Bad Monkey (Andrew Yancy, 1)

by Carl Hiaasen

“It didn’t matter to me what you looked like because I thought you were dead. I was busy trying to catch your killer.” Stripling smiled crookedly. “That’s pretty fuckin’ funny, I gotta admit.”

The only way to foolproof the scam was to disappear with a trace. Give the bastards something to bag up and truck to the morgue, actual human remains. So when they do the DNA, when they stare at your mauled rotting stump, there’s no doubt in their minds that this poor fucker is dead as a doornail. Because who’d be crazy enough to cut off his own arm? Eve had begged her husband not to do it, but he had no intention of going to prison,

the whole plan depended on the thing being recovered and positively identified as belonging to him. Being indisputably dead would get the feds off his case, not to mention bring a sweet payoff on the life insurance.

“She’s determined to plead insanity,” Montenegro said. “Says she torched the house only because she was deranged by her passion for you.

“Insanely jealous isn’t the same as clinically insane.”

One benefit of working in a violent metropolis such as Greater Miami was superior crime-lab technology, which had advanced by leaps and bounds during decades of extreme homicidal misbehavior. The .357 Smith & Wesson found by Gomez O’Peele’s body was tested, at Dr. Rosa Campesino’s request, for the presence of a cornstarch mixture commonly used on the inside of powdered latex medical gloves. Sometimes, when fitting a nervous hand into such a glove,

a criminal might externally disperse microscopic particles of the cornstarch formula. That’s what turned up on both the handle and the trigger of the weapon that killed Dr. O’Peele. It was a significant finding because a person who purposely shoots himself typically doesn’t worry about fingerprints, and therefore doesn’t don gloves before putting the gun barrel to his temple. In any event, the hands of Gomez O’Peele were bare when his body was discovered, and the only latents on the .357 came from two of the doctor’s right-hand fingers, which was instructive because his sisters reported he was left-handed.

the life insurance company paid off on Nick’s $2 million policy. Half of that was going to his one and only daughter, who could expedite its delivery (Eve had explained at their reconciliation lunch) if she quit making wild accusations about the manner of her father’s death. And Caitlin stopped, like, right away. The anticipated windfall had brightened her attitude toward all humanity; Simon said she was like a new person. When he got home from work every morning Caitlin would have two bagels thawing for him in the toaster oven. It was like being married to a geisha!

the arm was definitely your father’s. He had it removed by a surgeon. That was key to the whole scam, see? So everyone would think he’s dead. The feds were getting ready to bust him, so he decided to have a quote-unquote boating accident.”

“Eve’s in trouble, too,” Yancy said. “Good! You mean like jail?” “Oh yes.” “Awesome!” “We’ll see.” “Then who gets all Dad’s money?” “The lawyers do,” Yancy said. “Good-bye, Caitlin.”

“Wait. Why are you laughing?”

“Tomorrow there’s going to be an item in the Key West newspaper—you should look it up online. It’ll say Crime Stoppers is offering five thousand dollars for information leading to the arrest of the person or persons who murdered a man named Charles Phinney in Key West. I’d appreciate it if you call that hotline number, Johnny, and tell them who did it.

“Johnny, I picked you for three reasons: experience, experience, experience. Nobody can work Crime Stoppers like you,”

“One thing you didn’t tell me,” he said. “Who put up the reward?” Yancy looked amused. “You never cared before.”

“Don’t be a douche. Is it the dead kid’s family came up with the money?” “You’ll love this,” said Yancy. “It’s the Russian mob.”

Now Egg sat by himself at the conch hut wondering what to do. He didn’t strictly believe in Caribbean magic, but the woman possessed some kind of mystic power. What else would account for him being seduced by such a moldy-smelling crone?

Tumescence

Weech and the other officers stepped away, into the sunlight, to converse out of earshot. Egg thought their balls must be roasting in those combat uniforms.

First he had to pick up a gold necklace

he’d left at the Dragon Queen’s place last night. Hanging on the chain was a miniature gold anchor inlaid with real diamonds. The piece was quite expensive, and Egg couldn’t believe he’d forgotten it. The Dragon Queen had told him to remove it so she could lather him head to toe with some smelly green cream she’d said would stop the pain in his privates.

“I spoke with the hospital. The nurses said he moved his right hand yesterday.” “I don’t doubt it. That’s how he got where he is,” said Plover Chase.

She pulled an orange thread from the sleeve of her jumpsuit. “I’m not scared of a trial. It isn’t like I tried to kill somebody. Nobody was in the house when I lit the match.” She was something of a surprise to John Wesley Weiderman, the level way she looked at him, her poise and confidence seemingly unshaken by the grubby experience of jail. For some reason he’d been expecting despondency or a teary plea for lenience. Instead Plover Chase came across as a strong, composed woman who’d just happened in a heartsick lapse of judgment to torch an unoccupied structure.

he was still puzzled

by people who were determined to live in turmoil. Plover Chase wasn’t a career criminal, yet she was making it impossible for her to be treated as anything less. Oklahoma wanted her sent back as soon as possible, the arson having upended the assumption that she was harmless.

“You owe me, bey,” she said. “Fuh wot I owe you?” The Dragon Queen huffed. “Fuh dot woo-doo. Ha! You’ll see.” She held up a gold chain strung through a small, diamond-studded anchor. “Dis here fuh my lil’ pink boy.”

Their excited shouts, loud enough for a tent revival, failed to pierce the voodoo woman’s boozy trance. The taxi slammed hard into her bony frame as Philip stomped uselessly on the brake pedal. In a sinusoidal path the van petered on down the road. Through its punctured windshield jutted the Dragon Queen’s legs,

He wanted to see the place where Eve Stripling, surely believing she was free, had at a fatal velocity steered the Lefty’s Revenge into a coral outcrop known to islanders as Satan’s Fist.

The fisherman flipped open the Styrofoam cooler. “Here’s wot de shocks dint eat.” “Oh Christmas! Of course!” It was Nick Stripling’s other arm.

“Just when we’re about to nail the sonofabitch, he really dies—and the exact same way he wanted us to think he died before.”