James Hall - Miami Noir

She didn’t mean the ordinary clothes in the small closet, the shoes side by side on the floor, or the cans of beans and bag of rice in the kitchen cabinet. She meant the heavy purple curtains that made it dark as a cave in here if you closed them. She meant the things on that table over there in the corner. What kind of a crazy person would have such things in her house?

I’d seen the like in homes of Cuban believers in Santería but this made Nena’s simple collection look almost Puritan. Mrs. Sánchez’s altar had a three-foot-tall statue of St. Michael the protector, about to slash a demon with his sword. There were drums, conch shells, cowrie shells, beads, feathers, and carved gourds. There were candles in glass holders, dozens of them. Little bottles of perfumed oil. I saw a box of kitchen matches, four butane lighters, and a quart bottle of Ronrico rum. I lifted the lid of a wooden box and saw a pile of small charred bones.

“Did she burn these in the backyard?”

The landlady gave a shake of her head that bounced her pink rollers. No, that wasn’t allowed, burning bones. Such things were not permitted.

I thanked her for her time.

Before I went away to the police academy, my grandmother stopped crying long enough to make me promise to come over for a sacred fire circle. I’d seen her do one before, when my cousin joined the army, and he came back from Iraq in one piece. So I said okay. If it would make you happy, Nena, okay.

It’s best to do this under a full moon. You need a flat concrete surface, like a driveway. Or a back porch.

Mami was there, and my Aunt Josefa. I can’t say they believed, but they didn’t want to tempt fate, so they agreed to help. Nena made me kneel, then she used two entire cans of lighter fluid to make a circle around me. She clicked a lighter, and orange flames shot up in a whoosh of heat. I coughed on the smoke. Meanwhile, Aunt Josefa poured rum over the blade of a machete. I believe she got it from my Uncle Raul, who had been clearing weeds in their backyard.

Blue flames poured off the steel and dripped to join the orange circle. Nena took the machete and sliced through the flames. “Olodumare, rey del universo, protégela. Protege a esta niña. Cuídela.” She was praying to the gods for my protection in the line of duty, but I remember looking side to side and hoping none of the neighbors were seeing this insane little white-haired lady dancing around the fire.

The women passed the bottle around and filled their mouths. They pressed the trigger of a butane lighter and sprayed out the rum, which turned to a fiery blue mist. I was afraid my clothes would catch on fire, but miraculously all I felt was a cool rush of air. The orange flames sputtered and went out.

For years I thought Nena had invented this ritual, and that she and her friends used it as an excuse to get drunk. She had put her own touches on it, but she hadn’t made it up.

When I broke my back, Nena came every day to the hospital and reminded me I was alive. She said it was a sign: I should get out of police work and take a normal job like other women.

If Nena is looking on, I don’t know if she’s happy with what I do. It may not be a normal job, but it’s a job, and I’m pretty good at it.

For the second time that day, I went through the shoe shop and up the stairs to Rosario Cardona’s place. It was a few minutes past 6 o’clock, and her last client had just left. Heavy clouds were moving in, bringing an early twilight.

I knocked. Rosario Cardona frowned when she saw who was there. “I’m sorry, but I can’t see you now. If you could call tomorrow—”

“I only have one more question. I promise it won’t take long.”

I slid past her. The sound of New Age flutes and a harp came through hidden speakers.

Rosario pushed the door shut. “All right. What’s your question?” Her perfect little mouth was in a polite smile, but her body language said something else. Arms crossed, weight on one hip. The sharp heels of her boots cut into the rug.

“Has Rick Zaden been here lately?”

She waited for me to explain this. When I didn’t, she said patiently, “No. I told you, I haven’t seen Rick for a long time.”

“At his restaurant in the Grove.”

“Correct.”

“Then why — and I guess this makes two questions — why did the lady who owns the shop tell me she’d seen a yellow Hummer in the parking lot two days ago?”

Rosario Cardona shrugged, a slight lift of one shoulder. “There’s more than one yellow Hummer in Miami.”

“And last week, and sometimes at night—”

“It wasn’t Rick,” she said. “I don’t know whose car it was, but it wasn’t Rick’s. Excuse me, but I have work to do.” She went to the door and swung it open for me.

From my purse I took a small plastic bag and held it up to let her see the brown glass bottle inside it. “Do you remember this?”

“Yes. I just gave it to you.”

“No. You gave it to Carmen Sánchez. I found it in her apartment.”

There was the first flicker of dark anger in her eyes, like distant lightning. “Everyone sells that.”

“I called seven botánicas , and they never heard of Nature’s Meadow.”

“I don’t know what your little game is, but I want you to leave. Right now.”

I pivoted and crossed the room to the table in the far corner. The gypsy smiled blankly at me. Rosario’s boots thudded across the floor. “I’m calling the police.”

“Go for it.” I tipped a basket to see what was inside. “Bones. Mrs. Sánchez had these in her apartment too.”

“Get out.”

“How did you meet her? Did you bump into her by accident at Sedano’s Supermarket on Calle Ocho? At the Nicaraguan restaurant where she ate? No, not there. Someone might’ve remembered you. What did you say to her? I see loss. I see grief. A young man who died. Is that what you said? Rick knew she was nuts, but he couldn’t play her like you could. But you wouldn’t have used your own name. You couldn’t bring her here. Did you open a studio in Little Havana? Turns out, you didn’t have to worry. Kathy Zaden shot her.”

“I said get out!”

“I can’t decide if you’re sleeping with Rick Zaden or he’s paying you. It must be tough working over a discount shoe store.”

She leaped for the first thing in reach, a wrought-iron candle-holder about waist high. The candle flew off the top, leaving a bare black iron spike that came straight for me. She was a small woman, and I wrenched it out of her hands, put a hip in her side, and threw her to the painted concrete floor.

She lay there wheezing, no wind in her lungs. I picked up the stuff that had fallen out of my purse, including the bottle of oil. Maybe her fingerprints were on it, maybe not.

When I looked back at the shoe shop in my rearview mirror, they were turning off the lights, closing up.

I dialed a direct line to Miami homicide and listened to the rings on the other end.

What would Rosario Cardona do next? Make her own phone call. And then she and Rick Zaden would run around trying to figure out what to do, and they would trip over themselves. Rick wasn’t that smart.

I didn’t have all the answers, but I had a few.

A man’s voice said, “Nance here.”

Nena used to tell me that a psychic couldn’t read her own cards, couldn’t see into her own future. That must be right, because Rosario Cardona didn’t have the least idea what was coming for her.

South Beach

Jacques first saw the other three Haitians through the darkness as he stepped into the go-fast boat at the dock in Freeport, Bahamas. They were sitting huddled together on the deck, leaning back against the side. Paul had nodded to Jacques in greeting as soon as he saw him, and Jacques returned the nod. Though sitting, Paul looked short, had a well-groomed mustache, and was bald. His wife, Bahy, looked even shorter, had thickset stubby hair, and was overweight. Bahy’s head rested on Paul’s shoulder and she looked at Jacques with suspicion, and then pressed her face against Paul so hard that Jacques could see her neck straining. He thought the third passenger, Emania, was beautiful — stick-thin legs, bulbous knees, high cheekbones, and night-black, shiny skin that glowed in the dim light from the wharves. The unblemished white of her eyes flickered when she blinked, and when Jacques looked for too long, she fixed them to the floor between her knees.