Scarlet Fever

by David Stever

  “Color?”

  “Dark blue. I think. I always thought it was funny. The little guy who came around should be called Mouse and the big dude …”

  “Enough, Maurice.” I pointed at him. “But you did good. Thanks. You see anything odd, give us a call. Any guys hanging around, things like that. Give me a paper.” He handed me a small note pad and a pen. I wrote my cell number on it. “I’m out of cards. If Boyd comes back, don’t tell him we were here. Just call me. Got it?”

  “Yeah, I got it.”

  We headed for the door. Katie stopped and winked at Maurice. “You did good.”

  We got outside and I said, “And now we have a lead.” I smiled at her. “And you did good, too.”

  We no sooner got into the car when my cell rang. It was Marco.

  “Brindisi’s personal effects. Seven dollars, a lighter, and a matchbook from the Highway 6 Hideaway Motel. Might be something. Not sure what, but better than nothing,” he said.

  “Highway 6 Hideaway? Could be where they’re holed up. Thanks, brother. We’ll check it out.”

  “You need to wrap this up. You’re going to have cops swarming all over it in a matter of hours and I don’t want to see you jammed up.”

  “Copy, that, Marco. I appreciate it.”

  I ended the call and said to Katie, “Turn this baby toward Route 6.”

  “Highway 6 Hideaway. Sounds sleazy.”

  “Let’s just say you’re overdressed.”

  Chapter

  47

  It took forty-five minutes to go the fifteen miles to the appropriately named Highway 6 Hideaway because of traffic. It was one of those motels that time passed by when the interstates came through. Route 6 led into Crescent Beach but now that Interstate 24 carried the weekend sun worshippers, only truckers and couples sneaking away for a little afternoon delight had any use for a place like the Highway 6 Hideaway.

  If Rosso and his boys were ensconced in this fleabag, I could put an end to Rosso’s reign of terror and ring him up for Sammy’s—and Brindisi’s—demise. Again, I needed surprise on my side. My phone rang again—Jim Rosswell. I let it go to voice mail, and then listened to his message. He not-so-gently reminded me the DA’s office expected me at three which was ten minutes ago. Please, Jim. Cover for me.

  The only clue we had was Mouse’s dark-blue Mercedes. We made two passes by the motel and didn’t see anything. We parked across Highway 6 in a small dirt lot for a farmer’s roadside vegetable stand. A teenage girl sat in the stand with her legs propped up on a wooden table and her nose in a paperback.

  The Hideaway was built in a L shape with an office at one end and a small patch of grass in front. An old riding lawn mower was rusted in place on the grass, a beat-up pickup sat next to the office, and two other cars were in the lot. We waited for thirty minutes, and nothing happened. We cooked up a quick plan and drove across the street. I called her phone and we kept the call open for me to listen. I stayed in the car while Katie went into the office.

  I could only see a large lady with a white T-shirt and piled-up blonde hair behind the front counter; their conversation came through on the phone.

  “Excuse me, ma’am,” Katie said. “I’m hoping you can help me.”

  “I’ll try and if I can’t, we’ll find somebody who can,” said the lady in a down-home country accent.

  “I’m looking for my cousin. Tall woman, about thirty, red hair. Real long red hair.”

  “We was wondering what you two were doing. We was watching you sit across the road. That’s my daughter, Becky, working in the vegetable stand, and she and I was talking while you all sat there. My name is Charlene.”

  “Oh, hi. Well, we weren’t sure if this is the right place.”

  “It’s the right place if you want it to be.” I watched as she leaned closer to Katie and her voice went lower. “You two look like our typical customers. Older guy, younger gal come out here for an hour or so. We thought you two couldn’t decide what to do.”

  “Oh, no. Nothing like that. Supposed to meet my cousin, is all.”

  “Actually, you all just missed them. They pulled out a few minutes before you two pulled in across the road.”

  “Oh, yeah—were they driving a big, blue Mercedes?”

  “Sure were.”

  “She with an older guy with gray hair and a ponytail?”

  “She’s with two guys. The pony tail man and another big guy. We wondered about the arrangement. All kinds of characters come through here but they don’t look like her type. She looked high-class to me. The only way she would be with those two was if they was paying big dollars…oh, sorry, me and my mouth. This is your cousin we’re talking about.”

  “No problem, she’s a piece of work anyhow. Thank you for the information.” She turned toward the door. “Which way were they going?”

  “They headed back toward the city.” Thank you, lady. “Real hurry, too. They all came busting out of the room, jumped into the car and off they went.”

  “Thanks again. You’ve been quite helpful.”

  “You’re welcome, sweetie. Hey, if they come back, should I mention you stopped by?”

  “No. I’m sure we’ll catch up with them.” Get a phone number, Katie. “By the way, did they leave a phone number when they registered? I lost her number.” Good girl.

  “We don’t ask for a lot of personal information when people pay cash. Know what I mean?”

  “Yeah, sure do.”

  “You and your friend come back.”

  Katie came out and got into the car. “You get all that?”

  “I sure did. They are headed back toward the city and once again, he’s one step ahead of us.”

  While I was listening to Katie and Charlene, two more calls came in from Jim. I listened to his voice messages, and he was not happy. “I can’t cover for you, Johnny. You better be dead someplace, that’s all I can say.” I’d face that music tomorrow, but for now, it was back to the office to confirm a suspicion.

  Traffic wasn’t as bad this trip; it only took twenty minutes for us to make it back to town. We pulled into the alley and stopped in front of my garage. I opened the garage door and the trunk on my BMW. From my box in the trunk, I grabbed the GPS detector and switched it on. “Start your car,” I said to Katie. She did and sure enough, the device beeped and the green LED lit up. My suspicion confirmed. “Son of a bitch.” Katie got out of the car and came around to me. I showed her the device.

  “So they tracked us and got out before we got there,” she said. “Wow, they got my car, too.”

  “It also means they know you work for me.”

  I found the tracker under the left front fender. I handed it to her. “Souvenir from your first case.” I put the detector back in the trunk of the BMW and closed the garage door. “Meet me inside. I want to figure out when my skills abandoned me.”

  Chapter

  48

  All we could do was wait. Rosso would dictate the next move, and that bothered me—if Rosso was the mastermind and not Claire. I’m sure nothing got past Charlene at the Hideaway Motel. If Claire was in distress, Charlene would know. Cops packed the bar, and Mike kept going back and forth between the bar and our booth. He would add a new pearl of wisdom every time he came back.

  “We set a trap. Tell him you have the money,” he said.

  “We tried that,” I said. “That’s when Brindisi showed up driving his car from the trunk. We wait until he contacts us.”

  “Just trying to think of every angle.” He went back to the bar and we continued.

  “Anything on Bocci that we didn’t cover?” I picked up the Bocci file.

  “Nope. His background came back clean,” Katie said.

  “Either very boring or very smart. Why would he kill himself?”

  “Maybe he was sick. Cancer or something?”


  “Say that’s true. Why wait until I show up? He could have just sent the money to Claire. If there is any money,” I said.

  “More romantic this way.”

  “Huh?”

  “Yes, his last dying wish. That sort of thing.”

  “Why make her work for it and start all this? I don’t buy it. If the safe deposit box is real, why not tell her? Or, if he was dying, why not draw up a will and leave it to her?”

  “Because it’s money he stole?”

  “True. But after all these years? He’d look like some senile old geezer who stashed away every penny he made.”

  Mike came back and sat beside me. “The guy in the jeans and black T-shirt at the end. Recognize him?”

  I scanned down the bar. “No. I don’t. The guys at the far end are cops. I don’t know this guy. Is he acting weird?”

  “No. Just sitting with his beer and watching the game.”

  “Well, could he be just a guy in a bar?”

  “You’re right. Just saying.”

  He went back behind the bar. Katie and I kept brainstorming. We went through every file, talked through every character. Claire’s background was clean, too clean. She had nothing except for one credit card with a small balance on the credit report. The address she gave us matched her records. She had no employment history, which was unusual, but she did say she spent the last few years taking care of her mother. “Did we miss something with Jackie?”

  Katie pulled her file on Jackie and flipped it open. “I don’t remember anything standing out. No criminal past, nothing on her credit report that would indicate a problem. Had some medical bills, but that is what Claire said, right?”

  My eye kept going to the bar and the guy in the black T-shirt. He got up, threw some bills on the counter and left. Just a guy in a bar. False alarm. “Right, Claire took care of her until she died. That’s the story anyhow.”

  Katie swiveled around in the booth, put her back against the wall and stretched out her legs. “So we wait?”

  “Yep.”

  Mike came back and threw a piece of paper on the table. “The guy in the black T-shirt left you a tip.” Written on the paper: tell delarosa. tonight at 1:00 a.m. city salvage. bring the money.

  “You see him leave?”

  “I noticed him getting up, but a minute or so went by before I picked up his money and there was the paper.”

  “Damn. Here we go again. Tony. I gotta get to him before they do.”

  Katie grabbed the paper and read it. I called Tony’s phone. No answer.

  That was not good. I prayed he was drunk in his club or somewhere, anywhere. Just not at the salvage yard. I felt a showdown coming on and Tony was out of control as it was. If Rosso confronted Tony, it’d be the end of the line for one of them.

  Chapter

  49

  I passed City Salvage the first time at eleven. No cars in the lot, no lights on inside, all buttoned up for the night. I went a half-mile, turned around and came back toward the junkyard. I pulled off Lincoln Road and parked in the driveway of an old factory across the road and about forty yards away. I had a view of oncoming traffic and the salvage yard lot, plus I was tucked back far enough to be somewhat hidden.

  Tony never answered his phone so Mike went to Stiletto’s. Katie set up a communication center in my condo where she could monitor my GPS and my phone. Sounded more sophisticated than it was, but she said it was cool, like on TV. I reminded her that people died because of this case. Not cool. And not like TV.

  Brindisi getting whacked left something stinging in me. I felt responsible. Like I put him in front of the gun. But this was Rosso’s game. Brindisi didn’t deserve it, and neither did Sammy. And it bothered me so bad I didn’t want Rosso breathing.

  My phone buzzed and broke me from my contemplation of the unfairness of life. I answered: Mike. “I’m still at Stiletto’s: nobody had seen Tony all day. Listen to this—he signed over his truck to one of the dancers. Told her he wouldn’t need it anymore.”

  “What is that? Death-wish thinking?”

  “Hell if I know. Are you at the junkyard?”

  “Yeah. All quiet.”

  “Okay, I’ll head that way and lag back until I hear from you.”

  “Copy that.”

  I closed the phone and waited. Two cars passed, and then the road was empty. The lights went off in the gas station next to the salvage yard. The clerk locked up the store, threw away a bag of trash, then got in his car and pulled off. Now midnight. The windows were down in my car for me to listen for approaching vehicles, but the cool air coming in soothed out the adrenaline that rushed through me.

  The night was quiet, except for my breathing, an occasional cricket, and a light rustling of tree branches. I had to stay put to see the parking lot but I noticed I could pull my car closer to the factory and out of view from the road if I needed. The only way into the field of junked cars was through the office. Rosso would have to come through the front parking lot to access the property. An eight-foot fence surrounded the six acres of the salvage yard and the back line of the property went down to a small stream and a wooded area beyond. Tony’s battle against city planners to keep them from re-zoning to eliminate the eyesore of a junkyard had played out in the newspaper for years. The point was, I couldn’t imagine Rosso’s crew coming through the woods and the stream, over or through the fence, and across six acres of rusted-out cars and trucks. They would use the front door.

  At 12:40, a car passed me and swerved into the salvage yard parking lot, stopped, cut off its lights, and sat idling. The blue Mercedes. A moment later, two men ran out of the office and jumped into the car. It sped off spraying a shower of gravel and dust. Had they been in there the entire time? So much for my element of surprise. I backed my car into the spot to block it from the road. I hopped out, pulled my Beretta from the shoulder holster and ran to City Salvage.

  The front door was ajar, with a makeshift CLOSED sign tacked to it. I pushed it and stepped into the office. The stench of cigar smoke hit me. It was odd being in this office without Tony and Sammy behind the counter. Narrow shafts of light slashed in through the window from outside street lights. Newspapers were spread on the counter and a pile of new daily papers, still wrapped in plastic sleeves, were on the floor by the door. I scanned around with the Beretta in front of me. A twinkle of light caught my eye and drew it to the wall behind the counter. The glass case for Tony’s Samurai sword—his prized possession—was smashed and the sword was gone.

  Tony. The office had a back door that led to the junkyard. I turned the knob and it opened to a set of rickety wooden steps. A small spotlight was mounted on the outside of the office above the back door. I went down the three steps to the ground and moved away from the light into the shadows a few yards to my right. I stopped and waited for the quiet of the night to tell me something. And it did.

  Breathing. Heavy, raspy, and slow came from my left. Between me and the breathing was the cast of light. I didn’t want to illuminate myself in case someone was ensconced in the maze of junked cars, waiting to take a shot. I walked out and around the light, putting the field of cars to my right and the office building to my left. I aimed toward the breathing, my heart pounding.

  I moved forward no more than five paces when the glint of a reflection caught my eye. Two more steps closer and I noticed the slow rise and fall of an oblong object, gold in color, reflecting light every time it would rise. Another step and the horror came into view. “Tony?”

  His back was against the office building, which was no more than a shanty, and the gold handle of his Samurai sword stuck out of his belly. Blood from the wound had soaked his shirt and pants. “Tony, Jesus.” I used the flashlight on my cell phone. The sword went through his belly and out his back, impaling him to the wooden wall of the building.

  His breathing was the bubbling gurgle of the death r
attle every time his body gasped for air. He stood against the wall, his eyes wide, his mouth gaped open. The only movement was his chest and stomach, rising and falling with every strained breath. Every time he sucked in air and his chest rose, blood would trickle out of the wound.

  “Tony, I’m calling for help.”

  “No.” He struggled to talk. “Johnny.”

  “I’m here. I’m calling 911.” I opened my phone to dial.

  “No. Listen.” The words came slow and heavy. Tears rolled down his cheeks. “They’re coming back.”

  “Who? Rosso?”

  He nodded. “Will you help me?”

  “Tony, of course. I’m calling—”

  “No…my gun.”

  “Tony—”

  “Under the counter. You have to. Look at me.”

  Tears rolled down his cheeks as he struggled through another breath. His skin was pale gray; he had to be in shock. “Tony. I don’t—”

  “Get my gun. Don’t get prints on it.”

  “Let me help you.”

  “Too late.” Every word difficult. “I’m done.”

  “I’m getting help…”

  His eyes went wide, or as wide as they could. “Get the fucking gun.”

  He was right. The sword was clear through him.

  “Okay.” Everything told me this was wrong, but I did it anyway. I went back into the office and searched behind the counter for the gun. Broken glass from the frame crunched under my feet. I used the flashlight from my phone and found a compact Colt .45 in a box below the cash register. It was wrapped in an oily rag that I used to hold the gun. I hurried back to Tony. His breaths were shallow; the gurgling in his breathing was gone. Must not be enough air going in to make a gurgle. Last call for Tony the Scar. His right arm came up and he opened his palm. I put the gun in his hand and threw the rag aside.

  He nodded, struggled a whisper. “They’re coming back.”

  “Okay, okay. Stay strong, friend.”

  His eyes went past me toward the yard of cars. A small smile crept onto his face. “Sammy?”