Rum Luck Read online

  “Most of them seem to think it is a robbery. The register was cleaned out, and Antonio’s watch is missing.” The corner of Ana’s mouth twisted.

  “You disagree?”

  “Antonio knew how to handle robbers. He would be sweet as roses and hand over the money. Then, when the robber’s hands were full and his back was turned, he would knock him senseless with the baseball bat.” Ana mimed her uncle knocking a robber over the head, splashing her sangria in the process.

  Ben smiled. He wished he could have got to know Antonio. All he remembered was the gleam in the man’s eyes.

  Ana leaned back in her chair. “It feels wrong. The bathroom is a mess, but the back room with the safe was untouched. They take his watch and his wallet, but not his rings or credit cards. They do not even take the good Scotch. Maybe I just do not want to believe that my uncle was killed by some lowlife looking for quick cash.” She rose on unsteady feet. “Please excuse me. I need to take care of the cleaning up. Those cleaners the police send, they barely do anything.”

  Ben and Victoria paled.

  “Ana?” Miguel took a deep breath. “Do you want any help?”

  Ben froze. He had to force himself to wash the dishes; he couldn’t imagine cleaning up after the murder of someone he loved. He thought of Tara, then remembered that he wasn’t supposed to be in love with her anymore. He blinked twice. He had enough to worry about without feeling sorry for himself.

  “Thank you, but I would like some time by myself,” Ana said. “Ben, please talk with Luis when he arrives. He has not answered any of my calls.” A shadow crossed Ana’s pretty face as she disappeared behind the bar.

  “Victoria,” Ben said once Ana was out of earshot, “did the police say anything about how Antonio died?”

  “He was beaten to death with his own baseball bat.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  It took a full hour for Ana to finish her grisly task. By then, Ben had taught himself how to work the draft tap and had poured himself and Miguel a pair of frothy pints.

  “So,” Ana asked, “what is the plan for tonight?”

  “Plan?” Ben didn’t have a plan, other than sitting in a lounge chair, drinking beer, watching the sun set, and trying not to think about Tara. Victoria had already left for the hotel to change her clothes, and wouldn’t return until sometime after dinner.

  “Are you going to open?” Ana asked, hands on her hips.

  “Doesn’t that seem a bit soon?” Soon was one word for it. Callous and ghoulish were two more. Besides, all he really wanted to do was have a pint or three and go to bed.

  “It is better than sitting in my apartment, worrying if anyone will show up for Uncle Antonio’s funeral.” She sighed. “Also, it is Friday night. We do half of our business on the weekend. Unless you have enough money for us to fix the place up before we open again, maybe?”

  Ben looked at Miguel, who nodded his approval. “Okay. Let’s open.”

  Ana walked behind the bar and flicked a switch, lighting up the large neon sign that read “Antonio’s.” She stabbed her finger at another button, and the speakers by the dance floor crackled to life with Latin dance music. She checked her watch. “It is almost five. Customers should be here any minute.”

  “Here’s one now,” Miguel said.

  A young man with impeccably spiked hair sauntered into the bar, clad head to toe in designer duds.

  Ana scoffed. “That is Luis, the busboy.”

  Luis flinched when he saw Ana glaring at him.

  “Luis, where the hell were you? I leave five messages on your phone.”

  “Sorry, Ana,” he said, hands thrust into the pockets of his tailored jeans. “My battery died.”

  “Those missed hours come out of your pay.” She looked at Ben, who nodded. “Meet Ben Cooper, the new owner.”

  Luis brightened. “Pleased to meet you, Mr. Cooper. Can I stay on as a busboy?”

  “Sure, Luis,” Ben said, puzzled. His silk sport shirt alone must have cost more than Ben’s first car. “We’re glad to have you.”

  “Wait until you get to know him.” Ana turned back to Luis. “Get changed. Customers will be here any minute.”

  Luis hustled into the kitchen without saying another word.

  “He’s our busboy?” Ben asked.

  “If you ask him, he’s God’s gift to fashion design,” Ana said, rinsing their sangria glasses and hanging them to dry on the metal rack above the bar. “He’s always telling us how he’s going to bring Costa Rican style to the international stage.” She snorted. “Diay. It would help if the sleeves stayed on.”

  Ben exchanged puzzled looks with Miguel, then shrugged. “So, is there anything in particular I should be doing tonight?”

  “If you knew how to mix drinks, I would ask for your help behind the bar.” She moved on to cutting up limes. “No offense, but until you learn how to bartend, you are more trouble than you are worth on a busy Friday night.” She looked Miguel up and down. “I can use your help, though.”

  He hopped across the bar and started rummaging through the fridge. It sounded like the two lovebirds had gotten to know each other rather well last night. Miguel had tended bar at one of the top clubs in Toronto for close to three years, despite once dropping a two-thousand-dollar magnum of champagne. Ben eyed the row of dusty liquor bottles along the back wall of the bar, then appraised the way the thin vintage polo shirt clung to his friend’s muscular form. Whatever damage Miguel might cause in breakage would be more than made up by the boost in sales.

  Ana turned to Ben. “Talk to the customers. Keep them happy and buying drinks.”

  “And if they don’t speak English, I can smile and wave like a finalist in some damned beauty pageant,” Ben groused.

  “Now you are getting the hang of it.” Ana gave him a reassuring smile. “The rest will have to wait until tomorrow. Otherwise—trust me, you will know when you need to help.”

  Ben grabbed his pint and sat down on a bar stool. Customers started to trickle in, alone and in pairs at first, then in small groups. There didn’t seem to be a single age group that called Antonio’s home: a couple of local surf instructors preceded boisterous women of a certain age, followed by graying men clad in Hawaiian shirts boasting of their marlin catch.

  Ben wondered if they were among the expatriates Ana had mentioned. What secrets lurked beneath those bronzed, smiling faces? He tensed at the thought of Antonio’s killer returning to the bar this evening. He gazed down at his bloody knuckles. Perhaps the killer was already here.

  He grabbed a tray full of colorful drinks to deliver to a bachelorette party that had taken over the beach lounge. He managed two steps from the bar before the heavy daiquiri glasses slid off the tray and exploded on the terracotta tiles. The crowd was silent for a moment, then someone started a round of lively applause.

  He closed his eyes and wished he could sink through the floor. Ana coughed twice, and he looked up to see Luis standing next to him, with a mop, broom, and dustpan.

  Next he tried mingling, with mixed success. Half the customers spoke no English, at least not while Ben was around, and the other half avoided eye contact altogether. He handed out a free drink to a middle-aged woman sitting alone, but she turned out to be almost as drunk as Ben had been last night and tried to drag him onto the dance floor. And into a table. He politely disengaged from her grasp.

  He reached for his phone and its dizzying array of distractions before remembering it was lost. After drumming his fingers on the bar for several minutes, he headed to the men’s to splash some water on his face, gather his thoughts, and escape the growing din.

  The bathroom was still a wreck. Oscar had done what he could to put it back together in time to open, but it looked like a war zone. The cracked toilet lid had been filled in with globs of putty, while the shattered mirror had been replaced with a burnished metal tray. A roll of paper towel now hung from a coat hanger on a nail, and circles of fresh plaster marked where the drywall had been crushed.
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  Sloshing water on his face didn’t revive Ben as he had expected. The haphazard repairs couldn’t mask the lingering sense of boundless rage. He again wondered if the fight had started there, though Ana hadn’t mentioned blood anywhere other than behind the bar.

  By the time Ben got back to the bar, the trickle of customers had become a flood. Surprised, he turned to Ana and asked, “Hey, is this usual for a Friday ni—?”

  A tipsy, sunburned tourist bumped him from behind. “Hey man, get a picture of me at the scene of the crime,” he shouted, mugging for his friend’s camera. “Sucks that they got rid of the chalk outline so soon, but what can you do? Hey, look at me, I’m a dead bartender.” He lay down on the ground with his tongue sticking out, twitching around for comedic effect. His friends—flabby college kids in pink polo shirts two sizes too small—laughed until they doubled over.

  Ben turned to the crowd of drunks. He wanted to bellow at them—all of them—that they were miserable human beings. He wanted to force them to apologize to Ana. Then, he wanted to toss them to the curb with the rest of the garbage. If only that baseball bat were still behind the bar.

  The moment balanced on a knife’s edge. Then the pounding stopped.

  Ben turned back to the bar. “Miguel. Ana. For the rest of the night, I want those punks to pay twice as much for half the booze.”

  “Sure thing, boss.” She unclenched her jaw and smiled. “If Antonio was here, he would be proud.”

  Luis looked up from sorting dishes and muttered, “If Antonio was here, he would sell T-shirts that said, ‘I got wasted at Antonio’s.’ ”

  Ana opened her mouth to yell at Luis, then stopped herself. Ben couldn’t tell if she was furious or fighting the urge to laugh. He wasn’t sure if she knew, either.

  Ben said, “Keep up the good work.”

  Ana gave him a small smile and lifted a glass to pour another pint. He turned around and ran straight into Victoria, now wearing a vibrant blue sundress.

  “What the hell is going on here?” Her eyes darted around the room, trying to count the people who’d come for the thrill of partying at a real crime scene.

  “We opened.”

  “I’ll say you did,” she said. “Good idea. Looks like you’re doing well.”

  Ben glanced at the pack of college kids, emptying their wallets in exchange for a tray of watered-down rum-and-Cokes. “Business is booming.”

  “Do you have a minute?” she asked.

  “Let’s step into my office.”

  Victoria seemed impressed. “Certainly, Mr. Cooper. Lead the way.”

  They walked past the bar into the back hallway and opened the first door on the right. Ben noticed closed doors farther down the darkened corridor. He’d ask Ana to give them the grand tour sometime soon.

  The office hadn’t been touched during the struggle, but it still looked as though it had been struck by a miniature tornado. Papers covered every surface, including a large safe and a row of filing cabinets. The stained walls were plastered with photo after photo of Antonio Guiterrez, smiling down at them from cliffside restaurants, sisters’ weddings, children’s birthday parties, and the ever-present sailboat. The effect was unpleasant.

  Ben waved Victoria toward one of two wicker chairs and shut the door behind them. Rather than trying to wedge himself behind the battered wooden desk, he sat in the second wicker chair.

  “What’s on your mind?” he asked.

  Victoria squinted at him. “Are you feeling okay?”

  “Never better.” For the first time in a while, he actually meant it.

  “Bad news. Mansion’s landed a big client and he wants me to take the lead on the file. I’ll need to head home the day after tomorrow,” Victoria said. “Sorry, Ben. I wanted to stick this one out. If I can’t clear your name before I leave, I should be back within a week.”

  “I understand. We’ll miss having you here, but we’ll figure out a way to make it work.” Two days wasn’t much but, with luck, it would be enough. As for later—well, he was due to fly back in a week, but it was anyone’s guess whether he’d be on that plane.

  “I’ve found a local law firm that should be able to ensure you get fair treatment until I return. I’ll meet with them tomorrow to sort out the details.”

  Ben grinned lopsidedly. “By ‘details,’ do you mean how best to keep Vasquez and friends from tossing me back in jail on a trumped-up charge?”

  “That’s exactly what I mean.”

  “Just making sure,” Ben said. “Was that everything?”

  “No, actually. I wanted to talk to you about Ana.” Victoria weighed her words carefully. “Have you considered that she might have the most to gain from Antonio’s death?”

  “How so?”

  “First, it seems she was Antonio’s closest relative, which means she will likely inherit the sixty thousand dollars you paid for the bar plus the remainder of Antonio’s assets. That’s more than ten years’ wages in Costa Rica. Second, she has no alibi for the time of his murder and is the last known person to have seen him alive.

  “Third, she knew everything there was to know about the bar, including where Antonio kept his bat and how he’d react during a robbery. And finally, we have no idea whether her version of events is true. For all we know, she sold you on a discount fishing charter to get you to access your online banking, drugged you, stole your money, and forged your signature on the deed.”

  Ben opened his mouth to explain that he remembered signing the deed, but he couldn’t recall exactly what had happened, apart from holding a pen, seeing the gleam in Antonio’s eyes, and feeling really good about it afterwards. That was hardly conclusive evidence in Ana’s favor, but Victoria’s litany of charges still seemed extreme.

  “What about the bathroom? Why would she trash it?” he said.

  Victoria deflated slightly. “That’s the part I can’t figure out. Perhaps she did it so the police would suspect a male robber. Maybe she wanted to muddy the waters.” She leaned forward, lowering her voice. “I’m worried about Miguel getting too close to her before we have all the facts.”

  “I’ll keep an eye on him,” Ben promised, although inserting himself into Miguel’s love life was the last thing that he wanted to do. He briefly wondered if this was more about Miguel than Ana, but, no, he couldn’t imagine Victoria and Miguel romantically involved with each other. Could he?

  Victoria looked around the office. “This all feels too convenient to me.”

  Ben leaned back. “Let’s look at what we know. Fact: Antonio is dead. Fact: Antonio was killed the same night I bought the bar.”

  “That’s a rather large coincidence,” Victoria said.

  “I agree. Especially considering what Ana said about my paying less than Antonio thought he could get. That’s worth looking into.”

  “I’ll make a call to the office. They should be able to check what a place like this usually fetches,” Victoria said. “What if Antonio knew someone was coming for him, and that’s why he dropped the price?”

  “But who? And why?”

  There was a knock and Ana eased the door open. Her face was a grim mask. “There is something you need to see.”

  Ben rose from his chair, wondering how long Ana had waited before knocking.

  The sky flushed red and gold, backlighting the beachside bargoers as they watched the Pacific swallow the last sliver of sun. Ben let out a heavy breath and wished he was out there with them, watching the sun set on his first day as the bar’s owner, worrying only whether his ice cubes were getting lonely.

  Ana grabbed an envelope from the counter and handed it to Ben. “I turn my back for a second to get some clean pitchers. When I turn around, I find this on the bar.” She reached under the sink and drew out a pair of cheap yellow cleaning gloves. “Put these on when you open it.”

  Feeling nervous—and a little ridiculous—Ben pulled on the sour-smelling gloves and extricated a single sheet from the envelope. Letters cut from newspapers and magazines s
pelled out two short sentences:

  Antonio died well. Will you?

  Ben shivered.

  “Seriously? Letters cut from a magazine?” Victoria asked, peering over his shoulder. “Do criminals even still do that?”

  Ana shot her a glare. “Not everyone in Tamarindo has a fancy office with a printing laser.”

  “Laser printer,” Victoria corrected.

  “Have you ever seen anything like this before, Victoria?” Ben interrupted.

  She shook her head. “I haven’t. Then again, I wasn’t practicing law in 1972. We also don’t get a lot of anonymous death threats at a corporate law office.”

  “Really? That is a surprise,” Ana snapped. “What do we do with this, Ben?”

  “Victoria, take a photo of it. Then Ana will put the letter in the safe. We’ll give it to the police tomorrow.”

  “That’s not necessary, Ben,” Ana said as Victoria took a picture of the letter with her phone.

  “You have another idea?”

  “No, no. Captain Reyes is here. You can give it to him now.”

  Ben shut his eyes. What’s next, a plague of locusts?

  He looked down the length of the bar and spotted the captain standing alone. He was in street clothes—a dark green golf shirt tucked into pleated khakis—presumably to avoid drawing attention to himself. He wore the civilian attire awkwardly, like a man who lived and slept in uniform. There was a distinct tan line across his forehead where his forge cap usually sat.

  “I can handle this,” Victoria said, using a folded glove to hold the letter by a corner.

  “I’ll go with you,” Ben said. “This isn’t a social call.”

  Victoria glided over to the policeman, a death threat in one hand and a bottle of rum in the other. “What can I get you, Captain?” she asked smoothly.

  “Nothing more for me, thank you.” He raised a glass of soda water. “I simply wanted to see how you were getting on.”

  “Just glad to be part of Tamarindo’s thriving economy, Captain.”

  “I have no doubt.” He laughed. It almost sounded genuine. “Business does seem to be thriving. Perhaps a bit too well? You are aware that the fire code limits you to two hundred customers at a time, yes? You seem to have rather more than that.”