Castro Directive (27 page)

The waiter placed the spritzer on the table and Odin carefully stirred it with his swizzle stick, taking his time.

"Thor, we're close now; I feel it in my bones. Very close. Are you ready?"

"What if we can't find the other one?"

"It's not a matter of looking. It's a matter of waiting. It won't be found until the appropriate time."

"That's what worries me," Thor said. "I don't think I'm going to hang on much longer. They're coming down on me. I can feel it."

Odin nodded. "I know. But don't worry. It'll be sooner than you think."

T
he eye of the video camera seemed to follow Pierce as he paced back and forth in the cell. Who monitored it? Did Carver and Bellinger stop by to watch him? Did he look anxious? Neurotic? Guilty?

He stopped in front of the camera and peered up at it. He grinned. Then he continued to pace, until a guard in his early twenty with a Marine-style crew cut slipped his breakfast tray through the slot in the door. "For the guest of honor. Glad to see you're still here," he remarked, and walked away chuckling to himself, as if he'd just cracked a joke and Pierce had missed the punch line.

Breakfast was rubbery scrambled eggs, cold toast, and weak coffee in a plastic mug. It was every bit as bad as the night he'd just spent on the hard bench. He legs were sore and cramped. He'd been given a thin blanket and a pillow, but his back and neck felt bruised. Richard, his short-term cell mate, had been right about the light. It was never turned off, and as if that and the bench weren't enough to keep him from getting much sleep, he was wakened twice during the night by a guard on the boardwalk above the cells.

The first time, he'd bolted awake as someone called his name and a flashlight beam caught his face. He'd remembered where he was and thought he was getting out. He'd leaped up, but the guard just moved on without another word. He'd barely dozed off, maybe an hour later, when it happened again. He'd cringed as the bright light shone in his eyes and shielded his face. But this time, he'd just turned over and pulled the blanket, over his head.

"So how was the chow?" Crew Cut asked when he came by to pick up the empty plate.

"About like the bench. Why did they wake me up during the night?"

"Part of our services for the guest of honor."

Pierced listened to him laugh as he walked away. "Real funny guy," he muttered.

A couple of hours later Crew Cut said, "A call for you," holding up a telephone. "Thought you'd like to take it in your office. Just pick it up and say, 'Hellhole." Get it? Hellhole." Crew Cut cackled at his joke.

Pierce took the phone and sat down on the bench. The phone was a prison special—no dial, no buttons. He lifted the receiver, thinking it was Gibby.

"Yeah," he said.

"Nicholas?"

Aw, shit. It was Andrews. "Uh, Ray. Hi. I—uh . . . I guess you heard what happened."

"Tina called me last night."

"I was set up."

"I suspected as much. I can have a lawyer down there within the hour. I'll get you out."

"I've already got one, but he can't do much until they arraign me."

"You mean you haven't gone to court yet?"

"Not yet."

Andrews was quiet a moment. "I'd like to know what the hell's going on."

Pierce nearly laughed. "You're not alone there."

"Feel free to have your lawyer call me if you need any help. Just hang in there. I'm sure everything will get straightened out."

"Thanks, Ray."

Feel free, he thought as he hung up. He didn't. Not a bit.

Pierce smelled food. Lunchtime. The only way to tell time in here was by the rhythms and rations of the jail itself. He figured he'd been here at least thirty hours, and he still hadn't seen a judge. His life was on hold, and it seemed that the person on the other end of the line had forgotten all about him.

"Still alive, I see," Crew Cut said when he passed him his lunch of two hot dogs, potato salad, and milk.

"Still alive," Pierce repeated as the guard walked off.

He tasted the potato salad; it was the blandest he'd ever eaten. Forty more hours, forty-two tops, he thought. He wished they'd return his watch so he could check the time. He wished someone would tell him something. Get it over with.

Jangling keys. Pierce sat up and dropped his legs over the side of the bench. Maybe this was it, the arraignment.

"You know this is a special cell, Pierce," Crew Cut said, pointing at the camera as he unlocked the door. "And you're a special case."

"You guys really think I'm going to escape?"

"Yeah, sure. Escape through death. You're in the suicide watch."

Pierce remembered the bandages around Richard's wrist. "I'm not suicidal."

"Don't tell me about it. Tell the shrink. C'mon. He's waiting to see you."

"Jesus, now what?" he muttered.

He was taken to the same visitor's room where he'd seen Gibby and the lawyer. To his surprise, Redington was seated at the table. Redington, his ticket out of here.

"Where the fuck have you been?" Pierce hissed as he sat down. "You're my alibi, for Christ's sake."

Redington jabbed a finger at Pierce. "Don't talk to me that way," he groused. "Just listen. I've got a few things to tell you."

"Well, that'd be a great start, Professor."

Redington twisted the elastic band that held his half-moon glasses. He didn't look any different than he did in his office. He wore the same suit coat, and his white hair was tied back. The only thing missing was the thermos of hot water.

"I told Carver you were with me when your friend was killed."

"Good. Since it happens to be the truth. What the hell else did you tell him?"

Redington sat back and started explaining. About an hour after Pierce had left his office, he said, someone called and told Redington he'd be killed if he told anyone he'd seen Pierce that day. He left the office immediately and went home. He didn't know what it was about, but he figured it had something to do with the investigation of Loften's murder.

"My wife and I were planning on leaving in a few days for our place in the Smokies. It's very private; we don't even have a phone. We decided to leave immediately. The rest of that day and the next, I tried to blank out the incident. I didn't want to think about it, but, of course, it kept coming to mind."

Redington looked down at his hands as he continued. He said that he'd awakened this morning to feelings of guilt, knowing that he was not only ignoring something that could affect another person's life, but was allowing some unknown person to force him into hiding.

"Finally, my wife told me to go into town and call Elise and find out what it was all about. When I did, I was surprised by how concerned she was about me. She told me everything that had happened, and when I heard you were in jail and why I made up my mind to come back. My wife agreed, and insisted on returning with me."

His story, Pierce thought, sounded genuine. He told Redington he appreciated his willingness to help in spite of the danger. The old professor waved a hand, an impatient, almost deprecatory gesture. "I refuse to live in fear that something I do or say is going to get me killed." He paused and glanced over his shoulder toward the door. Bellinger had just stepped in. He ambled over to the table as though he were just passing through and happened to see them.

He nodded to Redington, looked over at Pierce. "You're free to go, Nick. Just pick up your stuff at the desk. Everything except your gun, of course. Apparently, it was stolen from your car, then returned to set you up to take the fall. Sorry about the mistake. Happens to the best of us." He smiled and glanced conspiratorially at Pierce. "Even Mo Carver."

Surprise, surprise. And wasn't everyone friendly and helpful all of a sudden. He was suspicious, but didn't ask any questions. He wasn't about to push his luck.

On his way out, he picked up an envelope containing his billfold and a receipt that described his car. Then he heard the bad news. Swedie had been towed in as evidence and wouldn't be ready for him to pick up until tomorrow morning. Redington, who was standing nearby, offered to drive him home and said he'd get the car and meet him in front of the courthouse.

After he'd signed several forms, Crew Cut opened the gate to the cell block. "You stay alive now," he said, apparently still convinced that Pierce was suicidal.

"You, too," he replied, and headed for the stairs.

After sitting and sleeping on the hard bench, Redington's Volvo felt like the epitome of luxury with its comfortable leather seats and frigid AC. A smooth, quiet ride. Passing through downtown Miami had never been so enjoyable, and Pierce took a renewed interest in everything around him. He looked in the windows of the shops and at the street vendors and shoppers. They were young and old, mostly Latin and black, and he felt like a tourist rather than a longtime resident. For a change, he didn't even mind the long waits at the traffic lights. Redington remained mostly silent, allowing Pierce to enjoy his restored freedom and think about what he'd told him.

As they crossed Biscayne Bay, Pierce puzzled over the relationship between Elise and Redington. The more he thought, the more confused he felt. Redington had gotten him out of jail when he could've stayed away for his own safety. And now he was delivering him home. But he also knew that he was protecting Elise; he'd said as much. But was he protecting her from Andrews, or from the law?

"Have you talked to Ray since your arrest?" Redington asked as they neared his apartment.

"He called me earlier today."

"Doesn't surprise me. Are you still working for him?" The question annoyed Pierce. "Kind of hard to do much work when you're behind bars."

As he got out of the car, he thanked Redington again. "You're out of jail, Nick. Now what?"

"I'm going to see what I can do to find Fuego's murderer. Right now, nothing else matters."

Pierce had been home about two hours, and had showered and eaten a meal when he heard a knock on the door. It was Carver.

"Now what?"

Carver walked in without answering. "If you think Redington's word means anything to me, you've got another thing coming. That doesn't clear you. It makes me even more suspicious. Especially since no one else saw you."

"I told you I bumped into a guy on the steps."

"So you said. What's his name? What's he look like? What was he wearing? For all I know, you made him up."

Pierce crossed his arms. "Is that why you came here, to tell me you think I'm a liar and a killer?"

Carver's dark eyes watched him.

"I think you should be looking for the dirty cop, the one Loften hired. Maybe you don't even need to look very far."

"What do you mean by that?"

Your partner, asshole.
"You're the cop. You figure it out."

Carver stared at him. "If you've got some evidence, I'm ready to listen."

Pierce looked down at the floor. He didn't have anything on Bellinger; that was the problem. "Maybe he drives a dark blue Mercedes."

Carver laughed. "On a cop's salary? Get serious."

"I've seen the car following me. It was parked outside my apartment the night I got jumped. I suppose the cop would keep quiet about it if he paid for it with tainted money."

"You got a license plate number?"

Carver glared at him when he shook his head. "That's the problem with dicks like you, Mr. Pierce. You've always got hunches and no evidence, no proof."

T
he morning light slanted through the venetian blinds, forming dark, narrow bars on his ceiling. A fitting metaphor, he thought, for his two days in jail. Fitting and depressing.

He dropped his legs over the side of the bed and went into the bathroom, still groggy despite nine hours of sleep. He stepped into the shower; the hot spray pelted his cheeks, his shoulders, and chest. It washed away the physical vestiges of his incarceration, but didn't touch the emotional wounds of Fuego's murder. It was still hard to believe.

He was toweling himself dry when the phone pealed. He wasn't in the mood to talk to anyone. The way his luck had been running lately, it was probably Carver again with more questions and accusations. But after the fifth ring he walked into the bedroom and answered. Elise's voice was soft and concerned, but it didn't comfort him; he wished he hadn't answered.

"I'm glad you're out of jail, Nick."

"So am I."

"I'm really sorry about your friend."

"Yeah." Sorry, and maybe responsible, he thought. "Would you like to come over for lunch?"

"Can't. I've got to go downtown and get my car back from the police. I don't know how long it's going to take."

His tone was brusque, but he didn't want to alienate her, so he added: "How about this evening?"

"That's fine. How about if we order Chinese takeout. What do you like? I'll order ahead of time." When he hung up, his evening was all planned. Tonight, he'd put her on the spot.