Blood Money

Chapter Fifty-Three

Midnight came. Jack was driving across the Rickenbacker Causeway to Key Biscayne, halfway home and flanked on both sides by the dark waters of Biscayne Bay. With a slight turn of his head to the left, he could admire downtown Miami and the sparkling skyline that stretched along the shore of the mainland. The view was beautiful-deceptively so, as the city seemed oblivious to Merselus and his plans for the night. Rene, her necklace, and Sydney were heavy on Jack’s mind when the phone call came from Andie.

“Are you okay?” asked Andie.

“Yeah. Where are you?”

“You won’t see me tonight.”

He got that answer a lot in response to “Where are you?”

“Do you want me to notify Sydney’s parents?” Jack asked.

“It’s covered.”

“Good. Not exactly two of my favorite people.”

“Which reminds me. Don’t lie awake tonight mulling over your long-shot theory about Celeste Laramore’s biological parents. It went nowhere. DNA tests showed no possible biological connection between Celeste and anyone in the Bennett family-Sydney, her parents, Emma. No one.”

Andie had told him from the get-go that he was getting carried away with the physical resemblance between Celeste and Sydney. “Still don’t understand why she visited Sydney, why she started looking more and more like her.”

“My bet is that Celeste thought she could be related to Sydney, or maybe even wanted it to be true. I hate to speak badly of a young woman in a coma, but frankly I think it was some kind of weird celebrity worship. Granted, Sydney was the worst kind of celebrity, but she was still a celebrity.”

“Maybe,” said Jack.

“I gotta go. I’ll call you.”

“Stay safe,” he said, and the call ended. Jack checked his speed. He was on the downward slope of Miami’s highest bridge, the end of the causeway and the beginning of the island of Key Biscayne and its notorious speed traps. He brought it down to thirty-five m.p.h. and dialed Theo at his bar. Music and crowd noise were in the background.

“How’s Abuela?” Jack asked. Jack hadn’t told his grandmother what he and Andie were up to, but she had still felt uncomfortable staying at the house alone, so Theo told her it was national Take an Abuela to Work Night.

“She’s awesome,” said Theo. “She’s sharing a booth with Uncle Cy and on her third Cosmo-Not.”

Cosmo-Not was Theo’s version of a nonalcoholic Cosmopolitan. Uncle Cy was Theo’s great-uncle, an eighty-year-old relic of Miami’s Overtown and its jazz heyday of the mid-twentieth century. Cy was still quite the saxophone player, with emphasis on player.

“Tell Cy to keep his hands to himself,” said Jack.

“Will do. How did it go tonight?”

“Don’t really want to talk about it.”

“Got it.”

“I’m almost home, and I’m embarrassed to say that I forgot all about picking up Abuela. Too damn much on my mind.”

“No problem. I’ll drop her off.”

“Thanks.”

“Unless she hooks up with Cy.”

“Don’t push it,” said Jack.

Jack ended the call, tucked his cell away, and just drove. The monotonous hum of tires on asphalt was the backdrop for his thoughts. He passed the Seaquarium, home to Flipper the dolphin and Lolita the killer whale. He wondered if they were asleep; and if they were asleep, he wondered if they were dreaming; and if they were dreaming, he wondered if these highly intelligent legless mammals ever dreamed about walking like the trainers who fed them. Then he shook off the silliness and accepted the fact that the old games he played to trick himself were futile. Never in his life-not even as a high-school boy obsessed with the hair and lips of Julia Roberts-had he managed to conjure up a successful diversion from worries and concerns that were certain to keep him wide awake and staring at the ceiling till dawn.

Jack steered into the driveway and killed the engine. The headlights remained on for a few moments, then blinked off. The house was dark, and the porch light was off. The narrow driveway was the only opening in a thick ficus hedge that extended like a castle wall across the front and along both sides of his smallish yard. It was great for privacy, but at ten feet it had grown way too tall, and it made the night seem even darker. He was glad Abuela had decided not to stay behind by herself.

Jack opened the car door, stepped out, and then froze. A man was sitting on his front doorstep. He rose slowly-not a threatening motion, but Jack proceeded with caution as he walked around the front of his car and started up the sidewalk. The man waited, and Jack soon recognized the face.

“Mr. Bennett?”

Sydney’s father answered in a low voice, his tone and body language conveying not so much reluctance, but resignation. “We should talk,” he said.