Garden of Evil (16 page)

Detective Marcia Anders and Sally, a chubby-faced technician from the Special Investigations Section, wired me for sound, securing a beeper-sized unit to the small of my back with medical tape.

“This is a lot easier,” Sally said cheerfully, “than taping guys with hairy backs. You should hear 'em scream when it comes off.”

The wire, held in place by tiny strips of tape, ran up the back of my neck, hidden by my hair, around, and down into my bra, where a clip like those worn by TV anchors held the mike between my breasts.

The receiver, built into a slim aluminum briefcase,
would be with the detectives in the primary car, an off-white Isuzu Rodeo, trailing me as I drove to Michelangelo's Garden. They also placed a voice-activated tape recorder under my car seat. The global positioning unit concealed in the trunk would transmit my car's location in approximate street addresses to a portable computer screen.

Instead of the conspicuous
SWAT
trailer, a smaller cargo van disguised as a delivery truck would be parked in a lot behind Michelangelo's. Ojeda and Simmons would be with the brass, supervising from a staff car concealed on a nearby side street. A jet ranger helicopter, borrowed from the sheriff's department, would be airborne. Miami police lost their air support to budget cuts when the city went bust. All the technological apparatus seemed like overkill to me, but, as Lottie said, big boys love toys.

The Rodeo and two other unmarked cars, each with two detectives, one driving, the other concealed in back with a shotgun, would escort me through traffic. Two would leapfrog behind me, frequently passing each other, pulling up and falling back. The lead car would range blocks ahead.

My face looked pale in the mirror during my third visit to the rest room. Too much coffee, too much waiting. I was eager to see her, to look into her eyes just once while she was still free, before her features became the expressionless mask worn by humans in captivity. The drive would normally take fifteen minutes. Allowing for rush hour, they gave it thirty-five.

McDonald and I exchanged glances but had no chance to speak again. He would be with the others at the command post. Ojeda jabbed a fist gently at my shoulder before leaving with the brass.

“Break a leg, kid. Just stay cool and remember the rules. No screwups. See ya later.”

 

The sky was broad and blue, the sun relentless, and the pavement scorching as I drove south on Interstate 95. I
could see the Isuzu Rodeo in the rearview mirror—its stubby little black antenna tuned in to me—riding high in traffic four or five cars behind me. A middle-aged detective named Boggs was driving; a younger one, named Rodriguez, rode shotgun. I felt as secure as the president, surrounded by Secret Service.

“Look at the traffic,” I said aloud, aware they could hear me. “We're lucky it's not raining.” The heavy stream moved smoothly. I stayed at the speed limit and watched passing motorists. What would they think if they knew where I was going and why? I thought of Althea for some reason. In all the excitement I had forgotten to ask the cops about the drive-by. What would my mother think of this? Would she be proud, or would she redouble her efforts to talk me into some other line of work? What was McDonald thinking right now?

I squinted into the sun on the approach to the SW 16th Avenue exit, where traffic swooped down off the interstate onto South Dixie Highway. Even with sunglasses the glare was brutal. Would the killer try to scratch my eyes out when she saw the cops? I was to step away quickly when they made their move. Humph, I thought, if they had their way, I'd have no chance to speak to her at all.

I hoped for the scenario the lieutenant had mentioned, a delay due to innocent bystanders. That would give us time to talk before the inevitable. I had so many questions. How did life lead her here? Was she remorseful? Was it men she hated? Or sex?

Merging into the far right lane, I slowed and signaled for the exit. Once off the interstate, past Vizcaya, Michelangelo's would be seven traffic lights ahead. The place was well-known for its policy of buy one slice, get one free. Tomorrow it would be famous for something else.

My lane of traffic inched toward the exit ramp. I braked as a shiny red Mitsubishi Mirage with a blaring stereo suddenly cut in front of me. “You jerk!” I muttered at the driver. Then he braked as another motorist, a cute
teenager in a blue Camaro, cut in front of him. What is this? I thought impatiently. I'm on a mission here!

Butterflies swarmed through my intestinal tract and I wished I'd visited the rest room one more time. The problem was not the task ahead, it was the damn waiting, the blinding sun, the slow-moving traffic.

“How do you guys deal with this?” I asked the microphone in my bra. “You get all psyched up for action, then sit in traffic. This part is so boring. I hate rush hour.”

I checked the rearview. The surveillance car, the Isuzu Rodeo, was seven or eight vehicles behind mine in the bumper-to-bumper crawl. The other, a Ford Explorer, was so far back I didn't see it. The ramp, a single-lane bottleneck at the exit, would broaden into two lanes on the descent.

The red Mirage in front of me literally vibrated with the sounds of rap music. The driver looked like a gang-banger: young, with big shades, a baseball cap worn backward, and the mother of all stereo systems. Did he open his car windows in this weather to bombard us all with his taste in music? Or were the windows closed? Was the volume so high we could hear it anyway? Were his eardrums still intact? What happened to the city ordinance against noise pollution?

He played drums, his hands slapped the steering wheel, his head jerked to the beat, as I inched down the ramp behind him. The girl in front of him suddenly slammed on her brakes, and the vibrating Mirage rear-ended her Camaro with a loud
bam!
“Damn,” I said aloud, hitting my own brakes in time. A bumper thumper.

Those of us behind them sat at a standstill in the heat, rush hour building all around us. The girl, out of her car now, wore a fast food uniform. Must be on her way to work, I thought. She checked for damage. I couldn't see from my vantage point, but at that slow speed it couldn't be bad. He got out and joined her, leaving the music blasting. Christ, I thought, what if I'm late? I gave the surveil
lance car in the rearview an exaggerated shrug, as if they could see me from there.

Neither of those two drivers should have a license. I fumed. This was Miami, they probably didn't. Their heads were together now. He took a quick step back, apparently irked at something she said, and began to gesture. He stalked back to his car and opened the door, releasing more throbbing bass into the superheated atmosphere. She said something else. He stalked back and appeared to be intimidating her. The son of a bitch was twice her size. I didn't like the looks of this. A cacophony of car horns sounded behind me as the drivers exchanged angry words. She walked past his car, ponytail bouncing, as though in search of something. He followed, red in the face, shouting words I couldn't hear. His car still vibrated. The least he could do, I thought, is turn down the volume.

She approached my T-Bird, a flowered straw purse swinging from her shoulder, and motioned for me to roll down my window.

“Do you have a cell phone? I have to call for help.” She rolled pitifully worried eyes back at the angry gang-banger, who was bellowing something just two steps behind her.

“Sure,” I said. “Want me to call the cops?”

“Think you should?” she said timidly, near tears. “I was just gonna call my boyfriend. It's his car. He's gonna kill me.”

“Okay, but make it fast, you've gotta move the cars.” She smiled gratefully as I handed her my phone. Somebody behind me leaned nonstop on their horn, adding to the earsplitting din. I sighed impatiently as she placed the phone on my car roof and reached into her straw bag to find the number. Instead, in a split second that seemed like slow motion, she drew out a gun, swung it over her shoulder, and shot the hulking gang-banger square in the face. Blood flew as he was hurled back. I heard the screams of other motorists as he crumpled to the pave
ment, a messy hole just above the bridge of his nose. The gunshot and the music resounded up and down the concrete barriers of the ramp.

Her eyes so wide I saw the whites, she wrenched open my car door. “Move over!” She swung the gun at my head. The still smoking barrel looked huge. “Move over, damn it!” She shoved her way into the car without waiting for me to obey. At the last moment, she turned, aimed, and fired another shot at the young man, whose body still jerked on the scorching pavement. A middle-aged motorist, half out of his car, ducked back inside and slammed the door. As I scrambled for the passenger-side door, the gun was back on me.

“Don't you move, Britt!” she shrieked. “I'll cap you! I'll cap you right now!”

How does she know my name? I wondered stupidly. Then I knew who she was. The detectives, I thought; they must have heard the shot.

She turned the wheel hard and hit the gas as I looked back. Boggs, a gun in one hand, his radio in the other, and Rodriguez, with the shotgun, were charging down the ramp on foot.

Terrified motorists trapped in traffic were screaming, ducking, hitting other cars in escape attempts. They had to think they'd been caught in a gang war.

She threw it in reverse and slammed into the front bumper of the car a few feet behind me. My cell phone flew off the roof as she wheeled around the red Mirage and ran over something: the man she shot. My T-Bird dragged him until she cut the wheel again and swerved past the Camaro. The driver's-side door scraped noisily along the concrete barrier as she floored it.

“My car!” I gasped. “I don't let anybody else drive it.”

“Well, excuse
me.
”

Behind us, Boggs stood shouting into his radio. In front of us, the squeegee men working the ramp scattered, flee
ing for their lives. Rodriguez was still running, despite the growing distance between us.

“He won't shoot,” she panted, grinning. “Too many people around, includin' you. Wouldn't worry if he did, most cops can't shoot worth shit…

“Hah! Look at that!” she yelped gleefully. “See that? The stupid son of a bitch with the shotgun tried to take over somebody's car and they peeled out to git away from 'im. Aw right!”

Hunched forward, peering over her shoulder like a racecar driver, she gunned my T-Bird into the emergency lane, rocketing by other traffic.

“Wasn't that good shootin'? Damn, I'm good! You best remember that, girl!”

“Wish you hadn't shot him,” I mourned. “You ran over him, too. Think he's dead?”

“Most likely. That's life. You can be fine, fine, fine, then—
boom!
You're dead!” She shrugged her slim shoulders philosophically. “Didja hear that music?” Her pert nose wrinkled in disgust.

I saw now that she was no teenager. But she was young and sweet-faced, with a dimpled chin and engaging grin. Somebody you would smile back at in a mall. Her cuteness wore off fast. I took a deep breath and tried not to be sick as the car lurched and swerved. I didn't see the Rodeo or the Blazer behind us, but they would overtake us any second now. She would have to surrender when surrounded, I told myself.

She slowed into the flow of traffic and swung off Dixie into a residential neighborhood.

“Why are you taking Seventeenth Avenue?” I asked, for the cops who were listening.

She reacted violently and hit the brake, tearing crazily at my blouse with her right hand, the gun still in her left. I shrank back but not before she yanked out the body bug, ripping my blouse in the process.

“You bitch! You think I'm stupid?”

I wanted to say yes, shooting strangers is stupid, but she wasn't. She had just outsmarted me, the
SWAT
team, and the entire Miami Police Department.

“Fuck you, assholes!” She kissed the tiny mike with a noisy smack, chortling as she lobbed it out the window.

Another right mm, then a left into the nearly deserted parking lot at Shenandoah Junior High School, where she braked and turned off the engine. We stared at each other for a moment. Without makeup, she had a shiny fresh-scrubbed look with high broad cheekbones sharp enough to cut glass, lashes long and curly, eyes a watercolor blue.

“Hi,” I said, to break the silence.

Her smile was cynical. “I drove by the Garden and saw the van. Never expected you not to bring the cops, but I hoped maybe you might surprise me.” She sighed. “But you didn't.”

“Sorry,” I said. “Can I take my notebook out of my purse? I have some questions.” They would be here any second.

“No, give it here,” she snapped, and took it. She checked the mirror. “Git out! Now remember, I kin shoot the eye out of a squirrel at thirty yards. You and me, we're takin' a walk. Git out real slow, then you lean on the car. Forgit your purse, leave it right there. I'll come round to your side. You ain't gonna be the first human to outrun a bullet, so don't even try it. You do, and you're gone. Go real slow now.”

I did as she said. I closed the door and heard the locks snap down. She wiped off the steering wheel and the rearview mirror with something she stuffed back in her purse, then slipped out gracefully. She watched me over the car roof, one hand in the straw purse concealing the weapon. I saw no one in the adjacent neighborhood. Residents were inside, air conditioners humming.

“Stay right there.” She eased around the car.

“Can I see the damage to the driver's side?”

She shook her head.

“Is it bad?”

She didn't answer.

“Where are we going?”

“Shut up!” She slapped me so hard it rattled my teeth and sent my sunglasses flying. “Don't move, don't talk! Shut up and listen! Do what I say!”

I didn't dare try to pick up my glasses. The impact of her surprisingly strong blow and her sudden rage struck mortal fear into my heart.