Found: A Matt Royal Mystery (32 page)

“We apparently encroached into the territory of some very bad people who are planning to kill us.”

“What people?”

“I don’t know.”

“Tell me what you do know,” said Jock.

“If I don’t tell you, and you shoot me, you’ll never find out what I know.”

“And if you don’t tell me and I let you live, I still won’t know anything.”

“I’d say we’re at a Mexican standoff,” Evans said, grinning.

“Not really. Here’s how it’ll work. I’ll shoot you and then go talk to Sal Bonino.” It was a shot in the dark, but Jock watched the color drain from Evans’s face. He’d hit a nerve with Bonino’s name.

“You know about Bonino?”

“Yeah,” said Jock, “and a lot more. Lie to me and you’re dead.”

“I’m dead anyway if I tell you what I know.”

“Yeah, but you won’t be dead today. Besides, there may be a way to get you out of the line of fire if you cooperate.”

“You can do that?”

“Yes.”

“Who are you?”

“I told you, that’s not important. Just believe that I have connections that can make you disappear. Either dead or alive. It won’t make any difference to me.”

Jock’s phone rang. Matt Royal. “I’ve got to take this. Sit tight.” He moved out to the porch leaving Evans bound and on the sofa.

“What’s up, Matt?”

“I’m sorry to intrude on your meeting, but if it’s with Wayne Evans, I thought you’d like to have this information.”

Jock laughed. “What makes you think I’m meeting with Evans?”

“I can read you like a book, old friend. Where are you?”

“Mr. Evans and I are having a nice chat at the grove house over in Avon Park. What did you turn up?”

“Your people sent me those bank records. Fredrickson’s bank account received a wire transfer in the amount of ten million dollars on January tenth of last year. The wire came from a bank in Orlando from the account of a developer named Robert Hammond. It was for the purchase of the grove where you’re sitting right now.”

“This place can’t be worth ten million,” Jock said. “Do we know anything about Hammond?”

“The computer whiz at the LBK police department came up with some interesting information. We don’t think the guy exists. There is no record of him anywhere except for that little website we saw and the bank account that wired the money to Fredrickson’s account. Turns out the website was set up by a freelance web designer in Sarasota. J.D. is going to have a talk with him. Tonight, if she can find him. Do you think your people can find out more about Hammond’s account?”

“I’ll get right on it. You said the money was wired in on January tenth. When did Fredrickson die?”

“The night of January tenth.”

“I’ll be damned.”

“Yeah.”

“I’ll let you know what Evans has to say. This shouldn’t take long.”

“Don’t hurt him,” Matt said.

“Right.”

It was eight o’clock. J.D. and I had eaten a meal of frozen Chinese food and iced tea. Most of the meal was sitting like a lump in my stomach. She was getting dressed so that we could go find the web designer. We had a name and an address. Bret Zanders lived in an apartment complex off University Parkway, not too far from the airport. We took J.D.’s car, the official police vehicle, and headed south on the key, stopped at the Starbucks on St. Armands Circle, and sipped our coffee as we drove through the night.

We found the complex and then the apartment, climbed one flight of stairs, and knocked on the door. I was expecting a small bespectacled young man with frizzy hair. The guy that opened the door was about my height, totally bald, and probably fifty years old.

J.D. showed him her badge and said, “I’m Detective Duncan from the Longboat Key Police. This is Mr. Royal. Are you Bret Zanders?”

“I am. How can I help you?”

“May we come in?”

“Of course. I’m afraid I’m forgetting my manners. Can I get you something to drink?”

J.D. smiled as we followed Zanders into his living room. “No thanks. I don’t think we’ll be but a few minutes. We’re trying to find out who retained you to design a website for a man named Robert Hammond?”

“Please, sit down,” Zanders said. “That name doesn’t ring any bells to me. Do you have a date for when it was set up?”

“March of last year, I think,” said J.D.

“Are you sure I set it up?”

“Our department tech says you did.”

“Excuse me for a minute. I’ll see if I can find it in my files.”

We sat quietly for the few minutes it took Zanders to return with a file folder. “This is the file on the Hammond website, but I never dealt with Mr. Hammond. Everything was done through his business manager, a man named Jim Smith.”

“How were you paid?” J.D. asked.

“By check. I always keep copies of checks.” He handed J.D. a sheet of paper with the image of the check, both front and back. It was a cashier’s check drawn on a small community bank in Orlando.

“Do you have a copy machine here?” J.D. asked.

“Take this one,” he said. “I made two copies.”

“Do you always require a cashier’s check?” I asked.

“No, and I didn’t this time. This is what he sent me.”

“The website is pretty skimpy,” I said.

“It sure is, but that’s all Mr. Smith wanted.”

“Did you ever meet Mr. Smith?” asked J.D.

“No. Everything was handled on the phone. Can you tell me what this is about?”

“I’m sorry,” said J.D., “but no. It’s an ongoing investigation. Would you happen to have a phone number for Mr. Smith?”

Zanders looked at his file and read out a number to J.D. She jotted it in her notebook and looked at me. I shook my head. I didn’t think we were going to get anything else out of him. I was pretty sure he’d told us everything he knew.

We stood, shook hands all around, and J.D. handed him one of her business cards. “If you think of anything else, I’d appreciate your giving me a call.”

“I’m guessing that Jim Smith is as bogus as Hammond,” I said as we drove away from the apartment complex.

“And I’m guessing you’d be right. That was kind of a dead end.”

“Not completely. We got some more information on the bank the cashier’s check was drawn on. I’m betting it’s the same one that wired the ten million dollars to Fredrickson’s account.”

“But we still don’t know who Hammond is.”

“Hammond doesn’t exist and neither does his manager Jim Smith. But somebody’s out there stage managing this whole charade.”

J.D. handed me her notebook. “Call the manager’s number. Let’s see what we get.”

We got nothing. There was no such number. We drove on through the night, anxious to get back to the key.

My phone rang. Jock. I put him on speaker. “Hey, podna,” he said. “This thing’s starting to unravel a bit. Evans told me that the money wired into Fredrickson’s account was drug money. They set it up to look as if Hammond had bought the Avon Park property for ten mil. Evans handled the transaction so all the paperwork is in order. The property was transferred to the limited liability company that we found on the property appraiser’s website, but the ownership of the LLC has since been transferred to a corporation controlled by Evans. It all looks clean as a whistle on paper.”

“Who’s playing the part of Hammond?” I asked.

“Evans doesn’t know, and I think he’s telling the truth. This whole operation is run like a spy ring with cells of people who don’t know anything about the people in the other cells. Somebody is in charge of the whole thing and nobody knows who that is.”

“Bonino?” I asked.

“Maybe. Evans knows Bonino and is scared to death of him. He’s never met the man, but he thinks it was Bonino who had Fredrickson killed. The little group in the Fredrickson cell had been threatened by somebody who said he was working for Bonino. They were told to get out of the drug business or they’d be killed. Nobody took it seriously until Fredrickson was murdered.”

“Are you coming home tonight?” I asked.

“I’m on my way.”

“What about Evans?”

“I’ll drop him at his house. He’s riding in the trunk.”

It was nearing ten o’clock and the key was quiet as we drove north for home. The night was chilly, the result of yet another cold front drifting south. The weatherman said that Wednesday’s high would be in the low sixties, but Thursday would see the temperature move back into the mid-seventies. Winter never lasts long in our paradise, a day or two usually, but it brings a somnolence to the island, with people staying indoors and off the streets. The bars and restaurants close a little earlier and the traffic is almost nonexistent. We met an occasional car going south, but the usual hustle and bustle of the season was absent. As we passed Harry’s Corner Store, a car pulled out of the parking lot and followed behind us. Somebody had made a stop for beer or bread or some other convenience item that Harry sold.

J.D. turned off Gulf of Mexico Drive onto Broadway. Almost home. As we neared the second cross street, I saw a large truck with no lights moving from our right. As it came under the streetlight I could see that it was a large garbage truck, the kind that should not be working late at night.

“J.D.,” I said.

“I see him.”

I felt the car slow as her foot came off the accelerator. The truck was still moving, not slowing for the stop sign. J.D. began to brake hard. The truck blew the stop sign and came to rest blocking the road. The car from Harry’s had turned onto Broadway behind us and was pulling to a stop. I saw the truck driver climb down and come toward us. He carried what looked like an Uzi machine pistol in his right hand.

“He’s armed,” I said as I opened the door and rolled onto the pavement. J.D. ducked down in the seat and was trying to free the shotgun that was mounted on the dash rack, its butt on the floorboard.

I stood behind my open door and fired two shots from my little nine
millimeter. Tap, tap. Two in the chest. The gunman went down, sprawling face-first. I looked to my rear. Two men had exited the car that had stopped behind us, both carrying pistols. They were walking toward us, apparently not aware that we were armed. Maybe they hadn’t heard the shots that got the garbage truck driver. I didn’t have time to sort it out.

The man on the left let loose a round that whizzed by my head. Close. I dropped to the ground near the rear tire of J.D.’s cruiser, but there was no place to take cover. I had to get him with my first shot. I was raising my pistol to return fire when I heard the shotgun blast and saw the chest of the man on the right explode in a plume of blood and bone.

The man on the left turned to run and I shot him in the back. Tap, tap. Two right between the bastard’s shoulder blades. Sportsmanship be damned. I wanted him dead. He went down without trying to catch himself. One of the shots may have severed his spinal cord, instantly paralyzing him, or perhaps blew out his heart. I’d let Doc Hawkins figure that one out.

“J.D. You okay?”

“Yes. Are they dead?”

“I think so. I’ll check. You cover me.”

“Go.”

The entire incident had taken only seconds. I ran to the man I’d shot in the back. He was dead. I turned and ran back to the garbage truck driver. Dead. I turned to see J.D. falling to her knees. Was she hit? No. She was doubled over, sobbing and retching, spewing the remnants of the bad Chinese meal onto the pavement. I put my arm around her shoulder and held her. The sounds of a siren cracked the cold air. One was coming from the north, from Anna Maria Island, and the other from the south.

I held J.D. and my pistol and waited for the cops. The car coming from Anna Maria, blue lights painting the dark night, turned onto Broadway and came to a stop behind the car that had been following us. An officer got out and stood behind his open door, his weapon in his hand, headlights pinning us like captured moths. “Let me see you,” he said. “Hands in the air.”

J.D. was on her feet, trying hard to regain her composure. “I’m Detective Duncan,” she said.

“J.D.? Who’s with you?”

“Matt Royal.”

“What the hell happened?”

“We got ambushed,” she said.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes. We’ve got three dead bad guys.”

Another patrol car turned onto Broadway and came to a stop, its light bar adding to the cacophony of blue-and-red shadows bouncing off the nearby houses, its headlights illuminating the first police cruiser with the Bradenton Beach P.D. logo on the door panel. I thought the second car would be from Longboat. The officer had probably been patrolling near the south end of the island, and asked for help from Bradenton Beach.

The Bradenton Beach cop holstered his weapon and waved to the second cop getting out of his vehicle. “It’s J.D. She’s fine.”

Lights had come on in the houses that lined Broadway. The flashing blue lights of the police cars gave the people the confidence to come out onto porches and stoops and sidewalks. They stood quietly, watching the action, not interfering. One of the men in the group called out. “I’ll put the coffee on. Matt, you and J.D. okay?”

“Yes,” I said. “Thanks.”

The investigation would take a while and involve forensics people and other cops. They would all be supplied with coffee and food by the neighbors. The village was that kind of place.

I recognized the Bradenton Beach cop, but didn’t remember his name. The Longboat officer was my friend Steve Carey. “Damn, Matt,” he said. “What the hell have you gotten yourself into?”

I shrugged. “Beats me. Can you put a light on these dead guys?”

Steve shined his flashlight on the face of man who’d been driving the garbage truck. I recognized him. “I’m pretty sure that’s the guy who tried to kill us at my house on Sunday,” I said.

“Pretty sure?”

“Real sure, Steve. I got a good look at him.”

We walked over to the one J.D. had hit with the shotgun. Part of his face was shot away and his chest was a mess of internal organs, bones, and blood. He was unrecognizable.

The third man, the one I’d shot in the back, was lying facedown near
the right front tire of the car they’d arrived in. I couldn’t get a good look at his face without disturbing the body and that would really piss off the forensics techs.