AGAINST THE WIND (Book Two of The Miami Crime Trilogy) (22 page)

Silvana

Hialeah, Florida

Friday, April 13, 2012

1:55 PM

B
ACK IN THE
CAR
, Silvana and Vargas locked eyes anxiously. They both wanted to
speak, but she got it out first. "I smell whores."

"Right down to the heavy perfume,"
Vargas said.

"Drive."

"Where to?"

"Brownsville," she said.
"Meanwhile, I'll get Vice on the phone."

Vargas fired up the engine and headed out of the
racetrack complex, out of Hialeah altogether. Silvana punched in the number of
Detective Sergeant Tommy Kelly.

"Tommy, Silvana Machado."

"Yo, Silvana. What's up, darlin'?" His
soft drawl floated through the phone line.

"Listen, we got a murder vic here, Ana Maxina
Méndez, Hispanic female, DOB 9/15/90. Do you have a jacket on her? Any prostie
beefs?"

"Méndez? Doesn't sound familiar. Let me look.
Hold on."

Silvana leaned away from the phone and said to
Vargas, "Head toward 26th Avenue."

Kelly came back on the phone. "No prostie,
Silvana. But we picked her up for marijuana possession back in November of '07.
That was dropped, though."

"Dropped? What happened?"

"Well, let's see … looks like the evidence
was inadmissible. No probable cause for the search. That's not unusu
¾
whoa! What's this?"

"What? What?" Silvana leaned forward in
the passenger seat.

"Her lawyer got the case thrown out. Her
lawyer, who just happened to be Reese Kilgore. Fuck me! He was getting five
hundred an hour
back then
! I wonder
what he was doing defending a seventeen-year-old girl on a two-bit marijuana
charge."

"I think I know," Silvana said.
"She was Maxie Méndez's daughter."

"Maxie M — holy shit!" Kelly said.
"No fucking wonder. He probably spread a little dough around and got it
dropped. I'm surprised we even still have this record of it."

"So am I. But I've got one more question for
you, Tommy. What was the name of that escort service that provided Evalena Diaz
for Bob Harvey and his brother Phil? I remember you told me, but I forgot the
complete name. Magic City something, wasn't it?"

"Yeah. Magic City Suites. They're one of the
higher end services."

"Do you have an address on them? And the name
of someone in charge? A contact?"

"Sure, let me get that for you. Hang on
again."

While she was holding, she filled in Vargas on the
Reese Kilgore connection and he expressed the appropriate surprise at the
understanding of one of Miami's most prominent attorneys coming to the rescue
of Maxie Méndez's daughter.

Vargas said, "I wonder what else he does for
Maxie."

Silvana said, "And I wonder who knows about
it, if any of his high-priced country club friends know he's down and dirty
with scumbag racketeers in Hialeah."

Kelly popped back on the line.

"Okay, darlin', here you go. We did a reverse
phone search and came up with 1418 Brickell Bay Drive, apartment 312. That's a
pretty nice area. Lot of high rises right on the water. Figures, though. Like I
told you, Magic City Suites deals in the pricier whores."

"1418 Brickell Bay Drive, unit 312," she
said, looking at Vargas, signaling him to commit it to his ironclad memory.
"And what about a contact?"

"Right. We've got someone listed at that
address who's also registered as the owner of the service. One Sofía
Ramos."

Silvana let out a soft grunt, but she felt like
she'd been sucker-punched right in the gut. Like all the air just got sucked
out of her lungs, out of the whole fucking car. Vargas glanced at her to make
sure she was all right.

Kelly said, "Silvana? Darlin', are you
there?"

"Y-yeah, Tommy."

"You okay?"

"Yeah," she said. "I'm okay. Thanks
for the information."

"Sure you're okay?"

"I'm fine. No problem."

"All right, then," Kelly said.
"Have a great day." She swiped the call off, eyes still blankly fixed
on the glove compartment.

"Silvi," Vargas said. "What is it?
What's wrong?"

"Uh, n-nothing. Nothing's wrong."

"Come on, don't bullshit me," he said.
"What's the matter?"

"Kelly just told me the owner of this escort
service that Evalena Diaz worked for is a girl I used to know when I was a kid.
A teenager."

"No shit? Were you good friends with
her?"

"Not really, but I used to see her all the
time. She was about a year or two older than me. We … we were in high school
together but she quit pretty early, while I graduated."

Memories flooded back. Memories of a girl so
fetching, so incomprehensibly beautiful that Silvana would have done anything
—
anything
to be with her, just
to be able to touch her, to inhale her natural scent, which must have been
intoxicating. Even then, at twelve and thirteen years old, when Silvana had
never had sex with anyone, she first felt the exciting stirrings within her,
stirrings that would eventually ignite and set her loins ablaze. Fires that
would burn for other women later on, but never so bright and never so hot as
they did for Sofía.

They motored along Hialeah Drive. As they crossed
into Miami, they left behind the Cuban atmosphere. Here the street became
simply Florida Route 944, knifing through a strip of low, flat-roofed
industrial buildings whose businesses included tires, auto glass, and body
work. Brownsville lay ahead.

Florida 944 quickly became all-black Northwest
54th Street, and a look of despair drew down over the neighborhood. Vacant
buildings which once housed retail and office space now sat as hollow shells,
covered in graffiti. One look down the cross streets showed one of Miami's
worst crime-ridden areas. The two cops drove slowly down 54th.

"Who we lookin' for?" asked Vargas.

"G-Man," said Silvana. "Keep an eye
out for his car."

They plotted out a section between 22nd and 27th
Avenues and 54th and 62nd Streets, and began cruising every one of the streets
in between.

"There it is," she said some time later,
pointing to a black Dodge Charger making the turn onto 26th Avenue from 62nd.
Vargas put the Kojak light on the roof of their car and gave the siren a little
goosing. The Charger pulled over in front of a trash-strewn empty lot. The cops
saw two people in the car, a man driving and a woman passenger. Vargas took the
driver's side, Silvana the passenger's.

The driver's window glided downward. G-Man said,
"What the fuck? Dis ain't Friday."

"Step out of the car, please." Vargas
was at his politest, while Silvana ordered the woman riding shotgun to do the
same.

"What the fuck is this?" G-Man cried.

Vargas grabbed him by his fake silk collar and
pulled his skinny ass straight through the open window. G-Man howled in protest
when Vargas dropped him on the street like a sack of potatoes, and meanwhile,
the woman, seeing this same kind of treatment might be awaiting her, quickly
got out of the car.

Silvana looked her over. Tight, low-cut gold top
showing lots of her plentiful cleavage, electric blue fake satin hotpants,
low-grade hoochie-mama stilettos. Way, way too much makeup, especially around
her eyes, and a wig that didn't do her any favors. Silvana said to her,
"Let's see some ID." The woman reached into her cheap blingy clutch
purse and pulled out a driver's license. Silvana read from it: "Laquita
Hawkins, Miami address, DOB 1/4/88. Is all this information accurate?"

Laquita Hawkins stood in the slouch required of
all ghetto youth when confronted by any kind of authority, especially cops.
You can't let on that they're getting to
you. You gotta show 'em you don't give a shit. Let's get this over with,
motherfucker.

"It's acc'rate," she said.

"What do you do for a living, Laquita?"
As if it weren't obvious.

"I ain't workin' nowhere right now."

"Really? You're not out working the streets
for our friend the G-Man here? Could've fooled me."

Laquita jutted her tits out and threw her head
back as though she were Beyoncé in front of legions of adoring paparazzi. She
segued her voice into buttery levels. "I ain't workin' no streets."

"Come stand behind the car. And don't
move." Silvana dragged her to a point between the two cars and cuffed her.
After a loud protest about the cuffs, Silvana slapped her to shut her up.

"Hey!" said G-Man. "Easy. That my
bottom woman!"

 
Silvana stepped up to G-Man, now on his
feet fidgeting, visibly concerned for Laquita. "Tell her to cut the crap
or she's gonna be your shit-beat-out-of-her woman."

"Whatchu motherfuckers want, Macha
—" Silvana punched him squarely in the face. His guard was down and
it caught him flush. Blood streamed from his nose before he said "Owww!
What the fuck!" and jerked backward.

"We'll ask the questions," she said. She
got right into his space, her face about two inches from his and grabbing his
slimy-feeling collar, and said softly, "And it's Sergeant Machado to you,
faggot, not 'motherfucker'. We're not here to bust you, that is, unless … you
want to get busted. For example, by not cooperating."

He threw her a nod, his hands trembling.
"Y-yeah, I get it … Sergeant Machado."

She backed away from him. "That's good,
G-Man. That's a very good start." Her voice turned authoritative.
"Now, are you ready to cooperate?"

"Whatchu want?"

A hard slap to his face. "I said, are you
ready to cooperate?"

"Yeah, yeah. I be ready."

"All right," Silvana said. "For
starters, what can you tell me about an escort service called Magic City
Suites?"

"Not too much," G-Man said. "They
high end, you know what I'm sayin'?"

"I know they're a lot higher end than
anything you've got," Silvana said, throwing a glance Laquita's way. Laquita
was still overflowing with attitude, mumbling curses, even with cuffs on, her
jaw as far forward as it would go. Silvana had to hand it to her.

G-Man calmer now, his body loose and gangly.
"They got the girl next door kind of bitches, you know what I'm sayin'?
Real clean-cut. I'm lookin' to get me a setup like that one day. You know, a
service. Get off these damn streets."

"You know one of their girls named Evalena
Diaz? Also known as Diamond?"

"Diamond? Yeah, I heard of her."

Vargas said, "What did you hear?"

"She big on that circuit. Used to get top
dollar. Man, thass the kind o' bitches I need to get, you know what I'm sayin'?
I hear she get a
thousand dollars
a
pop. Man, I can make myself —"

Silvana broke in. "What do you mean, 'used to
get top dollar'?"

"Hey, word is, she disappeared. Friend o'
mine does muscle for Magic City. He say she gone, you know what I'm sayin'?
Nobody knows where. S'pose to show up for a date one night and dint. Been gone
'bout a week now. Okay if I smoke?" He reached in his shirt pocket for a
pack of cigarettes.

"Go ahead," Silvana said. He shook one
loose from the pack and sparked it with a Bic lighter.

After a couple of puffs, he said, "I don't
know no more 'bout that service, Sergeant."

Silvana and Vargas looked at each other. "All
right," she said, nodding Vargas toward Laquita. He went over and uncuffed
her.

" 'Bout fuckin' time," she said,
massaging her wrists and strutting back to the passenger door. She put her
hands on her generous hips and with her head rolling and sliding from side to
side on her shoulders, said, "Cuffin' me for no motherfuckin' reason. I
ain't done nothin'. I got rights, you know."

Silvana gave him a business card. "Okay,
G-Man, if you hear anything else, here's my number. Put it in your cell phone
now
. Meanwhile, let's have the
money." He pulled some bills from his pocket. She grabbed them and counted
out a thousand dollars. Shoving the rest back at him, she gestured toward Laquita,
who was still rubbing her wrists and claiming her rights. "Now, take your
pet and get the fuck out of here."

Silvana

Miami, Florida

Friday, April 13, 2012

4:45 PM

C
ALLE OCHO
WAS A PARKING LOT
, going in both
directions. At least there was movement every once in a while going toward
downtown. The cars coming out of downtown might as well have been covered with
moss. Vargas cursed the Miami traffic, one of his favorite pastimes, while
Silvana punched up a number on her cell phone.

When the call was answered, she said, "Maxie.
Sergeant Machado."

"Sergeant Machado. You have something for
me?" Maxie's voice was lacking its usual toughness, now all hope and
pleading.

"The detectives who are working the case just
finished questioning Glenroy Charles's driver. He didn't see the shooting,
because he had driven into the garage to park, but like any good driver, he
always had his eye on the rear view mirror, and he caught a look at a car that
pulled into the property a little way behind him."

"Did he get a make?" Maxie asked.

"Red Cadillac Escalade. Said he thinks he saw
it following them earlier when they were leaving a club in North Miami."

"Red Escalade?"

Silvana said, "They're running it through the
DMV now. We should have something tomorrow."

"You'll call me?"

"Yes. We'll let you know."

"Sergeant," Maxie said softly,
"thank you very much. This means a lot to me."

"You're welcome, Maxie. We'll be in
touch." She swiped the call off.

"What'd he say?" Vargas said.

"He's very grateful. You can't blame him, you
know. It was his only child."

Vargas said, "I don't know, Silvi. I think
you might be going soft. This is Maxie fucking Méndez, for Christ's sake. Why
are we doing him any favors? I'd just as soon pop a cap up his fat ass as look
at him."

"I know, I know," she said. "Me
too. But this … the guy's daughter took one in the fucking face. She was
Daddy's little girl."

Vargas chuckled. "Yeah. Daddy's little girl …
who's fucking some Jamaican drug dealer along with anybody else with a little
cash."

They finally made it past Miami Avenue and
approached US 1. Vargas was positioned to go straight through the light.

"Turn here," Silvana said.

"Silvi, it's US 1. It's too crowded this time
of day. I was gonna go straight to Brickell Bay Drive and go on down to the
address. It's only about ten blocks or so."

"You ever been on that fucking street?"
she said. "It's all high-rises and cars spilling out of parking garages at
this hour. We'll be all fucking night trying to go those ten blocks. Better to
take US 1."

Vargas grumbled a curse, but hit his turn signal
anyway and turned right. Traffic was bad, but he'd seen worse. They eventually
swung over to Brickell Bay Drive and pulled into number 1418. Vargas parked
directly in front of the door under the porte-cochère. The doorman gave them
some shit but they flipped their badges at him as they entered the building.

Silvana thought she had prepared herself for this
visit. She'd told herself over and over this was a murder investigation and
Sofía was no different than anyone else she might have to question. It had
been, what — fifteen years since she'd seen her? She might not even
recognize her after all that time. Sofia was no teenager anymore, hustling guys
for pizzas. She had to be around thirty-three, thirty-four now. Probably a
different person entirely.

Maybe she's been fucking herself up with drugs all
these years, Silvana told herself. Drugs give you that hollow-eyed, sunken
look. That look of desperation. Certainly years and years of fucking thousands
of guys in heartless transactions for cash must have left a few wrinkles on her
once-pretty face. Maybe she's even overweight. Drinking heavily? Not out of the
question. Silvana had seen more than a few madams in her day and none of them
were what you would call radiant, more like used up and relying on
entrepreneurial skills and a gift of gab to carry them through. Definitely what
you would call worn goods. So why was her heart pounding as they stepped onto
the elevator?

Apartment 312 was directly across the hall from
where they stepped off. Vargas laid the cop thud on the door and momentarily it
opened. Silvana's rapid inhale was almost an audible gasp.

Vargas said, "Miss Ramos, we're police officers.
May we speak with you for a moment?"

La Bruja.

There she stood, looking like April in Paris. All
firm flesh and shining hair. Long, slender body wrapped in an emerald green
silk blouse and tight fawn-colored slacks. Neutral-colored open stilettos clicked
under her feet on the tile floor as she moved aside to admit the cops. Her
brilliant face bore the beauty of one to whom high-priced gifts flow naturally.
In gazing at that face, Silvana could almost feel the warm blood pulsating just
below Sofía's snowy skin. Not a single gorgeous dark hair strayed out of place
as it cascaded stylishly to a point just above her shoulders. Piercing eyes,
around which there was
absolutely
not
one line or wrinkle, were still quite capable of casting spells. Her perfect mouth,
painted a light orange shade, pulled back into a smile across even, white
teeth. At thirty-three, she basked in the Indian summer of youth.

La Bruja.

She showed no recognition of Silvana, and Silvana
thought this a good thing at first. This way, they could just brace her about
Evalena Diaz and go on about their business.

"May I see your identification?" she
asked.

Silvana and Vargas produced their badges, and she
looked them over carefully, as though there was going to be a test on them
later. When she was finished, she said, "Sergeant Machado? Are you Silvana
from Hialeah? Weren't we kids together?"

"Yes, we were, Sofía. We were." Silvana
froze in her tracks, utterly unable to move.

Sofía widened her luscious mouth into a grand
grin. Her eyes lost their wariness and took on a look of pure delight.
"Oh, Silvana! It's been so long! Please come in." She eagerly
beckoned the cops into her apartment.

The place was very nice. Not eye-popping, but very
nice. The kind of nice that speaks of nice income, income that could buy nice
furniture and other nice appointments, possibly decorated by a nice
professional. The centerpiece of the living room, which was where they all
stood, was an L-shaped couch of steel-gray leather. Goes with everything. Very
nice. Sofía took a seat on one leg of the L, pointed the two cops to the other.

"So, Silvana, how long have you been a police
officer?" Sofía asked.

"About ten years now."

"I hardly ever see any of our old friends
from back in the day," she said. Her smile never left her face, revealing
all those magnificent sparkling teeth.

Vargas cleared his throat. "Uh, Miss Ramos,
we're here on serious police business."

The smile vanished. "Oh, I'm sorry,
detective. What can I help you with?"

He said, "You're listed as the owner of Magic
City Suites, an escort service. Is that correct?"

"Yes." She said it slowly, returning the
wariness to the eyes.

"We're interested in a girl you have working
for you. One Evalena Diaz, aka Diamond."

Her voice dropped a level or two. "Yes,
Diamond. Evalena. I don't know if you know this, but she's disappeared. Or, at
least, I haven't seen her. It's been about a couple of weeks now."

Silvana said, "Sofía, we know she was sent on
a date to the Sea & Sand Motel, probably to meet Bob Harvey, who was murdered
shortly thereafter. We need to speak with her. She was supposed to meet Harvey,
right?"

Sofía nodded. "The last I saw of her was that
afternoon. Right before she went on the date."

"Right before?" Silvana said. "Was
she here?"

"No, no. The girls never come here. But that
day, I took her to lunch. We lingered over coffee and talked for quite a while.
Then she left for the date."

Vargas said, "Do you often do that? Take your
girls to lunch?"

"Every once in a while," Sofía said.
"Evalena had had several dates with Harvey before that. He was paying her
pretty well. A lot of her clients were paying her well. She was a good earner.
I'm going to miss her."

"Miss her?" Vargas said. "You talk
as though you'll never see her again."

"No, I mean, I miss her now. I hope she
hasn't
really
disappeared, you know?
I like her a lot."

Silvana leaned forward. "When she left your
lunch, did she leave alone? I mean, did she drive away herself or did someone
pick her up?"

Sofía gave it a little thought. "As I
remember it, she left alone. We arrived in separate cars, and I don't know
where hers was parked. We walked away from the restaurant in different
directions." She appeared to be through talking, then she said,
"Silvana, you don't think she could've had anything to do with that
murder, do you? I mean, Evalena was a really gentle girl. She wouldn't hurt a
fly."

"Well, she met Harvey at the motel and he was
killed not too long after that, so if she didn't do it, we'd certainly like to
ask her who else was there."

One shake of the head and Sofía said, "She
didn't say anything at all about meeting anyone. Other than Harvey, that is.
She had another date the next night, but obviously she didn't keep it. I had to
send a substitute."

Silvana said, "Sofía, did you know Harvey
yourself?"

A flickering deep in her eyes. The answer, Silvana
knew, was yes.

"No," she replied. "I never met
him."

"All right," Silvana said. "There's
another girl. Ana Maxina Méndez. Do you know her?"

Sofía made a face. "Yes, I know her. Too bad
about what happened to her the other night. I heard she was shot in the face.
How awful!"

"Did she ever work for you?" Silvana
asked.

"She came to me wanting to be an MCS escort
in the worst way. I can't blame her, of course. Our girls escort men of means.
Very generous men, if you get my meaning."

Silvana got her meaning. Sofía had been exploiting
male generosity since her teenage days of hustling whole pizzas at Rey's back
in Hialeah.

"Did you hire her?" Silvana asked.

"We gave her a trial. She was very
good-looking. Young, fresh … she had what men want in an escort, you know? So
we sent her on a few dates, but …"

"But what?" Vargas said.

"Well … she … oh, it was her appearance. She
was gorgeous, like I said, and she always dressed tastefully, but her hair and
makeup made her look cheap. Her attitude was low-level, too. She had a dirty
mouth."

"Really?" Silvana said.

"Really. We sent her on a weekend date to Las
Vegas with a client, and when they came back, he complained about her. Said he
was embarrassed to be seen with her out there. She was drinking too much,
acting up in these fancy casinos and restaurants, cursing in public, flirting
with other men, that kind of thing. Our clients don't want to be seen with
someone who looks and acts like street trash. I tried to talk her into a
makeover, but she resisted, so we quit booking her. I heard she was killed with
some Jamaican drug dealer. Doesn't surprise me."

Silvana said, "What else do you know about
her? Anything about her background? Where she was from?"

Sofía thought a moment. "I believe she came
from a good family. As I recall, she said she was raised in Hialeah Gardens,
which has some really nice homes over there. You know Hialeah Gardens, don't
you, Silvana?"

"Yes, I know it. So that's all you know about
her background, her family? Nothing more?"

"No. Not that I can think of. Like I said,
she only worked a few dates with us."

"Miss Ramos," Vargas said, "who is
the real owner of Magic City Suites?"

Sofía's head went back, partly in surprise, the
other part in indignation. "Why, I am the real owner. Where did you get
the idea that —"

"You're listed as the owner," Vargas
said, "but who's pulling the strings? Who do you kick up to?"

"Kick up?
What
are you talking about? Magic City Suites is a legitimate business providing escorts
for men who want to take a girl out for a night on the town —"

"Or to fuck her over at the Sea & Sand
Motel." Vargas penetrated her eyes with his own.

"Detective — uh, what was your name
again?
¾
Vargas. Yes, Detective Vargas. My company is in no way involved in prostitution
or any other illegal activities."

"Oh, really?" he said in his best
wiseass tone. "An escort service not involved in prostitution? You don't
say."

"Yes, I do say," she said. "We are
completely legitimate."

"And how about you personally," Vargas
said. "Are you 'completely legitimate'?"

Still on the couch, she straightened her posture
and brushed her hair back with a flip of her hand. "Very much so. I always
have been."

"Well, let's see." He pulled out his
notebook. "Back in 1999, you were picked up for solicitation for
prostitution in the bar at the Intercontinental Hotel. You spent the night in
jail and you arranged bail the next day. Between 2000 and 2002, you were
pinched on three occasions. Same charge, same result. You avoided trouble for a
few years until 2007. That year you were working for an escort service
yourself. You were busted at an orgy at the Eden Roc in Miami Beach. There was
cocaine at that one. But there were a few too many big shots getting blow jobs
that night, so the whole thing was swept under the rug. How'm I doing so
far?"

Sofía's chin touched her chest, but her eyes
glared at Vargas, then at Silvana. "Silvana, why is he saying all these
things? What did I do to deserve —"

"There's been a murder, two murders if you
count Ana Maxina Méndez, and you're in it up to your sweet pussy. How about you
tell us what we want to know?"