Emily Kimelman - Sydney Rye 03 - Insatiable (11 page)

“Yeah, it’s all online. We have chat-boards and stuff. I’m a forum monitor so I can access that kind of stuff.” Ana Maria blushed and looked away from me.

“What do you guys talk about?”

“Just, like, you know, your philosophy.”

“Philosophy.” I couldn’t help but let out a snort of a laugh. “What philosophy?”

She looked up at me. “You stood up for yourself and for your brother. You didn’t let the machine roll you over. Don’t you know there are a lot of people out there who wish they could do the same?” A pause. “I do.” Her eyes were serious and I felt strange under her gaze, almost ashamed of myself. I do too, I thought.

“Ana Maria, I want to see the site.”

She shrugged. “Sure.”

We went downstairs to the lobby where a complimentary computer was provided for the guests. Ana Maria pulled up the site and there was that letter again, my childish handwriting and arrogant prose. I swallowed, steeling myself against the anger, pain, and humiliation I felt when I looked at it. Ana Maria clicked on the forums then signed in and started scrolling through names.

“It’s all women,” I said.

“There are some men,” she said, and then after a pause, “not many, but some.”

“I want to find anyone who lives in your parent’s neighborhood or nearby, any police?” A loud squeal distracted me; I looked up to see a teenage girl being tickled by a male counterpart. They looked kinda drunk and like they were having a lot of fun. That’s what Ana Maria should be doing, I thought, not hanging out with a depressing fuck up like myself.

“Here is someone in customs,” Ana Maria said.

“Great,” I said, watching the kids head out to the pool deck. “We need to find as many people as possible.” Would any of them really help us? How much could I ask them to risk?

Ana Maria turned away from the computer screen. She was smiling at me. “This is awesome,” she said.

“Maybe,” I said. Leaning over her shoulder I saw a familiar face. “Malina,” I said.

“What?” Ana turned to the screen. “She is very pretty. Says she owns an entertainment facility what do you think that is?”

I closed my eyes. Malina. “We met in Juarez,” I said. When I was Sydney Rye, just a couple of months after James’s death.

Ana Maria looked up at me. “You were friends?”

“We shared a common purpose.”

“What?” I shook my head, not willing to share with Ana Maria the journey Malina and I bore together. Malina saw me at my worst, my most out of control, and here she was on Joy Humbolt’s site singing her praises. Obviously, she figured out who I was and didn’t reveal me. I did give her enough money to last a short lifetime. A gift for a woman I admired. “What?” Ana asked again.

“Where is she?” I asked.

Ana Maria turned back to the screen. “Mexico City.”

“I’ll have to give her a call,” I said with a smile. Malina changed the way I felt about everyone on that site. Maybe they weren’t all nut bags. Malina was one of the smartest, quickest, most ruthless women I’d ever met.

Later Ana Maria and I enjoyed sandwiches sitting on our respective queen-size beds. I perused the pages of member’s profiles we’d printed. I was surprised by the number of female police officers on my side. I flipped through seeing a general theme. Women were sick of being stepped on. They wanted to change the world and men wouldn’t let them help.

A 28-year-old lawyer who worked near Pedro and Juanita’s neighborhood complained about the treatment she received not only from her clients but also her employers. Over the past two years, she was passed over for promotion seven times. Her male counterparts, and even her underlings, got promoted right past her. Her latest post announced her intention to quit and go to work for a non-profit fighting for women’s rights.

I was going to ask this woman to help me. Would she do it? I wondered. Would she take it as an opportunity to live out her principles or would she ignore me? How many of them would listen to me?

Looking back down at the young attorney’s profile, at her angry posts over the last six months, her increasing urge to do something building up until she decided to quit her job, I thought she would help.

I was going to offer her much more than new employment. The thought spread a smile across my face. Ana Maria chewed on a bite of turkey and flipped through another pile of profiles. “What about finding a woman to seduce my father?” she asked.

“Doesn’t he have a girlfriend?” I asked.

“He was tiring of her. Let’s find him someone new. That will be the best way to learn what he is doing. Man can’t keep his mouth shut or his pants zipped.” Ana Maria wiped some crumbs off a sheet of paper and passed the profile to me.

I looked down at a photograph of a pretty woman living in Mexico City. I turned to look at Ana Maria. Her brow was creased in concentration. Ana Maria’s eyes exuded intelligence but no emotions as she questioned whether the exotic dancer described on the piece of paper in my hands was the right one to help spy on her father. I just had to ask, “Ana, are you sure you want to do this?”

She cocked her head. “Of course.” Ana Maria looked back down at the pile of possible supporters. I kept looking at her until she continued, “Don’t you understand? They killed…” her chin wobbled and tears appeared at the edges of her eyes. She sucked in a big breath of air and continued, “They killed Alejandro. I can’t let them get away with that.”

“But they are your parents.”

“That does not make them above the law.” She looked up at me with fire in her eyes. Her chin crinkled but she didn’t look like she was going to cry. For a moment I thought she might hit me. Then the flame died down and she turned back to her work.

I held up the picture of the beautiful girl Ana Maria suggested we sic on her father and said, “I don’t feel right asking anyone to do that.” I put her profile to the side.

“Don’t be afraid, Sydney. We have to be bold if we want to win.”

I looked over at Ana Maria. “I’m not going to ask someone to prostitute themselves for me, no matter what the ultimate goal.”

Ana Maria bit her lip. “You’re right. I’m sorry.” She turned back to her pile of profiles. They would be our ground force. Our eyes and ears in Mexico City. I wanted to know not only what Pedro and Juanita were doing, but also if Blane was still there. How his arm was doing? I smiled at the thought of Blue’s teeth marks in that perfect forearm.

“Computer programmer,” Ana Maria said, handing me another profile. “And a man, see I told you there were men.” I took it from her. He loved me because ‘she is like a wild animal with a moral compass that no amount of magnetic pull can effect’. “I don’t know what that means,” Ana said, “but he lists his occupation as Computer Specialist. I think he might be able to help.”

I wanted to know what Pedro was saying to his friends. What Juanita’s assistant was emailing her. But most of all I wanted into Mulberry’s computer. I didn’t know if it was possible but I wanted to know what was buzzing around in his email account.

As I laid on my bed that night I thought about Mulberry for a long time. I verged on getting out of bed to call him. It was almost impossible to believe he set me up. Then again I never would have believed he told Robert “Bobby” Maxim about Kurt Jessup. And even if Mulberry wasn’t setting me up, someone close to him was.

When I started working for Mulberry three years earlier he’d offered me a new identity and a job, two things I needed. The identity for obvious reasons but the job was a more subtle gift. I didn’t need the money but the training he’d provided and the distraction were priceless. When he pulled me off the beach, I was on the verge of drinking myself to death. Being a detective was large enough to block bad memories and help make new good ones.

I never asked who I was working for beyond Mulberry. I assumed he was the big boss man. I’d only dealt with him. But now I was coming to understand that Mulberry was full of shit and that Bobby Maxim owned a piece of the business. I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that he was the one behind all this mayhem. He probably got me my name; it’s possible there would be no Sydney Rye without Robert “Bobby” Maxim.

In the morning we left when the sun was just peeking over the edge of the sea. It turned the world a soft pink and left the air moist as we climbed into a cab. We were going to see Easy Robbins, a woman who flew a small charter plane anywhere you wanted to go in the Caribbean. She was based in Grand Cayman and I wanted a ride to St. Thomas where a woman who worked for US customs claimed I was her hero.

MS. EASY ROBBINS

The cab ride was long. I spent most of the trip watching clouds get pushed around. They were wispy little things; the innocent cousins of storm clouds. They flew across the blue backdrop of the sky, sometimes bunching up on each other to form little mountains of whipped cream. Then they’d spread out so thin it looked like a spider web was stretched across the sun. From the clouds I’d look down at the picture of Easy Robbins. She was the first one I was going to ask for help. Asking a complete stranger to risk her livelihood and who knows what else for me, for an idea, made my stomach feel like shit (I don’t like to blame alcohol for my hangovers).

The nausea reminded me how scary this was. If I mis-stepped, if I fucked this up, I could end up dead, Ana Marie with me. I looked over at Blue, his snout in the air taking in every scent that the open window offered. He might make it, I thought. Ana Maria sat in the front seat, her gaze focused on the horizon. She was barley a woman but at least she had something personal at stake. What would motivate Easy to join me? And who the fuck names their daughter Easy?

I looked down at her profile. Ms. Easy Robbins owned her own plane. She loved to fly. Loved to take risks. Loved life. What did she like about me? According to Easy, Kurt Jessup attempted to rape her while vacationing in Jamaica. She wished she had the guts to “blow his fucking brains out.”
 

Palm trees gave way to the never-ending sea and before long we stopped in front of a marina. I handed our cabby a big chunk of change. He showed me crooked, yellowed teeth in appreciation.

The marina was all boats except for one plane. We headed toward it. Two men stood on the dock watching a woman in cut-off jeans lean over and struggle to pull something out of the hold. They laughed when the woman stumbled back holding an insanely large suitcase. I stopped at the top of the dock to watch.

The woman was tall and lean with brown shaggy hair; she wore a collared blue shirt and a wry smile. She dropped the bag and leaned back into the plane again. The two men looked at each other and then back to her butt. One of the guys pretended like he was going to slap her ass and the other laughed. They wore matching Hawaiian T-shirts. Both their stomachs were too large for their khaki pants and hung over their waist lines. One had blonde hair, the other black.

The blonde reached over and was about to pinch the woman but when she pulled out another bag, it sent her a little off balance and the guy cupped her butt. In a faux attempt to help her, he placed his other hand on her breast. Even from all the way down the dock, Ana Maria and I could both see her face turn red and her mouth become a deep frown. She used the suitcase to knock the guy down. The other man yelled something we couldn’t quite hear and started to help his friend up.

The woman said something low and deep. The blonde man looked up, shocked by the words. The dark haired man scrambled to his feet. They grabbed at their overweight luggage and dragged it toward us. The woman stood with her arms crossed watching them walk away. Then she spotted us.

I waved and started toward her. As we passed the men, Ana Maria stuck out a foot tripping the blonde. He fell hard, scraping his elbow. “Hey!” he yelled. “What the fuck?”

“Yeah,” his friend said. “What the fuck?”

“Fuck you,” Ana Maria replied. The dark haired man puffed out his chest and started toward her. Blue growled and the man paused.

“Forget about it,” I said, and taking Ana Maria by the arm, led her away.

Easy watched the whole thing with her arms crossed and when we got close enough, I put my hand out. She looked down at it but kept hers locked into her elbows. “Hi,” I said. She nodded. “You Easy?” She nodded again.

“I’m Sydney Rye.” She looked at my face and furrowed her brow deeply. I pushed my sunglasses up onto my forehead showing her my grey eyes and deep scars. Easy took a sharp breath. She looked over at Blue and suddenly it made sense.

“You’re-”

“Sydney Rye,” I finished the sentence for her. “I wanted to talk to you about a job.”

She smiled. “Yeah, sure. Of course. How about my office?”

“Perfect.” Easy led the way to a small freestanding building not far from her slip. She unlocked the door and flicked on an overhead fluorescent that came to life with a whirl of electric current. She motioned for Ana Maria and me to sit down in two white rattan chairs that faced a small desk. Framed posters of aerial views of the Caribbean hung on the walls. Brochures for charter flights sat next to ads for day trips to private islands. Easy closed the door behind us and locked it. She turned on a fan to move the stuffy air around and then sat at her desk.

She was in her mid-thirties, pretty in a rough and tough kind of way. For some reason I liked her instantly. Whether it was watching her knock that guy down on the dock or the special attention she was showing me, I couldn’t say. But I was feeling at ease with this woman. It suddenly made perfect sense for me to say, “I need your help.”