The man yelped, twisting his head to get a better look at Sutter, or to see if anyone else was around.
“Just you and me, Asshole the Giant.” He put more pressure on the hand.
The man cried out.
Sutter said, “I was asking about a girl. I could tell by your face you knew who I meant. Now give me a name.”
The man had given up any false heroics. “Her name is Champagne.”
“Oh, please, I’m supposed to buy that? Not her stage name, doofus, her real name.”
The man didn’t answer. Sutter stepped harder on the hand, feeling one of the small bones snap under his foot. “In about three seconds, you’re never gonna jack off with this hand again.”
The man gasped. “Alicia.”
Sutter froze. “What?”
“Alicia. Her name is Alicia Wells.”
That was where Sutter knew her from. The Wells arrest. Now he had to find her. She might be able to lead them right to her husband. “When’s she come in?” He moved his foot so the man would feel some relief.
“Who knows? These chicks keep their own schedule.” He curled into the fetal position, whimpering like a sick dog.
“You better make a good guess, unless you want a matching cast on your other hand.”
He stuck both his hands between his legs so Sutter couldn’t get to them. “I’m for real. She usually comes in second shift, but I know she works a club in the city, too.”
“Which one?”
“Don’t know, man.”
“Guess there’s no way you won’t tell her I was asking about her?”
The man just stared at him, tears still in his eyes.
“Next time you be polite to customers. We all know you’re big. You don’t have to scare us. Understand?”
The man nodded furiously as Sutter slowly strutted back to his car. Tasker was never gonna believe this.
sixteen
Tasker had driven to work before traffic started to build. Inside the office, he found his reliable criminal-intelligence analyst, Jerry Ristin, staring at his computer screen through the thick, brown-tinted glasses that seemed permanently affixed to his head.
“Got anything for me, Jerry?”
“Hi, Billy, I’m fine.”
Tasker felt embarrassed for not greeting the older man properly. “Sorry, Jerry.”
“There’s more to life than work, Billy.”
“Yes, sir,” Tasker said slowly, like a kid talking to an adult.
“Now, what I have that you’d be interested in is simple-two flags on the license plates for your good friend Mr. Daniel Wells of Dade County.”
“Two hits, no shit?”
“Yes, shit,” said Ristin in a professional monotone. “One was in Homestead. And one was in the city.”
“Miami PD?”
“Yup.”
“That must’ve been Sutter running him for some reason. He’s working the case with me.”
“Regardless of Detective Sutter’s work, I can make a few calls and give you an idea of what you may or may not want to follow up on.”
“Jerry, you’re the best.”
“Please, tell me something I don’t know.” The older man smiled and winked, as Tasker jumped up to see what else he could find out.
After a little work on the computer and a few phone calls, Tasker had headed down to Homestead to speak with Officer Mike Driscoll. The diligent Officer Driscoll had apparently stopped Wells last week and ticketed him for speeding. This was the kind of break that blew a case wide open.
Inside the neat, professional police department, Tasker sat in a conference room with Driscoll. The cop’s blue shirt had every possible insignia in precise rows and perfectly spaced.
“You got some lapel pins there, don’t you?” said Tasker, trying to loosen the mood.
“Why have ’em if you don’t show ’em?” He had a slight Boston accent.
“You look like you know your way around a uniform.”
“Four years in the U.S. Marines and two as a Connecticut state trooper. No room for errors.”
Was this guy for real? Tasker looked at the young man. His broad shoulders filled out the uniform well. “You were a state cop in Connecticut? How’d you end up here?”
“Sir, you ever been to Hartford in February?”
“No, can’t say that I’ve ever been in Connecticut.”
“If you had, you’d know why I’m here.”
Tasker nodded, “I see.” He looked at the officer for any sign of a joke. He decided to get to the point. “You remember writing this man a ticket last week?” He held up a photo of Daniel Wells.
“Sure, got him doing eighty near the speedway. Happens all the time. Straight road, sight of the track. People go crazy.”
“Notice anything unusual about him?”
“Like what?”
“Don’t know. Anything stick out?”
“Just a redneck in a crappy Toyota. We didn’t chat. I had to jump in a chase down the turnpike.”
“He’s the key to an investigation we got goin’ on. Could you keep your eyes open for him or the car?”
“Sure. You want me to grab him if I see him?”
“Could be dangerous. Just try and figure where he lives.”
“I doubt if any of these local good old boys could cause me much harm, but if all you want is his address, I’ll try and get it for you.”
“Thanks,” said Tasker, feeling pretty confident that Daniel Wells was still in the area.
“You think Tasker is on to something?” asked Jimmy Lail, as he placed the thirty-pound dumbbells back on the old iron rack. He used his ratty FUBU T-shirt to wipe the sweat from his face.
Camy Parks looked up from her hamstring stretch. “You heard what he said the day he was here. They did the search warrant but didn’t find anything.”
“You sorry you’re not down with the locals on this caper?”
She looked at him the way she had to do so often. “Yeah, I wish the bosses weren’t so afraid. I think Billy is trying to do what’s right.”
“That dawg’s got some drama playing out in south county. He’s close to a sting sheet.”
Camy stood up, adjusting her tight shorts. “A what?”
“An arrest warrant.”
“Why didn’t you say ‘warrant’? Besides, I haven’t heard that.”
“I got scoop. The FBI makes it their business to know what’s going on.”
“Please, Jimmy, it’s me. The Bureau is no closer to knowing what’s happening than you are to being a black man.”
He ignored the comment. People always resented his effort to know other cultures. He liked hip-hop and rap. He actually ate collards. He identified with the African-American experience. Why did people have to judge him? He made sure he slipped back into his original voice and accent from Laredo and asked, “We may need to decide if we have to take this case back.”
“What do you mean, we?”
“I’m only good for certain cases, but not the big ones?”
“Jimmy, you’re not even good on regular cases, but you do what you’re told. That makes you useful.” She shot a blinding smile at him as she walked into the ladies’ locker room.
Jimmy Lail shrugged. He’d heard worse over at his own office. He smiled at the sight of her perfectly formed, firm butt disappearing behind the door. Maybe that was one thing in which he wasn’t down with the African-American community: he liked small butts, and on that he could not lie.
“So how is Nicky?” asked Tasker, looking into the sea-blue eyes of his former wife.
She smiled. “Nicky is fine, why?”
“Just curious how the good counselor is feeling. I’d hate for him to catch a virus like cancer, or maybe Lou Gehrig’s disease.”
“Although we haven’t discussed his last checkup, he looks fine and seems to be getting by all right for a thirty-eight-year-old man.”