The officer, who I could now see by his stripe was an Ensign, snapped his fingers twice, low. The two larger sailors came forward and without a sound took down the two goons with three punches each. “What deputies?” the officer asked.
Roberts was heaving with short breaths and despair. His anger was so intense I’m pretty certain he had a mild stroke right there in the street. The blood was coming faster from his hand now, and he was beginning to sway.
“You som’ bitch.” Roberts’ voice was low and breathy, growly like a mad bear. Sweat poured off his red face. “When the sun comes up I’m gonna issue warrants for every one of you. That includes you, Dee-tective, and your little whore too. I’ll see every last one of you bastards hung for this.”
“When the sun comes up,” the officer said, “You’ll be sitting in the Monroe County prison. Chief Roberts, you’re under arrest for conspiracy to commit murder, assault with a deadly weapon, and unlawful abuse of office. Boys, put the cuffs on this asshole’s hands, and make them tight. Real tight.”
I don’t know for certain how much authority the military has on civilian soil, but given the size of the Navy base on Key West, I’d have to believe it was a lot. Roberts couldn’t move. He was shocked, but moreover he knew his goose was cooked. The reign of Chief Roberts was over, all on account of ’lil old me.
“What about this fucker?” he squealed. “That som’ bitch done shot me!”
“Self defense,” Jessica said. “And you can shove your threats up your ass, Roberts. I knew someday you’d pay,” she said with a meanness I’d not seen in her before. “Happy pay day.” She spit in his face. I noticed for the first time she was shaking all over. Beads of sweat ran down her face and mingled with the tears.
Roberts started to say something and I slapped him again, this time with hand that held the .38. I didn’t know what he did to her, but whatever it was I was determined she’d have the last word.
“Are you ok?” the officer asked both of us. I said yes. Jessica just nodded. “Ok, then we’re gonna take this criminal and his thugs up to the station and call Sheriff Jackson. Sorry we couldn’t get to you sooner detective.”
“That’s fine, buddy, you got here in plenty of time.”
“Well, pleasure to be of help. And a real pleasure to catch this scumbag in the act, finally. He won’t be bothering no one anymore. Goodnight, Detective.” He turned to Jessica. “Goodnight, Ginny. Sorry this had to happen to you.”
“Goodnight, Larry.” He tipped his hat and left with Roberts, who was wheezing heavily. I had a feeling they’d be taking him to the hospital, not the jail.
The four other sailors each turned back and said goodbye. Two of them said goodbye Ginger, and one said goodbye Ginny.
“Ginger?” I asked Jessica, still trying to catch my breath. “What’s that all about?”
She sighed heavily and came into my arms. “It’s a long story. Let’s go down to the beach and I’ll tell you about it there. I need the fresh air.”
I nodded, and she led the way.
In a few minutes we were looking at the Atlantic Ocean. The moon, almost full, danced on the rippling waves as the breeze came off the water and played with Jessica’s platinum blonde hair. We walked to the edge of the water, shoes in hand. The water was warm. Jessica was boiling up.
“The short of it is…that was my stage name.”
“Stage name?”
“Yeah. I used to…dance.”
Where I come from, there was only one kind of dancing where a dame’s stage name would be Ginger.
“You’re a stripper?” I asked coolly. Surprisingly, I somehow wasn’t too surprised.
“Not exactly,” she said, and the pain was clear in her eyes, pain of a thousand nights of acting a part she was never meant to play. “I don’t actually strip…I…well, it’s a private club.” She bit her lip and spoke more softly, now looking out at the ocean, not at me. “I’m onstage…well, nude, usually with other women. The dancing it sort of...risqué.”
All the Bourbon had cleared out of my head and I was sober as sin now. I kind of wish I hadn’t been. That clicking that’d been bugging me since yesterday hit me again, this time loud and clear.
Click,
“Jessica….sex shows? You perform sex shows? Where in the hell are there sex shows in Key West?”
“I said, it’s a private club. Mostly Navy men, some locals and a lot of out-of-towners. But it’s not what you think Bill, please don’t judge me.” Now she was looking right at me and her eyes were pleading little melted balls of wax, sad and glistening in the moonlight. “It’s just a show, nothing real happens. It’s all just a show.” She started to cry again.
“Calm down sugar,” I said and held her close. “I’m a cop, not a judge. It’s not my place to lay judgment on you. Although you’ve laid a pretty heavy load on me, baby. I wasn’t really expecting that.”
“I’m sorry Bill, I should have told you before, I know, but just like you didn’t tell me you were a cop, everything was going so well I didn’t want to foul it all up.”
I held her closer, our lips almost touching. “I understand kid. That’s why you looked so shook up when you found out I was the law. You thought I was going to put the pinch on you. I understand.”
Her eyes twitched just the slightest then. “Yeah, that’s why Bill. Do you hate me?”
“Nothing could be farther from the truth,” I said and our lips connected, a new storm of fire ripping through our souls. I held her tight as we kissed, tighter than I ever held a woman before as if that would prove to her I didn’t care, I didn’t care if she was a stripper or a stag dancer or anything. I didn’t care if every guy in the Navy saw her naked body swaying onstage, because it was I she chose to show off her best moves to, it was all for me. She’d given herself to me in a way that no one could ever dream of while eyeballing her on some dark, sleazy stage, and I had given myself back, all of me, maybe too damned much. In a few days I’d be back in New York, alone, and she’d be here in Key West with her choice of any of a thousand mugs to fill my shoes. But tonight she was mine, all mine, and I would take what was mine.
“I don’t care what your name is, or what you do for bread. You can be Ginger tomorrow. Tonight you’re Jessica, and you’re all mine.”
She moaned softly and we kissed again, and we found ourselves laying in the sand of the secluded beach, intertwined and heaving, our bodies becoming one and pulsing to the beat of the waves as they softly glided to the shore. My bruised ribs and scraped face didn’t hurt anymore. The pleasure was too intense to let any other feelings come through.
In the moonlight Jessica arched her back one last time. The swell of her breasts shimmered, silhouetted against the darkness of the night sky, and we collapsed in the sand, the fury extinguished.
We fell asleep in each other’s arms there in the sand, lulled by the sounds of the waves. It was close to one a.m. when I awoke, alone. I looked around and finally saw Jessica at the water’s edge, outlined in the moonlight. She was talking to someone who was standing in the water.
+++
Jessica awoke less than an hour after she had fallen asleep on the Key West beach. At first she was peaceful, laying there in the arms of the man who had finally freed her (she hoped) from Roberts’ clutch, and maybe more. But soon her tranquility was cut short. The voices came, and she froze with terror.
In the surf a figure appeared, sickly and weak, walking in from the tide. It was just a shadow, but one Jessica knew well. The voice called to her, faint, distant, pleading. Without control she came to her feet and slowly walked to the water’s edge. The figure met her there, same as before, same as always, with hideous countenance and sea creature-infested flesh.
“What do you want from me,” Jessica spoke weakly, quietly, trying not to look the thing straight on.
“Release me,” the shadow said. Behind Jessica, Detective Bill Riggins was getting to his feet.
+++
My eyes had sand in them
, and rubbing them hurt and made them bleary. Through the darkness, lit up by the glow of the high moon I could see Jessica and the other person at the shoreline. Something seemed wrong. I was groggy but I could tell something just wasn’t kosher. I got up and began to walk over toward them. I could hear Jessica speak now.
“Leave me alone, please, just stop torturing me. I can’t help you! I don’t know how!” she screamed as I came up behind her.
Everything got pretty trippy all of a sudden. I don’t know if the alcohol settled in and had a relapse or what, but as I walked up behind Jessica the person she was talking to just…well, they just faded into the darkness. Gone.
“Jessica?” I said and put my hand on her shoulder. She about jumped out of her skin. She’d been crying, and her tear-streaked face wore an expression of fear, insanity and despair all balled into one. “Jesus, kid? What gives?”
“Bill! Bill!” she cried through hysterical tears. She was shaking hard. “Oh God Bill, you’re here, oh God, did you see her? Did you see her Bill? Oh my God!” She was rambling on, kinda crazy.
“Who was it? And where did she go?” I asked, looking around for the shadowy woman in the ocean.
“Jesus Bill, you did see her! You did, didn’t you, it’s not just me, I’m not crazy!”
“Yeah, I saw someone, but she’s gone. Tell me the story, will ya?”
“My God Bill, you don’t know? That was her! That was the freaking ghost, Bill! That was the ghost I’ve been seeing all these nights! Now you’ve seen it too!” She was wild.
“Ok, calm down dollface, calm down. I saw someone, but I’m not so sure it was a ghost, it was just somebody walking down the beach, that’s all.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” The language threw me, I’d not heard her utter words like that except when she was actually doing what she was talking about. But it sobered me up a little more, that’s for sure.
“Jessica, there’s no ghost here. We’re alone.”
“Exactly Bill…you saw her a minute ago, and now she’s gone…where did she go?”
“I don’t know…into the ocean for a swim?”
Her voice was hoarse, scratchy. “Into the ocean? She disappeared, Bill. She dissolved into the Goddamn ocean.”
“Jessica, come on…”
“You saw her Bill. You saw her disappear. You just don’t want to admit it because you can’t understand it and that would piss you off to no end. Did you see her face?”
I didn’t answer.
“Bill, did you see her face?”
“No,” I lied. I had seen it. I thought I was still dreaming or something. And I sure as hell didn’t want to admit I saw a black face with no eyes and crabs crawling over it.
“It was her Bill. Same as before. She won’t stop coming to me.”
“What does she want?” I asked, sort of like I was leaning toward believing her. I guess I was.
“God, I don’t know. She tries to speak to me but it sounds like a hundred brakes screeching on a train. I think…I think she wants me to help her somehow, but I don’t know how.”
I held her again, tried to stop her from shivering. “Lets get out of here. We can go back to your place if you want.”
“I, I don’t have air conditioning. It’s so hot in that damned room, and cramped. I don’t want to go back there.”
“We can get a room if you want.”
“Yeah, that would be good. I know a few inexpensive places with air.”
We began to walk back off the beach into town. Funny, it crossed my mind that it was funny she’d know which motels had air conditioning. She probably got so hot some nights she booked a room just to sleep in the air.
Click, click.
We walked up a side street to a motor inn with a vacancy sign lit up in neon letters hanging in the office window.
“I’ll wait out here,” she said, and lit up a smoke.
“Ok, I’ll be right back.” I went inside and rang the little copper bell on the counter. A tired man in a bathrobe came out from a door adjacent to the counter and said “Two bucks”. I put the money on the counter and he got me a key. Just as he was about to hand it to me he stopped.
“Hey mack, you with her?” He pointed to Jessica.
“Yeah, what’s it to you?”
He took the key back. “We don’t run that kinda joint here. She can stay alone when she wants, fine, but no boyfriends. Sorry.”
I scooped up the cash and said, “Great, a two-bit motel with morals. Thanks pal.” He just turned and went back through the door. I went back outside to Jessica.
“Which room?”
“No can do, doll. He said you can stay here alone but no boyfriends.”
She shuddered, and I mean all over. “Jackass. Fine, we’ll go someplace else. This place is creepy anyway.” We walked a little farther to another motor inn with another neon vacancy sign. This time we went in together. She rung the bell. The sounds of a radio filtered in from behind the desk. “Hey, Mel? Wake up,” she said, and a paneled door that matched the wall slid back, revealing a rather voluptuous woman in her mid thirties, wearing a black negligee and an open housecoat.
“Oh, hello sweetie. Kinda late, ain’t it?”
“I need air conditioning. This is my friend Bill. He needs air conditioning too.”
“Don’t we all,” she said seductively and handed Jessica the key. “I’ll put it on your tab, sweetie,” she said, “and holler if you need any help with this one.”
“All I need is some sleep, Mel,” Jessica said and led me out the door.
“Night Ginger,” I heard as we left.
“Let me guess…one of your old work buddies?”
“Something like that,” she said and we walked up the sidewalk to room 102. Once inside we flipped on the lights and threw ourselves down on the bed. “I can use a drink,” Jessica said, and rolled over on her back.
“Yeah, me too. Anyplace around here to get one?”
“Liquor store about a block from here, open till three a.m.”
“I’ll go,” I said, “You settle in here.”
I sure was on my guard as I walked to the liquor store. Not a soul in sight. When I got back a few minutes later, Jessica was sitting up in the bed, propped up on pillows with the radio on. Some modern jazz was playing, nothing I recognized but pretty good riffs.
“I found you a jazz station,” she said as I rolled into bed with the bottle of hooch and the two motel glasses from the sideboard.
“Groovy,” I said, and poured. We each took a belt, and she tilted her head back on the pillow.
“What am I going to do, Bill?” she asked, her eyes closed tight. “How can I make it stop?”
“I don’t know kid, but we’ll find a way,”
“What if we can’t?”
“Then you come live with me up in the city. Ghosts are the least of your worries up there.”
“That might be a nice change.”
“Jessica, does everyone in Key West know you as Ginger?”
She sighed and took another drink. “Pretty much. I started using the name years ago, and it sort of stuck. Now even when I work at a hotel or serve drinks, I’m known as Ginger. It’s ok, it gets me better tips. No one cares much for a ‘Jessica’. But Ginger, that sounds like the name of a girl who’s pants you can get into. So I get better tips.”
“I can see the logic in that.”
We drank some more and lit a couple of Camels. We didn’t say much for a while, just listened to the music. An older tune by Miles Davis and Charlie Parker came on. “Damn, do I miss Charlie Parker. Bird, we used to call him.”
“Who’s Charlie Parker?”
I cringed a little. “Sax player, one of the best. Maybe the best. I used to watch him play in clubs when I was a kid.”
“Where’s he now?”
“Six feet under.”
“Drag. What happened?”
I sighed. “My dad was a cop. Ran across him a few times in the city, strung out, high on H.
He was an addict, bad. Said he could only play the way he did when he was juiced up. Finally, it killed him.”
Jessica swallowed hard. “Overdose?”
“Heart attack, pretty much. The junk ripped his system to shreds.”
“A heart attack? Oh so he was old.”
“Nope, thirty-five. The doctor who found him thought he was 70.”
“That’s horrible.”
“That’s what riding the white horse does to you.”
“It does, I know.”
“Yeah.”
Jessica leaned in close, snuggled against me.
“You know Riggins, it seems we’ve been through a whole lot in the last couple of days, yet I don’t know much about you.”
I took a sip of whiskey and said, “Not much to know, really. I’m twenty-eight but most people say I act a lot older.”
“You do,” she said to me. I guess I do.
“I was born in Weehawken, New Jersey but don’t hold it against me.”
She let out a little giggle. “I won’t. Where’s Weehawken?”
“Just across the river from New York City. I can see the skyline from the end of my block, where the wharfs are on the water.” I continued on pretty flat, not much emotion in my voice as I remembered the years. I didn’t like my past much. I certainly didn’t like talking about it, so I gave her the short version. “My dad was a beat cop in the city and my mother took in sewing jobs on the side, so even during the Depression we did all right. My dad went into the big war as an MP, and when he came out in 1946 he was promoted to sergeant in the police department. I went to college in Boston, then off to Korea in ’52 and when I got back a year later, decided to go into criminology. I had a knack for working cases and was on the fast-track to becoming a homicide detective. Then, in late 1953, a junkie high on Horse stabbed my father to death, leaving him to die in a back alley in Manhattan. That’s when I decided to go into vice. A year later I made detective, and at 24 was one of the youngest ever promoted to the gig. A few weeks later my mother was run-over and killed by a guy who had a few too many at the local watering hole. Never had a steady girl, so that left me alone with my work, and I haven’t stopped for a minute since, until I came down here.”
Murder on Tiki Island: A Noir Paranormal Mystery In The Florida Keys (Detective Bill Riggins Mysteries) Page 19
