Backwater Cove

by Steven Becker

  I stood there staring after them. Before I could decide what to do, a Miami-Dade cruiser pulled up.

  “She’s gone. A white van just grabbed her,” I yelled to Grace and ran around to the passenger side. The door was locked and we lost another valuable second. The lock released and I jumped in, directing Grace toward where the van had disappeared. It was only seconds ago, but in the labyrinth of stacked containers the van had vanished.

  “You didn’t tell me we needed backup,” Grace said as she stopped.

  There was no point in pursuing. The van was probably off the island by now. “I had no idea she was going to run.” I explained about Becky’s phone.

  “Do you have her number? We can pull her records and see who Misty was talking to.”

  I pulled my phone out of my pocket and a notification flashed on my screen. It was gone before I could read it and I scrolled through the contacts until Becky’s name came up. I gave the number to Grace who wrote it down. While she tried to locate someone who could give her the last number that Becky’s phone had called, I went back to my phone and read the notification. It was the reminder I had set for the meeting with the attorney.

  “You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” Grace said, turning to face me.

  The phone was to her ear, and I guessed she was on hold. “I have a meeting with a lawyer in half an hour.”

  “That doesn’t sound good.”

  “Custody thing.”

  “I don’t guess you’re going to get there by boat. Can I drive you?”

  I hadn’t expected the offer. “You sure? It’s just downtown.” I read her the address from my phone.

  “No worries. I’ll keep working this end. At our salaries, meetings with lawyers don’t take very long. After that we’ll figure out what to do about your missing girls.”

  I realized how bad that sounded. Not only had I lost the girl on the backside of Adams Key, now I had lost the girl I had saved, who apparently didn’t want to be saved. The web was becoming more tangled by the minute. There was still no sign of the van as Grace pulled onto the MacArthur Causeway. Minutes later, we were downtown. We found the building and she pulled into a no-parking zone across the street.

  “Go ahead. I got this.”

  We still hadn’t heard back from the cell phone provider and until we did, there was nothing else we could do with Becky’s phone on the bottom of the bay. Phone companies were notoriously unresponsive to requests for records without a warrant.

  After losing the phone, I would have to try and get Martinez to reimburse her for the cost of it—another battle I would have to fight. I climbed out of the police cruiser and walked across the sidewalk, feeling out of place, dressed in my dark green park service shorts, khaki shirt, and boat shoes. It felt even stranger entering the lobby of the office building. Passing a marble fountain and several large paintings, I checked the directory and headed for the elevator wondering if I really deserved to see my own kid after losing two others in less than twenty-four hours.

  Thankfully, I had the elevator to myself and when it stopped on the twentieth floor, I had an urge to head back down and run. Fighting through my anxiety, I crossed the plush carpet and entered the tall double doors of the attorney’s office. A few minutes later, and ahead of several other better-dressed people in the waiting area, I was ushered into the office of Daniel J. Viscount, Esquire.

  He barely acknowledged me as he leaned back in his desk chair and thumbed through a file which I hoped was mine since I figured we were on the clock the minute I walked in the door. Motioning me to a chair, he continued to read. I sat, fidgeting to get comfortable. Sitting in any attorney’s office was intimidating, but this was clearly over my pay grade. I had tried the less ostentatious firms, but as soon as I mentioned the cartel that had firebombed my house, they kicked me up the ladder. I guessed I had reached the top.

  Finally, the attorney set the file on the bare mahogany desk and looked at me.

  “Cartels are bad for custody.”

  I couldn’t believe I was going to be denied again. If he wouldn’t take the case, I didn’t know where else to turn. Fortunately, money, at least in the short term wasn’t a problem. I was living rent free and had a company boat and truck. The feds covered my insurance and funded my pension plan. They even clothed me. The only expenses I had were food, which I had become pretty good at catching myself, and the occasional date with Justine. I sat there in silence waiting for him to continue.

  “But, it looks like you’ve done the right things in the last year.”

  That was the first time a “but” had gone in my favor. “Okay,” I stammered, wanting not to hope.

  “I’m not saying this is going to be easy, and you’ll probably have to settle for supervised visits for a while.

  “That’s okay.” I had been expecting a no. Anything was better than that.

  “So, if this is suitable, I have set an emergency hearing for tomorrow.” He leaned over, wrote something on the back of his business card and handed it to me.

  My heart started to race when he said tomorrow and I was about to pocket it, thinking it might be a phone number when he cleared his throat. When I turned the card over I saw a number with four zeros after it. I looked at him, but he had already picked up another file. Still staggered by the amount, I thanked him and was about to turn and leave the office when I saw the view from his floor-to-ceiling windows. He didn’t seem to notice when I walked toward it. My five-figure fee probably covered a few minutes of admiring his office.

  Facing east, his office had an unobstructed view of the upper bay and Miami Beach. Peeking from between the high-rise condos lining the water, I could see the Atlantic Ocean. That wasn’t the view that had caught my attention; it was the cruise ships lining the north side of Dodge island and the grid of containers beyond. Daniel J. Viscount had probably never noticed the industrial section of his view or he surely would have raised his fee and moved to a better office. I found the park service green fabric covering my T-top and then looked back to where the van had gone. I panned my gaze over to South Beach and looked at the grid of streets.

  I hadn’t gotten a license plate, but I did notice the van had been customized. The signage and increased headroom made it stand out from the thousands of other white vans cruising Miami.

  “Mr. Hunter?”

  I took out my camera and shot a picture. “Nice view.”

  “Yes, it is.”

  I barely heard him as I ran out of the office, past the receptionist who was probably about to toss my file for not leaving a retainer, and to the elevator. I paced the luxurious carpet while I watched the lights above the door tick up. Finally, the car arrived. I got in and started down. The five stops on the way to the lobby were excruciating.

  Most observers that knew who I had just met with probably thought I was running out of the building because of the fee, but it was the white van that I had seen that had me running.

  8

  I ran across the street to the Miami-Dade cruiser. “That’s the van that grabbed Misty,” I said as I jumped into the passenger seat and thrust the phone in front of Grace.

  She fumbled with the screen and I wanted to grab the phone from her but finally, after a few long seconds, she had zoomed into the block where the van was parked. “There’re thousands of white vans in this city.”

  “The lettering looks the same. It had one of those wraps around the back and a high top, like they use for airport shuttles.”

  “Well, that narrows it down to a few hundred. I guess there’s no harm. Let’s go have a look.”

  “What about a helicopter?”

  “Slow down, Kurt. We don’t have any crime here, besides an unreliable girl’s report of a friend who is missing.”

  She was right. After all, Misty had called the van to pick her up. I tried to lower my expectations and started squirming in my seat as she calmly checked the mirrors and pulled into traffic. “Shouldn’t we call some backup?” My gut told me there wa
s more to this.

  “To check out a van that looks like every other shuttle in Miami? We need a little more than that.”

  She must have sensed my urgency and sped up, but it was still slow going. It was the middle of the afternoon now and traffic was heavy. I cringed when I saw the brake lights ahead on the MacArthur Causeway. Even if I could have talked her into turning on the lights and siren, there was nowhere to go. The shoulder was too narrow for the cars to pull over or for us to pass. If South Beach were a true island, with one way in and out, I would have felt better, but it was just the tip of Miami Beach. There were at least a half-dozen bridges the van could take to the mainland before they reached the Broward County line. A1A, the main artery running along the beach was my only saving grace. It was usually so congested that people took the closest bridge back to the mainland.

  While we waited, I thumbed Daniel J. Viscount’s business card, wondering how depleted my finances were going to be if and when this was over. I had three years before Allie was eighteen and could make her own decisions. With an hourly fee north of four hundred dollars, it was going to be a long few years. The attorney that referred me to him said that Viscount’s background as a US attorney justified his paycheck. With the connections he had accrued over his years of service, he would hopefully be able to work some magic for me.

  Finally, traffic started to move, but it was short-lived and stopped again when we hit Alton Avenue. Grace worked her way into the left-turn lane where we were stuck again, waiting for the light to change. I followed along on the map app on my phone as we turned left on Alton. A past case based out of the Miami Beach Marina was the extent of my South Beach experience. I looked back through my window and saw the tips of the masts from the sailboats docked at the marina through the narrow breaks in the high-rise condos and apartment buildings.

  We were moving north now, close to the southern tip of the long stretch of real estate known as Miami Beach. Grace avoided the beachfront route and stayed on Alton, hugging the Intracoastal Waterway heading north.

  The neighborhood was eclectic. Strip malls were interspersed with scaled-down versions of the larger chains stores. Many of the smaller stores had Kosher signs in the windows. Delis and liquor stores were prevalent. The area as a whole looked like a tropical New York—which in fact it was. We passed several newer art-deco style buildings and pulled over in a no-parking space adjacent to and across the street from where the van had been parked.

  “It’s gone,” I said.

  “You were hoping for…?”

  I looked up and down the block. If the van had stopped here, there must have been a reason. “Must be that place,” I said, getting out of the car. After scanning the other storefronts on the street, there was little doubt that on this street if there was foul play, it would happen at a “gentleman’s club”.

  “Not so fast. You gonna run in there with your guns blazing… and what?” Grace asked.

  I knew she was right in one regard and wrong in another. “I’ll go in alone.” She paused and nodded in agreement. The locals were already less than fond of the often overbearing Miami-Dade police, though in defense of local law enforcement—this was one hard area to work. Comprised of neighborhoods that resembled mini-countries, Dade County held factions of every ethnic group in the Caribbean blended with a newer mix of Eastern Europeans—most didn’t get along.

  Crossing the sidewalk, I stood in front of the door, noticing the placard with the club’s hours. It appeared they were just about to open. I pushed the handle and found it unlocked, and was immediately assaulted by the sound of a driving bass and flashing lights. An electronic buzzer sounded, startling me when I entered. The door closed behind me and I stood in the entrance to the club. There was an empty chair on the left where a bouncer normally sat. A quick glance showed a vacant counter to the right with a selection of T-shirts and paraphernalia. Again, there was no one there and I suspected they were minimally staffed this early.

  The layout was typical strip club. A curved stage with several brass poles jutted out over the carpeted floor. Chairs were pushed up against it with tables behind.

  Glancing around, I saw no sign of life. I expected at least a couple of dancers and a bartender, but the club seemed empty. Moving to the back, I saw a closed door with “VIP Room” stenciled on the frosted glass. Crossing the room, I went to the door, finding it slightly ajar. Before I pushed it open, I saw small spots of a thick liquid covering the glass, some still wet and dripping. With just the tip of my finger, I slowly eased it open.

  Blood splatter covered the room and a body lay prone on the floor. It was a young man and from the blood pooled around his head, there was no reason to rush for an ambulance. Feeling the bile rise in my stomach, I left the club and walked over to the driver’s side of the cruiser. I took a deep breath as the window lowered. I’d been around several dead bodies in my recent past. The first few had been in the water long enough for it to scour them clean of any blood and they were clinical. The last had been gorier, but finding it in the water had helped. This was my first fresh kill.

  “Dead guy.”

  Her door flew open, almost pushing me out of the way, and Grace ran to the entrance, pulling out her service weapon before entering. Her training overrode the fact that I had already checked the premises and, with her gun scanning the empty club, I walked in behind her. Satisfied we were alone, she assigned me to the front door and went to check the back—something I had failed to do. A minute later, she emerged, speaking into her phone as she approached.

  “Medical examiner and forensics are on the way. You found the body, so I’m going to need a statement.”

  She was all business now, which was a good thing, because it was after five and Justine would be the tech. The two held a professional respect for each other, but there was something slightly off with their relationship. Justine gave me a hard time about the women I encountered in my cases, but it was just that. Though I had no idea what it was, there was something more between her and Grace. I didn’t think it had anything to do with me.

  “Now or later?” I asked.

  “Why not while we wait. Walk me through what you did after you left the car.”

  It only took a few minutes. Grace followed behind me taking pictures with her phone and writing down what I said. We ended the tour at the VIP room and both looked at the dead man.

  “Quite the party.”

  Dollar bills and empty glasses littered the floor and the handful of couches in the room. There were several champagne bottles on the side tables with condensation pooled underneath them. Music, if you could call it that, blared through hidden speakers and a disco ball still spun in the middle of the ceiling.

  “Can’t tell if there was a fight or just a party.”

  “I’m going with party. The furniture is all still standing,” Grace said.

  I concurred and leaned over to look at the body. He was probably in his mid-thirties, heavily tattooed with the pale complexion of someone who rarely saw the light of day. I suspected he worked here.

  While we waited, I thought about Misty’s stated career as a hostess and how with the van appearing here at a strip club, aside from her missing friend, she was now linked to a murder in South Beach. My analysis was interrupted by sirens—more than one vehicle from the sound of it. Seconds later, four officers entered the club. A little overkill for a single dead body, but no one had asked me.

  In the room full of assault weapons and bulletproof vests, I was feeling out of place in my NPS uniform. Grace issued some orders and the club was quickly ringed with yellow crime scene tape. I wondered if it wasn’t a good time to duck out and leave this to Miami-Dade when Justine walked in carrying her forensics case. Right behind her was Sid, the Jersey-bred, almost retired, nighttime medical examiner.

  “You again? Can’t imagine what you were fishing for in here.”

  His nasal accent was directed at me. It seemed every time he had seen me, there was a dead body between us.
Usually I had found them out fishing the backwaters of the park. I caught Justine’s eye and motioned my head toward the bar.

  “Hey,” I started.

  “Funny meeting you and Wonder Woman here,” she said.

  “My runaway ran away again and we tracked her here.”

  “Funny, no bloodhounds outside, but there’s Grace.”

  “You told me I needed to file a statement.”

  “So this is my fault?”

  This was going nowhere with her on the defensive and I turned away.

  “I get it. Just get fired up sometimes. How’d the lawyer thing go?” she asked.

  Before I could reply, Sid called her over. She smiled. I wasn’t sure if it was for my benefit or if it was because of the victim. My girl liked dead bodies.

  While Sid examined the corpse, Justine started working the scene. The flash of her camera went off every few seconds as she placed numbered cards and recorded whatever evidence she saw. While she was occupied, I stepped outside to think. As if on cue, my phone vibrated. I didn’t even have to look at the screen to know who it was.

  “South Beach? Need a little sun and sand?”

  Of course he knew where I was. “I had requested some personal time to see a lawyer about my daughter,” I reminded him. There were a few seconds of silence while I waited for an apology. Before he could answer, I heard the thump, thump, thump of a helicopter close by. The Miami-Dade chopper came in low and hovered over the crime scene for a few seconds before moving away, in what I guessed was a search pattern looking for the van.

  “And there are helicopters in your attorney’s office?” Martinez spat.

  With his resources, it wouldn’t take much to find the chatter about the murder. “I kind of found a murder scene,” I said. “At a strip club,” I said, figuring I might as well get it all out now.