A False Dawn

SEVENTY-TWO

The elevator to the basement couldn’t move fast enough. On the way down, Ron radioed for more backup and an ambulance. He watched the digital lights change as the elevator descended from the penthouse. Forty-six floors to the garage. Ron said, “He’s one of our best. Did a stint in Iraq. Special forces. Volunteered to help stop the anarchy in New Orleans after hurricane Katrina. He’s got three kids, all small.”

Floor twenty. Seventeen. Fourteen.

“Move elevator!” Ron shouted. His jaw-line could crack stones.

Lauren said, “Lots of concrete and steel in the basement. Could block the radio.”

“That’s a possibility,” said Agent Barfield. “Since the hurricanes of ‘04, builders have been sinking the footing for these new condos very deep.”

When the doors opened, we stepped into the parking garage, handguns drawn.

“Oh shit!” Ron said, stopping like an animal frozen in a car’s headlights.

“Try to reach the paramedics!” Lauren ordered. “Tell them where we are!” She ran toward Bob Rawls.

He was slumped against a wall between a Mercedes and a Jaguar. It looked like he was sitting, resting after jogging. The closer I got, the more I knew it wouldn’t make any difference how fast the paramedics arrived. Signs of death were there, face slack, color drained. His head was resting against the concrete block wall. Blood trickled out of the right side of his open mouth, soaking into his uniform. His eyes were open, like a camera shutter that had jammed, exposing the film to the image of horror. Blood settling in the retinas.

Agent Barfield crouched beside the body and did a perfunctory reading of the pulse. He shook his head. “No sign of a bullet or stab wound. From the position of the body in relation to the head, looks like his neck was broken. Snapped like a tree branch.”

I said, “Let’s search the garage. Stay within sight of each other.”

I could hear the wail of sirens growing louder as we searched for Santana. I knew he had escaped. He was probably in the backseat of a cab en route to the airport, or he might be strolling along Ocean Boulevard, stopping to consider a Versace window display. He’d blend in, like an international tourist. Blasé as the police cavalry roared by in a blur of chrome, red, blue, and white lights enveloping the condos in the moving colors found somewhere between life and death.