The Riptide Ultra-Glide (11 page)

“You know how many horse blankets are moving between Ocala and Kentucky? Nobody will ever suspect.”

“I should have my head examined,” said Parsons. “Okay, I'm in. When do you want to get started?”

“How about now? They didn't find our third bus.” Catfish got on his hands and knees. “The goods are in my trunk.”

They ducked again. The trotting sound went by and became faint.

Catfish looked up. “Shit, Gooch passed out again.”

Another wave of the salts.

“Oooooo, where am I? . . .”

Parsons shook his head at Catfish. “A live burial and a life sentence of drugs in your car . . . Man, when you decide to drop in out of the blue, you
drop in
.”

They rolled Gooch into the hole.

“Catfish! Stop! . . .”

“Shut up!” Catfish jumped down in the hole. “And you're just the kind of asshole who would pass out again. Well, I'm going to make sure you stay awake as long as possible, and then some.” He violently crammed the smelling salts all the way up one of Gooch's nostrils.

“Ahhhh! Ahhhhhhhhhh!”

Catfish climbed out of the hole and picked up his shovel.

“No, Catfish! Don't throw dirt on me!”

He threw dirt on him.

Chapter Ten

TAMPA

A
'76 Gran Torino cruised along Columbus Drive in West Tampa.

Serge finished off a large cup of 7-Eleven coffee. “ . . . And another problem I have with Charles Manson. He created image problems with the British.”

“Not the British again,” said Coleman.

“Oh, yes,” said Serge. “In jolly old England, a helter-skelter is a child's playground slide. Can you imagine what we'd think if some Liverpool mass-murder cult smeared their victims' blood on the walls to spell ‘teeter-totter'?”

“It's just embarrassing,” said Coleman.

“Manson is the gift that keeps on giving.” Serge checked his rearview, then checked it again.

Coleman lowered his joint. “The police?”

“No, a Toyota. The driver's acting suspicious.”

“How?” asked Coleman.

Serge looked back again. “Keeps checking his mirrors.”

“He just changed lanes,” said Coleman. “Coming up on our left.”

“I've seen this movie before.” Serge took his foot off the gas. “He's making sure there are no witnesses behind us.”

“Carjacking?” asked Coleman.

“Nope, the classic Swoop-and-Squat.”

The joint came back up. “What's that?”

“Tampa is now the national insurance-fraud champ. And one of the oldest but still effective methods is the Swoop-and-Squat. The scam artist targets a victim and tails him until conditions are optimal. Then he zooms past and cuts back in front of him and hits the brakes. It's nearly impossible to avoid a rear-end crash. And under Florida law, the person in back is automatically at fault in the accident because theoretically the person in front has no control over someone following too close. If you're lucky, they'll just go for collision damage; if not, they'll fake whiplash and jam you up for thousands in medical, pain and suffering . . . But I've developed a foolproof strategy to not only defeat this tactic, but punish the scofflaw and hopefully illuminate the error of his ways.”

“He's racing past us,” said Coleman.

“The Swoop.”

“Now he cutting back in. He's hitting his brakes.”

“The Squat.” Serge was already applying his own brakes.

“Wow,” said Coleman. “You were right. He
was
trying to make us crash.”

“The fucker,” said Serge. “It's like Manson all over again.”

“You're really hung up on that.”

“It's my conscience,” said Serge. “I've never admitted this to anyone, but I secretly dug the Manson chicks.”

“Really?” said Coleman. “Me, too.”

“You're kidding,” said Serge. “And all this time I've been thinking there was something wrong with me.”

“No, those babes definitely had it going on.” Coleman took a hit. “They smoked weed. Very hot.”

“But only until they shaved their skulls and carved
X
s in their foreheads,” said Serge. “If you're on a dinner date with someone like that, your eyes just involuntarily drift upward.”

“That's always awkward,” said Coleman.

“Then you nervously fill up on bread sticks and don't have room for the T-bone.”

“What about punishment?”

“I think some of the women got out of jail.”

“No, I mean the guy in the Toyota.” Coleman pointed at the windshield with his roach. “You said you were going to teach him a lesson.”

“Oh, right,” said Serge. “I'm still on it. I'm following him until I can employ my own patented maneuver: Serge's Squat-and-Scoot.”

“What's that?”

“First I keep tailing him until we come to a red light with a bunch of other cars already waiting.”

“That light up there just turned red,” said Coleman. “The Toyota's stopping.”

“And there are a bunch of cars in front of him,” said Serge. “Now here's the Squat . . .”

The Gran Torino eased to a halt in front of a motel converted into an office complex.

“What about the Scoot?” asked Coleman.

“ . . . And then I ease forward ever so gently until our bumpers are in contact.”

“I just felt us touch.”

“And now I give a quick burst of gas, followed by perfectly timed brakes . . .” Serge used both feet simultaneously on the pedals with coordinated heel-toe action. “ . . . Sending the Toyota crashing into the rear of the car in front of him, but leaving us back here unscathed.”

“And since he's the car in the rear?” said Coleman.

“He gets the blame—no insurance money.” Serge cut the steering wheel. “And then we just back up and take a left to depart down this side street so the guy can't point fingers when the police arrive . . .”

Coleman turned around as they drove off. “He's grabbing his neck. I think he's screaming in pain.”

Serge aimed his camcorder. “We don't even have to fake this.”

* * *

A
loud noise made Arnold Lip glance up from a patient folder and out the window of his examination room. A Toyota had rear-ended someone at a traffic light; a Gran Torino whipped down a side street.

Lip swung a rubber hammer.

“Ow! Bastard!”

Lip clicked his pen open. “Bruised eyeball.”

Later that afternoon, an attorney with a Tour de France haircut knocked on the reception window.

Lip slid it open. “Oh, Hagman, glad you're here. Listen, I think I've got a patient who's actually injured. What do I do?”

The lawyer shook his head. “He
is
injured. One of our guys was pulling a Swoop-and-Squat and went and fucking rear-ended someone. Hurt him pretty bad. Is it too much to ask to drive well enough to cause a simple wreck?”

Lip pointed over his shoulder. “How'd the victim end up in here?”

“Luckily, the accident happened right outside our building, and I was able to run out there and tell the banged-up driver that I'd represent him and get some big bucks.”

“You can get him a lot of money?”

“No, our guy's at fault. Make it go away.”

Lip looked at the file. “The patient can't move his head, has second-degree facial burns from the air bag and is spitting up some blood.”

“Tell the insurance company it's a pre-existing condition.”

Lip made a notation. “You're the doctor.” He began closing the reception window.

Hagman grabbed the edge to hold it open. “That's not why I came to see you. I've got another proposal . . .”

Arnold finished listening to the concept. “Isn't that illegal?”

“We're already at that dance,” said the lawyer. “What's the difference?”

Arnold shrugged.

“Good,” said the attorney. “We'll get started tomorrow. I know some people who will play ball . . .”

The next morning, Arnold and Hagman arrived at the same time in matching Porsche 955s. They parked in adjoining spaces and waved cheerfully at each other.

“Like your new lifestyle?” asked the lawyer.

The doctor buffed a spot on the hood with his sleeve. “Yes, thank you.”

“There's a lot more where this came from.”

“So when, uh, do you think we'll start seeing a return on what you mentioned yesterday?”

“It's going to be big, but it'll take some time . . .”

Before it had time:

Hagman Reed locked up his office at the end of the day and headed down to his coupe.

Arnold was waiting.

“You don't look so hot,” said Hagman. “What's the matter?”

“I need a lawyer.”

“Why?”

“I was indicted this afternoon. I need someone to represent me.”

“That's legal stuff. I don't know any of that.”

“What am I going to do?”

“First off, what did they indict you for?”

For greed. Arnold liked the car, and new clothes and champagne. He'd gotten the taste, and he wanted more. So he bought a second Porsche. He needed the second because he totaled the first after getting hold of a friend and staging their own little accident. Skidded into each other at a remote boat ramp and sank both vehicles. No small percentage of cash from someone else's wreck this time—they got to keep it all.

But here was the thing: When a two-car crash involves people who know each other, it's a major red flag to insurance investigators. Hagman had taught him that. So when the police accident investigators arrived at the scene, Arnold and his buddy said they'd never laid eyes on each other in their entire lives.

Then the cops started snooping around, just because both accident victims' driver's licenses listed addresses in the same apartment building. On the same floor.

“Really,” said Arnold. “That's quite a coincidence . . . What do you mean, ‘Do I still want to stick with my story?' We really don't know each other.”

Then the detective confronted Arnold with Facebook photos they'd posted of themselves posing together at a Rays baseball game.

“Is that who that is?” Arnold asked the detectives. “Wow, what are the odds?”

And now Hagman and Arnold stood in conspiracy, whispering loudly between their Porches in the parking lot of a converted motel.

“Will you keep your voice down?” said the attorney. “They could be listening right now . . .” He twirled a finger over his head. “ . . . With those parabolic microphones.”

“But I can't go to jail,” whimpered Arnold.

“You won't,” said Hagman. “They just want to shut you down. So you'll lose your license in exchange for a plea to something that will get you a suspended sentence.”

“Lose my license!” Arnold grabbed the hood of his car with both hands. “What will I do for money? I need food to live!”

“Don't piss yourself,” said Hagman. “And put your hand over your mouth.”

“What?” asked Arnold. He couldn't hear well because the attorney had a hand over his own mouth.

“I said put your hand over your mouth.” Hagman twirled a finger again. “They have lip-readers with binoculars.”

The doctor complied.

“You calm now?”

The doctor nodded.

“Good, because remember that other venture I mentioned? It's still on.”

“With the police all over us?”

The attorney shook his head. “We'll just do what I did last time. When they cracked down on insurance fraud in Miami, I simply moved up to Tampa.”

“But we're already in Tampa.”

“You idiot! I'm talking about going back south.” Hagman glanced left and right. “And here's the important part because I was depending on your medical license. But since you're now out of commission, do you know any other doctors who might play ball?”

Arnold nodded again.

“Are they any good?” asked Hagman.

“Not really.”

“Excellent. Now I want you to follow my instructions very carefully . . .”

And the attorney laid it out point by point. When he was done, Arnold scratched his head. “I'm moving to Fort Lauderdale?”

“Live wherever you want down there. Fort Lauderdale, Boca Raton, a tree house, just get your ass moving.”

“But I don't have the kind of money this requires—”

“I promised I'd stake you, remember? I'll wire all the cash we'll need to get started. You just make sure you come up with your doctor friends.”

“Where will you be?”

“Right behind you,” said Hagman. “You're the second doctor connected to me that's going down, so I'm not pressing my luck by sticking around here.”

Crash
.

Arnold looked toward the wreck in the street, then raised his eyebrows toward Hagman. “Our guys?”

The attorney unlocked his Porsche. “Let's get the hell out of here.”