Powder Burn - Carl Hiaasen [103]
NELSON FELT DAZED. His head throbbed. He had gone to the shopping center without expectation. Señora Lara, he had decided, would be a crank or an angry wife who had read someplace that cops made good lays. Well, she had been spectacular. And the elliptical architect had been simply bewildering: castles in the air. Had Meadows flipped out? It would be tempting to believe that, but he hadn’t seemed crazy—just single-minded and as idealistic as ever.
With a sigh Nelson wrestled open the glove compartment of the police Plymouth and dragged out the aspirin. Then he turned on the dome light and opened the package Meadows had given him.
The book was called Shark Fishing in Florida Waters. Nelson was about to toss it into the back seat when he felt the folded paper inside the cover.
There were three sheets: a peasant, a boxer with a bad ear and a man whose well-known grace and power seemed to leap off the page. When he fanned out the three sketches on the steering wheel before him, Octavio Nelson realized his hands were shaking.
LATER, AS THEY LAY in bed, Terry nibbled at Meadows’s right ear. “I think you are brilliant, querido. But now that he has the sketches, do you really believe Nelson will wait for the week he promised you?”
“No, of course not. He might get Cauliflower Ear and the Peasant, and if he does, so much the better. But he won’t get Bermúdez in a week—the man’s wound his cocoon of legitimacy too tightly around him.”
Terry was silent for a time.
“Chris, that pistol Nelson talked about,” she said at last. “It’s mine, isn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“How did he know about it?”
“I’ve been thinking about that. I think Nelson must have come here one day while you were flying and I was in Fort Lauderdale.”
“If he knows about this apartment, then he probably also knows we are here right now.”
“Yeah, but he won’t bother us now. He has too much else on his plate. He’ll wait to see how things develop.”
Terry shivered.
“He scares me, Chris.”
“He doesn’t miss a thing. But for now at least, he’s no threat.”
“And your insistence on letting justice have its way with Bermúdez? Do you think Nelson believed it?”
“I hope so.” Meadows left the second half of his response unspoken: I almost believed it myself.
Terry’s fingers marched like soldiers with a mission along the inside of Meadows’s thigh.
“Sometimes, querido,” she whispered, “you scare me, too.”
Chapter 26
JOSÉ L. BERMÚDEZ pressed the button for the twentieth floor. His hand explored a breast pocket of his pale suit. The speech was still there. One of the secretaries would have to retype it before noon. He hit the 20 button again, and the elevator doors whispered together, then stopped.
A huge black hand had inserted itself.
Bermúdez hit the Door Open button. “I’m sorry,” he said hastily. “I didn’t see you.”
“That’s all right,” a voice answered. A massive barn door of a black man strolled into the elevator. He wore a neat dark suit with a silvery tie on a French shirt. A lush, symmetrical Afro cut sprouted from his head. A finger the size of a small blackjack tapped the 19 button.
Bermúdez stared up at his early-morning companion.
“Excuse me,” he said. “I can’t help but asking, but do you play pro football?”
Arthur Prim smiled bashfully.
“I thought so! For the Dolphins, right?” Bermúdez was jubilant.
“The Steelers,” Arthur said.
His eyes fell on the brown leather briefcase the banker carried. He studied it for a few seconds, then looked up at the indicator light as the elevator hummed toward the top of the building.
“The Steelers have a fine team,” Bermúdez offered.
Arthur nodded confidently.
“I’m a Dolphins fan myself. I have season tickets on the forty,” Bermúdez said. “I haven’t missed a game in two years.”
“Yeah?”
The elevator doors opened on the nineteenth floor.
Bermúdez suddenly set down the briefcase and extended his right hand. “I’m José Bermúdez,” he said. “Nice to meet you.”
Arthur Prim shook his hand. “I’m Terry Bradshaw,” he said, stepping off.
FROM NIGHT TO NIGHT the dream changed little. Always