James Grippando - Last to die

A waitress pulled up to the station at the end of the bar. “Couple a’ Buds, Theo.” He set two open long-necks on her tray, and off she went.

“There’s more,” said Gerry. “If Tatum does drop out, I’ll pay him a quarter million dollars, cash, right now. It’s not contingent on me inheriting the money or anything else. He drops out, I give him the money. It’s that clean.”

“You trying to buy your way to the prize?”

Gerry pulled an ice cube from his soda and applied it to his fattened lip. “Brains, not brute force. That’s what it takes to win Sally Fenning’s game.”

“Funny, you don’t look so smart.”

“I’m not the one with a restraining order entered against me, am I?”

“You must want that money pretty bad.”

“There’s nothing illegal about cutting deals with the other beneficiaries to induce them to drop out. It’s just business. The mining business.” Gerry flashed a crooked smile, calling Theo forward with a curl of his finger, as if to let him in on a big secret. “This is what I call a gold mine.”

“You’re using trumped-up assault charges to get my brother to settle cheap and drop out.”

“I said I’d withdraw the charges. I didn’t say they were trumped up.”

Theo shook his head, then chuckled, “Who you think you’re talking to, fool?”

“Excuse me?”

The smile drained away as Theo leaned closer and said, “This is blackmail.”

“That’s not the way I see it.”

“Doesn’t matter how you see it. I see it as blackmail. Tatum will see it as blackmail. And that’s not a good thing for you.”

“Am I supposed to be scared now?”

Theo got right in his face, pressing his huge hands into the bar top. Gerry was trying to be a tough guy, but the twitching eyelid gave him away. To his surprise, however, Theo backed down. Gerry seemed pleased to have won the staring match, until Theo walked over to the stage, grabbed the microphone from the stand, and said, “Ladies and Gentlemen, your attention, please.”

The noise level dropped a notch, though it wasn’t completely quiet.

Gerry shifted nervously on his bar stool, clearly apprehensive.

Theo continued, “I don’t mean to rat anybody out, but I just heard that tonight we have with us Mr. Gerry Colletti, seated right over there at the end of the bar. You might be interested to know that Mr. Colletti is a former representative from the state of Massachusetts, where he was the author of the very first mandatory biker helmet law in the U.S. of A. Dude, take a bow.”

A chorus of boos rolled across the room. The bikers at the pool table shot a volley of death glares that had Gerry sinking into the woodwork. Two guys with bulging biceps started toward the bar. The ugly one had identical tattoos on each forearm, the word “villain” spelled “villian,” as if to brag that he was too stupid to check a dictionary. The tall guy was wearing no shirt, just tattered blue jeans and a black leather vest. His metal dog tags rattled with each tap of the fat end of a pool cue into his open palm.

Theo was feeling pretty smug as he walked back behind the bar. “Club soda’s on me, Genius. Have a nice walk to your car.”

Jack and Kelsey were surrounded by books.

The homicide detective’s tip that Deirdre Meadows had written a true-crime story about Sally Fenning was a good lead, but Jack had struggled over what to do next. Going straight to Deirdre was one option, but he wanted more facts before taking that shot. That was where Martin Kapstan came in.

Just Books was hands-down the best bookstore in Coral Gables, and Martin made it that way. The store itself was beautiful, an old Mediterranean-style building, perfectly restored, and plenty of book-filled rooms for browsing. With signings and readings virtually every night of the week, it would be difficult to name a national best-selling author in the last twenty years who hadn’t made an appearance there. But it was Martin who set the store apart. He’d started out as a high school teacher, and he’d never really lost that guiding touch. Every aspiring author in south Florida sought his advice, and somehow he always found time to give it. Some of them found success. All of them found a little hope. Kelsey figured that if anyone knew anything about Deirdre’s unpublished script, Martin was the guy.

“Damn, we should have come last night,” said Kelsey. She was checking out the event calender posted by the door. They’d just missed Isabelle Allende.

Kelsey had worked a summer at Just Books before Nate was born, before law school, before interning for Jack, before her sphere of knowledge had begun to shrink to the point where she felt as though she knew absolutely nothing about anything except what she happened to be working on at the moment. She seemed a little embarrassed by how long it had been since her last visit, but Martin greeted her with his usual gentle smile and soft-spoken manner. She introduced Jack, and the three of them stepped outside for coffee in the central courtyard. Martin and Kelsey spent a few minutes catching up, then Martin asked, “How long you two been dating?”

They both let out a nervous chuckle. Kelsey said, “Oh, we’re not-”

“No we’re not…we’re friends,” said Jack. “And of course we work together.”

“Oh. I just assumed from the way Kelsey gushed on the phone about-” Martin stopped in mid-sentence, as if someone had just flattened his big toe.

“About how crazy Nate is about Jack,” said Kelsey, her smile strained.

From the look on Martin’s face, it seemed as though he had something else on the tip of his tongue. “Right. I understand you and Nate are great buddies.”

“I’m his Big Brother.”

“That’s terrific.”

“Yeah, it’s been great.”

All three tasted their coffee, as if thankful for the silence. Then Martin said, “So, how can I help you?”

Jack asked, “Have you been following the newspaper stories about a very wealthy woman named Sally Fenning? She was shot to death downtown about two weeks ago.”

“I did read about that.”

“Kelsey and I represent one of the heirs to her estate.”

“Yeah, she mentioned that in our phone conversation.”

“It turns out that one of the other heirs was writing a book about Sally. She’s a reporter for the Tribune. Her name is Deirdre Meadows.”

“I’ve met Deirdre,” said Martin.

“You don’t happen to know anything about the book she wrote, do you?”

“As a matter of fact I do.”

Kelsey smiled proudly, looked at Jack, and said, “Told you.”

Jack said, “I don’t want to intrude on anything she might have told you in confidence, but can you tell me anything about it?”

“Not much, I’m afraid. I’ve never read it. I offered to read it, but Deirdre didn’t feel comfortable sharing it.”

“Why not?”

“The way she explained it, her lawyer told her not to let anyone read it, except for her literary agent and any publishers they sent it to.”

“What was the fear? Someone stealing her ideas?”

“I think her real concern was a libel suit.”

Jack did a double take. “From Sally?”

Martin nodded. “As I understand it, she started out writing the book with Sally Fenning’s cooperation. About six months into it, Sally decided she didn’t like the angle Deirdre was plying. Actually, to say she didn’t like it is an understatement. She threatened to sue Deirdre for libel.”

“So her lawyer told her not to let anyone read it?” asked Kelsey.

Jack gave the lawyer’s answer. “She was probably trying to keep her legal exposure to a minimum. Obviously, if the only people who read the allegedly libelous material are a handful of potential publishers, Sally’s damages would be negligible.”