by James Swain
I reached the Vero Beach exit in two hours thirty minutes and got off. The sky was clear and there was a chill in the air. I took Highway 60 through Yeehaw Junction, a redneck burg of truck stops and squawking chickens strutting on the highway. Forty-five minutes later I stopped at a McDonald's in Bartow and ordered breakfast. As I pulled up to the take-out window, a teenage girl opened the slider.
“Two sausage biscuits and an OJ?” she asked.
“Not me,” I said.
She stared at her computer screen. “One egg biscuit and a small offee?”
“Wrong again.”
“You'd better repeat your order. My computer's messed up.”
There were no cars behind me in the take-out line, and I wondered how her computer could be placing orders for customers who didn't exist.
“Large coffee and hash browns,” I said.
I was back on 60 sipping my drink when my cell phone rang. Central Florida used to be one giant dead zone, but modern technology changed that. Caller ID said Unknown.
“Carpenter here,” I answered.
“Jack, this is Veronica Cabrero.”
“How's my favorite prosecutor?”
“I'm afraid I've got some bad news.”
Bartow was famous for its speed traps, and my foot eased up on the gas pedal.
“What's wrong? Don't tell me your case against Lars Johannsen went south.”
“Lars was found dead in his cell this morning,” she said.
“What happened?”
“He slit his wrists. The police think his wife slipped him a razor in court yesterday.”
I nearly said “Good riddance” but bit my tongue instead. Veronica was a devout Catholic who did not believe in capital punishment, and I could tell this turn of events had upset her.
“Any idea why he did it?” I asked.
“Lars knew he was going down.”
“How so?”
“I followed up on your hunch,” Cabrero said. “You told me Lars matched the profile of a predator who'd been beating up hookers in western Broward. I ran an advertisement in one of those strip club magazines with Lars's picture and asked any women who'd been brutalized by him to come forward. One finally did, and she agreed to testify.”
“So Lars knew you had him by the short hairs.”
“Yes. Now, I need to ask you a question. The police are considering charging Lars's wife as an accessory. What do you think?”
I braked at a stoplight and considered Veronica's question. If there was anything I'd learned as a cop, it was that there was no understanding the tangled relationships between men and women. Perhaps Lars's wife was an accomplice and into the same twisted things as her husband. But more likely she loved the guy and, when the truth became known, afforded him a graceful exit.
“I think you should leave her alone,” I said.
“Seriously?”
“Yes. She'll have to live with this for the rest of her life. That's punishment enough.”
There was a short, thoughtful silence.
“Thanks, Jack. I really appreciate this.”
“Anytime, Veronica,” I said.
I crept into Tampa with the rush-hour traffic. Tampa had the feel of a small southern city, the downtown streets paved with brick and uneven. The people were a lot friendlier, and it was rare to hear anyone honk their horn. The beaches weren't as pretty, but a lot more of them were unspoiled. And the sunsets beat any in the state.
At eight-thirty I pulled into Rose's apartment complex in Hyde Park. I had her address written down on a piece of paper and found her building without trouble. Her blue Nova was parked in front, and I parked two down.
I left Buster in the car with the windows rolled down. Rose's unit was on the second floor, and I took the stairs, feeling apprehensive. It had been a while since my wife and I had seen each other, much less had a real conversation.
A copy of the Tampa Tribune was stuffed into her mailbox. I pulled it out, then knocked. Rose answered in her white nurse's uniform.
“Surprise,” I said.
The resounding slap my wife delivered across my face had every ounce of venom in her body.
“You stinking bastard!”
She raised her arm to strike me again. I grabbed it in midair.
“I didn't sleep with Melinda Peters. Or Joy Chambers.”
“Let go of my arm,” Rose declared.
“You have to believe me.”
“Let go.”
I obeyed, and she slammed the door in my face.
“Don't you want your newspaper?” I asked.
“No,” she shouted through the door.
“It has my picture on the front page.”
“Lucky you.”
“Yours, too.”
The door opened, and my wife snatched the newspaper out of my hands. I got down on one knee and looked up into her face.
“I swear to you, Rose. I didn't sleep with them. You have to believe me.”
Rose stared at me impassively. She looked no different from the day we met. Small-boned and perfectly proportioned, with toffee-colored skin and big round eyes. She was waiting tables in Fort Lauderdale while going to nursing school, and I was six weeks on the force. In my face she'd seen my daddy's Seminole genes, and mistakenly thought I was part Mexican. We'd started dating, and ten months later Jessie was born.
“A woman would not say those things unless they were true,” she said.
“This woman did,” I said. “They're not true.”
“You'd better not be lying to me, Jack Carpenter.”
“I didn't drive all this way to lie to you.”
Rose scrutinized the newspaper to make sure her picture wasn't on the front page, then went inside. This time, she didn't slam the door in my face, and I followed her.
Rose's apartment was a one-bedroom with furnishings purchased from secondhand stores. My wife made enough money to spruce the place up, but instead she sent a monthly allowance to Jessie that I wasn't supposed to know about.
“You want a cup of coffee?” she asked.
“That would be great,” I said.
I cleared off the coffee table in the living room while she brewed a pot. Sitting on the table were five hand-carved wooden boxes, which Rose had owned since I'd known her. Each box had a drawing of a skeleton and contained a belonging from one of her dead relatives. A button from her grandfather, a lock of hair from her grandmother, and other keepsakes from her aunts and uncles. The boxes were part of Dia de los Muertos, or Day of the Dead, a religious holiday celebrated in Mexico each year. In my wife's faith, not to remember the dead was considered a disgrace.
I handled the boxes gently as I placed them on the floor. Rose entered the room holding two steaming cups, and sat down beside me.
“Why did you come so early?” she asked.
“I wanted to catch you before you went to see the lawyer,” I said.
We drank in silence. My eyes drifted around the apartment. Hanging from the wall was the family photograph that also sat on the night table beside my bed. It was a painful reminder of our past.
“You've lost weight,” she said.
“Almost twenty pounds,” I said.
“You look like you did when we met. Lean and tan and . . .”
“And what?”
She wouldn't let the word come out of her mouth.
“You look the same, too,” I said.
“No, I don't,” she said.
“You look beautiful.”
“Why did you really come, Jack?”
“Because I love you and don't want to lose you.”
Her cup hit the saucer hard. “Then why haven't you come for me? Why stay in south Florida and let people destroy your reputation? I love you, too.”
“I know you do.”
“Then why haven't you come for me?”
I moved closer on the couch and put my hand over hers. “Because I can't leave until I figure out how Simon Skell killed those women. If I do that, he stay
s in prison. If I don't, he goes free. I must resolve this. Then I'll come back to you.”
Her face melted, and I watched her fight back tears.
“Is that a promise?” she asked.
“Yes, it's a promise.”
She took my left hand and stared at the gold band encircling my third finger. Looked at it a long time, her eyes blinking with thought.
“Take it off,” she said.
“You mean my wedding ring?”
She nodded, and I tugged my wedding ring off my finger. I didn't know what Rose was up to, and I watched her lift my left hand and stare. The place where the ring rested was milky white, the rest of my finger dark brown.
“You never took it off,” she said.
Then I got it.
“Not once,” I said.
“Never went out on a Friday night and played the field?”
“No, honey.”
“No strippers on the side, or trysts with female cops? There were a couple who had their eye on you.”
“Nope.”
“You knew I was waiting, didn't you?”
“I hoped you were,” I said, smiling.
She rose from the couch and motioned to me. I stood up, and she unbuttoned my shirt and ran her fingertips across my hairless stomach. Her nose twitched, sniffing my skin, and before I knew it, her head was resting on my chest and I was holding her.
“I love you so much,” she whispered.
After a minute she called in late to work. Then, clasping my hand, she led me to her bedroom. She undressed me, then I undressed her. It was our little ritual and never failed to get us both aroused. We tossed the sheet on the floor and got into bed.
“I want to be on top,” she said.
“You sure?”
“Yes. Lie down.”
I was too tall for her bed, and my feet stuck out at the end. I wiggled my toes and pointed at them. She laughed and slapped me on the thigh.
“Move over, big boy.”
I slid across the bed until I was lying crosswise. Then Rose mounted me. At first our lovemaking was awkward, and I felt like a teenager doing it in the backseat of my car. Rather than be annoyed, my wife smiled at me. If she'd needed any more convincing that I wasn't fooling around, she just got it.
It only took us a minute to get our rhythm back, and then we were flying through the clouds. Rose knew what made me happy, and as I climaxed I was reminded of all the times in our relationship that she'd pulled through for me.
When we were done, she snuggled up beside me and put her head on my chest. Then she drifted off to sleep. Her energy was flowing through my overheated skin, and for a little while I felt whole again.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
At eleven we walked down to our cars and kissed each other good-bye. Rose was back in uniform and had her hair tied in a bun. Seeing Buster, she let out a happy squeal.
“You got a dog.”
She stuck her hand through the open window and scratched the back of Buster's head. To my utter surprise, Buster wagged his tail and acted like a normal dog.
“I like this dog. You should breed him,” she said.
“You're the second person who's told me that,” I said.
“Then why don't you?”
“He's got a mean streak a mile long.”
“Maybe it's the people you hang out with.”
Rose got in her Nova and lowered her window. When I was a cop, we'd never said good-bye. It was always “See you later.” I said that now and saw a tinge of doubt in her beautiful brown eyes. So I added a postscript.
“I promise.”
“When will that be?” she asked.
“Once I get this mess cleaned up.”
“Another six months?”
I shook my head. “They'll run me out of town before then. A couple of weeks.”
“Don't make a promise you can't keep, Jack.”
“I mean it.”
“I know you mean it,” she said. “But that doesn't mean you will. You have to figure out what Skell did with those girls. If you don't, you won't be able to live with yourself, and neither will I.”
There was a finality to her voice that made arguing useless.
“I'll come the moment the case is solved,” I said.
“Is that a promise?”
“Yes, it's a promise.”
We kissed again, and then I watched my wife drive away.
I decided to get lunch and cruised the neighborhood. Hyde Park was an eclectic mix of old homes, funky watering holes, and ethnic restaurants. Rose liked it here, and I tried to imagine myself fitting in. A sign boasting the best sub sandwiches in town caught my eye, and I pulled in.
Soon Buster and I were sharing a steak hoagie in my car. My vet said that people food was bad for animals, so I asked him why we ate it. He didn't have a good answer, so I continued to share my meals with my dog.
On the other side of the street, two workers were replacing a billboard. They were fifty feet in the air and were using putty knives to strip away an ad for a popular lite beer. It looked like dangerous work, and I wondered why they did it.
As the lite beer ad came down, the old ad beneath it was exposed. That ad was for a morning radio program, and showed a bad-boy DJ sitting on a throne with a pitchfork, his ears pointed to make him look like the Devil. Printed beneath his picture were the words Weekday Mornings, 6–10. Prepare to get Bashed!
I handed the last piece of my sandwich to my dog. The poster was for Neil Bash. Although I'd heard him on the radio many times, I'd never seen his face. He was big and homely, with a flat nose and jug ears. As more of his face became exposed I saw how someone had defaced his likeness with red spray paint. It said:
THIS MAN'S A FUCKING PIG!
The words bothered me. Whoever had written them had taken a real risk climbing up there. I wanted to know why. I got out of my car and called up to the two workers.
“Hey! You up there.”
One of the workers stopped, and found me with his eyes. His skin was the color of a pencil eraser, his hair jet black.
“What you want?” he called down.
“That guy in the sign. What did he do?”
“Dunno,” the worker said.
“Ask your partner, would you?”
The worker asked his partner. The partner shook his head. I guessed they were both illegals and scared I was from Immigration. The first worker turned back to me.
“We're busy,” the first worker said.
“Does your friend know?” I asked.
He hesitated.
“I just want to ask him a couple of questions.”
“Come back later,” the first worker said.
I knew what was going to happen if I came back later. They would both be gone.
The billboard had a ladder attached to it. I crossed the street and started to climb up. A stiff breeze was blowing, and I stopped midway and held on for dear life. One of my greatest fears was getting killed doing something stupid, like crossing the street without looking. Yet, for some reason, I continued to do stupid things. Finally the wind died, and I resumed my climb.
Reaching the top, I grabbed a handrail and looked around. I could see downtown's shimmering skyscrapers and rows of gritty warehouses in the Port of Tampa. Seeing me, the workers stopped what they were doing. I pointed at the devilish face on the poster.
“Tell me what he did.”
The second worker stepped forward. He was also Hispanic and looked scared out of his wits. I handed him and his partner some money, and they both relaxed.
“He did something bad,” the second worker said.
“What was that?” I asked.
The man scratched his chin.
“I think it was with a girl,” he said.
“A young girl?” I asked.
“Yeah. He did something bad on his radio show to a young girl. They ran him out of town.”
“How long ago was this?”
“Two, maybe three years ago.”
>
“Thank you very much,” I said.
He smiled. I'd made his day, and he'd made mine. Neil Bash was living in Tampa at the same time as Simon Skell, and he was doing something with underage girls that got him in trouble.
I'd found a link.
I climbed down and got into my car. My cell phone was stuck to a piece of Velcro on the dash, and I retrieved Ken Linderman's business card from my wallet and punched in his cell number. Getting voice mail, I told Linderman that I urgently needed to speak with him. Five minutes later, he called me back.
“I'm in Tampa, running down a lead on the Skell case,” I said. “Do you have an agent I could team up with for a few hours?”
“Of course,” Linderman said.
The drive to the FBI building on Gray Street was a short one. Although Tampa wasn't a big city, the FBI's presence was, and I waited on line at a security checkpoint for several minutes, then had a German Shepherd bomb sniff my car before I was allowed to drive onto the manicured grounds.
The three-story FBI building sat on seven pristine acres overlooking glistening Tampa Bay. It resembled the headquarters of a Fortune 500 company, and I found a shady spot beneath a mature oak tree and parked. Buster was not having fun, and he curled up into a ball and went to sleep without being told.
I walked through the building's front doors, feeling out of place in my beach-bum clothes. Having worked with the FBI many times, I knew that behind these walls were several hundred dedicated agents who did everything from finding missing children to stopping domestic terrorism.
At the reception desk I presented my driver's license to the uniformed male guard on duty. The guard kept my license and told me to have a seat. A minute later he called me back to his desk and returned my license.
“Go over to those glass doors,” the guard said. “Special Agent Saunders will be out shortly.”
I thanked him and stood by the shimmering glass doors. Thirty seconds later Saunders marched out. He wore a starched white shirt and dark blue necktie, was about thirty-five, and had a football player's broad shoulders and imposing physique. His palm swallowed mine as we shook hands.
