Cover

Dedication

Dedication

This one is for my mother, Valerie

Epigraph

Epigraph

Death is not the greatest of evils; it is worse to want to die, and not be able to.

Sophocles

. . . The same is true of violence. Our violence in word and deed is but a feeble echo of the surging violence of thought in us.

Mohandas Gandhi

Chapter 1

1

His first waking thought was that his sins had caught up with him.

It was a moment of epiphany he’d never have come to without this shocking wake-up call.

Linden Case had always denied that there was anything wrong in the way he treated the whores. He paid them well, even gave them a bonus if they fully pleased him. By the nature of their trade they invited him to do to them whatever he desired. But he fully grasped his reason for being here in this basement of a building in a less than salubrious district of Tampa, Florida.

Earlier he’d been driving his Mercedes along Seventh Avenue in historic Ybor City. Although the area was famous as a tourist destination where people came to photograph the colorful buildings, it also had a darker underbelly that appealed to him. Street girls often hung out there, waiting for men like Case to offer them a ride. He was stopped by a red light—ironically under the circumstances—and checked out a woman standing on the sidewalk while waiting for the light to go green. She was Seminole: dusky skinned with jet-black hair. On green, he decided he’d carry on. He was only interested in blondes. As he waited for a stocky woman to clear the crossing, his passenger door opened and a man slipped in beside him. Case was used to women being as bold, but never men.

“Hey, buddy, I’m not your type, okay?”

“You’re exactly my type, Case.”

“I don’t know you. How do you know my name?”

The man shoved a handgun into Case’s ribs.

“Shut your mouth and drive.”

Case wasn’t familiar with handguns. This one was big and black, and it was enough to know that it would kill him. He drove.

The man refused to answer Case’s questions. He spoke only to direct him. They left Ybor City, heading south over Causeway Boulevard. Case noticed a huge depot with trains parked on sidings, but he was unfamiliar with this area of the city, then the man directed him off the highway into a run-down area that was made up of derelict buildings. At a warehouse made from preformed concrete panels, the man made Case get out of the Mercedes. Case had again tried to get the man to answer his questions, but all that earned him was a smack around the head with the butt of the gun.