Линкольн Чайлд - Crooked River

“He was a courageous man who died in service.” A grim look flitted across Pendergast’s face. “One can offer no higher praise than that.”

After another moment of silence, he turned toward Constance. “I should warn you this news is more than just tragic. It could mean we’re in significant danger ourselves.”

“Oh?” Constance’s expression did not change. “In that case, there’s something we had better do right away.”

“What’s that?”

“See about getting dinner. I’m famished.”

They rose and — with Pendergast placing a partly affectionate, partly protective arm lightly around her waist — they made their way to the end of the porch, down the steps, and out toward the restaurants of Captiva Drive.

It’s here,” Smithback said.

Flaco turned off U.S. 41 onto Kellogg Street. Checking the road ahead, Smithback relaxed ever so slightly. It was as he’d remembered: Kellogg was one of those streets whose buildings, once large private residences, had been converted into law firms and doctors’ suites, and cute office buildings with tasteful wooden signs advertising the businesses inside.

It was also, he noted grimly, just steps away from Lee Memorial Hospital.

Smithback had put everything he had, body and soul, into making sure this moment came to pass and thinking how he would pull it off. He’d suggested that a few pages of the manuscript be redrawn to improve their appearance. He’d requested a brush to put his hair into some kind of order. Anything, everything he could think of to keep Flaco — who, once Carlos returned, had clearly started to waffle — dreaming of Hollywood riches instead of Bighead’s rage. As night came on and the hours crawled slowly by, Smithback had grown increasingly worried. What if Flaco lost his nerve? What if Carlos didn’t go out after all? Every hour, he knew, was an hour closer to Bighead’s promised return. I’ll come back and break you in .

When Flaco silently brought him breakfast, Smithback even resorted to demanding a portion of the imaginary profits. “Look,” he said, “if El Acero really becomes big — a franchise, you know? — I think we’d better agree now on what my percentage will be. I mean, I’m the one putting you together with Bill. Right? Normally, an agent gets 15 percent. But I don’t want to be greedy. I’ll take 10 percent, maybe 12 — we can talk about it once we get back here, after the meeting.”

Flaco dropped the plate of tortillas and beans on the mattress, then turned and left without a word. Smithback didn’t know if the images of wealth, his own implied willingness to return to captivity, Stockholm-style, had gotten through to the young gunman. He wasn’t even sure Flaco had understood him.

The next two hours were the longest Smithback ever spent.

Then, suddenly, the door to his cell opened. Flaco was standing there. “We go now,” he said.

“But my clothes, my face—”

“In the car, ese . Carlos back by noon. And you get no fucking money.”

So the muscular goon had gone out. Smithback hurried after Flaco, down one cramped corridor and then another. After his time in the cell, it felt strange to walk more than a few steps at a time. Suddenly, Flaco opened a metal door and they stepped out into bright sunlight. Smithback stopped, momentarily blinded.

“ ¡Date prisa! ” Flaco said in a low, urgent voice, pulling Smithback by the arm and flashing the butt of a pistol he’d shoved into his waistband.

They were in the alley where Smithback had initially been ambushed. Sitting outside the door was a ’60s Impala coupe, butternut yellow. Smithback had seen countless vehicles like it when he’d worked the vice beat in Miami: a gangbanger’s ride, chopped and shaved but still street legal. Inside, he found a paper bag with a brush, cheap sunglasses, a box of wet wipes, and a folded T-shirt with the logo of some rock nacional band. Flaco had pulled out onto the boulevard, then turned north on 41 while Smithback took off his filthy shirt, pulled on the tee he’d been given, and went about brushing the dirt from his pants and cleaning himself up as best he could. The mirror on the passenger visor had reflected a frightful visage: bloody, vomit-flecked, and dark with matted hair and several days’ worth of stubble. There was nothing he could do about the beard, but a few wet wipes and the hairbrush restored his appearance to something resembling normalcy. The sunglasses and an artful combover did a good job of concealing his bruised face. By the time he’d finished his toilette, they were downtown and fast approaching Kellogg. Smithback put his shirt in the paper bag, rolled it up, and stuffed it between his feet just as they came up to the street. He’d had no time to steady himself for what was to come.

But what was to come? All his effort had been directed at this moment: getting downtown and away from that hellish prison. He hadn’t known the layout of Fort Myers well enough to come up with any better plan: he’d just have to wing it. One thing he knew: he couldn’t just jump out of the car and make a run for it. Flaco would gun him down without a second’s hesitation, and then burn rubber back to the tienda , where he’d spend the time coming up with a satisfactory explanation for Smithback’s demise. The only chance he had was spotting a passing cop. But as usual, there were none around when you needed one, and as the blocks went by, Smithback realized he was running out of time. About half a mile ahead, he could see the character of the neighborhood already changing: shabbier, less affluent, the well-kept buildings giving way to Florida cracker houses.

“Slow down,” he told Flaco. Shit, he’d better do something, fast.

“Where is it, cretino ?”

“It’s close. Okay? These houses look familiar. I’ll know it when I see it.”

As Flaco slowed, Smithback scanned the surrounding buildings, doing his best to conceal a rising panic. The far side of the street, nearest Flaco, had already given way to larger commercial buildings. Many of the houses on Smithback’s side still had tasteful shingles set out in front of them, but they, too, were becoming sprinkled with less attractive structures, and beyond their backyards was some kind of overgrown slough.

“There!” he cried, more out of desperation than anything else, pointing to a particularly large and ornate building whose signpost they were just approaching. Flaco drove past it, made a U-turn at the next intersection, then came back and stopped across the street from the structure.

Smithback was almost afraid to look at it. He’d had to choose one, and there had been no time to consider the relative merits of each building. It was no better than playing Russian roulette.

The signage was attractive, thank God, of lacquered redwood with the lettering cut in bas-relief. Across the top of the sign, straddling its two posts, the main plaque read: THE FLAGLER BUILDING. Below it, screwed in vertical series between the redwood posts, was a series of names: John Kramer, DDS. Lauren Richards, DDS. Kenneth Sprague, DDM. Shirley Gupta, DDS. And then, at the bottom: ENDODONTICS.

Oh God , Smithback thought. A goddamned dentist’s office. If he’d tried, he couldn’t have chosen a worse place to stage his deception. He felt, more than saw, Flaco looking at him.

“Flagler Building?” Flaco said, his voice even more menacing and suspicious than usual.

“Of course. Haven’t you read any of Bill’s periodicals?” Smithback was suddenly beyond caring what he said: fuck this, he’d done his best and he was fresh out of ideas. “That’s his company, Flagler Publications. He named it after his brother, who died young. Flagler Johnson.”