TWO SUDDEN!: A Pair of Cole Sudden C.I.A. Thrillers Page 3

  CHAPTER 5 – BLING

  No one was watching anyway, and it took Sudden less than a minute to break into Tucci’s ground-floor apartment. Once inside, he opened the tool box, put on the gloves and used the face cloth to wipe anything he’d touched on entering. He put the wedge in the door. Then he went to the kitchen. There was a Mister Coffee machine. Next to it was a tin canister of Newman’s Own French Roast. There were also three Entemann’s donuts in a box on the counter. Even psychopathic killers can have good taste, Sudden thought. He started brewing a pot of coffee.

  The apartment was a generic Florida condo, with about 1,000 square feet of living space. There was a kitchen with breakfast bar, open living room, two bedrooms, two baths and a small screened lanai that overlooked a pond. Two green lizards scampered off the glass sliders leading to the lanai when Sudden looked out. In addition to the pond, the rear of the unit faced a wooded area. The lanai was sparsely furnished, with only a small table and a lounger. He decided not to open the sliders and go out unless absolutely necessary, even though he doubted anyone would see him. There was no place to hide anything on a lanai.

  Sudden spent the next two hours searching the condo’s interior, starting with the bedrooms. As expected, it was a lucrative search. Mario Tucci and his ilk are prepared for the day when they have to pick up and leave at a moment’s notice. They always have a stash handy.

  In Mario’s case, the loot was secreted in a first-rate Hollon safe bolted to the floor in a bedroom closet. The safe, which probably weighed 300 pounds and had an electronic push-pad lock, would have defeated a run-of-the-mill burglar. But the lock quickly succumbed to one of the digital devices in Sudden’s tool box. Inside were stacks of cash, mostly in crisp $100 bills; a small bag of what looked like women’s estate jewelry, and what appeared to be some of Tucci’s own bling: watches, rings and neck chains.

  Sudden put the estate jewelry and the $100-dollar bills, just over $58,000, in the tool box. Undoubtedly stolen goods, none of it would be missed. He left the remainder of the cash, which was in smaller bills, and Tucci’s personal jewelry. The rest of the house search confirmed his belief about Tucci’s monograms but turned up nothing else he could take without arousing suspicion of a break in.

  Sudden put the tool box by the front door, leaving it open. Then he broke for lunch.

  There were some cold cuts in the refrigerator and he made two ham-and-provolone sandwiches on rye with Dijon mustard and ate them with three cups of coffee sitting at the breakfast bar. He had a donut, too. Then he cleaned up the dishes and coffee maker. The smell of coffee would dissipate by the time Tucci came home, although he probably wouldn’t even notice with a snoot-full of booze and beer.

  Sudden sat in the living room and took out his Kindle. He started reading the latest Alton Rhode thriller he’d downloaded the night before. Sudden was a big fan of the private detective series. He looked out the window whenever a car pulled up. None of them were Tucci’s.

  Until one of them was.

  ***

  It was just after 2 PM, and from the look of Tucci as he wobbled across the street from the carport, Sudden knew he had enjoyed a few more drinks than usual. Which probably meant he had scammed his golf buddies again. Sudden hoped he had at least bought a few rounds for them. He went over to the door and put the Kindle in the tool box, then soaked the face cloth with chloroform. Thanks to the wedge, Mario was having trouble opening the door. Sudden pulled out the wedge and Tucci stumbled in.

  Sudden came from behind the door and covered Tucci’s nose and mouth with the cloth. Using his other forearm, he locked the man’s neck in a vice. Sudden could only imagine what Tucci was thinking as the fumes began to work. Which murder had come home to roost?

  Tucci struggled briefly but the alcohol in his system helped move things along considerably. He was soon unconscious and Sudden lowered him to the floor, face down. He held him there for another moment to be sure.

  There was no sense in dragging it out, so Sudden got out the syringe and rolled Tucci over on his back. The hit man snored contentedly while he pulled off his shoes and socks, wincing at the odor. He quickly found a suitable spot between the toes on Tucci’s left foot.

  Sudden injected the potassium and waited. Tucci’s eyes snapped open. He gurgled, took a few deep, rasping breaths and was silent. After five minutes there was no pulse. The pupils of his eyes were fixed and dilated. Unlike his many victims, Tucci expired quickly and painlessly.

  After death, a body’s cells excrete potassium naturally and Sudden knew that the dose injected to stop Tucci’s heart would escape notice, as, hopefully, would the site of the injection. He put the shoes and socks back on and dragged the body over to a recliner facing a wall-mounted, 55-inch flat-screen TV. He lifted the body on to the chair and arranged it in a position of repose. He turned the TV to a sports channel. He had already located Mario’s liquor cabinet and now went to it and set the dead man up with a half-empty bottle of Johnny Walker Black, a glass and bucket of ice.

  Sudden poured a stiff drink for Tucci, and drank half of it himself. Being good at killing didn’t mean he liked it. He poured some of the rest of the scotch into Tucci’s mouth, the remainder on his chest and left the glass in his lap, grasped in his lifeless hand.

  Tucci’s age, a round of golf, lipid-filled lunch, steady drinking in the grill followed by more at home, the almost-empty donut box – all added up to a heart attack. From his research, Sudden knew that bad tickers ran in the Tucci family. It just might fly, especially if the Collier County medical examiner got the corpse before the Feds found out. The coroner was undoubtedly on autopilot in Naples, where the median age is dead. The population was swollen with geriatric refugees, many of whom were candidates for heart attacks and strokes. When Tucci’s safe was opened, the remaining cash and jewelry would hopefully argue against any thought of burglary.

  Sudden stepped back and looked at the tableau. Something still didn’t look right. He put the remote in Tucci’s other hand. Perfect.

  Sudden checked the house again for any signs he’d been there, gathered up his equipment and looked out the front window.

  All clear. On the way out, he again wiped down anything he thought he might have touched before he put on the gloves. Before he shut the door, he looked back.

  Mario “The Ice Pick” Tucci, stone killer of 31 men, women, children and family pets, was sightlessly staring at the scantily bikinied women in a professional beach volleyball match.

  CHAPTER 6 – ALLIGATOR ALLEY

  Sudden exited Stonebrook at a leisurely pace. No one in the gatehouse even glanced at him. He paused to let a small motorcycle club rumble by on the main road. None of the bikers were wearing helmets.

  “Organ donors,” he muttered.

  He’d been in town just over a week and the local news had stories about two bikers killed in separate accidents. In both cases they were cut off by an elderly driver suddenly changing lanes. Alligators get a bad rap in Florida, Sudden believed. If they killed half as many people as the “left turn signal” crowd, they’d all be turned into luggage.

  On the way back to his hotel, Sudden stopped off at a local high school he’d passed during his exploration of the area. The athletic department was delighted to accept the donation of his golf clubs for the school team. It was with some reluctance that he parted with the driver. He’d been crushing the ball and damn near broke 80 with it.

  Sudden had been staying at the Ritz Carlton in North Naples, which is part of the Tiburon golf resort. Tiburon is Spanish for “shark” and its two first-rate, if diabolical, golf courses were designed by the Shark himself, Greg Norman. During his stay Sudden managed to play both the Black and Gold courses and, typical of Norman creations, they had greens that rejected the slightest mishit. Sudden revered Norman, but after his fifth approach shot rolled off a green into a collection area he began fantasizing using a syringe on him.

  After checking out of the Ritz, he headed to Miami via I-75, or Alligator
Alley, as the 90-mile superhighway is universally known. He didn’t see one alligator. In fact, he didn’t see many animals, save for birds, and most of them were turkey vultures. He knew the Everglades teemed with wildlife. The media in Naples had been rife with stories about giant Burmese pythons wreaking havoc on native species, including alligators, and about Florida panthers, 18 of which had been killed along Alligator Alley by cars in the past year. Considering that there were only about 200 of the beautiful cats in the entire state of Florida, it was a worrisome statistic. Sudden kept his eyes peeled, but he didn’t see any panthers, either.

  He made Fort Lauderdale in an hour and 15 minutes and then got caught up in the suicidal traffic on I-95. It took him another hour to get to Miami. Once there, he checked into the InterContinental off Biscayne Boulevard downtown. The eight-day Miami Book Fair was just wrapping up over the weekend at the nearby campus of Miami-Dade College. He’d long wanted to attend the event, which draws an astounding 350,000 visitors each year to meet and greet some of the finest authors in the nation.

  He had even considered moving up the Naples assignment to Wednesday to give himself several days at the event but decided to give Tucci’s golfing partners an entire weekend to miss him. Of course, that didn’t preclude someone else finding the body, but it never hurts to go the extra yard.

  Sudden grabbed a quick lunch in the hotel and spent the rest of the afternoon sunning at the pool, sipping margaritas and answering emails. He checked various news feeds for any mention of Tucci. There were none. Either his death was still unnoticed and he was moldering away – which would further muddy the forensic waters – or it was being covered up. Sudden’s money was on the moldering. It didn’t matter to him, either way.

  He eventually went up to his room and, with grouper up to his eyeballs after more than a week in Naples, ordered a room service dinner of steak, creamed spinach and a baked potato, along with an interesting Greg Norman cabernet-shiraz.

  Then he slept.

  ***

  Sudden spent the next day at the book fair, which was a short walk from the InterContinental. He crammed as many seminars and author talks in as he could, stopping only to eat delicious Cuban food from vendors when hungry. He was able to score good seats at hilarious presentations given by Carl Hiaasen and Dave Barry, two Florida-based writers with a penchant for macabre humor, and at a history roundtable chaired by Doris Kearns Goodwin, the Pulitzer Prize-winning American presidential biographer.

  That night he took a cab to Coconut Grove and had an excellent veal blanquette with a split of Sancerre at a small French bistro. The famous Coconut Grove Playhouse was featuring Nunsense, a one-woman farce about a Mother superior from hell. Sudden found himself laughing along with everyone else at the silly jokes.

  The next morning he was back at the fair. Most of the top authors were now gone but Sudden managed to sit in on another roundtable, this one of first-time thriller writers. A table was set up showcasing their books, and he bought a few that looked interesting.

  On the way out of the campus, Sudden spotted a small booth where a man dressed to look like Mr. Spock on Star Trek was selling used science fiction novels. Sudden was not a big fan of the genre, but he did have some favorites: Heinlein, Scalzi, Bradbury. Business at the booth was virtually nonexistent and the guy looked happy to see him.

  “You a sci-fi fan?”

  “Somewhat,” Sudden replied, as he started looking at the books.

  “Got a great Bradbury omnibus,” the man said, pulling a dog-eared tome from a box behind the booth. “All his best short-stories. I’m closing up. Will let you have it for ten bucks.”

  It was a big book and Sudden didn’t know how he was going to fit the books he’d already purchased in his travel bags, which were packed and waiting for him at the concierge stand at the InterContinental. But what the hell? It was Spock, after all.

  “Deal.”

  “Live long and prosper,” the man said, and gave Sudden the split-finger hand signal.

  Sudden always had trouble with the Vulcan sign, so he merely nodded.

  He caught a late Sunday afternoon commercial flight out of Miami International. Three hours later, he landed at LaGuardia and took a cab into Manhattan. He’d booked a room at his club, the Union League, because he’d scheduled an early meeting with his agent for Monday.

  One of Sudden’s own novels, written under the pen name of Cole Swift, had apparently generated some interest.

  CHAPTER 7 – REFUGE

  Sudden woke early the next morning with a headache born of residual tension, travel and hunger. He’d gotten to the Union League too late for a proper meal and made do with a pre-wrapped ham-and-cheese sandwich and a bottle of beer from a local 24-hour deli. Now, his breakfast meeting was two hours away, at 8 A.M.

  There was a brochure on the night table next to his bed entitled, An Informal History of the Union League Club. It looked new, and was probably designed as marketing material for prospective members. He recognized the author, John Gibbons, the club secretary. Sudden knew that the Union League’s membership had declined in recent years, along with that of other “exclusive” clubs. He liked clubs, social and golf, and joined as many as would have him. A surprising number of them did, although they obviously did not know his real occupation. In addition to satisfying his natural predilection for coddling, their reciprocity privileges with other clubs often provided comfortable refuge and athletic opportunities in cities across the globe.

  Sudden started to read.

  “The Union League Club was founded in 1863, during the darkest hours of the Civil War for the North, by prominent New Yorkers who wanted ‘to cultivate and strengthen a devotion to the Union.’ Considering that the news from the front was almost universally bleak – bloodbaths in the Peninsular Campaign, at the second Bull Run, Fredericksburg and Antietam had spread gloom and despair throughout New York – and the city itself was on the verge of anti-war draft riots that would kill 1,000 people, the club’s founders showed a fidelity and determination that was not lost on Abraham Lincoln, who gratefully accepted an honorary membership. (Courage and patriotism notwithstanding, the founders insisted that the club should provide good food, a library, an art collection and, of course, a first-rate wine cellar.)”

  Sudden smiled. That last was pure Gibbons, a small, dapper, bow-tie man with a handlebar moustache and large appetites.

  “The club was domiciled in several small buildings for more than almost 70 years, including a mansion owned by the Jerome family, which produced a daughter, Jenny, who eventually became the mother of Winston Churchill. It only found a permanent home in 1932 on Park Avenue in a 12-story Georgian brownstone built on land formerly owned by J.P. Morgan, who was an early member.

  The Union League Club immediately began a campaign of support for Lincoln and the Union cause. Efforts by politically powerful members were crucial in overcoming strong antiwar sentiment in New York City, where many new immigrants were virtually drafted off their boats and sent into the meat grinder that was called the Army of the Potomac. As it was, Lincoln barely carried New York in the presidential election of 1864, despite the turning-point Union victories at Gettysburg and Vicksburg the previous summer.

  Union League Club fundraisers were notable for their day. In two years, after the President restored the Thanksgiving holiday, the club sent 600,000 turkeys “and all the trimmings” to soldiers at the front.”

  That’s a hell of a lot of turkeys, Sudden marveled.

  “But members did more than open their purses. They opened their hearts and their gun cabinets, taking in and protecting the Negroes who were the main targets of the draft riots. By war’s end, the Club had raised a regiment of Negro soldiers, who fought with distinction, as did 6,000 white soldiers recruited by the club. Indeed, the club’s staunch support of the rights of the Negro often put it at odds with other, less open-minded, supporters of the Union. (When the city government, out of spite, refused to allow blacks to participate in the fun
eral procession for Abraham Lincoln, the Union League Club provided a venue for a separate ceremony.) The Union League Club’s efforts on behalf of Negroes did not end at Appomattox. It became club tradition to employ African Americans when that was not the norm and, to this day, many club employees are descendants of those early workers.

  The years following the end of the Civil War saw a steady stream of dinners and events honoring Union heroes, including Grant and Sherman, and the club’s reputation and influence grew. Sixteen presidents, scores of Senators and Congressmen, diplomats, cabinet members and the chief executives of many of the nation’s major corporations have been members of the club over the years. The Union League Club continued to wield considerable political clout. It’s “Political Reform Club” was instrumental in ending the influence of the “Boss” Tweed cabal.

  But the club was perhaps best known for its cultural, civic and historical contributions to New York City. It played an important roll in establishing the American Red Cross and the New York City Fire Department, and helped erect the Statue of Liberty. Without the support of the Union League Club, there would be no Metropolitan Museum of Art.

  The club building itself, with its Georgian motif that reflects similar Park Avenue mansions, has been designated as a historical landmark. Its most famous feature is its entrance foyer, with a grand double staircase. The building’s massive walls provide almost perfect insulation from street noise, a feature much appreciated by members and guests who stay in one of the club’s 50 private rooms and suites.”

  The soundproofing thankfully worked both ways, Sudden knew from experience, having entertained at least one vocally orgasmic lady one weekend. He’d seen people tortured who made less noise.

  “The club’s facilities include a distinguished art collection, a grand ballroom, a members’ bar and billiard room (which contains one of the few regulation snooker tables in the United States), several dining rooms, squash courts, a fitness center, a barber shop, a state-of-the-art computer center, a now-famous wine cellar and perhaps the finest club reference and lending library in the city. Its reading and smoking rooms provide a serene respite from the busy bustle of Manhattan.”