Brother Thomas answered on the second ring.
Before he could say a word, Brack told him, “I got Vito, but I don’t think this is done yet. Cassie wasn’t with him.”
“Where is Regan?” he asked.
“I don’t know.” Brack realized he hadn’t even considered that she might have been in the SUV with Vito. Vengeance had blinded him to the possibility that he could have killed her in the crash. Idiot. Instead, he said, “We have to find Cassie. I bet she went after her sister. But first, I need a lawyer.”
How one wild girl could start a series of dominoes falling to bring together all these tragedies was beyond comprehension. Regrettably, this happened around Brack a lot.
Chapter Forty-Two
Monday, quarter to midnight
The police did not release Brack. Thanks to Justin Welcott the third—and over Darcy’s protest—Brack was charged with grand theft auto. He sensed trouble brewing in paradise, but didn’t mind seeing another man’s pride take him down. Especially that man. Brack’s own pride had done enough damage over the years.
He was placed in a holding cell with mostly minority folks coming down from whatever chemicals had gotten them into trouble and landed them in there. The Latinos stood together on one side and the African-Americans held the other side. There were only three whites, including Brack. He still wore his new tux. Keeping to himself, he stood in a corner and thought about where, once he was released, he might find Regan. Brother Thomas was currently very busy trying to find him a lawyer for the hearing.
Predictably, it didn’t take long before Brack’s loner strategy for self-preservation was tested. Two Latino thugs, tats up and down their arms and necks, approached.
“Ese,” one said, “what you in for?” His nose displayed a red sore where, Brack assumed, some form of jewelry had resided before the police made him remove it before locking him up.
“I stole a Range Rover,” Brack said, already tired and not in the mood for this. “How about you guys?”
The holding cell became quiet. Everyone focused their attention on the new floor show.
The second thug, who wore red sneakers, said, “We took a sweet white boy like you into the bushes and made him our bitch.”
Brack nodded. “You must have been hard up.”
Chuckles came from the African-American section.
“You think that funny, ese?” asked Red Sneakers.
“Hey man,” Brack said, “I don’t judge. You like white guys. I get it.”
The two squinted at him, as if trying to decide what to do next. All this time Brack had been looking them in the eyes, which he’d heard was a mistake. His failure to cower at their implied threats was likely to get him killed.
Another Latino from the group in the corner called out, “Hey, Raoul, he call you a homo. You gonna take that?”
Before either of the two facing Brack could respond, one of the black men said, “He call it like he see it.”
All eyes in the Latinos’ corner turned from Brack to the group of African-Americans.
Red Sneakers said, “You stay out of this, mayate.”
Brack’s Spanish was more than a little rusty, but he knew that was not the smartest insult to be used in a place like this.
The African-Americans grew in stature. Brack hadn’t realized it before, but the shortest man matched his own six-foot height and the rest stretched upwards of six-five, six-six. They formed a wall.
The Latino contingent, all of them under six feet, lined up in opposition.
Brack’s two fellow whites did their best to slink away from the middle. It was about to become a war zone, and the three of them would be collateral damage if Brack didn’t do some—
Too late.
One of the Latinos pulled out a shiv that a decent search should have confiscated and stabbed the closest black man. Then all hell broke loose.
Brack jumped into the fray, deciding at the last minute to team up with the African-Americans whether they liked it or not. He grabbed the first Latino he found who also possessed a heretofore hidden shiv and broke his arm. Then Brack punched another and elbowed a third in the face.
The Latino with red sneakers swung his own shiv at one of the African-Americans who’d had his back turned. Brack caught the hand with the shiv and wrenched the wrist backwards until it popped. Brack caught a fist in the face and all of a sudden had two shivs swinging at him from two different directions. An African-American turned around in time to realize Brack saved him from getting stuck. The black man slammed the heads of the two Latinos together and they collapsed.
Brack turned to face another attacker only to find there weren’t any. All the Latinos lay on the floor, along with three black men. The rest stood breathing hard but victorious.
“You fight pretty good for a cracker,” said the man Brack saved.
“Thanks.”
“What make you think we ain’t gonna finish you off too?”
“You’re not into white guys?”
The man gave Brack a hard glare. Several others also faced him, ready to finish him off, he supposed. The man Brack took to be their leader then faced the ceiling and laughed. A second or two later, the others began to laugh.
“You real funny.”
As if knowing the threat was over, two guards appeared who should have heard all the ruckus from the start but failed to intervene. They stood at the cell door and one of them said, “All right, what happened?”
Brack held up his hands. “There weren’t enough white guys for them to play house with. So they started fighting over us.”
All the cellmates still standing laughed even harder.
The guards looked at everyone laughing, then at the men bleeding and busted up on the floor, and called for reinforcements.
The situation couldn’t have worked out better for Brack. The guards split up the Latinos who hadn’t been stabbed or had a broken bone and moved them to their own cell. The bleeding and unconscious, including Brack’s two fellow crackers, got an express trip to the infirmary. And Brack got put in isolation.
With his newfound solitude, Brack stretched out on a fairly clean bunk and passed out, secure that he wouldn’t be carried into the bushes by any strapping tattooed young men.
Thanks to Brother Thomas’s connections, when Brack entered the attorney-client meeting room at nine the next morning, his new lawyer awaited. For the first time this week he’d gotten a great night’s sleep, but he looked like he’d been in a jail fight. His face was bruised and scratched, and his new tux was now torn.
The attorney representing Brack was a tall slender African-American woman about fifty who filled out a serious business suit. She reminded him a lot of Pam Grier in the film Jackie Brown. Draped across one of the chairs was a garment bag. She gave Brack a disapproving onceover but held out a hand. “Mr. Pelton, I’m Jacqueline Boyd. Brother Thomas sent me to represent you.”
Okay, Jackie Boyd. “Great, but you can call me Brack.”
“Mr. Pelton,” she said, “I need to know how you want to plead. With the few facts I have been able to ascertain, I’d recommend not guilty. Promise to pay for the car’s rear window and any inconvenience and leave it at that. The judges have too many cases to waste time on something that could be construed as a misunderstanding.”
“You really think you can construe it that way?”
“Are you patronizing me?”
“A little,” he said. “What I’m guessing you don’t know, and which will probably make it hard for you to construe much of anything, is my past record.”
She pulled a thick file from her very nice, very expensive briefcase. “You mean this?” Dropping it on the table, the rubber-banded overstuffed folder made a loud thump when it hit the wood surface. “Interesting reading. I usually develop a profile from the contents.”
“Let m
e guess,” he said. “You just found the man of your dreams.”
A stiff grin lightened her face a fraction. “Actually, I already found him. He’s my husband.”
“Too bad for the rest of us,” Brack said. “So skip the psycho-babble and give me a rundown of the profile you have of yours truly.”
“Impulsive, heroic, manic, masochistic, loyal, arrogant, lost, direct, immature, dangerous, and self-destructive.”
“You forgot hedonistic and chaotic.”
“I was trying to be nice.”
Brack chuckled. “Gee, thanks.”
“Word is there was a bad fight in your cell last night.”
“I had a cell to myself,” he said, waiting to see just how good her info was.
“Yeah,” she said, “you did. After the fight ended and they had to cart fourteen men out, several with stab wounds and broken bones.”
“No thanks to the officers supposedly guarding the holding cell. Anyway, I’m here in one piece, aren’t I?”
“Barely.” She handed him the garment bag. “Put this on before court. When you go in front of the judge we can’t have you looking like you had too many drinks at a party and went joy-riding in someone else’s car.”
“I’ll try to keep that in mind.”
“Do that.” She gathered the file folder that constituted his record.
Brack noticed the name written on it was not his own.
His attorney watched and gave a sly grin. “We’re scheduled for ten a.m.”
It occurred to Brack that her mostly spot-on profile of him had come not from the file in her hands but from their brief meeting just now. Plus maybe from Brother Thomas. Brack considered it “mostly spot-on” because he thought she threw in the masochistic part only to rattle him. It almost worked. Or maybe he was masochistic.
Jacqueline Boyd worked the judge so well that Brack thought even Darcy could take lessons. When his attorney described his incarceration as a big misunderstanding, batting her eyes and pursing her lips, the judge watched her with a loopy grin on his face. The Assistant D.A., a wet-behind-the-ears wannabe all of twenty-five, didn’t have a chance. His thick glasses and bad complexion did not work in his favor. Too bad, because he’d done a lot of homework digging up Brack’s past. Prepared he was. Unfortunately, he could not overcome the judge’s appreciation of the defense attorney’s many skills.
Brack walked out a free man, thanks to Jackie Boyd and the judge’s generous dismissal of the charges against him. As long as she defended cases in front of him prosecuted by a pimply kid, the District Attorney’s office had no chance—a scandal in the making.
Vito, on the other hand, had not fared so well. After a police-guarded hospital stay, he was detained for a whole slew of activities. His diplomatic status would save him from jail in the States, but Brack had a feeling he would be deported within the week.
“Can I at least buy you a cup of coffee?” Brack asked his attorney.
“Even with the new suit, you look like you just got out of jail, and I don’t socialize with clients.”
“I’d say your representation of me ended as soon as the judge banged the gavel. Call it a thank-you gesture. Or stay on the clock and call it a business meeting.”
She slipped her phone out of her briefcase. “You have an answer for everything, don’t you?”
“That’s your job,” he said. “I’m only trying to be friendly.”
The grin returned. The one that mesmerized the judge. It was working on Brack too. “Okay. There’s a Starbucks around the corner. My treat. Or ultimately yours after I bill you.”
With the heat of the day just coming on, they found shade on a bench under a tree. Turned out she really was happily married. And had been an A.D.A. until the dark side of defense lured her with large stacks of cash, which Brack would be adding to.
“Brother Thomas said I stood to make a lot of money off you,” she said. “How long can I count on your being in town and in trouble?”
“As long as it takes.”
“I’m guessing that not knowing your business would be in my best interest.”
“Correct,” he said. “Sounds like you want to stay on retainer.”
“You’re the perfect client,” she said. “You can afford my fees and you have a propensity for staying in trouble.”
Brack raised his cup. “Cheers to that.”
“Mr. Pelton,” she said, tapping his cup with hers, “this could be the start of a beautiful friendship.”
Chapter Forty-Three
Tuesday afternoon
Brack had previously discovered that life was easier when he had a good lawyer to get him out of jams. Today looked like he’d retained the Wonder Woman of barristers.
He tooled down Peachtree in the turbo hatchback, thinking he was luckier than he deserved to be. Except that Mutt was still recovering in the hospital and no one had yet found Regan or Cassie. So he still had to remain in town. Oh, and Darcy was still marrying the peckerwood.
His pocket vibrated as he slowed for a light. Darcy was calling.
“Speak of the devil,” he said.
“Whatever,” she said. “Sounds like you survived your night in jail.”
“Best sleep I had in months. That’s after they moved me into solitary confinement.”
“For everyone else’s safety, no doubt,” she said. “Listen, I’m sorry.”
Brack didn’t know how to respond to that.
She continued. “Justin has issues about his things.”
“Well, to be honest, I was playing a bad game of chicken with his Range Rover when he shut it down. The situation could have ended much worse.” He didn’t add how close he’d been to ending it all in an intentional head-on collision.
After a pause, she said, “I wish you’d have totaled it.”
Brack’s turn to pause, surprised.
“Then I would have had to pay for it. Probably better for my bank balance that it washed out the way it did. I already have to replace my Porsche, you know.”
“I know.”
“Of course you know,” he said. “You were kind enough to film a clip and put the carcass—as you put it—on Atlanta’s number-one news channel.”
“How could I pass up such an opportunity?”
“So what’s next?”
She said, “Vito’s in custody. Townsend’s out of the picture for the time being. We still need to find Cassie. And when we do, I’ll bet we find Regan.”
Brack said, “We never did find out what was in those warehouses—both the ones by the airport with the old guard, and those the kid tipped Mutt to that the bikers visited at night.”
“Maybe you should check it out,” she said. “I’m going back through Vito’s assets to see if I can find any place Regan could be that Cassie might have known about. Let’s regroup later.”
“What does the fiancé say of our alliance?”
“This is business. I don’t care what he has to say about that.”
While Darcy researched Vito’s properties to find where Cassie might be, Brack picked up Tara, and the two of them headed to the warehouse where Mutt and he got into their little disagreement and Mutt kicked him out of the car. On the way, they stopped and purchased a set of bolt cutters, a sledge hammer, and a stout pry bar. They had most of the day left before the bikers returned in the dark and he planned on a heck of a lot of breaking and entering.
Trolling the run-down streets of the old warehouse district once again, Brack had to think hard to remember exactly which warehouse. After three failed attempts, they found the one Mutt and he had been shown by young Jacob. Brack recognized the dock by its recent refurbishing.
He and Tara looked around, mostly for motorcycles. No other vehicles were in sight. They got out of the Mazda and carried the tools to the doors. After examining the lock on the side d
oor next to the roll ups, Brack pulled out two thin screwdrivers from their bag.
A voice behind them said, “Whatcha doin?”
To say Brack was startled was an understatement. When he recognized the voice he turned. “Jacob?”
The lanky boy who’d previously guided Mutt and Brack to this location stood behind Brack and Tara. Jacob had managed to successfully sneak up on them both, an extremely unnerving experience.
Tara said, “We want to see what’s inside this place.”
“Oh,” the boy said.
Brack said, “I’m afraid I forgot to bring some baseball cards with me. We’ll come back with some.”
“That’s okay,” he said.
Thanks to some training Darcy had given Brack when she’d lived in Charleston, Brack picked the lock. The door swung open to reveal a dark cavernous space. A keypad glowed next to the door, flashing red. No alarm sounded, so Brack guessed the alert signal went somewhere other than a security agency. Although that meant the police were unlikely to show up, he wondered who might. Then he thought if anyone did, it would be Levin and his pathetic road hogs. With their boss in jail, Brack figured they’d be itching for even greater revenge that their barroom bust. He decided they needed to work quickly.
Inside next to the keypad Tara found the light switches. When she flipped them on, the three of them saw a fairly large space, probably a hundred feet wide by three-hundred feet deep. Six large wooden crates stacked in the center were nailed shut. Using the pry bar on one of them, Brack worked the lid, one side at a time. Tara used the handle of the sledge to help pry it up. After about five minutes of sweaty work, the lid came free. They lifted it off and sat it on top of another crate, then looked inside.
Brack stood in shock.
Tara screamed.
Jacob looked at both of them. “What is it?”
In a hoarse voice, Brack said, “Elephant tusks.”
Each had been completely removed from the head of a slaughtered elephant so the only thing shipped was the ivory.
Big City Heat Page 24
