“It’s Sunday, go read the comics.”
She read off the tag from the woman’s car. “It’s a white Buick Century, tag says Hillsborough County.”
There was a long pause and then he said, “Okay, got it. Where did you spot this vehicle?”
“At the Jardin Café.”
“You shouldn’t be out there.” Then, after a minute, “Tag is registered to one Elena Duarte in Tampa. I know she’s a cook at the café. No surprise her vehicle would be there. What are you up to?”
“I think it was Norma Martin. I think she’s connected to the murder.”
“She already told me she lives with Elena Duarte, although I’m not too sure of that. Probably uses her vehicle. What else?”
“I saw her. She acted guilty.”
“That’s it, she acted guilty? That's nice, she acted guilty. Sandy, you didn’t talk to her, did you?”
“I met her in the parking lot. No, I didn’t actually talk to her. She thought I was a reporter and came all apart. Give me her address.”
“You’re not getting it. I don’t think our deal is going to work. I need to know what you’re doing, and I need to know in advance before you screw up something. Goodbye.”
“Give me a chance, buddy,” she said into her dead phone.
She opened her laptop and searched the Internet white pages for Elena Duarte. A phone number in Tampa came up. She punched in the number and got an answering machine with the default male electronic voice saying please leave a message. Sandy sat confused. So, we have a Norma Martin living in Park Beach with this Elena Duarte who doesn’t live in Park Beach, and Norma uses Elena’s car registered miles away in Tampa. Now she needed to talk to both Norma and this Elena.
She drove back into town and parked in the police station parking lot intending to visit Raymond at the jail. She had just parked when Miss Runway Glider in her white Buick Century pulled in fast and stopped alongside. She motioned for Sandy to come over.
“I followed you,” she spoke rapidly with no trace of accent, “please get in so we can talk. I shouldn’t be seen with you. I see your car parked here with police cars almost every day. I need help. What’s your name?”
“Sandy. Hey, I’m not a reporter and I’m not police.”
“You must know the police, you always park here.”
“If that’s good, I do. If that’s bad, I don’t,” Sandy slid in beside her. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m in trouble and my people can’t help me. The police are going to arrest me. This is very strange, but you must believe me. Everything was okay until Albert was killed.”
“You can say that again,” Sandy replied. “Okay, slow down. You called him Albert. You knew him from the restaurant, I suppose.”
“No, we would never go to the restaurant together, never. The way it started, they told me he’d be speaking at a street fair one day, so I followed him around. I flirted with him like I was told and it worked. That was the plan. He didn’t take the bait immediately, but I know how to get a man interested.”
“No kidding.”
The woman was excited. “They’ll find some of my things in his apartment. They'll arrest me. I didn’t kill him. It’s all political and terrible and all screwed up.”
“What plan? Slow down and start at the beginning.”
“I was supposed to meet him and have an affair. I was to leave a trail of evidence so when people checked it out, it would look like he was having an affair with Norma Martin.
Sandy didn’t get it. “You mentioned your people. Who are we talking about here?”
“Some of my Tampa relatives are part of La Familia. I don’t understand it all, it’s about politics. Anyway, after his campaign got rolling, all the evidence about him being involved with Norma Martin would come out and embarrass him. She’s married and the scandal would ruin his election. Then I’d disappear, move back to Tampa.”
“In the first place, I don’t think a politician as smart as the senator would get involved with a married woman.”
“He didn’t get involved with a married woman, he got involved with me. He checked me out and found I’m not married. But of course, Norma Martin is.”
That stopped Sandy. It took a moment for her to ask slowly, “So, you’re not Norma Martin?”
“She’s my mother. Just turned sixty but looks much younger, so she fit the plan okay. She’s the one who runs the restaurant.”
“So, who are you?”
“Elena Duarte. I’m an accountant from Tampa. They brought me down here just to set up the senator.”
“You’re telling me Towson actually fell for this charade? Who did he think you were?”
“I was myself, Elena Duarte from Tampa. That’s why I checked out okay for him. Why would he suspect anything? He saw my driver’s license, passport, and everything. We took some great trips. He didn’t show me off in public around here because I’m twenty years younger. Why be common about it, he once said. But if it ever did come out, so what, he was a normal bachelor dating a younger woman, both single, no big deal. Might even gain him some votes. He wasn’t aware that in the meantime, we were spreading the rumor he was seeing a married Norma Martin.”
Sandy understood. “It might work for awhile. Rumors don’t have to be precise. Some would believe it and some wouldn’t; the confusion would be all that was needed. Even so, eventually someone would tip him to the rumors going around.”
“The plan was to keep it going until he figured it out. It only had to work for a month or so. At a critical time, they would drop both names like a bomb on the Towson campaign. He’d have two women to explain: was it a mother and daughter thing, or was he only doing the daughter?"
“It would ruin him.” Sandy realized she might not get another chance at getting answers out of this woman. “Did you shoot him?”
“No! Don’t you see my problem? I fell in love with him.” She stared off into the distance, her mind apparently overtaken by a cloud of memories. She started to cry. Sandy handed her a tissue. It took a minute before she could stop and speak again, “He was my lover and now he’s dead.” The crying began again.
“But, if you loved him wouldn’t they be afraid you’d come forward and reveal the plot? What could they do?”
“I don’t know. They might kill me or go after my mother.”
“Geez, they play rough. And a dead mistress would be even better. Norma, ah, Elena, this was a scummy deal you were pulling.”
“I know, I know. But I had to. I refused at first. I told them I’d date him but that was it. Truthfully, I haven’t been around that much; I’m a lot of show but not much go. I wasn’t going to do the whole sex bit with some strange man, even if he was a rich, good-looking bigshot. I’m an accountant, for God’s sake. That’s when they sent Pirro around to explain how it was going to be.”
“Pirro?”
“He’s one of the goons that do dirty work for La Familia, the strong arm stuff. He said I must become Towson’s girlfriend and do what girlfriends do, the whole enchilada. The creep said he’d be glad to help me practice. He said to either screw Towson or screw him.”
“The old fate worse than death thing.”
“Yes, and I could die. Pirro uses whores. Mom calls it VD but it’s HIV. He doesn’t care about spreading it. He’s the lowest lowlife. One day, in the restaurant kitchen, he started telling this long dirty joke, loud to everyone one in the room, except I was the girl in the joke. He kept putting my name in his filthy joke as if I was doing all that stuff. I was embarrassed and terrified. Mom overheard him and lost it. She flew into him, slammed him up against the wall, and held this monstrous kitchen knife across his throat. She said if he ever touches me, she’d cut off his cojones. You understand?”