Gomez cut his eyes over to Davis and said, “Get that rope from the other room.”
Davis went into the adjoining office.
“Shut up about Santana,” Gomez’s voice was flat, something drained from his eyes, replaced by half closed slits of hate. “You had to keep stickin’ your nose where it don’t belong, amigo. Now you’re a dead man. Not all gonna be lost ‘cause the good thing is this…you’ll be keepin’ somebody else alive. Part of the great cop lives on!”
Davis brought the rope. Gomez said, “Tie his hands behind the chair.”
Davis yanked my hands behind the chair and began tying the rope tightly around them. I could feel the circulation cutting off.
To Davis, Gomez said, “I’m callin’ Santana. He can get Doc out here quick. Soon as Doc arrives, we’ll pop him. Until then we’ll make him pray he’s dead.”
Gomez drove his fist square into my jaw. The blow almost turned over the chair. The force caused a white explosion in my brain. I was back in a dank interrogation room in Afghanistan, the slap of a nine milliliter across my jaw, the surge of electricity through my body. The whirl of chopper blades fading.
I spat blood and heard Davis laugh. It sounded like a laugh tract playing a second behind the first tract. Through blurred vision, I could see Gomez stepping to the open door to use his cell phone. “We got O’Brien…at the gator shack. Send Doc with all his tools…sure, Santana…no problem…got it, yeah…okay man.”
He closed the cell phone and stood in front of me. I looked up at him, blood dripping from my crushed lip and gums.
Gomez rubbed his knuckles and hooked his thumbs in his wide belt. He rocked on the ball of his ostrich skin cowboy boots. “We got a little time to kill before you go under the knife. What can we do to pass the time?”
Davis said, “We can cut his balls off. Toss ‘em in the river for the baby gators to chew on. Don’t think nobody wants recycled cop’s balls.”
My right eye was beginning to swell, closing my vision. Through my left eye, I watched him take the pistol out of his pocket. I said, “Why are you two going down for Santana? Do you think I came here alone? Santana is calling the shots from his hide-away in Miami while you two are about to be arrested. If you cooperate—”
“Shut up!” Gomez bellowed. He stepped closer and held out the pistol. “I had a feelin’, sooner or later, I’d take you out. You’re one tough dude, O’Brien, but every man’s luck runs out if he keeps on rollin’ the dice.”
Davis stood to my left, his arms folded, a smirk working on his face. “Before you waste him. I need to pee real bad. Always wanted to piss on a cop.”
“You piss on him and Doc would be pissed. He don’t have that kind of time.”
Both men laughed. Davis said, “I think Doc left one of his scalpels in the drawer. We can use it to scalp him. Maybe that’s where they got the name scalpel. Got it from cuttin’ people’s scalps off.” He laughed and said, “Mexicans learned the art from the Southwest Indians. Shit, man, we probably taught them how to do it, you know?”
Gomez cell rang. He answered it, stepping to the door for a better signal. “Yeah. Where you at?” He paused for a beat. “If you’re a few minutes away, we can go on and take care of him. We know you don’t like that part, Doc.”
He disconnected and turned back toward me. “Crazy dude, Doc. He can filet a man faster than I can cut on a steak, but he don’t like the part when the lights go out.”
Davis gripped my hair in one hand and jerked my head back. His breath was sour, smelling like vomit and marijuana. His T-shirt stank of chicken grease and reefer. He used the index finger of his other hand, stuck it in the blood pouring from my mouth and drew an imaginary line across the top of my forehead. “We could start the cut here, go down to the bone, and end over here. It’s like pullin’ the skin off a catfish. Hand me the scalpel, Juan.”
Davis stood in front of me, legs slightly spread, a sneer on his face. I waited for just the right second. I brought my left foot up hard between his legs, burying my shoe deep in his groin. His face seemed to detonate in pain.
He hit me in the ribs. The air blew out of my lungs.
Gomez said, “Stand back, Silo! ‘Less you want O’Brien’s blood spray on you. Headshot sprays like a melon dropped from a movin’ truck.”
He pointed the pistol directly between my eyes, a grin working at the corner of his mouth. “Now’s the time to kiss my brown ass, O’Brien.”
I saw a shadow move. Between Gomez and Davis. In the threshold of the door. I looked at Gomez, his eyes wide with delight. I said, “If you drop the gun, you and Davis walk out of here. If you don’t, they’ll carry you out in a body bag.”
He laughed and brought his left hand up to his right, holding the pistol with both hands, the barrel less than three feet from my face.
“Beg, asshole!” Gomez yelled.
I said nothing.
“Waste him!” Davis said, stepping back.
“I want to hear O’Brien beg! Beg cop!” Gomez shouted. “Lemme hear what you’re gonna tell the Virgin Mary! O’Brien, you ain’t gonna go to heaven. You’re gonna see the devil. What you gonna say to him, huh?”
I looked deep into Gomez’s eyes and said, “Fuck you.”
He brought his left hand back to the pistol. He stopped grinning. His face blank. “You really aren’t afraid to die! You got balls, O’Brien. Now they’re dead balls!”
I could see the index finger on his right hand slowly start to move against the trigger. He grinned just as a hole the size of an orange exploded in his throat, blood spraying across my chest and face. Gomez fell like a giant at my feet.
“Put your hands up!” It was Dan’s voice. He had his arms extended and a pistol pointed at Silas Davis’ head. Dan and two uniforms stepped into the room. They threw Davis up against the wall and cuffed him.
I said, “There’s another one coming.”
“He’s the first we got.” Dan said. “Cuffed. Scared. Sitting on the grass crying like a baby. Says he didn’t kill anyone, only did the organ removal after death. ”
“What a boy scout,” I mumbled, my head entering a vertigo spin.
Dan knelt down. He used both hands to hold and examine my face. He turned to one of his men. “Call for an ambulance. Tell them to step on it. Now!”
SIXTY-TWO
It took about five days before Max could look at me without quickly turning her head. I don’t think my swollen face scared her. She seemed to be more uncomfortable than afraid. She still slept at the foot of my bed. The dark is often the great equalizer.
On my sixth day of convalescence, I left the river house with Max and took her to the beach. She played in the small breakers while I floated on my back, tilted my face in the sea, letting the sun and saltwater gods heal my cuts and bruises.
From the beach I decided to head over to Ponce Marina to pay the boat slip rent. My cell rang. It was Dan Grant.
“Sean, the guy you said Davis and Gomez referred to as ‘Doc,’ is a real doctor. His name is Jude Walberg, an oncologist. He says he didn’t kill anyone. He was being blackmailed by someone he never met. Walberg says one day he received an e-mail with a video attachment. Showed him having sex with underage girls. Although he swears he was told they were all over eighteen. He met them through an escort service that specializes in Central American women. Said he was given directions to meet the women at a posh condo. Camera must have been hidden there. The good doc is married with two kids. He cried straight for the entire hour we questioned him.”
“Who’s blackmailing him? What’s the escort service called?”
“He didn’t know the guy’s name. Service is called Exotic Escorts. Because all biz is done online, who the hell knows where they’re located. Probably some pimp’s house. Walberg would get a call about a few hours before he was supposed to drive to the processing shack near the river. Vics would be on ice. He removed a heart or kidneys and left them in Styrofoam cartons with that clear liquid in the tanks.”