Powder Burn - Carl Hiaasen [99]
The cocaine itself also troubled Meadows. It was like a dead rat, lying there in Terry’s refrigerator. Sooner or later it would smell. He had not wanted to involve Terry. Now there seemed no other way, and that troubled Meadows. Ignore that, too. Deep down, Meadows knew, she was tougher and stronger than he could ever be.
And so was Octavio Nelson. There was no way he could be ignored. Meadows would have to take him head-on. That would be a trial and a danger. Nelson was the foundation on which Meadows’s structure of revenge had to rest. But could Meadows trust him? Probably not. Certainly not beyond the Cuban cop’s own self-interest.
Meadows watched the coconut fronds rustle in a light breeze off the sea. The night before, he had paced the beaches of Key Biscayne with Terry and Arthur. Terry thought Nelson could be trusted in his promise to forget about the Mono killing. Arthur believed otherwise.
“Nelson is shrewd and mean, and he will use anything he’s got on anybody he knows to get what he wants,” Arthur had pronounced.
“But he is latino,” Terry had objected. “If he gives his word, Arthur, then somehow he will keep it.”
“Only if it’s convenient.”
Meadows had cocked half an ear to the debate around him on the deserted beach. He thought Arthur was right, but he had taken no side. Mono would be academic to the plan Meadows was devising. Nelson would see that. Even if he had lied to Arthur, events would persuade Nelson that the Mono killing was not worth pursuing.
With the right enticement, Meadows could snare Nelson and use him as calculatingly as Nelson had used Meadows at the funeral parlor. Locked away in Terry’s apartment, Meadows had what Nelson wanted most: the lifelike sketches of a peasant, a man with a cauliflower ear and a double-faced bastard with a dazzling smile and a rose at his lapel. Or perhaps triple-faced. That flamboyant José L. Bermúdez and the faceless Jefe were the same man, Meadows knew without question. Was Bermúdez also “Ignacio” to some of his doper minions? Meadows thought back to McRae’s avuncular lecture. McRae had said the name Ignacio with the same reverence some reserved for God or the president. El Jefe-Bermúdez-Ignacio. The name was as irrelevant as Mono. Whatever he was called, Meadows would destroy him.
The sketches were vital for that. He would scatter them like chum and watch Nelson rise in pursuit like a hungry swordfish. Meadows could afford to give away the identities that Nelson craved because he had more than that. Meadows knew that Bermúdez and the Colombian chieftains would meet in Miami to formalize their alliance. He had learned that from McRae. And from what Meadows had heard from Alonzo, he suspected the cocaine summit would be soon.
Meadows couldn’t know for sure how soon until he found the missing arch. He would dedicate tomorrow to it. A two-hour search by telephone that morning had been fruitless. Meadows was sure Alonzo had said “Cumparsi’s.” He had said it was a restaurant, but Meadows had been unable to find it in the phone book or through Information.
“Cumparsi.” Meadows rolled the name over his tongue. He must have heard it wrong. But it was close, surely. Still, there had been no listing under Cu, Ca, or Co. He had even checked the G’s and the Q’s.
Tomorrow he would look in earnest. A bell captain at one of the big hotels might know. Or one of Clara Jackson’s colleagues at the Journal. If necessary, Meadows would drive block by block through Little Havana until he found it. After that it would only be a question of hammering the roof in place.
Meadows pushed himself to his