by Lowe, Tom
Courtney looked directly in his eyes and said, “You move your hands any closer and I’ll kick in your teeth.”
“This one’s got some piss and vinegar.” Johnny grinned, his hands inching closer.
Bandini said, “That’s good enough. If she can hide a bug in there, she’s got some talent. Johnny, take a walk. Go get some smokes.”
“Sure, Boss, but you got a nut job standing here.”
Bandini gestured with his head. The man grumbled and walked away. Bandini looked at Courtney from head to toe in an appraising glance. “What do you want?”
“To talk with you.”
“About what, your job?”
“I don’t want to lose it. And I wanted a chance to explain to you what happened.”
“All I know is I got a dead worker and cops believe you stuck him. I’m gonna miss Lonnie. The kid had potential. Sounds like a hellava love fight between you two.”
“Maybe it was between you and Lonnie.”
Bandini didn’t blink. Face empty. “Didn’t know him that well. So you want to stay on here, huh?”
“Yes, I really need this job.”
He studied her for a few seconds, moistened his wet lips and said, “Never hurts to talk. Come on back to my office.”
From the shadows between the trailers, Isaac saw Courtney enter the office. As the door closed, he watched the custom bus. He could hear the screams from the townspeople riding the coasters. Then his eyes followed two bats in aerial acrobatics, flying in and out of light cast from a streetlamp. Isaac felt his scalp tighten, his skin taut as a drum across his wide forehead. He whispered a silent prayer and made the sign of the cross.
14
As Dave, Nick and I walked back down L dock toward our boats, I played a missed call voice message on my phone. “Sean, this is Courtney Burke. I don’t want to bother you, but when you gave me your card you said call if … look, you’d asked me if Lonnie was dealin’ drugs. A friend of mine here at the carnival says he was. Said Lonnie was a mule for Tony and Carlos Bandini, the owners of the carnival. He said Bandini may have been the one who killed Lonnie ‘cause Lonnie owned him money. Maybe you could like tell that detective, the one who knows you, Detective Grant, maybe you could tell him for me. Thank you … something else … do you have … never mind, it’s not important. Bye.”
I put my phone on speaker and replayed the message for Dave and Nick. When it concluded, Nick said, “Sounds like life is really turning to shit for the girl.”
“Maybe not,” Dave said, his eyes following a sixty-foot yacht, diesels humming, making the turn from the marina into the Halifax River, heading for Ponce Inlet and the Atlantic Ocean. “Maybe this will take the heat off Courtney and give police investigators a look into the real core of evil, the guy who slammed an icepick into the heart of the murder victim.”
I said, “She mentioned ‘something else’ and then disconnected. What was the ‘something else’ and why didn’t she leave it in her message?”
Nick shrugged. “Probably wasn’t that important.”
Dave said, “Someone could have walked into the room and she didn’t want them to hear what she was going to tell you.”
I watched the rotation of the light coming from the Ponce Lighthouse. “Maybe. I think she called me from the carnival because she said ‘here at the carnival.’ What else did she start to say?”
Dave leaned against a wooden dock pilling, the slight smell of fresh creosote coming from near the waterline. “Leave it alone, Sean. The police have probably already arrested her. If she’s innocent, it’s up to the legal system to prove her guilt. At this point in time, I spotted a grey goose flying over the marina. Alas, the bird thought it was an artic penguin and took up refuge in my freezer where it resides. Let’s have a drink and toast to American jurisprudence.”
“You guys go without me.”
“What are you gonna do?” Nick asked.
“I’m going to hit the redial button on my phone and see who picks up from the number Courtney Burke used to call me.”
***
Courtney followed Tony Bandini into the office decorated in dark woods and leathers, antique framed carnival posters on the walls. He took a seat behind a desk, stacks of banded money, checks, and a calculator placed neatly on the desk, a dark cigar smoldering in a tarnished ashtray, a half empty glass of scotch on the rocks, sweating. A two-inch line of cocaine on the desk. A Beretta was on the far right side. Bandini said, “I got a dilemma on my hands. Murder at a carnival isn’t good for business, at least in the same town. The beauty of this life is we move on, move past obstacles, head towards new opportunities. Maybe I could have a few opportunities with a filly like you in my stable, but I can’t have you killin’ the clients.”
“Clients? I’m a ticket taker—that’s it. I didn’t kill Lonnie. I was on a ride when he was stabbed. A man in a hooded jacket did it. I need this job. Do I still have it?”
He grinned out of one corner of his mouth. “Everything is negotiable. Come here.”
Courtney stepped closer to the desk. “Thank you.”
He shook his head. “No. Come around here.”
She stepped behind the desk, within a few feet of Bandini. He said, “You wanna get high?”
“No.”
He grinned, stroking her body with his eyes. “Now, it’s negotiation time. Depending how good you are, purely based on performance, you can have your job back …. And other jobs, too. Now, get down on your knees and open your mouth.” Bandini started to unzip his fly.
“No! That’s not gonna happen.” Courtney held up one hand.
Bandini rubbed his crotch and grinned. “Shut up! I say what does and does not happen in this carnival. Now get down on your knees and open your fuckin’ mouth.” He reached out and grabbed her left wrist, pulling hard, gripping her hair with his other hand and dragging her down to his open zipper. She could smell the odor of dried sweat, testosterone, and cigar smoke on his clothes.
She fought back, trying to stand. He slapped her hard across the mouth, splitting her lower lip, blood running down her chin. He tore open her shirt and reached for her breasts, laughing, his breath smelling of scotch and garlic. She drew back, then slammed her right fist into his testicles.
“You fuckin’ bitch!” He reached to his right, trying to grab the pistol on the desk.
Courtney scrambled, kneeing him a second time between his legs as she grabbed the gun. She pointed the Beretta directly between Bandini’s eyes and shouted, “Stand back!”
He sneered, eyes fierce. “You won’t shoot me!”
She backed away a few feet, reached down and picked up four one-hundred bills from a stack. “This is what you owe me in salary and the cost of replacing my shirt you just ripped open. I’ll take another hundred for what you owed Lonnie. I’m sure he’d want that. And I’m telling the cops you had Lonnie killed.”
Bandini pushed back in his chair and stood. “You’re crazy! Take that money and you won’t live to spend it.” He stepped closer. “Put the gun down and we’ll talk.”
Courtney backed up. “Stay where you are!”
Bandini grinned and stepped a little closer.
Courtney raised the pistol in her hand. “Stop!”
“Or what! You don’t have what it takes to kill a man. Your hands are shakin’ like a little girl.” He took another step.
Courtney backed up against the closed door. “Don’t make me do this.”
“Do what?” He grinned, moved a toothpick from one side of his mouth to the other. “Gimme the fuckin’ gun. Johnny’s gonna be back here in a second. He’s a big boy. Hung like a mule. He’ll literally tear you up so bad you’ll wear a diaper for a month.”
“No! No, he won’t. Stop! I swear I’ll do it.”
“Get real, bitch. You never took the safety off the gun.”
Courtney glanced down at the Beretta, searching for the safety. Bandini jumped, reaching for the pistol. “No!” she screamed as he tried to wrestle th
e gun from her hands. She squeezed the trigger, the bullet hitting Bandini in his throat, severing the spinal column in the back of his neck. He fell to the floor, eyes wide—disbelieving, head trembling. He died with the toothpick still in the right side on his mouth.
Courtney placed the gun in her purse and ran has hard as she could, running by motorhomes tucked in the long shadows, hidden from the lights of the midway, sequestered from the crowds. She could hear the contrived narrative from a reality TV show coming from the open windows of one trailer, heard the bark of a pit bull chained to the steps of a motorhome.
Someone stepped from the dark into the soft light.
She stopped, tried to catch her breath, eyes wide and frightened.
Isaac Solminski said, “Courtney, follow me. Hurry!”
She nodded and followed the dwarf between the tents, campers, and motorhomes. He snatched open the door to a camper and said, “Come on!” He closed the door behind Courtney and led her to a couch and two chairs. He gestured for her to sit on the couch and said, “I saw you go into Bandini’s office. What happened to your mouth? Hold on, let me get some ice for that.” He opened the door on a small refrigerator, removed two ice cubes, wrapped them in the center of a clean, white washcloth, and stepped back to Courtney. He reached out and tenderly touched the cool cloth to her lips. “What’d Bandini do to you, or was it Johnson who did this?”
“It was Bandini. He tried to force himself on me. I fought back as hard as I could. He’d left a gun on his desk. I got to it before he could. He kept coming for me. I warned him.”
“Is he dead?”
“I don’t know … I think so.”
“Look, it was self-defense. You had no choice.”
“Nobody’s going to believe me.”
“I believe you. Just tell the cops what happened.”
“They’re convinced I killed Lonnie. I have to leave. I have to think.”
“I have a friend who lives south of Tampa in a little town called Gibsonton. It’s a carny town. The place where circus workers and carnies live in the winter during the off season. My friend’s name is Boots Langley. He recently retired from the business, and he knows just about everyone in it. He rents out cottages. Stay as long as you need. Tell Boots to put it on my account. I’ll write his address down for you. He’s a quirky kind of fella, but once you get to know him, you can overlook his … uniqueness. Also, he knows a lot of people in the business. Maybe he can point you in the right direction, help you find who you’re looking for.”
“Thank you.” She stood up to leave, walking to the door.
“Wait!” Isaac climbed down from the chair and stepped to the door. He slowly opened it and peeked outside. He watched Johnny Johnson and two other men as they pounded on camper doors, spoke into the crackle of walkie-talkies, and shined flashlights into the dimly lit areas backstage from the midway. “I’m gonna go out there and stall them best I can. Courtney, leave through the side door. Cut between the Himalayan and the Zipper. The taxis are out there. Head for the bus station. Go see Boots Langley.”
She leaned down and hugged Isaac. “Thank you for being here … for helping me. I won’t forget you.”
There was a loud knock at the door. Johnny Johnson bellowed. “Open up! Ten seconds and we rip the damn door off.”
“Gettin’ my pants on. Hold on a sec.” He turned back to Courtney and whispered, “Go now. If they find you, God help you. Go!”
Courtney nodded and slipped out the back door moments before Johnny Johnson stepped inside, flashlights igniting the entire camper in a blaze of white.
15
When I stepped over the ladder onto Jupiter’s cockpit, Max was there to greet me. “Hi, little lady. Were you the captain of this ol’ boat while I was ashore?” She sat and cocked her head, brown eyes bright. “Kim sent a piece of pompano for you.” I held up the Ziploc baggie with the small piece of cooked fish and Max moved her tail like a maestro’s baton. She followed me inside the salon where I set the warm fish in her bowl. Three gulps, gone. “Let’s head to the bridge to catch some air.”
I tucked Max under one arm and climbed the steps to the fly bridge. I sat in the captain’s chair and thought about the call I was about to make. I thought more about the message Courtney Burke left. ‘Maybe you could like tell that detective, the one who knows you, Detective Grant, maybe you could tell him for me. Thank you … something else … never mind, it’s not important. Bye.’
I hit the dial button to Detective Dan Grant. As he answered, I could hear the heightened communications coming from police radios and the blare of carnival music in the background. “Dan, Courtney Burke left a message on my phone. She said a guy by the name of Bandini ordered the hit on the victim. I don’t know who he is, but—”
“Was.”
“What?”
“He’s dead.”
“How?”
“Shot through the neck. Witnesses say Courtney Burke was seen going into Tony Bandini’s trailer just before the shooting.”
“Where is she?”
“I’ll tell you where she’s not, that’s here at the carnival. Gone, baby, gone. But somebody who just arrived is Carlos Bandini, brother of deceased. I hope we find Burke before he does.”
“What if Courtney is taking the fall for a hit?”
“Her prints are on the murder weapon.”
“That means she was at the crime scene. But it doesn’t prove she shoved the ice pick into the vic’s heart”
“Look, Sean, now I have another murder to investigate. Gotta go. But I want to leave you with a piece of advice: this crazy chick’s a serial killer. And now she’s on the run, packin’ a pistol and a hard-on for any man who gets in her way. That would include you. If she shows up again at your boat or cabin, let’s hope you’re faster than she is, pal. This is gonna be one fuckin’ long damn night around here.” He disconnected.
I looked at Max, who sat on the bench seat behind the captain’s chair. She watched the boat traffic in Ponce Marina, her dark eyes reflecting the lights from the mast of a sailboat entering the harbor. The tide was rising, Jupiter rocking slightly, the ropes groaning like a nautical snore. I glanced down at the phone in my hand, scrolled to Courtney’s message, and hit the redial button. It rang five times before a beep came on indicating the call had entered voice-message mode. No instructions to leave a message after the beep. Just the beep. “This is Sean O’Brien trying to reach Courtney Burke. Courtney called me earlier tonight from this number, and I wanted to return her call. Thank you.” I disconnected and wondered whose phone I’d left the message on, and whether Detective Dan Grant was right about Courtney Burke.
“Sean, how about a nightcap?” Dave Collins crossed the dock from his boat, Gibraltar and stood near Jupiter’s cockpit holding two glass mugs in his one hand. He stepped over the transom steps and looked up at me.
“Maybe later. Max and I are just enjoying the night air.”
“Hells bells, you might want a cocktail now. I just saw a live TV news report from the county fairgrounds. Place looks like a circus, no pun intended. There’s been a shooting. It’s Courtney Burke, Sean. Police believe she shot a guy through the neck. Another damn murder.”
“Maybe it was self-defense.”
Dave climbed the steps to the bridge, petted Max, lowered his big frame onto the bench-seat and set one mug on the small table. He released a heavy sigh and said, “It certainly could have been self-defense, but according to the news, she didn’t stick around long enough to tell that to the police.”
“Detective Dan Grant feels the same way.”
“You spoke with him?”
“Just a couple of minutes ago. He said witnesses saw her going into the office, the trailer of the guy who owns or co-owns the carnival with his brother. Their last name is Bandini.”
Dave nodded and sipped from a sweating mug, the ice tinkling against the glass. “I saw video of the surviving brother. The guy looks more like he’s Tony Soprano’s brother. In his
sound bite he said if the police can’t find the killer of his brother, he will. The news reports are saying that the girl is MIA. If it was self-defense, why run?”
“Maybe she panicked.”
“She was composed enough to not leave the weapon behind. According to the news reports, police haven’t found the gun. That didn’t happen in the first murder.”
I said nothing, the only sounds coming from the lapping of water around the dock pilings and a sailing halyard tapping against the mast of a sailboat.
Dave sipped his cocktail. “What are you thinking? I’ve seen that look on your face too many times. Leave it be, Sean. Police are focusing heavy on this one. It has serial killer written on it like graffiti on a wall of shame.”
“Dan Grant said a report indicates that Courtney Burke spent time in a mental institution. More than once.”
“I assume she didn’t self-commit, so it begs the question: who wanted her locked up and why? Was it ordered by a judge—maybe from recommendations by child services or foster care? Or was it her family? What did she do?”
“What if she didn’t do anything? Maybe that was part of the problem. She could have been helpless and victimized. Or traumatized from witnessing something horrific as a child.”
“Reached her breaking point?”
“For a child who has been sexually abused, it’s often a layered breaking point. Created from a series of horrendous layers of physical damage to the body coupled by the most painful—emotional damage to the human spirit. It’s the scar left from a branding iron to the soul, and the mark doesn’t fade like a cheap tattoo. What kind of therapy completely erases the fallout from that? Did she get help in an asylum … or did locking her up in a psych ward add more layers?”
Dave scratched Max behind her ears. “Maybe all of your speculation is true. But we don’t know that. We do know that since you found that young woman walking near a remote highway in the dead of night, there’s been a second murder—”
“There’s been a second killing. Murder isn’t an act of self-defense.”
