Continued...

* * * *

  The dead guy on the boat had been an Elvis fan – and a big one. He’d called his 40 foot long yacht The Roustabout and the vast downstairs lounge area they found him in was a shrine to The King. Gold records and framed film and concert posters adorned the wooden walls. There was a stone statue of Elvis at various stages of his career in every corner – rock ‘n’ roller, soldier, ‘68 Comeback special leather, the Vegas jumpsuit years. Taking pride of place, over a faux fireplace next to a fully stocked bar was a picture of Tubbs and his idol with their arms around each other’s shoulders. They were almost indistinguishable – both round faced and double chinned, both with the same black hair and long pointed sideboards, both wearing the same tinted sunglasses. Max wondered if the dead guy hadn’t had surgery to look more like Elvis.

  The corpse was face down in the middle of the room, his left hand wrapped tight around a woman’s turquoise shoe. He was barefoot, wearing white duck pants and a blue and white striped shirt. There was an open bottle of champagne and a half-empty glass on a coffee table, next to some lines of coke and a gold straw on a chain, which spelled confirmed user. There was an open billfold next to the drugs. Max checked it. No cash or cards, save a Tucson driver’s licence and gun permit.

  “Burnett W Tubbs,” Max read out the name.

  Joe told Paley to hang back, out of the way, so as to not disturb the scene. It was bullshit, of course, because they were already contaminating it by being there. Miami PD would be rolling in as soon as they were done. Admiring the surgical gloves Joe had given him to wear, Paley went off and stood close to the stairs leading below deck. Max crouched down over the body and rolled his jacket sleeves up to the elbow.

  “What do you think?” Joe asked.

  Max felt the corpse’s right hand and tried to move its arm. The flesh was stiff and cold, the joints frozen in place.

  “Dead twelve. Rigor mortis.”

  The body had the slight smell of death about it.

  He raised the shirt up and pointed to the dark red tinge of the skin.

  “PM lividity here”, Max pointed out.

  “What’s that?” Paley asked.

  “Means he met Elvis last night,” Max said impatiently. He wanted to get this shit over and done with.

  Joe explained that the colour came about because the heart was no longer beating and mixing the blood up, so the heavier red blood cells sunk through the serum and settled.

  Paley scribbled all of this down, emitting a constant low groan-moan as he wrote.

  Max felt Tubbs’s head for wounds, then he turned him over. There was a smashed champagne flute under the body. He checked the neck for signs of bruising consistent with strangulation, and prised open his closed eye sockets to check the eyeballs for burst capillaries. Joe gave a running commentary on what he was doing and why for Paley’s benefit.

  Max spotted a white crust of cocaine residue at the edge of the corpse’s nostrils.

  “Who called it in?” he asked Joe.

  “Cleaner, came in this morning, found the body,” Joe said. He’d talked to the two uniformed cops who’d been waiting for them on the jetty.

  Max looked at the body.

  “No sign of external trauma. I think what happened was he was partying with some girl – probably a hooker – did some coke, had a heart attack. Bye bye. Girl takes off. Doesn’t want to hang around for questions because she’s probably got a record,” Max said.

  Paley moaned louder, wrote furiously.

Max carefully turned the body over back on its front.

“Guess that about wraps it up in here,” Joe said.

“You haven’t finished here guys,” Paley piped up. “You gotta go check below deck too. In fact, one of you should’ve checked the whole boat out while the other one looked at the body.”

Max and Joe exchanged a “what the fuck?” look. Paley was, of course, right, but Max wasn’t going to take that kind of shit from him.

“You tellin’ us how to do our jobs?” he said angrily.

“You don’t seem to be following procedure, is all I’m saying. I’d hate you guys to get into trouble.”

“Man’s right,” Joe said, making a calm down gesture to Max, like he was patting the back of a large fearsome dog. But Max wasn’t having it.

“You wanna look below deck?” he said to Paley, just about holding his anger in. “You go down and check it out and come back here and make a full report.”

“Really?” Paley gasped excitedly, looking at the two of them.

“Our gift to you,” Max said sarcastically. “You can do some real police work, help with your show.”

“Sure, OK. Neeet!” Paley said keenly.

Paley started to go down the stairs.

When he was out of sight, Max bared his teeth and flipped him the finger. Joe guffawed.

Then, suddenly, from downstairs, they heard a piercing – “JEEEEZUSSSS CHRIST!” – and saw Paley scrambling back up the stairs, glasses askew, panic-stricken.

  “What’s wrong?” Joe asked

  Then he saw.

“FUCK ME!” Joe yelled.

Then Max saw.

He couldn’t quite believe it.

A gator!

Nine or ten feet long, dark green, sprinting up the stairs after Paley.

  Paley ran behind Joe. Joe reached for his gun.

The gator sprang up at Joe, jaws open.

  Max pulled out his ankle piece and shot it three times in the centre of its body.

  The gator flipped and landed on its side with an almighty crash, which shook the whole boat, knocking down posters and records from the wall, and sending some bottles toppling off the bar.

  “Fuck me!” Joe repeated.

  “Where the fuck did that come from?” Max asked Paley, who just pointed at the stairs. “How many more down there?”

  “I just saw that one.”

  The two uniformed cops rushed in, guns drawn.

  “Call your people in,” Max told them. “Plus gator handlers.” Then he turned to Paley. “Show’s over. We’re outta here”.

* * * *

  “Wah-hair! That was just so awesome! The way you shot that gator, man! That move you made – that ankle piece! That was so damn neat! – neat neat neat!” Paley exclaimed when they were leaving the Marina. He was scribbling away like crazy. “God this material is just sooooo neat! “How come you didn’t tell me about your ankle gun?”

Max didn’t answer. He was doing the driving now and Paley was really pissing him off. He decided not to talk to the jerk at all for the rest of the day, so he could at least avoid telling him what he really thought of him. He wished the gator had taken a bite out of the fuck. That would have solved having to spend the rest of the day with the prick.

“Man gotta have some secrets,” Joe said before the silence became too awkward.

“What kind of gun was that?”

“Detonics Combat Master,” Joe said. “It’s like a cut-down version of my Colt. Same bang to it.”

“O! Neeeet!” Paley gushed. “Can I see it?”

“I think you already did,” Joe filled in for Max who was gripping the wheel tight, in lieu of Paley’s giraffe-like neck.

They toured Liberty City’s desolate streets, Joe explaining the history of the place and telling more war stories. Paley scratched away at his pad, moaning pleasurably as he wrote.

“You got any actors in mind for your show?” Joe asked.

“A few for the leads, yeah,” Paley replied. “I don’t know whether to make one of the cops white and one black, or have a white guy and a Latino – maybe get a black Latino, cover both demographics. We’re talking to Pam Grier about a part.”

Max couldn’t help himself.

  “You know Pam Grier?” he asked.

“Met her a couple of times, yeah,” Paley nodded.

  “What was she like?”

“To be honest I couldn’t get past her tits.”

Max smiled.

“Do you like Pam Grier?” he asked Max.

Like her? Max thought. I fucken love her. That passion had started way back in 1972 when he’d gone to see Hit Man at the drive-in with a girlfriend. He’d seen that movie all five nights it had played, just for her. He’d felt like a pervert, but what the hell? He’d seen pretty much every film she’d made in the 70s.

  “I seen a couple of her films on TV, yeah. She’s ok, I guess.”

“Have you seen Fort Apache, The Bronx? Paul Newman flick just opened. She’s in that.”

“What as?”

“A prostitute.”

“Yeah …?” Max said, thinking he could take his girlfriend Sandra, then deciding maybe it’d be best if he went alone.

“She’s a psycho junkie too, kills her clients. And she keeps her clothes on – for once.”

“Oh …,” Max said. Maybe he’d skip that one.

Max took North West 71st Avenue.

“I’m thinking of getting some famous musicians to play cameo roles,” Paley continued.

“Like who?” Max asked.

“Talking to Frank Zappa. You know his stuff?”

“No.”

“Willie Nelson, Jerry Garcia, Johnny Cash, Miles Davis …”

“Miles, huh?” Max smiled. Maybe this guy wasn’t such an asshole after all.

“Yeah, maybe,” Paley looked out of the window and locked eyes with a guy standing with a group on the sidewalk, talking and smoking. The guy mouthed something in his direction. Paley waved.

“You met him?”

“Not personally, but my people are talking to his people.”

“What kind of part would you have him play?” Max asked.

“Thinking of him as a real cool pimp.”

Max suddenly hit the brakes. Paley flew forward, hit the back of the front seats and bounced back, glasses askew.

  “A pimp!” Max turned around and roared. “The finest fucken’ musician this country has ever produced and the best thing you can fucken’ think of is gettin’ him to play a pimp on your bullshit cop show!”

“B- bu - but – ” Paley stammered, scrabbling for his pen and notebook.

“Max … ,” Joe said.

“Keep out of it!” Max snapped at him.

“Kind of Blue, Sketches of Spain, In A Silent Way, Bitches Brew … all that groundbreakin’ fucken music he made, and you want him to play a fucken’ PIMP on primetime TV! Who the fuck do you think you are?”

“But – but – ” a confused look crossed Paley’s face. “Wait a minute,” he said to Joe. “Didn’t you just call him Max? I thought you –”

“Get the fuck outta my car!” Max yelled at Paley.

  “NOW!”

“Wh- what –here?” Paley looked out of the back window at the group of men, all of whom were looking at the car.

“Yeah, here you cocksucker! You wanted to “capture the ethnicky beat of the streets”? You can start right here – with an ethnicky beat down! Now fuck off!”

“Listen, please – I – I – it isn’t safe here.”

“FUCK! OFF!!” Max yelled.

Paley scrambled out of the car.

Max floored the pedal and sped off.

“Max…?” Joe said

“WHADDAYAWANT?”

“Miles was a pimp,” Joe said quietly.

“I knew THAT!” Max shouted, seething.

“So – why the fuck did you kick him out?”

“That little prick was pissin’ me off! Had enough of the cocksucker!”

Joe laughed loudly and shook his head.

“The guy was an asshole,” Joe said. “But …Eldon’s gonna be pissed.”

“Fuck Eldon! I’ll take responsibility.”

They drove on in silence for a few minutes.

“What did that asshole say his series was called again?” Max asked.

“Miami Homicide,” Joe said. “And it ain’t a series, it’s a pilot.”

“Yeah? Well, it won’t fly.”

© Nick Stone 2007 All Rights Reserved