Powder Burn - Carl Hiaasen [77]
Manny dug into his jeans and pulled out an amber glassine container. He unscrewed the cap and dipped a tiny spoon. “You want a blast?”
Meadows shook his head.
“Know why Moe didn’t turn over? Maybe Moe should tell this story.”
“Manny, leave Chris alone,” Patti said. “I don’t think he’s interested in any of this.”
“Oh, I think the real estate man is very interested. Am I right?”
Meadows tightened. For a moment he thought Manny was going to lunge at him and break him in half like a cracker. The Cuban was waiting for some kind of answer, and Meadows realized sickeningly he could not even speak the language.
“Like I said, business is slow.”
Manny cackled. “Times are tough. You should get hold of some condos. Condos move real good down here. Patti, how about another beer? Anyway, Christopher, you want to know why Moe didn’t flip? Patti’s heard this story.”
“A million times,” she said on her way to the kitchen.
“Joey Dent.”
“Yeah.” Meadows felt like standing under a hot shower until Manny and his friend rinsed away.
“Joey Dent was a friend. Pat knew him, too. Very heavy into the export-import, import-export business. But at a safe and respectable level. One day he does a dumb thing and goes along for the ride. A DC-6 lands at Opa-Locka one night, tries to land, I should say, but the nose gear snaps like a twig, and the plane skids off the runway. Twelve fire trucks show up. Joey Dent’s legs are broken, and the pilot is dead. They haul Joey out of the plane and kablam! Two million bucks’ worth of grass and ludes.
“It’s four in the morning, Joey Dent is in Parkway General and in walk two DEA jerkoffs. ‘Your wife, your kids, your house, your mistress, all down the toilet, Joey. Help us out, and you fly like an eagle. We’ll send you off to Montana with a new name and a little ranch in the valley. It’s so nice out there, Joey. If you don’t help, however, we send you to Atlanta for seven years. By the time you get out your wife will be gone with the TV repairman and the kids won’t recognize you.’ Dammit, can you get this open? My hands are wet.” Manny tossed the cold bottle of Miller’s across the room, and Meadows snatched it before it hit the tile. He wrapped a corner of the terry-cloth robe he was wearing around the cap and twisted it off. He handed it back to Manny, and the smuggler drank half in four huge gulps.
“Imagine you’re Joey Dent,” he went on. “You’ve just had the shit scared out of you in a plane wreck; you’re lying broken up in a hospital and loaded on Dilaudid. And these two DEA pricks tell you your life is over.”
“He talked,” Patti said wearily.
“Yup. Joey Dent talked. Two of the men he worked for got set up. And busted. They even did time, not much time, but they did go to the can. And Joey Dent never got to Montana. The feds gave him a new name, Jack Somethingorother, and moved him all the way from Miami to Tampa. Wasn’t that generous? One day Joey didn’t come home from his job at the post office. They found him in the Port Charlotte waterway. Before he died, someone cut off his tongue with pruning shears. Then they shot him in the head.” Manny drained the Miller’s. “So you see why Moe didn’t mind Eglin at all.”
“It works the same way everywhere,” Meadows said casually. He had heard plenty of these stories from Octavio Nelson, bless his black heart.
“Hey, I wasn’t trying to scare you,” Manny said.
“Like hell,” Patti hissed.
“I just wanted you to know why Moe’s so…careful. He doesn’t trust many people. He’s a good influence on me. He’s saved my ass more than once.”
“Well, he’s not going to save your ass from Susan if you don’t call her,” Patti said. The phone