Author's Notes: The geography is going to be off a little in this. I wanted it still to take place in Miami and Florida State Prison isn't near it, so I just nudged it around the Miami area.
-3-
-Boulevard Hotel, Ocean Drive, Miami Beach, Florida-
Kyra Eubanks felt a twinge of guilt as she walked into the suite of the Boulevard Hotel, located in South Beach's Art Deco district. Aware that she should have told her aunt and uncle herself of her plans, Kyra also knew that the minute the words, "I'm going to visit my father before he dies" came out of her mouth than her uncle would have hit the roof. "It's better he hears it from Delinda," Kyra said quietly as she hung up the smart black dress in the closet, an article of clothing she had dubbed, "The Execution Dress".
Sighing quietly, the woman again looked around her environment before walking over to the large window overlooking Ocean Drive and pushed out the window, letting the sultry Miami air into the room. Leaning out the window, Kyra observed the sounds of Latin music being played up and down the road mixed in with the sounds of the ocean as it crashed against the cliffs.
Knowing that the decision to leave Las Vegas as quickly as she entered it made sense to nobody but herself, the twenty-seven-year-old native Floridian also knew that while she would always love Ed and Jillian and the life they provided her, Florida will always be the place she'll call home, despite the events of her childhood.
Walking over to the laptop she brought with her, Kyra plugged in the phone line and logged onto the internet to get directions to the Florida State Prison.
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"She did what!"
Delinda Deline sighed as her father ranted and raved, pacing his office at the same time.
"Daddy, please calm down," she begged, her eyes zeroed in on the vein in her father's forehead which throbbed angrily. "She felt she had to do this."
"I don't care if she felt the need to report the remains of Jimmy Hoffa, Delinda," Ed began, "she should have told me first."
"You aren't her father!" Delinda pointed out as she stood up and looked at her father. Sighing heavily, the blonde haired woman walked over to him and put her hands on her father's chest to calm him, speaking softly, "Daddy, she needed to do this. She loves you and mom for all the support you've given her, but she needed to this alone."
Sighing heavily, the former CIA agent resumed the pacing in his office, "This is going to break your mother's heart."
"Mom knows," Delinda admitted quietly, "I told her before coming to tell you. While she's not exactly jumping for joy, she is understanding of why Kyra did this. Besides," she paused, "Kyra said that she wanted us to call her when we were going to go down there and she'd meet us at the airport."
"She won't get any information out of him," Deline said quietly.
"She has to try though, Dad."
Turning to look at his daughter, Ed nodded his head in defeat, "If you hear anything from her..."
"You'll be the first person I call," Delinda promised, cutting him off.
"Alright," he sighed as he waved his daughter out of the room, "Go on. I need to get some paperwork finished."
Nodding quietly, his daughter kissed his cheek and headed out of his office, calling out over her shoulder, "Love you."
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-Florida State Prison-
Kyra Eubanks silently waited in the visiting confessional. Daunted by her surroundings, she kept replaying in her head over and over what the woman at the front desk of the Boulevard said earlier that morning when she asked for directions. "Oh, that's a place of real history," the desk clerk--identified by the brass nameplate on her chest which read "Sabrina"--chirped. "Many famous people were killed there... Ted Bundy, Aileen Wuornos, just to name a few."
"It's fitting," Kyra mused quietly to herself later in the cab, "that my father die in the same place that two of America's most brutal serial killers were put to death."
The loud sound of a monotone buzz shook her out of her reverie as she witnessed men and women filing into the other side of the visiting confessionals, each clad in a tangerine orange poplin jumpsuits. Kyra couldn't help but get a small smile on her face as she imagined what Ed would have to say... she knew that whatever her uncle would say, she was sure that it would be something along the lines of looking like a line of Crayola orange crayons after they were just made.
Her smile quickly faded when Robert Eubanks sat down on the other side of the Plexiglas screen. "Hello, pumpkin."
Kyra felt the bile begin to creep up her throat at the pet name. Shaking her head, she pushed it down with a hard swallow and let out a quiet sigh, the air blowing through her pursed lips in a cool stream. "Robert."
Eubanks' smile vanished. "'Robert'?" He asked. "When did we get so formal?"
"When you killed my mother," she shot back.
The man sighed heavily. Reaching up to run a hand over his face, he was quickly reminded that his wrists were handcuffed together. Glancing around, he leaned forward to speak softly to his daughter, "Kyra... I did nothing of the sort. I loved your mother like you would not believe."
Kyra shook her head as angry tears filled her eyes, "Don't defame her memory anymore than you already have. You loved her? Since when does a man prove his love for a woman by strangling her, chopping her up into small pieces and dumping her overboard a boat off the coast of Cuba?"
"That wasn't me," Robert said adamantly.
"Really? Than who was it?" She spewed at him, "Your evil twin? God! How stupid do you think I am?"
"I don't think you are stupid at all," he admitted quietly, "but you have to believe me, Kyra, I would never do what I've been accused of doing."
"You've been arrested, tried, convicted and sentenced," Kyra pointed out, "You are two weeks away from being jolted down to hell. You've been on death row now for twelve years. Why the hell haven't you appealed if you are so innocent?"
"What would have been the point?" Robert asked desperately. "Your uncle has more strings between his fingers than a friggen puppeteer. It wouldn't have mattered how many times I appealed, Kyra, Ed would still have made sure I wound up here."
"Because it's where you belong," Kyra said quietly. Grabbing her purse, she started to stand up.
"Wait," he pleaded softly, causing her to sit back down with a sigh. Looking at his daughter, he asked with a soft smile, "Which hotel are you in?"
Curiously, Kyra cocked her head as she looked at him, "Why?"
The inmate shrugged, "I'm curious." Seeing the hesitation on her face, he rolled his eyes, "Kyra, what am I going to do? Break out of prison and come after you?"
Letting out a quiet sigh, she said quickly, "The Boulevard on South Beach." Standing back up again, she quickly walked down the hall and banged on the gate and soon another loud buzzing was heard as she exited the area.
Once his daughter was gone, Robert stood up and walked down the hall, towards the guard and looked at him, softly, "Boulevard. Can you get me there?"
The crooked guard looked at the inmate, and his best friend, and nodded, softly, "You have grounds privileges, Bobby," he said quietly, "All I need to do is alert the warden that I need your help transporting something and it'll be a piece of cake."
Making sure that the cuffs were secure, for visionary reasons, the guard escorted the inmate back to his cell, where, in three hours, the two would orchestrate a daring escape.