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  The report went on to explain that the police had found the husband’s car in a canal in the Everglades that afternoon, and they suspected that it was dumped there. They would have divers check the water for a body once enough officers arrived to keep watch for gators as this particular canal was known as a gator hot spot. They didn’t mention the note or the knife that Bill had planted in the car or the gun that I was supposed to have used to kill myself before the car went into the canal. All in all, it looked like I got away clean.

  “So, Bill, what am I going to do for transportation? I’m sure you don’t want to spend all day ferrying me around,” I mentioned as I stepped from the master bath.

  “Hey, be sure to shave your moustache before we go out to dinner. After dinner we can go over to my place, and you can pick a car or SUV from the garage, unless you just can’t wait to spend some money,” Bill quipped.

  “Are you sure? I mean you’ve done way too much already,” I lamely stated.

  “For my new best friend, whose life I saved and thus saved my own, I can do lots more. You’ll see. I’ll even get you laid if you want. I know a couple of dozen girls that will do anything—and I mean anything—to be with the rich dudes, and you’re a rich dude now.” Bill grinned that wicked grin again, and I felt a shiver run down my spine.

  “There are some clothes in the closet. Dress casually. I took the sizes off your clothes back in Fort Myers so they should fit. There’s even new tennis shoes in there. Just make sure to pitch all your old clothes. We don’t want anything that might be traced back to your old life,” Bill stated as he walked back to the living room.

  “Like I said, the entry code numbers are there on the counter. There are three of them—one for the gate, one for the elevator and one for the penthouse door. There is a Glock under the sink and one in the bedroom in the second drawer in the nightstand on the right side of the bed. The ammo is in the freezer. I’ll be back in a few hours, say ten thirty. We’ll get some dinner, and I’ll show you where I live. Then you can get that car to drive around in. Tomorrow, the real excitement begins as we start looking for my next convert to Christ. There are so many bad guys here in Miami. It is a regular Sodom to Vegas’s Gomorrah,” Bill expounded as he stepped out the door, leaving me to fend for myself in this twisted wonderland.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  I took the longest shower you could imagine. The hot water never ran out and the pressure was strong and pleasant. I tried the blow dryer again, and it wasn’t half bad, but to get completely dry, I would have had to stand there for way too long. So after three or four minutes under the swirling air, despite feeling still just a bit damp, I waddled over to the sink, where I found a tooth brush still in the wrapper and a new tube of toothpaste. It felt good to have a clean mouth after the last couple of days. I had forgotten to brush in all the excitement, and rubbing my finger over my teeth just didn’t cut it.

  I found towels in a small closet, and they were the softest I’d ever felt. They sucked what little water that was left on me right off. Wrapping a towel around me (that’s how big they were), I checked out the balance of the place. It was two bedrooms with the guest room facing north toward Hollywood. The second bedroom had its own separate bath that was bigger and nicer than my master bath at the old house in Michigan—the bathroom I had built, with what I thought were luxury features, but clearly, I had no idea what luxury really was.

  The living room had a fireplace that allowed you to enjoy the crackling fire but didn’t allow the heat from the fire to spill into the room, which would have made it uncomfortably warm in Florida. The living room also overlooked the swimming pool, which I had completely missed when I had first arrived. It was only a few steps out the sliding glass doors, and the water was crystal clear.

  I stood taking in the view when I noticed that over to the side of the room was a large telescope. It was on a swivel that would allow you to look at downtown or maybe even at South Beach as well as the stars. I knew I’d be playing with that tonight after I got back from dinner with the crazy guy.

  Dinner with the crazy guy. What was I thinking? What the hell was I doing? I couldn’t keep hanging out with this guy. First of all, he’s nuts. Second, he’s downright dangerous. I must have been be nuts, if I thought I could hang out with him and not get dead real soon. But then again, he had saved me from suicide and a life that had run its course. Oh, yeah, he was okay, practically a saint. Except for the threatening phone calls, the killing of my soon-to-be ex-wife and her lover, the dead woman in the old house and the staging of my own death—he was just fine. Oh, yeah, I’m totally screwed, I thought to myself. I needed some options.

  Bill picked me up at ten thirty just like he said he would. He was driving a really nice Mercedes. He drove us down to a place called Coka Cola Charlie’s. It was jam-packed with people. We pulled right up front and Bill jumped out, tossing the keys to the valet, while motioning me to follow him inside. He walked right past the line of people who were patiently waiting there. The bouncer at the door dropped the rope as we approached, and we walked right in.

  “Must have reservations?” I asked as Bill marched in like he owned the place.

  “Yeah, something like that,” Bill quipped as he strolled up to a table in the far corner where he sat down with his back to the wall.

  “Let me guess. You own this too, right?” I more stated rather than asked him as I took the seat next to him with the other wall to my back. When I looked up, he was looking at me with smirk on his face.

  “I knew you weren’t too dumb,” Bill commented as he waved for the waitress. “So, you hungry? Order whatever you want.”

  I reached out for a menu, and he stopped me with a growl. “Order anything you want. That means anything! Just tell her, and the kitchen will make it happen. Anything!” Bill was clearly showing off.

  I hesitated for a moment, and then I ordered a fillet with a baked potato and corn on the side. I also ordered two double Jim Beam’s with Coke. I hadn’t had any meds since yesterday, and my back was really starting to take exception to all the moving and bouncing around I’d done in the airboat. My legs were starting to jump on their own with the ever-so-pleasant feeling of electrical shocks running up my legs. Usually, alcohol at least slowed it down some. Bill ordered his usual.

  “You really own this place?” I asked, sounding like a rube, which I clearly was.

  “Yeah, I do. This one and the one next door and two on the next block,” Bill stated with pride. “I needed the tax write-offs.”

  “Some write-off. You mean it doesn’t make any money?” I asked stupidly.

  “It doesn’t if my accountant knows what’s good for him. None of them do.” Then he suddenly yelled toward the bar, “How long do I have to wait?!” and the waitress raced over with our drink order and quickly moved away.

  Once we were alone, he leaned toward me and said, “I really don’t like acting that way toward the help here. It’s just that the manager tends to make them think I’m a real jackass, so they treat me like a king. I usually give them a really good tip and a raise after I’ve been in. I don’t get here too often, but when I do, I get really good service.”

  “So…who are you really?” I asked.

  “I also own a boat dealership, a couple of car dealerships and a couple of carwashes.”

  “Why? It’s not like you need the money? Are they all tax write-offs?” I asked stupidly, but Bill just grinned and continued.

  “I get bored. Every couple of years, I gut these places and start over with a new theme. I also own a couple of golf courses and I don’t even play, but that doesn’t stop me from redesigning them every five years or so. I even design boats now and then just for fun.”

  “Yeah, okay, but who are you?” I pressed Bill for the low down. “I mean, you own condos, houses, businesses and have a couple of hundred billion in the bank. You don’t need this headache, so why the show? Just who the hell are you?” I asked rather loudly, which made Bill stop smiling and gi
ve me a hard look.

  “Do you really want to know who I am?” Bill asked, a very sinister look crossing his face as he spoke.

  “Yes, I do,” I quickly stammered before I really thought about it.

  “If I tell you, the information goes no further than right here, right now. It would mean the end of our friendship,” Bill stated coldly.

  “I can live with that,” I shot back, swiftly projecting an air of unearned confidence.

  “It is the only way, you will,” Bill stated matter-of-factly, and I finally understood that maybe I had gone too far. I realized I was trying too hard to be tough, and I just looked at him blankly.

  “Once I start, there can be no return to the old way of being just friends. You’ll be part of my inner circle which is quite small, and the only way out is by dying. We’ll be friends—close friends—for the rest of your life.”

  Bill tried his best to scare me off, but I didn’t flinch, so he continued. “I’m a top notch predator.”

  “What?” I asked, not sure what I had just heard.

  “I am a top notch predator,” he repeated. I just looked at him, like a deer in headlights. “In life, Jake, there are two kinds of people. There’s the prey. That would be the everyday people. The ones who work hard and die young, pay their taxes, sit home and watch TV. Then there are the predators. They go out and take what they want, amass fortunes, date supermodels and are the pillars of the community. They are the rich and the famous and the infamous! I’m more the infamous kind…” Bill stopped for a moment to let that sink into my pea brain.

  After a few moments and a quick swallow of my drink, I asked, “If you’re such a heavy hitter, why help me, or anyone else for that matter, who doesn’t give you more money or power?”

  “That is a good question, Jake. And I’ll tell you why, through my abridged life story.” Bill looked at me, and I nodded but didn’t say a word. “I wasn’t always a top notch predator,” Bill stated as if he were confessing a sin. “I was raised by my parents in North Miami. For my entire childhood, I thought my father was a developer, a businessman. You know, condos on the beach, condos on a golf course, condos by the shopping mall, condos, condos and more condos. We had a very good life with all the best that money could buy. I went to private schools and private summer camps for the wealthy.

  “When it came time to go to college, my father asked where I wanted to go, and he wrote the check. While I was off at school, my parents met with a tragic traffic accident in which they were killed. It seems a cement truck ran a red light and broadsided them, crushing them both. I was devastated, and if it hadn’t been for my father’s friend and attorney, I would fallen completely apart.”

  I interrupted at this point. “Didn’t you tell me this afternoon that your parents had been killed when a truck jackknifed?”

  Bill frowned and then sheepishly said, “I lied. I wasn’t sure I wanted to be that close of friends. But what I’m telling you now is the God’s awful truth, so help me!”

  “If you say so,” I quipped sarcastically at him.

  He looked annoyed but continued. “After the funeral, he went over my father’s estate with me, and I was once again overwhelmed. The estate was left to me, his only son, in its entirety—two hundred billion in cash and assets. There were condos, houses, businesses, cars, boats, golf courses here in Miami and other cities as well. The only asset that didn’t quite make sense was his last condo project. From it, I received five million in deferred profits, but he was listed as the sole investor. What happened to the other forty-five million that project’s paperwork promised? I tried to talk with my father’s attorney, but he stonewalled me and suggested that I go back to school, and the next summer we would sit down and talk again. So I went back to school feeling completely alone in the world and wondering what to do with myself. Attending college was certainly a waste of my time. I had more money than God.

  “At first, I went through the motions of attending class, but I quickly found I couldn’t let that last condo deal go. It wasn’t really the money, but the fact that my father had never gotten screwed in his business dealings. He was always a success.

  “That was when I started ditching class and doing research on my father and his so-called friends, including his attorney. The Miami Herald’s records went back to the nineteen sixties with stories about my father and his friends. They arrived in Miami right after the Cuban revolution, and they were the talk of the town. There were rumors that they were from old money in New Jersey or New York. They drank hard and played hard, while they built a development business that ranged from Jacksonville to Key West.

  “They were the playboys of their time, except my father. He met my mother who was the daughter of some rich senator from out west and married her to bring in daddy’s clout and bank roll. The business boomed. Everything he touched made millions. I remember when I was little, the senator would come to town, they would throw huge parties, and everyone who was anyone or wanted to be someone came and paid their respects.

  “While doing my research, I also found out the senator was drummed out of office for shady land deals in Las Vegas and retired to the Caribbean somewhere. My father and his friend, the attorney, were implicated in the same dealings, but the charges didn’t stick, so life went on. In fact, my father was accused over two dozen times of improprieties only to have the charges dropped. He never went to trial. There was talk in the papers about how most of the accusers either recanted their stories or disappeared before they could testify against him. It seemed my father was in the mob—the Miami mob.

  “During junior high school, I remember coming home early one day. My father was having a rather loud conversation with a Colombian gentleman in his den about ‘the merchandise’ not being where it was supposed to be. He told the guy he had twenty-four hours to fix the problem or else. I remember seeing the man wiping away the sweat from his face with a handkerchief and seeing his picture in the paper a week later. He had drowned in his own swimming pool. I double checked with the paper, and I was right. That’s when I realized that my father could have guys killed.

  “Of course, we all know what the merchandise was he was talking about.” Bill put his finger against his nose symbolizing snorting cocaine. “It had never crossed my mind that my dad could be a mobster and have people killed until that day. He was my dad, after all, and he treated me like I was his angel for Christ’s sake.

  “But all that research into my father’s life got me thinking that I didn’t know the real story about his death and I wanted to know.”

  “It couldn’t have actually been an accident?” I asked.

  “Accidents are what happen to the little people. The rich and powerful do not have accidents. A man as rich and powerful as my dad planned everything and had at least two cars full of bodyguards who would have had the street blocked off. No, it wasn’t an accident.” Bill gave me a sideways look as if I’d asked if I could take off my shoes and put my feet on the table. After a moment of Bill shaking his head over my naïve question, he continued. “I knew if the story were true about him being a mobster, I wouldn’t get a straight answer, being his son. Asking questions would just get me killed, as well. So, I decided to get tough.

  “I enrolled in survival training school in El Salvador, and I learned how to kill men with my bare hands. I learned about firearms and how to use them. I learned tactics and how to be stealthy. I studied for two years, and when I felt I was ready, I came back to Miami and found out the truth.

  “My first stop was the old family friend, the attorney. I told him I wanted to sell off some of the holdings, like the old house where I grew up and several of the marginal businesses. I fed him a story about how I wanted to go out west and ranch in Montana, maybe build a hotel or two on a big lake out there. He bought it hook, line and sinker. After he had made the sales, I confronted him about my father and mother. He tried to tell me that it was best if I didn’t ask too many questions. It was dangerous. So, I showed him how dang
erous I was. I beat the crap out of him and then tortured him, just a little, to get the answers I needed to have.

  “It seemed that shortly before my father and mother were killed, a Young Turk came to town from New Jersey. He was the son of the top Don up there—the one who was in charge of Miami for the boys in New York—and he was here to take over the operation. My father had been next in line according to the hierarchy of the family. Even though my dad was getting old (he was sixty three at the time of his death), he felt he shouldn’t have to turn over his spot to this young punk, whose daddy didn’t want the punk hanging around waiting for his own daddy to die, so he could become the top dog. It must have given the old Don the willies having junior watching his every move.

  “There had been a few shouting matches, and even though my father was right, the top man in Miami ordered him to give over the controls and his shares to this kid. My father refused, and he and my mother were dead within two days. This attorney acted as if this was an everyday occurrence, and that it was nothing to get too upset about. When I asked why I didn’t get his full share of the last condo deal, the attorney told me that it was decided to cut me out completely; but because they didn’t want any outside attorney looking into the deal, they decided I would still get a small cut but nothing more.

  “It took me two hours to get the name of this new boss and where I might find him out of the attorney. Then it took another two hours to drag out of him if the old boss had okay’d the hit on my dad. Of course he had. If he hadn’t, the new guy would have been killed as well. It’s the way of the mob. There are rules. I asked how much the old boss got of my father’s share, and he said twenty-five million. The new boss got fifteen million, I got five million, and the damn attorney got five million for faking the papers and for keeping me in the dark about it. He explained it was just business. If he hadn’t gone along, they would have killed him, too. He begged me not to kill him, and he offered me the five million, which he had in his wall safe, and I took it.