Blood Relations Page 30

  “George Fonseca,” he said.

  “I know that name.”

  “A defendant in the Duncan sexual battery case.” Sam came back with another beer and sat down in one of the upholstered side chairs. The lamp reflected in the tall cabinet that held the china they never used anymore. He could see Dina’s profile in the glass.

  “Fonseca. Yes, the ex-boyfriend. How did he die?”

  “He was shot. Twice.” Sam took a swallow of beer. “Not neat, but effective. He bled out pretty fast. I think he was twenty-six years old.”

  She laid down her pencil. “Charlie Sullivan was shot twice.”

  “Correct. With a forty-five-caliber handgun. It could be the same shooter.”

  “Who?”

  “No idea.”

  The corners of Dina’s mouth turned up. “Does Ali Duncan know yet about George Fonseca? She’ll be ecstatic.”

  “Ecstatic?”

  “One down, two to go. Only Ruffini and Lamont left now.”

  “I don’t think she expected any of them to get the death penalty.”

  Dina made an impatient noise with her tongue. “Nothing would have happened to him. He wouldn’t have been found guilty.”

  Eyes closed, Sam rubbed his forehead with the heel of his hand. “You know, Dina, I’m damn good at my job. I would not have lost this one. I promise you that.”

  She looked at him another moment, then turned back to her papers. She ran her finger down a column of numbers.

  “What is that?”

  “I have an appointment with Frank tomorrow morning.” Dina clipped a stack of papers together and set them aside. Other little stacks were spaced evenly on the table.

  “Christ. What the hell is this? What is he making you do now?”

  “He isn’t making me do anything. This is my idea.” She lifted another stack of papers out of a file. The adding machine started up again. Click-ca-thunk, click-click. I’m reconciling Matthew’s checking account, which he never attended to. He received almost twenty thousand dollars when he turned eighteen by cashing in the savings bonds we purchased for him. When he died he had less than three hundred dollars. Where did it go?”

  “He spent it.”

  “On what? He bought his motorcycle with his earnings from modeling.” She shook her head. “Someone stole it.”

  “Stole it?” Sam paused with the beer halfway to his mouth.

  “Yes. If not outright theft, then a fraud of some kind. You remember, Sam. He was talking about investing in a business. Someone must have taken his money in a spurious deal. They robbed him.”

  Sam lowered the bottle to rest on his thigh. $20,000. Not so much money for a kid in a fast crowd on South Beach. Matthew could have run through that amount in weeks. He could have spent it on clothes, clubs, parties. He could have snorted it, drunk it, even shot it into his arms. “Dina, it doesn’t matter anymore.”

  She wet her thumb and flipped through a stack of cancelled checks. “I’m going to trace every one of these. Someone as good as held a gun to his head and emptied out his bank account. Frank says we can sue whoever did this.”

  “Oh, Jesus,” Sam muttered softly.

  Her eyes lifted to pin him with a dark stare. “I’m not asking you to get involved. You’ve made your position clear. I’ll take care of it. Frank may require your signature on a document, but otherwise, you needn’t bother.”

  Sam finished his beer, then put it on the table. He picked it up again, wiping off the circle of condensation. He said, “I’ve been thinking about Matthew lately. It may surprise you, but I do think about him, Dina. I don’t dwell on it, but sometimes … he comes to mind.” Sam took a breath to ease the tightness in his chest. “There was a lot about him I didn’t know. But I wasn’t aware of it at the time. Not knowing, I mean.”

  She wrote down some figures with her mechanical pencil. Dina had neat handwriting, very precise. She’d had her nails done. Lengthened, painted. Whatever women did to their nails.

  He set his bottle on the carpet beside his chair. “Did Matthew ever talk to you about Charlie Sullivan?” Dina looked up. “Did he ever mention the name?”

  Twin lines appeared between her dark brows as if she’d drawn them there. “Not that I recall. He knew that man? How?”

  There was no point to this, Sam thought. No reason to tell her. He said, “Around South Beach. Matthew knew him from modeling. One of the witnesses on Ali Duncan’s case told me they had met.”

  “So? I don’t see the importance.”

  He shook his head. “It isn’t important.”

  She sighed. “Sam, you’re drunk. Why don’t you go to bed?”

  He laid his arm out on the table and clenched and unclenched his fist, easing the stiffness. “Today I was thinking about the time I took Matt fishing up at Crystal River. Don’t know why I thought of it. How old was he, fourteen?”

  “Fifteen. It was his birthday. June twenty-first.”

  “That’s right. It was. We used your brother Nick’s camper. A long weekend, just Matt and me. It was great. Shit, I don’t think we caught anything, but we had a good time. Did he ever tell you about it?”

  “Yes, Sam.”

  “We used to be buddies. He said that. ‘Hey, Dad, we’re buddies.’ So what happened? I swear to you I don’t know. One day we’re okay; then there’s a wall between us, and he grew up on the other side of it. He was always closer to you. What was he like, Dina? What … was my son like?”

  Dina smiled. “You’re really asking that. He was perfect. He was—life. Everything.” The lamp made a circle of light on her files, the machine, and her arm, sleeved in red silk, lying across the papers. “Matthew would have been twenty years old this month. Twenty.” She was silent for a while, then said, “I can’t talk about him now.”

  Sam dropped his hand over hers. “Never mind.” He stood up, steadying himself on the back of the chair. “Let’s go to bed. How the hell long has it been since you and I have gotten into bed at the same time? How long has it been since we made love? I’ll bet you have that tallied up somewhere. Do you?” He laughed. “You’d better hurry, or we’ll be in the debit column again.”

  There might have been an exhalation of breath. “Go on. I have to finish this,” she said. “I’ll be there soon.”

  Somewhere in the night he saw Dina sitting at the dining room table with a .45-caliber pistol. Loading it, metal clicking on metal. Her fingers moving quickly, precisely. Pressing bullets into the clip. Hollow-points. Click. Click.

  What are you doing, honey?

  I have to balance the accounts.

  No, no. Let me do it.

  Sam saw himself looking down the barrel at a beautiful blond man, felt the weight of the gun. Then an elongated boom, slow motion. Then aiming at George Fonseca. Pulling the trigger again, feeling the heavy steel shuddering in his hand.

  Heart slamming against his ribs, Sam sat up, disoriented.

  Dina was a shape under the blanket. He stared at her for a while. She breathed peacefully, a hand curled at her cheek. He remembered his dream, and his body trembled. A sudden, horrific thought had shaken him to the bone. Making no noise, he pushed back the blanket and got out of bed.

  Tying his robe, Sam went downstairs to his study, a small room off the living room. Dina’s antique mantel clock ticked softly as he passed by. Three thirty-five A.M.. He closed the door and turned on the desk lamp. The key to his gun cabinet lay on top of the bookshelf across the room, out of sight. The cabinet, six feet tall, was paneled in oak. He opened the decorative door and inserted the key.

  Past the inner walls, made of steel, were his single-shot .22 from boyhood, a double-barreled twelve-gauge, a restored Mauser, a .357 Winchester hunting rifle with a scope, a .38 Smith & Wesson chrome-plated revolver in a leather zipper bag, and his Colt pistol, military issue. The pistol was in a wood box. Also in the cabinet were bluing, machine oil, rags, brushes, and boxes of ammunition to fit the various firearms. Sam pulled the .45 rounds off the shelf. Neat
rows of bullets. One box of steel-jacketed rounds, two of hollow-points, plus another half full. He couldn’t remember how many rounds were in there, last time he looked.

  He opened the box that held his .45. The pistol was there along with three clips, all loaded, nine rounds each. He took out the gun. Not so heavy now, but it would weigh close to two pounds fully loaded. He checked the chamber. Empty. Checked the action, pulled back the slide, fired it dry, then did it again. The clicks were loud in the quiet room. He shoved in a clip with the heel of his hand, sighted down the barrel. Then unloaded, rechecking the chamber. He smelled the barrel and ran his hands over the crosshatched wood grip and the smooth, gray metal, looking at his fingertips afterward.

  Nothing. It was clean, only the faint scent of oil. Sam sat heavily in his lounge chair. “You’re crazy, that’s what.”

  If Dina walked in here right now, asking what he was doing up at this hour, playing with his guns, he wouldn’t know what to tell her. He would feel ridiculous as hell.

  This pistol had been smuggled out of Vietnam by way of a friend in transportation. Sam had carried it in combat. Had used it. Maybe he had stolen it because he’d thought it was lucky. It had saved his life a couple of times.

  Now he looked down at the Colt, which he still held by the grip. He got up, put the pistol back into its box, returned the box to the cabinet, and locked the door.

  chapter twenty-four

  For an art exhibit on Miami Beach in the month of June, long after the season was over, Caitlin’s show wasn’t doing too badly. She allowed herself another glass of champagne. Her photographs looked splendid, mounted on the high, white walls. Five or six had already been sold.

  Paula DeMarco, the gallery owner, had planned the usual wine and cheese and crackers. Caitlin had run her charge card to the limit having the show catered with champagne. She was wearing loose slacks and a hand-painted vest, looking properly artsy. On South Beach, image was everything.

  Now she was in the middle of an interview with a freelance writer for Ocean Drive magazine. He wanted to know how a fashion model could make the leap to art photography. Then he asked what other top models she’d worked with. And wasn’t it great that the Beach was acquiring some of the cultural ambiance of New York? Caitlin said yes, she’d heard about a new restaurant opening up on Collins where the waiters were all transvestites. Very East Village, didn’t he think? Then he asked if she had any shows this summer. She said there would be an exhibit in Soho, a gallery on Mulberry Street. A lie, and he probably knew it but wrote it down anyway. Surely, before the summer was out, she would have a show somewhere. The reporter had a camera and asked to take her picture.

  Sipping her champagne, Caitlin glanced past him toward the door. A young couple going out, a trio of men coming in. Catching herself, she muttered idiot under her breath. She knew what she was doing, for the hundredth time tonight: looking for Sam Hagen. The more rational part of her brain told her this was the last place he’d show up.

  “Caitlin, I adore your photographs!” A model agent she’d known for years gave her a fumbling hug. The woman was high or drunk, possibly both. “But I knew you had talent. Didn’t I say that? Didn’t I?”

  “Thanks,” Caitlin said. “They’re for sale.” For less than you paid for those ugly shoes, she added to herself.

  The woman grabbed the reporter’s shoulder. “Brian! My God, somebody told me you’d gone to L.A.”

  Caitlin slipped away, nearly bumping into Rafael Soto around the other side of a divider. He was speaking Spanish to a good-looking man about thirty. Caitlin took the cigarette out of Rafael’s hand and filled her lungs.

  Exhaling smoke, she said, “Thank you so much.”

  He took it back. “That’s all you get. Caitlin, this is Julio. Julio, esta loca es mi amiga preciosa, Caitlin.”

  “Hi,” said Julio. He had eyes as dark as Rafael’s, and perfect teeth.

  “Hello. Did you come willingly tonight, or did Rafael twist your arm?”

  “Please?”

  Rafael did a fast translation, then said, “Julio just moved here from Paraguay. He speaks no English, so I’m showing him around.”

  “He’s gorgeous. Should I say congratulations?”

  “Not yet, but stay tuned.” Behind the red-framed glasses, Rafael’s eyes shifted across the gallery. “Oh, God. Your ex just walked through the door.”

  Caitlin glanced around. Frank Tolin was looking at her. He smiled. Then picked up a gallery guide and walked toward the first grouping of photos as if he had actually come here to see them.

  “Have him thrown out,” Rafael suggested.

  She turned her back. “He’ll leave if I don’t speak to him.”

  Rafael chattered on, but Caitlin didn’t hear him. Frank’s presence in the room intruded like speakers turned up to high volume. In the past ten days, Frank had left so many pleading messages on her voice mail she’d lost count at fifty. He had sent flowers. She refused delivery, but they kept coming. Two days ago she’d found all the equipment Frank had taken from her studio stacked up neatly outside her door. She sold it all to pay some bills. She was packing up, finishing leftover jobs, and calling old contacts in New York. In two weeks she would be gone.

  “Caitlin, Hiii-ii-iii!”

  A tall, black-haired girl in a short white dress was coming toward her, arms extended. If Caitlin hadn’t noticed Tommy Chang next to her, she wouldn’t have know who it was. Ali Duncan.

  Caitlin gave her a quick hug. “What are you doing here?”

  The day after George Fonseca’s murder, Ali had gone back to live with her mother. She’d told Caitlin that Sam Hagen had practically forced her to. “Tommy drove all the way up to Broward County to get me tonight.” She patted his chest. Isn’t he sweet?”

  Tommy blushed. His long black hair was tied back with a beaded strip of leather. This was the first time Caitlin had seen him in long pants and a new shirt.

  Ali smiled at Caitlin through the dark glasses. “I’m not afraid to be on South Beach. All these people around? Nothing’s going to happen. I had to see your show, Caitlin. It’s so genius!” The black, wedge-shaped wig was short in back, longer in front, with heavy bangs across her forehead. Her sleeveless white minidress skimmed her perky little butt and high breasts. Waving toward the linen-draped table at the rear of the gallery, she pouted prettily with a mouth made scarlet by glossy lipstick. “Go get me some champagne, Tommy. Please?” When he was gone, she said quietly, “He is really nice, but so protective you would not believe.”

  How easily she ordered him around, Caitlin thought. How readily he complied. One of them would eventually suffer when this romance ended, and it wasn’t likely to be Ali Duncan.

  Caitlin scanned the gallery. Frank Tolin had wandered to the candid photos of models on a runway, pretending to study them. Acting casual. Hands in his pockets. Wearing the Armani double-breasted suit she’d picked out for him last year in New York. His eyes shifted to meet hers, piercing.

  Quickly she turned back to Ali. “Are you working?”

  “Yeah. I’m doing okay. I got a booking in Fort Lauderdale. It’s like, nobody heard of me up there, so it’s cool. My mother is driving me crazy, though.” Ali took her cigarettes out of her tiny purse, then fished around for a lighter. “I am still in total shock about George.”

  “That’s a strange reaction,” Caitlin said.

  Ali lit her cigarette, and for a second her blue eyes flashed over the top of her sunglasses, making sure Tommy wasn’t on his way back. “I didn’t want George to die. I was trying to tell Mr. Hagen it wasn’t George who was the worst, but he won’t listen. He’s so, like, Be quiet, Miss Duncan, what do you know?”

  Her elbow on a hipbone, she took a long drag on her cigarette. “God, I can’t stand living like this. Caitlin, why am I putting myself through hell for a bunch of cops and state attorneys who only want to use me? Like, to chase Klaus Ruffini out of South Beach. And Mr. Hagen was on a TV interview show on Sunday, did you se
e him? I’m his most visible case. The reporter said that. And he goes, ‘Mr. Hagen, are you going to run for state attorney?’ Ha. Is Mickey a mouse?”

  “Ali, they won’t let you drop it.”

  “I know. I said I was sick of this, and he gives me this really mean look and says it doesn’t matter. It’s not my case anymore, it belongs to the state of Florida.” She made a muffled scream through clamped teeth. “I wanted to show George, and now I can’t. Oh, damn. Damn. Why’d he have to get shot? It isn’t fair.” Her lips trembled. “I didn’t want him dead.”

  Frank had moved closer, no longer pretending to look at the pictures. He stood silently and stared.

  Caitlin took Ali’s arm and walked her slowly around a group of chattering social types, all of them munching on hors d’oeuvres. She found a place along the windows that faced the side street.

  “Ali, you did the right thing. You were so brave.”

  “Brave. Yeah. Try stupid. I should’ve gone to see Tereza Ruffini when she asked me to.” Ali laughed. “Now she’s out of the country and it’s too late, and I’m modeling for Kmart.”

  Tommy came back with her champagne and another glass for Caitlin, who held it without drinking. Her hands were trembling slightly. As if her vision could extend at all angles, she saw Frank behind her, watching. Waiting till she was alone. It was nearly nine o’clock now, and the crowd in the gallery was thinning out.

  When a male friend of hers, a graphic artist, started a conversation, Tommy and Ali drifted away, hand in hand, to look at the pictures. The graphic artist owned a production company in the design district in Miami. They got into a friendly argument about digital cameras and manipulation of imagery. Caitlin stupidly had to ask him to repeat what he had said. She couldn’t concentrate.

  Then Frank was standing beside her. He’d bought something, which was now tucked into a large, maroon plastic bag with the name of the gallery in gold. “Forgive me for interrupting,” he said. “I wanted to tell Ms. Dorn how much I admire her work. I just purchased the series of night views of Lincoln Road.”

  Lips compressed, Caitlin stared at the floor for a moment, then swung her hair off her face and looked directly at him. She didn’t want Frank buying her photographs. Didn’t want them hanging in his living room.