Stuff to Die For (20 page)

“Have you been to the doctor?”

“No.”

Two chubby Latin babes in too-tight pants and halter tops walked by us, both pushing a stroller with an infant inside.

“I’m going to see my OB-GYN in a couple of days.”

I searched for questions. I had a million, but couldn’t think of one. Finally, I said, “Does your dad know?”

She sighed. “No. He’s going to rave and rant and threaten you—”

“Tell him to stand in line.”

“Then he’ll settle down and realize it takes two to tango.”

There was an uneasy silence. Finally, I had to ask.

“Where do you see me in this scenario?”

“You’re the father. Where do you see yourself?”

“Look, Em, I’m in love with you. You know that. I’d have an exclusive relationship if you’d agree to it. That’s no secret.”

“So what are you proposing?”

I put my hand on hers. “Proposing may be a bad choice of words.”

She laughed. Out loud. “God, Skip. I’m scared. I never, we never . . . did you ever—”

“No. I never expected anything like this. Should we get married?”

“Oh, God no. Are you ready for marriage? I don’t think so.”

“And you are?”

She shook her head with exaggerated swings. “Hell no. I’m not ready to have a kid either. But I’ll deal with it.”

“Why wouldn’t you marry me?”

She took her hand from mine and picked up her coffee cup. Taking a sip she struggled for words. “I wish I smoked cigarettes.”

“So you wouldn’t have to deal with issues.”

“All right,” she said, “you want issues? You’re immature.”

“Well . . .”

“You live like a pig, you and your Neanderthal roommate.”

“Not a husbandly trait?”

“You’ve got a job that doesn’t even support you, and you have absolutely no future.”

I shook my head in agreement. “Yeah, but I’m cute. And I love you.”

She pursed her lips. “All right, let me take those two things into consideration.”

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

I
MET JAMES AT THE APARTMENT. He told me he’d slept till noon in between two calls from Cap’n Crab threatening his employment if he didn’t get his ass into work. But James has a great sick voice. You’d swear he was going to die. He groans, sputters, wheezes and pretty soon you decide he isn’t long for the world. Lindsey at Cap’n Crab told him he’d better be in tomorrow for sure. She didn’t fire him, but I think she’s sweet on him, so he gets a pass.

“When we have employees, Skip, I hope to hell they’re better workers than we are.” He lay on the couch sucking on a long-neck beer.

“If they don’t show up, we’ll have to do all the work.”

“Yeah.”

I straddled a dining room chair, the screws stripped from the metal legs. It was perilously close to collapsing and we had a bet on how many more days it could support us. The bet was only for five bucks. Probably an immature act on my part.

“James, Fuentes hasn’t called. If the man doesn’t watch the news, he probably doesn’t know about the bodies.”

“Call him, pardner. I do not want to get into this mess tonight unless he knows what’s going on.”

I dialed the number. This time he answered on the first ring.

“Mr. Moore. I assume you’re still dropping off the mail tonight?”

“I am, Mr. Fuentes. However, I may have some bad news.”

“I don’t recall you calling me with good news.”

“No. I haven’t. However, this may be the worst. They found two bodies in the burned-out building. One of them was missing a ring finger.”

He was silent, but I could hear him breathing on the other end.

“Mr. Fuentes?”

“Holy Mary, mother of God. Do they know?”

“No. The last time I heard, they had not identified the body of that person.”

“Then there is hope. Continue with your plans, Mr. Moore, and keep your mouth shut. Please. I’ll look into this matter. I know some people on the Miami police force and I’ll make some immediate inquiries.” Abruptly he hung up the phone.

“He was pretty shook up?” James asked.

I thought for a second. “He sounded shook up. Not like I think I would sound if I’d lost a son, but, you know, shaken.” It wouldn’t be too long before I could relate.

“Do we drop off the mail?”

“He said to go ahead with the plans. Then he told me to shut up. What is that? About the tenth time? Anyway, maybe he’s in denial. He said, ‘Then there is hope,’ so I’m thinking he believes Vic may still be alive.”

James drained the bottle of beer and rolled it like a bowling ball into the kitchen area. “You haven’t talked much about Em. How did the meeting go?”

How did it go? “It was awkward.”

“You’d think, after all the history, that it wouldn’t be that tough.”

“But it is.”

“How did you leave it?”

I shouldn’t have told him but I did. “I proposed. Sort of.”

His eyes got wide and he slowly sat up. “You really did? This is big, compadre.”

“Not as big as her situation.”

“Situation? You mean Em being pregnant?”

“Yeah. Pregnant. Anyway, she said no.”

“She’s not thinking rationally.” He stood up and went to the refrigerator, grabbing another beer. “But, then, neither are you.”

I bristled. “What would be wrong with that scenerio?”

“Wrong? Jesus, Skip. You’re my best friend, okay. I’d trust my life to you, but come on, buddy. You’re immature. I mean really. You’ve got a job with absolutely no future and . . .”

I got off the chair and walked to the door. I needed some fresh air. “And I live with an asshole roommate who not only is an asshole but a complete idiot. Fuck you.” I walked out and slammed the door, almost taking it off the hinges. The door, like everything else in our apartment, was dirt-cheap.

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

I
DROVE AROUND FOR A WHILE. Down to the stadium, then onto I-95, and I lost track of time. When I finally got back to Carol City, I drove over to Gas and Grocery. I parked, walked in, and pulled a bottle of Pepsi out of the cooler. I paid and asked if Angel had been around. The girl simply shrugged her shoulders and turned around, stocking cigarette packs behind the counter.

He was sitting on the hood of the Prism when I walked out. Knowing how cheap the car was, I was concerned he might leave a dent. Hell, the car had so many dents already one more wouldn’t be noticed.

“Angel!”

“Man, how does it go?”

“It goes. Listen, tonight we’re dropping off a piece of mail from our truck into a trash can at Denny’s.”

I’m sure he thought I was crazy. He cocked his bald head and looked at me as if I’d lost my mind.

“You can give it to me. I’ll throw it away right here.”

“No. The Cuban guys asked us to drop it off. They’re going to pick it up and we’re going to try to follow them. We can see where they go and, hopefully, find our friend Vic.”

He shook his head. “You guys are crazy.”

“Yeah, well . . .” I knew he was right. Angel was much smarter than we were. “Do you want to come along?”

“Yeah. I do.”

The guy was as crazy as we were. Somehow that made me feel better.

“Do you want the complete package?”

“We do.”

Angel smiled, his white teeth contrasting with his dark skin. “Okay, man. I’ll bring everything. We’ll find those sons of bitches.”

The three caballeros. For justice, for a way of life. It was a stupid move on our part, but we were young and there’s an age when you understand death, you watch it happen around you, but you, you are invincible. Soldiers going into war must feel like that. Fear, trepidation, awe, but no doubt that you’ll come away alive and victorious.

“I want to show you something.” Angel motioned to me and we walked behind the Gas and Grocery.

I was invincible. Then, I thought about Em and my kid. I shook. This probably wasn’t a good time to be putting my life on the line.

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

“A J
EEP?” James looked shocked.

“A Wrangler. Midnight black. He parks it behind Gas and Grocery. Honest to God, James, it looks like he polishes it every day. Showroom new.”

“What about the Prism?”

“Angel is right. These guys have seen my car parked here. If they see that eyesore behind them they’ll know right away we’re following them. They’ve never seen the Jeep and it’s a perfect car for tailing them. If they go off road, we can go off road. It’s dark, not that iridescent shit-green color of my Prism.”

“What the hell. Let’s take the Jeep. In half an hour I’ll walk across the street and put the envelope in the trash can. I’ll walk back here, and you guys pick me up in the next complex.”

“As long as they don’t grab it in the first five minutes we should be able to get the Jeep in position and see them when they take it.”

“It’s gonna be a strange night, pardner.” James was wired. Six cups of coffee and ten cigarettes will do that to you.

“No stranger than it’s been, James. And it’s been pretty strange.”

Half an hour goes very slow when you want it to go fast. James dropped the envelope and the list into a garbage bag, tied the straps on the top of the bag, threw it over his shoulder like a South Florida Santa Claus in cutoffs and a Mötley Crüe T-shirt and walked out of the apartment. I stood on the porch and watched him as he walked it across the street, through the field, and into Denny’s parking lot. It was still light enough to see and I watched him take the top off the plastic container. He stuffed the bag in, replaced the top, and started back. Nothing to it.

I went out the back door just in case they were watching the front. The old black man was sitting in a cheap aluminum chair on his slab reading a magazine. He nodded as I walked by, never looking up. The empty playpen had a new powder blue blanket draped over the side.

Angel was in the next lot, sitting in the Jeep Wrangler.

“Hey, man. Nice clear evening. We should be able to see everything.”

“Anybody watching me? Do you see anybody?”

“Nah. My feeling? They think you want to be done with all this. You pass on the mail, you’re done. The last thing in the world they gonna think is that you follow them.”

I slid in the passenger side. James could ride in the back. “My feeling? I should tell you this, Angel. I think that once they get the mail, they could kill us.”

“Why they gonna kill you? Huh? What did you do?”

“They think we know what’s going on.”

“Do you?”

“Yeah.”

“Then maybe you’re right.”

“You still want to go?” I looked him straight in the eye.

“Seems to me I’m the one who shot one of those boys. I’m in pretty deep already.”

James came around the corner, watching behind him as he sprinted for the Jeep.

“Hey, guys. I didn’t see anyone. Where do we go from here?”

Angel started the engine. “Spot up by the ditch has a gravel bed like a pullover. When they were digging it out I suppose they put the heavy equipment and dump trucks there. We can see Denny’s pretty well from there.” He pulled out of the parking lot and down the narrow road pulling into the gravel. He turned the Jeep around and we faced the back parking lot of the eatery.

“It’s going to be dark soon.” James leaned forward, staring intently ahead.

“Those lot lights stay on pretty late,” I said.

We sat there, at least one of us feeling pretty stupid. We were way out of our league, playing James Bond and not having a clue what we’d do if we did stumble on a hiding place. My gut reaction was that Vic was dead. The last time they found us stalking them, they warned us. This time they could do much worse.

“If we don’t do this, they may kill us.” James sounded like a continuation of my thoughts. “I mean, we all agree, right? The object is to find out if Vic Maitlin is alive or dead. Once we know, we’ll have to report this whole thing.” Pretty serious comment from a guy who hated the authorities.

“If we report it now, and Vic is alive, they may kill him. We know they’ve threatened to send more body parts to Fuentes.” I was embarrassed at how we were trying to justify this escapade. We were nervous and scared, but I believe all three of us were raring to go. We finally had some adventure in our lives, something a little out of the norm.

“Hell, we should have just walked away from the whole thing.” James lit up a cigarette.

“Five thousand dollars for a little stakeout, James. Remember? A simple little job. Sure, Mr. Fuentes, we can do that.”

He blew a stream of smoke at my head. “And Vic, Mr. Fuentes’s son, saved your life, pardner. Correct me if I’m wrong.”

Angel didn’t react, but reached across me and opened the glove compartment. He pulled out a black leather case and opened it. “Binoculars.”