by David Berens
“It’s called scotch, Winnie,” Frank McCorker said. “A taste for a more refined palate.”
“Tastes like gasoline if you ask me.”
“I didn’t.”
“Get that new waitress to bring me something easier to drink,” Winchester said, sliding his glass over toward the third man. “Maybe a mojito or something like that.”
“A goddamn mojito?” Frank asked. “Why don’t you grow up and drink your scotch like a real man? Besides, I don’t think Johnny knows how to make one of those.”
“It tastes pretty dang good to me,” Country said, throwing the liquor back in one gulp. “Reckon I could git another one?”
He smiled and a trickle of blood came from his mouth.
“Christ in a handbasket,” Frank sighed. “What the fuck is wrong with your tongue?”
“I cut it shavin’.”
Frank opened his mouth, but closed it without asking his next question. He didn’t really want to know anyway.
“Where the hell is the waitress?” Winchester peered through the mirror. “Can’t hire good help these days.”
“We could if this jackass,” he said, pointing at Country, “would stop kidnapping them.”
“She seen too much,” Country complained. “What was I s’posed to do? Just let her waltz out and tell everybody about our stash?”
“He’s right,” Winchester said. “If she tells the police what she saw, the house will be traced to me.”
“And that leads ’em to you,” Country added, grinning at Frank.
The candidate for Governor of Massachusetts took a deep breath and swallowed the last of his drink. “We can’t have that. What do you propose we do?”
“Same thing as last time,” Country said. He pointed his finger at his temple and made a pew sound.
“Shut your pie hole, Country.” Frank stood and paced around the room. “Let’s not do any more of that. We need a situation to get her away from the house and make her disappear. And for God’s sake, get that other woman out of there too.”
“I just got me a real good idear,” Country said as he scratched his mutton chop sideburns. “I know this feller from up Point Judith way. A retired cop.”
“You can’t be serious,” Winchester said.
“Hear me out,” Country said. “Banksy is a good friend. We go way back to one of my junior arrests. I was out shopliftin’ for some new Van Halen tapes, and—”
“Get to the point,” Frank said.
“Right. So, Banksy is retired, but due to a bad break, he was let go without his pension. Some girl said he roughed her up or somethin’ like that. Anyhow, I reckon he’s a little hard up for cash, cause he plays Santa Claus every year for the kids down at the hospital. Says it’s how he gits his spendin’ money.”
“A retired cop who plays Santa Claus is who you’re trusting to help you get rid of these two girls?” Winchester slapped his hand to his forehead. “God, I really do need a drink now.”
“As I was sayin’, he’d be perfect, cause he knows what all the cops do to solve crimes and such. He’d know how to eliminate all the traces of them and us before the C.S.I. gets on the scene.”
Winchester arched an eyebrow and let out a grunt. “It’s not a half bad idea.”
“And, he can help me get ’em on the boat and make ’em fish food before the week is through.”
“You can’t seriously think this is a good idea, Winnie.” Frank said. “A cop. We’re going to get a cop to help dump two bodies into the ocean.”
“If the man needs cash, he just might do it.”
Frank thought for a moment. There were too many holes in this plot, but he wasn’t sure they had any other choice. But then again, he was retired military and here he was running dope and selling guns. Who would’ve thought.
“I still don’t like it,” he said. “But do what you have to do. Get someone else to help, though. And if any of this shit comes back on me, I will burn you. You will beg to be sent to prison to get away from me.”
“Boss, don’t you worry. I got another idear about a helper. You’ll see. When I git through,” Country arched his back, cracking it as he got up from the table, “won’t nobody find them girls.”
He thumped his index finger on the card table and one of the legs gave way. The whole thing fell over, and with his weight leaning over it, Country fell forward. He stumbled, trying to catch himself, but only made it worse. Frank managed to slide out of the way and the flailing man went flying past him. At the last second, he threw his arms up and they both crashed through the two-way mirror.
As if on cue, the music paused and every head sitting in the main lounge turned to see what had happened. Country raised his hand, a steady stream of blood trickling down from his elbow, and pointed at the front of the room.
“Holy shit, y’all,” he exclaimed. “We’re gonna git a shower dance.”
12
Help Wanted
Troy waited at the end of the driveway for the cop to leave the Boonesborough house and eased the car up to the front. Then he thought better of leaving it out in the open and pulled it around the side of the house in the grass. Without coming around the corner, it would be hard to see from the driveway.
He rushed into the house and charged through the hallways shouting for Prosperity. When the echoes died down, he bent his neck sideways raising his better ear and strained to listen. Nothing. The house creaked a little, and once he thought he heard a voice, but he couldn’t locate it.
He found a door he hadn’t opened before at the end of the first floor hallway and discovered stairs behind it. He rushed down into the cellar, but there was nothing there. The room smelled like death, but all it had in it were plastic shelves full of cleaning supplies, travel size toiletries, and bedding.
He walked back up the steps slowly and wondered if it was time to call the police. Then again, there had been that suspicious cop that had come here looking for him. He wasn’t entirely sure the whole department wasn’t on the Boonesborough payroll. Maybe tomorrow he’d call his buddy Chris with the CIA. If he even still had his number.
“Dangit,” Troy muttered as he walked into the kitchen.
Thankfully, he’d made a pit stop to Fat Ronnie’s Burger Bar on the way home and picked up a massive burger called the Fat Ronnie. A second stop at the Stop and Shop grocery yielded a fresh twelve pack of Corona and a couple of oranges. He devoured the burger and flipped the cap off a beer. He sucked half of it down in one sip without even putting an orange in it.
“Where the hell are you, Prosperity?” he asked the empty house.
A few beers later he was asleep in the hammock on the back porch. The waves were just loud enough to muffle the screams.
The dawn sun woke him and he realized he’d slept all night. He untangled himself from the hammock and knocked over a couple of empty bottles running into the house. He picked up his phone, intending to scroll through and find Chris Collins’ number, but stopped short. He had seven calls from the same number. He didn’t recognize it, but it was a local area code.
He punched the number to dial it and waited. It only rang once.
“It’s about damn time, Bill,” the man said. “What the hell, fella? You sleepin’ the day away?”
Though he was thrown off by the wrong name, Troy recognized the accent and voice from his run-in with the man at the McCorker campaign office. And then he remembered telling the intern girl his name was Bill Clinton and it all made sense.
“Just gettin’ up actually,” Troy said. “Why you askin’?
“Thought you might like to get a little work in today. Pays good as long as you can keep yer mouth shut.”
“How good?”
“Five hundred.”
“Done. I’ll meet you at the McCorker office.”
“No. Shit no,” the man said, a tinge of anger in his voice. “We don’t want to be seen around there. Why don’t I come pick you up? Where do you live?”
Troy almost told him
it was the big gray house with blue shutters, but he caught himself, remembering this guy was connected to Boonesborough.
“Tell you what,” he said. “I’ll meet you up at the Phillips station. Cool?”
“Good enough. Be there in ten.”
Troy disconnected the call and scrolled through his contacts. He couldn’t find Chris’s number and wondered if he had deleted it after that incident down in the Keys. He put his phone away and walked out to the car. The drive to the Phillips 66 gas station was short, and he saw the man sitting in an old pickup truck.
Ten minutes later, the man who called himself Country pulled the truck up to the dock behind the Black Dog Tavern.
“What’s this job all about?” Troy asked.
Country turned off the ignition. “See them boxes back there?” He pointed through the rear window.
Troy saw two wooden crates, about four feet long and a foot and a half wide. He recognized them immediately as the type of crates rifles were commonly shipped in. He nodded, understanding exactly what they were going to do.
“You and me’s gonna carry ’em out to a boat,” Country said, opening his door. Troy did the same and walked to the back of the truck.
Country lowered the tailgate and grabbed the end of one of the crates. “Then, we’re gonna deliver ’em to a fella out on Muskeget.”
Troy slid the other end of the crate toward him, so he could help Country set it onto the ground.
“What’s in ’em?” he asked.
“That ain’t for you to know.” Country slid the next crate back. “And if you ask again, yer off the job.”
“Roger that.”
Troy helped him lower the crate onto the other one, and the men heaved them up together. They walked down the row of boats and stopped at a big one with “Fake It Till You Make It” painted across the back. They set the boxes down and Country stepped onto the boat. He dabbed his moist forehead with a purple bandana and shoved it into his back pocket.
“She’s nice. Is she yours?”
“Dammit, dude. You ask a lot of questions. You writin’ a book?”
“My bad. Just makin’ conversation.”
“We ain’t here to conversate. Now help me load these.”
They muscled the crates onto the boat and slid them back under a bench. Country dug a tarp out of a nearby storage bin and laid it over them. Neither of them spoke for the rest of the trip out to sea. As it turned out, they never got to the island. Instead, once they were far enough out that they couldn’t see land, Troy spotted a seaplane sitting in the water. The pilot did not look like a resident of Martha’s Vineyard or Nantucket. He looked more like a member of the Tijuana cartel.
Country idled the boat up to the plane, and the man inside stepped down onto the pontoon to pull the boat close and tie it off. Troy helped Country get the crates up and over to the man on the pontoon. He was big but not that fit, and to Troy’s surprise, he took the crate by himself.
“Get that other’n ready, dude.” Country waved him back into the boat and stepped over to the plane.
He and the cartel man disappeared into the cockpit, likely to check the box and trade a big wad of cash for it. Troy looked down at the crate slid back up under the lip of the boat. Maybe he was wrong. Maybe it wasn’t guns. He knew they were, but wanted to be sure. He glanced over his shoulder to make sure the two men were still inside the plane. Seeing no sign of them, he bent down and unlatched the two black clasps holding the lid on. He knew he was going to find AK’s inside. The lid creaked as it opened, but the waves were loud enough that he felt sure the men wouldn’t hear it.
The contents in the box were covered with a layer of foam padding, and Troy took a corner and lifted it up. To his surprise, he did not find guns. And he didn’t find drugs. Hell, there weren’t even any stacks of cash. Signs. He found two big stacks of signs declaring in some way that Frank McCorker was running for governor, along with the wire struts that would be used to stake them into street corners and along the highways of Massachusetts.
“Dangit,” Troy muttered.
“Feller,” Country’s voice came from behind him. “I don’t know what in the hell you think yer doin’, but you better have a damn good explanation.”
Troy turned around to see that the man had a pistol pointed at his head. It was a small pistol, maybe a .22, but Troy figured it would do plenty of damage if the man scored a direct hit from this distance. He raised his hands and opened his mouth a little. He did not, in fact, have a good excuse. Country flexed his fingers and Troy cleared his throat. He decided to do what Frank, the consummate politician, might do in this situation—dodge the question.
“Well, shoot fire, son,” he grinned and leaned down to pick up one of the signs. “I just wanted one of these for my yard. Don’t ya know I’m a big supporter of Frank’s from way back?”
Country’s eyes widened. “Where the hell’d ya git that?”
“Right here in this crate. It’s full of ’em.” Troy replied. “Come on now. Tell me you can spare one ... heck, maybe even two of these beauties.”
Troy could see the man’s resolve wavering into confusion and decided to go big.
“I’m here to tell you, if’n we don’t get Frank elected, this whole state is gonna go to hell in a handbasket. I mean, with the crime and the … uh…”
“Illegals?” Country added.
“Dang straight.” Troy said. “And then there’s all the…”
“Abortion clinics?” Country was getting into it now.
“Abso-frickin’-lutely.” Troy held up one of the signs. “And this is the man to change it all.”
Country lowered his gun, his suspicion trickling away. “That’s what I’ve been tellin’ everybody.”
“I sure am glad we had this talk.” Troy laid two signs out and closed the lid. “Now, let’s get this thing loaded on the plane.”
“Oh, that one ain’t goin’,” Country said. “We just needed it for counterbalance.”
“Ahhh,” Troy said, touching his temple with a finger. “Good thinkin’.”
“You’re all right, Bill.”
“Much obliged, Country. And uh, Bill’s what my mama calls me. It’s my first name. But most folks call me by my middle name. It’s Troy.”
“Well, alright, Troy. What say we get back to town and grab a drink. I know a hell of place with cold beer and buck naked ladies prancing around. We can talk about the next job.”
“Much as I’d love to,” Troy said, “I better be gettin’ back home.”
“Aw, hell.” Country slapped him on the back. “I’ll bet you got a little honey waitin’ for you back home. Am I right?”
“You know it.”
“Well, okay, partner.” Country reached over and started the boat. “Let’s get you back to yer girl.”
A fleeting image of Prosperity flashed into his mind. He hoped she was still alive, but was starting to have serious doubts. He was anxious to get back to the house, but he wasn’t sure what his next move would be. He decided that staying close to Country would likely give him the clues he needed to find her.
“You’ll let me know about that other job?”
Country eyed him, a tiny crease forming in his brow. Troy wondered if he’d pushed too far.
“I don’t know if I’ll need ya for the next one.” Country nodded and turned to look over the wheel. “I got another hand on deck for that, but if it turns out I need ya, I’ll give you a ring.”
Troy watched as a squall turned darker and boomed with thunder and lightning. He figured he’d spend his last night in the Boonesborough house and hit Country up for a place to stay. He had a bad feeling that this guy had something to do with Prosperity disappearing and he aimed to find out what.
13
Cabana Day Dreamin’
Country dropped Troy off at the Phillips station, and he watched the man’s rusty truck pull out of the parking lot. He thought about walking into the Black Dog for a drink, but then decided against it. The
bartender had likely been the one to call that cop on him. He slid into the bug and flipped on the radio. Raindrops began to spatter on the seats and he pushed the button to raise the top. As if on cue, Jimmy Buffett began singin’ about barefoot children in the rain.
Troy took a long, slow breath and eased his car out onto the road. Lightning lit up the sky in front of him and he flinched. To his surprise, he felt a tear trickle down his cheek ... or was it just a stray, leftover drop of rain? He wiped it away. Here he was again, messed up in a kidnapping, maybe even a murder … He pushed the thought out of his mind. He was going to believe that Prosperity was alive and okay until he found out otherwise.
By the time he reached the massive Boonesborough Airbnb, it was pouring rain. He ran into the house and shook himself off in the foyer. He decided a hot shower and some dry clothes were in order, and the thought reminded him of his first meeting with Prosperity. He walked down the lonely hall toward the bathroom, unbuttoning his shirt. He climbed into the shower and turned it up to lava. It burned for a second, but felt better as he grew accustomed to the steam.
“You know you cain’t wash it away, Troy,” he said to himself.
“I know.”
He dried himself off and put on his last clean shirt and shorts. He grabbed a couple of Coronas from the fridge and padded out to the screened-in porch to watch the storm. Before he could take his first sip, his phone rang. This time, he recognized the number. It was Country.
“Hey, dude,” Troy said. “Long time, no see.”
“Yeah, well, I got ta thinkin’,” Country said. “This next job we got comin’ up, it’s a real big one. I got another guy I’m gonna get to help, but there’s probably some work for you, too, if you want it.”
“I do,” Troy said.
“Okay, good.” Country sniffed and Troy immediately had the impression that he was the Barney Fife of the organization. “Everything is on a need-to-know basis, so I’ll fill you in when you need to know. Capiche?”
