Disclaimer: IfI owned Without A Trace, would I seriously be sitting here, writing fanfiction in my pajamas? Just read and enjoy, people.
THE MIAMI TRIP
By Alilee
The sun rose hot over the city, a ball of fire consuming cool blue skies. The beaches began to hum with early-morning activity, streets filling with traffic. Iron grates over store windows went up: Miami was awake.
Jack Malone had been up with the sun, watching from a fifth-story window in a motel. In the adjacent bed, Martin snored away the morning. Had he gotten up and gone next door, Jack might have found Sam in a pair of Tweety Bird pajamas, still asleep.
He closed the blinds, deciding to let Martin and Sam sleep in. They were on a case, a missing coffee-shop owner who might have been abducted back to hometown Miami or gone of his own free will. Either way, the FBI decided to send three people down to look into it, expecting there to be a drug ring or an illegal immigration scam going on.
There was nothing. Only a guy who'd heard his mother was sick, panicked, gone down to Miami, and found out she had cancer, perhaps a year to live. That was last night. Now it was six forty-seven and there was a plane that, in seven hours, would be taking them back to New York.
Jack pulled on a pair of black slacks and a shirt, hoping there was a good place to get breakfast within a few blocks. He was selecting a tie- debating between black or blue- when there was a loud thump from the hallway.
He would have ignored it, except it was followed by another thump, louder than the first.
Martin stuck his head up from under the covers, suddenly awake, "Jack?"
"Yeah, I heard that."
Martin jumped up, yanked on a pair of sweatpants over his boxers, already wearing a t-shirt, "Should we-?"
Jack let the question dangle for a moment. There was someone yelling in the hallway, in indecipherable Spanish.
"Yeah, I think so."
Jack unlocked the door, closely followed by Martin. The two men were almost all the way out the door before another bout of yelling began.
The door at the end of the hallway was flung open with a bang, hitting the wall and denting the plaster. A small cloud of dust settled down, turning the flat gray carpeting chalk-white.
A man flew out of the room, stumbling head-first into the wall before regaining his balance and starting to yell again. Jack wished he'd paid more attention in high school Spanish class.
"He just called somebody a cheap son of a bitch." Martin commented, nodding his head at the man in the hallway. He was a tall Hispanic, with a deep tan and jet-black hair in disheveled spikes, no older than Martin. He was wearing a pair of boxers and struggling into jeans.
A shirt, shoes and a tan jacket were thrown out of the room as an undeniably male voice said from within, "Be glad I paid at all, whore. You're a lousy lay."
"You owe me twenty-five dollars, Viagra-boy!" the man in the hall said, in English once more, struggling into his jeans. The door slammed shut once more.
With a sigh, the man pulled the shirt over his head and finished dressing. It wasn't until he was lacing his shoes up that he saw Jack and Martin, still standing at the opposite end of the corridor.
"What're you looking at?" he demanded.
"You're bleeding." Martin said. And, when Jack looked away from the deep brown eyes, he saw that the man's nose was dripping blood. Probably from hitting the wall so hard.
"Oh, shit." he murmured, "Ow."
"You…umm…want a washcloth or something? A tissue?" Martin asked hesitantly, hand on the door of their room. A few drops of blood hit the man's dark shirt.
"Yeah, if it's not inconvenient." There was no sign of the screaming 'whore' from a few moments ago; just a man with a nosebleed.
"Just a minute, okay?" Martin went back into the room, leaving Jack standing in the hallway. The man pinched his nose shut and strode towards him, offering the un-bloodied hand
"I'm Danny."
"Jack Malone."
Danny settled himself down at the bottom step of the stairwell, still wiping blood from his face.
"Sorry, did I wake you guys up?"
"I was already up." Jack answered, shifting from foot to foot. He kept his eyes firmly trained on his shoes, trying to work up the nerve to make conversation. He didn't do well with people; he did worse with strangers, especially in any situation that required social skills.
His discomfort was obvious enough that Danny finally sighed and said, "Look, man, you don't have to hang around. I'll be okay."
"That guy might-" Jack protested weakly.
"I've got his phone number. One call to the esposita and he's screwed. He'll pay me back in a few days, if he knows what's good for him. That's why he's a regular."
Jack continued to avoid eye contact, though, until Martin came back out of the room with a wet washcloth.
"Sorry it took so long." Martin handed the still-bleeding Danny the washcloth and addressed Jack, "Van Doren called, Sam and us have to be back in New York by tonight. Vivian's holding down the fort until we get there."
"If you'll wake Sam up, I'll call Elena to get our tickets changed." Jack took a cell phone out of his pocket, ready to get out of the situation as fast as he could, "By the way, this is Danny."
"Hola." he said around the washcloth, "Welcome to Miami, yeah?"
"We've already been here a few days." Martin settled down next to the man, "I'm Martin."
"Here on business?"
"Yep," Martin was ignoring Jack's signals to get moving instead of sharing his life story, "What about you?"
"Man, if that," he waved down the hall to the room he'd recently been evicted from, "wasn't obvious enough for you…"
"Oh…yeah, um…" Martin stammered.
"Hey, it's all good. Gotta make the cash somehow, verdad? Fifty bucks is worth a little blood." he grinned.
"Are you from around here, though?" Martin seemed to have recovered his dignity, trying to make casual conversation.
Danny checked his nose; the bleeding seemed to have stopped, "No way, man, I'm out of Hialeah. Rich hombres drive through there, pick somebody up, take 'em to a hotel. Miami's got too many cops to do much business."
"Do you know a place for breakfast around here?" Jack dodged the 'cops' remark, deciding it wasn't worth arresting the guy.
Danny thought for a moment, "If you're not looking for another IHOP, try the café, on Cervantes. Good Cuban food- nothing like it. Good drinks, too."
"It's a little early, man." Martin joked.
"Never to early for a drink, especially if you got something to drink about." Danny stated, "Well, I know they give cops discounts. You guys could probably get by with FBI badges."
Martin gaped, "How'd you know that?"
"You're pretty obvious, amigo. It's in the step, the way you talk. Assertive, confident." Danny smiled at Martin, "Different than a cop, though. You guys are always more polite."
"Maybe you ought to be doing my job." Martin remarked.
Danny chuckled, "Maybe. Probably a lot safer."
"How so? I get shot at, remember?"
Danny rolled up his sleeve in a fluid movement and showed him a band-aid in the hollow of his elbow, "I get tested."
Jack's brow furrowed, and Martin's happy, casual grin fell away. Danny stood, clutching the blood-stained washcloth. Jack noticed his eyes darkening in the poor light of the hall.
"I think maybe you'd better not touch this. I haven't got the results back yet, but to be safe…" he opened a nearby laundry chute and tossed the cloth down into the blackness. There was a moment of stilled silence.
Sam opened the door to her room, blearily asking, "Martin, Jack? What's up?"
"Nothing, señorita, just talking. Sorry if we woke you." Danny turned to go, but stopped and turned to Martin, "Véale en la vida próxima, amigo."
And like that, he was gone down the stairs.
"What was that?" Sam asked, walking towards the two men.
"He said 'See you in the next life'." Martin translated.
"He seemed sort of familiar." Sam remarked, "Who was he?"
Jack answered, "Just a guy who was staying in the hotel."
"Just a guy." Martin repeated, "Nobody."