Miami Midnight

by Alex Segura

  Pete stood up. Time to end this.

  He heard the words first. Muñoz’s voice laced with hate and vengeance.

  “You son of a bitch.”

  Even with the music, the gunshot cut through the room. It took Pete a second to realize he’d been hit, the burning in his back getting stronger, the ache turning into screaming pain. He looked down at the Death—out cold. He felt his body fold, his knee hitting the ground first. The heaviness in his shoulders and back. He thought he heard a scream behind him. Then he was on his side. He couldn’t feel his hands. The room was spiraling around, losing focus. He felt his mouth filling with liquid—water? No, blood—as a shadow draped over him. La Madrina.

  His eyes took longer to focus now. Everything in slow motion. Every sound dulled and distant. He’d been here before. On the brink. He’d tried so hard to avoid this. To live a life. To become the son his parents—his father and mother—had deserved. A good man. A good detective. A good father. He’d done his best. He knew that now, at least.

  “Of course, I need to clean up Isleño’s mess. What a fool I was to think a man could do a woman’s job,” she said, her words sounding distant and distorted to Pete, his vision blurring every few seconds. “Goodbye, Pete Fernandez.”

  Pete opened his mouth as if to say something—felt his lips forming the words—but no sound escaped his mouth.

  “What?” La Madrina said, leaning forward. “What did you say?”

  “I said,” Pete croaked, his voice sounding more like a croak. “It’s not over.”

  La Madrina stood up and shook her head dismissively. “He’s already gone,” she said, more to herself than anyone else.

  Then her head snapped to one side in a jerky, abnormal way—a byproduct of the chair Kathy swung at her head. La Madrina’s face contorted into a grimace of shock and pain before she tumbled to the ground, clutching the side of her skull, a long, wide gash down her cheek. She was screaming. Even Pete could hear her, though he felt the edges start to darken—his vision flickering out. Then he heard noises. Doors swinging open. Yelling. A crowd storming into the tiny room. Kathy now. Close to him. Her hand holding his head up. Her voice—soft, soothing, coated in sobs but trying to focus. He wanted to sleep.

  “Hold on, Pete,” she said. “Hold on, goddammit.”

  He tried. He wanted to meet his girl.

  But the blackness came again.

  “Don’t go,” he heard a voice say. “Pete, don’t leave us.”

  THE BEEPS AND pings and sighs of the hospital room had burned themselves into his brain by now.

  Everything hurt. Blinking felt like a chore. He wasn’t sure how long he’d been awake.

  But he was awake.

  He was alive.

  Pete Fernandez tried to smile, but even that seemed uncomfortable. He felt someone leaning over him. Kathy.

  “Good morning, Mr. Man,” she said, kissing him on the forehead. “You were in and out most of yesterday. Glad to see you’re back.”

  “Barely,” he said, his voice hoarse. “What’d I miss?”

  Kathy slid a chair to Pete’s bedside. The room was sparse in terms of furniture, but loaded with flowers from Allie Kaplan, Dave—who was recovering down the hall—and Pete’s Book Bin employee Isabel Levitz, plus the usual get-well-soon paraphernalia one could easily find in the gift shop on the ground floor. He hadn’t seen many people—couldn’t remember if he had, anyway—since being admitted. The ambulance, overhead hospital lights, panicked doctors and nurses ... then darkness. He’d only started to piece things together a few days ago—or so it seemed. Kathy had told him it’d been a week. It felt like a lifetime.

  “Not much,” she said, trying to put a smile on her face. “Just me sitting here and watching you snore.”

  “Sounds like a relaxing alternative to our last few weeks,” Pete said, his throat dry. “How’s Dave?”

  “Surprisingly well, all things considered,” Kathy said. “The wound was messy, but the bullet didn’t hit any essential organs. Lots of blood, though. Had he stayed passed out for much longer, it could’ve been a lot worse.”

  “Dave’s a survivor,” Pete said. “What’s on tap for today? Maury Povich and local news?”

  “Someone here to see you, actually,” Kathy said, wiping at her eyes and standing up. “You think you’re up for a visitor?”

  “Sure,” Pete said, half-heartedly. “As long as they’re here with two medianoches from La Carreta.”

  “You’ve never been the lucky type,” Kathy said. “It’s Detective Hudson. You want me to ask her to come back? She seemed pushy. Shocking for a cop, right?”

  “It’s why I survived—so I could get interrogated by a cop one more time.”

  “Then your wish has come true,” Hudson said, rapping her fingers on the door to Pete’s room. “Clear to come in?”

  “Detective,” Pete said.

  “Mr. Fernandez,” she said, walking toward his bed and placing a hand on his good shoulder. “You have a habit of almost dying. Let’s try to stop that, all right?”

  “I’m 0-2 in the dying department,” Pete said. “How can I help you, detective?”

  “I wish I could say I just came by to check on you, but that would be a lie. That’s just part of it. The other part was to say thanks. You tipping off Alter made for a huge bust,” Hudson said, taking the seat Kathy had vacated. “And Alter did the right thing, letting me know so we could get some firepower to pull you out of there.”

  “And, in the process, you got La Madrina.”

  “For now.”

  “What do you mean?” Kathy asked.

  “Well, the lady has to go to trial, that’s how it works in our slowly fading democracy. At least for now,” Hudson said, not turning to face Kathy. “And, not surprisingly, the lady’s got money. And money buys lawyers. Good ones.”

  “Well, that’s where Rosen comes in, right?” Pete asked. “You got him to flip?”

  “We did,” Hudson said.

  “But …?”

  “Rosen hung himself in his cell this morning,” Hudson said, her mouth a flat grimace. “Guard found him dangling after a shift change.”

  “What?” Kathy said. “How does that fucking happen?”

  “It does fucking happen, unfortunately,” Hudson said, running a hand through her short, close-cropped hair. “We are not perfect. As you and your partner have been fond of pointing out with regularity.”

  “What does this have to do with me?” Pete asked. He was getting tired. This conversation was the most activity he’d had in days and it was starting to wear him down.

  “We need someone to testify,” Hudson said. “Someone who saw La Madrina order a murder, or comment on her business. As you can imagine, there aren’t a lot of people alive who can do that, present company excluded. I’m gonna take a wild guess that you don’t want your wife—”

  “Girlfriend, sort of,” Kathy said. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.”

  “Your girlfriend,” Hudson said. “Let’s say you don’t want her in the line of fire for this one.”

  “Shit,” Pete said. “What happened to Rosen? He seemed ready to tear down everyone in his Rolodex if it meant a few years shaved off his sentence.”

  “Buyer’s remorse, I guess,” Hudson said. “Eddie Rosen was an echo of a man when we found him—physically and mentally. He’d cashed in every chip, every relationship he had, for a shot at becoming a drug kingpin, a chance to one-up his old boss. He had Mujica murdered; he set up his protégé, Javi Mujica; murdered Emily Sprague, a woman he’d manipulated and fooled; and that’s just off the top of my head.”

  “And my mother,” Pete said.

  “Right,” Hudson said. “It caught up with him, I guess. What’s a few years to a pariah? Who does he have to come home to? His life was over, I guess.”

  Pete shook his head. He’d only just learned Rosen survived La Madrina’s assault, and had hoped to get a chance to talk to the man. To learn what had driven him to murde
r Graciela Fernandez. Emily. Harras. Eddie Rosen had torn out a huge part of Pete’s life and past, and now he’d never get to look him in the eye.

  “I’ll testify,” Pete said with a shrug.

  “You will do no such thing,” Kathy said, stepping closer to Pete’s bedside, her glare focused solely on Hudson. “Or have you forgotten you’re going to be the father of Currently Unnamed Fetus here?”

  “She has a point,” Hudson said. “I can’t argue that.”

  “What happens if I don’t?”

  “Can’t be certain,” Hudson said, shrugging. “But there’s a chance she walks.”

  “Let me think on it,” Pete said. “I’m tired.”

  “I’ll get out of your hair, then,” Hudson said, standing up. “Seems like you’ve got plenty going on.”

  “Can I ask you a question?”

  “Shoot,” Hudson said.

  “Why did he do it?” Pete asked. “Why did Rosen do it?”

  Hudson’s expression softened. She knew what he meant. She knew Pete wasn’t asking about Javier Mujica, or Vincent Salerno. He wasn’t asking about Osvaldo Valdez or Alvaro Mujica. He was asking about his mother. A woman he never got to know. A woman who could have taught him so much—who could have helped him navigate the landmines and pitfalls that had left him bruised and battered as he crawled toward his own stint as a parent. Why was his mother dead?

  Hudson sat down again with a sigh.

  “Eddie Rosen was a sick man. But not insane. He was conniving. A snake. He killed because he thought he had to—each time. He killed Osvaldo Valdez because he found out the retired cop was digging around your mom’s file. He killed Javier Mujica because Javi’s side piece found out he was banging Javi’s wife, and that put his entire plan—to con Emily into connecting him to La Madrina—at risk. He killed Alvaro because his cover was almost blown. Once Eddie found out your girl Emily had intel on how to connect with La Madrina, nothing else mattered. Even when that rogue Mafioso, Salerno, came barreling into town, desperate to find Ms. Emily, he didn’t bat an eye. Took the guy right out, made the Italians believe it was Mujica and made Mujica believe the Italians were hungry for blood. You know what was sick, though? He loved Mujica’s boy like his own. Javi Mujica wasn’t close to his father—hated him a lot of the time. But he was close to Rosen. He learned a lot from the guy: how to run a business, how to be a self-made man. Imagine how cold and calculating a son of a bitch you have to be to murder someone you love like a son because you want something his wife has. That’s some cold shit,” Hudson said. “So why did he kill your mother? A woman he was having an affair with? A man your mother—if I’m reading that dream book right—thought might love her? Because he was a rat, pure and simple. Your mom was smart. She had her problems. Demons. But she knew it was time to get out. Time for the adventure to end. She came back to what she knew—police. You know she called your dad? Asked to come home?”

  Pete shook his head. He had no idea.

  “Yeah, he told her to come home. They were going to try again,” Hudson said, choosing her words wisely, knowing the impact they’d have on Pete. “She’d already told Meltzer she was out, after she set up Rosen once and for all. Meltzer tried to talk her out of it, but she didn’t want to leave things unresolved. But it was too late. She didn’t have enough time. Rosen was too powerful. He had the entire Mujica organization at his fingertips.”

  Pete sagged further into his bed. Kathy rested a hand on his head for a moment.

  “What about the Death?” Pete said, trying to change the topic. “Who was it under the mask this time?”

  “Guy by the name of Andres Barrera,” Hudson said. “Formerly of the Sinaloa cartel. Went freelance. Once Novo was dead, he took over.”

  “Not for long.”

  “It’s a high-risk gig, it seems,” Hudson said.

  Pete couldn’t tell if she was making a joke.

  “Thanks for coming by,” Pete said, looking away from the detective and toward his hospital room’s large window. They overlooked Kendall Drive.

  “Rachel Alter resigned, by the way,” Hudson said. “She’s moving. Somewhere up north. Vermont, I think.”

  “Oh?”

  “Don’t play dumb,” Hudson said. “It’s not a good look. We found out about her background—which, to be frank, would not have been a deal-killer in terms of joining the force. It’s never the crime, as you know, it’s the cover-up. But the tampering with evidence, the informing to Rosen whenever anyone accessed the file—she has a cop’s blood on her hands. She kept a cold case cold, and she sent you down few wrong turns. When she tried to pin it all on Mujica to you, she knew there was no going back. That it’d only be a matter of time before you figured it out and turned on her. Maybe that’s why she helped you in the end—for some kind of redemption.”

  “I hoped she would,” Pete said, rubbing his eyes. “I hoped there was some good in there.”

  “There was, lucky for you,” Hudson said. “Maybe that’s why she quit before we could fire her. Either way, she’s broken the law more than a half-dozen ways.”

  “Will she go down for it?” Kathy asked.

  “She should, she really should,” Hudson said. “Honestly, if she didn’t have a kid, if I didn’t know she acted under extreme duress, I dunno ... I guess I could press it harder. For now, she’s not a cop. She’s out of my hair. That’s the best I can hope for.”

  Hudson got up again, this time more definitively.

  “What’s next for you?” she asked, looking at both of them. “I mean, beside creating a little person.”

  Pete’s eyebrows popped up, as if he’d been thinking about the answer to that question for years.

  “A new life.”

  Nine months later

  PETE FERNANDEZ’S EYES fluttered open, and for a moment, he had no idea where he was.

  Then the image came into focus. The morning light sneaking in through the blinds. Kathy’s arm draped over him, her face buried in a pillow. Their breathing in sync as he craned his neck to see the small bassinet on her side of the bed. Grace, three months old, had begun making the gurgling sounds that precede a cry—of hunger, usually. But Pete knew for a few seconds there’d be quiet.

  Their apartment was large, but in flux. Located in the loft-like space above The Book Bin, the space had been remodeled by Pete and Kathy to accommodate them, reworking it into a spacious three-bedroom that led directly to the bookstore below. At least that had been the plan. But like any large-scale remodeling, stuff took longer than expected and stuff came out different than they expected. That left Pete, Kathy, and little Grace living in a much smaller space, as the rest of the apartment morphed into something else. It didn’t help with a sleeping baby, to say the least. The Book Bin, for all intents and purposes, wasn’t really a bookstore anymore—the sign out front read Bentley & Fernandez Investigations. Underneath, in a clear font it also read USED BOOKS FOR SALE, TOO. Dave, who’d passed the lease on the store to Pete months back, put the rest of the building in Pete and Kathy’s name shortly after he and Pete were released from the hospital.

  “Time for you two to settle down,” he’d said, as he wheeled himself to their waiting car. “Let me help.”

  The unexpected gift was the backbone of their day-to-day. The used books were still sold, but that side of the business was secondary, and mainly run by Isabel, who was now full-time—splitting her work between managing the book sales and organizing Pete’s chaotic schedule, when required.

  It’d taken years. Fits and starts. But Pete finally felt settled. Part of something. The pieces had always been there—the work, Kathy, Miami. But he’d pushed back. Dulled his senses. Evaded. Run. He could spend years bemoaning the time lost, but that’d be counterproductive.

  The thump on the door surprised him—for a second. But the now-familiar sound, like an open palm slapping something solid, didn’t scare him. It was another source of comfort. It was Neko and Polly Jean, their two rescue kittens, alerting Pete and Kath
y that they, like their human sibling Grace, needed to eat.

  Pete slid out from under Kathy’s arm, trying his best to let her enjoy these last few minutes of rest before she’d have to nurse their daughter. He caught a glimpse of his phone. The screen lit up a nanosecond before the vibrations hit. Hudson.

  “What’s up?” Pete asked, before the police detective could speak.

  “Are you awake, Fernandez?” Hudson asked. “Because I might have some work for you.”

  “Nisha, we have a newborn. We’re always awake.”

  “How’s that family of yours, then?” she asked.

  “Good, I think,” Pete said, his voice low. “They’re sleeping at least, thank God. Grace wakes up a few times a night, so we’ve been alternating.”

  “Kid likes to eat,” Hudson said. “Good sign.”

  Kathy stirred behind Pete, wrapping her arms around his midsection as she pulled herself into a half-sitting position.

  “Who is it?” she asked.

  Pete gave her a quick kiss. “Hudson. Not sure what she wants.”

  “I’m still on the line, you know,” Hudson said. “You could just ask me.”

  “And I’m still on leave,” Pete said.

  “You can’t take leave from being a private eye,” she said. “You know that. Plus, this is good. Don’t you like making money?”

  After La Madrina and Rosen were taken into custody, and once the remnants of Los Enfermos, the Silent Death, and his mother’s case were swept together, Pete and Kathy decided the time was right for a break. To bring their child into the world. To see if this thing they’d been dancing around—them, as a couple, not just friends—was viable and, well, to breathe. That had been months ago, when Pete got discharged from Baptist Hospital.