The Auction House Read online

  A chuckle came from Dwayne. “You better have a full clip in that bean shooter. It’ll take that many to slow her down.” He continued, “Big Patty is my top gator for the movies and well trained as long as you have a lot of chicken around.”

  Didier set the scene and asked all but Jin to step behind a tree trunk set back fifteen feet from the waterline. A shocking look came over Jin and even more so when he locked eyes with Julie. She gave him a nod to go forward as she stepped with the rest of them behind the stump.

  “Does he know what the hell he’s doing?” Julie asked with a grim look at Dwayne.

  “Other than his pinky finger, the gators have treated him well,” Dwayne laughed it off. “Gotta keep the big ones belly’s full.”

  Julie stared at Didier’s left hand. It was okay. The right had a missing little finger. “You know how close that gator was to taking his arm off?”

  “Oh, Didier knows to be careful—now,” Dwayne said it like he was proud. “Didier got his share of kills. That necklace, each one of those teeth came from a gator. Not any gator, mind you. It had to be over three hundred pounds. It’s the Logan’s prize for killing a big one.”

  “I should have put a bullet in my brother’s head,” Julie said. “It has to be less painful than getting eaten by an alligator.

  “You still have time to shoot Jin—put him out of his misery.” Howard laughed.

  Jin looked petrified, especially with the makeup. He listened as Didier explained what was going to happen. Jin glanced at Julie as if to say, Kill me. I’ll never see the bullet coming.

  Dixie and Didier chatted. Then Dixie scrambled through her makeup box that sat on a portable table near the bamboo coverage. She came back with a brush, two makeup tubes, and a small piece of rubber then worked on Jin’s neck. Didier pointed to a spot, and she dabbed a little more red makeup.

  “Perfect,” Dixie said, pointing to what looked like flesh hanging from his neck.

  They rested Jin on the dryer part of the soil with his head about four feet from the water. His eyes focused on the water’s movement, knowing one swirl meant the gator was on the move. If it moved, he planned to run like hell.

  From where Jin laid, Didier took three steps into the water. Then came back and moved him further toward the trees.

  “Need room for Patty to get a running start,” Didier said, adjusting Jin’s hips upward. “Need your body to look mangled. Are you ready?” He said to Dixie, “You’re only going to get one shot.”

  “I know, Didier. No different than the movies,” she said. “It’ll take time for the gator to settle down.”

  “Not the gator I’m worried about.” Didier raised one eyebrow and looked down at Jin. “He ain’t going to do this but once.”

  A smile came across Dixie’s face. “Didn’t think of it that way.”

  It was time. Didier reminded Dixie to take a photo only of Jin—the boat couldn’t be in the picture. “Get ready! Keep still, Jin.”

  “Easy for you to say, asshole!” blurted out the side of Jin’s mouth.

  Didier pulled a whole chicken from the ice chest. Then he untied the rope from the side of the boat. He pulled two hard tugs and let the line go. With the chicken swirling around and around in Didier’s hand at the perfect moment, Big Patty showed movement, and he let the chicken fly over Jin. Patty ran up the bank quickly and snatched the chicken before it hit the ground only two feet from Jin. Patty stood and shook the chicken in her mouth with the flesh flipping as she chewed. It was like Patty was on cue of what was needed, then she walked back to the water and submerged.

  “Did you get it?!” Didier shouted. “Oh shit, I hope you got it.”

  “Got it! Perfect!” came from a joyous Dixie.

  “You can get up, Jin,” Dwayne said as the group walked over to see the picture.

  Didier did a side-glance. Jin wasn’t moving. “Oh shit, I thought this might happen,” he said, reaching in his pocket. “I always carry a packet of smelling salts.” He broke the packet and waved it under Jin’s nose, then a second time. “He’s out. I mean, like getting hit by Mike Tyson.” With another wave of salt and a few slaps in the face, Jin finally came around.

  Chapter 26

  Mario walked closely with Camila through the entrance of the hospital. Butler Ray, with one arm around the teenager, took each step with the frightened child. They took the elevator to the basement and continued down a dimly lighted hallway. At the far end, a man waited in a white lab coat with the New Orleans Coroner’s Office logo on his left breast pocket.

  Butler gave a nod. “Doctor?”

  He extended his arm to Camila, and they shook hands. “Hi, sweetie. I know this is a little scary for you, but it will be over in no time.” He explained all she had to do was answer yes or no. Camila worked up a fake smile and shook her head up and down.

  The doctor lifted a phone on the wall next to a plate glass window covered by a gray curtain. “We’re ready. Please open curtain one.” The drape slowly opened, exposing the entire length of a man on a gurney covered in a sheet. A lady in green scrubs pulled the sheet uncovering the face of the man.

  “Is that the man who kidnapped you?” the doctor asked, taking Camila’s hand.

  She got closer and stood on her toes, looking down at the man’s face. “Not sure. Does he have a tattoo on his right hand?”

  “Where the hell did this tattoo come from,” spewed from Mario’s mouth uncontrollably. He got a quick sharp eye from Butler.

  “Honey, does the man that attacked you have a tattoo?” Butler asked Camila, giving a gentle touch to her shoulder. Camila nodded her head. “What did the tattoo look like?”

  “Like a knife,” she said. “It’s on top of the hand.”

  Mario walked away, made a few steps in a circle, and returned. His usual movement not to blow up at a witness for not coming clean from the beginning—this case, a teenager.

  The doctor repeated the tattoo description on the phone to the person behind the wall. She checked both hands, raising the sheet on each side. She shook her head then reached for the phone. “No, sir. No tats.”

  The curtain closed, and Mario, Camila, and Butler walked to the elevator. The elevator was slow coming down.

  “You know, in a trauma case, people remember things weeks later. Out of nowhere, something will trigger, and they will remember a key point,” Butler said in a whisper, never looking Mario’s way.

  His face red, still blushing from his unprofessional remark, especially in front of a minor, Mario said, “Sorry, I didn’t mean to shout at you back there.” He patted Camila’s back. “It was good that you remembered.”

  “It just popped in my head when I saw the man in the white coat,” she said. “He had a tattoo on his right hand.”

  The elevator door opened, and Butler gave Mario a chilling stare. “That was the trigger.”

  They made it up to ICU. A nurse stopped them from seeing the second person Butler shot because he was in recovery. Mario stayed calm and asked her to check the top of the man’s hands for a tattoo. She agreed and returned a minute later and nodded her head. “Yes. It looks like a curved Saber Knife,” she said. “Like a pirate’s knife.”

  Mario pulled his badge and flipped it down. “We need to see him now.” Mario pointed to Camila. “She’s an eye witness and needs to identify him.”

  The nurse started to dispute then saw Mario’s eyes weren’t letting it go. “It’ll have to be quick. The man is in critical condition.”

  “Like I give a crap if he dies,” Mario said, pushing the swinging door open. “Bring us to him.” The startled nurse didn’t respond quickly enough for Mario’s liking, so he shouted, “Now!”

  They made it through a maze of small glass rooms, with monitors propped at each bedside beeping with a green line going up and down. Tubes ran from oxygen tanks, while bags were attached to the bed’s side and connected to the patient’s arm. It was all terrifying for Camila, who expressed she’d not seen that part of a hospital.
The nurse assured her they were recovering from operations and soon would move upstairs, and in a few days, they would go home.

  “Most of the people,” Mario said. “Our guy could only wish he’d die here for what is in store for him.” The comment got a quick head turn from Butler. “Just saying,” Mario smiled.

  The nurse stopped at a room separating them by a glass sliding door. She motioned for them to stay, and Mario nodded to the other two to do the same. The door slid open easily to the tiny room that housed the bed and equipment. She checked the closest arm to the door that laid on top of the sheet and found nothing. Then the other arm. There it was, the tattoo Mario described to the nurse during the walk.

  Camila stepped forward two steps, just barely inside the door. The tubes up his nose made her cringe. She followed more lines from a bag hanging on a pole down to his hand and glared for a second. “That’s the tattoo,” she said softly. Then she stared at his face. “That’s the man that pulled me off the bus.”

  It was all Mario needed to hear. He moved them out of the area into the waiting room. A police officer sat in the back of the room, reading a magazine.

  “You’re standing guard on a prisoner?” Mario asked, stepping toward him.

  The police officer put the magazine down. “Yes, I am.”

  “Well, would you mind moving closer to the door?”

  “The guy’s in recovery,” he said. “Who’s asking, anyway?”

  It wasn’t the response or attitude Mario cared to hear and flipped out his wallet, exposing a gold badge. The officer quickly stiffened up as a gold badge indicated he was a detective, and even if he was a first-grade detective, which he wasn’t, it was way above the officer’s pay grade.

  “Sir, what do you need?”

  “I need back up. I want an officer at the door, the elevator, and another one in the lobby. The guy may be in recovery, but I’ve seen prisoners walk out tubes dragging the ground.”

  “Yes, sir,” he said unequivocally. “I’ll handle it—no prisoner is escaping on my watch.”

  “Thank you, officer,” Mario said and took Camila by the arm. “Your work is done. Let’s get you to your Dad—he’s waiting at the hotel.”

  The New Orleans Police Department had special rates at several hotels around town, from the airport Hilton to an upscale property in the Central Business District. Even some high-ranking police officers and detectives who might want to transfer to the city were kept up overnight for interviews. The Mayor’s office wanted to impress them, especially the ones they sought after.

  Camila had been to hell and back in the last few days, so Mario wanted something special for her. He pulled some strings and got them a suite at a fancy hotel on Royal Street. It wasn’t one of those special deals the city got but a comp room for the asking. He kept up with his contacts and hotel managers from his early days of walking the French Quarter’s beat. Just for the asking, he’d score a complimentary room to impress a girlfriend for the weekend. In return, the hotel managers and security had Mario on speed dial when they needed someone removed from the hotel that might have been in a compromising position. Usually, some councilman getting out of line with a woman he picked up in the bar. They thought they were above the law. It was best for management to call Mario, and he’d handle it, or he’d send a Black and White unit to the scene with strict instructions—get the man out the building peacefully and talk the woman down from pressing charges.

  The three of them arrived at the hotel to find an officer standing guard with Camila’s father in the lobby. She and her father embraced for a moment and shed a few tears. Then Mario broke the good news. He arranged for them to stay overnight and enjoy the sights, including a city tour and dinner. The next morning, Camila would give a video statement of the kidnapping and formal charges would be brought against the thug in the hospital.

  Mario had lived through many horrors where an abducted person didn’t have an ending anywhere near Camila’s. For now, he enjoyed the happiness he brought this family. A police officer was assigned to them for the next twenty-four hours and would escort them downtown the next day for her statement.

  Outside the hotel, Mario gave a hardy handshake to Butler. “Thanks for your help.”

  “I could have easily recommended a rookie cop to help with Camila,” she said with a broad smile. “The truth is when going through her clothes in the lab with a UV-black light inch by inch then a second time, I could only think what this poor girl went through.”

  The black and white unit Mario called dispatched for earlier arrived curbside. The passenger’s window went down, and Mario leaned in. “Give Ms. Butler a ride back to the lab on Broad Street.” The officer gave a nod and came around and opened the passenger’s door.

  “Wow, quite the gentlemen,” Butler said, giving a pleasant smile the officer’s way. “I haven’t had a car door held for me in a long time.” The shy young policeman grinned and closed the door.

  Mario intervened quickly, bending down to the open window. “Maybe you’ve dated the wrong men, Butler.”

  She gave him a teasing look then gently touched his arm that rested on the door. “Maybe so, Detective Mario.” The patrol car pulled away slowly. She gave a quick side-glance with a broad smile, and her lips gave a clear message when she formed the words, “Call me.”

  It was only the sound of a text from Mario’s phone that broke his focus of gazing down the street at the back end of the police car. He’d never met a woman to say what she wanted. For him, it was always a guessing game. Her words came through loud as if she said it to his face—Call me. It brought a funny feeling inside, but he made a mental note to call her—maybe for coffee one day or wine after work. What the hell? he thought. Shoot for dinner.

  He looked at the message. It was from the officer posted at the ICU waiting room of the hospital. It read: The prisoner is in critical condition but awake.

  Mario wasted no time and headed to the hospital.

  Chapter 27

  Mario arrived at the hospital to an empty ICU waiting room except for the tired officer whose replacement was standing by. The officer met Mario as he came through the door.

  “Sir, I didn’t want to leave until you returned.”

  It seemed like a long day but just after noon when Mario peeked at his watch. The officer had been on the job way longer than expected but wasn’t leaving until speaking with Mario. He hadn’t seen the prisoner but relayed information the nurse passed on to him. Based on the information received from the nurse, she sounded much more cooperative than the one earlier.

  Mario gave the officer a handshake. “Thank you for waiting,” he said. “Get some sleep. You’re on duty tonight.”

  At the ICU station, Mario found the head nurse whose name tag read Nurse Becky. Mario addressed her that way.

  She quickly corrected him. “Just Becky, Detective. No need to call me Nurse Becky.”

  Mario filled her in on the pending charges against the man, and she escorted him down the hallway to the prisoner’s bed.

  Before entering the room, she detailed some further information not given. “The prisoner’s name is Wally Green from Troy, Alabama, and his wife is Jackie Green. We treated her for a stab wound earlier. She was released.”

  Mario smiled. “The wife is under lock and key at Central.” He made a funny face. “She had a driver’s license in her possession—I didn’t think that was her real name.”

  “I’m sure that’s both their names, Becky said. “When the heavy drugs wear off, patients get chatty—Wally was no different. He asked if his wife got away. I assured him she did, and that’s when he confirmed their names and address.”

  Mario hugged the wall, a little taken back by her approach with a prisoner. “Did he say anything else?”

  “At one point, he talked crazy and as if someone else was in the room, even stared at something in the corner. Said, ‘Hudson better get me paid. The deal was to hold the girl, and someone would pick her up within four hours. If they
had done their job, she wouldn’t have escaped going on seven hours after I did my part.’”

  Mario thanked her for the information and stepped toward the glass cubical housing the bed and all the equipment.

  “Detective,” Becky said. Mario stopped and gave a head turn. “My dad is on the job—detective at the 3rd District.”

  “Really?” he answered.

  She gave a smile. “I know how to drill a prisoner for information.”

  “You sure do.” He smiled, then stepped closer to the bed.

  Mario stared for a moment. The damage from the bullets had him wrapped tightly and lying stiff in the bed.

  “Hi, Wally,” Mario said in a whisper, leaning over the bed for a better view.

  Wally Green laid with his head slightly up and rolled his eyes Mario’s way. “You come to finish me off?”

  Mario played nice, talking softly and almost compassionately as if he cared. He reminded Wally the two bullets in his chest only came after he put a gun to Mario’s head. He pulled a chair and sat bedside.

  Nurse Becky came in and took his vitals, asking if he needed anything. Was he in pain? Did he need another shot? She continued to work with Wally, gaining his confidence. She put the emergency remote control closer to his hand. “You need anything—press the button. Okay, Wally?” She strolled out and gave Mario a glance, then broke into a smile and closed the glass sliding door behind her.

  “Wally, you want to shave ten years off your sentence?” Mario kept with the good cop attitude.

  “First, you have to convict me, don’t you, Detective? Innocent until proven guilty.”

  Mario stood bedside. “Wally, we both know you’re going up the river for a long time.” He bent a little closer and chewed on his lip. “Here’s what’s puzzling. We check Troy, a little town in Alabama where everyone knows everyone. You have a record, an assault with no time served. Your wife, on the other hand, probably should have gone to jail but didn’t.”

  Wally turned to his side momentarily while the pain subsided, giving Mario a fearless stare, he said, “What’s your point?”