Night Moves (Doc Ford) - By RandyWayne White Page 0,85

I wanted to spare us both the details, so I steered him toward the parking lot, saying, “Don’t worry about it. They’ll wait until he calms down, then commit him for seventy-two hours. Couple of days in the psych ward might help him snap out of it. And”—I hesitated, thinking it could wait. But it couldn’t, so I continued—“and one of us needs to phone Cressa. She’d probably rather hear it from you.”

Deano had spotted us and was now lying on his belly, spitting sand, yelling, “Hey! I’m talking to you, Ford! Fuck up my life, then turn your back on me! Hear me, Forrrrrd?”

Tomlinson slowed for a moment, then decided, Hell with it, so Arturo had to address the cops and the crowd, yelling, “Those two—they’re both screwing my brother’s wife! That’s what this is all about. The hippie, I’ve got video! And the big-shot biologist—I know he’s doing it, too! They’re friends with all the local cops!”

My turn to consider stopping, but Tomlinson kept me moving. “Challenge him and people will think it’s true.”

“We’ve got nothing to worry about,” I countered. “No video of us—not after last night.”

“Who cares if he does? Doc, next time you come up with a peaceful solution, don’t bother because—” We were in the parking lot now, shattered glass on the walkway outside Deano’s room, so Tomlinson paused to look. A cop stood guard inside the sliding door, framed by a jagged hole, so it was like peering into a cave where sunlight touched a tangle of broken furniture, the detritus of a brawl.

I was ready for what came next, so prodded, “Now you’re against nonviolence?”

My pal shook his head to shush me, derailed by something. After a moment, he asked, “Did you hear a cat?”

No, just the diesel rumble of the EMS truck and Deano’s distant howling. “From inside the room?” I asked. “I don’t know the officer, maybe he’ll let us take a look. But, hey, you know it’s a waste of time. Crunch & Des would have bolted when the door broke.”

Tomlinson’s eyes were linking images together: a TV screen that had been ripped off the wall, mattress overturned, minibar bottles scattered . . . the cop’s meaty hand resting on his holstered Glock, aware of us but unconcerned. My guru pal appeared to shudder, said, “Forget it,” then continued walking and soon remembered that he’d been saying, “Next time you come up with a peaceful solution, Doc, do me a favor: please don’t. Stick with what you’re good at.”

“Deano can’t kill us from the psych ward,” I reminded him, but was thinking, I will!

23

THAT AFTERNOON, I WAS ALONE IN MY LAB AWAITING a telephone update from Lt. Kerry Brett while I also kept an eye on the drug dealer, Kondo Ogbay. With Ogbay were three associates, all voodoo devotees judging from their head nets of red and black, who had loaded themselves into a rental boat—a twenty-foot tri-hull with a sun awning and red plastic upholstery from a marina on the other side of the causeway. When they were seated, the little sumo-shaped man freed the lines, then idled out the channel. Tomlinson’s dinghy was ashore, but his absence didn’t stop the drug dealer from waving at No Más and calling a cheery greeting that sounded like: “How you doin’, mon? We gone check’n you maggy drops! Be fun, you joyin’ us!”

Which was nonsensical until I played with the phonetics, replaced a few words, and finally understood. “We’re going to check on your magic crops!” is what the witch doctor had said. It was a reference to mangrove islands with enough high ground to plant seeds and harvest crops. Pot was the money crop, in Tomlinson’s case, and there were several secret spots he tended with a shepherd’s tender care. Now Kondo and friends were on a raiding trip, apparently, and had challenged Tomlinson to interfere with this cryptic taunt.

Watching through the north window, I spoke softly to Kondo, who was a football field away, saying, “Break a leg,” and I wasn’t smiling. One option was to get in my boat and follow. Instead, I called my cousin Ransom, who knows about voodoo and obeah because she was raised in the Bahamas and who might even recognize Kondo if she stepped out on her dock—she’s popular with the wealthy nightclub set from Naples to Sarasota. The channel from Dinkin’s Bay exits at Woodring Point, where Ransom lives—rents among the last of the old Cracker houses—and Kondo’s boat would soon