A King's ransom

by James Grippando

  “No one’s talking about prison.”

  “I seen what they did to my brother in his cell. Guys like us don’t do well in prison. Somebody’s boy.”

  “You don’t have to explain. Just put the knife down.”

  He was grimacing, almost whining, slowly unraveling before my eyes. “Damn you. Why did you have to go and threaten me like that?”

  “Let’s forget it, okay?”

  “A little money. That’s all I wanted. Just a small percentage, and you turn around and threaten to put me in jail.”

  “Just put the knife down. I won’t say anything to anyone.”

  He laughed mirthlessly. “You expect me to believe that?”

  “I promise.”

  “ ‘Promise,’ ” he said in a sissy voice, mocking me.

  Slowly all traces of sarcasm drained from his expression. In his rage-filled eyes I could see that he felt abused, perhaps more by his former employer than by me. At that moment, however, I was the only target in front of him. In a weird way, he must have seen himself as the victim.

  “Please, Jaime. Don’t do something stupid.”

  “You’re the stupid one.”

  He charged across the kitchen and came at me, leading with the knife. I dodged out of the way. He fell but sprang right back. I had my hands in front of my body defensively. A perverse smile came across his lips as he began to toy with me. We moved strategically in a circle, like two boxers looking for an opening. He kept lunging at me and pulling back, taunting.

  Blood oozed from a cut over his right eye. He’d apparently injured himself in the initial fall. He wiped it away, then suddenly seemed to realize that the blood was his own.

  “You son of a bitch!” he shouted as he lunged toward me, swinging wildly.

  The knife cut through my shirtsleeve, and I felt the sharp metal against my skin. It was just a glancing blow, but it sparked my survival instincts. Somehow I found the strength and quickness to grab his arm. Locked together in a struggle for the knife, we whirled across the kitchen and slammed against the sink. I hammered his wrist against the basin, hard. Once, then again. The third time I heard bones pop. He cried out in pain as the knife fell to the floor. He gouged my eye with one hand, but his injured limb was hanging limply. Still pinned against the sink, I grabbed the good arm and twisted it behind his back in a half nelson, then wheeled him around and shoved the broken hand down the opening to the garbage disposal.

  He screamed as his knuckles met the sharp, still blades. I shoved even harder, jamming his hand deeper into the disposal. Finally he was in up to his elbow. His arm was stuck and he couldn’t pull it out, not even after I let go. I kept his other arm locked behind his back as I reached for the switch.

  “I’ll turn it on!”

  “No, not my hand!”

  “Then talk!”

  “Let me go, I’m begging you, man. I’m your friend.”

  The word “friend” made me think of the note. Maybe it hadn’t come from Beverly. “Are you saying you’re a friend?”

  “I’m your only friend, man.”

  I wasn’t sure what he was saying, but I wasn’t backing down. The cut on my arm was throbbing and bleeding. He’d sliced it deeper than I’d thought. “Tell me what you know, or I swear I’ll grind your fingers to the nub.”

  He grimaced, shaking his head defiantly. “No, no, man! Not for free!”

  “Don’t make me do this.”

  “Please!”

  “You got till the count of three. One. Two-”

  “Okay, okay,” he said, his whole body shaking. “I’ll tell you anything you want to know.”

  I took my hand off the switch and prepared to listen.

  59

  I had everything, but in effect I had nothing. That was the legal conclusion Jenna and I reached in her office that afternoon.

  Jenna was seated behind her desk. I was in the silk wing chair facing her. She’d listened to my detailed recount of Jaime’s confession without much apparent amazement, as his story jibed with our own theory: It was an inside job.

  “We have the same problem we’ve always had,” I said. “How do we prove it?”

  “You think Jaime’s long gone?”

  “Absolutely. He was happy to sell me information on the sly, but he wasn’t about to walk into a courtroom and testify against Quality Insurance Company under any circumstances. He’s terrified of them.”

  “The way they strong-armed Judge Korvan into recusing herself from our case, I guess he has good reason to be afraid.”

  “Even if I could somehow corral him, could you imagine the cross-examination?”

  Jenna was right with me, breaking into role. “Mr. Ochoa, exactly how close did your hand come to being ground into a Quarter Pounder before you spit out the lies that Mr. Rey wanted to hear?”

  Her saying it made me wince. “I wouldn’t have actually done it, you know.”

  “Done what?”

  “Flipped the switch.”

  “I wouldn’t have blamed you. The creep handed your father over to kidnappers.”

  I stared out the window, thinking. Jenna said, “Have you thought about making good on your threat to Jaime? Why not go to the state attorney?”

  “I need three million dollars by Sunday. Can you think of anything that would make a company circle the wagons and pay me nothing faster than the threat of a criminal investigation?”

  “I suppose you’re right.”

  I rose and started pacing across the Oriental rug. “There has to be something we can do.”

  “I don’t know what, short of finding another witness.”

  I stopped. A wry smile came upon me as I looked at her and said, “Now that is a great idea.”

  60

  Matthew smelled rum. He was in the slow, disorienting transition between dreams and the dark reality of life behind a blindfold, and he thought surely that his mind was playing tricks as he woke. His last cocktail had been more than fifteen years ago, but he could have sworn that a strong Cuba Libre was right beneath his nose.

  He raised his head from the floor and sniffed the air. Giving up the sauce hadn’t robbed him of his memory. The place definitely smelled of rum and Coke.

  A screech pierced his darkness, the shrill sound of a chair sliding away from the table on a hard tile floor. He heard footsteps, and it finally registered that he was no longer in the van. He had no memory of being moved into a building, and he couldn’t possibly have slept through that. The throbbing pain behind his eyes made him guess drugs.

  As the footsteps drew closer, he instinctively raised his hands for protection. Chains rattled. The slack quickly disappeared, and metal handcuffs pinched his wrists. His wrists were cuffed in front of his body, rather than the more restrictive behind-the-back method. But the range of motion was still only about a foot.

  “Buenos dias.” The slurred Spanish had sounded like bad Castilian, Buenoth, diath. The voice was definitely Cerdo’s, but the inescapable breath was Bacardi’s. As hot as this room was, Matthew surmised that the sweat oozing from his captor was about eighty proof.

  Matthew answered in Spanish. “Man, how much have you had to drink?”

  “Enough to make me wish you were Nisho.”

  Just the smell of this pig had him pitying poor Nisho. You’re gonna wish you’d never laid a hand on her.

  “Where are we?”

  “Can’t tell you.”

  “How long was I asleep?”

  “A while.”

  “How long do I have to wear this blindfold?”

  “As long as I say.”

  As stupid as he was, Cerdo could handle questions with the skill of a politician. “Just take it off, would you? I already know what you look like.”

  “True,” he said. Cerdo’s thick fingers fiddled with the knot behind Matthew’s head. The blindfold fell from his face.

  His eyelids fluttered in the sudden burst of light. The room was dimly lit, but the adjustment from total darkness came sl
owly. It seemed to take forever for him to focus, and even then he had to alternate eyes, closing one and then the other to alleviate the discomfort.

  Images slowly began to materialize. He was on the floor, chained to the frame of a metal bed with a lumpy mattress and no linens. The small room had no other furniture and no window. The walls were filthy, paint peeling away, graffiti everywhere. He could only guess at the original color of the floors, they were so dirty. The only source of light was a low-wattage bulb hanging by a wire from the ceiling. The door was open, and in the hallway outside were a chair and a small table, Cerdo’s guard post.

  His eyes turned back to his captor, settling on the hideous paisley-pattern tattoo that covered the left side of his face. This close, Matthew got a full appreciation of the tattoo’s purpose. It did a fair job of hiding a ghastly scar that started at the corner of Cerdo’s mouth, curled back across the cheek, and then up over the ear. It looked as though, years ago, someone had tried to remove the skin from his skull with dull scissors.

  “What are you looking at?”

  Matthew rubbed his eyes. “Nothing. Takes a little getting used to the light, that’s all.”

  “I could put the blindfold back on you.”

  “No, that’s all right.” He tried to hand it up, but with the chains he could only reach so far.

  “Keep it,” said Cerdo. “You may want it.”

  “For what?”

  “When families don’t pay, Joaquin always shoots his prisoners in the face. Seven, eight times. He never returns a handsome corpse.”

  Matthew had hoped that release was near, but now he feared a snag.

  Cerdo shaped his hand into a pistol, aiming at Matthew’s nose. He made a clicking noise, as if to pull the trigger, then tossed the blindfold in the prisoner’s lap. “Believe me, those last ten seconds, you’ll beg for one of these.”

  Matthew was more sickened than afraid-to think that good lives had ended at the hands of this worthless thug.

  Cerdo snatched back his gift and stuffed the rag in his pocket. “What the hell was I thinking? Joaquin doesn’t allow blindfolds.”

  He laughed at his own joke as he crossed the room, then hit the light switch and closed the door on his way out.

  Matthew sank low to the floor in total darkness. It was no better or worse than being blindfolded. The whole exchange had gained him nothing, save the unwelcome insight into how he might die.

  61

  It was almost 10:00 P.M., and Jenna was still at my place. We’d filed an action in federal court that afternoon. An emergency hearing was set for two o’clock tomorrow afternoon, and we’d been preparing all day, even working through dinner. It was a long shot, but it was clearly my last chance.

  “Ouch,” I said.

  She was changing the bandage on my arm. Luckily I hadn’t needed stitches, but the knife wound was pretty ugly. And sensitive.

  “Double ouch,” I said as she dabbed it with alcohol.

  “Men are such wimps.”

  “Give me a break, I was stabbed.”

  “You were scratched. I’ve done more damage to myself with an eyelash curler.” She reapplied the butterfly bandages. “There. All set.”

  I checked it out. “Nice work. Do you do back rubs?”

  “I think you know everything I do and don’t do.”

  It was one of those half-serious, half-flirtatious remarks in her Kathleen Turner voice that I hadn’t heard in a long time. It left me speechless.

  “Sorry,” she said. “I think that crossed the line.”

  “It’s okay. I’m not really sure where the line is anymore.” I sipped my beer. “You mind if I ask a personal question?”

  “Depends on what it is.”

  I took another drink, a longer one this time. “Have you dated anyone-you know, since we broke up?”

  She smiled coyly, as if she’d been expecting that question for some time. “Actually, no.”

  “Me neither.”

  She gave me a serious look. “I didn’t see much point in getting to know anyone new here. I’m moving to Tampa.”

  “You’re what?”

  “I listed my town house a few weeks ago. As soon as it sells, I’ll be moving back.”

  “Wow. That’s. . amazing.”

  “It’s where I grew up. It still feels a little like home to me there.”

  “Sure.”

  “I talked to my partners. They’re all for opening a Tampa office.”

  “Sounds like you have it all figured out.”

  “It just seemed like the right thing to do. At the time.”

  “Does it still seem like the right thing to do?”

  She dropped her egg roll. Jenna was a natural with chopsticks, so my pointed question had made her nervous, clearly. “I don’t know.”

  I wasn’t sure where to go from there, but she didn’t seem comfortable with the direction so far. “So how much are you asking for the town house?”

  “Why? You want to buy it?”

  “No, but I don’t want to see you get hurt in a fire sale. It’s a really nice place.”

  “How much do you think I should ask for?”

  “Just don’t grab the first offer. It might mean having to stay here a little longer, but I’d hold out for maybe. . six million.”

  “You,” she said, smiling. She uncrossed her legs, rose from the floor and started clearing away the empty Chinese food cartons. I grabbed the empty bottles and followed her into the kitchen. The conversation seemed unfinished, but I sensed that she had enough on her mind already.

  “Are you feeling any better about tomorrow’s hearing?” I asked, shifting gears.

  “Honestly? No. We’re going to be bounced out of court so fast it’s not funny.”

  “Just trust me, all right?’

  The phone rang, which made me flinch. Lately every time it rang a part of me expected the worst. I placed the empty bottles in the recycling bin and grabbed the phone on the third ring.

  “Hello?”

  “Duncan Fitz here.”

  He said it as if he were the president of the United States. “Nick Rey over here,” I replied with equal self-importance.

  “What’s this crap you served on my client this afternoon?”

  “It’s called a complaint and an emergency motion to prevent Quality Insurance Company from intimidating witnesses.”

  “That’s preposterous. My client has done nothing improper.”

  “Then you have nothing to worry about.”

  “Look, you can’t just bounce around from state court to federal court.”

  “I didn’t file in state court. You did. And that was nothing more than an action to enforce the confidentiality provisions of the agreement. That’s over.”

  “We’ll still oppose this.”

  “I’d expect no less from you. But once a federal judge hears our newly discovered evidence, we’ll have a whole new ball game.”

  “What evidence?” he said, scoffing.

  “You’ll hear it all at tomorrow’s hearing.”

  “Are you planning to call witnesses?”

  “Just one.”

  “Who?”

  “Me.”

  He laughed, then it faded. “You’re not serious?”

  “Here’s your chance to tear me to shreds.”

  He paused, then said smugly, “I’ll look forward to it. Forget what I said about opposing the hearing. This is going to be fun.”

  The line clicked, and he was gone.

  “That’s what you think,” I said as I hung up the phone.

  62

  Jenna and I reached the big center courtroom a few minutes before the scheduled two o’clock hearing. We were in the oldest section of the federal courthouse, which was also the most beautiful, done in the Mediterranean style with colorful frescoes on the arched walls and ceilings. The center courtroom had the largest area for public seating, big enough to accommodate events like the investiture of new judges or the trial of a Panamanian d
ictator. It was an impressive place, even for the most jaded of lawyers. Yet as I sat waiting at counsel’s table with Jenna at my side, the cavernous surroundings made me feel even smaller in relation to Quality Insurance Company.

  “You still worried?” I whispered.

  “I told you from the beginning, you can’t just take the stand and repeat everything Jaime Ochoa said to you. It’s all hearsay. It won’t come into evidence.”

  “Maybe Judge Weinstein will cut us some slack.”

  “Maybe she’ll spit in my eye.”

  We heard a knock, and a side door opened.

  “All rise!”

  Jenna and I were immediately on our feet. Standing at the other table, farthest from the empty jury box, was Duncan Fitz. Beside him was the one lawyer at Cool Cash who seemed to hate me more than my old boss did-Maggie Johans.

  The judge settled into her leather chair as the clerk called the case and announced, “The Honorable Judge Sylvia Weinstein presiding.”

  “Good afternoon,” the judge said. “Please be seated.”

  She spoke without looking up from the open file before her, making eye contact with no one. I might have felt a little better had she glanced my way and conveyed just a hint of sincerity in her greeting, but it wasn’t her style to buddy up to lawyers in any fashion. Judge Weinstein had a reputation for being a scholarly thinker and a sharp-tongued talker. I supposed that was a step up from state court, where we’d had to settle for spineless and corrupt.

  Finally she peered out over the top of the gold-framed reading glasses that had slipped down to the tip of her nose.

  “I’ve read the motion that is the subject of today’s hearing,” she said. “Witness intimidation is a serious charge. Frankly, there’s virtually nothing in the filed papers to support it. I scheduled this emergency hearing only because of the immediate danger faced by Mr. Rey’s father. While the court is sympathetic to his plight, the plaintiff had better have some evidence.”

  “We do,” I said.

  “Then call your witness.”

  Jenna rose slowly, as if she were headed for the gallows. She clearly didn’t believe in the plan, and now that we were actually in the courtroom, neither did I. I realized that desperation had blinded me and that Jenna was right. No way could she put me on the witness stand and fight off Duncan’s objections.