Murder at the Beach: Bouchercon 2014 Anthology

by Patricia Abbott

  One day, this tall skinny Latino dude drives up in a brand-new Lincoln SUV, gets out and walks in. The Lincoln is black and he is wearing all black. Amanda has a security camera that records video and audio, and she showed me. Guy looked Mexican, six-one, one-seventy-five, thirty, lean. Moves his head back and forth, steps a little to one side like a boxer when he walks. Goatee, moustache. Black suit, white shirt, bolo tie, big silver and turquoise bob on it. New Mexico or Texas. Flat-brim hat low over his eyes, you can’t really see his face.

  Guy walks in and the first thing he does is lock the door. Then he turns the sign around, so it says CLOSED, and pulls down the shade.

  “Now we are all alone,” he says, in a soft whisper. “Anybody in the back room?”

  She’s getting nervous. You can imagine. “No,” she says.

  He pulls a knife. Flicks it and the blade pops out. Click.

  “Come here,” he says.

  “Not in this lifetime,” she says.

  “Well, maybe in the next.” He dances toward her in that boxer step.

  I’m proud of my Amanda for what she does next. She comes out with a baseball bat and takes a big swing at Mr. Bolo who ducks, and the bat hits some plastic shampoo bottles. They tumble to the terracotta tile and one splits open. Shampoo oozes out across the floor.

  She takes another swing and the dude slips and falls. Right on his ass. I’m laughin’ while I watch this whole thing. Amanda swings again, and Mr. Bolo rolls away. The bat cracks his knee. He screams bloody murder and starts to crawl toward the door. I guess he’s had enough. I am cheering.

  Amanda picks up the phone and dials 9-1-1. “There’s a man with a knife trying to rob my store.”

  Mr. Bolo gets to the door and manages to stand up. He looks at her. His hat is off now and you can see his face. “I’ll be back,” he says, in a pretty good imitation of the Terminator.

  “You do that, tough guy,” she says. “I got your picture.”

  Oh-oh, I’m thinkin’.

  “Oh really?” the guy says and splits.

  The cops come and Amanda shows them the video and gives them a copy. They call her back later. They tried to I.D. him but they can’t. Amanda didn’t think to get the license number on his SUV and it isn’t clear on the video.

  Next day, a guy on a motorcycle shows up. All in black. Black helmet, black face shield, full leathers and gloves. No license plate on the bike, so there’s no way to I.D. the guy. He hands her a big brown envelope. She has to sign for it. He bugs out. Inside is a stack of legal papers from some outfit called Day One Properties. The return address is in downtown L.A.

  She reads through the stuff, and it basically signs over her business and the building, which she owns, to Day One Properties for about one-tenth market value.

  She calls the cops and they say there is no way to connect the papers to Mr. Bolo. She shows them to her lawyer, who is also one of her customers, a lady named Kim Browne. She says it looks like a binding offer. Maybe not fair, but legal.

  Kim Browne does some research and finds out that Day One has bought the entire block across the street and filed plans with the city to construct a giant mall, with a Parisian theme, called Hot Couture. It would specialize in upscale shopping. I hate that word—upscale. Why is nothing ever down-scale, or normal-scale, or just plain middle-class?

  The next day, an old friend of hers, another shop owner, Derrick “Daddy” Crane, a barber, doesn’t show up for work. Couple days later, he does show up. On the beach, in shallow water, face down, seaweed all over him. Cold as a fish. Naked. No swim suit in sight.

  Cops say it’s an accident. Trouble is, Daddy Crane never went swimmin’ in his life. Not for fun anyway.

  Amanda goes around to talk to the other shop owners, finds out three other shop owners have disappeared. One by one, over the next week, they also turn up in the shallow water. Dead, naked, food for the fishes. None of them were regular ocean swimmers. Two of them couldn’t even swim, according to their relatives.

  So now Amanda visits all the shop owners on both sides of the block. Most have sold out to Day One, for ten cents on the dollar.

  “What’re ya gonna do?” one says. “It’s progress.”

  Amanda goes to the police station and talks to a detective. Nothing he can do, he says, without forensic evidence. “We do not have magical powers,” he says.

  So then Amanda asks my help. She calls me. Very unusual. She never calls. And I never heard any of this stuff before. She says she got a lowball offer on the place and she’s gonna get some pressure to sell. She doesn’t bother to mention the Mexican or the knife or the dead barber or her other neighbors who died and those who sold out for a slow gentle hump against the wall.

  I don’t realize how serious it is. “I’ll come over next week.”

  She says, “No, Dad, I’m hurtin’ right now.”

  But I’m livin’ the good life on my ranchito outside Flagstaff, up in the Arizona hills. Got a little chiquita livin’ there with me, you know. I call her Salsa, ’cause she’s so hot. Some horses, couple dogs. A good life. Ever’ body up there has guns, so it don’t seem strange when I carry a six-gun or I front a stranger with a twelve-gauge pointed at his belt buckle.

  Next day, Amanda calls again. Extremely unusual, two days in a row. The Mexican came back. Two other guys with him. They tied her up in the back room and he cut off her blouse and her bra, then he pricked her bazookas with the blade. Got excited by the sight of blood.

  Steam comes outta my ears. You can imagine.

  I load up some hardware in the trunk of my old Cadillac—two shotguns, two assault rifles, a handgun, a blowgun, which used to be my specialty, one of my own handmade knives, some grenades, and three or four teargas canisters. You know, the works.

  That convertible Caddy’s trunk is big enough to carry a football team all suited up, and it has the biggest V8 they ever made. I leave my little Salsa and my ranchito behind, and I hit the road.

  On the drive to L.A., I make plans. I’m gonna track down Mr. Bolo and tie him up and tickle his talking points with my knife. Draw a little blood. See how he likes it.

  These guys think they’re tough. They don’t know tough.

  I’ll show them my old moves. The leg takedown. The mastoid punch. The neck cracker. The spinal jerk. The kneecapper. They’ll wish they’d never seen daylight.

  I show up at Amanda’s shop and she says, “Dad! What happened to you? You can hardly walk!”

  “Well, baby girl, I am a little crippled up. Rattlesnake bit me on the foot the other night. I went outside to use the outhouse and stepped on a big diamondback in the dark. I was barefoot. Thought it was a pile of cow dung at first, then it squirmed. Heard the buzzin’ but I was half asleep, so I paid it no mind. I grabbed it by the tail, but it was hard to get off me.”

  “Jesus, Dad, you should take better care of yourself.”

  “What? Say it again.”

  “Do I have to yell in your ear?”

  “Pretty much.”

  “Oh, Dad, you shouldn’t have come. Here, let me help you.”

  So she is helping me over to a chair and I trip over a display of soaps, knocking some to the floor.

  “You can’t see too well, either, can you?”

  “Well, the light’s a little dim in here, that’s all.”

  “How did you drive all the way over here?”

  “Followed a big truck. I could see him just fine.”

  “Jesus Christ.”

  “Jesus won’t help you, child.”

  “No, you’re right about that.” Then she says, under her breath, “I doubt if you will either.”

  She thinks I don’t hear that, but I do.

  I try to figure out what the bad guys will do next. I’d bring in some new talent. In other words, I’d send in somebody who looked completely innocent. You know, like the mailman.

  Amanda showed me how to work the cash register and the computer. I’m pretty good at that tech stuff, so I got hip righ
t away to the whole smartphone thing. She let me handle two regular customers who came in together.

  “This is my dad,” she told the two guys. I could see Amanda squirm, like she wasn’t too proud of me or somethin’. But those two guys hung in there with me while I screwed up their order three times.

  “It’s nice to see a father who gives a damn,” one guy said. “Mine never did.” He put his arm around Amanda and said, “You are such a good person, Amanda, I don’t know how you do it.”

  Amanda just laughed, for some reason. Then she went to see the cops while I minded the store.

  The whole time she was gone, I sat in a rocking chair by the front window with that baseball bat in my hands. For some reason, no one came in. I don’t know why. She was gone about three hours.

  I wondered why she was gone so long.

  When she came back, Amanda leaned over and said, into my good ear, “I went to that address, Dad.”

  “You what? Holy Christ, that could be dangerous. You shoulda taken me with you.”

  “Sag your muscles, Dad. I was fine. The place is an old warehouse. Looks deserted. Windows covered with dirt. All boarded up. Weeds everywhere. Looks like it’s been a hundred years since anyone went in there.”

  “What do you think?”

  “Some kinda shell game,” she said.

  “Okay,” I tell her. “Let me handle it.”

  “Not likely,” she said.

  “Hey, honey,” I said, “I need a place to stay. I was kinda hopin’ you’d...you know...invite me.” I grinned at her, or at the place I thought she was.

  “Hey, Dad, I’m over here.”

  “About that place to stay....”

  “Oh, yeah. Sorry, Dad. My place is way-way-way too small.”

  I checked into a motel down the street, half a block away, where I could see her place, if I used my binoculars.

  The next morning I got up early and sat by the window, with a handgun in my lap, and watched her place until about noon.

  Ah-ha, just as I expected, there came the mailman.

  Nothing could be more innocent, right?

  Maybe, but I saw that movie, years ago, where the postman is a killer. You know the one? The mailman comes in, dressed in his blue uniform and his regulation hat. He pulls a machine gun with a silencer on it. Rat-a-tat-tat. Kills everyone.

  So I knew this dude was up to no good.

  I hobbled out the door with my cane. And my gun.

  It was hard gettin’ down the stairs, with my foot botherin’ me. I wasn’t walkin’ too good, but I needed to get there, so I jumped in my car and roared over there.

  The mailman was already tryin’ to get away. I intercepted him, though. Just lucky, I guess. Knocked him down with the fender of my car and tried to run over him, but he jumped up and ran down the street screamin’ like a little girl. Such a coward for a tough guy.

  I headed him off with my car and jumped out with my roscoe. That’s what we used to call it back in the old days—a roscoe. I get him down in the street with my roscoe pressed against his forehead. Like in the movies. I yell, “Do ya feel lucky, punk?! Do ya?!”

  Amanda comes runnin’ down the street. “Dad! Dad! That’s the mailman! Stop it! Stop it! Damn it! You old fool!”

  That makes me sad. No one ever called me an old fool before.

  While I’m tryin’ to deal with her, the mailman grabs for my gun and we start to wrestle. Holy Moses, do we have a time, Amanda and me and the mailman rollin’ around in the street.

  A crowd gathers. These two guys, the ones I waited on, come runnin’ up and dive into the tussle.

  One guy grabs me and screams, “No! No! Stop that! Be nice!” The other guy grabs the mailman and pulls him off me. Amanda is yellin’, the mailman is gruntin’.

  Down the block, I see three guys step out of a black Lincoln SUV. They are laughin’ so hard they are bumpin’ into each other and fallin’ down, like the Three Stooges. I look closer and the tall one looks like the Mexican from the video.

  The next day, there I was in the motel, laid up pretty good. Bumps and bruises and my leg really hurt. Amanda and the two guys brought me some chicken soup.

  I am lyin’ there in bed, and the three of them are standin’ around. It’s all very sad. I say, “And you let the ‘mailman’ get away?”

  One of the guys says, “Sonny, I know you mean well.”

  The other one starts to speak and then thinks better of it. Amanda puts her arm around him, and he bursts into tears.

  After they leave, I’m layin’ there with my binoculars and feelin’ guilty. I have not done much good so far—those three guys are still out there somewhere, and so is the “mailman.” I wish I could be more help.

  I see Amanda go into the shop and the two guys leave.

  I think about what I’m gonna do. I don’t want to disappoint Amanda again two days in a row, so I decide to lay off awhile. Give things a chance to cool down, ya know? And I’m really tired, for some reason. My whole leg is swollen.

  So I close the drapes—you know how they are at these motels. You can close out the noonday sun and it’s so dark you can’t even see your dreams.

  I go to sleep. Haven’t slept much lately, so I’m out like last year’s Christmas turkey.

  Apparently, that’s when the poop hits the fan.

  I wake up. I hear what I think is Amanda screamin’. I look out the window and there are these same three guys carryin’ Amanda out the front door of the shop. She’s all tied up, kickin’ and screamin’, and they throw her in the back of the black Lincoln SUV.

  I go runnin’ out the door, hobblin’, with my cane and my bad leg, yellin’, loud as I can, “Stop! Let my Amanda go!”

  They go tearin’ off, and I jump in my car, that big old Caddy.

  Then I remember two things: One, I lost my handgun. Have no idea where it is. Two, I forgot to put gas in the car. That sucker only gets about nine miles to the gallon. But away I go, by God, no time to dither now.

  The black SUV goes around a corner on two wheels, tires screechin’ and traffic all around. The Mexican dude, Mr. Bolo, is drivin’ too fast and he almost loses it.

  I floor the Caddy and then I remember one more thing: I took all the hardware out of the trunk. It’s all back in the motel, all those guns and hand grenades and tear-gas canisters. Never mind, I tell myself. I still got my trusty blowgun, which I left behind the seat on the floorboards.

  As I’m drivin’, I reach around the seat and down. Yeah, the blowgun is there—a long thin metal tube with cork mouthpiece and wooden handle—but now I remember, the darts and the poison are in the trunk.

  The blowgun has a strap on it and the strap gets caught behind the seat, so I’m not payin’ much attention to my drivin’, and I’m goin’ really fast, that Caddy with the big engine and all.

  Suddenly, I look up to see loomin’ in front of me a red and white postal truck. I jam on the brakes, but it’s too late, and everything goes KA-BOOM! I hit that sucker like a ton of bricks, and it jumps a curb and knocks over a fire hydrant and WHOOSH, a geyser of water shoots sky-high. Water everywhere.

  The postal truck driver gets out, and guess who it is? It’s that same mailman from yesterday. He’s got one arm in a sling and he’s on crutches, limpin’ and hobblin’, all crippled up. Almost as bad as me.

  He takes one look at me and his face turns red and he yells at me and waves one of his crutches in the air.

  I slam the Caddy in reverse and hit the gas. My bumper hooks the mail truck and there I go, draggin’ that mail truck down the street, the mailman hobblin’ after us, screamin’ and cursin’ all the time.

  I wrench the wheel back and forth two or three times and finally get loose from the mail truck and I floor it and roar off down the street.

  Just then, the Caddy runs out of gas. It coughs and sputters and stops dead in the street. I find the darts and the poison canister in the trunk, inside their shoulder pouch, and there I am, blowgun in hand, trying to flag down a passi
ng car.

  A pretty blonde drives up in a red convertible and I wave my blowgun in the air and she looks scared and speeds off.

  Time’s a wastin’, so I see a guy ride a BMX bicycle up to a burrito joint across the street and he gets off and just leaves it there.

  I strap the blowgun over my shoulder and run for the bike. It’s small, but I hop on. It’s been a long time since I rode a bike, especially one this small, so I wobble along and a couple of young people, tattoos all over, come strollin’ out of a Starbucks, lookin’ down at their phones, and wham, I hit ’em smack on. Their coffee cups go flyin’, and they are screamin’ at me, but I got no time to waste, and I keep on a goin’.

  Up ahead, I see that black Lincoln SUV stuck in traffic. I zoom between the cars and pretty soon I am almost there.

  The light changes and the traffic breaks and they take off, but I am only two car lengths behind. A guy leans his head out the window and aims two fingers at me and pulls the “trigger.”

  Ha-ha-ha, I say and shoot him with my finger, too.

  I almost catch up several times at stop lights but they pull ahead, and it’s cat and mouse like that.

  We get close to the Marina, and I remember the dead bodies on the beach. They must have used a boat. I peddle even harder. I’m in pretty good shape for an old geezer.

  I don’t see too well, so I almost follow the wrong SUV, which turns left, but then I hear Amanda scream and I see a tussle in the SUV up ahead and I see an arm wavin’ out the window.

  They pull away, but by this time we are in the Marina, in one of those loopend streets. I round a curve and see them, a hundred yards away in a parking lot, pullin’ Amanda out of the SUV and draggin’ her toward the docks.

  I pedal like a fiend and get to the dock just as they are motoring away, in a green and white boat about thirty feet long with an inboard motor and a small cabin. It’s flying a pirate flag, a Jolly Roger, a grinning skull with two crossed swords. I unsling the blowgun, pull out a dart, dip it into the poison and lift it to my lips.