“You still here?” she asked, smiling.
“Ha, no, made a couple of stops and came back,” he said and smiled over his own iced tea. “I actually didn’t come in for breakfast earlier. I came to see you.”
Georgiana’s mind raced. What had happened last night? Oh God, did we drive? No, we took a cab, I remember that much… What could it be?
He must’ve seen the trepidation leap into her face, because he immediately held up his hands, and said, “You haven’t done anything wrong, miss. I just needed to talk with you about something.”
Her mind leapt to another unacceptable conclusion; oh geez, he was here to ask her out.
“Look, Officer…?”
“Biggins.”
“Officer Biggins, I’m flattered. I truly am, but I’m really… unavailable at the moment.” She couldn’t remember how many times she’d waved off potential suitors and wannabe daters at the bar with one line or another like this.
He picked up his napkin and wiped his smiling mouth. She was having trouble reading this guy.
“No ma’am.” He blushed. “I’m not here to… well, never mind that. I’m here because we’ve had a piece of evidence come up in a case that…”
He paused and stepped off his barstool. He reached into his pocket and produced what looked like a Ziploc bag. It said EVIDENCE on the side and contained a rumpled piece of paper.
It was her turn to be a little flustered. She’d basically just accused him of hitting on her, which in his case might not have been all that bad. She guessed most people would say he was plain. He wasn’t particularly tall, not ridiculously handsome, but good-looking enough. His hair was cut short, but not quite a cop buzz cut. He did have a nice smile though.
“Tell me what you can about this,” he said, handing it to her.
Georgiana flinched… Oops, was I staring? She felt the warmth in her cheeks and hoped they weren’t too red.
“It’s a receipt.”
“Yes, I can see that. But we found this receipt on someone that was apparently tortured… and ultimately murdered.”
“Murdered?” she asked, looking closer at the receipt.
Chesney nodded, pinching his lips together.
She checked the date and time stamp. Couple of days back, lunch rush… her mind searched back through the faces she had seen, but there were too many such days and they all ran together.
The signature line was a scribble, no help there either. The tip line was written in a curvy scrawl too, kind of familiar, kind of like… Georgiana felt her hands go numb.
“Twenty-five dollars,” she whimpered and felt tears sting her eyes. “Oh my God.”
Apparently not noticing her sudden surge of emotion, the officer said, “Yes, quite a lot, we thought, but hey, you are the town’s best…”
That was the last thing Georgiana (Laura-Kate) heard before she fainted.
9
Ev’rybody Jus’ Be Cool
Darren “The Body” McGlashen was sweating something fierce. He could tell his foot was swelling in his shoe, but he was afraid to unwrap the tourniquet. His tattooed accomplice, Man’ti, was driving, but the New Zealander kept trying to drive on the wrong side of the road. He’d nearly killed them both heading straight into the headlights of a UPS truck. They swerved just in time to leave a brown scrape where the driver’s side mirror had once been… not that he cared.
It was a stolen van that the previous owners had apparently stolen from the seventies. Bronze, with white pin striping around each and every panel, the van’s look couldn’t be considered complete without the airbrushed sunset on the back doors. Two crescent-moon shaped windows in each side near the back let light into a bed built for two. Orange shag carpet on the walls carried the musty odor of long past parties with beer, wine, cigarettes and cigars. Under the dash, clearly bolted on aftermarket, was an 8-track tape player, currently housing The Best of The Doors. Darren had insisted on fast-forwarding and flipping, fast-forwarding and flipping, again and again in an attempt to find his favorite Doors song, Been Down So Long. After several of Darren’s failed search attempts, Man’ti grabbed the whole 8-track player, jerked it out from its loosely screwed in perch, and flung it out his window.
“What the f—” Darren cried, incredulous, but upon seeing his companion’s dark eyes, he let it go.
Man’ti swerved again, jerking Darren so hard to the right he hit his head on the passenger side window.
“I dunno which is worse, mate,” Darren said through his fevered haze, “the pain in m’ foot, or your drivin’.”
Man’ti said nothing.
A muffled ding sounded from Darren’s pocket and he murmured something incoherent about a big trouble and flipped open his prepaid anonymous cell phone. He squinted into the blue light of the phone, trying desperately to make out the last message. He held the phone closer, then farther, then closer. The haze of pain in his head blurred the image, making it completely unreadable. Frustrated, he snapped the phone shut and shoved it back into his pocket.
“Gotta stop, mate… ” Darren’s head lolled from side to side, “… find me a chemist, mate. Amcal, Saugatuck, somethin’.”
“You’re delirious,” Man’ti growled, “ain’t none o’ them places here.”
Darren gritted his teeth and screeched, “DRUG STORE!! Find a damn drug store—”
His scream was abruptly interrupted when Man’ti’s fist slammed into his jaw. The darkness that closed in around him was comforting… so, so comforting.
Man’ti had had enough of the scrawny guy’s wailin’, so he knocked him out. He thought he might be right about needing meds though, so he pulled into the CVS just a few blocks away from Crazy Sam’s Mini Warehouse where they’d been camped out.
He wasn’t sure what to get, but he thought the Pharmacy bloke ought to be able to point him in the right direction. He parked the stolen van, but left it running. When he walked in, he could feel the stares of the workers inside, but he was used to it.
He stood almost two-hundred centimeters and weighed one-hundred-fifteen kilograms, average for most inmates at Rimutaka Prison in New Zealand, but way above average for CVS #2736 in Murrell’s Inlet, South Carolina. Picture an American Football linebacker, but meaner.
The girl at the register in the front of the store just stared and pointed when he asked for the druggist. He walked slowly to the back of the store, picking up duct tape, diapers and petroleum jelly on the way.
The pharmacist’s eyes went wide at the site of the hulking man at the counter. Man’ti calmly put his things down in one of the chairs near the pharmacy window, pulled the .38 from his belt, and pointed it at the man in the white coat.
“Larry,” he said, finding the man’s name on his CVS nametag, “I need somethin’ fa pain and somethin’ fa infection.”
Larry didn’t move. Instead, he peed. Man’ti smacked the man on the side of his head, not to kill him, just to put him out.
He walked behind the counter and two female pharmacists cowered behind the medicine shelves. One was crying, the other was shaking and moaning.
“Ev’rybody jus’ be cool,” he said as tucked the gun back into his belt. “Jus’ gotta get some drugs for m’ friend.”
Friend was a stretch, he thought, but he needed Darren alive to get what he was after.
He pointed to the pharmacist who was crying. “You, get the pain pills.”
She grabbed a prescription bag from the counter and began shoveling medicines in and sobbing.
“And you,” he said, turning to the pharmacist who was now rocking back and forth, but seemed to have it together somewhat, “antibodies.”
“Well, what’s the infection? I can’t just give you anything…”
Man’ti lurched forward, jutting his jaw an inch away from her nose. She yelped like a hurt animal.
“Toes,” he growled, “ripped right awf.”
She nodded and grabbed a bottle of pills. She shoved them into Man’ti’s hand and sputtered, “
This will help fight infection, but if there are bone splinters or jagged edges, it could become re-infected at any—”
“Got it.” He grabbed the bag of pain pills and shoved the antibiotics in with them. “G’night, ladies.”
He stepped over Larry, the pharmacist, and gathered his things from the chair in front of the counter. As he walked by the candy aisle, he grabbed a giant bag of orange circus peanuts, some peanut M&M’s, and three bags of Haribo brand gummi bears.
It was tough to carry all that he’d picked up and things kept slipping and falling from his arms. At the front door, he dumped all his stuff into one of the shopping baskets.
“May I?” He raised his eyebrows at the girl standing at the front register. She turned and ran toward the back of the store.
“I take that as a yes.”
10
#Hottie #Headboat #Ouch
Troy woke in the hammock hanging from the pilings under his beach house. He had come here to sleep so that Karah could have the bed to herself. She’d protested, saying that she would take the futon and he could have the bed, but the futon was unsleepable for more than a nap, so he’d insisted she take the bed and he would make do. And so, here he lay. He didn’t mind at all, as he’d spent more than a few nights under the house in the hammock; sometimes it was planned, sometimes it was due to the fact he couldn’t find his keys.
Warm air breezed over him, and he stretched. He could hear the comforting whoosh of the waves rolling in and racing out along the sand. The cowboy hat was tilted down over his eyes and sunlight peeked in through the straw.
Fighting the urge to catch another hour of shut-eye, he sat up, rolled out of the hammock and creaked his way up the back steps. He wasn’t sure if it was the decades-old wood groaning, or his body protesting the beating he’d given it chasing his rod and reel down the creek yesterday.
Guessing from the tide and the hazy early sun, it must’ve been about nine in the morning. He thought wistfully that it would’ve been a perfect morning to break out his rod and catch a few dozen fish from the creek… if some blasted fish hadn’t decided to take it for a ride out to sea.
He opened the door, more than half expecting Karah to have vacated the premises (he was used to this sort of thing happening as well.) However, he was surprised to be hit by a surge of breakfast smells emanating from the kitchen. She was pushing a spatula through what appeared to be a skillet of scrambled eggs while a plate full of bacon sat nearby, dripping and drying on a paper towel. He didn’t remember having bacon in the house, or eggs… or paper towels for that matter. The smell of the food was intoxicating.
She beamed at him from behind the kitchen counter as he came in. “Coffee or juice?”
“Coffee,” he said, scratching his head, “So… where did all this—”
“Relax,” she said, stopping him mid-sentence. “I needed my venti iced chai tea with soy and espresso from Starbucks, so I hit up the Farmer’s Market on the way back.”
“You needed a what?”
She laughed. It was an infectious sound.
“Never mind, silly.” She grinned and handed him a large Starbuck’s cup with a pink wrapper saying Now Proudly Serving Pastries from La Boulange Bakery in San Francisco. “I got you a white chocolate mocha. It’s definitely not truck stop coffee, but I think you’ll like it.”
She watched and waited expectantly as he took a sip. He was pleasantly surprised. It wasn’t merely good… it was damn good! It wasn’t really coffee in the technical sense, but more like hot chocolate, but he supposed that’s what the granolas were serving down at Starbucks anyway. He nodded his approval and slurped more of the warm, sweet coffee-esque beverage.
“Yayyy!” She clapped her hands together and smiled an even bigger smile. “I hope you like bacon too.”
“You’re kidding, right?” He slid onto a stool and pulled himself up to the bar that looked into the kitchen. “Who doesn’t like bacon?”
“Good,” she said, scooping some of the scrambled eggs onto a plate and piling bacon on top.
“Hats off at the breakfast table, mister,” she said, filling her own plate and coming around to perch on a stool beside him. He took the hat off and flung it over to the futon.
“Better?” He grinned.
She nodded, smiling around another bite of bacon.
Apparently, she had raided his closet to find an old Pawleys Island Fourth of July t-shirt and a pair of his boxers. Suddenly, she bit her bottom lip.
“I hope it’s okay I borrowed some of your clothes,” she asked, and nodded to the t-shirt. “More comfy than a bikini to sleep in.”
“Mi casa es tu casa.” He chewed a piece of bacon and sipped more coffee.
“I can put ‘em back if you want…” She started to raise the t-shirt.
Troy could see the tan skin of her stomach underneath and nearly choked on his bacon. “NO, no… just keep it. Or you can bring it back later, or whatever.”
She looked puzzled, but then grinned and maybe blushed a little.
“Troy!” she playfully, pushing his shoulder and raising an eyebrow. “I have my bikini on underneath!”
“Ah… oh… um…” he stammered. It was his turn to blush.
She winked at him and picked up her cell phone from the counter. She tapped the screen with her thumbs in a flurry of what he thought must be a text message. Pause, set phone down, pick up phone, more tapping.
“I need to check in with my cousin in a bit anyway,” she said and looked up from the screen with a tinge of worry creasing her eyes. “I’ve been texting her since last night, but she hasn’t texted me back.”
Troy caught a glimpse of the phone’s screen. “Hey, what is that?”
“What is what?” she said guiltily, and thumped the phone to her chest, hiding the screen.
“Let me see it,” he said and arched an eyebrow.
She sighed heavily and handed the phone to him. He slid his finger on the screen and was somewhat surprised to see an image of himself kneeling in the creek water, hands on the back of his head, silver jon boat floating past.
“You saw that?” He wasn’t sure if he was creeped out or not.
She nodded but said nothing.
“How much did you see?”
She shrugged her shoulders. “Um… everything?”
His eyebrow arched even further and he looked back at the screen. Under his photo were the words: KarahC1989: #springbreak #vaca #bestever #pawleys. Then another line: KarahC1989: #hottie #headboat #ouch. Apparently, a friend had seen the photo and commented as well: LaKatLit: OMG total babe! Please tell me u talked to him!
Troy handed the phone back to Karah and said nothing.
“I’m so sorry,” she said sheepishly. “I’ll delete it right now!”
He shrugged his shoulders and a smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “Hashtag hottie, eh?”
She bit her lip again and the blush returned fiercely.
After breakfast, he made her leave the dishes for him to do and she made him promise he’d hang out with her after she checked on her cousin. He wasn’t sure what a college girl would think of as hanging out, but he presently didn’t have much else to do, so he’d agreed.
11
Balancing Act
Laura Kate Starlington (known to most Pawleys patrons as Georgiana) sat in a booth at Lee’s Inlet Kitchen crying, clutching the evidence bag containing Rick Hairre’s last lunch receipt.
“He’s my… was my stepdad,” she said and choked out a sob. “Are you sure he’s…”
Deputy Chesney Biggins sat across the booth from her. “Georgiana, I’m afraid—”
“Please, call me Laura.”
He started again. “Okay, Laura, I’m afraid it’s definitely him.”
More tears burned her eyes.
“I found his body… well, I found him myself,” Chesney said, obviously trying to soften the blow.
“Why? I don’t understand.” Laura looked up at him. “Everyone loved him.”
>
The deputy shifted nervously in his seat, erupting one of those squeaky-farty vinyl seat booth noises that would’ve been funny under any other circumstances but now just heightened the anxiety.
“We really don’t know much yet,” he said, and lifted a hand and rubbed the back of his neck. “That’s why I came to you.”
He shifted in his seat again. “I only thought you were the last person we could confirm to have seen him. I had no idea you were his daughter.”
“Step daughter, yes,” she said, “but he’s the only dad I’ve ever known.”
“So, you’re a Starlington?” Chesney raised an eyebrow. “Of the Starlington Stables Starlingtons?”
Laura took a sip of coffee that had long since gone cold, but she was numb from shock anyway.
“My mother’s family,” she added. “Pretty distant relations though. I haven’t kept up with any of them since she died.”
He nodded, but didn’t say anything. She knew what he was probably thinking. The Starlingtons were ridiculously rich. To not keep up with them would seem strange to most people. But her mother had been the black sheep of the Starlingtons, preferring a simpler life, not carrying on the family’s legendary horse breeding tradition. They hadn’t exiled her mother, but preference definitely went to her siblings. Laura was pretty sure she wouldn’t be in the will.
An awkward silence stretched between them before Chesney spoke again. “So, how did you know it was his receipt?”
She smiled, and tears welled up in her eyes again. Wiping them away, she said, “My bank account had gotten low and I accidently bounced a check. I told Mrs. Reedy, my landlord, to hold it, but she must’ve forgotten.”
Another sip of cold coffee. “Anyway, the bank charged me a twenty-five-dollar overdraft fee, basically putting me in the negative.”
Chesney nodded, looking a little confused.
“So, dad was gonna give me the money, but I refused. Heck, I was gonna get paid in a week and I’d have it then.”
The Troy Bodean Tropical Thriller Series Boxset Page 5