James Swain: Midnight Rambler

Crossing the parking lot, I tried to put the trial out of my mind. I could not change the past or predict the future, so I'd learned to accept the present for what it is. My daughter taught me this trick, and so far, it seemed to be working.

My car was parked in the back of the lot. I drove a dinosaur called an Acura Legend. The salesman had said it would be a classic one day, but he'd never mentioned that the line was being discontinued. I left it unlocked with the windows open, and no one had tried to steal it.

Buster was asleep on the passenger seat and didn't stir until I opened my door. Remembering my manners, I let him out. He hiked his leg on a Porsche with a vanity plate that read ISUE, then circled my car while sniffing the ground. Something was bothering him, and I came around the passenger side to have a look.

Then I cursed.

Someone had keyed the passenger door and left a message.

SICK COP

I ran my fingers across the words. They were too deep to buff out. The door would have to be repainted. Only I don't have the money. I looked disdainfully at Buster.

“Some watchdog you are,” I said.

I lived in nearby Dania, a sleepy beach town known for its musty consignment shops and antique stores that sold the world's best junk. Most days, time stood still here, which suited me just fine. As I drove down Dania Beach Boulevard toward home, the ocean's dank, funky smell filled my car.

Pulling into the Sunset Bar and Grille on the northern tip of Dania Beach, I parked in the building's shade. The Sunset was a rough-hewn two-story structure, with half sitting on the beach and the other half resting on wood stilts over the ocean. I lived in a rented studio directly above the bar. My room was small, but the ocean view made it feel big. My rent was four hundred and fifty bucks a month, plus sitting on a stool next to the cash register on busy nights with a mean look on my face. So far, no one had robbed the place, and the owner seemed happy with the arrangement.

My cell phone rang, and I glanced at the Caller ID. It was Jessie, checking up on me. My daughter did this every day. I knew I should be grateful, but all it did was remind me of how far I'd fallen.

“Hey, honey, how's it going?” I answered.

“Great,” Jessie said. “How are you? How's Buster?”

“I'm okay. Buster is Buster.”

“How was the trial? Did you make out okay?”

“I survived.”

“I hope they strap that son of a bitch into Sparky and fry his brains out.”

Sparky was the infamous malfunctioning electric chair at Starke prison. A few days after Ted Bundy got juiced, the favorite joke among cops was to call each other and say, “Did you hear the news? Ted Bundy just stopped smoking.”

“I hate to be the bearer of bad news,” I said, “but the state has switched to lethal injection.”

“That sucks,” Jessie said. “Do you have any tips for me? The game is tomorrow night, and I need to get the team ready. We've got practice in an hour.”

I grabbed a legal pad covered with scribble off the backseat. I hadn't done much with my daughter until she started playing basketball. Then I attended every high school game she played, and traveled with her to state finals. When she went to Florida State University on a basketball scholarship, I started calling a local bookie I knew. Women's hoops are big in Florida and, as a result, had a betting line. My bookie would get the skinny on the teams Florida State was playing, and pass it on to me.

“Here you go,” I said. “Mayweather, their leading scorer, is in a slump. She picks up her shooting in the second half, so double-team her late in the game. Cooper, one of their forwards, missed December with a mystery illness, and is only good for twenty minutes. Run her around and she'll fold. Fisher, Cooper's sub, can't shoot but is a good passer. The team has a tendency to rush their shots when they get behind. That's it.”

“That's brilliant,” my daughter said. “Coach wants to take you out to dinner the next time you visit.”

“Tell her she's on.”

“I will. Have you talked to Mom? I did. She asked about you the other day, wanted to know how you were making out.”

“I'm doing fine. Tell her that, okay?”

“Why don't you tell her?”

I stared through the windshield at the Sunset. Talking about my wife made me want to get drunk. I had screwed up our marriage and couldn't bear discussing it.

“Mom wants to know how you're doing financially,” my daughter went on. “How are you making out, Dad?”

My financial situation was a disaster, courtesy of Simon Skell's sister, who had brought a civil suit against me for the beating I'd inflicted upon her brother. The cost of hiring a lawyer to defend me had wiped me out.

“I'm living like a king,” I said.

“But where's the money coming from? You're not robbing banks, are you?”

“I'm doing jobs for people.”

“You mean detective jobs that you don't want to talk about.”

Most of the work I did these days was helping understaffed police forces around the state find missing kids. It was my specialty, and the departments paid me under the table for my services, not wanting my name to appear on any internal documents.

“That's right,” I said.

“Oh crap, look at the time,” my daughter said. “I've got to run.

Love you, Daddy.”

“I love you, too.”

A cold beer was calling me as I walked into the Sunset's horseshoe-shaped bar. Sitting at the bar were the same seven sunburned rummies who had been there since I started renting my room. I called them the Seven Dwarfs, since it was rare to see any of them standing upright. Sonny, the multi tattooed, multi pierced, shaven-headed bartender, sauntered over.

“Nice suit,” Sonny said. “You getting married or laid out?”

“I was in court,” I said.

“All those traffic tickets finally catch up with you?”

“What do you want?” I asked.

“Peace, love, and understanding. Barring that, a good blow job.”

Sonny was an ex-con and loved to get under my skin. Because of his record, he legally shouldn't have been tending bar, just as I shouldn't have been doing private jobs for the police. Knowing each other's secret had formed a special bond between us.

“What do you want?” I repeated.

“A woman has been calling for you,” Sonny said. “She sounded hysterical, said she needed to talk to you. Sounds like a booty call.”

“What's her name?”

He started to wipe the bar with a dirty rag. “I put it in the till.”

“You going to get it for me?”

“What's it worth to you?”

Sonny was going to end up back in prison if someone didn't straighten him out. I dropped my voice. “A punch in the face-that's what it's worth.”

“You'd hit me in front of all these customers?”

“If I ask them, they'll probably hold you down.”

The loopy grin left Sonny's face. He got a slip of paper from the till and slapped it on the bar. I read the name printed on it and felt myself shudder. Julie Lopez. Six months earlier, I had helped Julie come to grips with a loss that no one should have to bear. I hadn't seen her since, knowing that my presence would only open deep wounds.

I walked outside and punched her number into my cell phone. Julie answered immediately, her voice riddled with grief.

“It's Jack Carpenter,” I said. “What's wrong?”

“The police found Carmella,” she wailed.

“Where?”

“In my backyard!”

My head started to spin, and I leaned against the building and tried to compose myself. What Julie was saying couldn't be true. Carmella Lopez was murdered by Simon Skell, who made her disappear just the way he made seven other young women disappear. Of all the places he might have put Carmella's body, Julie's backyard couldn't be one of them.