by Tom Turner
“Sorry, man.”
“Yeah, me too.”
Neither said anything for a few moments.
“Well, at least we got ’em for paying off Lalley. A hundred seventy-five grand, to be exact,” Crawford said.
“Yeah, you want to go back down there and hit ’em with that?” Ott asked.
“Nah, let’s dig around a little more and see what else we can come up with.”
Crawford decided to take a ride out to the Maxwell Investigations HQ in the exclusive warehouse district of West Palm Beach. He figured he’d just show up.
He parked and walked over and hit the buzzer.
“Charlie,” came Maxwell’s voice over the intercom, “you decided you wanted a piece of pizza after all.”
“Buzz me in, will ya, Max.”
And he did.
Maxwell was waiting for him at the top of the steps.
Crawford walked up to the landing and eyeballed Maxwell. “I think you lied to me.”
“What do you mean?” Maxwell said, gesturing with his hand to go into his office.
“For one thing, you told me Guy Bemmert had a clean record.”
Maxwell gestured to the Herman Miller knock-off. Crawford sat down in it. “Well?”
“I don’t know what you’re getting at.”
“I’ll tell you what I’m getting at. I told you what you asked about my case and you lied to me about Bemmert. You withheld, too. Why?”
Maxwell let out a long, theatrical sigh. “Charlie, I could bullshit ya, but well… I’m just not gonna do that. I got too much respect for—”
“Cut the bullshit.”
“Okay, this woman called and said she’d pay me a grand to say Bemmert was Mr. Clean, if someone ever asked.”
“When was this?”
“Same day you came here.”
“And you’re gonna tell me you have no idea who she was, right?”
“Yeah, ’cause I don’t. Honest.”
“Bullshit. So, you just expected some unknown woman to pay you a grand?”
“Yeah, and know what? A messenger came by with an envelope full of ten Benjys.”
Crawford chuckled. “And I’m guessing… ‘Benjys’ would be private dick lingo for hundred-dollar bills.”
Maxwell smiled and nodded.
Crawford got to his feet. “You sure you don’t know who she was?”
“Hundred percent.”
“Okay, Maxwell. In the future, don’t lie to a cop. It’ll get you in deep shit.”
“I’m sorry, Charlie, it’ll never happen again.”
Yeah, Crawford thought…until the next time.
Thirty-Six
Ott had just joined Crawford in his office where his partner had recounted his brief conversation with Maxwell.
“Think he really didn’t know?” Ott asked.
“No, I bet he did. But what was I gonna do, beat it out of him? Some woman doesn’t just call you out of the blue, say they’re gonna pay you a thousand bucks… it just smells bad.”
“I agree.”
“So, it had to be either Fannie Melhado or my old friend, Vega.”
“How do you figure?”
“Well, Fannie because when I asked Maxwell about her, he said she was ‘clean as a whistle.’ Which doesn’t quite jibe with Peavy’s little revelation.”
“So, you’re thinking that if Maxwell took money from her, he’d bury something like that?”
“Yeah, definitely. And Vega ’cause of my spy theory. That she’s the ultimate spinmeister. Then again… I don’t know, man, maybe neither one.”
They were both silent for a few long moments.
“Maybe we should go rattle Guy Bemmert’s cage again,” Ott said. “About those payoffs to Christian Lalley.”
“Yeah, I’m just not sure where that’s gonna get us. I mean, for all we know Bemmert could just say that was money he was donating to SOAR.”
“I hear you.”
“I’m going to have a talk with Freddie Melhado. See what he can tell me about big sis and that dreamboat boyfriend of hers, Leo.”
“You still thinking Leo’s our guy?”
“If I knew he was handy with a knife, I’d say definitely. Right now, he’s still just a leading contender. Up there with the boys from Boca.”
“While you’re doing that, I’m gonna check our GPS bugs to see if the girls are going anywhere suspicious.”
“Let me know.”
Freddie Melhado boasted to Crawford that he had just done a hundred laps in the Elysium pool.
“Best all-around exercise there is,” Crawford said.
There were still some beads of sweat on Melhado’s brow as he sat down opposite Crawford in the Elysium living room.
“I used to play tennis, but I sucked at it, so doing laps is my thing now,” Melhado said.
“I’d probably peter out after about three of ‘em,” Crawford said, then segueing, “Does your sister swim, too?”
“Nah, she still rides, but that’s about it.”
“Out in Wellington, right?”
Melhado nodded.
“She ever ride with Leo Peavy?”
Melhado chuckled. “So, you’re up to speed on all the campus romances?”
Crawford smiled. “You hear a lot of stuff in my business.”
Melhado nodded. “I bet. So, in answer to your question, far as I know, Leo’s not a rider. But he’s got a kayak down at our dock.”
“Oh, there’s a dock here?”
“Yeah, not a very big one.”
“So, not big enough for the boat Crux is interested in?”
Melhado laughed. “Oh God no, not even close. Guy Bemmert’s boat just barely fits.”
Crawford’s head jerked back. Oh my God.… It was the proverbial lightbulb moment. He felt like dialing Ott immediately.
“So, Guy Bemmert’s got a boat?”
“Yeah, a very expensive one, called a Pershing. Technically, I guess it’s Guy’s and Larry’s.”
“And he keeps it at the dock here?”
“Oh, no, he’s got a dock down in Boca.”
And there it was….
Crawford got to his feet. “Well, thank you, Mr. Melhado, I appreciate your time.”
Melhado looked bewildered. “That’s it?”
It was all Crawford needed to know.
“Yes, thank you. If I have any more questions, I’ll give you a call.”
Melhado shrugged. “Okay.”
And Crawford was headed to the door at a walk just shy of a run.
“Mort,” Crawford said into his cell phone. “Bemmert and Swain have a boat at a dock behind their house in Boca.”
“No shit. I didn’t know their place was on the water.”
“The Intracoastal. We never saw it ‘cause of that big ficus hedge behind their apartment.”
“So, you’re thinking… I got it,” Ott said, amped up, “Instead of taking a car—”
“They took a boat.”
Ott was nodding. “Now I got something for you. In fact, I was just about to call. So, speaking of Boca, guess who just went down to Coquina?”
“Who?”
“Vega.”
“No shit. I’ll pick you up in front of the station in ten minutes.”
“I’ll be waiting.”
Thirty-Seven
Designated drive-fast driver Ott jumped into the driver’s seat, gunned the Vic, and turned to Crawford. “So, first, the boys took the boat up to 1450 and did Lalley, then the next night went up again and tried to do Simon Petrie? Swain being the guy with the knife, I’m guessing?”
Crawford nodded and said. “Yup, and I’ve been thinking about Vega’s role in this. Know how she knows everything?”
“Yeah?”
“Maybe she found out that Bemmert and Swain were robbing the SOAR piggybank and wanted a piece of the action,” Crawford said, watching a sign for Delray Beach fly by in a blur.
“Hmm,” Ott said, “I like that, I like it a lot. Which
would explain all the fancy clothes and the hundred-eighty-thousand-dollar BMW…. Hey, check the GPS and see if she’s still at the boys’ house.”
Crawford checked it. “Looks like she’s leaving.”
“So, we can’t round ’em all up at once,” Ott said. “I just hope we don’t have to chase her.”
“Why?”
“‘Cause that M760 would leave us in the dust. Zero to sixty in three point five seconds. Top speed two-hundred-five miles an hour.”
Crawford nodded. “So, let’s worry about Bemmert and Swain for now.”
“Wonder what kind of boat they have?” Ott said.
“It’s called a, ah… Pershing. Ever heard of it?”
Ott’s eyes lit up. “A Pershing what? How many feet?”
“No clue.”
“A Pershing, my friend, is my dream boat. In one of my if-I-won-the-lottery moments, and maybe after a cocktail or two, I surfed the Pershing website. Made by this Italian company and in this video, they kept talking about the “Pershing thrill,” claiming that a Pershing was not driven, but like a fighter jet or a race car, it was “piloted. It’s kind of the boat equivalent of the M760.”
“205 miles an hour?”
“Not quite, but I bet it does forty-five knots.”
“What’s that in miles an hour?”
“Over fifty. Shit, man, sucker’s got over 3,600 horsepower.”
Crawford couldn’t relate.
Ott told Crawford about a video he had seen about the boat. In it, it showed a smaller boat, called a tender, he explained, which could motor up to the swimming platform at the stern of the Pershing and moments later disappear inside the yacht. Like it had been swallowed up. Ott had been curious enough to want to know more and had called a yacht broker he knew. The broker explained that there was an “eye” built in on the bow of the tender and a “hook” attached to a cable inside the boat, and a “garage” effectively, inside the boat. Ott didn’t need to be told any more to understand how it worked.: the big boat hauled the tender into the garage hydraulically. The whole process took no more than three minutes.
They were five minutes from the house at 702 Coquina Drive when Crawford’s cell phone rang. He hit speakerphone.
“Hey, Rose.”
“Charlie, I’ll make this quick. Richard Guy Bemmert is the proud new owner of 702 Coquina Drive.”
“Thank you, Rose. I can’t thank you enough.”
“Bye, Charlie. Go get him.”
“On it,” Crawford said and clicked off.
“Wow,” Ott said, “top-of-the-line boat, waterfront mansion, wonder if he’s bought a jet yet… so how we gonna play it?”
“We got enough circumstantial to take ’em in for questioning.”
“So just arrest ’em, take ’em back to the station and work ’em over until we break ’em?”
Crawford nodded.
“Wonder whether they’ll be in the main house or the apartment?”
“Good question,” Crawford said. “We’ll soon find out.”
Three minutes later the Crown Vic eased up to the gate at Coquina Drive.
Ott pressed the buzzer to speak to Bemmert or Swain so they could get buzzed onto the property.
“Who is it?” Swain answered.
“Crawford and Ott, Palm Beach homicide.”
They heard a click but the arm for the barrier gate didn’t move.
“Try again,” Crawford said.
As Ott pressed the buzzer, they saw Bemmert and Swain charge down the steps at the back of the main house, headed for the Intracoastal at full speed.
“Gun it!” Crawford shouted.
Ott floored the Vic and the gate’s arm snapped like a brittle twig.
Bemmert and Swain cut to the right of a ficus hedge. Crawford was surprised—unpleasantly—how fast the older man was.
Ott had the car halfway down the driveway as Crawford drew his Sig Sauer pistol from his hip holster.
Below them, at the dock, Swain jumped onto the Pershing, turned, and pulled Bemmert on board. Then he unhitched the line and cast it aside.
The Crown Vic screeched to a stop at the end of the driveway, but Crawford had jumped out while it was still moving.
“Hands in the air or you’re dead!” Crawford bluffed.
Bemmert dived to the deck of the boat as Swain jammed the accelerator forward on the Pershing. A line that Swain hadn’t had time to untie snapped with a cracking sound and the Pershing engine roared like a racecar with the accelerator mashed to the floor. The big yacht picked up speed fast.
Crawford and Ott, his Glock out now, ran toward the dock. Neither was prepared to take a shot, but they wouldn’t have had a clear line-of-sight even if they had. Swain was hunched down low behind the wheel and Bemmert still flat on the deck.
On the dock, Crawford pulled out his iPhone and hit speed dial.
“Dispatch.”
“Patty, it’s Crawford, put me through to Cooper.”
“Will do.”
A male voice came on seconds later. “What’s up, Charlie?”
“You in the chopper?”
“Yup. But I’m on the ground.”
“I need you to fly down toward Boca. Right now.”
Crawford heard a clicking noise.
“You got it. Okay, I’m goin’ up,” Ronnie Cooper said. “Fill me in.”
“All right. Go south on the Intracoastal. Keep your eye out for a silver boat. ‘Bout, um, seventy feet long, sleek as hell, probably doing—”
“Forty-five knots, close to fifty miles an hour,” Ott said.
“Hear that?” Crawford asked.
“Got it,” Cooper said.
“Once you see it, fly over and keep going south,” Crawford said. “We need a pick-up at the dock it took off from. 702 Coquina Way’s the address, in Boca. You’ll see us. There’s a chance the boat might pull in somewhere in the meantime, but I hope the hell not.”
“I’ll fly low. See what I see,” Cooper said.
“All right, man, we’ll be waiting for you.”
“Roger that.”
Crawford dialed again. Patty answered.
“Me again,” he said. “Rutledge there?”
“Yup. Want him?”
“Yes.”
Crawford waited a few moments.
“Crawford,” said Rutledge. “What’s up?”
“Norm, I need two sharpshooters at the South Bridge. Quick as you can get ‘em there. Or if they’re not available, two officers with rifles.”
“Roger that. Hold on a sec, I’m on it.”
Thirty seconds, which felt like five minutes to Crawford, crawled by.
“Okay, they’re on their way. What do I tell ’em the play is?”
“They’re looking for a silver boat seventy feet long goin’ fast, maybe close to fifty miles an hour. Two guys on it. One’s wearing a yellow shirt. Tell the shooters to take a few shots into the bow.”
“Not at the men?”
“No. Idea is to make ’em U-turn, so we get ’em hemmed in. Ott and I are gonna be comin’ up behind ’em in the chopper.”
“Care to elaborate on what this is about?” Rutledge asked.
“No time for details, but they did Lalley. Maybe someone else, too. Send out the police boats too. Tell ’em to go south and if they see the boat I described, keep their distance. These guys might have a small arsenal on board.”
“All right, be careful and keep me updated.”
“You got it,” Crawford said and clicked off.
Ott chuckled. “Think he’ll get out his old deer rifle and head down to the bridge himself?”
Crawford laughed. “Probably.”
Ott turned serious. “What if these guys shoot at us in the chopper?”
“I don’t know, man. Depends on how desperate they are.”
“Probably pretty desperate.”
“Yeah, I hear you. If they do, let’s hope Coop knows some evasive moves.”
“Damn well better.”
Crawford’s iPhone rang. “Coop?”
“Hey, I just flew over the boat. Few minutes from you.”
“Okay, man, I’ll keep the line open. Put the chopper down in the lawn next to the dock, east side of the Intracoastal. Ott’s wearing a red shirt. We’ll flag you down, then jump in.”
“Roger that. I saw two guys in the boat. Hey, is that a Pershing?”
“Yeah, why?”
“Shit, man, that’s my dream boat.”
Ott nodded silently.
A few minutes later Crawford saw a dot in the sky, growing in the distance.
He pointed it out and Ott nodded.
“What’s his top speed?” Crawford asked.
“I know it’s a Bell Jet Ranger, just don’t know which one. I think somewhere between one forty-five and a one-sixty.”
“So, we can catch up pretty quick.”
Ott nodded. “My guess is when they see the chopper coming back up, they’ll figure it out.”
“Yeah, they are Mensas. Bemmert, anyway.”
“They’ll want to pull into a creek or something, ditch the boat and take their chances on land.”
Crawford nodded. “I like that scenario better than them shooting at us in the chopper.”
“If they shoot at us, they’ll know they’re startin’ a war, and we got a lot more guns and troops.”
“Gonna be a tight squeeze anyway, gettin’ that battleship into a creek,” Crawford said.
“’Cause of the draft, you mean?”
“Yeah, I’m guessing it’s five feet, maybe a little less.”
The helicopter was a few hundred yards away, its propeller whipping up the Intracoastal water.
They ran over to the lawn between the dock and the guest house as the helicopter approached, twenty feet above the ground now.
Cooper brought it down expertly and Crawford jumped in the front seat and Ott the back.
“Welcome aboard, boys,” Cooper shouted.
“Thanks for getting here so fast,” Crawford said, raising his voice over the racket.
Cooper nodded.
“So, you gonna fly it if Coop gets popped?” Ott said to Crawford.
Cooper frowned as he maneuvered the chopper back up over the Intracoastal. He shot a glance at Crawford. “I forgot about your partner’s lame sense of humor.”
