Geek Mafia: Mile Zero by Rick Dakan (best fiction novels to read .txt) 📕
"If you can spare it, it'd help. I've already doled out all my cash on hand to secure the place and get the liquor. But we still need..."
"I know, I know," said Paul, handing the money to Sandee. "Let's just try and make tonight kick ass so we can earn that back as quick as possible."
"We should be flush by dawn, my dear," Sandee assured him. "Just you wait."
"That's the plan anyway. But would you explain that to Chloe for me?"
"What is Chloe doing tonight, anyway?" Sandee asked. "I was hoping to get her to come out with me and check out the new help at the Hyatt."
"She's busy getting everything set up for our visitors. She's kind of freaking out about all the little details."
"Oh my, are they coming in tonight? I thought that was next week."
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“Actually Bee,” Chloe interjected, “If you could run home and get the car, that’s all you have to do.”
“Ok,” she said. “Um… where are you going to put her?”
“In the freezer,” said Chloe.
“The freezer in my workshop?” asked Bee.
“I’m afraid so. It’s the only place…”
“For how long?”
“Not long,” Paul assured her. “We can’t keep a body in our house. We’ll get Winston or Isaiah to help us…” he was going to say get rid of it, but that sounded so cold and heartless. “They’ll help us.”
“This is crazy,” said Bee.
“Yep,” Paul and Chloe both replied at once. They smiled at each other, although nothing they were talking about was very funny.
“Christ,” said Chloe. “We’ve spent too much time together.”
“Not enough lately,” said Paul before he could think. This was not the time for that argument, and Chloe shot him a glance that said as much.
“Ok,” Chloe said. “Let’s get this show on the road. Time’s a wasting.” She looked around the dark alley they were standing in. There were street lights at either end, neither of which provided much illumination here in the middle. “I don’t want to spend any more time here than we have to.”
“Sure,” Bee said as she set off at a trot down the alley. Paul knew she was hating every minute of this dead body stuff. That made two of them.
“So,” he said to Chloe. “How’re we getting her out of there?”
“The same way they got her in. Through the window there.”
Paul looked at the window. It was certainly large enough to easily fit a body through, assuming you removed the panes. “Do we have to go back in through the front?”
“Fuck no. Bee and I unscrewed it from the inside. Actually that’s how we left, just to make sure we could.”
Paul walked over to the window and looked close, but it was hard to make out any details in the darkness. He touched it gently and found that the sliding pane was just leaning against the frame, not inside it. “Can you reattach it from out here?”
“No,” said Chloe. “And neither could the killer. He had to have done it from the inside.”
“Which means he didn’t leave out the window,” concluded Paul. “Our tenant comes on duty as receptionist tomorrow. We’ll ask her if she saw anyone that might be our guy. You said Raquel was moved here after she was killed?”
“From somewhere wet and salty,” said Chloe. “But I don’t know how long she’s been dead. The body felt cold to me, but I can’t translate that into a time of death.”
“I’ve always said this Crew needed a team forensics expert,” joked Paul.
“I thought you wanted to stay small,” said Chloe.
“I was kidding.”
“I know.”
“But you weren’t?”
She looked away from him. “Well I don’t want a team forensics expert. Unless they’re also a kick-ass hacker.”
“But you do want a bigger Crew?” asked Paul, knowing full well that he was starting an argument he didn’t want to have, and yet he seemed incapable of stopping himself.
“It sure would be useful right about now. Four is small.”
“Four is Fantastic,” countered Paul. Chloe groaned at the pun. “Seriously. We know we can trust each other. And Bee. And now Sandee. And we’ve never needed more.”
“On this fucking island, no, we haven’t.”
“So what’s the problem then? It’s not like we’re going to make a habit of hosting gang summits and investigating murder scenes is it?”
“God, I hope not,” said Chloe. “But what about off the island?”
“We’re just now getting things set up here the way we like them,” insisted Paul. “We’ve only had an almost positive cash flow for like two months. The party’s in full swing. Bee’s cameras need another six months to cover the island. A few more properties to manage and…”
“I know, I know. Secure base of operations. Vaguely dependable income. Total security. It’s not like we haven’t had this conversation three or four times a week for the last year.”
“Then why…” Paul started to say, but stopped himself. She was right, they had had this conversation over and over again and he had started to lay out his next argument as if it were a line in a play, he’d said it so often. He was tired of fighting about it. And looking at Chloe’s expression, she was too. He bit back his words and remained silent.
“Why what?” she asked.
“Never mind.”
She glared at him a moment then turned away, walking back to the end of the alley. After a minute loitering in the dark, Paul followed her to the corner. They stood in silence, waiting for Bee.
“How was the meeting?” Chloe asked.
“Pretty interesting,” said Paul, glad to talk about something less likely to end in yelling. “Isaiah’s got some ambitious plans.”
“So I gathered. Did he give any specifics yet?”
“Yeah, he got into specifics. Or rather Amelia did. She laid out a plan to go after this big corporation that’s up to no good. The fourth Crew guy, Eddie, he wasn’t interested in the theory stuff. He wanted practice.”
“Sounds like my kind of guy,” said Chloe.
“Actually he’s kind of an asshole. But he seems to know what he’s doing. His Crew must have some mojo for Isaiah to put up with his shit like he did. I could tell Winston didn’t care for him much either.”
“Hmm,” said Chloe. “Well, give me the Cliff ‘s Notes version.”
Paul recounted everything that had happened at the meeting, including Amelia’s details about the target corporation and how going after them would benefit the member Crews and how Eddie had reacted to everything. He then filled her in on his talk with Winston about possible suspects.
“So basically it could be anyone,” said Chloe. “Either someone who really likes the idea or someone who really hates it or someone who had a beef with Raquel.”
“Yep,” said Paul. “Or just some random psychopath, although that’s not likely.”
“I guess we need to start investigating our guests, huh?” she asked.
“Well, I know we didn’t do it, so yeah. The other question is, when do we bring the others into the loop? Isaiah and Winston both offered to help any way they could.”
“I’ll bet they did. But we should keep as much to ourselves for as long as possible, at least until we know more.”
“They’re not going to like that,” said Paul. “But then, I don’t like people getting murdered on my island.”
“Your island?”
“Our island.”
“Our island?”
“This island.”
“This goddamned island,” said Chloe. “It’s too small…”
Paul didn’t rise to the bait again. “Anyway, it’s our turf and I agree with you, we’ll handle it without their help. Letting them into the investigation will inevitably reveal other aspects of our operations. The only problem is, there’s going to be insane pressure from Isaiah for details. And from the others, too. I don’t think Eddie’s got much respect for us.”
“I’ll handle those guys,” said Chloe. “Don’t worry. I’ve got a plan.”
“An abso-fucking-lutely brilliant plan?” asked Paul.
As he hoped, she smiled at this reference to the day they’d first met. “Of course!” she said.
“Does it involve wigs?” he asked.
“Definitely.”
“Then I’ll leave them to you.”
A pair of headlights swung into view. It was Bee, driving the larger of the Crew’s two vehicles, a gray, rust stained conversion van. Plenty big enough to transport a body in.
“Time to get to work,” said Chloe.
“This is only the second time I’ve cleaned up a murder scene,” said Paul, remembering the hotel room in San Jose with her and Bee.
“Me too,” said Chloe.
“Let’s try not to make a habit of it,” he said.
“Agreed.”
IT was 3 a.m. by the time they’d secured Raquel in the freezer in Bee’s workshop. Bee collected an armful of equipment as they left the air-conditioned shed. Paul knew she wasn’t going to want to go back in there until the body was gone, and he couldn’t blame her. Having a murdered corpse in their home, even in the secured shed outside, made him nervous as hell.
They rented their house from a property management company that represented several dozen different wealthy owners from all over the world who had winter homes in Key West. Few of them ever visited more than once a year, renting the places out to vacationers or local residents the rest of the time. The owners looked at them as investments, and as soon as they had two years in a row without a hurricane coming through, they would sell them for a massive profit. Until then, the less they had to think about them, the better.
When Chloe, Bee, and Paul had arrived in Key West last year, they’d rented a pair of apartments in New Town while they looked for a more permanent base of operations. Key West was filled with charming old houses that had been subdivided, rebuilt, damaged, refurbished, and worn away again over the years. They had wanted something big enough to set up a solid base, but not too fancy or expensive. This particular house, right across the street from Key West’s cemetery and its above-ground stone tombs, had fit the bill perfectly. The faded gray wood exterior hadn’t seen a paint brush in years, and it would require a lot of work by the owners before it would be fit to sell. Inside it wasn’t too bad though, with scuffed but attractive hardwood floors and a wellappointed kitchen. Plus it had a large, ivy-covered fence around the yard and a screened-in porch out back.
They did their research before approaching the property manager (by breaking into the house to take their own tour). The company, Keys Condos and Estates, was a two-person operation consisting of Norm Lilianfield and his personal assistant Quincy. Norm was an aging gay hipster who’d lived in Key West for thirty-four years. He loved his afternoon cocktails and his evening wine and his late night brandy. He had no love at all for property management, but tourism and real estate were the only games in town, and he needed to put drinks on the bar somehow. He was a laissez-faire property manager who specialized in laissez-faire owners, putting in just enough effort to keep the places clean and generating vacation rental incomes.
Paul and Chloe had never seen a riper target for their machinations. As it turned out, they didn’t even have to con Norm. After digging through his financial records, cutting deals with his drug suppliers and secretly videotaping him in compromising and illegal positions, they’d confronted him. It turned out that Norm was as laissez-faire about blackmail as he was about everything else. He was more than happy to be a figurehead, as long as he got his cut. Surprised but pleased, Paul and Chloe had made a deal.
Now they ran Keys Condos and Estates, and all Norm had to do was sign the odd check and field an occasional phone call. He didn’t even have to go into the office anymore. Every week he and Paul met for dinner at Pisces, and Paul gave Norm an envelope of cash while Norm filled in Paul on all the latest gossip from around town. Paul of course always picked up the check, but after the first night he didn’t let Norm order caviar anymore. The foie gras was pricey enough.
Their own house got moved off the list of available vacation homes. Chloe and Paul falsified records of occasional renters to keep the owners in New England from asking too many questions. After deducting their management fees from the quarterly checks, they ended up
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