Sheridan Brown was allowed to operate so long as the majority of her profits went to Marvin Whalen, who owned Sheridan’s and a number of other massage parlors throughout Tampa. Marvin “Moby Dick” Whalen was of course only fronting the chain of parlors on behalf of his boss man, Mick O’Neill. It was the likes of Whalen and O’Neill I couldn’t tolerate.
When I arrived at Sheridan’s parlor, the cops had not yet paid a visit. Sooner or later they’d question Sheridan about Candice Berry, and it would be a waste of all their time and energy. Stuck between a rock and a hard place, Sheridan could neither blab about her bosses, or about what Candice had been up to before she was grabbed off the street corner. Her position was untenable. But I hoped that she’d be more truthful with me. Some of the girls working the streets jokingly referred to me as “Our White Knight” because I’d come to their rescue on more than one occasion, and had even taken out a deviant scumbag preying on the younger girls last year. When I say taken out, I mean the evil game that he was playing. Carl Riley would pick up girls, then beat and rape them, all under the threat of a knife. One night I used the knife on him. Without major reconstructive surgery there was no fear he’d entice a girl into his car again, and if and when he did, he wouldn’t have the tools necessary to rape them. I’d left his family jewels in a jar alongside his rape kit of duct tape, rope, and knife, when I dumped him outside an ER.
I parked my Audi A6 opposite Sheridan’s Parlor and fed the parking meter. Before crossing the busy street I adjusted my SIG Sauer P228 in the small of my back, allowing my shirt to hang over it. I didn’t expect trouble from Sheridan, but who knew if Whalen or one of his underlings were on hand to ensure she said all the right things when the cops did show up? There was no hint from the opaque shop front that anything was amiss, or that Sheridan had even heard the news concerning Candice yet, but she’d know all right.
The Floridian sun was beating down mercilessly, but the streets were packed with tourists, and as I approached the parlor I received more than one knowing look from passersby. I ignored them, and entered the shop, the little brass bell above the door tinkling. The front of the house looked like any other salon or parlor I’d ever graced, and there was no hint of what went on behind the door to the right of the reception counter. I ignored the posters on the walls proclaiming the treatments — everything from Shiatsu, to Swedish massage, to something applied by the way of heated stones — and asked the receptionist if Sheridan was in.
The woman behind the counter was Seminole, with raven hair, high cheekbones, and dark eyes. She was a stunner. She was also suspicious. Offering her my most open face, I said, “Don’t worry, I’m not a cop.”
“Isn’t that exactly what an undercover cop would say?” she asked, her voice as sweet and mellifluous as warm honey.
“Yeah, but then anything he would later say or hear would be deemed entrapment. Don’t worry, I’m not a cop and I’m not here to cause Sheridan any problems. I’m a friend.”
“What’s your name?”
“Joe Hunter.”
Her eyelids closed a fraction. “I’ve heard of you.”
“Good things, I hope?”
She smiled, but didn’t enlighten me. She checked that no one else was about to enter the shop. From inside the smoked glass wasn’t as opaque. People moving past the windows appeared as dim shadows, but none looked to be interested in entering. “Wait here, I’ll go and see if Sheridan can see you.”
With that the woman went through the interior door and closed it behind her, but not before I noticed that her white uniform smock was cut inordinately short and revealed a splendid set of dusky legs set off by six inch heels. I briefly wondered what the rest of the uniform concealed, before scolding myself to keep my mind on the job.
Less than a minute later the woman was back. “Would you like to come through?” she said, holding open the interior door for me, leaning up against the frame.
“Thank you,” I said and went forward. The woman didn’t move, and I had to squeeze past her. We were so close I got a pleasing waft of her perfume, and felt the warmth rising from her. Her eyelashes batted up at me and I could see my face reflected in her dark irises. My earlier resolve about never making out with a prostitute wavered slightly, and I told myself that the beauty was a receptionist, not one the actual girls. But I was kidding myself, and so it seemed was the beauty, because I heard her chuckling at my expense before the door swung shut behind me.
Sheridan Brown was waiting for me at the end of a corridor. Doors to the left and right had been closed, and from behind them I could hear moans of pleasure and the gentle strains of relaxing music. All that you’d expect to hear in a massage parlor. Yeah, right.
Sheridan showed me into her office and I sat on a leather chair against one wall. She perched herself on her desk, crossing long legs as she studied me in turn. Sheridan was in her early fifties now, but there was no denying her beauty. She was part Cuban, part African American. She had a delicious tilt to her eyelids, and full lips, straight black hair to her shoulders as sleek as a panther’s hide. The only thing to spoil her looks was the sadness I caught behind her green eyes.
“You’ve heard about Candice?’ I said.
Sheridan nodded. “I’m expecting the police around anytime soon. I wasn’t expecting you to show up, Joe.”
“Normally it would be none of my business, but I think Candice’s death is tied to something else I’m looking into.”
She surprised me by saying, “William Murray’s suicide?”
“We both know it wasn’t suicide,” I said, “the same way we both know that Candice wasn’t murdered by a random killer.”
Sheridan didn’t reply. She leaned behind her and picked up a pack of Marlboros and flipped them open. She thumbed a cigarette to her lips, then paused, looking at me. She took the cigarette out of her mouth. “Would you like one?”
“I’d kill for one, truth be told. But I’ve given it up. Three years, three months, and twelve days since I had my last one.”
“You actually keep count?”
“I was told things would get better, but I think it was lies. I still crave a cigarette every day. I keep count of how long it is since I gave up just so I can prove the doctors wrong.”
“Why not give in to the inevitable? You’ll return to them sooner or later.”
“I’m a sucker when it comes to inevitability,” I agreed. “But this is one thing I’m sticking with. My other vice — too much caffeine — keeps my mind off nicotine most of the time. I’ll take a coffee if you’ve one on the go.”
She shook her head apologetically. “I send out to Starbucks when I need a kick start,” she said. Placing the Marlboro between her lips she paused once more. “Do you mind if I smoke?”
“Go for it. This is your place, after all.”
Sheridan laughed to herself as she struck a match. She spoke around the cigarette as she puffed to get it going. “You’re very accommodating, Joe. Some of the johns we get in here are happy to snort coke, or to smoke crack, but pull out a Marlboro in front of them and they get all holier than thou.”
“Hypocrites,” I said.
“Isn’t it a little hypocritical of you giving up smoking when you chance injury or death all the time? I mean the odds of cancer finding your lungs before a bullet does are kind of slim.”
“I wasn’t aware that my activities are such common knowledge,” I said.
“Joe, you’ve taken down more mobsters than Eliot Ness. Everyone on the streets knows that. So do the cops, for that matter. What we don’t know is how you keep getting away with it.”