Motor Mouth

of shells that had probably been collected in China. We bypassed the trinket shops and bought new cell phones, running shoes for Hooker, and binoculars.
    By the time we left the mall, it was late afternoon. Our plan was to park our butts on bar stools at Monty’s outdoor tiki bar and watch Huevo’s yacht. The bar was nice and public, and we thought chances were slim that Hooker’s gonads would get lopped off from the rest of his body while at Monty’s.
    We ordered nachos and beer and broke out the binoculars. We’d each gotten one of those mini things. Not as much power as what I was used to but easier to carry. We had a good view of the boat without the binoculars, but the binoculars would let us see faces better.
    “To Beans,” Hooker said. And we clinked our beer glasses together.
    I put my binoculars to my eyes for a test, focused on the pier leading to the Huevo boat, and then a woman walked into the picture. “Hello,” I said. “Who’s this?”
    The woman looked like Blond Bitch Bimbo. A platinum-haired Cruella DeVil. She was wearing four-inch heels and a designer suit that fit her like skin. She had enough diamonds on her watch and in her ears to give me cataracts from the sun reflection. Her hair was knotted at the nape of her neck and her face was frozen in a look of perpetual open-eyed awe. She had a long-legged, ass-swinging stride that carried her down the pier to the yacht gangplank. The uniformed guard onboard ship snapped to attention when he saw her and rushed forward to help her with her single bag, but she waved the help away. A small, tufted dog head popped out of the bag.
    I glanced at Hooker and found him readjusting his binoculars.
    “Focusing on her ass?” I asked.
    “It’s a pretty decent ass. Looks to me like a StairMaster ass. Man, her ass is so tight, you could bounce a quarter off it.”
    “You like that?”
    Hooker had his binoculars to his eyes. “I like any ass that…” He froze in midsentence. He was having a mental head-slap moment. A deer-in-headlights moment. He lowered the binoculars and looked at me. “I like
your
ass.”
    Okay, so he wasn’t perfect, but he was trying.
    I had my binoculars back up, watching the woman go into the main salon and disappear from sight. “Do you know who she is?”
    “Darlin’, that’s the newly widowed Mrs. Oscar Huevo.”
    “Zowie.”
    “Exactly. She’s wife numero uno, and she’s out for bear.”
    Ten minutes later numero uno marched out of the salon door, crossed the deck, and swung her ass down the gangplank. She adjusted her sunglasses, tucked her dog back into the bag, and power-walked the length of the pier.
    I dropped my binoculars into my new tote bag. “You stay here and watch the boat,” I said to Hooker. “I’m going to follow her, see where she goes.”
    Hooker handed me the keys to the SUV. “In a small, dark corner of my brain there’s a fear that once you’re out of my sight you’re going to get on a plane and go home without me,” he said.

SIX
    I ran to the SUV and slid behind the wheel just as the widow Huevo strode into the parking lot and got into a waiting limo. I cranked the engine over and followed at a distance. The driver took Fifth Street and then went north on Collins. Several blocks later, the driver turned into the elaborate entrance to the Loews Miami Beach Hotel. Mrs. Huevo disembarked, still carrying her doggie bag. The limo trunk popped open and bellmen scrambled to unload luggage. The luggage was put on a cart and whisked away into the hotel, following the swinging ass of Mrs. Huevo.
    I had Hooker on the phone. “She’s checking into Loews, and she’s got a lot of luggage.”
    “She looks like she’d take three steamer trunks for an overnight.”
    “I’m going to hang out here for a while and see if anything interesting happens,” I told Hooker.
    “Ten-four.”
    Loews is a spectacular hotel with acres of marble, pretty couches, and potted palms. It has outdoor areas that look like a cross between a Fred Astaire movie and King Tut’s tomb. And it all leads to the glorious wide white sands of South Beach and the rolling Atlantic. I valet-parked the SUV and walked into the super-air-conditioned lobby. It was so cold my nipples got hard and my fingertips turned purple. I’m not one to make frivolous purchases, but in the interest of nipple well-being I forked over thirty dollars to the hotel gift shop and bought a sweatshirt.
    I took a position on one of the couches and