Dead of the Day (2007)

by Karen E. Olson

''I heard that you know my friend, Marisol,'' I said again.

  For a second I thought he was going to slug me. I took a step back, away from him. ''Sorry, am I wrong?'' I asked.

  As I studied his face, which was showing a mix of emotions, none of them good, I wondered what he was trying to hide. He wasn't married at the moment, and he and his ex-wife didn't have any kids, so he didn't have to worry about anything like that. If he wanted to date Marisol Gomez, it wouldn't raise any red flags for anyone. Especially since she was rather easy on the eyes and guys can be superficial about shit like that.

  ''I know her, but not well,'' he lied, not that I would've known it was a lie other than that I'd seen him locking lips rather seriously with her. ''What about her?''

  I shrugged. ''Just thought I'd mention it.'' But my curiosity about their relationship was now thoroughly piqued.

  ''What did you want?'' Sam asked now, a bit eager to get me off the subject.

  ''When?''

  ''Why are you here?'' he tried again.

  ''Oh, yeah, well''—I thought quickly—''I was wondering if you'd ever ID'd that floater the other day.''

  He shook his head. ''No, not yet. Doubt we will, either. Those guys are a dime a dozen.''

  By ''those guys,'' I assumed he meant undocumented Hispanics who might not want the cops to know who they are, so when they're found dead, they remain John Does forever.

  I nodded, then figured, what the hell. ''I heard that warehouse where my car was is a sweatshop,'' I said quickly. ''And I heard there's going to be a raid tonight. Can you confirm that?''

  His eyes narrowed, his bushy eyebrows moving into each other so he looked remarkably like Neanderthal man. ''No. No, I can't,'' he growled.

  It seemed like an overreaction, but I couldn't call him on it. ''Okay,'' I said resignedly. I started back down the steps toward my car.

  ''Annie,'' I heard Sam call.

  I turned. ''Yeah?''

  He was looking at me with a funny look on his face. ''Marisol's on hard times right now. You might want to steer clear of her. She's not that stable.''

  First Tom and now Marisol. Sam sure didn't want me poking around in any of what he perceived as his business. I just nodded and kept walking. It was going to take more than that to keep me from trying to find out what was going on.

  I still hadn't gotten any information about the alleged warehouse raid. I settled into the Kia—hated to admit it, but I was getting used to it—and dialed Tom's cell number. I probably should've done that instead of coming over here.

  But all I got was voice mail.

  I thought again about the bee stings, and realized that I had let something slide the last two days. Tony Rodriguez. I hadn't done too much to find out who might have wanted to see him dead. Rocco's ''tip'' about the Homeland Security meeting came back to me. That, combined with Lin Rodriguez's bombsniffing bees and a sweatshop full of illegal workers, gave me an idea. I punched in another familiar number.

  ''Hey, Annie, what's up?'' Paula Conrad was one of my best friends. The last time I'd seen her, she was knocking back beers at Bar with a very good-looking guy. But I wasn't calling to find out how things had turned out. She was an FBI agent, and if I wasn't mistaken, the FBI was under the umbrella of Homeland Security these days.

  ''Tony Rodriguez. Heard he was meeting with some Homeland Security people. You know about that?''

  ''They were talking about beefing up security at the port,'' Paula volunteered.

  I thought about my conversation with David Welden, debated with myself for about a nanosecond, then said, ''His wife was working on a bee project that was tied into it, I think. Bees sniffing out bombs or something. Ring a bell?''

  She didn't say anything.

  ''You know about that?'' I asked.

  ''How do you know about that?'' she asked.

  ''It's going to be in the paper in a few weeks,'' I said. ''Why the secrecy now?''

  ''It's going to be in the paper? Are you writing about it?''

  ''Not me, our science reporter. Lin Rodriguez told him about it.''

  ''Shit.'' She said it softly, but I could hear the force behind the word. Lin wasn't supposed to leak this; I could tell.

  ''This is off the record,'' Paula said.

  ''Okay.''

  ''It's not working the way it's supposed to. We had a little, um, accident over there a few days ago.''

  ''Accident?''

  She snorted. ''Goddamn bees went everywhere they weren't supposed to. Lin finally found them near a freighter that had just come in. We had a shitload of TNT in another location, and only one bee found it.''

  I couldn't suppress the chuckle. ''At least there was one.'' But then I sobered up with another thought. ''Did you check that freighter?''

  ''Damn straight we did. Nothing.''

  I remembered the John Doe. ''What about crew?''

  ''What do you mean?''

  ''What about crew on the freighter? Did anyone get stung?''

  ''We don't let them off,'' Paula said. ''Crew stays on the ship at all times for security reasons.''

  ''No one could get off?''

  ''No.'' She seemed pretty sure about that, but I was dubious. That guy had gotten stung, and if he was the guy whom Marisol had seen dumped in the river, then he might have come off that freighter.

  ''Where'd the freighter come from?'' I asked.

  ''I don't know, some Latin American country, I think. They were speaking Spanish.''

  I was pulling my net a little closer to shore. That guy must have been there; the timing was right.

  ''Why all the questions?'' Paula was asking.

  ''John Doe, Hispanic, washed up on Long Wharf. Just found out he died from a bee sting.''

  ''No shit?'' I could tell she was putting the pieces together now, too. ''I'll ask around, see if someone did get off that freighter after all. Maybe I missed it.''

  ''Thanks,'' I said. ''Can you let me know?''

  ''Sure. Listen, don't tell anyone that it got screwed up, okay? The bees, I mean. The suits are all hot and bothered about this. Maybe by the time your reporter writes his story things will have gotten better.''

  ''What about Lin Rodriguez?''

  ''What about her?''

  ''She was released from the hospital. Is she okay? I mean, after the overdose?''

  Paula didn't say anything.

  ''Paula, what's going on? Is she okay?''

  Finally, ''It wasn't an overdose.''

  I let the words sink in before I asked my next question. ''What was it, then?''

  ''You can't tell anyone. This is so off the record.''

  I crossed my fingers. ''Okay, fine. What is it?''

  ''Really, I mean it. Off the record.''

  ''Okay, okay.''

  ''She was checking on her bees. She keeps some of them on the back patio at her condo in boxes. Some one knocked her out as she was leaning over the hive, took off her protective headgear. She fell right into the hive, got stung a shitload of times. It's amazing she's not dead.''

  Chapter 24

  If it weren't for Lin Rodriguez's sister, who showed up just minutes later, Lin might have died. Paula told me Mei spotted a cop car and flagged it down; the cop got her to the hospital in record time. But since there wasn't a 911 call, no one had found out exactly what happened. Paula said in light of what happened to Tony Rodriguez, the cops were being tightlipped about Lin's ''overdose.''

  ''So no one has a clue who killed Tony or who tried to kill Lin?'' I asked. ''Do you think it has something to do with the bees?''

  Paula sighed. ''I have no idea.''

  ''Why the hell does she keep bees at her condo? That doesn't seem safe. And aren't beehives pretty big?'' I had no clue about bees.

  Paula chuckled. ''They're like a dog or a cat to her. And the hives are really just three small wooden boxes that she stacks up. You wouldn't think anything if you saw them.'' She paused. ''She's a little crazy, I think, but I saw the setup myself. It's not like there are swarms of bees ev
erywhere. Just one or two going in and out at a time. She gave me some honey. Fantastic.''

  ''Bet her neighbors don't know, otherwise they'd run those bees right out.''

  ''You're probably right. Hey, I have to get back to work. You promised, right? You're not going to write about this.''

  There was no way I could get this confirmed by anyone. Tom would keep mum, I knew, and without getting it confirmed, I couldn't use it. ''I'm not going to write about it,'' I promised again, meaning it this time. But that didn't mean I wouldn't try to put the pieces together using it.

  It's too bad the bees couldn't talk.

  But before she cut me off, I said, ''Wait.''

  ''Yeah?''

  ''There's a warehouse in Fair Haven. I heard it's a sweatshop with illegal workers and there might be a raid tonight. Know anything about that?''

  She was quiet for a couple of seconds, then, ''I might.''

  ''So there will be a raid tonight?''

  ''Might be. But you can't quote me on that. I have to go.'' And before I could get anything else, she hung up.

  I closed my phone and started the car. At least I knew this raid wasn't a figment of Rocco's imagination. And even though I couldn't say on the record who told me about it, we could be there tonight to cover the whole thing.

  I twisted my hand slightly as I moved the steering wheel, and pain shot through to my elbow. My thumb had been throbbing all morning, and I'd been working through it. I wanted to go home, take a Percocet or two, and lie down, giving myself some time to try to figure out what the hell was going on. Already there were three dead bodies and one attempt on Lin's life. But I had to talk to Marty first.

  I pulled over to the side of the road and flipped the cover on my phone, dialing Marty.

  ''What'd you find out?'' he asked without saying hello.

  ''Got it confirmed from my FBI source there will be a raid at that warehouse tonight.'' I paused. ''I don't know what time or anything, but we could go over there and wait.''

  ''We?''

  I took a deep breath. ''I really want to go. I want to cover this.''

  He was silent for a few seconds. ''Charlie'll have my ass if you're out there, Annie. I'm going to send Dick. If he needs some help putting it together, you can do that.'' He paused, knowing I was getting ready to argue. ''That's the best I can do, okay?''

  I didn't have a choice. ''Okay,'' I said slowly.

  ''I'm sorry, Annie.'' I could hear in his voice that he really was. He hung up and I threw the phone on the seat next to me.

  I turned onto Olive before I noticed the car behind me. He was right on my ass, too. I sped up a little, and he sped up, until the next thing I knew, I was being thrown back against my seat and the Kia was careening toward a tree. In a second of panic, I swung the steering wheel as far to the left as I could, and I both felt and heard the tree scrape along the side of the car as I slid against it.

  The side airbag exploded; I couldn't see the tree anymore, but I could still feel the car behind me pushing the Kia toward the road.

  An SUV was coming toward me. There wasn't a damn thing I could do about it. I threw my hands up over my face as I heard the screeching of brakes.

  Then silence. I'd stopped moving, and I let out the breath I'd been holding. Slowly I moved my arms away from my head to stare at the Lincoln Aviator in front of me and saw a guy in a suit and tie jumping across the hood of the Kia and pulling my door open.

  ''Are you okay? Are you okay?'' His voice was trembling, like my entire body.

  I shook my head, uncertain if I could speak. There was a knot the size of my fist in my throat.

  Finally, ''Where did he go?'' I asked.

  The guy shook his head. ''The other car? He took off. Are you okay?'' he asked again.

  I thought for a second. I wasn't sure I was, but a flashback slammed into my brain. ''It was a Honda,'' I said softly. ''It looked like Hector's Honda.''

  The guy's name was Paul. He was some sort of salesman, and he wanted to call the cops. I wanted to find Hector and ask him what the fuck his problem was with me. The last time I'd seen him, Rosario Ortiz's body ended up in the trunk of my Accord, and now this.

  But my plan was flawed. The number one problem was, the Kia didn't seem to be in very good shape, and number two, Paul wasn't inclined to let me leave the scene without getting a police report. Figured I'd get a real Good Samaritan who was a law-abiding citizen. Paul also hinted that perhaps I needed to be checked out at the hospital. I already had Percocets at my house; fat chance I'd sit around the hospital all day again. But I was a bit shaken up, so I didn't argue too much.

  We waited for the cops.

  Ronald Berger climbed out of his cruiser and surveyed the damage. ''What happened here?'' he asked me, taking out his notebook.

  I told him about the Honda, and as I did, his partner, Mike Mancini, crept around the Kia, taking his own notes. When he came around the front of the car, he stood next to me and nodded at Berger. ''She's telling the truth. Someone crashed the shit out of it. Other car was green—there's green paint all over the white. And it looks like the other car will have some white paint on it, too.'' He paused. ''Like that tree.''

  We looked at the old, tall maple. Yeah, it was branded for life.

  I wasn't quite sure just what my rental agreement said about accidents. But I was willing to bet that it wouldn't be good.

  Shit. I'd managed to lose two cars in just two days. I'd be lucky if the rental place would even give me another one.

  '' . . . not her fault,'' Mike was saying.

  Okay, so if the cops said it wasn't my fault, then maybe, just maybe, I wouldn't have to replace the Kia. Christ, putting down good money for a Kia just wouldn't be right. Even if I had started getting used to it.

  ''I think I know who was driving,'' I said, telling them about Hector. I gave them the address on Blatchley where I'd seen him with Lourdes and Marisol. I assumed he lived there with them, but I wasn't

  100 percent sure. He could've just been visiting. Berger said they'd check it out. I heard my phone ringing. It was Vinny. ''Just checking in,'' he said. I let the sound of his voice soothe me for a second before saying, ''I had an accident.''

  Immediately, I heard concern. ''Are you okay?''

  ''Yeah, don't worry. The cops are still here.''

  ''Where are you?''

  ''Olive and Court.''

  ''I'm at my office. I'll be there in a few minutes.''

  As I closed my phone, I glanced over at Berger and Mancini. Mancini was on the radio, putting out the call to look for the Honda. Paul was giving a statement to Berger.

  Vinny and the tow truck showed up at the same time. As Vinny put his arm around me, I admitted I wasn't sure where to send the car. Should I send it back to the rental place? Vinny told me he'd take care of it. I felt cold as he left my side, watching him as he spoke to the tow truck guy.

  ''Are you doing okay?'' Paul asked for the umpteenth time.

  I nodded. ''Yeah, I'm fine,'' I said, although I wasn't quite sure. He squeezed my upper arm as he said good-bye and shook Vinny's hand.

  ''Seems like a nice guy,'' Vinny mumbled absently.

  ''He stopped before he hit me,'' I said. ''I really thought he was going to hit me.'' I shivered with the thought.

  Vinny and I watched the tow truck take the Kia away, and after Berger and Mancini said they'd be in touch, Vinny helped me into his Explorer. We weren't far from Wooster Square, so it only took us a few minutes to pull up in front of my building.

  As we climbed the stairs to my apartment, I felt Vinny's hand on the small of my back. He wasn't urging me forward; it was just a light touch that brought back some memories.

  He followed me inside after I unlocked my door.

  The pot from the soup my mother had made still sat in my sink, along with the bowl and a mug. I hadn't washed them yet; I hadn't been sure if my hand could deal with washing dishes.

  Vinny helped me off with my slicker, then led me into the bedr
oom, grabbing the yoga pants off the floor. ''Put these on,'' he said.

  I raised my eyebrows and he grinned. ''Jesus, Annie, I've seen more of you than that.''

  He had a point. I stripped off my jeans and slipped on the sweats, more than aware that he was watching, and wondering if he'd try something. But he just stood there until I was done.

  ''Where are your painkillers?''

  ''Bathroom.''