A King's ransom

PART FOUR
58

I was in Hialeah before the morning rush hour. I hadn’t bothered with a phone call before starting out on the road. From what I remembered of my last meeting with Jaime Ochoa, hitting him cold was the way to go.

The note was cryptic, but it was just enough to set my thoughts in motion. Jaime was the so-called psychic who’d sent me the e-mail a little more than a week after my father’s kidnapping, claiming to know his whereabouts. I’d thought it was a total scam. With this latest note, however, I had a compelling sense that Jaime really did know something and that his knowledge was linked to the vague question of “why he got fired.”

I knocked twice before he came to the door dressed in shorts and a T-shirt, no shoes.

“Hey, Mr. Nick, I knew you’d be back.”

A predictable greeting from a guy who’d claimed to “know” everything. “I wanted to follow up on some things. Got a few minutes?”

“Sure.” He opened the door and led me back to the kitchen. I entered carefully, checking for that Doberman pinscher that had pinned me against the wall last time. I heard barking outside, looked out the window, and was relieved to see Sergeant chained to the doghouse.

Jaime went to the espresso machine on the Formica counter and measured out a scoop of ground Pilon. “Have you reconsidered my power package?”

“Let’s not waste time with that psychic stuff again, all right?”

“I do know all.”

“But not because you’re psychic.” I was pushing it, but I had to pretend to know more than I did. “It’s from your other job, isn’t it? The one you were fired from.”

He placed his espresso cup beneath the drip and said, “Jaime Ochoa has never been fired from any job.”

“I’m not talking about just any job,” I said, still fishing.

“I know exactly what you’re talking about. Jaime Ochoa never worked for Quality Insurance Company.”

My heart raced. He was in denial, but at least he’d confirmed my suspicions that we were talking about Quality Insurance. “That’s not what I hear,” I said, bluffing.

“Then you heard wrong. Jaime Delpina was fired from Quality Insurance. Not Jaime Ochoa.”

“Who’s Jaime Delpina?”

The little espresso cup was full. He downed it in one swallow, then said, “Yours truly.”

“You changed your name?”

“They made me change it.”

“The company?”

“Claro.”

“Why would you let them do that?”

“Because they gave Jaime Delpina a choice. Go to jail or disappear.”

“I’m pretty sure I know the reason, but you tell me. Why did they want you to disappear?”

He smiled thinly. “Sorry, my friend. For the rest of the story I must tap into my inner clairvoyance.”

“Huh?”

“That’s all you get for free, Jack,” he said flatly.

“You expect me to pay you money?”

“Absolutely.”

“That’s extortion.”

“It’s just business.”

“Not when the business is kidnapping. Maybe I’ll call the state attorney and see what she thinks it is.”

“You’d be a fool to do that.”

“Watch me.” I started for the door.

“Hold it.”

I stopped.

He said, “Let’s be reasonable about this. The policy limit is three million dollars. You’ll probably deliver the ransom by pack mule through two or three intermediaries. Do you honestly think the kidnappers will even notice that you slipped a little something to me?”

“You’ve seen the policy, haven’t you? That’s how you know it’s three million.”

“I told you, I know all.”

“And you’re going to tell all, too.”

“Surely, for fifty thousand dollars, cash.”

“I don’t have to pay you fifty cents. I’ll subpoena you.”

“And I’ll forget everything I know.”

With that, something snapped inside me. I was tired of being extorted by kidnappers and scumbags like Jaime. I started toward him and said, “Maybe I’ll just beat it out of you.”

“Bad move,” he said as he grabbed a big kitchen knife from the counter.

I stopped cold, then took a step back. “Take it easy, pal. I wasn’t serious.”

“You looked serious.”

“There’s no need for a knife.”

“I don’t see any other way to keep you from walking out that door.”

“Just let me pass, all right?”

“Can’t let you go to no state attorney. I changed my name to stay out of prison.”

“No one’s talking about prison.”

“I seen what they did to my brother in his cell. Guys like us don’t do well in prison. Somebody’s boy.”

“You don’t have to explain. Just put the knife down.”

He was grimacing, almost whining, slowly unraveling before my eyes. “Damn you. Why did you have to go and threaten me like that?”

“Let’s forget it, okay?”

“A little money. That’s all I wanted. Just a small percentage, and you turn around and threaten to put me in jail.”

“Just put the knife down. I won’t say anything to anyone.”

He laughed mirthlessly. “You expect me to believe that?”

“I promise.”

“ ‘Promise,’ ” he said in a sissy voice, mocking me.

Slowly all traces of sarcasm drained from his expression. In his rage-filled eyes I could see that he felt abused, perhaps more by his former employer than by me. At that moment, however, I was the only target in front of him. In a weird way, he must have seen himself as the victim.

“Please, Jaime. Don’t do something stupid.”

“You’re the stupid one.”

He charged across the kitchen and came at me, leading with the knife. I dodged out of the way. He fell but sprang right back. I had my hands in front of my body defensively. A perverse smile came across his lips as he began to toy with me. We moved strategically in a circle, like two boxers looking for an opening. He kept lunging at me and pulling back, taunting.

Blood oozed from a cut over his right eye. He’d apparently injured himself in the initial fall. He wiped it away, then suddenly seemed to realize that the blood was his own.

“You son of a bitch!” he shouted as he lunged toward me, swinging wildly.

The knife cut through my shirtsleeve, and I felt the sharp metal against my skin. It was just a glancing blow, but it sparked my survival instincts. Somehow I found the strength and quickness to grab his arm. Locked together in a struggle for the knife, we whirled across the kitchen and slammed against the sink. I hammered his wrist against the basin, hard. Once, then again. The third time I heard bones pop. He cried out in pain as the knife fell to the floor. He gouged my eye with one hand, but his injured limb was hanging limply. Still pinned against the sink, I grabbed the good arm and twisted it behind his back in a half nelson, then wheeled him around and shoved the broken hand down the opening to the garbage disposal.

He screamed as his knuckles met the sharp, still blades. I shoved even harder, jamming his hand deeper into the disposal. Finally he was in up to his elbow. His arm was stuck and he couldn’t pull it out, not even after I let go. I kept his other arm locked behind his back as I reached for the switch.

“I’ll turn it on!”

“No, not my hand!”

“Then talk!”

“Let me go, I’m begging you, man. I’m your friend.”

The word “friend” made me think of the note. Maybe it hadn’t come from Beverly. “Are you saying you’re a friend?”

“I’m your only friend, man.”

I wasn’t sure what he was saying, but I wasn’t backing down. The cut on my arm was throbbing and bleeding. He’d sliced it deeper than I’d thought. “Tell me what you know, or I swear I’ll grind your fingers to the nub.”

He grimaced, shaking his head defiantly. “No, no, man! Not for free!”

“Don’t make me do this.”

“Please!”

“You got till the count of three. One. Two-”

“Okay, okay,” he said, his whole body shaking. “I’ll tell you anything you want to know.”

I took my hand off the switch and prepared to listen.