Caribbean Hustle (A Nick Teffinger Thriller / Read in Any Order) (11 page)

Eyes fell on him.

He detected them in his peripheral vision

He turned full on to find they belonged to a petite Asian woman with long black hair, a T ripped off just under her breasts, exposing a taut little tummy, and a short white wrap-around that extended to mid-thigh. She didn’t turn away when he looked at her. Instead she headed straight for him on bare feet, sipping from a glass as she came.

“I’m Evil Angel,” she said. “I’m from Hong Kong.”

The words were in English.

Teffinger took a swallow.

“You’re a long way from home.”

“Yes I am,” she said.

“How’d you end up here?”

“Fate,” she said. “Do you believe in fate?”

Teffinger nodded.

“Sometimes.”

“How about right now?”

He shrugged.

“Maybe. Do you know Johnnie Rail?”

“Of course.”

“Is he here?”

“Yes but we don’t need him right now. What we need is a little privacy.” She reached into his front pants pocket and wiggled her fingers. “Did you bring me any?”

“I probably did,” he said. “But first I need to talk to Johnnie Rail.” He headed into the crowd towards the open glass doors of the house and said over his shoulder, “I’ll be back. Don’t go anywhere.”

“I won’t.”

Inside, he dropped to the lower level and searched for Modeste. She was nowhere. He made his way up, through the main floor, and then to the upper floor, interrupting lots of sex, but not feeling too badly about it. He headed back outside and fanned out, checking the outlying buildings and enclaves.

Modeste was nowhere.

Evil Angel had some news for him when he returned. “Did you catch Johnnie before he left?”

“He left?”

“Two minutes ago.”

“Where was he going?”

“I don’t know.”

“Do you have a car?”

“No. Johnnie’s the one with all the cars.”

“He has more than one?”

“A lot more than one.”

He grabbed her hand.

“Show me.”

Two minutes later they were in old rusty piece of crap Land Cruiser, 70s vintage, with no doors or top, busting speed down the pitch-black road. Evil Angel was in the passenger seat, impervious to Teffinger’s repeated requests to stay behind.

A hundred yards into it, he slammed on the brakes.

“Check the back tire!”

“Why?”

“See if it’s flat.”

When she got out, he floored it and didn’t look back.

Five minutes later red taillights appeared up ahead. Teffinger closed the gap with every ounce of power he could muster from the puny little 4-banger under the hood.

He honked the horn.

It didn’t work.

Then he rammed the taillights.

It wasn’t hard, just enough to get the other vehicle to stop.

Then something happened that he didn’t expect.

The other vehicle slammed on the brakes.

The Land Cruiser caught the bumper at a bad angle. It tilted sideways onto two wheels, twitched violently back and fourth as he tried to regain control, and then pitched into a death roll with all the fury of a screaming beast.

30

Day Five

June 8

Sunday Morning

Teffinger opened his eyes to find himself in a bed in a dark room in the middle of the night. Pale moonlight shined through balcony doors, enough to vaguely define a vaulted ceiling and sheer window coverings swaying softly from an outside breeze.

Next to him, sleeping soundly on top of the covers, was a naked woman with long black hair. Teffinger couldn’t make out the face but recognized the perfume.

It was Evil Angel.

Did he have sex with her?

He couldn’t remember.

He remembered crashing the Land Cruiser; that was it, nothing afterwards. He slipped out of bed carefully so as to not wake the evil one, found he was wearing nothing, and headed for the bathroom.

A large gauze patch was taped to the side of his stomach. He peeled it open to find a wound five or six inches long, held closed with a large number of stitches and disinfected with something that made his skin a zinc color. He sealed the patch and then pressed against it. The wound itself responded with a deep pain but nothing resonated underneath it. It appeared to be a flesh wound with no deeper damage.

His throat was dried sandpaper.

He drank a full glass of water, rubbing it into the pores of his mouth with his tongue.

Then he drank another.

Several darkish bruises marked his body, together with three smaller bandages, all of which showed stitches underneath, but minor in scope.

His clothes hung over the shower rod.

Everything that should be in his pockets was, including his wallet, fully intact, and his cell phone, which did not appear to have been tampered with or used.

He turned the lights off, opened the door and made his way back to bed in the dark, slipping in quietly so as to not wake the evil one.

Every caveman gene in his body told him to take her; take her until she lost every semblance of control; take her so hard she’d never recover, not in a thousand cave-girl years.

He resisted the genes and let his thoughts turn to Kovi-Ke, the big question mark in his life, the reason he was here in Haiti trying to figure her out, or protect her, or arrest her, or whatever it was that the final answer would be.

What was she?

Who was she?

Why did he care?

Evil Angel breathed with a soft rhythm next to him.

All he needed to do was shake her shoulder. That’s all it would take to enter heaven, the angel part of her. That’s all it would take to bring out the gyrations of her body and the warmth of her mouth and the energy of all that little life inside her.

He closed his eyes but sleep didn’t come.

He was going to be killed soon; maybe tomorrow, maybe not for a few days, but soon. He could feel it down in his gut. It was as real as the moon creeping into the room. All he hoped is that it wasn’t at the hands of Kovi-Ke. That would be too much to handle. That would be too ironic of an ending. That would be too much of an ultimate mistake.

He fought with the ghosts in his head for some time before finally disappearing into a safe vortex where they couldn’t follow.

31

Day Five

June 8

Sunday Morning

Teffinger bolted upright in bed, covered in sweat, the victim of a horrific dream where Kovi-Ke slit his throat from behind and then walked off before he hit the floor, not even bothering to look back; he was that insignificant. Dawn had broken, not by much, but enough to wash the room in a warm Caribbean glow. He fell on his back, grateful that his death was only a dream.

Evil Angel opened an eye, rolled on her back and stretched her arms high above her head. Her Hong Kong skin was golden brown.

Her body was perfect.

Her nipples were candy.

She rolled over, draped a leg over him and got her face close. “Good morning.”

“Yes.”

“It’s good to see you awake,” she said.

“I don’t remember anything.”

“You don’t remember making love to me?”

“No.”

She put disappointment on her face, then smiled and ran an index finger around his stomach.

“Relax, you were unconscious,” she said. “Nothing happened.”

“It didn’t?”

“No,” she said. “We put it off until now.”

She swung on top, her stomach to his, her chest to his, her legs spread, her breath hot on his face.

“Time to pay up,” she said.

“For what?”

“For all the stitches.”

“You did those?”

She nodded.

“Every one of them. I gave you a shot too, for infection. Now it’s time for you to show me how grateful you are.” She straddled his chest and then inched up until she was on his face. “Love it,” she said. “Love it like you stole it.”

He complied.

After a shower, Teffinger wandered downstairs to find Johnnie Rail outside by the pool with Evil Angel, drinking coffee and eating from a tray of pastries. The man had a classic front-man look, a modern-day Jim Morrison, with thick shoulder-length black hair, eyes that had seen the world from a path less traveled, and a lean but agile body that didn’t seem to have been beaten to death with bad habits.

“Baby,” Rail said. “That was her name.”

Teffinger sat down.

“Whose name?”

“The land cruiser,” he said. “She was the first vehicle I ever owned. Bought her for five hundred pounds back when I was seventeen, working the kitchens by day and trying to get a band going by night. Everyone thought I was crazy. They were partly right, I mean, who needs a 4-wheel drive in London, especially one with the steering wheel on the wrong side? But she had some swag and was big enough to carry gear. I’ll be honest, my instinct last night was to kill you for killing her, but I didn’t.”

“Apparently not,” Teffinger said. “I’ll make it right. I’ll get her fixed, if that’s possible, or replace her; whatever you want.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Rail said. “I’ve got the money and at his point we’re sort of related, anyway.”

Teffinger wrinkled his face.

“How’s that?”

“Evil Angel,” he said. “We’ve both engaged her finer side.”

Evil Angel smiled.

Teffinger shrugged.

“Do you have any extra coffee?”

“Absolutely. Then you can tell me why you tried to kill me last night.”

“I didn’t try to kill you,” Teffinger said. “I was only trying to get your attention.”

Rail clinked his cup against Teffinger’s.

“Well, mission accomplished.”

Teffinger’s phone rang; it was Sydney. “The dead woman down by Tarzan’s place is someone named Nicole Carter. She’s an attorney in San Francisco in a mega-firm called Taylor, Robinson & Lee.”

“Hold on.”

He got up and headed for privacy on the other side of the pool, saying to Rail, “Excuse me a minute, I need to take this.”

“No problem.”

To Sydney, “What was she doing in Denver?”

“According to a guy named Michael Ross, who’s the head of the division where she works, which is the litigation division, she was on vacation. She wasn’t here on work. Here’s the big news, though. We found the note.”

“Where? What’d it say?”

“There was an old pop can about twenty feet from her body,” she said. “It was in there. It said, KK.”

“KK?”

“Right,” she said. “I’m assuming it stands for Kovi-Ke. What I’m not sure about is whether it means she’s next or whether it was her signature, taking responsibility for the murder. I’ve tried to call her about twenty times. She’s not answering. Her phone’s completely off so I can’t even track her. I have no idea where she is.”

32

Day Five

June 8

Sunday Morning

The villa was awash in the aftermath of last night’s revelries. Glasses and trash were everywhere. Dozens of beer bottles laid in drunken death at the bottom of the pool. A cushion floated on the surface. Teffinger picked up a book of matches and set a stick on fire as he headed back over to Rail and Kovi-Ke. They watched him as he came, curious, but in different ways and for different reasons.

Teffinger sat down, looked Rail in the eyes and said, “Here’s the problem. I have a friend named Modeste. Someone took her.”

Rail washed his face in confusion.

“Me?”

Teffinger shrugged.

“I don’t know. You tell me.”

Rail shook his head in denial.

“I don’t know anyone by that name,” he said. “And I don’t take people. I make music. I don’t know why you’re barking up my tree but it’s the wrong one.”

“She took your little gold bars and your little diamond divas. You figured it out.”

Rail’s face tightened.

“Who is she?”

Teffinger frowned.

“I’m not here to play word games,” he said. “I want her back and I want her now.”

“I don’t have her,” Rail said. “You think that because I have a motive that I’m the one who took her? Do you have any idea how many people have that same motive? The word’s out, my man; it’s out far and wide; everything’s out there for the grabbing. It’s not just me looking for it. It’s everyone. Hell, I’ve heard rumors that people have come in from as far as New York looking for it.” He paused and added, “If you really want her back, tell me what you know.”