“If you live to tell about it.”
“Well, I can’t just let it go, Harry. This is what I do.”
Even in the dark interior he could read her expression, see she’d made up her mind.
He drove back to his house, and kept going. Zeller’s car was gone. Of course it was gone. Harry had taken Zeller’s gun, but left his clothes and keys in the house. He debated whether to call the police, tell them someone broke in. Tell them Colette had been kidnapped. But he decided against it. What was he going to say? A German heavy came to Detroit looking for Ernst Hess, a former Nazi accused of committing crimes against humanity in a war that ended twenty-six years ago. “Was anyone hurt?” he could hear the cop asking. “Was anything stolen?”
Just the Tabriz. It’s a rug, Harry could hear himself saying, and the cop looking at him like he was nuts.
Harry took Colette to Club Berkley for dinner. She was starving. They ate steak pan-seared in garlic butter, the house specialty, French fries, and washed it all down with bottles of Heineken. After, they checked into a no-frills motel on Woodward Avenue. Harry didn’t want to risk going home, have to deal with Zeller and the rednecks again tonight. He needed time to think, figure out what to do.
Dink thought he heard someone in the kitchen. Grabbed the .45, turned, leveled it and saw Zeller. “Jiminy goddamn Christmas, where in the hell you been at?”
“Where is she?” Zeller said.
“That a trick question?” Squirrel said.
“Go down and see for yourself,” Zeller said, hands on his hips. “She’s gone because you are here watching television, not paying attention.”
Dink was kind of embarrassed. “I tell you to go check on her, or what?” he said, throwing Squirrel under the bus.
“Well she didn’t untie herself,” Squirrel said. “I’ll tell you that.”
He had a point. That crazy-ass redneck knew how to tie a knot. For sure.
Zeller said, “It was Harry Levin.”
“How’d he know where she was at?” Dink said, gaze holding on the German.
“He had a gun,” Zeller said.
“So’d you, I thought,” Dink said.
“Whyn’t you take it from him?” Squirrel said to Zeller.
“ ‘Cause he ain’t Superman. What’s next on the agenda, mein Herr?” Dink said, looking at Zeller. “I think maybe you should fill us in. Looks like you’re in over your head, might could use some help.”
Eight
When he was within ten meters of the beach Hess turned off the engine and coasted to shore. The bottom hit sand in shallow water and the boat came to a stop. Hess stepped into the ocean halfway to his knees, dislodged the dinghy, and let the current take it back out to sea. Farther out, the Hatteras looked like it was drifting with the tide.
He was on a private beach, deserted in the early evening. Hess walked toward South Ocean Boulevard, wet espadrilles and trouser cuffs getting caked with sand. There was a huge Mediterranean villa straight ahead on the other side of the road, and to his right a beach house that matched the villa’s Italian shade of umber.
Hess had Brank’s watch, wallet, credit cards and $1,500 in cash. He also had Brank’s Smith & Wesson .38. The sun was fading, casting streaks of red behind the oceanfront estates as he walked the beach side of the road, saw the sign for Via Bellania and knew he was only a couple miles south of Worth Avenue.
He kept going, walked with purpose, arriving at Gulfstream Road at 6:40 p.m., and entered a seafood restaurant, went through the bar and dining room to the telephone that was in a hall leading to the restrooms. Hess opened the Yellow Pages, selected a taxi service, phoned and asked to be picked up at Charley’s Seafood. It would be fifteen minutes, so Hess found a seat at the crowded bar and ordered a Macallan’s neat.
“You look familiar,” the woman sitting to his left said. “You’re a character actor, aren’t you? Or maybe just a character.” She smiled, gliding her fingers up and down the stem of the martini glass.
“You must have me confused with someone else,” he said, glancing at her.
“What do you do?”
Hess studied her, a plain-looking brunette without a lot to work with, and yet, there was something appealing about her.
“I produce erotic films,” Hess said.
“So you’re not in front of the camera, you’re behind it,” she said, picking up her martini glass, taking her time before bringing it to her mouth, sipping the drink. “Dirty movies, huh?”
“I prefer to think of it as art.”
“Of course.” She speared an olive with a plastic sword and put it in her mouth, chewing slowly, savoring it.
“What are some of your movies?”
“Have you seen Twat’s Up, Doc?
“No, but I’ve heard of it.” She shook her head and smiled. “You did that?”
“Largest-grossing erotic film of all time,” Hess said.
“Don’t take this the wrong way, but you sure don’t look like the type.”
“Public perception is it’s a sleazy business.”
“Exactly, and you don’t look sleazy.”
She had good teeth and skin, and an outgoing personality. Late thirties, maybe forty.
“What’s another one?”
“Deep Six. It was my ex, Denise’s, film debut.”
“Your ex was a porn star?”
Hess nodded, picked up his drink and took a sip.
“What’s that like? I mean watching her doing it with all those studs.”
“Why do you think I’m divorced?”
A valet in a red vest came in the bar and said something to the bartender. “Somebody call a cab?” the bartender said, heavy New York accent.
Hess drank his single malt in a couple swallows, put the glass down on the bar top, and a $20 bill next to it. “I have to go,” he said to the brunette.
“I’ll give you a ride,” she said.
“Cab?” the bartender tried again. “Anyone?”
“I have a car right outside. I’m Lynn, by the way,” she said, offering Hess her hand. “Lynn Risdon.”
“Tony Brank,” he said, taking her hand in his.
“You don’t look like a Tony.” She finished the martini and placed it on the bar top. Hess raised his hand and the bartender moved toward him.
“Another round?”
Hess nodded.
“You get remarried?” Lynn said. “I don’t really care, but I guess it’s better if you didn’t.”
“Still single,” Hess said. “Until the right woman comes along.” He thought about Anke, his mistress. She had become demanding like a wife. Wanted a commitment, wanted children. That relationship was over as well, and Hess was relieved. “What about you?”
“Divorced,” Lynn said. “Best thing that ever happened to me.”
An hour and three martinis later, Hess escorted Lynn Risdon to the parking lot. She was drunk. He could feel her weight, the sloppiness of her stride as she clung to him. He had watched her transform to annoying from interesting, the alcohol making her stupid and clumsy. “Where’s your car?”
“It’s got to be around here somewhere,” she said, slurring her words, glassy eyes scanning the lot. “There ’tis.” She pointed at a white Ford Mustang.
Hess said. “Where do you live?”
“On Seabreeze.”
He had passed the street a number of times, remembered it was just north of Worth Avenue.
“Anyone in the house?”