Clint Faraday Collection C: Murder in Motion Collector's Edition (15 page)

Unless she was good at fantasy writing she
never worked a brothel or even the streets or bar stools.

Frieda Anne Herman was born near Bakersfield,
California. She was raised on a small farm. She had been married to
a man who she caught in another man’s bed. He was bi and she loved
him, but she wouldn’t take the chances that brought to a
relationship, what with AIDS being so bad, especially in
California. They used the computer to stay in touch about once a
month. She didn’t use it much more than that. There wasn’t much
about her to be found. She had stayed in a rented apartment in the
poorer section of San Mateo for two years before coming to
Panamá.

Okay. The brothel idea wasn’t behind it.

He looked up Lucerne while he was at it. Not
much. Raised in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, went to LSU for two years
and finished at UCLA. Had a bit of trouble when he slept with a
sixteen year old girl, but she admitted she had convinced him she
was nineteen in court. The state dropped the charges her parents
had brought against her when she had claimed that he had molested
her when she was thirteen until she was almost fifteen. She
wouldn’t testify that he had direct relations with her, only that
he was always feeling her up. He was a party animal to an extent,
but didn’t care for the regular upper class parties. He liked the
more countrified places and stayed in a semi-barrio town called
Carnivalitas.

Sick bastard!

That left Clint about where he was when he
started. It wasn’t from recording a drug use or in a brothel.

Clint went back to Napoli and studied a
picture. He was a semi-handsome man. He probably had very little
trouble getting dates.

Police records were his main hope. He could
use the connection with the Policia Nacionál to get information
about him..

There was nothing in Carmel or the immediate
area except parking tickets and a careless driving ticket six years
ago. He was carrying a young boy somewhere and swerved off the road
when the kid spilled grape juice all over his new Mercede’s
hand-tooled leather seat. 1997.

Maybe the record was elsewhere. Santa
Clara?

He had two parking tickets there a year and a
month apart. By a fireplug once and another yellow curb violation
at the central park.

Carnivalitas? He had to go to Mapquest to
even find where it was located. It was three-quarters Mexicans.
Lucerne spoke fair Spanish and could communicate fairly well.
Napoli had lodged a complaint there because two of his hubcaps had
been stolen.

So. He had been to all those places for some
reason.

What about Danny Lesterinni?

A hour and a half and Clint knew he was born
in Denver, Colorado, but had moved to Phoenix Arizona when his
father’s job moved there. He was four years four monhs old. At nine
he was living in Oregon, then Washington state, then down to San
Francisco until he went to LA a month before he moved to
Panamá.

Napoli had a string of parking tickets in
several parts of the San Francisco area. It seemed he would park
his fancy car somewhere and not get back before the meter expired
or such. There was definitely a connection with something. Napoli
was going to the poorer sections of a lot of places for some
reason.

Clint checked with Mapquest on the exact
locations the tickets were issued. Near parks, movie theaters, bus
stations – that rang a bell! Was Napoli gay?

Not that he could find, but this guy was
trying hard for whatever it was not to be known. In California, who
would make a stink if he was? They were far too liberal about that
too ever make it a problem. Unless maybe...?

Unless there was more to it than that. He
didn’t have AIDS. He was far too public a person to hide it in his
own community.

Okay. Into pornography, which was why he was
so adamant about it ever coming into his own community? He was the
type, to look at, who would appear in those things.

No. Those things were made for money. He
didn’t need money.

That left ... what?

So!

Porno?

“
Manny, I
think I know what they have on him, but there’s no way I can check
that I know about. I know your family was never into porno, but
this isn’t really that. You had women. Did you have gay
contacts?”

“
If there
was a market for it we had a thumb or two in. Porno works if you
have the right women – or men for the gay trade. Anything we did
there was because they came to us for financing. We never trapped
anybody into that kind of thing. You knew Pops. You can’t begin to
picture him into ... Christ! He’s into young girls or
boys?”

“
I don’t
know. It’s all I’m left with.”

“
That
wouldn’t make too much of a splash in California. He could buy out
of that. It would do it to his reputation, though. There are male
and female hustlers there that are barely old enough to get it up.
We refused to use anyone underage.”

“
I found
where he had a traffic ticket in 1997 with an eleven year old boy
in the car. It’s not his kid, there’s nothing I can find that would
make him an uncle or such, so why the kid was there at all wasn’t
ever mentioned.”

There was a silence. “Pedophile?”

“
I just
don’t know! I sure as all the levels of hell don’t want to start
any rumors or accusations because I can’t find anything else
likely. He could be some kind of spy or something.”

“
I’ll try
to get some kind of information. There are people in almost any
town in California who we can use. Gimme names and dates and so
forth. If there’s anything there we’ll find it.”

Clint gave him the list. He then went back to
the computer to try other searches. Almost any kind of porno was on
the net. Very little kiddie porn. He didn’t want that kind of site
on his hard drive.

An hour for nothing. He went into town for a
good meal at the Rip Tide, then met Dave, Judi, Earl and Ben. they
went around town to all the places they usually visited. It was a
good night, particularly when Marianne, a girl he’d met a year
before when she was there on vacation, called him and asked if he
was busy tonight. she was back for three days, then was headed for
San Blas. He said he’d meet her at Toro Loco.

“
Clint?
Sergio here,” greeted him at about ten o’clock in the morning. “It
looks like another of our lovely Bastimentos residents has found
her way to the morgue. “Julia Bianco.”

“
Same
MO?”

“
Yes and
no. Different cause of death, torture employed. Some of it was
while she was still alive. She was hit over the head with
something. I’d say a piece of that rerod that’s laying around. The
first blow only stunned her, then she was worked over a little,
killed and beaten some more. I’d say an amateur who didn’t know if
it was enough so kept on. Messy.”

“
She
hadn’t been anywhere else but the finca?”

“
She went
into Bocas Town late yesterday afternoon for groceries. She went to
the internet café next door to the big China. She went to the wine
shop. She had dinner at Nine Degrees. She went back. She wasn’t any
worse than usual, but she wasn’t any better, either.”

“
Franconi
in town?”

“
I don’t
think so. I’m having my men check him out.”

“
What the
hell is with those people? There’s no way ... I’ll be
damned!”

“
What?”

“
I have
to check on some things. I’ll call you back.”

Clint called Manny and asked if there was a
way that Napoli would know they were checking into his past. It was
possible they asked someone some questions who had contact with
him. That was always a risk in the business.

He called Sergio back and said he wanted to
go out there to talk to them. Sergio said he was there. Come on
out.

He got in his boat and made a quick trip to
the island. He tied up at the dock and went to the house to find
the bunch of them sitting around the great room.

“
I think
something I’ve done resulted in Bianco getting murdered,” he
announced. “Whichever one of you is the plant, nobody here had
anything to do with my investigation into his past. It was just
something that happens a lot in international cases. You have to
check out everyone’s past. I can tell each of you a lot about
yourself. Knocking off Bianco was immensely stupid. My
investigation was coming up empty, but this tells me I’m dead on
target. If you got orders from Napoli for this you can tell him it
gave me a direction. I’ll find it now. I never give up.”

“
What the
hell?! You meddle around in his affairs and get us all killed and
it’s all just so sad?!” Catherine cried. “Oh, my god! If it’s
coming out anyhow we’re all as good as dead!”

“
Part of
the blackmail business. You places your bet and takes your
chances,” Clint replied. “Lesterinni and Bianco didn’t hedge their
bets enough. I don’t give a hoot in hell about any of you. Just no
more killing. It’s too late to hide it now.”

They mumbled at each other. They didn’t have
a clue as to which one was the plant. Clint had one very strong
possibility in mind.

“
I want
to know where each one of you was and with whom since early last
night until the body was discovered this morning.”

“
Well, I
was with Henry all night! He’s my
husband
, after all!” Catherine said.

“
We were
together all afternoon and all last night,” Dickerson
said.

Doc came in and said she was dead for six to
seven hours. He could get it much closer at the morgue. Clint
thanked him.

“
It’s ten
forty five. She was killed around three o’clock,” Clint said.
“That’s the time you have to tell me about.”

“
Nothing
to tell,” Frieda Herman said. “I spent the night with Frank. We
were together until about five thirty.”

“
Neither
of you left the room, even for ten minutes?”

“
Not for
any minutes,” Lucerne agreed. “That’s a particular time I would
have very damned well remembered if she wasn’t there, you can
bet!”

“
It had
to be Franconi!” Catherine wailed. “You said it wasn’t him, but
it
has
to be! I was
asleep
at that hour!”

“
Napoli
can hire fifty Franconis. He wouldn’t blink,” Dickerson said. “I
think it must have been him or some other thug he hired. He messes
with me he’ll wish he was never born!”

“
If it
comes out from another source you don’t have anything to bargain
with anymore,” Clint said. “I
will
get you!”

They looked at each other. They were mutually
suspicious now. It was a very unpleasant feeling.

Clint went out and talked with Sergio a few
minutes, then headed back home. His main suspect might have an
alibi. Crap!

“
Who do
you think it is?” Judi asked. She’d brought over some sticky buns
she made.

“
Did
think,” Clint answered. “Lucerne. He was only around a couple of
weeks before they came here.”

“
Oh.
Right. Logical. How will you find out who it is?”

“
I think
I have to come from the angle of who it isn’t.”

“
Chop off
everything that doesn’t look like part of an elephant and you end
up with a statue of an elephant.”

“
Only if
you get the parts in the right places.” She gave him the
finger.

He spent the afternoon around his house, then
went into town. Franconi was getting off the water taxi when he
passed so he asked where he’d been before Sergio could get to
him.

“
Santa
Marta, Colombia. I had a quick job there. Why?”

“
Bianco
got offed.”

“
Why? Now
it doesn’t make sense to me.”

“
Because
I was investigating Napoli, I suppose. Someone added two and two
and got thirteen point five.”

“
You’re
investigating him?”

“
Certainly! They’re blackmailing him to the tune of six
million dollars.”

“
Could
be, but I think I’d know about anyone else here. Anyone in the
trade. Professional job?”

“
No.
Messy. Any idea which one’s the plant?”

“
Would he
do that? I guess so. I haven’t paid that much attention. I just
watch them.”

“
Dickerson says he could hire fifty like you. He could be
right.”

“
As
amateur as it is, he might have hired the wrong one. I doubt it was
from him, but it could be. I don’t think he ever met them before
the meeting that brought them here. Not to notice,
anyhow.”

“
He has
to notice. It’s his only security. He’s in this because he tends to
not notice things that can be traced.”

“
Such
as?”

“
Parking
tickets.”

“
Ah! And
you started wondering why he was where he got those
tickets?”

“
More or
less.”

“
I think
maybe I’d better get paid pretty fast or I might not get paid at
all.”

“
Is he
fool enough to try to stiff his hit man?”

Franconi laughed. Clint waved and went
on.

Now he was going to have to decide where his
next step laid. He wasn’t going to get anything from that bunch on
Bastimentos. He would try to get something through Manny, but that
was more and more doubtful. Napoli knew he was under close
investigation and was covering. That he knew meant some pretty
powerful connections in California. Manny not knowing about him at
all showed he had one hell of an organization.