by Moulton, CD
“I am curious.” He waited a moment.
“It’s about some people who were planning a robbery of a lot of emeralds a certain person who got them by the same tactics was holding in a vault. There was something else in the vault. Some very important information about some VERY important people. They got the information and a few of the emeralds, which they have discreetly turned into cash, which is how we found who they are.”
“The information is about people staying here in Panamá to hide from other people?”
“Si. And people in other countries who are hiding from people here. These people tend to spend inordinate time hiding.”
“It’s usually because they tried shortcuts to something they didn’t really want,” Clint said. “Are these hidden people hiding from others like them or from more, shall we label them, legal situations?”
“Those people don’t hide from legal situations. That is why so many sleazy lawyers are needed.”
Clint grinned. He could like Gortas if he wasn’t what he was.
“If I return the information to you, will you stop the search for the ones who got it?”
“Him, yes. Her, no way! She’s the type to use what she knows for blackmail. It will make a bad situation much worse.”
“That is fact?” Clint stared hard into his eyes.
“This is not her first ... escapade. It is not her third.”
Clint nodded. “Give me a cel number and do NOT follow me. I’ll see what I can do.”
“Have you seen her?” Gortas asked with a small smirk on his face.
“No.”
“Hah! ‘Watch out for those soft shoulders and dangerous curves’,” Gortas sang the old country song.
“So I’ve heard from someone who has seen her. Often.”
Gortas handed him a slip with a cel number on it. He left to head for the bus. Gortas wouldn’t break the agreement.
He arrived in Boquete a bit after six and went to a good Mexican restaurant. He learned that the Vega man usually went out after eight. That was plenty of time, so he strolled up to in front of the house and yelled, “Buenas!” A man who had to be Vega came to the door and asked what he wanted.
“I want to try to keep you and the lovely lady from being killed. I’m Clint Faraday. I believe she called me with a cryptic message.”
“Not her. Come on in.”
Clint went in. Vega didn’t waste words. “How can we get out of this damned mess?”
“I don’t know if she can. You can.
“How could anyone be stupid enough to think they could blackmail people like those?”
There was a pause, then he nodded. “So that’s how it came apart. I was wondering why they were so suddenly trying to kill us. That would be, to my thinking, the fastest way to have the information she holds distributed.
“I learned two years ago, when we came here, that I was in a very bad situation because of her. I did not know what she was or her history. Then. I, quite frankly, wouldn’t lift a finger to protect her. I need a way to protect myself FROM her!”
“She isn’t here?”
“She went into town to purchase groceries. She wants to know if anyone was asking about us. She knows about the woman in Bocas.
“I am most sorry about that. My caller was thought to be her.
“Mr. Faraday, I want out of this! I tried to cause something that would allow me out. She is the one who was arranging for the assassination of Velasquez. He should be shot, but not by such as her.”
“Why would she try to hit Velasquez?”
“He has much of the information she holds. He made it quite plain that he would have her eliminated as a problem if he finds her. She is very good at hiding in plain sight.”
“I figured that. So did another person here.
“Is the information here?”
“In a safe in her room. Yes.”
“All of it?”
“It is there with all the copies. She couldn’t find a way to place the copies where she could feel secure about them.”
“Can you call her?”
“Certainly.”
“Call her. When I do certain things, act like it’s real. First, tell her there are two men in the house. You think one is a man you saw in Panamá City.”
He went to the desk phone and called a cell number. When she answered he said what Clint suggested in a whispered, panicky voice. Clint slammed a nearby door against the wall. Clint acted like he was throwing a fist. Vega grunted and dropped the receiver. Clint knocked the phone off the table and Vega made some more grunts. Clint turned the table over onto the phone and made a lot of noise, then picked up the phone and said, “Te matarse, puta!” and hung up.
Vega grinned at him. “What now?”
Clint took out his cell and called Gortas. “The stuff is in a safe in her room. Get it! She won’t be back here.
“Oh. Boquete. Hill road, fourth house. The ostentatious one. Her room’s ... (he raised his eyebrows at Vega) North corner. Carved teak door. Vega is out of it so long as nothing else happens where he involves himself.”
Gortas grunted and hung up.
“Get whatever you can’t do without and let’s get out of here. They’ll have someone close, so we don’t have much time.”
He said, “She’ll be somewhere she can watch the place pretty fast. She’ll sneak in to see if the stuff’s still here.”
“There’s a back way out?”
“Yeah. She’ll watch that more than the front ... which means we can go out the front if we stay right against the wall and she won’t be able to see. She knows if someone is in here they had to come in from in back somehow because the security in front is damned good. The laundry room is the only place they could get in.”
Clint asked where the laundry room was. He went back to wrench the door askew so it would look forced from a distance. Vega grabbed a suitcase, threw a lot of things in, asked Clint to carry the briefcase he slid from under a chair in the dinning room. They slipped out the front door and along the wall to the corner.
They could be seen from the hill she would have to be on if they crossed the intersection. Clint was looking around when a car stopped in front of the house and three burly men went to find the door open. Clint grinned at Vega, said, “It’s done. She can run, but I doubt she can hide.”
They walked across the intersection and down toward town, caught the last bus back to David and went to the Costa Rica. In the morning Vega caught a bus to Panamá City and Clint went back to Bocas. On the bus the radio announced that a burglary in Boquete in a very wealthy area had resulted in the death of the woman who lived there. Her husband was missing. The blood on the scene indicated that he was probably also dead. The robbery seemed to be of a safe and all its contents that had been removed from the house.
Clint was trying to remember the words to that song Gortas sang a line of. Watch Out for Those Soft Shoulders and Dangerous Curves. Something about trouble and ruining your nerves or something.
True.
C. D. Moulton’s works are available on most major outlets as printed or e-books. CD writes the CD Grimes, PI mysteries, the Det. Lt. Nick Storie mysteries, the Clint Faraday mysteries, the Flight of the Maita science fiction series, books on orchid culture and many others of many types. Mystery, adventure, intrigue, science fiction, fantasy, paranormal, mild erotica, and factual.
