The Riptide Ultra-Glide (22 page)

“Not nothing.” Gaspar tapped ash onto the floor. “Here's what you get: We take all the risk with the raids, from the clinics to the pharmacies, and you've got secured transport to the motel of your choice. Any losses come out of my end. From there, it's a cakewalk. You save the entire travel expense of shipping your crew down, plus my price is lower than otherwise because we were able to persuade the clinics to accept our group health insurance rates.”

The people in the beach painting were not speaking to each other at the time it was painted. Their daughter was dating a man suspected of being against the Vietnam War and Puerto Rican. Their vacation ended early when the mother suffered a bout of sensitive gums. The next year they put a new roof on the house and received word that a distant cousin wasn't actually related.

Gaspar blew smoke rings and overstated a gesture with his right arm. “If you prefer, I'll even buy a horse trailer and guarantee transport all the way to Ocala. For a modest fee, of course.”

“What if I say no?”

“You will never leave this room.”

“Two can play.” Catfish smirked. “Then nobody leaves this room.”

Gaspar tapped more ash. “One thing you should know: I love American movies. And you've got a pair of big ones coming in here alone. But you're not stupid. If I was in your shoes, I'd have a posse waiting outside with instructions to eliminate all of us if you didn't come out of the room. Or if you came out under duress, like a gun in your back. Was that the plan?”

The door opened. Catfish turned around. His men were marched into the room with guns in their backs. One of them looked at Catfish. “What was the plan if they brought us inside?”

Gaspar stood up and stubbed out the stogie. “Seven days. Same room if that's agreeable to you. One-fifty for two shipments. The rest of this and the next . . . I'll take that as a yes. Now go.”

Catfish grabbed the briefcase and led his men back into the sunshine.

The people in the beach painting were all dead now.

Chapter Twenty-three

MEANWHILE . . .

T
he sun was high and bright over the strip on U.S. 1. People continued going about their business loitering at boarded-up gas stations.

A curtain parted a slit in room 17 at the Casablanca Inn.

“You can't keep peeking out the window,” said Patrick McDougall.

“Why not?” asked Bar, secretly watching black Jeeps and a Durango.

“Because it's not healthy,” said Pat.

Barbara's eyeballs rotated the other way. “Nothing about this vacation is healthy.”

“But we've stayed cooped up in this room for hours ever since the police left.”

“Baltimore!”

“Forget about the luggage,” said Pat. “We need to get out of this room.”

“There's no way I'm unlocking that door!”

“Let's go to the beach.”

“How can you think about the beach at a time like this?”

“Because it's better than staying crammed in here letting our thoughts feed on themselves.”

Bar let the curtain close and turned around. “You're really serious about going to the beach?”

“It's the best thing in every way.” Pat grabbed their canvas bag. “We get out of this room and its negative energy, as well as all of U.S. 1. Then we relax at the beach and maybe start seeing things more clearly.”

“But the police . . .” She pointed at the curtains. “Last night at the Oasis.”

“When you think about it, the whole thing's crazy,” said Pat. “It's probably just random weird stuff. You've read the articles about Florida. We're probably letting our imaginations run wild.”

“Everyone out there's insane.” She opened the curtains again. “Look at that guy with the space helmet.”

Pat came up from behind and gave his wife a shoulder rub. “Bar, you know we're the worrying types. It's because we're responsible. But most likely all that business across the street was nothing. So we can either enjoy the beach, and have great stories when we get back, or we can stress out in this room and always have regrets.”

She turned around and hugged him. “I guess you're right. Let's go to the beach.”

“Now you're talking.” Pat headed for the bathroom and his toothbrush. “Should I take a shower?”

“We're going swimming.”

“Good point.” Pat pulled up his swim trunks and grabbed a chair.

Bar stood by the door. “I'm ready.”

“One more second.” Pat stuck her purse up in the ceiling. “Hey, I found my stolen wallet.”

“You mean your
lost
wallet?”

“That's what I meant.” He grabbed it and hopped down. “Now we can go.”

The rented Impala took the same road east back to the beach. Bar's head turned as a large building went by. “We never got to jai alai last night.”

“We'll go this evening.”

“Sorry for being a drag back in the room.” Bar put on dark, movie-star sunglasses. “I guess I'm not cut out to live here.”

Pat took a hand off the steering wheel and placed it on top of hers. “Don't ever say you're a drag. It was a perfectly normal reaction, which is why we're such a great team. Remember yesterday when I started to unravel after the fraud call from the credit-card people? And you talked sense into me?”

“I love you.” Bar leaned and snuggled into his arm. “Let's go have a nice romantic date . . . Watch out!”

Screeeeeech.

Pat swerved back into his own lane and grabbed his heart. “Jesus, we almost had a head-on!”

“Oh, honey, I'm so sorry,” said Bar. “It's all my fault for grabbing your arm.”

“Don't blame yourself,” said Pat. “But maybe we should just focus until we turn the car off at the beach.”

HOLLYWOOD BEACH

S
erge! Watch out!”

“Piece of cake.” Serge grabbed the first jellyfish in an oven mitt and flung it through the air, tentacles trailing in an aerodynamic arc. “Nothing gets by me: slap shots, one-timers, wraparounds, screens, rebounds, deflections.” Another jellyfish went sailing.

Coleman crouched precariously behind Serge's left shoulder. “The gloves I get, but what's with the rest of the getup?”

Fling. “My goalie uniform. Most people have no idea the degree of jellyfish protection that simple panty hose provides because they think, hey, water can get through panty hose. But a jellyfish sting isn't like a surface burn: Its tentacles release teensy-weensy nematocysts that pierce the skin and inject venom.” He raised an arm to illustrate. “But women's leg wear thwarts their invertebrate designs!”

Coleman watched another translucent orb go flying. “What's with that electrical bolt you drew in Magic Marker across your panty-hose vest?”

“For the Tampa Bay Lightning.” Serge corralled another jelly. “So my goalie uniform will be traditional.”

“Look at that next wave,” said Coleman. “There's a whole bunch more.”

“It's called a bloom,” said Serge. “Just stay down behind me.”

“How'd you know it would be here?”

“Because the chamber of commerce said it wouldn't.” Two more globs went airborne. “But I follow the scientific Web sites. So in addition to protecting you, I'm also the final defense of the tourist swimming public.” Another flying jellyfish launched with gusto. “And preventing unproductive headlines back up north.”

“Michigan?”

Serge nodded. “The last ice age carved out five big lakes, and we've never stopped hearing how
great
they are.”

“They're living in the past.”

“Fuck glaciers.” Serge looked at his hands. “And what the hell am I doing?”

“I thought you were inventing a new sport.”

“Changed my mind. I'm covered in panty hose. That's ridiculous.” Serge blinked hard. “I need to filter out some of these ideas that pop into my head, but there are so many, like you know that mega-sporting-goods store called Outdoor World? Except the whole store is indoors. Your head will explode if you don't learn how to let that kind of stuff go.”

A tap on his shoulder. “Serge.”

“What?”

Coleman pointed backward. “There's a dude up on the beach hanging around our stuff. He looks suspicious.”

“Good,” said Serge. “I was waiting for him.”

“How do you know who it is if you aren't even looking?”

“I
don't
know who it is.” Serge turned around. “But I know his type. And I knew he'd finally come. You think this was just about jellyfish hockey?”

“What is it about?”

“Fighting crime. For some reason, robbery really makes tourists gabby.”

“But how can you fight crime way out here in the water?”

“Observe as the Master Plan unfolds.”

“But I thought you already had a Master Plan.”

“The number one directive of any decent Master Plan is unlimited sub–Master Plans.”

Coleman gazed toward the beach. “I was right. He's deliberately trying to act casual, but really checking out our shit.”

Serge gazed off to admire clouds. “Is he going for my shoe yet?”

“As a matter of fact, reaching for it right now.”

“He's going for my wallet. Excellent.”

“But then he'll steal it. How is that good?”

“Because it's my backup wallet. You always take your backup wallet to the beach, containing just the bare essentials: driver's license, one credit card, fifty in cash.”

“But he's still stealing that stuff. Aren't you mad?”

Serge shook his head. “My backup wallet doesn't contain any of that. It stands alone among backup wallets everywhere.”

“How does it stand alone?”

A horrible scream from the beach.

Serge smiled. “That's how.”

A man grabbed his face, running in hysterical circles, trampling others' blankets.

“He'll soon be paying us a visit,” said Serge.

“How do you know?”

“Because jumping in the water is the natural reaction,” said Serge. “I got a small piece of string and rigged my wallet so that when you open it, a tiny key-chain canister of pepper gas is activated.”

Coleman pointed. “Here he comes now. Right toward us.”

“Let's give him a hand.”

The thief splashed out toward them and dunked his head. He rubbed his eyes and dunked again. The screaming stopped. Another dunk. He opened his eyes to slits, blood-red, puffing up. But at least the discomfort was fading.

“Are you all right?” asked Serge, splashing forward and reaching the bandit. “Maybe I can help.”

Serge steadied the unsteady man by holding him around the ribs with a pair of rubber oven gloves.

A two-second delay.

The thief's eyes flew open wide from the searing agony across his chest. He dashed back toward the beach, screaming even louder.

“Ooops,” said Serge, turning his hands over. “I forgot that my gloves are full of nematocysts. And since I handled so many of the little buggers, it's like that poor guy got stung all at once by at least twenty jellyfish.”

“Look at him run,” said Coleman.

“It is a motivator.” Serge marched toward shallow water. “I'm getting hungry.”

They returned to their personal space in the sand. Coleman began rolling up his beach towel. Serge stood over a trash can, carefully peeling off gloves.

Whispers behind them. Three different youths.

“It's Coleman! . . .”

“Quiet, he's working . . .”

“I just knew he'd have a Bob Marley towel . . .”

Coleman looked up. “What's happening, dudes?”

“We don't want to bother you . . .”

Coleman mixed another rum and Coke. “Nothing's really going on right now.”

A man ran screaming across the towels.

Coleman chugged from the can. “How can I help you?”

“Do you have a tip that can impress our friends? Something nobody else knows?”

“Let's see . . .” Coleman looked at the sky and tapped his chin. He finally raised a single finger of epiphany. “I got it.” He crawled across the sand and pulled a bottle from the beach bag. “If you've procured some primo 'shrooms or peyote buttons, select the type of sunscreen that has an amphibious moisturizing agent, which retards porous excretion, hence retaining the psychoactive ingredient for a more prolonged and potent ride.”

“Whoa, that is so cutting edge,” said one of the young men. Then he looked in Serge's direction. “Do panty hose work on the same principle?”

“No,” said Coleman. “He was playing hockey.”

“But tell us,” asked another youth. “How did you know about the excretion concept?”

Coleman finished off his rum and burped. “It's the same reason that heroin addicts don't take showers before spiking.” He then pointed at them in earnest. “But don't do heroin. Even though it created some really great music, the Big H is still a heartbreak.”

The trio nodded. “I think we got it.”

“Repeat it back,” said Coleman.

“Use sunscreen; don't do heroin.”

Coleman nodded. “Carry on.”

The trio walked away in delight.

Serge stepped up next to his buddy and watched the kids leave. “ ‘Use sunscreen; don't do heroin.' . . . If you could give the entire human race only one sentence of advice, I think you've just nailed it.”

Coleman stuffed Bob Marley in the canvas bag. “I'm ready.”

“Me, too.” Serge looked down at the special gift Coleman had received from his earlier students. “I guess we'll now get to see how that thing works. And for the record, I'm still jealous. It even has special wheels for traction in the sand.”

A man grabbing his face and chest ran by screaming.

Coleman leaned down and flicked a switch. “Let's rock.”

Serge began walking back to the parking lot, and Coleman drove along beside him on an electric riding beer cooler. “What happens now?”

Serge pulled out his beach checklist. “Get caught in a riptide.”

Coleman looked up from his riding cooler. “Aren't you supposed to avoid a riptide?”

“Those people are amateurs,” said Serge. “But it's like a free theme-park ride, and perfectly safe if you're a Floridian who knows how to bust a move in the middle of one.”

“You do?”

“An aquatic dance step I invented.” Serge picked up a shell and skipped it across the water. “The Riptide Ultra-Glide.”

* * *

A
rented Impala proceeded through another marathon search for parking, which ended when the McDougalls spotted the brake lights of a departing Corvette.

“See?” said Pat. “Our fortune's changing.”

Bar stopped on the sidewalk and stared at the ocean. “It's even more beautiful than yesterday.”