Reckless Abandon

59

THE FOLLOWING EVENING, back in Orchid Beach, Holly left her office at dusk and drove north on A1A, with Daisy in the passenger seat, her nose out the window, sniffing the damp Florida air.

Holly turned left down a side road and, after half a mile, came to the rear gate of the real estate development that had once been called Palmetto Gardens, and later, Blood Orchid, and which was now in federal hands. She stopped and, leaving the motor running and the lights on, got out and went to where the gate was chained and locked. She knew the combination to the lock because she had locked it herself. A moment later, she took off the chain, then drove her car inside. She locked the gate behind her and bore to her left, along a road that ran alongside the golf course.

The course looked good, since the Feds had kept on the grounds crew until they could sell the place. The auction was scheduled for a week hence, and they had been working hard to make the grounds look good.

Holly pulled into a dirt road and drove fifty yards, then stopped the car, switched off the engine, and got out, followed by Daisy. Using her SureFire tactical flashlight, she walked purposely through the woods, switching on the light a second at a time to find her way. Daisy ran ahead, scaring up rabbits and sniffing at everything.

She came to a live oak tree about thirty feet tall, then stopped. She stood quietly for a few minutes, letting her night vision develop and looking around for other human beings. The property seemed deserted, and as she waited, a full moon rose in the east, making the flashlight unnecessary.

She put the light back into its holster, took off her heavy gun belt, and began climbing the tree, while Daisy watched, baffled. A little more than halfway up, at about twenty feet, she stopped. The case was still there, though it was covered in pine pollen. She looked down. “Daisy,” she said, “go over there.” She pointed, and Daisy followed her instructions. “Sit.” Daisy sat. “Stay.” Daisy stayed.

What the hell, she thought, it was a sturdy case. She took it by the handle, dangled it for a moment, and let go. The case hit one limb, slowing it, then it fell unimpeded to the pine straw-padded floor of the woods. It bounced once, then fell on its side, intact.

Holly climbed down the tree, picked up the case, and put it into the trunk of her patrol car. Then she got Daisy back inside, let herself out the gate, and headed toward town.

She drove into the basement garage under the police station, parked the car, and got the case out of the trunk. It was heavier than she had remembered, and it was something of a struggle to get it upstairs and into her office. There were only two people in the squad room, a duty officer handling the phones and radio and a detective catching up on his paperwork. The rest of the night shift was on patrol.

She got the case into her office, dampened some paper towels, and wiped the pine pollen off the case, making its black aluminum surface look nearly like new. Then she hoisted the case onto a table and opened it. She was greeted with the sight of rows of hundred-dollar bills, sorted into stacks of one hundred, each secured with a heavy rubber band. She counted out twenty of the stacks and packed them into a small zippered duffel from her locker. Then she counted out another ten stacks, dropped them into a Federal Express envelope, and wrote out a note on her stationery. She put the note into the envelope, sealed it, filled out a FedEx waybill, and stuck it to the envelope.

Then she picked up the heavy case and took it into the darkened evidence room. She went through the procedure for setting the combination locks on the case, then locked them and looked around for just the right spot. She found a place among some filing boxes that had been seized during a drug raid, and set it there. Then she got an evidence sticker, put her name on it, and fixed it to the side of the case. If anyone came across it, they wouldn’t be able to open it, and if they asked about it, she could say she’d forgotten to log it in.

She went back to her office, picked up the duffel and the FedEx package, and set them on her desk, looking at her watch. It was nearly ten. The call should come soon. She switched on her desk light, picked up a law enforcement magazine, put her feet on the desk, and started to read. Twenty minutes later, her cell phone vibrated on her belt. “Yes?”

“Hey, you ready for us?”

“Yes.” She asked where he was, then gave him directions, then she hung up, picked up the duffel and the FedEx package, and walked down to the garage with Daisy clicking along on the tile floor behind her.

She got some gear out of her car, then waited in the garage for another twenty minutes, until headlights appeared outside. She walked out and held up a hand for the truck to stop.

Two men got out. “Hey, how you doin’?” the passenger said.

“I’m good. You got my package?”

“Sure. You got my package?”

She handed him the duffel. “It’s in stacks of one hundred hundreds. Count it.”

He counted it carefully. “It’s good,” he said, and he led the way to the rear of the vehicle.

Holly watched as the two men removed a dozen boxes from the back of the truck. Then one man climbed in and walked forward a few steps. He knocked on something. “Hey, man, we’re here,” he called. “You ready to come out?”

Holly switched on her flashlight, illuminated the inside of the truck, and pulled out her gun.

“Here we go,” the man said, opening the door.

Trini Rodriguez stepped out into the bright glare of the tactical light, holding up a hand to spare his eyes. He would be effectively blind for a minute or two. He followed the other man forward, then hopped down from the truck. “Hey, what’s with the light?” he said.

Holly held the light so that it illuminated her gun, which was pointed at his head. “Lie down on the ground,” she said.

“What?”

“You see the gun? Lie down on the ground, or I’ll shoot you where you stand.”

Trini prostrated himself.

“Is he clean?” Holly asked the men.

“Oh, yeah. We didn’t let him have a piece.”

“What the fuck is going on?” Trini asked.

Holly handed the belt to one of the men. “Put this on him,” she said, “buckle to the rear.” She watched as they buckled the belt on him and rolled him over. Then she handed them the cuffs. “Run these through the ring and handcuff him, hands in front,” she said, and they did. “Now get him on his feet.”

They stood him up, then stepped back.

“Guard, Daisy,” she said, pointing at Trini.

Daisy took up a position in front of him and bared her teeth, making a low growling noise.

“You keep that dog away from me!” Trini hollered.

“Behave yourself, or I’ll show you how she’s been trained to eat genitals,” Holly said. She turned to the two men. “Gentlemen, our business is concluded. Please thank Vito for me, and give him my very best.”

They bade her good night, got into the truck, and drove away.

“Now,” she said to Trini, “you’re under arrest. We’re going to pretend that I read you your rights, and I hope that, between here and the cell that’s waiting for you, you’ll give me an excuse to set the dog on you and shoot you in the head. Now turn around and march.”

Trini turned around and marched.

Ten minutes later, Trini was secured and logged in. “He’s being arraigned tomorrow morning,” she said to the duty officer who had helped her. “The paperwork is all done. Put him down for some breakfast.”

Trini looked at her sullenly through the bars. “I’m gonna get you,” he said.

“Trini,” she replied, “you’re all through getting people, and you’ve just spent your last day on earth as a free man. All the rest of your days, which are numbered, you’ll be looking at the world through bars, right up until the moment they put the needle in your arm.”

On the way home, Holly stopped at a FedEx box and dropped her package into it.

“Now let’s go home and get some dinner,” she said to Daisy.

Daisy made a little noise in anticipation. She knew what “dinner” meant.

Holly drove home with a wonderful sense of satisfaction. Now her only worry was what to do about Lance Cabot’s offer of work. In her head, just for fun, she began composing a letter of resignation to the city council of Orchid Beach.