Found: A Matt Royal Mystery (23 page)

“What do you mean by recycled?”

“Guy comes in and buys a car from Bonino, pays ten grand. He drives the car to Alabama, alters the vehicle identification number, and sells it, for one grand to another dealership that is either owned by Bonino or one of his cronies. The car is then resold to another buyer for ten grand and he moves on to Tennessee and sells the car again for one grand.”

“Slick. They leave a paper trail of buying and selling cars and the money comes into the dealership clean as a whistle.”

“Bonino also took over some other businesses that he used to make money. He’s a mini conglomerate and nobody’s ever seen him.”

“Surely his employees have met him.”

“Nope. Everything is done through managers who deal with Bonino only by e-mail. Nobody ever sees him.”

“Not even his thugs? His enforcers?”

“Not even them.”

“I’ll be damned,” I said.

The policemen left just as Jock and Logan were coming in. “Did you guys have a nice round?” I asked.

“I don’t want to talk about it, podna,” said Jock.

“It wasn’t that bad,” said Logan. “We had finished the second round and were in the clubhouse when the rain hit.”

“Why were the cops here?” asked Jock.

I told them about our afternoon and our speculation as to who was shooting at us.

“I think it’s time to have a chat with Mr. Bonino,” said Jock.

“Nobody knows where he lives or works or even what he looks like,” I said.

Jock grinned. “I’ll bet DeLuca does,” he said. “I think I might pay him a visit in the hospital.”

“The sheriff has him under guard,” I said.

“I’ll make a call,” said Jock.

“Jock,” J.D. said, “what are you going to do?”

“Have a little chat with DeLuca.”

“Come on, Jock,” said J.D. “You can’t beat him up in a hospital surrounded by cops.”

Jock looked puzzled. “Who said anything about beating him up?” he asked.

“J.D.,” I said, “let it go.”

“Sorry, Jock. I’m a suspicious person,” J.D. said.

“I noticed,” Jock said, grinning.

“Anybody up for Tiny’s?” Logan asked.

J.D. shook her head. I said, “Not us. I think I’d just as soon stay in and do nothing.”

“I’ll go with you, Logan,” said Jock. “If it’s all right, I think I’ll stay at your place tonight. Matt, keep your pistol handy. The shooter might come back.”

“Maybe J.D. will stay and protect me,” I said.

“Maybe,” said J.D. “If I don’t have to cook.”

“What’s Jock going to do?” J.D. asked after they’d left.

“Whatever he has to,” I said.

“I’m still not comfortable with his methods.”

“He’s not either, you know. But he does what he has to do to keep the country safe. And sometimes, when his family’s threatened, he does it to keep us safe.”

“We’re his family,” she said.

“Bingo.”

“How big a family are we? How many people does he consider family?”

“There’s you, me, and Logan,” I said. “I think his director, Dave Kendall, fits in there as well. It’s a small group. Jock can’t afford to get too close to anybody. It might bring harm to them.”

“Then how did we get into such a select group?”

I laughed. “Jock and I have been closer than brothers since we were twelve. We both came from very dysfunctional families and I think we kind of clung to each other as kids. Our high school buddy, Fran Masse, once said that Jock and I challenge each other every day. Not in a confrontational sense, but by each of us inspiring the other to seek excellence. We are each part of the other’s success. We’ve taken care of each other for a very long time.

“You and Logan sort of married into the family. Jock knows I love you and he knows that Logan has become more than just a friend. Other than you and Jock, Logan is my best friend, and Jock isn’t going to let anything happen to any of us.”

“He’s a very strange man,” said J.D. “He’s gentle and warm and funny, but every now and then I get a glimpse of a side of him that’s so cold it makes me shiver.”

“There’s another side you’ve never seen,” I said. “The side that brings on the cleansing time.”

“I never want to be part of that,” she said. “It would embarrass him and I think maybe diminish him in some way. When the time comes for that, I’ll disappear. Let you two do what you have to do to get him back to sanity.”

“I’m glad you understand. I worry that a time will come when he won’t be able to get back. When the horrors of what he has seen and done will outweigh what he sees as the good in it.”

“What then?”

“I don’t know. I’ve heard of pet dogs who grow old and one day disappear. They leave the owners who have cared for them and loved them all their lives and they go off somewhere to die. I’m afraid that may be what’s in Jock’s future. One day he just won’t come back.”

J.D. got up from her chair and came over to the sofa and hugged me for a long time. “I hope you’re wrong,” she said, finally. “For all our sakes.”

Jock followed Logan in his rental car and sat outside Tiny’s while he made a phone call. He hung up and went inside to join Logan. He was on his first O’Doul’s when his phone rang and he stepped back outside. He talked for a couple of minutes and reentered the bar.

“I have to go,” Jock said to Logan. “I’ll be back at your place before too late.”

Logan gave him a knowing look. “Be careful, Jock.”

Jock nodded, turned, and walked out the door. He drove to Blake Hospital and took the elevator to the third floor. He walked down the corridor to a deputy sheriff sitting in a folding chair next to a door.

“Afternoon, Deputy,” Jock said, as he walked up. “My name is Jeff Washington. I think you probably got a phone call about me from Detective Sims.”

The deputy stood. “I did, Mr. Washington. Go on in.”

Jock walked into a typical hospital room. DeLuca was in the bed, both legs in some kind of contraption with ropes and pulleys that held them off the bed. Monitors were hooked up and beeping, IV lines running to his left arm, cuffs around both wrists and attached to the bedrails. He looked up as Jock walked in.

“Are you the new doctor?” DeLuca asked.

“I’m Dr. Washington,” said Jock. “I just need to check your vitals.” He walked toward the bed and gently pulled a pillow from under DeLuca’s head, looked at him for a moment, and then forcibly pushed the pillow into DeLuca’s face, holding it down tightly, depriving the man of air.

DeLuca tried to scream, but the pillow muffled the noise so that it
couldn’t be heard outside the room. He jerked around in the bed, but his arms were locked down by the handcuffs and the contraption holding his legs in place allowed for almost no movement. Jock kept the pressure on DeLuca’s face until the struggles subsided some and then leaned in close. “Listen to me,” he said. “I’m going to remove the pillow, but if you try to scream it goes back on your face and it’ll stay there until you’re dead.” He let up the pressure and could hear DeLuca gasping for breath. “Nod if we have a deal.”

DeLuca nodded and Jock removed the pillow. DeLuca looked up at Jock, fear contorting his face. “Who are you?” he asked.

Jock was still holding the pillow near DeLuca’s head. One quick move and it’d cover his face again. “I’ll ask the questions. If I don’t like the answer, you’ll die right here, right now. Understand?”

DeLuca nodded.

“Where is Bonino?”

“I don’t know.”

Jock gave him a cold stare and began to move the pillow back into position. “Okay,” he said. “Sorry we couldn’t have communicated better.”

“No,” DeLuca said, his voice trembling in fear. “Honestly, I don’t know where he is, but I think I know who he is.”

“That’s better. Give me a name.”

“Dwight Peters.”

“Who’s that?”

“He’s the man I reported to. I think he might be Bonino.”

“Tell me about him,” Jock said.

“I don’t know where he lives. I always met him in a restaurant in downtown Sarasota or talked to him on the phone.”

“How often did you meet with him?”

“Not a lot. Maybe three or four times. Everything else was on the phone.”

“Why haven’t you told the cops about this?”

“Peters will have me killed if I rat him out.”

“You just did.”

“Yeah, but you were going to kill me if I didn’t. Cops don’t do that.”

“Did he tell you why he wanted you to beat up Matt Royal?”

“I never talked to him about that little job.”

“Little job? It just about got you killed.”

“Nobody told me Royal was that tough.”

“If you didn’t talk to Peters, who gave you your marching orders?”

“A guy named Norwood. Cal Norwood. He’s Peters’s right-hand man.”

“Did he usually give you your orders?”

“No. They usually came straight from the boss.”

“Why not this time?”

“Mr. Peters fired me a couple of months ago.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know. It may have had to do with his wife.”

“Peters’ wife?”

“Yeah.”

“How so?”

“She was with him when we met one time and she is hot. I might have mentioned that to Mr. Peters the last time I saw him. He fired me on the spot.”

“You’re lucky he didn’t kill you.”

“Yeah. I thought about that.”

“Why do you think Peters is Bonino?” Jock asked.

“Bonino runs things, but nobody’s ever met him or even seen him. Peters seems to be in charge, and sometimes I think he might really be Bonino.”

“How many people work for him?”

“I don’t know. Norwood’s the only one I’ve ever met. He’s usually with Mr. Peters. I think he’s some kind of bodyguard or something.”

“How many people have you killed, DeLuca?”

“I’ve never killed anybody. I just beat people up sometimes. I think Norwood and some other guys he works with do the killing.”

“So you know about the killings?”

“Not really. I just know there have been some.”

“How did you find out about them?”

“Just gossip. I go to some of the car dealerships sometimes and hear
people there talking about somebody who disappeared right after Norwood came around asking about them.”

“Why did you go to the dealerships?”

“Sometimes Mr. Peters needs me to tap on some of the guys a little.”

“Tap on them? You mean beat the shit out of them.”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

“Don’t know. Mr. Peters never told me why.”

“Are you smart enough to know that you’ll probably be killed the first night you’re in the jail’s general population?”

“Why would that happen?”

“Because you know more than you should about Peters’s operation.”

“Yeah, but I ain’t talking.”

“You just did.”

“That’s different. Are you going to tell Peters I’ve been talking to you?”

“No. But if anything you told me isn’t true, I’ll come back and kill you myself. If I ever hear that you’ve told anybody about our little discussion today, I’ll take you out.”

“How did you get by the guard at the door?”

“Think about it. I can get to you anywhere. If you’re willing to tell Detective Sims what you’ve told me, I may be able to get you into the federal witness protection program where you’ll be safe.”

“Okay. I’ll do it.”

No hesitation, thought Jock. The bad guys could always make quick decisions when it involved their well-being.

Jock sat in his car in the hospital parking lot and called David Sims. “Did you learn anything?” Sims asked.

“A lot, and DeLuca is willing to testify if you can get him into witness protection.”

“I’ll work on that. Do you need anything else?”

“Yeah. I need all you can get me on a man named Cal Norwood. I’d also like to know about any known associates.”

“Norwood has been around for several years. He’s been arrested a few
times, but we’ve never been able to make anything stick. I think our organized-crime unit will have some stuff on him. I’ll get right back to you. Five minutes at the most.”

Jock sat quietly, listening to a smooth jazz station, letting his mind empty. It was a form of relaxation he’d learned long ago. His phone rang. Sims. “I’ve got an address and phone number if you need it for Norwood and I’m texting you a picture of him. I’ll send some more information on his buddies within the next half hour. The organized-crime unit is digging it up for me.”

Norwood lived in a subdivision off University Parkway near its intersection with 1-75. Jock looked at his watch. He had about an hour and a half of daylight left. It’d have to do. He drove east on Cortez Road, south on Tamiami Trail to the airport, and then east on University Parkway. He pulled into the subdivision and found the address Sims had given him for Norwood. He parked two doors down.

Norwood’s house was ranch style, probably built in the ‘60s. The yard was neat and recently mowed. There was a single-car garage, no toys in the yard. Jock knew from the information sent by Sims that Norwood was single and had no family. The house seemed to confirm this.

Jock picked up his phone and called the number Sims had given him for Norwood. It was answered on the second ring by a gruff voice. “Yeah?”

“Mr. Norwood, you don’t know me, but I’m going to kill you tonight. First, I’ll take out Peters. Then I’ll come for you. Before daylight. If you need to say good-bye to anyone, now’s the time.”

“You some kind of comedian? Who the fuck are you?”

“You’ll never see me coming. Neither will Peters.” Jock closed the phone and waited.

Five minutes later, Norwood’s garage door opened and a black Lincoln Town Car backed out, Norwood at the wheel. Jock let him get around the nearest corner and then fell in behind. Norwood turned east on University Parkway and drove to Lakewood Ranch. He turned into an upscale neighborhood where the houses backed up to a golf course and parked in front of one of them. He got out of the car and walked to the front door, went inside.

A few minutes later, Norwood came out and got into his car and sat, waiting. The garage door at Peters’s house glided up and a red Corvette backed out, turned into the street, and left the neighborhood. Norwood followed close behind. Jock followed the Town Car and the Corvette to the little shopping village a half mile away and watched as Norwood parked directly in front of the restaurant. The Corvette pulled into a nearby parking slot, and the man Jock assumed to be Peters joined Norwood. They disappeared inside.