SKIN TIGHT by Carl Hiaasen

She retreated to the role of professional interviewer. “So,” she said, “tell me about yourself.”

“You first,” Stranahan said; a brief smile, then back to the magazine.

Oddly, she found herself talking—talking so openly that she sounded like one of those video-dating tapes: “Let’s see. I’m thirty-four years old, divorced, born in Richmond, went to the University of Missouri journalism school, lettered on the swim team, graduated magna, got my first decent news job with the ABC affiliate in St. Louis, then three years at WBBM in Chicago until I met Ray at the Gacy trial and he offered me an assistant producer’s job, and here I am. Now it’s your turn, Mick.”

“Pardon?”

“Your turn,” Christina Marks said. “That’s my life story, now let’s hear yours.”

Stranahan closed the magazine and centered it on his lap. He said, “My life story is this: I’ve killed five men, and I’ve been married five times.”

Christina slowly pulled her hand away.

“Which scares you more?” Mick Stranahan said.

When Dade County Commissioner Roberto Pepsical broke the news to The Others (that is, the other crooked commissioners), they all had the same reaction: Nope, sorry, too late.

Dr. Rudy Graveline had offered major bucks to rezone prime green space for the Old Cypress Towers project, and the commissioners had gone ahead and done it. They couldn’t very well put it back on the agenda and reverse the vote—not without arousing the interest of those goddamned newspaper reporters. Besides, a deal was a deal. Furthermore, The Others wanted to know about the promised twenty-five thousand dollar bribe: specifically, where was it? Was Rudy holding out? One commissioner even suggested that a new vote to rescind the zoning and scrap the project could be obtained only by doubling the original payoff.

Roberto Pepsical was fairly sure that Dr. Rudy Graveline would not pay twice for essentially the same act of corruption. In addition, Roberto didn’t feel like explaining to the doctor that if Old Cypress Towers were to expire on the drawing board, so would a plethora of other hidden gratuities that would have winged their way into the commissioners’ secret accounts. From downtown bankers to the zoning lawyers to the code inspectors, payoffs traditionally trickled upward to the commissioners. The ripple effect of killing a project as large as Rudy’s was calamitous, bribery-wise.

Roberto hated being the middleman when the stakes got this high. By nature he was slow, inattentive, and somewhat easily confused. He hadn’t taken notes during Rudy’s late-night phone call, and maybe he should have. This much he remembered clearly: The doctor had said that he’d changed his mind about Old Cypress Towers, that he’d decided to move his money out of the country instead. When Roberto protested, the doctor told him there’d been all kinds of trouble, serious trouble-specifically, that hinky old surgical case he’d mentioned that day at lunch. The proverbial doo-doo was getting ready to hit the proverbial fan, Rudy had said; somebody was out to ruin him. He told Roberto Pepsical to pass along his most profound apologies to The Others, but there was no other course for the doctor to take. Since his problem wasn’t going away, Old Cypress Towers would.

The solution was so obvious that even Roberto grasped it immediately. The apartment project could be rescued, and so could the commissioners’ bribes. Once Roberto learned that Dr. Rudy Graveline’s problem had a name, he began checking with his connections at the Metro-Dade Police Department.

Which led him straight to detectives John Murdock and Joe Salazar.

Roberto considered the mission of such significance that he took the radical step of skipping his normal two-hour lunch to stop by the police station for a personal visit. He found both detectives at their desks. They were eating hot Cuban sandwiches and cleaning their revolvers. It was the first time Roberto had ever seen Gulden’s mustard on a .357.

“You’re sure,” said the commissioner, “that this man is a murder suspect?”

“Yep,” said John Murdock.

“Number one suspect,” added Joe Salazar.

Roberto said, “So you’re going to arrest him?”

“Of course,” Salazar said.

“Eventually,” said Murdock.

“The sooner the better,” Roberto said.

John Murdock glanced at Joe Salazar. Then he looked at Roberto and said, “Commissioner, if you’ve got any information about this man … “

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