Decker stopped and looked out to the water. The winks of ship lights far out in the Gulf were the only interruption to the darkness.
That’s what this case feels like. Almost total darkness with a few feeble points of light. But will that be enough?
It didn’t surprise him that the Bureau was trying to get rid of him. After Ross Bogart had retired, Decker had sensed a subtle shift of opinion about him, and not in his favor. When Jamison had departed to New York, he had no one really in his corner, and he had no interest in fighting office political battles.
I can be annoying. I don’t like playing by other people’s rules. Solving cases should be the only goal, and the bullshit part of the job doesn’t interest me at all.
He imagined that he and Frederica White were in complete agreement on all that. But the last thing he wanted was to see the woman go down with him.
She has a family. The Bureau is her career, and she’s worked her butt off for it.
So absorbed was Decker in these thoughts that he did not notice the two men emerge out of the darkness until they were right upon him.
They were both dressed in jogging outfits and tennis shoes.
They stared at Decker and he stared back at them.
“Can I help you guys?” he said.
One man drew a knife; the other pulled a pistol.
Decker had left his weapon back in his room.
Well, this sucks.
He was about to try to tackle the guy with the gun when he saw a blur of movement to his right. A foot struck the gun and it went spiraling off into the water. Another foot hit the man in the gut, and he went down to his knees with a grunt of pain. Another side-winding kick to his jaw and he went down to the sand.
The knife guy slashed at their attacker, which gave Decker time to clamp down on his arm and twist it until the man cried out in pain and dropped the knife. Decker drew his fist back to land a haymaker on the man when a foot whipsawed against knife guy’s chin. There was a dull thud, his head shifted violently to one side, and he fell to the sand yelling in pain and holding his face.
Then a hand grabbed Decker’s.
“Come on!” yelled White. “Run.”
They hustled back up the beach and through the gate into the pool area of the hotel.
White pulled her phone, called 911, and relayed what had just happened. She clicked off and looked up at Decker.
“You weren’t kidding about that double black belt,” he said breathlessly. “That was pretty amazing.”
“I don’t kid, in general,” she replied just as breathlessly. “And you were lucky I was out there getting some fresh air and spotted the two guys coming up on you.”
“I was very lucky.”
“Okay, first thing, you need to be more careful.”
“Yeah, I can see that.”
“Second thing, I’m going to be beyond pissed if you get your ass killed.”
“Duly noted. But this happening is a positive sign, too.”
“How so?”
“We’re making certain people nervous, which means we’re getting closer to the truth.”
Chapter 81
Decker came down the following morning to the hotel lobby to meet White. As he crossed the lobby to go into the restaurant, someone approached him.
Gloria Chase was dressed, at least for her, in a subdued fashion. The dress was just above the knee, not all that tight, and the heels were barely two inches tall.
She held up an envelope. “Was this from you?” she asked.
“Have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“I’ll take that as a yes. Got a minute to chat?”
She led him over to a seating area where they wouldn’t be overheard.
They sat, and she crossed one long leg over the other, her expression dejected.
“Just when you think you know someone well enough to walk down the aisle with them.”
“Trouble in paradise?”
“Do we have to play this game?” she snapped.
“Have you spoken to him?”
“More than that. I told him I would not be marrying him, ever. I also gave him back his crummy ring before the collection people came after me for it.”
“Was he living beyond his means?”
“My people did a quick check on him, which I should have done when I first met him. He owes everybody. It’s not that he’s a bad lawyer. He makes good money. It’s that he has a gambling problem, which is why he really wanted to go to Vegas for the honeymoon. To gamble away my money.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Are you really?”
He glanced at the envelope. “Proof’s in the pudding, as they say.”
“Right. You could have let me marry him and there would go all my money.”
“I wasn’t so much worried about your money as I was about your safety.”
“You really think he’s dangerous?”
“That prostitute didn’t assault herself.”
She pursed her lips. “Have I been a complete fool?”
“The hardest thing for someone to do is admit they’ve been suckered. It’s easier to say the emperor is wearing his new clothes when he’s really stark naked, right up until the moment everything goes to shit and you have to pay the price for your bad judgment.” He leaned forward. “But moving on — do you stand by your alibi for him?”
She played with the latch on her purse. “Let’s just say that I was not counting the minutes when he was gone. I was actually in the shower and getting... spruced up.”
“So, longer than twenty minutes?”
“I think he found out when he needed an alibi for and then ‘reminded’ me how long he was gone. I can’t say for sure how long he was out, actually.”
“An hour or more?”
“I take a while to spruce up. So, yes, clearly an hour or more.”
“And you’ll stick to that if it comes to legal proceedings?”
“Count on it.”
She rose and so did Decker. She put out her hand, which he shook.
“Thank you, Agent Decker.”
“Thank you for being candid.”
“It’s not my usual forte, but an old dog can learn new tricks, I guess.”
“I guess so,” said Decker, thinking about himself.
As Chase was leaving, White walked over to Decker. “The cops turned up nothing on the two guys from last night. They were long gone and left behind no clues.”
“Not surprising.”
White looked in the direction of Chase. “What did she want?”
“To tell me she’s not marrying Langley, and she has no idea how long he was gone the night Cummins was killed. But it was at least an hour. So that puts Langley right back onto the suspect list for Cummins’s murder.”
“The motive? I mean, he was seeing Chase. They were planning to get married. She was loaded. She was his ticket out. So why would he kill the judge?”
“It doesn’t have to be about money. Cummins rejected him. With a guy like Langley, I doubt he took it well. So with what he thought was an ironclad alibi, he probably figured he could kill Cummins and he’d just argue he couldn’t be in two places at the same time and Chase would back him up. And even if she didn’t, once they were married, her lips would be legally sealed.”
“So now you think he’s good for the murder?”
Decker said, “Well, we know he is capable of violence.”
“Yeah, and he’s also a jerk.”
Chapter 82
As they were heading out White got a call. It was the officer from Miami’s Cold Case Squad.
“Didn’t expect to ever hear back from you in my lifetime,” said White.
“Yeah, I surprised myself. But even though you didn’t have a name, you had a specific date. I ran it through our missing persons database for the day after, and got one hit that matched your physical description. Her name is Wanda Monroe, African American, age twenty-three. She was reported missing by her roommate. According to her rap sheet, Monroe was a known prostitute who worked the strip back then, including the Fontainebleau.”