’d better take the dogs into the closet. In a couple of minutes, a bunch of armed men will break down that door and run in here with guns drawn. They’ll shoot first and ask questions later. If I were you, I wouldn’t open the door for anyone but Vic. Or the cops—they’ll be here in a couple of hours.”

  Eyes wide, she looked to Vidali. He shrugged, then nodded his consent. She scooped up a dog in each arm and scooted to the edge of the bed. She struggled to her feet, holding the dogs, and staggered naked to the closet. She pulled the door closed behind her. I hoped she’d be okay.

  I turned to Vidali. “I’m a friend of Bob Martinez and Graciela Perez.”

  Vidali’s eyes flicked to my face. “Who?”

  “The New York Jets quarterback and his fiancée.”

  “Okay, you’re friends with a football player. What’s that got to do with anything?”

  Apparently Vidali was going to deny everything. “Okay, you’re here. Whaddya want?” He started to get up.

  “Stay down, Vidali. I want to talk about the Super Bowl game.”

  “At least let me put on my robe.” He pointed at a dark blue silk robe with a gold VV logo embroidered on the pocket. It was draped across a side chair upholstered in raw silk.

  I checked the robe’s pockets before I tossed it to him. While he put it on, I picked up his gun and stuck it in my pocket. It was a Glock 17 like mine. I waited while he tied the sash. “What’s behind that other door?”

  “My study.”

  “We’re going in there, but first, you’re going to turn off the bedside lamp.” When he stood, I grabbed the collar of his robe and pressed the barrel of the Glock into his back, three inches left of his spine, right over his heart. “You know why I have the gun on your left shoulder blade, right?”

  “Yeah, yeah.” He turned off the lamp. The light from the candles and the landscape lighting outside was faint but adequate.

  I gestured with the pistol. “Lead the way.”

  He walked to the study door with me hanging onto his collar.

  As he opened the door, the clang of a Chinese gong came faintly through the be
droom door. Those yapping dogs had woken someone downstairs.

  He stiffened. “Nothing’s changed, Vidali.”

  The first gong falling would wake the other gunman. He would burst through the door and knock over the other gong in a few more seconds.

  Vidali turned on the light. The study was a walnut-paneled office that would have suited a Wall Street money manager. Thick green carpet, matching drapes, burgundy leather furniture, and walnut tables and bookshelves. Vidali started toward an ornate wooden desk with a leather desk chair behind it.

  “Not the desk, Vidali. You sit in the middle of the floor, legs crossed. Lean back on your hands.” With weight on his hands and his legs crossed, it would take him a few seconds to make any kind of move. I’d have plenty of time to react.

  I stepped behind him and kicked the privacy panel on the front of his desk. Thunk. Bullet proof. The whole desk was armored. Maybe that building permit was to make the study into a safe room instead of the closet. Or maybe he had armored both rooms. The mobster had money enough to build any kind of fortress he wanted.

  I searched the desk drawers. I found another Glock 17 in the top left drawer. The place was lousy with them. I popped the magazine out to make sure it had the full seventeen shells. It did. If Vidali trusted his life to it, it was safe to use without test firing. I checked his Glock from the bedroom. It was loaded also. I pulled the magazine for a spare. With luck, the shells from both magazines had his fingerprints on them, or prints of one of his thugs. I stuck my own Glock in its holster. If there was a gunfight later, the bullets would come from Vidali’s own gun.

  I put the empty Glock in the top left drawer.

  The top right drawer held a Smith & Wesson Model M&P R8 revolver. The Model M&P R8 holds eight .357 Magnum bullets the size of a golf ball that will stop a charging buffalo. I didn’t expect to see any buffalo. With two Glocks, I had enough armament without the cannon. I unloaded the S&W and dropped the shells in a wastebasket under the desk. The drawer also held a wireless panic button, knife, and a Taser. I removed the batteries from the panic button and the Taser. I stuck the knife in a pocket of my vest. It never hurt to have two knives. Rule Eleven: Always carry a knife.