He saw Esquivel and another man standing in the hallway in front of the open door to one of the rooms. He joined them.
“What’s happening, Eddie?” he asked.
“Sergeant, this is Fred Nettles, the night manager,” Esquivel said. “And this is Mr. Starkey, who says he won’t leave the room.”
“When we charged the first night’s stay on his credit card, it went through,” Nettles said. “The second night was rejected and he said he would handle it. He didn’t. The third night was rejected and now he’s been here five nights and only paid for one.”
“I’m fixing the problem!” Starkey yelled.
Starkey was the smallest of all four men, and Stilwell knew there was not going to be a problem removing him from the premises if push came to shove.
“I’ve been in constant communication with my bank and the credit card company,” Starkey said. “They’re processing payment, but it’s well after hours on the East Coast and this won’t be resolved until morning.”
“He’s been saying that for three days,” Nettles said.
“You gotta go, man,” Esquivel said. “You can’t stay. You get it fixed, then you can come back.”
“Where am I going to go?” Starkey yelled. “There are no more boats tonight and I can’t check in anywhere else.”
Stilwell tapped Nettles on the shoulder and nodded for him to follow. They walked down the hallway and out of Starkey’s earshot. Stilwell spoke quietly.
“He’s got a point,” he said. “We kick him out now and he can’t leave the island, and he can’t check in anywhere if his credit card doesn’t work.”
“What are you saying?” Nettles said. “That I have to eat another night with him?”
“I want to give him till the morning. He gets it fixed and he pays you, or we escort him to the pier and he’s gone.”
“That feels like a big win for him and a big loss for me.”
“I understand. Do you know anything about him? Like what he does for a living or what he’s doing here.”
“He says he’s a writer. We get a lot of them here. Not all of them are deadbeats.” He intentionally turned his head back toward Starkey’s room as he barked out the last word.
“You’re just making it worse,” Stilwell said. “We’re not going to remove him. So decide if you want to argue with him all night and disturb your other guests or give him the morning deadline.”
Nettles shook his head in frustration.
“Banks open at nine,” he said. “I’ll give him till ten if you promise to come take him if he doesn’t pay.”
“You got it,” Stilwell said. “I’ll go tell him.”
He walked down the hallway to the open door where Esquivel stood. There was no sign of Starkey.
“Where’d he go?” he asked.
“He’s in there making a call, I think,” Esquivel said.
Stilwell walked into the room, down a short entryway, and past the bathroom door. Starkey was sitting on the bed, the room’s phone to his ear. Stilwell made a signal that he wanted to talk to him.
“I’m on hold,” Starkey said.
“With who?” Stilwell asked.
“My agent. I’m trying to see if he’ll pay.”
“Mr. Starkey, the hotel has agreed to let you stay one more night. You have till ten tomorrow morning to settle your bill or we will evict you from the hotel and take you to the Express. Do you understand?”
“What if I pay? Do I still have to leave?”
“That will be between you and the hotel. But right now I need to hear you say that you understand that if you don’t pay by ten a.m., you are leaving the hotel.”
Starkey hung up the phone.
“I get it,” he said. “And it won’t be a problem. I just want to be left alone to write.”
“That’s fine, sir, but you need to pay for the room,” Stilwell said. “I’ll be back at ten tomorrow. I hope you get it fixed. Good night, Mr. Starkey. You want me to close the door?”
“Please. I’ve had enough of that man out there.”
Stilwell left and pulled the door closed. Nettles was gone, and only Esquivel was waiting.
“We’ll handle this in the morning,” Stilwell said. “You can roll.”
“Roger that,” Esquivel said.
“Meantime, get our prisoner some food. He’s hungry.”
“Who, Spivak? I fed him.”
“When?”
“About six. I got him a hamburger from Luau Larry’s.”
“Asshole tried to get another meal off me.”
“Fuck him. He’s fed.”
“You didn’t know him before the other night, did you?”
“No, why?”
“Just curious why he jumped in and hit Dunne. On tape it looks like he was targeting Dunne, like he knew him from somewhere. Was wondering if he knew you.”
“Not as far as I know. Did you ask Dunne?”
“Yeah, but he’s still fuzzy. Anyway, make sure you leave a report on this for day watch. I want the deadline on Starkey enforced. I’m heading home. I need you to get back to the sub and babysit Spivak. If you get a serious call — not bullshit like this — call me and I’ll come in.”
“Will do.”
Stilwell took the Gator up to his house. Tash Dano was sitting in one of the Adirondacks on the front porch, a glass of red wine in her hand.
“How’d it go over there?” she asked.
“About what I expected,” Stilwell said. “I’m on the case.”
“That’s good, right?”
“I’ll take it.”
“But you have to work with A-Hole?”
“Ahearn, yeah.”
“That’s the first time I’ve heard you call him by his real name.”
“Yeah, well, he started calling me by my real name, so, you know...”
He took the glass from her hand and took a sip.
“There’s more in the bottle,” she said. “And half a chicken sandwich from the Sandtrap, if you’re hungry.”
It was Stilwell’s favorite restaurant on the island. He nodded.
“Sounds perfect,” he said.
He took another slug of wine and handed the glass back to her. He leaned down and they kissed.
“I need to take a shower,” he said apologetically.
“I can wait,” she said.
He went in through the open door. She soon followed.
25
Stilwell ate the sandwich from the Sandtrap in the morning with fresh-brewed coffee. He ate quickly, filled a Yeti with more coffee, and left the house early — while Tash was still asleep — to get to the sub to start working on a search warrant for the Black Marlin Club. He knew the probable cause statement would need to be bulletproof in order to get by Judge Harrell, but that would be only the first test it would face. If a case was ever built against a defendant in the Leigh-Anne Moss murder, the search warrant would be his lawyer’s first stop in an effort to derail it, and that didn’t even take into consideration the appeals that would very likely come later. Prosecutions often succeeded or failed based on the underpinnings of probable cause. Stilwell knew it and wasn’t going to let his warrant be the Achilles’ heel of this case.
Mercy was already at her desk when he got there.
“Good morning,” she said cheerily.
“Morning, Mercy,” Stilwell said. “I’m going to set up in my office today to do some writing work. Try to keep people off me if you can.”
“Not a problem.”
“Anything going on that I should know about?”
“All quiet except back there in the jail. That man can get on my last nerve.”
Stilwell had forgotten about Spivak. He put the Yeti on the desk in his office and went back to the jail. Once again, Spivak was standing right at the bars like he was waiting for him.