Dragon Moon Read online

  Studying the number, I shake my head. The last thing I want to hear right now is any bad news from the office. Not that Rita ever said there was a problem. She only said she wanted to discuss something with me. But chances are, I’m sure, I won’t like what she says.

  Somewhere below, Henri giggles. I smile at the sound and decide Rita’s problem can wait until after the boy’s asleep. For now, I’d far rather go see what new mischief my son’s invented.

  4

  “Mr. DelaSangre!” Rita breathes into her phone. “I’m so glad you called.”

  “I hope it isn’t too late. I was sort of busy with Henri. He put up a major resistance to going to bed tonight and this is my first chance to call.”

  “No. It’s not too late at all. I only got in a few minutes ago. Anyway, I never go to sleep before twelve. I was hoping to hear from you.”

  The woman confuses me. At the office her tone had alternated between warm and business brisk. Now she couldn’t be warmer than if I were a new beau calling to make a date.

  “You said there was something you heard that I should know?” I say, keeping my own voice businesslike.

  “I didn’t hear it; I read it. Please don’t think I’m a snoop. I’m not. It’s just that one of my jobs is to do the mail and when any legal papers pass by my desk I like to look at them,” she says. “I’m going to Nova Law at night and I think it’s good to see how they do it in the real world. I have to tell you, Mr. Tindall may not be the nicest man to work for, but his legal work is great to learn from. ...”

  “And you read what?” I say.

  “This isn’t going to hurt my job is it? I won’t be through with Nova for a while yet and I like working at LaMar.”

  Rita speaks with just the right amount of earnest innocence. I smile at her ability to do so. Ian better watch out for this one, I think. Me too. “Somehow I don’t think you’d be telling me anything you thought would put your job in jeopardy,” I say.

  She pauses for a moment, laughs. “No, I guess not.”

  “Would you also be expecting me to do something for you?”

  Rita laughs again. “That would be up to you, Mr. DelaSangre. But I don’t think ambition is a bad thing. Do you?”

  Not as long as it serves my interests, I think, then say, “Why don’t you tell me what you saw?”

  “Well I didn’t know that they could, because of it being in Biscayne National Park, like your island is, but did you know Wayward Key was privately held?”

  “Yes,” I say, thinking of the island just a hundred yards or so to my north. “The original owner bought it to keep it as a bird sanctuary.”

  “Which was the intent of his children and their children. But the current owner, Paul Deering, died a few months ago and, with no children of his own and no living siblings, the island goes to his only niece. She doesn’t seem to care much about our feathered friends.”

  “And?”

  “Somehow Mr. Tindall got wind of this. He and some friends have put a bid on the island.”

  “A lot of good that will do them. The park service doesn’t want any development on any of the islands. They’ve been pestering me to sell to them for years. ...”

  “I thought so too. But Mr. Tindall received a letter from the director of the park service. He thanked him for being so innovative as to propose building Florida’s first ecologically sensitive resort — all natural flora, vacation huts that blend in with the landscape, complete with solar and wind power, even eco-tours of the surrounding waters. He said that a project like that could possibly presage a new era of business and government working together to improve the environment. A few days later, I happened to be in Mr. Tindall’s office when he had stepped out and there were some plans on his desk showing a resort — asort of Ralph Nader meets Walt Disney vacation experience.

  “Anyway,” Rita continues, “the talk around the office is that you’re pretty insistent on maintaining your privacy. I thought you might not like this at all.”

  “You thought right,” I say. “So do you know how much Tindall paid for the park service director’s support?”

  “No, but I bet it was a lot.”

  The thought of vacationers staying at a resort on an island only a hundred yards from my island makes me shudder. “Has the deal gone through yet?” I say.

  “I’m not sure.... I did see a letter from the Deering girl’s attorney objecting to some of the terms of the first offer.”

  “Is Gomez involved?”

  Rita laughs again. “You can’t even get Mr. Gomez to order lunch with Mr. Tindall. No, he isn’t involved.”

  “You didn’t by any chance make any copies of all this paperwork you saw?”

  “Mr. DelaSangre, that would be wrong!” she banters. “Of course, there might be some papers somewhere around here that I can get my hands on.”

  I smile. “You know, Rita, we just might have a place for you after you finish law school.”

  “You sure know how to talk to a girl, Mr. DelaSangre.”

  “Call me Peter,” I say. “Listen, Rita, it would be great if a folder holding all those copies was placed on Arturo’s desk first thing tomorrow morning. Leave him a note telling him I’ll be calling to discuss it.”

  “Mr. Tindall will be furious.”

  “He may be.” I grin at the thought of Tindall red faced and sputtering. I’ve long wanted someone else in office to use to help counter Tindall’s machinations. The girl surely has her own agenda, but she could be the one. “But if things work out the way I hope they can,” I say, “I don’t think he’ll be able to be sure who, if anyone, screwed his deal up.”

  “I hope so,” Rita says.

  “And Rita ... thanks for the heads up. I’d like to be able to count on you to watch things in the future for me. Let me know about anything else out of the ordinary that you come across.”

  “Sure, Mr. DelaSangre. ... I mean, Peter. Sure.”

  I try to sleep, tossing and turning for hours, thinking about Rita, Ian Tindall, DOCTOR’S RX and Chloe. When I finally drowse off, I dream over and over of finding my future bride flying above the irregular terrain of Jamaica’s Cockpit Country and chasing her from valley to valley, skimming the ground, zooming high into the air, never quite catching her, never being able to make her slow, the girl ignoring all my pleas.

  The frustrations the dreams bring build to such a level that I wake shaking with anger an hour before dawn. Glad to be done with my sleep and the disturbance it has brought, I get out of bed.

  No matter how Chloe first receives me, I doubt she’ll ever ignore me like that. Still, I have to do something to take my mind off the dreams and their troubling images and the other problems that now plague me — Tindall and his Wayward Key deal and the dolt who almost rammed me with his speedboat.

  Since I won’t be able to call Gomez for hours, I decide to at least do something about Chloe. If I really plan to be in Jamaica in two months, there’s much that I need to get done. I throw on some clothes and descend the wooden staircase that spirals up the center of the house from the storage rooms and holding cells on the bottom floor to the great room on the top.

  As I learned from my first wedding, my people’s tradition requires both a proper present for my future bride, as well as a substantial gift for her parents. The choice of the correct gift for Chloe’s parents, Charles and Samantha Blood, and where to find it causes me little concern. The answers to both questions reside beneath my house. But Chloe’s present is another matter.

  I wonder if she still wears Elizabeth’s emerald-and-gold, four-leaf-clover necklace that I sent to her after my bride’s death. If I know Chloe at all, I think, the girl not only wears it, but values it all the more as a reminder of her dead sibling.

  Switching on the lights as soon as I reach the bottom step, I rush past the first few cells. Even with their iron-barred doors open, they remind me too much of their former occupants, the woman and the man who betrayed my trust. I still can’t think of Jorge San
tos without damning his memory.

  I enter the last cell, the smallest, and pull up on the foot end of the cot. It resists only a moment before it begins to lift, the counterweights below taking hold, making my task simple, the cot and the floor beneath it rising, exposing a dark passageway into the bowels of the house.

  Stepping down into the dark, I reach up, grab the line under the cot and bring it crashing down over me, leaving me in total blackness. When I was a child, I loved it when Father brought me here. He would insist that I lead him down the narrow stone stairs into the equally dark, small chamber below. “Our kind relies too much at night on the stars and the moon. There will be times in your life when that light’s not available,” he said. “It’s best you learn now how to make your way in total darkness now.”

  He would follow me as I found my way through the stone-walled chamber to the corridor beyond it. Offering no guidance, he’d wait until I made my way to the massive wood door that opened to the outside, behind the bushes near the dock. Only after I made my way out and stood blinking in the sudden glare of the day, would he join me and nod his approval. But he’d also always say, “Remember, Peter, this passageway is our secret. Never tell anyone about it except your wife and children.”

  Then, as a reward, he would take me inside, light a torch and lead me back to the chamber. There he would open an ancient iron door and lead me into his treasure room.

  Having installed lights years ago, I’ve no need for any torches. I find the wall switch in the chamber, flick on the overhead lights and wince at the sudden brightness. The ancient steel-plated door to the family’s treasure room is only a few feet in front of me. I turn around and look across the chamber at the other steel-plated door, no more than six paces from me.

  Rusted, centuries’ old padlocks secure equally aged and rusted chains crisscrossing the door. Before he died, Father made sure I knew where the ancient key to those locks was kept, showing me a secret panel behind the third stone to the right of the top of the door. But he never opened the door for me, never suggested I see what he kept inside the room.

  “Open this door only if you have no other hope,” he said. “There is a chest inside that room that my father gave me, as his father gave it to him — from father to son as far back as anyone can remember. I’m told it holds a relic from a great war that was waged between our people ages before mankind gained its supremacy. I’ve never had any cause to open the chest, nor did my father, nor his. I’ve no idea what device it holds. I only know what my father told me — there is great power inside the chest and greater risk.”

  As always I’m tempted to ignore Father’s warnings and see for myself just what has been lurking beneath my house for my entire life. But I know I won’t. Just as my father followed his father’s wishes, I will follow mine. Besides, seeing the rust coating the padlocks, I doubt if Father’s ancient key could even open the locks now.

  I turn my attention to the treasure room. I long ago discarded the antique locks Father used to secure the chains on this door, preferring the convenience of modern, stainless-steel combination padlocks. Undoing the combination locks, I pull the chains clear and swing the door open.

  Stacks of gold and silver bars, piles of twenty-dollar bills, watches and jewelry, chests full of gold and silver coin clutter the room. I can’t help but smile at the huge accumulation of wealth sitting in this one small room.

  Of course my family’s true wealth is invested on the mainland and worth hundreds of times more than the baubles before me. But like my father, I like the smell and feel of money, the cold weight of gold and silver, the glint of diamonds and rubies. Like Father did, I bring home the possessions of my prey and add them to the treasures in the room.

  I frown as I count out enough gold coins to equal what I estimate would be three times Chloe’s weight. Charles and Samantha Blood had been furious when I came to wed Elizabeth without bringing the requisite gift for her parents. I’d made amends by promising and sending them twice Elizabeth’s weight in gold. This time I don’t want to risk any chance of their displeasure. Still, it pains me to give them so much.

  Certainly I’m not the first being to wish for more pleasant in-laws. But when I think of how unpleasant they’d been, I wish there were a way to pursue Chloe without dealing with them or rewarding them with any of my possessions.

  For Chloe, however, I’d part with all the contents of this chamber. I search the room, sift through the jewelry, hoping to find something that would thrill my future bride. I look for anything in the treasure room that might be equal to or compliment the simple emerald-and-gold, four-leaf-clover necklace that I first gave Elizabeth. But each piece I look at is too massive or too gaudy or too plain or too ugly. Finally, I stop searching and sigh. Chloe’s gift will have to be found on the mainland.

  I call the office later in the morning. Rita, of course, answers.

  “Mr. DelaSangre,” she says. “How are you this morning?”

  “Tired and cranky,” I say, not mentioning that I’m also irritated that I have to waste time over some human’s machinations this morning. “Listen, Rita, does Arturo have the copies we discussed last night?”

  “Of course, Mr. DelaSangre,” she says, her voice turning coy. “I always do as I’m instructed.”

  I have to grin. If I were in the mood to be seduced by a human, she certainly would be one of my choices, but I’ve other concerns right now. “Sure you do,” I say. “Please put me in to Arturo now — and Rita?”

  “Yes, sir?”

  “I told you, you can call me Peter.”

  “I don’t know if I should here,” she says.

  “You should.”

  “But you do own everything around me. ... You’re Mr. Tindall’s and Mr. Gomez’s boss.”

  “So?”

  “Well, they might not like it. They certainly don’t want me to call them by their first names.”

  “Then don’t call them by their first names. Anyway, I need to ask a favor of you after I finish with Arturo.”

  “Whatever you say, Peter.”

  “Goddamned Tindalls!” Arturo says as soon as he picks up the phone. “Can’t they ever just go along for a year or two without trying something?”

  “Guess not,” I say. “Tell me what you think.”

  “You don’t want to know what I think.”

  I know what he’s going to say. I’ve heard it before. “Sure,” I say. “Go ahead, tell me.”

  “The guy’s not worth it. Let’s cut our losses. I can arrange for him to go away, permanently. We could hire another attorney.”

  “Arturo, the man’s useful to me. So far he hasn’t done anything that would make me terminate him. If you want to be fair about it, the Wayward Key deal isn’t any violation of his responsibilities to LaMar or of my trust.”

  “He has to know how you’d feel,” the Latin says. “Technically he may not have betrayed you but any way I look at it, what he’s trying to do is a massive disservice to you.”

  Nodding, even though the man can’t see me, just as I’m sure Arturo is gesturing with his free hand, I say, “I agree with you. I’m sure Ian is taking pleasure in thumbing his nose at me. But I think we found out in time. We should be able to stop them.”

  Arturo says nothing.

  “What?” I say.

  “I made some calls before you phoned in. The sale may be a done deal.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Not completely. You know I couldn’t approach anyone on Tindall’s side of the deal. So I arranged for a broker to call the Deering side, feeling them out, if they would amenable to an offer. They didn’t show much interest in hearing one.”

  “Damn!” I say. Even though I know, in the worst case, I can force Ian to stop, I prefer thwarting his plans without his knowing of my involvement. Ian is more helpful when he isn’t sulking. Besides, there’s no assurance that the other principals in the deal won’t go on without him.

  “Give me until next week. I’ll see wha
t I can work out,” Arturo says.

  I grunt assent, then say, “We wouldn’t have known about this without Rita’s help. I want you to review her salary, give her a good raise.”

  “It might raise eyebrows. Tindall will certainly find out.”

  “Let him. The girl’s ambitious. She’s going to law school. We might want to put her to work with him after she graduates.”

  Arturo chuckles. “Oh, he’d love that.”

  “He’d adjust.”

  “Hey, it’s fine with me. We can move her there sooner if you want.”

  I mull it over. Do I want Rita working as one of Tindall’s legal assistants just yet? “No,” I say, thinking of her ability to screen all calls, review all of the office’s mail. “I like her just where she is right now.”

  “Sure,” Arturo says.

  “I need you to do something else for me, Arturo,” I say, telling him about DOCTOR’S RX, letting him know what I want.

  5

  The red Corvette and the silver Mercedes coupe remain parked near the valet stand at Monty’s just where they were left four years ago. I study their glistening paint jobs and nod. It’s a measure of Arturo’s attention to detail that, after all the years of my neglect, my two cars still look like new.

  “I want to ride in this one,” Henri says, pointing to the Corvette.

  Sometimes Henri’s similarities to his mother amaze me. I grin at his instinctive choice of Elizabeth’s car. Like she did, he gravitates to things that look fast. I put my hand on his shoulder, say, “Of course ... but when it’s just the two of us. Rita’s coming with us today. She’s meeting us here.”

  The boy looks toward the Monroe building. “But isn’t she up there?”

  “Not today.” I say, checking my watch. “I told her to meet us here at ten-thirty.” Lifting Henri, I put him on the Corvette’s hood, so he can sit with his legs dangling. “We still have at least fifteen minutes before she’s due to arrive.” I lean back on the hood next to him.