I said, “Security is waiting to escort you up. Everybody be careful. This guy’s very smart and very insane. Probably has no fear of death. Let’s go.”
“I got a rush back on the eyelash,” Ron said, almost as an afterthought.
“And…” I said.
“Bingo. It’s a match with the hair on the duct tape from the vic you found. It’s Santana’s DNA. He killed her. And the piece of fingernail found on the couch matches with the hair you discovered on the backhoe, probably from the stripper, Robin Eastman. Santana can run, but he can’t hide anymore.”
“Be careful,” I said. “He didn’t call me to just chat. Could be a trap.”
We got the passkeys from a portly man with thick eyebrows flaking dandruff. He looked over the tops of his brown glasses, a tic pulsating under his left eye. “This can’t get in the news. We’re selling the building.”
I said, “Stay here. Where’s the service elevator?”
“Beyond the alcove, where those plants hang from the second floor.”
It took us two minutes to ride the service elevator to the top floor, forty-six floors above the Atlantic Ocean. We walked down the polished marble hall, though pods of soft light, by ornate original oil paintings of the sea, and around marble columns.
We stopped at condo number 1619. Each person on our team held a pistol. I slid the passkey through the electronic detector. There was a click, like a wooden spoon against a wooden table, subtle.
“Freeze! Police!” Ron yelled as we burst in the condo.
The lights were on. A sea breeze teased at the curtains near the balcony, but the condo seemed vacant. We fanned out into each room. Pistol arms extended.
The place was huge. Professionally decorated. Artwork, collected from around the world, hung on the walls. The face of a sun god in a composite of gold, silver and rubies looked out from one wall. Classical music played softly throughout the penthouse.
“All clear!” Ron yelled.
Nothing. And no sign of anyone. In the master bedroom, I looked in the closet. A bright blue silk shirt was in the center of the expensive clothes. I took it off the rack. It was the same color as the thread Joe Billie found at the crime scene. Sleeve was torn.
“Sean!” Lauren yelled. “Take a look at this.”
We all stepped out onto the large balcony. A candle burned on an end table next to a recliner. On the wet bar was a bottle of champagne half submerged in a bucket of fresh ice. There were four glasses next to the champagne. In the center of the glasses was a piece of paper with my name on it. It read:
O’Brien and company, you’re to be congratulated. Pour yourself some champagne and toast each other…because tonight you almost caught Miguel Santana…
“Who the fuck is this guy?” asked Agent Barfield.
Ron opened the radio microphone. “He’s slipped us! Everyone come back!”
The radio crackled. “This is Jim…”
“Carlos here…”
“Tyler on the roof…”
“Ralph…at the rear emergency exit.”
Ron said, “Bob! Can you read me? Bob!”
Silence.
SEVENTY-TWO
The elevator to the basement couldn’t move fast enough. On the way down, Ron radioed for more backup and an ambulance. He watched the digital lights change as the elevator descended from the penthouse. Forty-six floors to the garage. Ron said, “He’s one of our best. Did a stint in Iraq. Special forces. Volunteered to help stop the anarchy in New Orleans after hurricane Katrina. He’s got three kids, all small.”
Floor twenty. Seventeen. Fourteen.
“Move elevator!” Ron shouted. His jaw-line could crack stones.
Lauren said, “Lots of concrete and steel in the basement. Could block the radio.”
“That’s a possibility,” said Agent Barfield. “Since the hurricanes of ‘04, builders have been sinking the footing for these new condos very deep.”
When the doors opened, we stepped into the parking garage, handguns drawn.
“Oh shit!” Ron said, stopping like an animal frozen in a car’s headlights.
“Try to reach the paramedics!” Lauren ordered. “Tell them where we are!” She ran toward Bob Rawls.
He was slumped against a wall between a Mercedes and a Jaguar. It looked like he was sitting, resting after jogging. The closer I got, the more I knew it wouldn’t make any difference how fast the paramedics arrived. Signs of death were there, face slack, color drained. His head was resting against the concrete block wall. Blood trickled out of the right side of his open mouth, soaking into his uniform. His eyes were open, like a camera shutter that had jammed, exposing the film to the image of horror. Blood settling in the retinas.
Agent Barfield crouched beside the body and did a perfunctory reading of the pulse. He shook his head. “No sign of a bullet or stab wound. From the position of the body in relation to the head, looks like his neck was broken. Snapped like a tree branch.”
I said, “Let’s search the garage. Stay within sight of each other.”
I could hear the wail of sirens growing louder as we searched for Santana. I knew he had escaped. He was probably in the backseat of a cab en route to the airport, or he might be strolling along Ocean Boulevard, stopping to consider a Versace window display. He’d blend in, like an international tourist. Blasé as the police cavalry roared by in a blur of chrome, red, blue, and white lights enveloping the condos in the moving colors found somewhere between life and death.
SEVENTY-THREE
I sipped the double espresso and checked the headlights in my rearview mirror more than I wanted to as I drove out of Miami, north up I-95. Each time a pair of lights came too close, I found myself touching the Glock between the seats. I didn’t think Santana was following me, but then I wouldn’t have thought he could snap the neck of a Special Forces veteran paratrooper.
I saw a text message flashing on my phone charging in the cradle. I picked up the phone and read the message. It was from Dan Grant. ‘call me when u get this…urgent…slater’s going down…’
It was almost 1:00 A. M. I called Dan. He answered after two rings.
“O’Brien, you okay? I saw the news. They had video of you, FBI types, couple dozen Miami PD, all coming out on a ritzy South Beach condo. An officer killed?”
“Neck broken. A good cop is gone, and we have one hell of a problem walking the streets. Pandora’s box is open and the baddest of the bad is out.”
“So this perp is our bad guy?”
“He’s the serial that’s calling the shots. Slater is, no doubt, on Miguel Santana’s payroll. How he got there, I haven’t figured out yet. We nailed Santana’s connection when we got a DNA match from the hair on the duct tape near the vic I found. A fingernail matched the missing dancer, Robin Eastman. Santana knew we’d made him. After we got that far, he turned the tables. He called me. The psycho in him figured he had nothing to lose. He’d make a game of it.”
“What’d he say?”
“Something about my days on the planet expiring. He wants me to start rehearsing my own epitaph. I think he’s a little pissed that we cut into his business and his perverted world. What do you have on Slater?”
“We searched his place while he was out. Canine found the jogging clothes. Slater had put the stuff in a plastic garbage bag and set it out by the curb with the rest of the trash. It would have gone to the dump, but one of the county’s trucks on that route was broken, so the trash was late in getting picked up. Dog found the scent in a matter of minutes. Grass and water stains matched, and there was a trace of Leslie’s blood on the sweatshirt. Ballistics says the gun used to kill Leslie was the same that killed the club owner Tony Martin. We haven’t found it yet, but we have enough to bury Slater. I got a warrant earlier tonight. We have his place staked out. Pulled his DNA from the skin sample on the sidewalk.”