Voodoo Eyes (17 page)

‘Scouting?
As in scouting for girls?’

‘Yeah. He goes to South America a lot. Brazil mostly. Those are the in-girls right now. That’s all guys want. White girls built black. Big asses and tan lines. You like Brazilian girls?’

Max ignored the question. A nervous reflex on her part, he was sure. She was the sort who talked a lot when she got stressed.

‘Doesn’t he ever call in to let you know where he is?’

‘No.’

‘That usual?’

‘He does this
all
the time. Says, “See you tomorrow,” and doesn’t come back for a while.’

‘How long’s a while?’

‘A week, ten days. Never more than two weeks. Right when I’m starting to panic and thinking of calling the cops, I’ll get a call or an email from him.’ She said all this with fondness, like she was talking about an eccentric but lovable relative.

‘What about his … his fiancée, Sharona, Gilmara, Whatever-a? She go with him on these trips?’

‘No.’

‘Where is she?’

‘I dunno. Maybe at home. I really dunno. I don’t have too much to do with her. Rudi says they have an open relationship.’

‘You don’t say. Where’s home?’

‘You want their address?’

‘That’s right,’ said Max. He could tell she was going to try refusing, so he moved in a little closer, crowding her, giving her no option but to comply.

‘I’m not supposed to give that out.’

‘The address.’ Max held out his hand. Her eyes were moving now, panicked. ‘And don’t even think of giving me the wrong one.’

‘He’ll fire me.’

‘Only if I tell him where I got it.’

‘What are you gonna do to him?’

‘Ask him some questions.’

‘Just that?’

‘Just that. I promise I won’t touch a single hairplug on his head.’

That made her smile a little. She started rifling through a Rolodex. Max took it from her, found Milk’s home address: Aledo Avenue, Coral Gables.

‘What’s your name?’ he asked her.

‘Petra Sorenson.’

‘How long’ve you worked here?’

‘Two years in January. I was a temp. Rudi liked me, I liked him. I stayed. It’s a great job. It pays well. Benefits are great. And Rudi’s a good guy.’

‘That’s nice,’ he said. ‘I’d like a guided tour.’

They went down a corridor to the right of her desk, past open rooms, a stationery cupboard with a photocopier and fax machine, a spotless bathroom and shower.

In the opposite corridor, the first office they came to was locked. As she opened it, she said it was the projection room, where Rudi watched his forthcoming films. It was a windowless space with a flatscreen TV in front of a recliner.

The next two offices were almost identical.

All empty.

‘Why do I get a feeling of déjà vu?’ he said. ‘Like there’s no one actually employed here?’

‘I’m Rudi’s only full-time employee. He uses freelancers to do everything else – film-editing, marketing, distribution, publicity, accounts.’

‘So why not get a smaller office?’

‘This is for show, to impress clients and investors. When they come round we just get some people in to look busy.’

‘Kind of like the scam you pulled on me?’

‘It wasn’t a scam … OK, it
was
kind of a scam, like you were deceived, but you got paid. A lot of money too. Why are you so mad?’

‘He still owes me for two weeks – plus expenses,’ Max said.

‘He’ll settle, I’m sure. He always pays his bills.’

They went into Rudi Milk’s office. At first glance, he thought it was an exact replica of the one Milk had in the Tequesta Building – the same wood-panelled walls, thick carpet, huge mahogany desk. Yet he noticed small but significant differences: its distinct smell of vanilla, the large square scented candles on the window sill, and a set of coasters in the shape of jigsaw pieces on the coffee table. The furniture looked a couple of years old. A ragged and filthy Stars and Stripes hung in a glass frame. The office had life to it, a sense of long hours passed, of ups and downs, triumphs spiked by setbacks. There was a photograph in the corner of a fireman carrying what Max guessed was the same flag away from the ruins of the World Trade Center. A gold plaque below it read ‘Never Forget’.

‘Rudi bought that on eBay,’ Petra said, pointing to the Star Spangled Banner.

Max lifted the frame back to check for a safe. Nothing.

As with everywhere else, there wasn’t a single hint as to how Rudi made his money. Max wondered if he wasn’t embarrassed about it. Milk revelled in the financial rewards and the image of respectability, but he refused to acknowledge the source.

Max motioned for Petra to sit down in one of the two chairs facing the desk.

‘Did someone pay to have me – specifically me – involved?’

‘I don’t know, I really don’t.’

‘You’re his PA and you don’t know? Bullshit. You were in on it.’

‘First of all, I’m not his PA,’ she said. ‘I just answer the phone, take messages. Second, I wasn’t “in on it”. He told me what to do and I did it.’

‘Did he tell you why?’

‘Yeah. He said it was all part of a movie he was shooting, and that you didn’t know.’

‘But I wasn’t
in
the movie,’ said Max. ‘It was already filmed.’

‘What?’

He told her what had happened at the Zurich Hotel.

‘That’s kinda weird,’ she said, frowning. ‘But kinda tame too, compared to some of the stuff I’ve seen and heard here.’

‘Rudi know anybody I worked for?’ Max reeled off a few names of past clients.

‘I don’t know any of his friends.’

‘None of those names sound familiar?’

‘No.’

Max sighed heavily. She was telling the truth. Best to finish up here and go to Coral Gables.

He picked up the keys from the table. They went back to the projection room. He told her to sit and he checked the room for something he might have missed.

‘Where’s your cellphone?’

‘In my bag outside.’

‘You’re going to have to stay here until I get back.’

She stood up.

‘What? No. No! You can’t do this!’

‘And walk out of here and let you call Rudi? I’ll come back for you soon as I’m through talking to him.’

‘But I’ve got a
date.’

‘If he loves you, he’ll wait.’

22

Porn pays, thought Max as he stepped away from the porch and stared up at Rudi Milk’s home. It was a three-floor red-and-white villa with stuccoed walls, dolphins and conch shells etched into the plaster, balconies hung with bright flowers, recessed windows framed by arches, a shamrock keystone over each. He supposed it was one of the first residential properties in the area. The architecture was of the same Mediterranean Revival style as the first Coral Gables buildings. The place had both the solidity and the discreet opulence of a bygone era about it; a monument to a time when class was something you couldn’t buy or acquire, you either had it or you didn’t.

Shame, then, about its current owner.

Who wasn’t coming to the door.

He tried the bell a third time. Those ding-dong chimes again, faintly, their resonance soaked up by the thick walls. He looked through the windows into a vestibule with a shamrock mosaic floor. A chandelier hung from the ceiling. The only piece of standing furniture was an eight-foot-tall wooden object to the right, one he originally mistook for a grandfather clock, until his eyes adjusted to the gloom, and what he had thought were edges and lines became the hourglass contours of a varnished sculpture of a woman, her face to the wall and big, high round ass to the world. On top of the woman’s head was a stuffed seagull. He found it about as fitting as it was utterly tasteless – while the house’s original owner had chosen to incorporate Irish heritage into this symbol of their success, Milk had created a monument to Brazilian (he guessed)
bunda.
He wondered if the sculpture had come with the gull.

He looked at the security camera, bolted to the left wall, trained on him. He stared into its oblong eye. He waved. He smiled. He mouthed, ‘Hello, remember me?’

He stabbed at the bell twice more in rapid succession. He knew it was useless. Either there really was no one home or no one was going to open up.

The late-afternoon light was starting to thicken as it faded; a soft, buttery yellow with a brown hue giving the overhanging leaves of the palm trees a golden tinge and making the grass sparkle. There was a mild scent of lemon in the air.

He looked back up the short gravel path and the open gate he’d come through. A sign on the gate warned of dogs on the premises. He’d assumed that a property this size might have more than one dog guarding it, so when he’d stepped out of the car, he put a collapsible baton and a can of mace in his pockets. But no dogs had come for him so far. He hadn’t even heard any barking.

He glared at the camera again, its eye immobile, fixed on him. He imagined Milk sitting somewhere upstairs, looking at him on a screen, smirking, maybe even recording it for a future flick.

Christ, he missed being a cop. The badge, the right of entry. And he missed being young, those reckless, thoughtless impulses that would have had him picking or shooting out the front-door lock.

And then he saw something pale flit across the window, like a face appearing at the glass for a furtive glance.

He peered inside.

Nothing.

He knocked on the window.

‘Milk, I need to talk to you,’ he said. He looked up and down the empty vestibule. There was something different about it. He wasn’t sure what. ‘Come on. Open up.’

He banged on the window some more.

His eyes moved to the sculpture.

And to the bird on top of it.

It was gone.

He searched for it. It wasn’t anywhere on the floor and it wasn’t flying around.

He looked up at the chandelier, which was swaying slightly. The gull was on top of it, looking right down at him.

It jumped off, fell heavily a couple of feet, before swooping up, then dipping and gliding gracefully in a smooth arc towards the sculpture. It reclaimed its position on top of the woman’s head, trotted a little and stood still.

Max stepped off the porch and walked around the house. He found the gate to the back. It swung open with a simple push.

He followed a brick path to where it stopped, at the edge of a long wide garden, bordered with roses, bougainvillea and banana palms. Three lemon trees stood at the very end, the fruit ripe and full, much of it on the ground.

Stone steps led up to the white French doors of a conservatory. He was about to try and open them when he spotted dried blood smeared on the edge of one of the handles. He wrapped a handkerchief around his fingers.

The door was unlocked. He walked in.

He noted the thin film of dust on the bar-top and stool seats. He moved towards the sliding door – also white – connecting the conservatory to the rest of the house. Dried blood there too, a fingertip-sized smudge close to the handle.

He came to the kitchen. Spacious and sleek, everything built into a long glass-topped counter. The window above the sink was wide open. That was how the gull had got in. At the very end of the counter was a silver tray with six champagne flutes on it. Next to that, a big silver bucket with an unopened Bollinger magnum floating in a puddle of water.

The trashcan was empty. No bag.

Max headed for the steps leading out of the kitchen and down into a sunken den in the middle of house.

He trod on something that scraped under his shoe.

It was a spent shell casing, which from above looked like a gold molar because of the way its ends were pinched together. He picked it up with his handkerchief and checked the base: 9 mm Luger. He scanned the casing for markings. None. He dropped it into the breast pocket of his shirt. His stomach tightened and his heartbeat quickened; his wrists started to throb, the watchstrap above his left hand tightening with his pulse.

As he reached the steps, he caught a glimpse of what lay at the bottom and his right leg froze, his foot hovering in mid-air, stranded in a half-step.

Jesus.

Explosions of dried blood covered the couch, the walls, the floor. The coffee table was upended and cracked right down the middle. Bullet holes absolutely everywhere. Furniture burst open to stuffing and springs. Spent shell casings covering the ground, glowing like disembodied lightbulb filaments. He walked down. Slowly.

The air was rank and sour with blood and stale gunsmoke. It was impossible to tell for sure how many had died right here. From the amount of blood on the couch, the wall behind it, and on the floor, he guessed three. A fourth person had been shot – probably afterwards – near the main stairs. There were more bullet casings around the coffee table. He didn’t know how many that made; he’d lost count at thirty-two.

Six champagne flutes. So how many dead?

Had the killer been a guest?

And where were the bodies?

No drag marks on the floor.

In the corner, by the steps, half covered in dried blood was a stack of wadded $100 bills. Around forty or fifty notes with a plain pink band around them.

He moved deeper into the rest of the house.

The gull, still on top of the wooden statue, looked at him as he walked into the vestibule. He saw its body bunch up. He examined the wooden woman: she was covering her face with her hands and her breasts with her arms, as if in shame – real or mock he couldn’t tell.

The next room he checked was completely empty. Bright white walls with a silk finish. A spotless white floor.

He heard a loud squawk close by and the flap of wings.

He looked around the door and saw the gull flying out of the house, its wings first flapping then straightening out, as the bird drifted low across the grass.

The sun was setting and it would be dark within the hour.

The gull alighted on one of the lemon trees at the end of the garden and shuffled around noisily, rustling the leaves as it did so, stopping to look back at the house.

Then the bird flew off and away, dislodging a small rain of bright yellow fruit as it went. A dozen lemons thudded on to the grass. Max watched them land, bounce and roll left and right. He noticed the way the other fallen fruit had massed in two opposing piles. He found that strange, how there seemed to be a large hump in the grass between them, how one particular area was higher than the rest.