Last Run Read online

  ‘You’re really not bad.’

  ‘I’m nothing.’ Cathy felt a thrill. ‘I mean, I don’t really compete.’

  ‘Maybe you should,’ Flanagan said. ‘With some work, a little harnessing, you could be pretty good.’

  The huskiness was almost like a smoker’s, though Cathy could scarcely imagine a dedicated athlete like Flanagan, her body every bit as hard and lean close up as from a distance, putting crap of any kind into her lungs.

  ‘You run,’ Flanagan went on, ‘like you’re trying to escape.’ She saw wariness spring into the younger woman’s eyes. ‘Which is cool, so long as you’re in charge.’

  ‘I guess,’ Cathy said.

  ‘Not my business,’ Flanagan said.

  ‘No.’ Cathy felt flustered again. ‘I mean, I don’t mind. Not coming from you.’

  ‘I’m no expert, mind.’

  ‘You’re the best.’ Cathy heard the awe in her own voice, couldn’t help it.

  Kez Flanagan shrugged. ‘Big fish, small pond.’

  ‘You got us gold at Sarasota.’

  ‘Because Jackson busted her ankle and Valdez screwed up.’

  ‘What about the silver at Tampa?’

  Flanagan smiled. ‘Tampa was special.’

  ‘You’re special,’ Cathy said.

  ‘I guess I have my moments.’ Flanagan paused. ‘What I meant, before, about the way you run—’

  Cathy waited.

  ‘Sure you don’t mind me talking about it?’ Flanagan checked.

  ‘No way,’ Cathy said. ‘I need all the help I can get.’

  They left the track, walked together away from the athletic building along one of the palm-shaded pathways, heading for the parking lot. Two tracksuited athletes – red-haired Flanagan an inch-and-a-half taller; Cathy, blonde hair tied back and a slighter build – both walking easily and unconsciously in matching rhythmic strides.

  ‘I’m no coach,’ Flanagan said in her matter-of-fact manner. ‘But I do know that being in charge of yourself matters. Running away may feel great, but when you’re racing it’s where you’re headed that counts.’

  ‘The finish.’

  ‘And how you get there,’ Kez Flanagan said. ‘Taking care of your body on the way. Not hurting yourself.’

  ‘OK,’ Cathy said.

  ‘You could use someone,’ Flanagan said.

  ‘We have Delaney,’ Cathy said.

  Mike Delaney was the Trent track coach, an all-round nice guy, but not reckoned by some of the students as the man to take the Tornadoes any place higher than two-thirds up the team rankings.

  ‘Delaney’s OK,’ Flanagan said. ‘And he’s been good to me.’

  ‘He calls you his star,’ Cathy said.

  ‘I’ve heard him call me other things.’ Flanagan shrugged again. ‘And he’s been right.’ They were close to the lot now, less than half filled by vehicles belonging to summer students and teaching staff. ‘If you’re interested,’ she said casually, ‘we could run together sometime.’

  More than interested.

  ‘I’d like that,’ Cathy said.

  Chapter Three

  ‘We got a two-year unsolved homicide on Pompano Beach,’ Martinez said, midway through Thursday afternoon. ‘Could be something, maybe.’

  ‘Actually on the beach?’ Sam checked.

  ‘Uh-huh.’ Martinez sat on the outside edge of Sam’s paper-jammed desk in his corner of the big open-plan Violent Crimes office and looked at his notes. ‘Victim Carmelita Sanchez, bludgeoned with a blunt instrument, probably a baseball bat, then facially disfigured.’ His face puckered with disgust. ‘Bastard sliced off her lips.’

  Sam took a second or two to force himself to mentally confront that image, then tried to file it in one of the mental cabinets in the back of his brain; he turned his gaze briefly to one of the Florida Grand Opera posters on his section of wall, then went back to business.

  ‘Muller’s throat was cut,’ Sam said. ‘Ugly, but not weird like this.’

  ‘Still in two stages, the bat first,’ Martinez said. ‘Something else too. Same kind of screaming reported by residents.’ He looked down at a sheet of paper in his hand. ‘ “Crazed”, one guy said.’ He looked back down at Sam. ‘ “Like an animal”.’

  ‘Close enough to go talk to Broward.’ Sam was already on his feet.

  Chapter Four

  August 12

  In his dream, Gregory Hoffman saw it all again. Blurred around the edges by his semi-sleeping brain’s unwillingness to process too accurately, too realistically.

  The terror, though, was undiminished.

  The thing looming out of the night, or maybe not really looming, too fast for that, more like a whirlwind, but solid; a figure, a person, he guessed, except it was too dark and too fast to get a real look at, but the thing was flying at the other guy and one minute he was running, the next he was down on the sand.

  But in the middle of that, in the middle of the guy getting knocked down, there were the sounds, terrible, sickening sounds, and Greg knew, even in the depths of his dream, that they were the sounds of small bones being crunched in the man’s face, and of his cry, cut off real fast too, because he couldn’t make any more noise, and anyway, the ocean got louder after that, the roar of the surf drowning it out, and that was good, that was better.

  Except then the damned moon came out from behind the clouds and that was when he saw the knife blade glinting wet-red-black, and that wasn’t so bad, he could take that more than the sounds of pulverized bones. Except that wasn’t all he saw, was it? He wished it was, wished it with every fibre, every goddamned molecule of his body and soul.

  He saw the face.

  The killer’s face. Except it wasn’t really a face, at least not one you could recognize or describe, because, like the knife blade, it was wet-red-black, shining in the moonlight, and Greg thought it looked like it was made of blood, so much blood that he had to squeeze his eyes shut to try and block it out.

  That was when he heard the other, final sound, louder than the ocean.

  The screaming. Awful, hideous, crazy, nutso screaming that made his own blood, still safely shut in his veins under his skin, thank Christ, run cold enough to freeze.

  And he woke.

  At two o’clock on Friday morning, in his nice safe bedroom in his nice safe house in North Bay Road in Sunny Isles Beach, Gregory Hoffman woke from his dream, sweating and crying out and shaking and more afraid, more terrified, than he had ever been in his whole fourteen-year-old life.

  But this wasn’t like most nightmares, where things looked better after you were awake, after you got over it. This one was worse, much, much worse, because he knew why he’d dreamed it, knew exactly why he was so frightened.

  Because he had seen the killer with the blood-soaked head.

  Because if he had seen the killer, then the killer had seen him.

  And because he couldn’t tell anyone, not his mom or dad or the cops, because of what he’d been doing before it had happened. Because if he told them that then they’d send him back to rehab again, and Greg knew he couldn’t stand that; he remembered it too clearly and it had been too bad, much too bad, and he couldn’t bear it, and so he didn’t know what to do.

  Except go on dreaming it again, over and over. Go on waiting for the killer to come for him.

  Three in the morning.

  Quiet time in Surfside. Nice, peaceful community, predominantly young professional families and retirees. Sleeping now, most of them. Visitors, too, nearing the close of their summer vacations, getting set to take their kids home.

  Not a whole lot of traffic on Collins.

  One car, already slow, braked to a crawl near 88th Street. Driver taking a look down the side street, towards the beach. Scene of the Muller killing. Thinking about making a right. Seeing another car, in the side road, lights switched off, a woman in the driver’s seat, a street lamp illuminating her face. Young, pretty, possibly Hispanic.

  Waiting for someone, maybe. Or wa
tching.

  Cop, perhaps, the first driver thought.

  And drove on more quickly, heading north.

  At a little past noon, Kez Flanagan was in the main cafeteria at Trent with a couple of fellow Tornadoes – like her, using the facilities during the summer.

  Her eyes were on Cathy Robbins Becket, in line at the counter, buying a salad. Cathy turned slightly, saw her and smiled. Kez lifted her right hand with its blunt, decorated nails, and smiled back.

  ‘You know her?’ Jackie Lomax asked.

  Kez nodded.

  ‘Know about her past?’ Jackie asked.

  ‘Sure,’ Kez said.

  ‘Poor kid,’ Jackie said.

  ‘Bit of a weirdo,’ Nita North remarked.

  ‘Nothing weird about Cathy,’ Kez said sharply.

  She looked back at the line and saw that the younger woman had gone, and felt something that surprised her.

  Empty.

  While Judy had still been with them, even during her illness, they had all, when able, come on Friday evenings to the Becket home on Golden Beach, to the old house, comfortable as old slippers and always welcoming.

  They came, these days, to Grace and Sam’s place, sat at the hand-carved kitchen table, gleaming copper pots and pans steaming on the stove. They all – women and men – took it in turns to light the Sabbath candles and say the blessings over bread and wine, and sometimes it was no more than two or three at the table, with Sam working a case or perhaps Saul or Cathy otherwise occupied. But this Friday, with the first few rounds of intense activity in the Muller investigation having hit dead ends, and with Sam feeling especially needy of Grace’s wonderful, essentially Italian cooking, and of his family in general, they were, as it happened, all present and correct.

  An extra place laid for Terri, Saul’s girlfriend. Saul’s love. Teresa Suarez. Petite, very pretty, and tough. Terri to her friends. Teté – her Cuban nickname – to Saul. No one else close enough to call her that.

  Sam knew her, too, as Officer Teresa Suarez, an intensely ambitious rookie working in Property Crimes at the Miami Beach Police Department. To her chagrin, since Terri’s aim was to be a homicide cop like Sam.

  Her single-mindedness was a little too much, on occasion, for Sam’s liking.

  ‘Why shouldn’t she want what you have?’ Saul had asked his brother a few months back, after Sam had passed a mildly concerned – and, to his mind, diplomatic – remark about Terri’s impatience.

  ‘She has a terrific job now,’ Sam had said. ‘And great potential.’

  ‘You mean that?’ Saul had been mollified.

  ‘Sure I mean it,’ Sam had said. ‘But Terri’s young. She can afford to take her time, hone her skills as she goes. And there’s nothing inferior about Property Crimes, believe me.’

  ‘She wants to help people,’ Saul said. ‘Make a difference.’

  ‘Then she couldn’t be in a better section,’ Sam had pointed out. ‘You know how violated people feel when their homes are burgled.’

  What Sam had felt – but had known better than to say – was that he had, for some time, had the disconcerting sense that Terri was one of those young officers with wholly unrealistic expectations of life in a homicide squad. The reality, of course, was exposure to horror, ugliness, sordidness, deep sorrow, pain and frustration. Not forgetting the mind-numbingly tedious chores that detectives in Violent Crimes had to constantly wade through because it was so vital to catch these most dangerous of criminals, and because knocking on a hundred or more doors and filling out forms and writing endless reports was part of the process that meant a killer might ultimately be not only caught, but also brought to justice.

  The homicide cop’s reason for being. The prize that made it all worthwhile. The prize that Terri wanted. And Saul was right, of course. Sam was in no position to blame her for that.

  Except that the work had more than its share of risks, and no one knew that better than Sam. Saul, his gentle young adoptive brother, was one of the most important people in his universe and Sam could not help feeling afraid that, in so adoring his spunky, bitter-chocolate-eyed girlfriend, Saul might be storing up pain for his future.

  Not yet, though, thank God. Not tonight. Hopefully not ever.

  ‘You look happy, sweetheart,’ David commented to Cathy part way through Grace’s chilli roasted, Tuscan-rooted version of her late mother-in-law’s traditional Friday night roast chicken.

  ‘She’s happy – ’ Saul got in before Cathy could answer – ‘because this Trent track star thinks she’s a hot runner.’

  ‘Kez never said that,’ Cathy corrected him. ‘She said I wasn’t bad.’

  ‘You’re better than not bad,’ Grace told her.

  Cathy smiled. ‘Kez said we could run together sometime.’

  ‘Would this be Kez Flanagan, by any chance?’ David was interested.

  ‘You’ve heard of her?’ Cathy was surprised, since being a star at Trent meant little in the wider college athletics world.

  ‘I used to know her,’ David said.

  ‘Patient?’ Sam asked.

  ‘Until her father passed away.’ David smiled. ‘Joey, her dad, was crazy about her.’

  ‘How old was she when he died?’ Cathy asked.

  ‘Young – maybe around seven or eight.’ David wrinkled his curved nose, thinking back. ‘I remember them both so clearly because it was always her father who brought her for check-ups, never her mom.’

  Grace offered more rice and salad around the table.

  ‘I’ve never caught the running bug,’ she said to Terri, hoping to draw her into the conversation. ‘Do you take time out for any sports?’

  ‘I go to the gym,’ Terri said. ‘I like to keep in shape for work.’

  ‘Me, too.’ Sam grinned, looked down at his waistline, which seemed to have expanded just a little since he’d hit forty. ‘I blame Grace’s cooking for this.’

  Cathy, seated to his left at the table that was used for everything from breakfast to Christmas dinner, reached over and patted his stomach. ‘I keep telling you to come running with me.’

  ‘I get exercise,’ Sam protested.

  ‘Walking Woody,’ Grace said, ‘doesn’t constitute exercise.’

  Her greatly loved old West Highland Terrier, Harry, had passed on three years ago, after which they’d found Woody – part wire-haired dachshund, part miniature schnauzer – in a Fort Lauderdale rescue shelter.

  ‘Saul’s the same,’ Terri said on the subject of exercise. ‘Except his nose is always in some book, which is even worse.’

  ‘What about all the sawing I do?’ Saul flexed his right arm.

  ‘Making bookshelves hardly makes you a lumberjack,’ Cathy teased, though she loved and admired the fruits of her adoptive uncle’s hobby that had made their way into her bedroom.

  ‘Was your father into sports, Terri?’

  Sam’s question sounded relaxed, though the fact was he’d never heard her talk about either of her parents – both dead in a car accident, Saul had told him – but even if there was maybe some big reason for her reticence, he hoped this was safe territory.

  ‘My dad’s only real sport,’ Terri answered steadily, ‘was beating up on women.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Sam said, dismayed, watching his brother reach for her hand.

  ‘It doesn’t matter.’ Terri shrugged. ‘Not any more, anyway.’

  ‘I imagine,’ David said quietly, ‘that it still matters a good deal.’

  ‘Teté always says she was lucky,’ Saul said, ‘because her grandma pretty much took over bringing her up when her mom and dad died.’ He still held her hand. ‘By the sounds of it, she was an amazing lady.’

  ‘She must have been,’ Grace said warmly. ‘Judging by her granddaughter.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Terri said.

  Awkward moment, come through as well as it could be. And not all bad, Grace reflected, since it represented the first truly personal piece of information they had learned about the young woma
n Saul so clearly loved.

  Not our business, Grace reminded herself, wrapping the chicken carcass carefully so that Woody couldn’t get at the splintery bones. No reason on earth for Teresa Suarez to share her deeply private affairs with any of them except, perhaps, Saul, and certainly not Saul’s place to betray her confidences.

  ‘Any leads in the Muller case?’ Terri asked Sam.

  The next troublesome moment, while he was brewing coffee for them all: Supreme Bean Espresso Luna for himself and Terri (who shared his love of the strong stuff, though her personal preference was for cafecito, the sweet Cuban coffee her grandmother had taught her to enjoy); latte for Grace and Saul, and a decaf espresso he’d found earlier in the week for Cathy and David.

  ‘Good,’ Grace had said when she’d seen the pack. ‘Better for you.’

  ‘It’s not for me,’ Sam had assured her. ‘Half the flavour.’

  ‘Half the impact on your heart,’ Grace had told him.

  Sam had said there was nothing wrong with his heart, and Grace had said that was the way she wanted to keep it, and then they’d gone into their usual routine where she told him he was addicted and he claimed he could stop if he wanted, and Grace told him to prove it and Sam said he didn’t choose to.

  Terri’s question now about the Muller murder case irritated him.

  Don’t overreact, he told himself.

  ‘Nothing yet,’ he said.

  ‘I heard about Pompano Beach,’ she said.

  ‘Uh-huh.’ Sam tried to focus on the super automatic espresso maker that he’d bought himself last Christmas, and which Grace had renamed his Harley, as if it were some kind of dangerous mid-life-crisis machine.

  ‘No link then?’ Terri persisted. ‘Victim was a cleaner, I heard.’

  ‘Did you?’ Sam turned away from the coffee machine, hoping he’d made his reply discouraging rather than downright chilly, saw right away from her expression that he’d failed.

  She looked annoyed – not angry, exactly, but her eyes held a distinct glint of hostility. And then it was gone.

  ‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘Inappropriate dinner conversation.’