Fatal Decree (6 page)

I smiled. “How would you rate the chances of that happening?”

“Probably nil.”

“Even if you could identify the killer, it’d take some doing to round him up.”

She shrugged. “At least we’d have a starting place.”

• • •

It was almost two when we pulled into the harbor at Marina Jack. Sam checked in by radio with the dockmaster, and then backed
Sammy’s Hat
into a slip next to a floating dock. J.D. and I handled the lines as Sam used the engines to hold the boat against the pier.

The lunch crowd had thinned out, so we didn’t have to wait for a table on the patio overlooking the harbor. We ordered drinks and chatted about gossip on the island, forgetting for a moment that a woman had been brutally murdered in this tranquil piece of the world. While we were waiting for our food, J.D.’s phone rang. She looked at the caller ID, said, “Shar-key,” and took the call. She listened, said “thanks,” and closed the phone. “They found a boat that fits the delivery captain’s description of the one he saw at Sister Key yesterday morning.”

“Where?” asked Sam.

“Tied up at a dock in a canal in Emerald Harbor, two houses down from the Alexanders’ place.”

“Somebody’s just now noticing it?” I asked.

“The couple who live there have been out of town for a few days,” J.D. said. “They got home an hour or so ago and noticed the boat at their dock. They called us. Steve Carey went down there, called in the registration number, and got a hit. It was the one stolen from Bimini Bay Friday night.”

“If the guy in my bar that night is the killer, how would he have gotten from Pattigeorge’s to Bimini Bay?” Sam asked.

“Were there any cars in your parking lot when you and Miles left on Friday night?” I asked.

“Only Miles’s convertible.”

“How about in the parking area underneath the Harbour Square building next door?”

“There’re always cars there.”

“It’d have been pretty simple,” I said. “He followed Nell home, popped her before she got into the house, stashed her body somewhere, drove his car to Bimini Bay, stole the boat, ran down the bay to the canal, put the body in the boat, went to Sister Key, left the body, took the boat back to the canal, and drove away in Nell’s car.”

“One of the neighbors would have heard the shot,” said Sam.

“Not necessarily,” said J.D. “That little twenty-two doesn’t make a lot of noise, and if he’d shot her in the car or inside the house, the noise would have been very limited.”

“Did your people take a look at the house to see if she was killed there?” asked Sam.

“Yes. The forensics people went over it with a fine-tooth comb. I don’t think she was shot inside the house. Maybe in her car.”

“You haven’t found her car?” asked Sam.

“Not yet.”

“The killer could be anywhere by now,” said Sam.

“He could,” said J.D. “Maybe we’ll get lucky.”

Our trip back up the bay was uneventful. I called Jock to let him know that we were on our way back, and he met us on the dock behind Pattigeorge’s. J.D. left for the police station to see if she could get an update on the forensic examination of the boat. Jock and I helped Sam wash down
Sammy’s Hat
and left for home.

Jock and I settled into a couple of deck chairs on my patio, he with an O’Doul’s and I with a Miller Lite. The sun would be going down soon. I loved watching the sunset from the Gulf side and I often did, usually at the outside bar at the Hilton. But sundown on the eastern side of the island was beautiful as well. In a few minutes, as the sun sank toward the surface of the Gulf, its rays would reflect off the cumulus clouds hanging over the bay, painting them in bright pastels as the turquoise water turned gray in the diminishing light.

“How’s Gene doing?” I asked.

“Not well, but he’s tough. He’ll survive this, but it’ll take some time.”

“What’s he doing about a funeral?”

“He’ll bury her here as soon as the medical examiner releases the body.”

“Do you think the murder was some sort of revenge against Gene for his involvement with your agency?”

“I don’t see how. I don’t think anybody could connect him to our group. His cover was as an analyst for the State Department. But I think the murderer is going to be very surprised to find out that he killed one of us.”

“What do you mean?”

“He won’t like the final result.”

“Explain that to me.”

“The director told me to take the bastard out.”

“You mean kill him,” I said.

“Yep.”

“Will you?”

“If I get to him before the law does.”

“I don’t know, Jock. What about J.D.?”

“What she doesn’t know won’t hurt her.”

“You can’t do that to her.”

Jock sat silently for a few minutes. I let him stew. He found himself in a paradox. J.D. was his friend and yet, so was Gene Alexander. Jock lived in a world where the bad guys were taken out. He killed them to protect all of us, his countrymen. I think he died a little with every one of the enemy he killed, no matter how deserving that person was of death. I was one of the few people in the world outside his agency who knew what he did for a living. He was a sometime assassin, a man sent by his government to kill those who would kill us. And when the deed was done, when he’d carried out his orders, finished his mission, he’d come to Longboat Key and crawl into a bottle of bourbon for a week. His nights were long and arduous, filled with regret and anger and self-loathing. He’d talk about our childhood in the small town in the middle of Florida where we’d grown up, of how he’d ended up in the service of his country, a noble calling, but one filled with duties beyond the understanding of the ordinary American. He hated what he did, but knew he was better qualified than almost anyone in the world to carry out his missions. And he knew that those missions were crucial to the survival of our nation. So he went out into the world and did evil to the evildoers. Was there some balance there? Or was he just another killer, no better than the idiots who killed for their rancid causes?

The answers never came, but by the end of the week, the week we called the cleansing time, he slowed down on the drinking, nursed less severe hangovers, and began running miles each day on the beach, leaching the alcohol and the hatred out of his system. Then he’d go back to the wars, back to the dismal pursuit of his deranged quarry, back to protecting his country.

“I won’t betray J.D.,” he said.

“What then?”

“She’s potentially a target. If I killed the guy and she didn’t know about it, she’d continue to feel threatened. I won’t do that to her.”

“Where does that leave you and the director’s order?”

“It wasn’t really an order. More like permission.”

“Then what’ll you do?”

He chuckled. “Play it by ear, I guess. If I can kill the guy without compromising J.D., I’ll do it. If not, he belongs to her and the law.”

I said, sarcastically, “I know she’ll be pleased.”

Jock laughed. “We’re not going to mention this to her, are we?”

“Not on a bet. She’d pack your ass off to Houston before you could get your gear together.”

“She’s tough, podna. God, she’s tougher than you and me put together.”

“And a lot prettier,” I said.

My phone began to play the first bars of
The Girl from Ipanema.

“J.D.,” I said as I wrenched the phone from the pocket of my shorts.

“Geez,” said Jock, rolling his eyes.

“Good afternoon, Detective,” I said.

Jock shook his head, grinning.

“Aren’t we formal?” said J.D.

I looked at my watch. It was after six. “You up for some dinner?”

“Sure. What’ve you got in mind?”

“How about the Lazy Lobster in thirty minutes?”

“I’ve got to shower and change. Give me an hour.”

“Okay, Toots.”

“Toots? Have you lost your mind?”

“Sorry, Detective. See you in an hour.” I closed the phone.

“Call her ‘Toots’ again and she’ll probably shoot you,” said Jock.

“Yeah. I gotta watch my mouth.”

We drank another beer, showered, dressed, and left the cottage for the two-mile drive down the island to the Lazy Lobster Restaurant. We didn’t know that we were driving straight into the path of a murderer.

The restaurant was housed in the Centre Shops on Gulf of Mexico Drive. We pulled into the parking lot, a sea of asphalt that was well shaded during the day by trees planted in the medians that bordered the parking spaces. At night, the trees partially blocked the security lights, giving the place a dappled look, one that could be a bit scary in a city, but not on our key. We didn’t have much crime and what we had was never violent. An occasional car burglary, but that was about it.

We parked and were standing in the shadows at the end of a row of cars, waiting for J.D. to join us. I saw her Camry turn into the lot. She passed us, waved, and drove toward an open space about halfway down the line of cars. A cream-colored BMW coupe came in behind her and turned down the same parking lane J.D. had taken.

“Shit,” said Jock. “That’s Nell’s car.”

“What?” I asked, but Jock was moving like a sprinter coming off the blocks, pulling his ever-present pistol from the rear waistband of his pants, running toward J.D., calling to her. I had been so engrossed in my thoughts that I’d missed the BMW. Jock was several feet in front of me as I began to run after him.

J.D. was getting out of her car as the BMW passed her and stopped a couple of car lengths from where she had pulled in. The BMW did not move, just sat in the driving lane, lights on, engine idling. The door opened and a man stepped out. Even from a distance of fifty feet, I could see the look of alarm on J.D.’s face as she perceived the danger. Her instincts were good. She dropped to the ground and rolled to her right, sheltering behind a parked SUV. I was running after Jock, not sure what was going on.

The man from the BMW was standing beside the car, a pistol in his hand. He fired two shots in rapid succession toward J.D. Missed. He looked in Jock’s direction and his pistol barrel started to move toward a new target. He was a half-second slow, and that cost him his life. Jock fired just as the man let loose his second shot at J.D. Had the man fired only once, he might have had a chance. Maybe his concentration on J.D. was so intense he didn’t see Jock barreling toward him, pistol coming out, rising to point at him. We’d never know. Jock’s shot, made on the run, caught the man just above his right eye. He fell backward from the impact, dead in the instant the bullet hit.

Jock was past J.D., running full out to make sure the man was truly dead. I stopped to check on J.D. She had her pistol out and was positioning herself to join the firefight. I told her it looked like it was over. “I think Jock killed the son of a bitch,” I said.

She got up, her pistol in her right hand, pointed toward the asphalt, her phone in her left calling for backup. We moved cautiously toward Jock, who was standing over the dead man. “This could be Craig,” she said, “the man Sam told us about. Look at the tattoos on his arms.”

The man lay sprawled on his back next to the open door of the BMW, his arms stretched out over his head. The interior light from the car shown weakly on the ugly tattoos that covered his arms below the elbows. He was dressed in a tropical print shirt, cargo shorts, and ancient boat shoes. A foul odor emanated from him, a mélange of unwashed body, day-old booze, and bad breath. Except that he wasn’t breathing anymore.

We were only a half mile from the police station and within minutes two cruisers careened into the parking lot, sirens screaming, blue-and-red lights flashing. The first one came to a stop a few feet from us and Officer Steve Carey stepped out, pistol drawn.

“J.D.,” he said. “You all right?”

“I’m fine. I don’t think there’re any more bad guys around.”

“Where’d he come from?” he asked, pointing to the dead man.

“He was in that BMW. I think he followed me from my condo.”

“Did you call in the tag number on the BMW yet?”

“Sorry,” she said, her voice tight. “I’ve been a little busy.”

Steve grinned, reaching for his radio mic. “Yes, ma’am. I’ll take care of it.”

The cop from the second cruiser walked up. “Should I call the medical examiner?”

“Yeah,” said J.D, “and let’s get this area cordoned off. We’ll need the forensics unit, and somebody better let Sharkey know.”

“I’ve already called him. He’s on his way. The chief, too. He just got in from Spain.”

A crowd was gathering, but so far no one had gotten too close. The young officer went to his cruiser trunk and pulled out a roll of yellow tape and began to surround the area with it. One of the spectators asked the cop when he could get his car out, pointing to a Mercedes parked next to J.D.’s car. “It may be a while, sir. We’re investigating a death.”

“I’ll be in the bar,” the man said.

The crowd was good natured and turned back to the restaurant. I suspected the bar’s booze stock would be greatly diminished before the scene was released and the guests could get their cars out.

“J.D.,” Carey said, “the BMW is Nell Alexander’s car.”

“Okay,” said J.D. “Nobody touch it until the forensics people have a look at it. Steve, can I borrow your flashlight?”

She shined the light on the dead man’s arms. “Those are prison tats if I’ve ever seen them,” she said. She ran her hands over his body, searching for any weapons or anything else he might have on him.

“Matt, help me roll him over. I need to see if he has anything in his back pocket.” We checked. “Nothing,” she said. “He’ll be in the system. As soon as we can run his prints, we’ll know who he is.”

“J.D.,” I said, “how do you know he followed you from home? And why? If he was planning to kill you, wouldn’t it have made sense to do it there? Less people.”

“That may have been his intention. When I came down the elevator to my car, several of my neighbors were in the parking lot, talking to that cop over there putting up the tape. He recognized me and said there had been an incomplete 911 call from one of the condos, and he’d been sent over to check it out. It turned out to be just a mistake in dialing by the
owner. She and a couple of visitors were in the lot talking to the officer. I guess the shooter was spooked by the patrolman.”