Electric Barracuda (15 page)

Serge stopped in front of the most run-down building on the street and gasped. He sadly ran a palm over gothic letters. “I can’t believe it. They closed the L and M. Another sign of the apocalypse.”

“What’s the L and M?”

“Just one of the most venerable bars in all the state. Pre-dating roadhouses, one of those dubious old fishermen joints that was like drinking on a fog-draped pier in Shanghai.” Serge dabbed a tear and pounded the wall.
“Why! Why! Why! . . .”

It was Coleman’s turn to place a hand over his heart. “Please don’t tell me this was the bar we were going to.”

“Yes.”

Coleman pounded the wall.
“Why! Why! Why! . . .”

A police car rolled to a stop at the sight of two men beating the front of the closed tavern.

“. . . Why! Why! Why! . . .”

The officer leaned across his passenger seat. “What are you guys doing?”

Serge turned around. “Pounding a building, asking questions.”

“Please don’t pound buildings.”

“You’re right, we’re visitors.” He grabbed Coleman’s arm. “Stop.”

The officer watched them warily as he drove off.

“That was close,” said Serge. “The natural enemy of the fugitive: a totally random encounter with law enforcement, even when you’re behaving completely normal.”

“The bar’s closed.”

“Fear not. I know this island.” Serge led Coleman to the end of the block and turned left. They strolled up a walkway.

“What is this place?” asked Coleman. “Looks like someone’s home.”

“It was, built in 1910, until the Eagles took it over.”

“Eagles?”

Serge pointed at a sign as they approached the door.

“The Eagle Club?” said Coleman.

“Good people.”

“But the sign says M
EMBERS ONLY
.”

“Just a formality.” Serge opened the door.

All heads swiveled around the U-shaped bar. A roar went up.

“The prodigal son returns!”

“Serge is in the house!”

He shook a row of hands until reaching a pair of empty stools.

“Excellent Fugitive Tour,” said the bartender. “Been following it on the Net.” She placed a bottle of water in front of him. “On us.”

“Coleman,” said Serge. “Meet Jill. And the other guy back there is Tom.”

A man with a full, distinguished head of gray hair waved back.

Coleman signaled for a drink. “He looks like that guy from the Sopranos.”

Jill poured a couple extra fingers of Jack for Coleman, then leaned against the bar toward Serge. “I know Cedar Key is a natural for fugitives. God knows how many people out here aren’t using real names. Just one teeny problem putting us on your tour.”

“You mean because there’s only a single, twenty-mile-long road in and out of here?”

She smiled. “Getting cornered sounds like a glitch.”

“That’s the whole point.” Serge smiled back. “What’s a vacation without near disaster?”

T
he Crown Vic’s suspension slammed hard against the chassis as the agents sailed over the crest of a small hump bridge to Cedar Key.

“Seal off Route 24!” White yelled into the radio. “I want ten men at that last creek.”

The unmarked sedan screeched to a stop at the intersection of Second Street. White’s head swung toward the back seat. “Mahoney! Which way? . . .”

R
aucous laughter and good times in the Eagle Club. Coleman won a bar bet for how many swizzle sticks he could cram in his mouth.

A cell phone rang. Serge covered his ear and answered. “. . . Uh-huh, uh-huh . . . Good work, Road Rash. I owe ya.” He hung up.

Coleman rubbed his face. “For some reason my jaw hurts.”

Serge opened his cell again and dialed a local taxi service. “Catfish, you’re on.”

He hung up and yanked Coleman off his stool. “Time to go to work.”

Chapter Ten

Cedar Key

N
ight fell.

Then all hell.

Nobody had seen so much action in Cedar Key since they could remember. Vehicles raced every which way, red and blue flashing lights, radios squawking, black-helmeted commandos knocking down motel doors with truncheons—made all the more dramatic by the tight confines of the town’s tiny grid of streets.

And the weather.

Nothing usual. A typical evening of forty-mile-an-hour gusts from the wharf’s open gulf exposure, crashing waves high over seawalls and bathing Dock Street in a misty spray. An evening fog rolled off the water, shrouding the island in a ghostly haze.

The street platting was also open exposure, providing full view of the entertainment for Serge and Coleman, casually sitting on a bench in the public park at the east end.

“You sure the island’s usually this windy?” asked Coleman.

“It’s impossible to keep your hair combed in this town.”

Serge’s name first popped up at the Island Hotel, and in went the tactical unit. Then out they came.

Heads turned on the park bench as Serge and Coleman watched the brigade charge over to Cedar Cove, then back to the Cedar Inn. The Crown Vic and SWAT van raced past cars going the opposite direction. A yellow Cadillac, black Beemer and turquoise T-Bird nearly traded paint in a mass U-turn, speeding back after the cops.

Another motel.

The SWAT team jogged down the stairs and shook their heads.

“Another decoy.” Agent White turned quickly. “What’s that noise?”

The Doberman’s motorcycle crashed through the end of the wharf and into the Gulf of Mexico.

Lowe ran over with a walkie-talkie. “Think we got something. Manager at the Dockside recognized his mug shot. Registered to one Horatio Farnsworth.”

“Move!” yelled White.

The pair on the park bench watched the tide of law enforcement reverse course again across the island.

“Look,” said Coleman. “They’re hitting our actual motel.”

“Perfect.”

“How is cops closing in on us perfect?”

“They’re not closing in on
us
. It’s just another coincidence like Kissimmee,” said Serge. “Told you this island is one of the state’s ultimate fugitive havens. I’d be more surprised if cops
weren’t
busting in places—and disappointed. Was starting to worry that I’d have to pretend police were swarming to test my new Cedar Key ‘Out,’ but this adds to authenticity.” Serge checked his wristwatch and looked at his cell phone. “What’s taking Catfish so long?”

He dialed. No answer.

“They pulled the Doberman onto the dock,” said Coleman. “They’re pumping his chest . . . He’s spitting up! He’s alive!”

The SWAT team poured back down the stairs of the Dockside.

“Looks like the cops are leaving?” asked Coleman.

Serge watched the unit’s departure pattern with concern. “Unfortunately not. This is getting a little too authentic. And Catfish is late.”

“Thought you said it was a coincidence?”

“It is, but they could
coincidentally
net us while looking for their actual target.”

Serge jumped up. He put his hands in his pockets and hunched his shoulders as if to fight the wind. “Start walking. Fast. And keep your face down. If anyone drives by, don’t look at them, but don’t look away. And don’t run.”

Coleman got up. “What’s the matter?”

“Island’s too small.”

“For what?”

“A fugitive. They got more than enough guys for a house-to-house canvass and matrix search of every inch in between. Walk faster.”

“But, Serge, it sure looks like they’re leaving.”

“Except it’s an even dispersion. They’re heading for assigned pressure points.”

“What’s that mean?”

“In minutes, someone will be stationed at the end of every street—north, south, east and west—cutting up the island like a checkerboard.”

“Why?”

“To keep people confined within every block while the rest conduct the sweep. If anyone crosses a street, they’re nailed . . . Damn it, Catfish!”

Sure enough, barely after they safely passed each street, sentries arrived. Serge pulled up his collar and walked as briskly as he could without breaking into a trot. Marked and unmarked cars made rounds in concentric circles, spotlights on buildings and alleys. A yellow Cadillac and black Beemer crisscrossed in front of the L&M.

The sea mist from the crashing waves wasn’t confined to the wharf district. It atomized and floated inland like an eerie soup, combining with the fog to give each streetlamp a large globe of its own fuzzy, penumbra light.

Serge watched a convertible T-Bird pass the other way on a parallel street and blinked hard. “Can’t be . . .” Now he did break into a trot.

They reached the middle of Second Street again.

But the sentry was already there.

Mist thickened, just an ominous dark form three blocks away, standing on the road’s center line.

“Coleman, get against that building.”

Serge took up his own position in the middle of the road, facing the shadow.

“What are you doing?” asked Coleman.

“Wild West time,” said Serge. “The sentry spotted us crossing the street, so I have to take him out before he can report our movements.”

“But you don’t hurt cops.”

“That’s right. I’ll just baffle him with disinformation until he realizes we’re just harmless tourists on the Fugitive Tour and not the derelicts they’re after.”

Serge began taking deliberate, individual steps forward, stopping between each. The form at the other end of the street advanced likewise. Serge took another step. Hands hung at the ready by his sides, fingers twitching.

The opposing form mirrored every stride, passing under one of the streetlamps and creating a silhouette. A tweed jacket and rumpled fedora.

“Holy Chesterfields,” said Serge. “It’s Mahoney!”

Just then, a screaming chorus of police sirens. Flashing lights. Party crashers.

No fewer than thirty squad cars not involved in the original dragnet sailed over the last bridge to Cedar Key. They raced across the street between Serge and Mahoney.

“Catfish! Yes!” Serge dashed back to Coleman and grabbed him by the shirt. “Our ‘Out’ has arrived. Run!”

They dashed past the old seafood packing house and down toward the bog.

A whisper in the darkness: “Serge? Is that you?”

“Stumpy?”

“Over here.”

Serge was able to keep his balance stutter-stepping down a wet bank of weeds, but Coleman chose to somersault.

Stumpy sloshed toward them in rubber boots. “Catfish filled me in. Are you crazy? . . .”

At that moment, on the other side of the island:

“You motherfuckers!”

Police in overwhelming force dragged a handcuffed, shirtless man from a small cottage. Not daintily. They threw him over the hood of the first prowler car, busting his nose.

A Crown Vic skidded up. White jumped out and ran to the police captain in charge. “What’s going on?”

“Cop killer from Jacksonville. Been looking for him eight years.”

Mahoney strolled over with a wooden matchstick bobbing between his teeth. “Is that James Donald Woodley?”

The captain nodded. “Aka Franklin Ignatius Turnville.”

“Shinola,” said Mahoney. “Been trying to clear that case forever.”

“Consider it cleared.”

“Mahoney,” said White. “Isn’t that the same guy you were after when you nearly caught Serge at that motel last year?”

Mahoney angrily whipped a matchstick to the ground.

White turned back to the captain. “How’d you find him?”

“Lucky tip.” The captain nodded across the road, where a uniform was interviewing a local cabdriver.

“What?” said Mahoney. “Some hack pegged his alias, bloodhounded him over here and dropped the dime?”

“No,” said the captain. “The driver told us Woodley was an afternoon fare, and after dropping him off, he just had this sensation that he’d seen his face before.”

“He knew the guy?” asked White.

The captain shook his head. “Said he remembered it from the newspapers.”

“Eight years ago?” said White. “Come on, nobody’s memory is that good . . . Mahoney, why are you smiling.”

“I recalled a joke. The punch line is, ‘Who shit in my tuba?’ ” Mahoney sauntered jauntily back to the car. As he passed the cabdriver: “Give my regards to Serge.”

Lowe stood next to White. “What a crazy day. A serial killer slips from a surefire quarantine zone, and then we solve a cop-killer cold case just a few blocks away.”