Lassiter 06 - Fool Me Twice (13 page)

Had there been a subtle shift in tone?

“
...You have a certain
easygoing charm and affability. Your eyes crinkle when you smile,
and doubtless, there are numerous women who find you irresistible,
chief among them I suspect are cocktail waitresses, South Beach
models, and bubble-brained cheerleaders.”

Somehow, I heard a “but” coming.

“
But if you think a smile
and a laugh can get you inside my panty hose, you’d better think
again, buster.”

“
Buster? Whatever happened
to
mi coraz
ó
n
?”

“
What happened between us
is ancient history. I swear I barely remember it.”

“
I don’t believe
you.”

“
Really, what do you
remember?”

“
A lot of caring,” I said,
“a lot of moist heat.”

“
Anything else?”

“
Squabbles, lots of
squabbles.”

“
That’s what I remember,
that and your leaving me.”

“
I still care for you,” I
told her, the words surprising me as much as her.

Her eyes measured me for just a moment.
“Nostalgia, Jake. Don’t get carried away. Right now, you’re
fantasizing about rekindling something that’s been burnt out a long
time. It’s a way of reliving your youth.”

“
I wasn’t that
young.”

“
You were playing ball and
having fun, and your future seemed infinite. Whatever you think
you’re feeling right now isn’t real.”

I tried to examine what I felt, real or not.
It wasn’t easy. “What I’m feeling, what I’m wondering really, is if
I stuck with your brother all these years just to maintain some
connection with you.”

“
And now?”

“
I’m wondering if you want
to give it another go.”

For a moment, her eyes softened. Thoughts
seemed to race around in her head, but I couldn’t catch them. Her
brow furrowed. She didn’t smile and she didn’t frown. She was
processing information, computing what she needed and what she
didn’t. And then the moment was gone. The thoughtful expression
changed. It was almost as if she willed herself not to yield, not
to show weakness, which to her, was any hint of emotion, other than
one: anger. Her eyes shone with determination, and her voice was
fire and steel.

“
Never, never, never. As
far as I’m concerned, Jacob Lassiter, Esquire, you’re just the
mouthpiece for that trashy brother of mine. You’re no better than
he is. You’re the enemy, get it?”

Whew! From sunshine to squall in the blink
of an eye. The suddenness and the fury shocked me.

“
I don’t get it,” I
said.

She blew a puff of smoke in my face, which
is a good trick against the wind. “You’re hopeless. Why don’t you
do something useful like find my brother and bring him in?”

Before I could answer, I heard Abe Socolow
calling from inside the living room. “Hey, Jake, c’mere.”

I think Socolow liked bossing me around.
Maybe it compensated for the few times I beat him in court. I went
back inside to let him insult me some more. Jo Jo followed a step
behind, and I made a mental note to check for knife wounds
later.

The file drawers from Blinky’s
bedroom/office were stacked in the living room. Every drawer was
open, and the contents were being searched by patient, if bored,
cops. In the foyer, an antique milk can, lacquered bright orange,
was turned upside down. A dozen carved wooden canes and shillelaghs
along with a couple of umbrellas were spilled onto the floor. The
canes weren’t just for show. Blinky used them after tearing up his
knee crawling out of a Dumpster filled with credit card
receipts.

Now Socolow marched around the living room,
holding a handsome cherry cane with a large polished knob for a
handle. The whole thing was fairly phallic, but I didn’t bother to
share my thoughts with Socolow, who was gesturing at me with the
damn thing.

“
You know what’s in those
papers?” he said, pointing in the general direction of the cocktail
table where he had spread out several thick, typewritten
documents.

“
No, Abe. You tell
me.”

He hunched over the table, leaning on the
cane like a pettifogger out of Dickens. He ran a finger along the
lines of a page, furrowing his brow.

“
You could read faster if
you didn’t move your lips,” I told him, helpfully.

“
What the hell is Rocky
Mountain Treasures, Inc.?”

“
A company Blinky formed,”
I answered.

“
I can see that. What’s it
do?”

“
Hunts for
treasure.”

Socolow scowled. “Didn’t Baroso get indicted
for something like that, selling stock in a deep-sea salvage
company down in the Keys?”

“
Only civil suits, and that
involved sunken Spanish galleons,” I corrected him. “This is all
about gold and silver in the Colorado mountains.”

“
Yeah, that’s what it says
here under ‘corporate mission.’ Socolow began turning pages, again,
reading aloud now. “‘The company will use its best efforts and
employ the latest sophisticated technology to locate and reclaim
one or more of the following: the Arapaho Princess Treasure, the
Golden Mummy, the Treasure of Apache Gulch,
La Caverna de Oro
, the Lost Dutchman
mine, the Purgatory Canyon Treasure, Moccasin Bill’s Lost Mine, the
Lost Gulch mine, the Devil’s Head Treasure.’ “Socolow closed the
folder and looked up at me. “Hey, Jake, what are you doing involved
in this wild West shit?”

“
What do you
mean?”

Now he was looking at the corporate minute
book. “Says here you’re a ten percent shareholder...”

“
That’s right.”

“
And secretary treasurer of
the company.”

“
What?”

“
Plus general
counsel.”

“
What?” I said
again.

“
You heard me. Your bio is
in the prospectus that goes to potential investors. You’re
described as one of the leading trial lawyers in Florida. Who wrote
that, your granny?”

“
I don’t know anything
about it,” I said, honestly. “Blinky gave me the stock in lieu of a
fee, but I never agreed to be a corporate officer or to let my name
be used. You know I’d never subject myself to liability like
that.”

Socolow was back in the file again, still
leaning on his cane. “Blinky’s bio says nothing about his criminal
record or the lawsuits against him. What do they call that in
securities law, Jake?”

“
A material omission of
fact,” I said.

“
Right. The feds would be
real interested in that, wouldn’t they? Maybe a 10 (b) (S)
violation. What else do we have here?” He turned over a few more
pages. “The corporation issued one hundred shares of stock, twenty
to Louis Baroso, ten to Jacob Lassiter, and seventy to Kit Carson
Cimarron.”

“
Who?”

“
Just what I was going to
ask you, Jake.”

“
Damned if I know. Sounds
like a cowboy.”

Socolow closed the folders, looked at the
detective, at Jo Jo Baroso, and back at me. He didn’t say anything.
He was into his genius-at-work mode. He started pacing, the cane
clacking against the tile. At the moment, he was probably the most
irritating person on the planet. He stopped at the sliding glass
door to the balcony and seemed to study the smooth waters of
Government Cut. To the south, cars were streaming across the newly
renovated MacArthur Causeway, and below us, the fronds of the palm
trees swayed gently in the breeze. Finally, he turned and faced me.
“Jake, I’ll bet you all the gold in Apache Gulch that Kyle Hornback
was going to sing about Rocky Mountain Treasures, Inc. Maybe it’s a
little farther from home, but it’s just another of Blinky’s scams.
Now, as for you, I know you step over the line once in a while, but
I gotta tell you, I’m real disappointed.”

“
Abe, listen to me,
I—”

“
Lemme finish. The way I
see it, Blinky figured he’d worn out his welcome down here. Kyle
was doing his selling up there, and this Carson probably put up the
money and added some local credibility. That left you to handle
legal problems.”

“
Abe, you’re not listening.
I never agreed to represent the company or be an officer. I didn’t
ask for the stock, and I didn’t write the prospectus. As far as I
know, the company’s legitimate, but even if it’s not, where’s the
proof Blinky killed Kyle. “

“
Who’s talking about
Blinky? I’m starting to agree with you. Baroso’s not a tough guy,
at least not without someone to back him up.”

“
Like who, or is it
whom?”

“
How about the guy who
owned the house where the decedent was killed, the guy whose tie
was the murder weapon, whose prints are on the body, and who just
happened to discover the body and call the cops?”

“
Are you nuts? Why would I
kill Kyle Hornback?”

“
Ah, motive,” Socolow said
in that infuriating tone intended to indicate his intellectual
prowess. “The missing ingredient. If I nailed down the motive,
Jakie my boy, I’d be in front of the grand jury quicker than you
can say life without parole. But I’m getting warm, aren’t I? It’s
got to do with Rocky Mountain Treasures, doesn’t it,
Jakie?”

“
It’s your case, Abe. You
figure it out.”

“
Let’s see now. If Kyle had
flipped, it wasn’t just Blinky who was at risk, was it? What about
the company lawyer? Come on, Mr. Secretary-Treasurer and General
Counsel. Want to bet that the motive is buried with all that fool’s
gold in cowboy country?”

He aimed the damn cane at me.

“
Abe, I hope you’re
prepared to use that thing. If not, I may just ram it up your tight
ass.”

Socolow glared at me, but the detective
growled and shifted in his chair. “There’s no need for that kind of
talk. The state attorney doesn’t have to stand for it.”

“
It’s all right, Major,”
Socolow said, pleased he’d gotten to me. “Jakie seldom hits anyone.
Hell, he seldom hit anyone when he played ball.”

Still Socolow kept the cane leveled at my
chest. He was enjoying this too much. I strained to keep my temper
under control, my mind’s eye playing a little fantasy involving
Socolow’s head and a heavy piece of polished wood.

“
You see, Major,” Socolow
said, “I’ve come face-to-face with every category of miscreant
known to the law, but essentially there are only two types, wicked
scoundrels and foolish scoundrels. I fear that what you see at the
end of my cane is nothing but a foolish scoundrel.”

I kept my voice low and didn’t raise an
eyebrow. “At which end, Abe?”

CHAPTER 9

EL AMOR ES CIEGO

Sylvester Houston Conklin fell asleep in
front of the television, watching Clint Eastwood blast five bad
guys in a San Francisco diner. Earlier, Kip had put away a double
portion of spaghetti and meatballs and a protein shake. Carbs and
protein, I was bulking him up. Yesterday, it was brown rice,
broiled fish, and raw vegetables for the fiber. I did the cooking,
and he ate it all. As a reward, we split a sixteen-ounce
Grolsch.

Now he was sacked out on the sofa, so I
carried him upstairs to the second bedroom, his body warm in my
arms. I tucked him in, pulling the sheet up under his chin, and
pushed the blond bangs out of his eyes. I was starting to feel
avuncular, if not downright fatherly.

Kip stirred, half opened his eyes, and said,
“Did you really threaten to jam a cane up the state attorney’s
ass?”

“
Guilty.”

“
He’s such a
dweeb.”

“
A major dweeb,” I agreed.
“You should have seen him prancing around with that cane, putting
on a show.”

“
Like Raymond Burr
in
A Place in the Sun
or Everett Sloane in
The Lady from
Shanghai
.” He reached out from under the
sheets and gave my arm a squeeze. “I really like your bedtime
stories, Uncle Jake.”

“
And I really like having
you here. Now it’s lights out.”

His eyes were closing again, and as they
did, he pointed his index finger at me, as if holding a gun.

“
Go ahead,” he said, “make
my day.”

“
Good night,
Kip.”

He nodded off, and I puttered around in his
room, gathering a pile of his shorts, socks, and T-shirts that had
been balled up in a corner. Then I padded out, closing the door
without a sound. I tossed the clothes into the washer and poured in
a double dose of the detergent that is supposed to nuke grass
stains into bright, sanitary molecules. Apparently, Kip had
accomplished what none of a series of bright and attractive young
women could manage: He had civilized me.

***

Even with the ceiling fan on high and a
gentle breeze filtering through the open windows, it was sweltering
in my subtropical bedroom. Most nights, I fall asleep to the muted
slap of palm fronds against masonry and the occasional blare of a
police siren just up Douglas Road in Coconut Grove. I am darn near
the last Miamian without central air-conditioning, and I like it
that way. The old coral rock house just off Kumquat sits in a
neighborhood of delectable street names. Loquat, Avocado, and
Cocoanut are just around the corner. My house is positioned on the
tiny lot to take advantage of southeasterly winds and is shaded by
live oak, chinaberry, and poinciana trees, but still, summer nights
are hot and sticky.