Hope to Lie (DeSantos Book 2)

by A. R. Case

  She brushed her hand over her forehead and switched to a pompous Bostonian accent. “Whatever would this world become without the little necessities, like caviar and fishy-swauce.”

  “Vichyssoise, you nut.” The dimple got almost as deep as his laugh.

  The noise of a snowplow got louder outside.

  “They’re digging out.” Alexis was at the window again. She also snagged one of the slices of bacon off his plate.

  “You ready to go? I can drive you to Atlantic City.”

  “As soon as we finish breakfast. You okay with driving me back?”

  “I live in Ventnor City, so no big,” Chris answered.

  “You’re not going to stay here and eat double your allotment in food?”

  Chris shook his head. “I can do that at home where I don’t have to deal with generators and crazy car-stealing blue-haired aliens.”

  Alexis laughed hard. “You’re kind of funny for an old man.”

  “Ha-ha.”

  “Happy Birthday, Chris.”

  He blinked and then swallowed. “Thanks. It wasn’t as bad I thought it would be. You’re good company.”

  “Remember that when you go back to the fish soup eating shrew who dumped you. You’ll miss me. I was a much better birthday present. Some assembly required, past performance does not guarantee returns and all that bullshit.”

  He laughed. But inside he put a pin in the memory of hair the color of water and bacon stealing. It would hold him over until he was free.

  An hour later, Chris pulled his Mercedes into a parking spot that was only half shoveled out. It was just down from a Chinese restaurant and smack dab in front of a deli that doubled as a small grocery. “You sure this is the right place?” The buildings here were all detached restaurants or businesses. There might be apartment space above the legal advice office space, or the bail bondsman’s, but it looked sketchy, just like the vacant lot where some houses may have been.

  “Positive. Thanks for the ride.” Alexis dragged her monstrous bag out from the tiny area in the back pretending to be seats.

  “Okay. I had fun.” He said, feeling awkward.

  “Me too. Thanks for not leaving me stranded.”

  “Ditto.”

  She swayed a bit, not quite the same motion she normally did to build up momentum with the bag, just normal hesitation.

  “Take care of yourself, Alexis.”

  “Wait! Your coat.” She set down her bag to take it off.

  “Keep it. It looks better on you anyway.”

  “You sure? It’s the perfect motorcycle jacket, cool patches, and everything.” She hefted up the bag again.

  “For a rock star, not me. Consider me the one you used and abused before you find your movie mogul.”

  “That’s sweet. I’ll make up songs about you, ya know.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Hot sex, riding naked in the rain, that sort of thing. But sadly, you went in for life for killing a man. So I was left with only your jacket and a broken heart.”

  Chris laughed. “Sounds good. See ya in lights, Alexis.”

  “Back at ya sign man.” This time she rocked to build momentum and disappeared into the deli.

  He didn’t hesitate to pull away, but four blocks south at a stoplight, he looked up at the sky then at the small strip of ocean revealed between buildings. Real-life water was gray and dull. He wondered if the summer ocean would look just as dull from now on.

  ~~~~~~~

  Same time, miles south.

  The Coast Guard handed over jurisdiction to the locals. Both had run a request for identification on the victim. Both requests landed in the lead FBI special agent’s inbox, on a Saturday. And, true to form with his non-life, Daniel Mills checked in and promptly canceled his plans to stare at his apartment walls in order to drive to a crime site.

  He pulled into the circular driveway. It was neatly plowed. Most of the driveways for houses on this stretch hadn’t been plowed. The property owner met him and showed him where to park. There were two cruisers, the coroner van, a Coast Guard truck, and two unmarked vehicles. He guessed one was the owners’ car.

  “They’re down at the dock. It made a huge mess when it hit.”

  He upped his pace to keep up. The owner was fast, even though he looked as old as his grandfather. “Were you here when it hit?”

  “Just down the road. I’d just finished with the Millers’ driveway. Mrs. Miller is pregnant with twins, so I promised her husband I’d check in on her.” He continued detailing his day. “My weekend guest checked out a day early, so I wanted to clean the place up a bit before shutting it up.”

  “You rent this place?” The mini-mansion looked like the kind that would have marble floors or something.

  “Nice, isn’t it? The missus and I got a little money from her mother when she passed. We tried our hands at flipping the property. Unfortunately, the market tanked and we were stuck with a house that is too big for just the two of us. We tried selling it, but no one wanted to buy it, so we rent it out over the summer and in the winter we get a few folks who like the quiet. It’s listed if you’re in the market.”

  “The boat wasn’t docked here?”

  “Oh no, we aren’t fit for a depth like that one has. Coast Guard says it grounded before it hit, otherwise it might have taken out the back deck. That would’ve been hell to fix.”

  They rounded the house. A large boat— Mills corrected himself, small yacht— was smashed up against a broken dock and listing badly to one side. There was a gaping hole where seawater washed in and seeped back out with each new wave. It was clear this beast sat lower in the water and had run aground instead. On the other side of the smashed dock, a small sailboat, no bigger than a rowboat, was tethered to a single upright post. The rest of the dock where it had once been parked at was gone.

  The investigator for the Coast Guard came up to him first. “Thanks for coming. CWO Torres.” He held out his hand.

  “Special Agent Daniel Mills. I’m lead on the Whitehead investigation.

  “Well, his face pinged on the first try, I’m pretty sure the victim is your fugitive.”

  There was a wooden ramp rigged to the lower edge of the deck. Mills slipped on the wet surface. The deck wasn’t any easier. A police officer came out of the lower deck area. “You’re going to need foot cover.”

  Since he was already digging in his pocket for the rubber booties he carried, he settled for sizing up the junior officer on scene before answering. The booties made the deck less slippery. He took care to watch where he was placing each foot on the steep stair to the lower decks. It deposited into a galley or, as land-dwellers like Mills called it, a kitchen. Blood had pooled and congealed along one wall, along with the body. But the motion of the boat before crashing into the dock had slid it and the body all over the floor. There were deep streaks, dried streaks, and even some circles of streaks. He observed the body’s position and condition. It looked like Whitehead. A bit thinner than before, and a lot deeper of a tan, but the very same receding hairline and bent nose he’d been staring at for over a year.

  He absorbed the briefing from the officers on-site who weren’t in other areas of the boat or onshore. When he got back to land, Mills trudged into the melting snowbanks on one side to get a view of the name and country of origin on the back of the boat. He confirmed it matched what he had found on Whitehead with the Coastie. Officially, this might close his case. Unofficially, it made him curious. Who killed Whitehead? Why? Was it related to the flash drive he’d given his asset? The same one that had gotten his asset killed? Questions were his job, and answers let him sleep at night. Leaving this one would be difficult. The contents of the drive triggered all sorts of red flags up the chain of command. There were faces in the photos on that drive which were well known. How Whitehead managed to get evidence the agency only whisp
ered about, was a huge question-mark. Daniel could guess the connection between Atlantic City and New York, and from New York to Washington, DC, but it was speculation. He didn’t deal in speculation. Facts got indictments. Without the answers he needed to sleep, he had to trust that other agents were digging deep enough. He trusted there were enough agents who would dig. That’s what they all did. Dig so you could sleep.

  He trudged back to the front of the house. The landlord was looking a bit lost.

  “You going to be okay with all this?”

  “I don’t know. I hope they figure this out quickly.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “Well, we sort of need the income. Money has been tight. Now I got to fix the dock. Thank God it didn’t hit the deck. I don’t think I could recover from that.”

  “You have insurance?”

  “Of course.”

  “Talk to the local police about getting what you need for a claim.”

  “Will do.”

  “You said your current renter left early?”

  “Yes, but he paid for the entire weekend. Told me to keep it. Nice guy. He and his girlfriend were down from Ventnor City.”

  “Yeah? Why did he come?”

  “Celebrating his birthday. Wanted somewhere quiet for a little nookie.” The old man nudged Daniel’s arm. “You know I’ve got four bedrooms in this place?”

  “Four, huh? They use all four?”

  “Sadly for them, no. Storm blew out the transformer for a few hours. He said they stayed downstairs, used the guest room in the back.”

  “Near the dock, correct?”

  “Yep.”

  “What was the man’s name?”

  “Oh, I don’t know if I’m supposed to tell you that. Privacy, you know.”

  “No problem. I’ll get it from the police if they subpoena it.”

  “Wait, it isn’t your case? Aren’t you FBI?”

  “It may be Coast Guard if he was killed on the ocean. But since it landed here, it’s probably local. If needed, I’ll share what information I have on the case with them and a prosecutor.”

  “Huh. Why you here then? If you don’t mind me asking.”

  “The guy in the boat? He was a fugitive.”

  “No kidding? Wow. It must be something to do dangerous work like that.”

  Daniel Mills didn’t know what the old man thought he did. Maybe it was building up in the old man’s imagination and playing back like the movies. Fiction was nothing like Daniel’s current work. He hoped he’d advance from his current role soon. His undercover training to get more hands-on with investigations was almost complete.

  The lead detective came into view with the coroner. He was one of the few people Mills hadn’t had a chance to talk to yet. He looked familiar.

  “Hey Mills, good to see you again. Weren’t you the lead on that floater with Whitehead?”

  Same one, just as loud as he remembered. “That’s me.” He tried to signal with his eyes that the officer shouldn’t talk about a case with the landlord present.

  “I was there when the body was ID’d. Man, the DB had a pretty girlfriend. What a looker. What was her name, Linda, Lisa, oh yeah, Lisa DeSantos?”

  The old man sucked in a breath and turned pale. It caught Daniel’s attention.

  “You okay?”

  “Uh…” He was turning a bit paler.

  “You need water or something?” He moved to help, maybe hold him up, or help him sit down. An old guy like this suddenly going pale, maybe it was a heart attack.

  “I’ll be okay. Did you say DeSantos?” he asked the officer.

  “Yeah. Whitehead offed her boyfriend.” It was delivered with the grace of a hippo in a mud hole.

  The old man collapsed to the front step he’d been standing on. “You might want that name.”

  The officer looked at Mills and Mills shrugged. The officer answered first. “Which name?”

  “My renter this weekend. His name is Chris DeSantos.”

  Daniel’s heart skipped a beat.

  “Do you have his address?” the officer asked.

  Mills stopped him. “You won’t need it. I have it.”

  ~~~~~~~

  “Hey, birthday boy. You’re not balls deep in some chick, are you?”

  Chris laughed. Crank never changed. He called on holidays and every birthday, lots of commentary and little filter. “Hey, old man. I’m alone.”

  “That’s a damn shame. But gives me a good chance to talk to you.”

  “You never just want to talk.”

  “It’s a special day. You made forty. I needed to say I told ya so.”

  Of course, Crank would want to rub it in. “I was in pain and on the good stuff, you can’t possibly hold that over my head.” Crank hadn’t forgotten Chris’s doubts in the hospital.

  “Since you wouldn’t share the good stuff, I’m obligated to hold onto my grudges. You doing okay? It’s been a bit since you weren’t busy somewhere.”

  About two months. For years, Chris had checked in every month. Two years ago, that changed. So did the old man. For one thing, he stopped asking for favors. “I’m good. Working on a big contract for a new construction install north of here.”

  “Always working. You need to get out more, live a bit. That brother of yours still keeping his nose clean?”

  Chris laughed. “Better than clean. I guess marriage suits him.”

  “How did the wedding go?”

  “Good. Small, short, no drama. Even her ex stayed cordial.”

  “He still a cop?”

  “Yeah, but don’t tell me you haven’t kept tabs on him.” The old man always kept tabs on his brother and Chris. For his part, Chris made the commitment voluntarily. He owed too many debts.

  “I don’t watch every damn thing. Too much fucking work.”

  “So, seriously, everything okay? You need anything?”

  “Yeah, a new fucking knee and a fifth of whiskey, but the docs told me I don’t get neither. So I’ll settle for being thirty again.”

  “Not forty?”

  “Hell no. No offense, but forty was a crap year. Spent half of it taking care of a couple of punk ass kids and their no-account father who got himself killed. Too many God damned funerals. And then there was all the trial bullshit that went down with your uncle. Fucking horrible year.”

  Shit. He was talking about Chris’s father, Gio, and the aftermath, and all of it had been Chris’s fault in the first place. “I’m sorry.”

  “Boy, don’t you ever fucking do that again. I’m God-damned sick of hearing you say that shit. I’m proud of how you turned out. You’d have been a better leader than your fucking father if it hadn’t happened. But I’m also old enough to know it wouldn’t have been the right thing for you. You weren’t cut the same way. You need more than that bullshit. Of course, because I don’t care for competition, it’s all for the best this way.” He laughed, but it turned into a wheeze, then a cough.

  “You got a cold?”

  “Naw, just old. Anyways, I’m going to cut this short for now, looks like I got other shit brewing so can’t keep you company. Find one of your society girls and lick her ass for me. She’ll love it, after she slaps the shit out of you. I called to tell you one thing, Happy Birthday.”

  “Thanks.” The call was ended before he spoke the word. Chris stared at the burner phone number that hadn’t changed in two years. It wasn’t just a matter of debt which kept him loyal to Crank. It was the little things, like never forgetting his birthday. And, of course, the big things, but those weren’t free.

  There was enough hazelnut dacquoise for another birthday treat. Chris settled into his easy chair to eat the thin slice he’d cut. Last night, before the clock turned midnight, he’d shared a huge piece with Alexis. He licked the fork, remembering her expression
at the flavor. He savored both the memory and the taste.

  It was interrupted by his phone buzzing. He checked the caller. It was Vi. He debated not answering but decided it was time to let go of the fantasy.

  “Hi, Vi.”

  “Hi, Chris, are you still at the rental?”

  “I’m back. I figured I wanted to be comfortable while alone.”

  “Oh, you poor baby. Last night was a total bust. Sheri called Tina, who called Emma, who called me when I was in the car to tell me Chi flaked on the party.”

  “So you didn’t go to New York?”

  “No, and the roads were terrible on the way back.” Her voice sounded like a pouty child’s.

  “Yeah, they got really bad farther south.”

  “You think I can come over, make it up to you?” Her voice purred.

  “Make what up to me?” He needed her to remember it wasn’t just another weekend.

  “Your birthday, silly. I can make it memorable if you know what I mean?”

  Chris hesitated for about three seconds. In typical Vianne fashion, she steamrolled right over him.

  “I’ll be there in twenty minutes.” She sounded breathless.

  “Okay,” he said out loud. Inside, it was more like “whatever,” but luckily, he didn’t voice it.

  He set the cake back on the counter and pulled out his laptop. The plans for Vi’s father’s installation were an easy three clicks away. He stared at them, remembering why he bothered. Motivation complete, he wrapped up the cake and put it away, then took his laptop with him to his chair to work on a proposal while he waited.

  In slightly longer than twenty minutes, Vianne buzzed for entry. He let her up.

  “Happy Birthday, baby!” She was wearing a silver trench coat and red heels. He tried to see if there was a dress under it or not. He wouldn’t put it past Vi to come into his building wearing nothing under a coat.

  “Take your coat?”

  “Sure.” She smiled and slipped a few buttons open. Unfortunately, she was wearing a short shiny silver dress that matched the coat.