The Harvesters

by William J Manning

  “I want you to bring the son of a bitch in.”

  “Sir, I think you’re jumping the gun. We got nothing to tie him to the Harvesters except the word of a shady PI. Let me tail him and see where he goes.”

  “Fine, tail him and keep me updated.”

  “Oh, one more thing.”

  “Yes?”

  “If anything happens to my brother, you will answer to me.”

  “Lobos, calm down.”

  “Don’t you ever tell me to fucking calm down; that’s my brother’s life you’re playing with, asshole?”

  “We’re prepping Donovan to be his new bodyguard.”

  “Has he ever been undercover before?”

  “Yes, he helped us shut down a big Aryan Brotherhood meth ring.”

  “Fooling a bunch of ignorant racists is not much experience; Russian mobsters are even more paranoid. You tell him don’t leave his side.”

  “He won’t. Focus on Dr. Merryweather and get back to me when you got something.” I hang up the phone.

  Miami Health Express

  I park outside Merryweather’s office, it’s a half-empty parking lot across the street from the golf course. Slow day at the doc’s office, it looks like. I reach into the backseat, getting my camera. I sit it down in my passenger seat and pull out my binoculars and watch the door.

  An old man leaves the office, but it’s not Merryweather; it’s just an old guy here to get his blood pressure meds. I glance at the clock, and it’s 6:30pm.

  Alright, the fucker should come out now.

  I take a sip of water from a cooler I packed on the way down here, Ice is melted by now, but the water is still somewhat cold. Just as I’m lighting a cigarette, a middle-aged white dude, probably early 50s with short black hair, leaves the office and heads to a dark red convertible jaguar. I glimpse his name tag as I snap a picture of him, and sure enough, it’s Merryweather. I take down the license plates, JHG-RMS. So if I lose him, I can run the plates to find him again.

  I take a drag from my smoke while putting the car into gear. I keep a car between us, so he doesn’t get suspicious because no doubt the Russians have warned him to watch his ass with the DEA and FBI snooping around. They had their suspicions before, but after they killed the agent, it’s more than just suspicion; it’s a fact now.

  We stop at a traffic light at a busy intersection. I watch him pick up his cell. Another body probably came in for this shitstick to empty. After following him for an hour, we end up in Little Havana, and it’s getting dark. He pulls into a seedy motel parking lot.

  When I was a Detective with Miami PD, this area was and still is Hooker Central. A brunette in high heels and an awfully short skirt walk over to his car. Based on observation, this area is still Hooker Central.

  The woman and the doctor talk for a few minutes, and then he gets out of the vehicle, the hooker leads him up to a second-floor motel room, and they close the door. Sitting here for twenty minutes, they emerge from the motel room. I snap a few pictures of the doctor and the working girl. He does the walk of shame back to his car.

  Looks like he’s heading back to Normandy Island. He leads me to a ritzy neighborhood there; he pulls into a two-story house’s driveway, and there’s something that makes an evil grin slide across my lips. A wife and two young little girls run out to the car to greet him.

  That explains the walk of shame. I gotcha on the ropes now, asshole. That’ll be a card to play later.

  So not only is he selling body parts, he’s cheating on his wife. Our vices do us in when we live a life of crime, and I found the one that will burn his whole world down. Now, I just need to catch him partaking in his other vice.

  Chapter 9

  Blue Dolphin Resort

  Sitting in a chair, smoking a cigarette and sipping my scotch, I stare at my brother sleeping and realize there’s a chance that his days are numbered. I shift away from him, quietly sobbing. Storming out of the hotel room, I lean on the railing, sipping my scotch and taking a puff of my cigarette, gazing at the neon strip of Miami.

  “Devi?”

  I turn around, and it’s Raul. “Hey.”

  “Are you all right?”

  “Well, my brother’s in bed with the Russian Mafia and the Harvesters, so what do you think?”

  “I am so sorry. It was stupid of me to get involved with those people, but by the time I realized how deep I was, it was too late, and now I’m stuck, and people are dead.”

  I hug him. “I’m going to do my best to get you outta this bullshit, but I’m not gonna blow smoke up your ass, little brother, and promise you something I can’t deliver.”

  His predicament is bordering on hopelessness, but it won’t do either of us any favors to let him know that.

  “I know you’ll do your best, hermana, but if the worst happens, promise me something.”

  I take a swig of whiskey, wiping my lips. “What?” “Don’t beat yourself to death over me because, like you said, this is my fault. I let the desire to be famous go to my head. My desire to be a rock star put Elliot where he’s at now.” He smiles at me. “I’m going to make this right, Devi. I’m going to right all my wrongs.”

  Staring at Raul’s smile, I’m reminded of time he nursed me back to health on his couch. I woke to see him and his band members standing over me with concerned faces mixed with smiles of relief. I wonder if Jerry told me is right. Will they prosecute Raul no matter what?

  “So, you find any leads, Dev?”

  “I have a name for one of the Harvesters. His name is Dr. Jon Merryweather, he has a medical office on Normandy Island.”

  “That’s great! So what’re you going to do? Send in your troops and snatch his ass up?”

  “Not yet. I need evidence that proves he’s a Harvester,” I say, flicking my smoke off the balcony.

  He sticks a joint in his mouth, lighting it. “Can’t you just drag him in and sweat him or something?” he passes me the joint

  I take a hit off the skunk. “What good will that do if I got nothing to tie him to being one of the Harvesters? I will eventually have to release him, and then he’ll go deeper into hiding.”

  “Fuck! Don’t you ever wish you could just kill an evil motherfucker and fuck all the legal bullshit?”

  The weed is really kicking in; my brother always brought the next level shit with the Mary Jane.

  “In a simple world that might work, but our world is far too complex.”

  He stares down at the parking lot; his face contorts with worry and fear.

  “What’s wrong?”

  He turns to me, his face wracked with anxiety. “I was just thinking of how deep I am with these assholes and how totally fucked I am.”

  “Hey, stop it with the defeatist shit. I’m going to do my best to get you outta this, but you adopting this stance of all hope is lost won’t do you any favors. It’ll just get you killed with Volkov.”

  “So I guess after all this is over with, I have to find another career other than music.”

  “Wrong, you’re going to continue making music. You have talent. You don’t need anyone else pushing for you, and you need an honest to god agent, not some Russian gangster posing as one.”

  “But if all this comes out, my rep will be ruined, just like Elliot.”

  “Listen, when we go after these fucks the media will be so focused on the mobsters and the doctors, you won’t even be on their radar. However, if this goes south, odds are your music career is over, and worst-case scenario, you end up being charged and convicted for the murder of a federal agent.”

  He takes a deep quivering breath.

  “But, I’m going to do my best to see that doesn’t happen, okay?”

  “I trust you, Devi.”

  “You damn well better.” I playfully jab him in the side with my finger.

  “Ow Fuck! I hate your goddamn rat claws.”

  My brother always hated it when I would sneak up on him and poke him in his sides with my fingers. I’d get him every mor
ning when we would get off the school bus.

  “I’m going to get some sleep, Devi. You should too, you look like you could use it.”

  “Yeah, no kidding, I’ve had a hell of a day. Plus, I got another round of tailing Doctor Merryweather coming up. So yeah, let the good times roll.”

  Merryweather’s Office

  His office is more crowded than it was yesterday. Suits me just fine. It makes my car blend in easier—my cell pings. I look down, and it’s Ingrid.

  Damn.

  “Hey, Ingrid. How’s my four-legged child doing?”

  “She’s doing well; she and my cat are sleeping on the coffee table.”

  “Well, that’s just great. My cat is learning more bad habits from yours.”

  “Indeed. My cat is the destroyer of good little kitties. So how is everything with the family, the emergency? Wasn’t too serious, I hope.”

  “Nah, just my brother got really sick and ended up in the hospital.”

  Well, I’m kinda telling the truth. He got mixed up with the Russians and Harvesters. So he is sick.

  “I’m glad it wasn’t too serious then.”

  Merryweather leaves the office, heading to his car. “Listen, I have to go, my brother is calling me,” I say, hanging up.

  I slap my car into gear and follow him. This time he’s heading down a different route; he’s driving to Atlantic Heights, hopefully, to lead me right to his buddies. He turns right on Collins Avenue until we’re stopped by a traffic light. I take this opportunity to spark a smoke. The light turns green, and I follow him across the intersection. After following a ways to the end of Collins Avenue, we end up on Dodge Island, an import-export area set up on an artificial island. Companies use it to ship in their merchandise and used by criminals to smuggle in their ‘merchandise.’

  Merryweather Parks his car in front of a large tanker ship; he gets out of his vehicle, jogging up a ramp, carrying a suitcase. I park the car in an alleyway where it won’t be noticed. I switch off the headlights and shut the engine off, observing the ship. The urge to want to see what’s on the boat nearly over takes, but sadly I don’t have a warrant to do that. Plus, it would be suicide. But my brother’s life hangs in the balance. I slip a suppressor on my Sig. As I’m heading toward the boat, someone grabs me, dragging me behind the container. I twist their wrist. He gasps in pain. “Ow! Goddamn it, Devora. It’s me,” Jerry whines.

  “What the hell are you doing?” I grit my teeth.

  “Saving your ass.”

  “I got this under control, jackass.”

  “Yeah? So you noticed the snipers on the deck providing overwatch with nightvision scopes?” he says, handing me his nightvision binoculars. I look through them, and sure enough, they’re four snipers armed with SVD Dragunov rifles. “Those snipers, sister. Aren’t amateurs they’re highly trained Russian Spec ops snipers, means they won’t miss your ass if they don’t like your looks.” The ship’s horn blasts throughout the docks as it drifts down the channel.

  I aim my gun at him. “Why the hell are you following me?”

  “I have some info you may be interested in.”

  “It better be good enough for you to stop me from getting on that ship.”

  He slings his hands out to his side, rapidly gesturing. “It’s not better, but this won’t require a suicide run. Look, why don’t you follow me back to my boat, and I’ll fill you in.”

  I beam a toothy smirk at him. “Trying to ring more money out of me?”

  “No. No, not this time. Listen, you and I go way back.”

  “You mean back before you turned into a greedy pornographer.”

  “Hey, what can I say? Being an honorable PI, doesn’t pay my child support, bills or taxes. The boat is the only home I got. So I can say I am a greedy pornographer with pride. But let’s get outta here. It’s not safe.”

  “Fine, I’ll follow you.”

  Chapter 10

  Miami Marina

  Thunder roars in the distance. The patter of rain pelts the roof of the boat as lightning illuminates the vessel’s cabin’s interior. Evening thunderstorms like clockwork. He hands me a glass of his disgusting Tequila. “You got something other than Tequila?”

  He smiles. “I got gin.”

  Gin is disgusting too, but it’s lesser of the two evils.

  “It’ll do, I guess.” He hands me a glass of chilled Gin. Taking a sip, my mouth fills with its piney taste, then its bite kicks in. I lean back on the couch, sitting the glass on the table, glancing at the rain gradually turning into a downpour. “So about this info?”

  “Well, after you left, I got to thinking about how you and I used to work together on cases back when I was what you called an ‘honest PI’ I figured maybe I can help an old friend for old time’s sake.”

  “So you’re going to help me out of the kindness of your heart?”

  “Pfft hell no, you’re going to pay me, like you used to.”

  I knew he wouldn’t help me for free, but I still had to be an ass.

  “How much is this going to cost me exactly?”

  “My normal rate is hundred bucks an hour, but for an old friend, I’ll say thirty bucks an hour.”

  “You want my kidneys too?”

  “Look, sweetheart, if I’m going to help you take down soulless assholes like the Harvesters and Russians, I’m getting paid, nothing personal.”

  Understandable. Russian mobsters are straight-up bloodthirsty savages, and the Harvesters are the ghouls that work for them.

  “Fine. Now give me this info that was so damn important.”

  “Okay, anyway, as I was saying, I did some digging after you left, and it turns out Mayor Timmons is in bed with the Russians and Harvesters.”

  “How’d ‘you come by this info, exactly?”

  “Millennials and their tech addiction have their uses. You know old generations say they’re going to be the death of America, but based on what I’ve seen them do with computers, I think they’re going to just tweak it a bit.” He nips from his glass. “Anyway, they’ve deciphered the encrypted messages between the Russians and our beloved mayor, yes, the beloved mayor, the mayor whom everyone bows down for and licks his ass. Mayor Timmons is sharp with politics, but not so much with technology, or he’d known encrypted emails can be decrypted.”

  I turn my head. “So the mayor is in bed with the Russians and Harvesters? Wish I could say I’m surprised. Do you have transcripts of his emails?” I take a sip of my drink.

  He smiles. “Of course.” He reaches under his coffee table and lays three sheets of paper on the table.

  After reading the transcript, I’m sick to my stomach at how the mayor can just casually talk to these monsters like they’re investors on Wall Street or his routine political dealings. “This is fifty shades of fucked up right here. All politicians are corrupt, but this takes it to a whole other level. Why?”

  Jerry sits down, crossing his legs. “Does the why really matter?”

  “In the grand scheme of things, no. But I’m curious.”

  “Apparently, his wife needed a new Liver. So a poor twenty-year-old middle-class female gym instructor had to lose her life so some rich bitch can have a new liver because she ruined the old one with her aggressive drinking habits.”

  “I’m guessing the Russians weren’t done with him after his wife got a new liver.”

  “He had to get Volkov’s hitman’s case thrown out. That whole fiasco got the two arresting detectives fired. Yeah, once the Russians do a favor for you, you’re locked in for life. Radomir Volkov likes the rush of controlling people, making them his personal dancing bears after he grants them favors. Hell, the mayor was so good at getting Radomir’s guys’ case’s thrown out. He made damn sure he got reelected.”

  “It’s been my experience that having a personal dancing bear is never a good idea because the bear eventually remembers that he’s a killing machine and eats his handler.”

  “Exactly, Lobos. I bet when we show the mayor th
is stuff right here, he’ll be ready to take his handler’s head off.”

  “Jerry, when this stuff starts, you should probably take measures to protect yourself. Russian Mafia becomes erratic when they’re backed into a corner.”

  He knocks back his Tequila. “We all gotta die sometime.”

  “I guess we’re on the same page then.”

  “Do you have the phone number for the mayor?”

  “Yes, little hacker nerds helped me with that too. Here’s his cell phone number.”

  “Good, we’ll arrange a meeting right now. Give me the number.”

  I’m sick of this case, I just want it over with, so I can go back to Tampa. Being here is too many terrible memories.

  After dialing the number, the phone rings several times. “Hello?” A groggy voice answers.

  “Mr. Mayor?”

  “Who is this?”

  “I have something you may be interested in.”

  “Lady, it’s 11pm at night. I’m going back to sleep; I am not interested in what your selling.”

  “Mr. Mayor, it’s in the best interest of your political career that you do not hang up on me. Otherwise, I’ll have to give your encrypted emails to the media.”

  “Who the hell do you think you are? Do you seriously think you can blackmail me?”

  “All I know is it’s gonna be very bad for you if you blow off this meeting.”

  “Fine!” he snaps. “Tell me where you want to meet, and we’ll talk.”

  “Also, come alone. You don’t want others knowing what you and I know.”

  “Uh-huh, and what do you know?”

  “Come meet me at the Den lounge over on Collins Avenue and find out.” I hang up.

  “You going to tell your boss about the mayor?”

  “Fuck, no! I tell him about this, and I’ll get shipped back to Tampa, and my brother will end up killed or sent to prison.”

  “It’s better to have good PR than be a good cop nowadays, I see. Thank god I’m not a cop anymore.”

  “Yeah, because you were such a fucking boy scout. Let’s move.”