Manny said, mildly detached. “Tara’s place got trashed?”
“Yeah, somebody broke into her apartment and ransacked the place, took a dump on her rug. I didn’t say anything to her, but I figured it was you. I think she figured it was you because she called me, running scared.”
“Why would I take a shit on somebody’s rug?”
“I don’t know, bro. But it worked. Dig this, she called me, wants to make a deal.”
Manny was immediately suspicious. “Why would she call you? Isn’t she banging Morelli?”
“I asked her the exact same thing, and she says no. She’s crying the blues, says she misses me.”
“Maybe he did it?”
“Why would he trash her apartment? He doesn’t know anything about the goods.”
“You sure about that? Maybe she told him.”
“If she told him, I bet he’d have it. She didn’t tell him because she doesn’t trust him. He’s a hit and run.”
“Franco, if you fuck me over, I’m going to kill you. I mean it this time. You’re fucking me around, man.”
“Manny, I want to make a deal. I need the money bad, bro. Listen, I got all nice and sweet with Tara. I told her I missed her, and guess what? She fessed up, admitted to finding the necklace. Here’s the thing. She’s got it hidden in Francine’s room.”
Manny said, “Morelli’s got guards on Francine’s room.”
“Not anymore. He had Victor toss the room. They were looking for money, jewelry—they didn’t know anything about the Blue Diamond—and Victor found my private stash, some illegal powder I was keeping up there, and a couple of gold chains. Morelli thinks this is what all of the fuss was about, pulled off his watchdogs.”
“How come Victor didn’t find the necklace?”
“Because Tara was walking around with it in her purse. She moved it back into the room after you jumped her. The point is, Manny: Nobody’s guarding Francine’s room now.”
“Damn.” Remembering how close he’d come to possessing Tara and her purse, Manny’s heart skipped a beat. He really wanted to believe Franco.
Franco said, “The only problem is, I can’t get in there, and I know you can’t. Tara told me all about your dustup with Victor.”
Manny snorted. “That fuckhead broke my ribs. I’ve been flat on my back for a week.”
“We’ve got to figure out a way into the room without Tara knowing about it. Think about it, Manny. You got any ideas?”
“I might. I got an idea of how I can get into the room.”
“Good. Because I have an idea of who might want to buy the diamond.” Casually, Franco mentioned some of the celebrities who used to slum at the Walker, hinted one or two of them might play if he “got the opportunity to present the Big Blue the right way”.
Manny didn’t like being partners with this traitor, but he didn’t have the contacts and he knew it, and neither one of them had the diamond. He saw that he was going to have to work with Franco. Abruptly, he said, “I think you should meet my friend Chucky Lane.”
Chapter Thirty-Three
When Chucky stepped into the Walker’s lobby, the brisk, artificial air felt wonderful. Having spent an hour at the cabana, he was overheated. He would have preferred to join the tourists frolicking in the pool, but his heavy cargo pants, which concealed his picks and files, weren’t suitable for swimming. His leather sandals, palm-tree patterned baggy shirt, and green sunglasses offset the trousers, helping him blend in. He was just a regular Joe on vacation.
Chucky headed toward the elevators. He still had the cardkey from his previous stay, and the guard waved him onto the elevator. Exiting on the third floor, he walked down the corridor, turned the corner and, with a clear view to the end of the hall, he saw Manny wasn’t kidding: Room 312 was unguarded.
Chucky had come with his hardware, but the flimsy lock on 312 yielded to a nail file. Undetected, he stepped in. The room had a different feel, the way the Walker looked seventy years ago, untouched and pristine and film noir, like something from a Bogart flick. No air conditioner was running, in spite of this, the room was chill. Traffic noise drifted up from Collin’s, brakes screeching, horns blaring. Right away Chucky got a sensation of being watched, and he understood why Franco had stashed his loot here. Nobody was coming into this room unless they had to.
Still, he wasn’t alarmed. He went to work, checking the obvious places, creeping when he poked his head into the shower. Observing the gap between the dresser and floor, Chucky sank to his knees, the tile cold to his touch. Putting his back to the room, he reached blindly beneath the bureau, hand sweeping the floor. He couldn’t shake the sensation of being watched. His skin was crawling, goose-bumps rising all over his flesh, and then bam, icy fingers seized his wrist, dug in.
Chucky let loose an ear-splitting howl. He struggled like a madman, wrist pinned to the floor beneath the dresser, and then he wrenched his arm free and scuttled like a crab till his back came up against the bed-frame. Heart beating like a jackhammer, Chucky sucked in a deep breath, valiantly fighting to control his reaction. How loud had he screamed?
Disciplining himself, he lifted the bedspread and peeked beneath it. Dust and more dust. He sneezed, coming shakily to his feet, and glanced at the other bed. To his horror, the mattress was moving, pressure points indenting as though from the weight of a body. And then, for an instant, Chucky saw a girl in a yellow dress standing on the bed. It happened in the space of a camera flash; one second he saw her, the next moment she vanished.
The room was cold as a freezer. With an involuntary cry he raced to the door and flung it open, coming face to face with two beefy guards. Possessing the swagger of ex-cops, they wore matching blue blazers, both with crew cuts. One guard looked Irish, with a florid complexion. His partner was Hispanic.
The freaking ghost had scared him witless. Chucky was actually glad to see the men. Without preamble the Irish guard hooked a strong hand on his elbow and said, “Come with us.”
Chucky did a wild-eyed scope of the room. It was empty, but the second bed was still messed, like someone had been standing on it. He shuddered, felt a tingling in his forearm. Red streaks marred his wrist, with one scratch beading blood. He looked at the guard, bewildered and almost incoherent. “Man,” he said, “I think I saw a fucking ghost.”
Pulling him into the hallway, they put him against the wall and frisked him, finding his tools in the long pockets of his pants. The Hispanic guard removed his wallet, studying his driver’s license. “What were you looking for in there, Charles?”
Definitely an ex-cop. Calmer now, breath flowing back into his body, Chucky was starting to think. “I wanted to see for myself if it was haunted,” he said. “I’m a writer, doing a piece on haunted hotels.”
“How about that,” the guy snarled.
He jerked Chucky away from the wall, slapping plastic cuffs on so tight, Chucky winced. “Hey, aren’t you going to read me my rights?”
“Who said you’re under arrest?” The guy asked smartly, shoving him down the hall. They saw no one, although Chucky distinctly heard a television from behind one closed door. Further up the corridor one of the elevators pinged. There was a sudden gaggle of voices, and then the doors whisked shut and quiet descended. A maid’s cart was parked outside one room, and his captors marched him around it.
Entering the stairwell, the Hispanic guard walked him down one floor while his partner phoned somebody named Victor, reporting that they’d “caught a live one.”
They put him in a windowless conference room with a scarred Formica table and chairs with cracked vinyl seats. The carpet was a dingy gray. A desk tucked into a corner supported a monitor, a stack of papers beside it. A counter with a shallow sink, a coffeemaker and Styrofoam cups was next to the door. The round clock above the door showed the time: three-fifteen.
Pr
otocol for catching a thief in a Miami hotel was to call Miami PD. But Chucky instinctively knew these ex-cops were rogue. They shoved him down onto one of the chairs, the red-faced guy cuffing him in the jaw when he protested his treatment. They took his phone and wallet, as well as his picks and files, departing without speaking another word.
The cuffs were way too tight, compromising his circulation. Pincers of pain shot upwards into his arms, his hands going numb. With nothing to do but watch the clock, he kept focusing on the round dials: Clocking his pain in fifteen minute intervals, three-thirty; three-forty-five.
Chucky heard doors slamming nearby, a vacuum sweeper humming. Trying to blot the pain, he circled the table a dozen times. Despite his cuffed wrists, he jiggled the door handle, not surprised to find it locked from the outside. He kicked impotently at it. The clock’s little hand moved to four, the big one slanting down.
At four-forty voices sounded outside the room. By this time Chucky had tears in his eyes, his glasses fogging. A scraping suggested a lock was turning, and then the door opened and three men crowded in. The lead guy was bigger than the cops, a linebacker with bushy-brown hair and wearing a tan sport coat. The second man in was security—a white man with a receding forehead and rubber-soled shoes. He wore the same style blazer as his captors.
Finally, the third man to step in was a businessman in a black pin-striped suit, the hem of which hung perfectly over his Manolos. Glints of silver were in his dark, wavy hair. He was slender and suntanned, obviously Italian. Chucky assumed this was Morelli. He walked to the table, regarding Chucky with cool detachment. He turned to his security guy, “Dan, take off the cuffs,” he ordered, with a hint of a smile. “Chuck’s not going anywhere, are you, Chuck?”
“Doesn’t look like it,” he quipped, with more bravado than he felt.
Dan fished a key out of his pocket, and bending over Chucky, he unlocked and removed the cuffs. Blood rushed back into Chucky’s hands like freezing fire, pinched nerves tingling. He flexed his fingers, caught Morelli’s inscrutable gaze. “Better?”
Chucky nodded. “Yeah, thanks.” He glared at Dan. “They were way too tight.”
Chucky sat at a side angle to the table, and Morelli dragged a chair forward, positioning it so they were face-to-face. “I apologize for the delay,” he said, hiking up his trousers. “Victor and I were in West Palm when we got the call.”
Chucky’s eyes went to the guy with the bushy hair, the muscle. Victor stood off to the side, watching. Morelli glanced at the guard. “It’s okay, Dan. Victor has me covered.”
Dan said, “It’s your call, Louie.” He set Chucky’s cell phone and wallet on the table. His eyes slid to Chucky. “I’ll be outside if you need me.”
Morelli scooped up the phone and wallet, handing both items to Chucky. He said, “I hear you’re really good with computers.” Chucky tucked his wallet into his pocket. Morelli hadn’t opened it, but he knew who he was, knew all about him. Chucky met his searching gaze, quickly looked away. Morelli smiled. “I think you’ll find it to your advantage to cooperate with me.”
“Why should I? I’ve done nothing wrong—”
“Well,” Morelli crossed his legs, studied Chucky with his head cocked to one side. “That’s debatable.”
Chucky pointed out that he had not lifted a thing and was, at best, a trespasser. “Curious about the ghost,” he added.
Morelli was amused. “Yes, but you are trespassing in my hotel. Let me explain myself. I’m Lou Morelli, and I own this hotel. And this,”—motioning to Victor—“is my associate, Victor DeAngelis.”
Victor inclined his head slightly, apprising Chucky with cool indifference. He stood behind Morelli’s chair, arms crossed; his big muscles straining the cloth on his shoulders. His eyes never left Chucky’s face.
Chucky looked at Morelli. “I know who you are.”
“Good. Then you know I’m a nice guy.”
He said it pleasantly enough, but there was an inflection that made Chucky’s antennae go up. Morelli. The name rang a bell, vaguely related to his days in the joint. But Morelli was a fairly common name in Italian circles.
Morelli said, “Look at it from my perspective, Chuck. You’re in my hotel with all the tools of the trade—it doesn’t look good, particularly in light of your record. Why don’t you level with me? Tell me what you were looking for in 312.” He gave Chucky an indulgent smile. “Besides the ghost, that is.”
Chucky held his tongue, met Victor’s challenging stare. Fuck it, he thought, let them muscle me. He snickered, “Why don’t you call the cops?”
Morelli said, “I could make this very difficult for you, Chuck. But I have great respect for a man of your intelligence. The thing I can’t figure is why a smart guy like you is working for a punk like Manny Bommarino.”
Chucky was starting to remember the context in which Morelli’s name had come up, and it wasn’t pleasant. No way this guy operated a hotel. He met the unfathomable black eyes, reached a decision. He said, “I don’t work for Manny. I’m just doing him a favor.”
“Taking all the risk too. Hmm. Personally, I don’t care for your friend. I have a problem with his attitude.”
“It’s a fact he’s got a chip on his shoulder,” allowed Chucky. “But Manny’s okay. He’s just trying to make a score.”
“Yes, well, aren’t we all.” Morelli tapped the top of Chucky’s phone, which he’d left on the table. His smile broadened. “What I’d like you to do is to call Manny and tell him you have the Blue Diamond. Tell him it’s the real thing, the score of a lifetime. Tell him you’ll meet him tonight and hand it over to him.”
Chucky hesitated. So Morelli had known what he was looking for all along. He met Morelli’s dark gaze, wondering at his game. “Go ahead,” said Morelli. “But make it believable; sound excited.”
“Why—”
Morelli handed Chucky his phone. “Just do it.”
At this point Chucky was figuring he could always backtrack later. He took the phone, improvising when he got Manny’s voicemail, saying, “I almost didn’t believe you, but I got the goods, Manny. It’s fucking incredible. Like nothing I’ve ever seen. Call me when you get this message.”
Chucky clicked off his phone just as Morelli removed a necklace from his pocket. It was the Blue Diamond, a large center stone set in a sea of white diamonds. Chucky gawked, and Morelli smiled, laid it on the table and smoothed the kinks in the chain. “Is this what you were looking for, Chuck?”
He was thinking, No way, no how, astonished by the sheer size and beauty of the stone. It dazzled, caught the fluorescent lighting and spun it back into the room in a violet orb. “Jesus,” Chucky muttered. Manny hadn’t been kidding, it was the real thing.
He caught Morelli’s mocking smile. Morelli scooped up the necklace and handed it to him. “Go ahead. Take a look.”
Chucky held the heavy necklace, measuring the weight in his hand. The prize of all prizes: the infamous Blue Diamond. For a former jewel thief, it was an incredible moment.
Watching him, Morelli said, “What’s your take on it?”
Chucky grinned. “Pretty damned awesome.”
“I understand you have some experience in these matters. Tell me: Is it authentic?”
Chucky fingered the stone. “Hard to tell, sir. It looks like the real thing, but I’m guessing it’s not.”
“What makes you say that?”
“It’s your attitude. If it was the real thing, I don’t think you’d let me handle it.”
“Maybe, maybe not.” Morelli shrugged. “Imagine. All those years buried beneath the floor, and it’s a fake.” Now he smiled, and this time the smile touched his eyes, lit up his whole face. “However, there is no reason Manny should know that. Tell him that, in your professional opinion,” and Morelli all but winked, “tell him it’s the real thing. Tell him
his Grandpa Bo set him up sweet. Can you do that for me, Chuck?”
Surprise flashed on Chucky’s face. “Sure, I can do that, but what I’d like to know is why I should do that. After all, I had an arrangement with Manny.”
“I understand your loyalty, Chuck, and I admire it, I really do. There is nothing I value more than loyalty. But I want you to understand that my friendship can be extremely beneficial to you. Manny,” he said, his mouth turning down, “is a troublemaker. He’ll never pull this off on his own. You’ll have to guide him. In fact, Manny will be fortunate enough to come out of this alive. At the very least he might have to take another ride upstate.”
Morelli patted him on the arm, turning on the charm now. He said, “With me it’s not a one-way street. A man with your talent … you could make a lot of money, Chuck.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
The first thing Marty Morgan did when he arrived at his estate on Jupiter Beach was to call his pal Franco and let him know he was in Florida. He asked Franco if he could set something up with his boy-toy Miguel for next week.
Franco said, “Sure, no problem, bro.”
Marty felt a sudden relief because he had heard a rumor, unsubstantiated, that Franco had lost the Walker. Marty mentioned this, and Franco said, “It’s not that extreme. It’s a corporate buyout, but they’ve retained me as manager at twice my former pay. Everything’s cool, man.”
Marty hung up the phone. He was at the marble table in his study, swiveling his chair so he could face the wall of windows that gave onto the view. His study overlooked the turquoise pool and surrounding patio where his wife and stepson sat in the circular shade of an umbrella. Cindy Kane—she’d kept her name when they married—was blond and tanned and thin. She had a fake rack—a has-been actress who’d had a pretty good run on a popular sitcom. When she turned forty, her character was killed off, and Cindy’s career became nonexistent. Nowadays, she got in the news for her environmental activism, as well as for being Marty’s wife.
Stella di Mare (Louie Morelli) Page 17
