The Butterfly Forest

ONE HUNDRED-TWO

I called Dave and told him what had happened. I gave him Gonzales number and said, “It’s probably a disposable phone. Maybe they can get a ping off the cell tower. Call Daytona PD and have them pick up Soto and his pal. They’re unconscious in an alley behind McLaren’s Pub on Ocean Drive. They’ll need an ambulance dispatched, too. Remind detectives that the guys on their backs are two of Pablo Gonzales soldiers, accessories in the bombing deaths of nine federal agents. I’ll wait until I hear their sirens, then I’m gone.”

“That should be in a couple of minutes,” Dave said.

“When I spoke with Gonzales, I could detect the sounds of an airport in the background. I heard someone being paged in English.”

“So you think Gonzales is or was in a U.S. airport?’’

“Probably Tampa International. Let the feds know. They can get flight information from the FAA. Maybe Gonzales flew in his own private jet. Probably some jet affiliated with a dummy corporation. Or maybe he flew in commercial airline. Very few people would recognize him. The only picture the feds have is twelve years old.”

“Are you coming back to the marina?”

“I’m driving to Tampa. Soto slipped when he said Mr. Gonzales doesn’t like to be kept waiting. He’s here, Dave. Someone over there may know where Gonzales hides when he comes stateside. If I can find that person, I can find him. Oh, I left Max’s leash on the nail on the outside of Jupiter’s door. ”

“I figured you did, that’s why I got it about an hour ago. Max and I are good to go for the night.”

“Dave…”

“Yeah?”

“You called Cal Thorp, didn’t you? That day we watched the warehouse disintegrate.”

“How’d you know? Never mind, yes I called him. He’s on stand-by.”

“Maybe, between the two of you, I can get an address.”

“What address?”

“Pull the phone records to the Marion County Sheriff’s Department for June ninth. I’m looking for an incoming call with a Tampa Bay area code. See if you can tie an address with the number. If you reach Thorpe, ask him to meet me in Tampa tomorrow afternoon, three o’clock at the Tampa Aquarium. Text the address if you can find the caller’s ID. Goodnight, Dave.”

I didn't know whether Gonzales had his men plant a bug on my Jeep. But now I didn’t want to be followed. I rented a car at Daytona Airport, drove west on I-4 through pouring rain. I felt Gonzales was here in the states. Maybe here to personally make sure Izzy’s body was taken home, or maybe he was here to make good on his threat to render me paraplegic.

It didn’t matter. I had a plan to find him. And if I could make it happen, Pablo Gonzales would never again harm another human being.

I bought a thoothbrush and a change of clothes at a 24-hour Walmart, paid cash at the truck stop motel on the outskirts of Tampa and checked in under an alias. I parked the rental car on the opposite side of the motel from my room and walked through a breezeway to the room on the second floor.

My room smelled of dried sweat and chemical bleach. I showered, placed my Glock under the pillow and stretched out on the bed. I was exhausted, sore but too wired to sleep. I lay there and listened to the rain fall, the odor of Clorox and old clothes crawling around the room like invisible spiders. My thoughts finally blurred when fatigue fell harder than the rain outside. Somewhere in my dreams, I saw the face of Agent Flores, smelled her perfume from that morning in the hospital room. Then I saw CSI investigators pick up her head, the eyes locked in the same remote expression I’d seen on Luke Palmer’s face as his body rotated slowly from the end of the rope.

I sat up in the bed, the single air-conditioning unit rattling and blowing tepid air, my chest damp from sweat, the lavender light from the motel sign bleeding in between the Venetian blinds. I heard the long, desolate echo from a train horn in the distance and remembered the passage in Marquez’s book about the dead banana workers shipped to the coast. I blinked away sleep, but couldn’t wash away images of their bodies. I saw the dead tossed, reminiscent of bags of garbage in open freight cars that bounced along a narrow-gauge track, under palm and banana trees. Under the blanket of a dark sea, sharks circled in expectation of things to come.