Glaring at the administrator, I spit out my words, “Can I keep this?”
He takes an involuntary step back, caused no doubt by either my expression or the tone of my voice or both. “Yes, of course, Mr. DelaSangre. We have plenty of copies in the office.”
My lips compress against my teeth. It takes all my self-control not to strike this fat, simpering, pompous little man.
Maxwell realizes what he’s said and blanches. “Not that anyone’s going to keep any of the copies. I’ve already ordered that all of them be thrown out. There’s no place for trash like that in an institution like ours.”
I nod, fold the paper, stuff it in the open compartment below the boat’s wheel. Without another word to Maxwell, I yank the wheel all the way over and throw the boat in gear, the motors roaring as I accelerate into a turn just tight enough to miss scraping the seawall on the other side of the channel.
As soon as I straighten out, I gun the motors and race out the channel throwing a vicious wake behind me that crashes water over the seawalls, dislodging a few of the school’s prams, washing them into the channel. Ordinarily such rude seamanship would draw an angry rebuke from the school. But I doubt that Maxwell feels anything but relief to see me gone.
As soon as I clear the channel, I jam the throttles to full speed and mindspeak to Chloe, masked so Henri can’t hear us, {
I’m going to the office before I come home. Remember the photographer I told you about? A couple of weeks ago? Some damn paper has the picture—Henri and me—plastered all over its front page.
}
{
It’s just a picture, Henri. There are worse things than that.
}
{
It’s not just the picture,
} I mindspeak.
Chloe says, {
Peter, I rung up Mum—like you suggested. She was furious. She can’t stand to hear it ring. Mum swears she’s throwing out the phone. Anyway, I just got off the phone with her—
}
I interrupt her
.
{
They have an article too! About me and Maria Santos and her brother, Jorge.
}
{
Now? After all these years? Why?
}
{
It’s all the disappearances. They’ve interviewed the Santos’s cousin, Pepe, and now they’re questioning whether I might have something to do with all the missing boaters.
} I turn the boat left, head for the old seaplane channel just north of Dinner Key Marina.
{
Peter, that’s terrible. How can they do that? Couldn’t your people stop them?
}
I pass the main channel marker, slam the wheel over so violently that the Grady White skitters sideways as it turns toward Monty’s docks. {
Maybe they could have stopped them. If they knew about it. We don’t own any stock in that paper. It’s too damned small. We own enough to control all the majors. Who’d have thought that a piece of crap like the
Dish
would ever bother us?
}
{The Weekly Dish
?
} Chloe mindspeaks.
{
That’s the one.
} I cut back on the throttles as soon as I speed past the NO WAKE sign at the entrance to Monty’s marina. It’s one thing to rock a few little sailboats, quite another to send a few millions of dollars worth of motor boats crashing into their docks and each other.
{
I’ll look it up online. But I fear there’s worse, Peter.
}
I groan, mindspeak, {
What now?
}
{
Mum says Derek’s gone. She says he disappeared more than three months ago.
}
6
Ordinarily I enjoy the leisurely pace of the final approach to the docks, cruising the last few hundred yards to my slip at Monty’s, the Yamahas rumbling gently, everything slowing down after a fast dash across the bay. But now I grit my teeth, tap my hand against the boat’s wheel as the Grady White glides through the water, leaving only ripples in its wake.
Today I wish I could ignore the NO WAKE signs. I just want to dock the boat and get to the office.
I can’t stop thinking about my brother-in-law, Derek Blood. I shake my head as I maneuver into my slip. I go from wondering if he’s somewhere in Miami to doubting that he could be so stupid. After all, he is Chloe’s older brother. He shares the same genetic background with her. But I have to admit he’s never exhibited any of the cleverness I’ve seen in the rest of her family.
The very clumsiness of all the disappearances. The very greed of taking so many, in such a small area, in so short a time all point to someone as limited in scope and judgment as my brother-in-law. I tie the boat off, roll up my copy of
The Weekly Dish
and jump onto the dock.
Fortunately, it’s a weekday and the dock’s clear of other boaters. I have no patience to tolerate idle chat now, no willingness to suffer any fools. Should someone interfere with me today, I’ll gladly lash out at them.
I huff out a loud sigh. The creature would be dead now if it weren’t for his sister’s intercession. Had I killed Derek three years ago, when he and his father tried to take over my company and my holdings, he would be no worry today. But this time, if Derek has been stupid enough to return to Miami, I doubt Chloe will intervene on his behalf again.
Rushing down the dock, I ignore the few workers readying the tables under the thatch-top cheekee huts at Monty’s outdoor dining patio nearby. I realize only after I first place foot on the asphalt surface of the restaurant’s parking lot that I’m barefoot. Unless I plan to go ashore, I rarely wear more than cutoffs and a tank top when I take Henri to school.
No matter. I smile. Few people pay notice to any of the many boaters who walk around near the Grove’s waterfront. The guards at the Monroe building are used to seeing me come in dressed for boating. Surely my bare feet will hardly register with them.
Striding across South Bayshore Drive, I pay no attention to the stoplight or to the cars that screech to a halt or zoom around me. I barely glance up at the Monroe building on the southwest corner of the intersection. I know full well the height of it, the green-and-beige design of its exterior. It, like the company it houses on its topmost floors, belongs to me.
Men in dark suits and women in equally stuffy business dress come and go from the six brass-door elevators that service most of the building. The two guards who oversee this constant bustle spot me as soon as I enter the marble-floored foyer. They ignore everyone else, rush to keep up with me as I walk to the private elevator on the other side of the lobby—the only one that goes to LaMar Associates’ executive offices.
“Mr. DelaSangre, how you doing today?” says the heavier of the guards, a pock-faced man who I remember goes by the name of Harry.
I nod, force a smile and walk on. At the elevator door, I put my hand in my pocket and find it empty. “Damn!” I say. “Look, Harry, would you use your key? Mine’s at home.”
The man’s rough face flushes pink. His right hand reaches for the ring of keys hanging from his belt, then drops away from it. “Mr. DelaSangre, you know I’m not supposed to use my key without Mr. Tindall’s permission. You know how he is.”
I nod. I know exactly how Ian Tindall is and I understand the guard’s fear of him. Unlike Arturo Gomez, who likes to warn people before he acts, Ian never tolerates any violation of his rules. To him any offense, no matter how trivial, merits at least immediate dismissal. I’ve seen him do worse to the few employees who’ve been stupid enough as to openly oppose him.
Still, the security guard should know better than to refuse me. “Did you forget who Ian works for, Harry?” I spit out. “Open the damn door!” I also tell him to call ahead, tell Ian, Arturo and his daughter, Claudia, to meet me in my office.
The elevator door opens opposite LaMar Associates’ reception desk. Sarah, the receptionist, already standing, says, “Good morning, Mr. DelaSangre. Mr. Gomez and Mr. Tindall have been notified that you need to see them in your office. Ms. Gomez won’t be in for a few more minutes. She called to say she’d been delayed.”
I nod and say, “Thank you, Sarah,” and grin at her rigid posture, the forced smile on her face. Whenever I’m near her, the woman gives off an aroma tinged with just the slightest acrid scent of fear. Understandable, I suppose. With a word I could have her gone.
Still, I wonder. Other than Sarah’s timidity in my presence and her constant battle with her weight, I know little about her. Father told me a few humans, very few, can sense our difference.
“They don’t understand it. They just know we make them uneasy. You have to watch for them, Peter. Fear always makes humans unpredictable.”
I’m tempted to stay near her for a while—just see how she’ll cope with it. “It’s beautiful out there today,” I say.
Sarah’s eyes widen. She looks around the room, down the mahogany-paneled corridor, then lets out a sigh. “Oh, there’s Mr. Tindall,” she says.
Turning, I see the tall, skeletal frame of LaMar Associates’ legal counsel and co-manager. “Peter!” he says, his black suit obviously well tailored but still hanging loose on his too-thin body, his pale, thin lips pressed into an insincere smile as he reaches out to take my hand. “This is an unexpected pleasure.”
I take his bony hand in mine, squeeze it just hard enough to make him wince. Father never tired of warning me.
“Never trust any of them. I’ve never seen an honest Tindall. They’re nothing but scoundrels. But useful,”
he said.
“After all, what need would we have for an honest lawyer—if we could find such a thing?”
Ian talks about sports, the Miami Heat basketball team, as he follows me down the hall to my office. “You should let me get tickets to the games for you and Chloe next year,” he says. “Everyone goes to them, the mayor, the archbishop, everyone important.”
I enter my office, barely glance out the large window overlooking the marina and Biscayne Bay beyond it and sit down behind my desk, putting
The Weekly Dish
face down on the desktop, motioning for Ian to take one of the leather seats facing me. “Just what I need,” I say. “Chloe’s already talked me into season tickets at the Coconut Grove Theater, the Philharmonic and the Theater of the Performing Arts on Miami Beach.”
The thin man waves his hand as if to dismiss my objections. “Don’t forget, Peter. I’m the one you called to arrange your seats. You may complain a lot, but I know you love doing it for her,” Tindall says.
“True,” I say, nodding, thinking about my wife and her desire to expose herself to all the things she missed growing up in her secluded valley. Because of her, I’ve seen more theater, more music and more art in the last few years than in all the rest of my life.
A waft of Aramis cologne enters the room. I shake my head. Wishing that sometimes my sense of smell could be dulled, I look toward the doorway. The scent of Arturo Gomez’s amply applied cologne always precedes him. “Hi, Arturo,” I say, just before the man steps into my office.
Wearing a perfectly tailored Armani suit, his dark complexion made even darker by hours of boating in the sun, the man flashes me a smile full of bright white, capped teeth. “Peter! I didn’t expect to see you so soon.”
I nod. I own LaMar Associates, but Arturo’s the president. He and Ian Tindall and Claudia make all the day-to-day business decisions. Except for the rare occasions when I’m called in to sign papers, I come and go as I please. Since Chloe’s arrival, I’ve been pleased to come very little.
Motioning for Arturo to take the other seat in front of my desk, I wait until he sits before I push my copy of
The Weekly Dish
toward him. “Turn it over. Look at the cover page,” I say.
Arturo picks it up and lets out a soft whistle as he studies it. When he finishes, he shakes his head and passes it to Tindall. “This sucks, Peter,” he says.
Tindall mutters, “Shit, shit, shit,” as he reads. When he finishes and looks up, I say, “I don’t want to see any more of this.”
“That’s easy to say, Peter, but it’s a news story. They only quoted what Pepe Santos said. They had every legal right to do it,” Tindall says, putting the paper back on the desk.
I turn toward Arturo. Of all humans, I trust him and his daughter most. His family has served mine since Don Henri first came to America. Unlike the Tindalls, who’ve served us almost as long and who’ve been responsible for all of our legal work and our political connections, not one Gomez has ever betrayed us. “I said I want it stopped,” I say.
Arturo nods. Besides being responsible for overseeing all aspects of LaMar Associates, he is also the person I turn to when what I want can’t be accomplished by legal means. He runs his hand over his hair, going mostly gray now, but still almost as thick as when he was young. “I understand what you want. I just have to figure out how to do it. There’s more than one problem here. . . .”
Claudia Gomez rushes through the doorway, a rolled paper clutched in one hand and says, “Wow. I guess you guys saw this week’s
Dish,
huh?”
“We did,” I say.
“Bet you’re pissed,” Claudia says. “Does Chloe know?”
I nod, watch the girl as she breezes into the room, kissing her father on the cheek and doing the same to me. She acknowledges Tindall with a curt, “Hi, Ian,” and grabs a chair from by the wall, pulling it over by her father, then sitting, rearranging her short brown skirt, tugging on it to cover a bit more of her long, tanned legs before her father glares at her.