Pine Island Coast Florida Box Set, page 82
part #1 of Pine Island Coast Florida Series
No one was privy to the fact that her favorite color was actually a softer version of olive green, and Sandi had no immediate plans to tell them. Locals chatting it up behind coffee cups and beer mugs and fishing poles didn’t tend to gossip much about people who had an optical affair with olive green. They did, however, gossip about Pepto pink, about a tacky sense of style. Sandi Littlejohn happened to know this and just how to capitalize on it.
“Come See Sandi...You’ll be Tickled Pink!”
This is who Tyler went to see about renting the house across the canal from Ellie’s. He had never met the lady, but she had a three o’clock available today. So Tyler had jumped in his truck and driven up to Pine Island Center. He had expected to find an eccentric, middle-aged woman wearing too much makeup who drawled on and laughed too much. What he found instead was a first rate professional.
Many of the homes in St. James City were owned by snowbirds, who came down from up north each year, generally around December, and waited for the icy snows to come and go before heading back up to their summer homes. The interim months away from Florida had many of them turning their empty properties into vacation rentals. Sandi informed Tyler that the house directly across the canal from Ellie wasn’t available. Someone was coming later this week for that one. But the one right next to it—on the north side—was; the previous party had backed out of the rental yesterday, and would he like to grab it up? Tyler thought about that for a second and told her it would be fine, just fine. A half hour after he’d walked in, Tyler left with a rental agreement, a set of keys, and, he admitted to himself, tickled pink.
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Ellie’s house was small, the rental house smaller, but it would work well for their purposes. Instead of a stunted section of grass that served as a backyard, the home boasted a screened-in Florida room that stopped a couple feet from the seawall. From there to her boat lift Ellie estimated the diagonal distance across the canal to be less than sixty feet.
After Tyler finished shaking hands with Sandy Littlejohn, he had gone to a used electronics store in Fort Myers and purchased everything on Ellie’s list. Then he went to her place and spent an hour installing hidden infrared cameras around the house while Citrus inspected them, jumping up and yipping crazily as though auditioning for Big Brother 87: Dog Edition. When Tyler was done, he gathered some of Ellie’s personal items and drove around the north end of the canal to the rental.
Citrus was thrilled at his new living arrangements. He spent the first ten minutes sniffing every square inch of the place and the next ten minutes running sprints across them. After crashing headfirst into a door jamb knocked some of the spunk out of him, he went and laid on the couch, finally falling asleep upside down, his head hanging off the cushion toward the floor.
Tyler left again for a Winn-Dixie run to stock Ellie up on some fresh groceries. While he was gone she got to work at the kitchen table, setting up the monitors he had purchased. When that was complete she opened her laptop and started programming the video feeds from her home. Once it got dark Tyler would position two more cameras on the outside of the Florida room so they could have a clear shot of Ellie’s back door and the canal in front of it.
After getting the feeds set up, Ellie checked her email. There was a message from Eugene Ripley, her Zurich-based connection who was getting her information on Ryan Wilcox’s death. He said that his Ukrainian-based informant would have the requested information to him in the next few days.
She cleared her inbox and then put in a call to her Langley contact, Nathan Price. His cell was turned off. She left him a voicemail, telling him to call, that it was urgent. Though she was no longer with the CIA, protocol still required her to report Virgil’s message to a special hotline. The idea that someone would actually follow such a procedure was almost comical to Ellie, at least in this particular situation. She didn’t know who to trust, and she wasn’t going to call a generic phone number where the wrong people would surely be keeping their ears tuned in. Nathan Price was a good man, as best she knew, and if she was going to trust anyone in the intelligence community, it would be him.
She set her phone on the table and clicked on her internet browser, intent on finding anything she could that might suggest Virgil or Cicero were in trouble. Ten minutes later, when Tyler walked in with grocery bags dangling from his fingers, Ellie was staring at her laptop screen, wiping tears off her cheeks. “What’s wrong?” he asked. He set the bags on the counter.
“Virgil. He’s...he’s dead. So is Cicero.”
“What? How?”
She motioned to her screen. Tyler squatted down and turned it toward himself. Ellie stood up and went to the couch, pulling her knees up to her chin and hugging them. Citrus woke up, took a quick look at his owner, and rested his chin on her feet. The news article detailed a patient who had escaped Banner Hospital in Phoenix and murdered a local pawn shop owner before dying from trauma. The patient was also connected to several deaths up in Flagstaff a couple days prior.
Tyler scrolled back up the page. “When was this?”
“Yesterday.”
“It doesn’t say what happened in Flagstaff,” he said.
“There's a couple other tabs in the browser. From all I can tell Virgil ran into an ambush or an assassination attempt. I think he or Cicero may have killed the team that came after them, but he was injured getting away.”
“It says that Virgil killed a pawn shop owner?”
“No. That is not what happened. Whoever failed to kill him in Flagstaff came after him and set him up. If I had to guess, that shop owner took him in after he got away from the hospital. Somehow they found him anyway.” She looked over at Tyler. “That’s why Virgil called and left me that message.” She choked on her next words. “And that’s why he never called back.”
Tyler stood up and went to the couch. He nudged Citrus. “Give me some room, Bucko.” Citrus, who knew something was off and was still recovering from a concussion, quietly moved over. Tyler sat down next to Ellie and took her in his arms. She laid her head on his shoulder. “I’m so sorry,” he said.
They sat there for several minutes while Ellie kept wiping tears away. “I’m so angry,” she said. “What the hell is going on?”
“I know you think we shouldn't get the cops involved, but now—”
“No.” Her voice was crisp. “The very reason Virgil escaped from the hospital is because he knew the authorities couldn’t protect him. Did you see in that article about his wounds? He didn’t bolt in that condition because he hated the food. If I call the police I will have no control over this. The assassin won’t show the way I think he will, and he’ll find a way around them. Let’s just stick to the plan.”
He stood up, walked to the Florida room, and looked across the canal toward her house. He folded his arms. “Fine. No cops. But I don’t like it.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chewy pushed on the door to the fishing shack, and Andrés followed him in. Looking around, Chewy sat on a wooden crate next to the air compressor. Andrés remained standing and peered through the small window toward Cayo Costa.
Chewy was wearing a new trench coa: same brand, same tobacco brown. It rested a little stiff across his shoulders, and he was thinking maybe it just needed breaking in when he heard the drone of a boat engine drawing nearer from the south. It slowed on its approach to the shack and finally cut off. A minute later Quinton appeared in the doorway, smiling.
“Gentlemen,” he said. Andrés turned away from the window. “Thank you both for meeting me out here.” He motioned toward Andrés’s feet. “Andrés, I wouldn’t stand right there. It looks sturdy, but that area of the floor is rotten on the underside. I’d hate for you to take an unexpected swim.”
Andrés smiled. “Thank you.”
Quinton ran a hand up the wall. “As soon as I can come about some more wood, this old girl will be right as rain.” He turned back to his associates. “I’ll be brief,” Quinton said. “You know that when I left for my trip this past spring I was fulfilling a promise.”
Both men nodded.
“However, in my extended absence I had also agreed to see what connections I could make for us in other cities. Most of them weren’t right for our purposes or present business model. However, there was one in particular that I think will be a good fit for us. Especially since Nunez is no longer around. So, for now, I’m going to divert a quarter of what we bring in to an alternate distributor. Neither of you will need to move inland. It will just remain at the drop off. I’ve gotten someone else to handle pickup.”
Andrés shot a concerned glance toward Chewy, who kept his gaze on Quinton.
“Who is it?” Chewy asked.
“For now, since it’s a new relationship, I want to see how it shakes out before I bring all of us into it.”
“They are just moving it for us as a new distributor?” Andrés asked. “Because with Cèsar gone our relationship with Ángeles Negros has never been better. His replacement has been worthy of the role.”
Quinton wavered, and when he did Chewy felt a prickling sensation on the back of his neck. He said, “Quinton, we are behind you, you know that. You and Ringo...we respect you both.”
“What is your concern, Chewy?”
“But why will you not just tell us who it is?”
“That’s fair,” Quinton said. “I know I’ve been gone, but from all that I can see and from what Ringo has told me the angle we’ve had with Kyle Armstrong and his distillery has been what my grandfather would have called the right size wrench. It was a perfect fit for us. Now that Mr. Armstrong has jumped off the deep end—” Quinton chuckled. “Excuse the pun. Now that Mr. Armstrong has made it so that we can’t work with him any longer, I’m pursuing a new direction. And it’s going to benefit all of us. A lot. I can promise you that. Expect to see your personal cash flows spike as we move forward. As soon as I’m happy with this new contact, I’ll bring you both in on it.”
“We already get paid very fairly,” Chewy noted.
“Yes. Yes, I know. But sometimes you just have to ‘put yourself at the front of the line to get that coin while you still have time’.” He grinned, more so with his eyes than his mouth. “Right, Chewy?” Chewy, stunned, just sat on the crate. “Anyway,” Quinton continued, “I’m excited for our future together.” He looked at his watch. “I’ve got to run. Just make sure to shut the door when you leave.” Then Quinton walked out of the shack, got in his boat, and headed back toward St. James City.
Andrés turned back to look out the window. “Chewy, why do I feel something is not right?”
Chewy stood and adjusted his coat across his shoulders. He felt it too. But he couldn’t fully decide if it was because Quinton wasn’t letting them in on the new business relationship or if it was because he had just heard Quinton quote Larry Lawrence as if it was the most natural thing in the world, as if he had listened to Larry enough to—to—to quote him.
And it was then, for only the briefest of moments, that Chewy felt something he had not experienced in his entire life.
He felt hot.
Chapter Thirty
Tyler rubbed the sandpaper across the wood, smoothing out the putty that he had scraped across the nail holes a couple days prior. Particle dust fell to the deck and was quickly taken away by a good breeze coming off the water.
No one had shown at Ellie’s house last night. Tyler had slept on the couch of the rental, and they took shifts watching the video feeds. Sometime around two in the morning Ellie woke Tyler up for his shift. They ended up talking at the kitchen table, and it was then that Ellie decided to tell him about her midnight escapades to work alongside the homeless. Javier said she was to be at the pickup spot the next evening, and if they didn’t see anything on the monitors before then, Ellie was going to need Tyler to watch them while she was out.
He listened to her reasons and logic before saying anything. After saying he thought she was simply jonesing for trouble, he’d left it at that and told her to get her butt in the bed.
Now, as Tyler rubbed at the dried wood putty, a seagull swooped down and hovered a few feet from him. It landed, cocked its head, and looked at him suspiciously. “What’s the word, big fella?” He put his knees onto the deck and started at the bottom rail when he heard Gloria’s lusty voice come around the corner. “Oh, Ellie? No, she’s down at the Keys for a couple days.”
Tyler stood up. He let the sandpaper fall to the deck and wiped his hands on his jeans. The gull snatched at the sandpaper, took several cautious steps, and took flight.
“I think she’s planning on being back by tomorrow night,” Gloria was saying. Tyler walked inside The Salty Mangrove’s now semi-covered seating area and passed through the small kitchen before stepping behind the bar. He grabbed a glass, filled it with water, and drank slowly, looking nowhere in particular. The man speaking with Gloria was about his own height, but thick muscles were clearly defined beneath his polo shirt. He had a red beard and wore a nondescript ball cap and sunglasses.
“Oh, Tyler,” Gloria said, “this is an old friend of Ellie’s...I’m sorry, I think I forgot your name. Did you tell me your name?”
Fu was busy shaking his head no when the man said, “I don’t know that I did. Dugan. Dugan Spencer.”
Tyler nodded a hello and wiped a couple droplets from his mouth with the back of his hand. “Just passing through?” Tyler asked.
“Yes. I have a business meeting down in Naples tomorrow. Was hoping I could catch her on my way down there.”
“She’ll hate that she missed you,” Gloria said.
“You guys go back a ways?” Tyler asked.
“Way back. College days. I’d heard from a mutual friend that she was still down here. No big deal.”
Tyler looked at the newcomer. “Do you want to leave your number so she can call?”
“Nah, I’d better be going anyway. I’ll connect with her another time.”
He said goodbye, and while Fu was muttering in Chinese to Gloria about another one of Ellie’s secret boyfriends, Tyler watched the man get back in a skiff and ride it south toward Sanibel. Then he grabbed up his truck keys from behind the counter and jogged down the ramp to the parking lot.
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“Here, hand me that pencil.” Tyler looked around for a piece of paper. Not immediately seeing one he leaned over to the bookshelf hanging above the kitchen table and pulled out a Randy Wayne White hardback. He opened the front flap and pulled out the dust jacket. He set the book aside, flipped over the dust jacket, and sat down. Using a forearm to keep the paper flush against the table, he spent the next couple minutes scratching away on the paper like a frenzied accountant. He rubbed at it with his thumb a few times and tilted his head in concentration. Finally he was done and he leaned away from it for Ellie to review. She stood over the portrait and was about to comment on his skills when she registered the man represented by hard pencil lines and soft smudges.
A sensation like melting ice chips trickled down her spine. “This guy?” she said. “You’re sure?”
“What do you mean am I sure? This was the guy. I mean he had sunglasses on, but...” He examined her expression. “Wait. You know him?”
She pulled out a chair and sat down, then rubbed at her temples. “It doesn’t make sense,” she groaned. “How could it be him?”
“Who? Who is he?”
“Trigg Deneford,” she said, still unbelieving, still confused. She spent the next five minutes filling Tyler in on the Nunez operation a couple months ago and Deneford’s role in it. How he had used his cover at Hawkwing Security to bring in tons of cocaine from Mexico. How it had been his operation that had used the old boat at Mondongo Rocks to store gas for their boats back to Mexico. She told him how it was Deneford who had bruised her ribs in the takedown that forced her to take it easy for three weeks.
“So maybe he’s just back for revenge,” he said. “Maybe it’s a coincidence that he’d show up at the same time as you got Virgil’s message.” But then he shook his head. “That’s too much of a coincidence.”
“Trigg got out of jail because someone high up pulled some strings,” Ellie said. “Whoever he’s working for must be tied into my old team somehow. But that would mean that they are some kind of top brass. Very few even knew about my team.”
“Revenge?” Tyler offered up. “For something you did when you were with the Agency?”
“Yeah. Could be.” But we disbanded four years ago. Why just now? She had no answers, and no facts at all from which to deduce any. She gathered herself, sitting up straight and rubbing her hands together. “Okay, well. Now we know who we’re dealing with. Trigg Deneford and anyone he brings along with him.”
Tyler said, “Since we know who’s after you now, let’s just call the police and let them in on it.”
“No. Nothing’s changed. Deneford—this guy is an ex-Navy SEAL. If a blade of grass is out of place or a shadow displaced, he won’t show. He’ll do it another way.”
“I can’t believe we’re sitting here talking about a guy who wants to kill you and I was five feet from him earlier today. I should have just beat his ass right there.”
