The Bishop's Pawn (Cotton Malone #13)(37)
I knelt and sent a bullet from Oliver’s gun their way.
It thudded into the sand at the end of the trail just as the two men crested a small dune and disappeared from sight. I ran ahead since the path was clear and found the dune. The sand beyond was thick and soft, slowing their forward progress. Fifty yards past them, where the waves crested at the shoreline, an inflatable boat waited. Daylight was waning, but enough light remained to see everything clearly. This part of the island seemed the realm of the wealthy. More private. Less crowded. No one was on the beach. I dropped to the sand, using the dune for protection, and fired again, intentionally sending the bullet to the right of both men.
“The next shot will be into one of you,” I called out, telling them there was nowhere to go.
They stopped.
“Leave the case.”
Coleen came up and lay belly-first beside me. I kept the gun trained. One of the men held a pistol. He moved to raise the weapon and I fired another round at his feet.
“Drop the gun.”
He did.
I’d already noticed a large boat about two hundred yards offshore, similar to the one Valdez had been using. But there was no way he could be here. His boat was back in the Keys. My guess was that these guys worked for him and had been previously dispatched to keep an eye on Oliver.
“Leave the case and go,” I said again.
They hesitated so I stood and aimed the gun.
“I can shoot you both. Right now. Doesn’t really matter to me.”
They turned and headed for the inflatable, trudging through more soft sand. Coleen and I headed for the case. She opened the container and made sure the files were still there.
“Tell Valdez to go back to Cuba,” I called out. “This is over for him.”
Coleen stood beside me and we watched as they pushed the inflatable into the surf and left.
“You handled that like a pro,” she said with a grin. “Aren’t you full of surprises.”
We fled the beach and headed back down the public trail to the street. It seemed quiet at the far end of the block where Oliver’s house stood. Probably because they were all still unconscious. Palm Beach proper was left, toward the south, a few miles away, past some of the most expensive real estate in the world. To our right, only a few hundred yards away lay the northern tip of the island. I decided the shorter route was the smart play, so we walked until the road ended. Across a narrow saltwater channel I saw more land populated with more lavish condominiums. No bridge made a connection from here to there. A small park stretched to our left, which came with a boat ramp. I knew Coleen wanted to read what was in the case as much as I did. And since there was no way to exclude her, I gestured toward one of the picnic tables. Daylight kept fading, now only a rim of orange on the western horizon, a lurid glow that highlighted the ever-graying darkness of the clouds scurrying low overhead.
We sat.
And read.
Chapter Twenty-three
July 16, 1967
Federal Bureau of Investigation
Internal Security-C
For CIP Supervisor Only
Contact has been established in Montreal with an individual who shows promise. He identified himself to our point of contact operative as ERIC S. GALT. Fingerprints revealed that name to be an alias for an individual who was in the eighth year of a 20-year sentence at Missouri State Penitentiary for armed robbery when he escaped on April 23, 1967. Currently GALT is an active fugitive in Montreal seeking a passport and passage to South Africa or South America. He spends a large amount of time at the local docks trying to secure work on an international freighter. GALT may have possibly robbed a local brothel a few days ago. We would like to proceed with further vetting. Depending on your decision relative to that request, we can alert the local authorities of his presence for capture.
July 19, 1967
Federal Bureau of Investigation
Internal Security-C
For CIP Supervisor Only
In reply to your specific inquiries, GALT is forty-one years old, slender, fair-skinned, clean-shaven, with black hair flecked with gray at the sideburns, worn oiled and straight back. Psychiatric records have been obtained from the Missouri prison system. They note he is not mentally ill, but is a “complicated individual.” He possesses a sociopathic personality and is severely neurotic. Perhaps even a pathological liar. IQ noted at 106. He suffers from undue anxiety and has clear obsessive-compulsive concerns about his personal health, bordering on a hypochondriac. He’s noted as introverted, distracted, and rarely returns a gaze. He’s a career criminal with multiple convictions of burglary and armed robbery, having served 13 years in four different prisons. Our point of contact operative notes he rarely tips servers, never laughs, and is overly paranoid about police (understandable, given he is a fugitive). Records indicate he was born in Alton, Illinois, raised Catholic, growing up in Ewing, Missouri, during the Depression. His current main motivations are money. He is not a member of any radical group, but admires the Nazis and would prefer an America free of Negroes and Jews. His personal motto is “never let the left hand know what the right is doing.”
I glanced up from reading.
Both reports were signed by James Jansen, SAIC.
Special agent in charge.
All of the documents inside the three file folders within the waterproof case were photographs. Not photocopies. Actual pictures of documents.