Genie for Hire (28 page)

Biff shook Laskin’s hand and told him the amount of duty and
fees required. Laskin had a pre-filled check in his pocket; all he had to add
was the amount. He handed the check to Biff, who attached it to the form.

“That’s all, right?” Laskin said. His nerves were evident in
the way his hand shook slightly, and in his rapid breathing.

“Aren’t you forgetting something?” Biff stretched his arms
toward Laskin, so that his palms were both open.

“Oh, yeah.” Laskin reached into his pocket and pulled out an
envelope, which he handed to Biff.

“Now we’re done,” Biff said. “Pleasure doing business with
you.”

“Yeah. See you around the gym, Bill.”

Laskin put the rest of the bills in his pocket and hurried
out the door. As he did, Biff noticed the white butterfly just outside. He
walked back to the office, where he watched Laskin direct a guy with a pallet
jack to load the crates in the back of a nondescript white panel truck.

He called Hector and told him Laskin was on the move, then
repeated the information to Jimmy and Frank Jaeger. When he got back to his
Mini Cooper, he found Farishta and Raki waiting there for him.

It was close to eleven p.m. as Hector conferenced his cell
phone together with Biff’s and Jimmy’s, and the three of them followed Laskin’s
truck onto Le Jeune Road south, past the empty greenery of the Melreese Golf
Course. The late-night traffic was a mix of beat-up pickups and luxury sedans, and
none of them seemed to know where they were going—alternately moving slowly,
then darting between lanes without warning.

Biff and Farishta were caught by a mistimed series of
traffic lights and lost sight of Laskin’s car. “Damn it!” Jimmy said into the
phone.

“Don’t worry, I can keep on him,” Biff said. He lowered his
window and stuck his head out, sniffing the air. Farishta did the same thing on
her side, though Biff assumed that while he was sniffing for the man’s scent,
she was honing in on the power emanated by the coin around Laskin’s neck.

The light changed and they passed row after row of depressing
strip centers, most of the stores closed. The buildings were run down, and Biff
wondered how the neighborhood could support so many cell phone stores, Latin
bakeries, and martial arts dojos. The garish neons were still illuminated,
promises of money that could be sent to foreign countries cheaply, sales on
twelve-packs of cheap beer, and ads for Spanish-language radio stations.

“Up ahead,” Farishta said. “He is turning.”

“Yes,” Biff said, agreeing even though neither of them could
see Laskin’s car make a turn on to Flagler Street toward the Miami River. They drove
past the bodegas and
farmacias
and pawn shops of East Little Havana. Old
women pushed shopping carts, and teenagers huddled on street corners smoking
and texting.

“I ran the license plate on the truck Laskin’s driving,”
Jimmy said through the conference linkup, when they were stopped at a light.
“Reported stolen this morning.”

“That’s the least of his offenses,” Hector said. “You’re
sure he’s heading toward the river?”

“Sure as anything,” Biff said. As they neared the Miami
River, he had to depend more on Farishta’s ability to track the amulet, because
his own powers weakened the closer they got to the water.

They caught up with Laskin, who was stuck behind a
tractor-trailer backing into a convenience store parking lot. Biff, Jimmy and
Hector traded positions, keeping Laskin in sight until he pulled up at a chain
link fence by the river’s edge. In the distance the office towers of Brickell
Avenue and downtown Miami glittered like welcoming beacons, but the area around
the riverfront was scattered with low buildings scrawled with graffiti.

Biff slowed down. Just beyond the fence was a cargo ship
called El Corazón de Managua. An anchor cable stretched down from a hole at its
bow, and the ship, nearly two hundred feet long, rode low in the water, already
overloaded with containers on its deck.

The hull was painted a rusty red to the waterline, and
catwalks criss-crossed up to the blue and white flying bridge. The boat was
tied to the dock with bow and stern cables, and big spotlights illuminated a
half-dozen men on deck, checking the containers, coiling ropes, and handling
other departure-related duties.

Biff parked a block away. He retrieved the backpack and
slung it over his shoulder,  and he and Farishta walked back through the humid
night, Raki scampering behind them. Farishta seemed to revel in her closeness
to the river, taking deep breaths of the salt-tinged air and smiling.

They met Jimmy and Hector in the parking lot of a ships’
chandler, now closed. Hector had a digital camera with a telephoto lens, and he
was taking pictures of Laskin supervising the transport of the pallets from his
truck to the ship.

“Got what I need.” He handed the camera to Jimmy. “Can you
download these onto your laptop and then email them to this address?” He
recited a government email, which Jimmy scribbled down in his notepad. “Biff,
you and Farishta keep an eye on things. I’m going down to the state’s
attorney’s office to pick up the search warrant.”

“You can get one this late?” Biff asked. It was close to
midnight by then.

“Justice never sleeps,” Hector said.

Jimmy had to go back to his car with the laptop in order to
get a signal on the air card. Biff and Farishta stayed in the shadows in front
of the chandlery, watching the transfer. Some boats headed for Haiti, carrying
beans and rice, canned goods, clothing and household equipment. Other cargo was
destined for ports in the Bahamas and throughout the Caribbean; it was still
cheaper to transfer heavy goods over water, especially for short distances. The
river had been cleaned up in the past decade or so; the derelict boats had been
removed, and new regulations on the discharge of oil and waste. There had once
been shootouts regularly, as cocaine cowboys made the riverfront their private
entrepôt.

Farishta turned to Biff. “When they arrest Laskin, I will
follow to the police,” she said. “And then I will be able to retrieve my
amulet.”

“And then?” Biff asked.

“What do you mean?”

“You know what I mean, Farishta. Are you going back to
Somalia, or wherever?”

“Oh, my Bivas. I am not meant for domesticity. I must have
my freedom. But I will see you again, you know that.”

“But what if I want more? Can’t you just whirl yourself
somewhere to cause trouble, then come back to my house every night?”

“You would like that? But we have been on our own for so
long.”

“Admit it. You were jealous when you thought Syl was…”

“More than just your employee?” Farishta laughed. “Yes, I
was jealous. But that is just one of the emotions I am capable of. I don’t
think you would like to see them all.”

“At this point I’ve seen everything you are, and everything
you can do,” Biff said. “And you’re still the most amazing woman I’ve ever
met.”

“Ever the charmer.” She leaned toward him, and they kissed.
Her lips were soft and moist and Biff felt himself transported, far from this
dark, grimy stretch of waterfront, to somewhere heavenly and magical.

 Then the night was torn with a loud, grinding noise. “They
are pulling up the anchor,” Farishta said, pulling back from him. “Where is
Laskin?”

The truck was dark. “He must be on board the ship,” Biff
said.

“No! He cannot leave! They must arrest him.”

Biff called Hector. “Laskin’s on board, and the El Corazón
is pulling up anchor. Where are you with the search warrant?”

“Running into complications. Can you do anything to keep the
boat there?”

Biff looked at Farishta, who was glaring out at the freighter,
her hands on her hips, a dark energy radiating from her.

“We can try,” Biff said. “Can’t you call the Coast Guard to
keep them here?”

“Not until I have the warrant. Call you when I do.” Hector
disconnected and Biff looked back at the ship. A dark-skinned man on the dock
near the aft end began uncoiling one of the ropes from around a cleat. Biff pulled
the lamp out of his backpack, and with his hands wrapped around the embossed
metal, he did his best to pull energy from the lamp and the ground and slow the
man’s progress, adding weight to the rope. But it was hard by the river, where so
much of his power was drained by the nearness of the ocean. The lamp’s power,
like his own, was limited in such close proximity to water.

The deckhand continued to pull the rope in, but at a glacial
pace, and someone on board yelled to him in bastard French. Then Laskin
appeared at the railing, wearing a bright red windbreaker and a Marlins ball
cap pulled low on his head. “What’s going on? Move your ass down there!”

The man grunted. Biff focused as much of his power as he
could muster on the rope, but it wasn’t enough; the man had a head start and he
was able to lift the last coil off the cleat and heave the rope into the water.
Another man on the boat began reeling it in.

Biff took a deep breath as the stevedore walked down the
dock to the stern line. He saw Farishta motioning to Raki, and the squirrel
bounded across the wood, skipping past the man and scampering up the rope.

She focused on the water as the engines roared to life, and a
whirlpool rose, forcing the freighter back against the seawall. A hundred years
before, Biff thought, Farishta would have been able to smash the boat into a
million pieces. But he could see the way her powers were waning in the effort her
actions cost her.

The boat was too big to be turned easily, its engines too
powerful to stop altogether. He watched as the cargo ship’s nose turned out
into the river and the stern line snapped, twisting wildly and knocking the stevedore
into the water.

And then El Corazón de Managua began her slow, stately trip
down the river and toward the open waters of Biscayne Bay.

Farishta looked pale but angry in the sodium-vapor light
streaming down from above the ship’s chandler. “They must be stopped!” she
said. “My amulet! It must be giving its power to Laskin.”

As Jimmy jumped out of his parked car and ran up to them,
Biff slipped the lamp back into the backpack.

“What’s going on?” the cop asked.

“The boat’s leaving,” Biff said. “We tried to stop it but we
couldn’t.”

“Jesus Christ on a stick. Where the fuck is Hector with his
search warrant?”

He pulled out his cell phone. “What do you mean, snafus?” he
said. “Either you’ve got the warrant or you don’t.” He listened. “By then, the
boat should be at the Brickell Avenue bridge. Then they pick up speed and head
on to open water.”

He slammed the phone closed. “We’re fucked. He won’t have
the warrant for another hour. The Coast Guard won’t do anything to stop the
boat without a valid warrant. And once they hit the bay, they’ll pick up speed
and hotfoot it to international waters.”

“What if we can slow it down?” Farishta said.

“How are you going to do that?” Jimmy asked.

“I have my skills.”

“Meet us at the Brickell Avenue bridge, Jimmy,” Biff said.
He turned and ran for his car, Farishta behind him, the backpack bouncing on
his shoulder. “Best place is going to be that bridge,” he said to her. “You can
see down the river from there, and you’ll have a lot of water you can marshal.”

When they jumped into the car, the small white butterfly
followed them. “Not much room in this back seat,” Syl said, assuming human form
as Biff turned the car on.

“Is Laskin going to stay on the boat all the way to
Nicaragua?” Farishta asked him.

“As far as I can tell,” Syl said. “I wasn’t sure you knew
Laskin was on the boat so Raki and I thought I’d better check in with you.”

“He is on the boat, too, the squirrel?” Farishta asked.

“Yeah, he’s doing what he can to create havoc in the engine
room—scaring the sailors, tossing nuts and bolts around. What do you want me to
do?”

“Stay on him,” Biff said. “We’re going to try and stop the
boat. If you can do anything…”

“It’s a big ship, and I don’t know enough about mechanics to
do anything by myself. But I’ll try to pull in help from some sylphs who work
with engines. Maybe one of them will have an idea.”

“If you can do anything, I’ll get you enough nectar for a
whole hive of butterflies,” Biff said. “Is that the right term?”

“Not really. Well, I’d better fly if I hope to get anything
done.” He transformed, and Farishta lowered her window so he could flit away.

Biff navigated the darkened riverfront neighborhood of empty
buildings tainted by graffiti, swearing as he came to one-way streets going the
wrong way. Farishta scratched her fingers angrily against the passenger door.
“Can you not go any faster?”

“Working on it.” They came to the broad one-way Southwest
Eighth Street, also known as Calle Ocho, and picked up the pace, rushing down
toward Brickell. A block from the bridge, Farishta channeled some of her anger
into disintegrating the lock on the gate of a parking lot and Biff pulled the
Mini Cooper inside. Then they raced to the bridge, the lamp inside the pack once
again banging against Biff’s back.

Biff noticed that Farishta could not run as quickly as she
once had, and he worried about her ability to survive the massive energy boost
she would have to summon. But he had his own problems. Could he gum up the
machinery that opened the bridge? If it remained down, it was unlikely that El
Corazón de Managua could pass beneath it. But he wasn’t sure he had that much
power in him, especially after his failed attempts to delay the freighter from
leaving. He already felt drained from that exertion, and worried that even with
the lamp’s help he might not be able to manage.

While Farishta slipped to the water’s edge, he clambered up
the bridge, looking for sources of magical energy that he could pull in. The
air buzzed around him as a steady stream of traffic passed along Brickell
Avenue. To the north lay downtown Miami, to the south a palisade of glass
office towers. He closed his eyes and concentrated, opening his third eye for
sources of magic.