Below the Surface

by Karen Harper

  “You’re kidding. In here?”

  “And since it’s not polluted,” Nikki said, taking a big swig of caipirinha, “King Cane cannot be blamed for hurting your sea grass hundreds of miles away.”

  “Was that King Cane or King Kong, my dear?” Josh asked, his cleverness sounding too forced. “This reminds me of the scene where the big ape comes out of the jungle—”

  “You’re not getting another one of these,” Nikki said, taking yet another swallow of her own drink.

  Suddenly, the green cane curtain ended in a big circle. Before them lay a large pond edged by reeds, with ibis wading for fish and cormorants spreading their wings to dry.

  “This day is full of surprises,” Bree admitted.

  “You ain’t seen nothing yet,” Josh said. “This is the hundred-acre detention pond, which filters out the phosphorus and nitrogen from the farm’s runoff before it even flows through the Glades to the gulf.”

  “Mandated by the ruinous Everglades Forever Act in ’94,” Nikki added. “As wonderful as it sounds, its purpose was to punish cane growers for giving Americans exactly what they wanted. Sugar—so they could all get obese! And, over here, our Shangri-la away from home.”

  Bree looked left where Nikki pointed and saw they’d erected a screened-in dome, large enough for a table and four chairs. A hammock hung inside, too. The cane field they’d just come through backed up tight against it, but on the other side was a great view of the pond. As they headed for it, a distant bell began to toll.

  “Damn, I told Lindy to hold dinner,” Nikki said, pouting. “Do you have your cell, Josh?”

  “Nope. This wouldn’t be paradise if I dragged contact with the outside world in here. Bree?”

  “Sorry. I left mine in the house. I had no idea we were going anywhere but to the veranda for a drink.”

  “I’ll jog back and tell her not to expect us for a half hour or so,” Nikki said as Josh opened the screen door and she deposited the drink tray on the table. “It won’t take me ten minutes, and I’m carrying that machete with me. I’ll bring a cell phone back.”

  “No cells!” Josh called as she hurried away. “No e-mails, no interviews, no statements, no press releases!” His voice trailed off as his wife disappeared around the twelve-foot-high, green corner of cane.

  “Sometimes,” he said with a sigh, “I’d rather be raising cane here than on the campaign circuit.”

  His pun seemed as flat as his earlier stabs at humor. Of course, he was tired, Bree realized, and trying to be a good host. But, like Nikki’s false-fronted house, was he covering up something?

  “That reminds me,” Bree said, as she took the wooden chair Josh indicated and he sank into the one next to her, “did Mark fly you here, too? Nikki and I could have waited for you.”

  “Yeah. He’s back and forth a lot,” he told her, rubbing his eyes with his thumb and index finger. “He has an apartment at Nikki’s dad’s house here, but he’s on call to us 24-7 since I’ve been running.” He looked over at her and forced a smile. “Like the Energizer Bunny, running, and running…”

  “I’m sure the strain of being onstage all the time is grueling. Everyone watching, never any private time—except here with Nikki. You’d never get away alone with anyone but her or Mark.”

  He didn’t answer but frowned out over the pond. Several red-beaked gallinules were fighting and others skimmed across the water’s surface, half running, half flying, as if to cheer on their favorite. Bree wondered if this convenient time alone with Josh was just a gift from God—or orchestrated by the earthly deities who seemed to rule this cane kingdom. Either way, she was not going to let this ten minutes Nikki had mentioned go to waste.

  “I’m sure it will be really emotional going back to our high school tomorrow, especially after Daria’s loss,” she said. “You two shared so many good times there—so many memories and, once upon a time, plans for the future.”

  “I hadn’t thought of the event that way. It all seems a long time ago. I’m in and out of the place in an hour and a half, with a speech to the whole school, then a Q and A with the government classes. Mark got some newspaper coverage.”

  “I know I’d be thinking of Ted—picturing him there—if I went back. And then, of course, recalling all that came later between us.”

  Josh shifted in his seat and took another swig of his caipirinha. The cane close behind them rattled its leaves, the sound almost like distant clapping. Bree’s hands tightened around her sweaty glass, resting on the arm of her chair.

  “But now Ted’s dead,” she went on, “and Sam blames me. It’s hard to have that on my head and heart. Sam acts as if I actually physically harmed Ted.”

  Josh sat up ramrod straight. “Bree, I know you’re grieving for her—I am, too, of course. But obviously, my emotions weren’t tied to her like yours, except—ah, you know…from the past.”

  The silver-tongued Josh was fumbling for words. Had she hit a nerve?

  “The truth is, I really, really regret,” he said as every nerve in her own body tensed, “that Sam Travers has been such a jerk to you over the years.”

  That wasn’t where she’d wanted the conversation to go at all. How could she get him back on Daria without giving everything away?

  “I can handle Sam, but—”

  “He’s only happy blowing things up lately, but that’s what he’s always done,” Josh insisted, “personally and professionally. He wanted to control Ted’s life from the moment Ted’s mother walked out. I shouldn’t have spoken up for him to get that Sarasota demolition job, but I thought you might like him out of your hair for a while.”

  “You arranged that job? As a favor to me?” Or, she thought, as a ploy to get Sam’s backing for your senate run.

  “Yes, and he mentioned he’d like to buy you out. I told him it had better be a fair price. Had you thought about that?”

  “He asked. I said no. I’m surprised both you and Ben think you can try to push us into that, though.”

  “Who’s us?” he said, ignoring her testy tone and veering off her chosen path again. “You’re talking as if Daria’s still with you.”

  She’d meant Manny, of course, but she saw another way to shake Josh up. “You know how identical twins are,” she said, leaning on the arm of her chair to turn her whole body in his direction. She wanted to shriek at him, to demand to know if he’d had an affair with Daria and fathered her child, but then he’d surely clam up. And Nikki might be back soon. She had to do this quickly, quietly, but take a risk.

  “How identical twins are?” he repeated her words, narrowing his eyes and staring her down. “Meaning what?”

  “We always shared everything, no matter what we told others. We even knew what the other was thinking, feeling.”

  Lies, lies, she told herself. She’d learned that the hard way in the eight days Daria had been dead. But surely Josh didn’t know that.

  “You’re not suggesting some sort of ESP with her, even now?” he asked, his usually assured voice gone almost breathy.

  “I don’t believe in ghosts, Josh, and yet I think someone could have harmed her. I believe she’s at peace, but I can’t let it rest.”

  She let her voice hang. She was starting to panic. Nikki would come back and she might not get Josh alone again, though she supposed his affair could be known to his wife. No, impossible. Not the way they carried on together.

  She tried the only other tack she could think of. “Josh, did you consider that the autopsy might show more than just cause of death? Daria was pregnant—and I can’t help but wonder if that could have, in a way, been the cause of her death. Not that the pregnancy went wrong, but that someone wanted to hush it up. I know you and Ben were trying to keep some things under wraps. I was going to mention it to you and Nikki later, but—”

  He looked angry, but also puzzled. “Who was she seeing?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. Do you?”

  “Are you crazy? You think it was me?”

&nbs
p; “It was someone she felt she couldn’t tell me about, for some reason.”

  “But you just said you shared everyth—”

  “I know what I said.”

  “Are you trying to set me up? You do think she was seeing me! Well, she wasn’t. And I don’t need you mentioning that Daria was pregnant to Nikki. She’s had two miscarriages, and I don’t want her suspicions running wild when there is no basis in fact. Bree, damn it, I trust you, and I expect you to do the same. I am not the father of Daria’s child. Hell, I’m not the father of any living child! And my only part in getting the autopsy results was trying to speed things up so you wouldn’t have to suffer longer than you were.”

  That was the thing about golden boy Josh Austin—he always had the right answers, Bree told herself as she apologized to him and said she’d been grasping at straws. “I only know how much she loved you once,” she said, looking out over the lake. “I had to know.”

  “Now you do. I repeat, I’m trusting you to be fair about this and not spread any sort of ugly rumor that would tarnish my reputation or Daria’s memory.”

  Or your marriage or campaign, she thought. His voice had wavered, perhaps because she’d surprised and upset him. Before she’d discovered Daria had lied to her, she supposed she would have given Josh the benefit of the doubt, but now she wasn’t sure. Did she really think he would have admitted an affair to her when that fact could ruin his marriage, his financial backing and tie him to a possible murder?

  Then again, she had to admit, there was no murder investigation but in her own heart and mind. Ben passed it off as untenable; Josh hadn’t made that leap when he denied the affair. Only Cole seemed to be in her corner, and he always played devil’s advocate.

  “I’m baa-ack,” Nikki called, and Bree saw she had Mark with her. “Guess who I found, hoping for a handout at dinner?”

  Josh didn’t look any too pleased to have his aide here, but then, Mark Denton was the ultimate symbol of the campaign Josh had come here to escape, even if for a few moments.

  As the sun sank and the tall cane cast long shadows across the pond, everyone chatted amiably, though she could tell Josh was seething. She knew she should regret that she’d abused her host and longtime friend with her fishing expedition, but she didn’t. If she’d been careless or headstrong, too bad, because she was getting more desperate yet determined by the minute.

  21

  As soon as Mark Denton dropped her off at her apartment, Bree headed straight for Dom Verdugo’s yacht to talk to Cole. It was just after noon, but she was exhausted. All night, she’d dreamed of Josh swinging machetes and cutting off heads, of sharks swimming out of waves of tall green sugarcane to devour her.

  Did those crazy dreams mean something? Should she heed them and, despite the fact the Austins were crisscrossing the state campaigning, try to keep an eye on them? Cole was doing the same thing with Dom Verdugo, and she’d have to watch what she said on his casino yacht, too.

  The huge banner draped across the side of the boat read You Can Bet On It! Bree shook her head. There didn’t seem to be much she’d be willing to bet on lately. She felt she was fighting the riptide again. Every time she thought she could get closer to answers, she was hit with another powerful pull of water trying to yank her under. And, in her worst nightmares, Daria still floated within the windows of the wheelhouse as if she were trying to escape from a glass coffin.

  Bree was met at the bottom of the gangway by a young man with such bulky shoulders that he seemed to have no neck. Cole had said there were a couple of men here who, physically, at least, could be candidates for her attacker at the Gator Watering Hole. Her assailant had had a T-shirt mask covering his neck, but this man’s build and height fit. Before she could open her mouth to tell him who she was and that she was here to see Cole, he said, “Ms. Devon, right? Mr. DeRoca said you might stop by. Right this way.”

  She followed him to an entry amidships. It was a beautiful craft with inlaid teak and mahogany, polished rails, gleaming brass fittings, and velvet drapes covering windows. She could hear music floating from somewhere aft and pounding, probably Cole’s, just ahead.

  “Have you worked for Mr. Verdugo long?” she asked, wanting to hear this man’s voice again. She’d like to put him in a lineup, along with Ric, with black T-shirts wrapped around their lower faces and wrenches in their hands and have them all repeat the single word babe.

  “Not long, ma’am.”

  “Are you part of the crew?”

  “Bouncer in the casino, once things get going.”

  “Do you think the gambling vote will go your way?”

  “Never put anything past Mr. Verdugo.”

  He led her into a spacious area with several so-called one-armed bandits sitting in the middle of the floor, crowding crap tables and roulette wheels so that Cole could work on the walls. She didn’t see him until he rose to his feet across the cluttered room and their eyes met. As ever, clear down to the pit of her belly, she felt the jolt of his stare, the sensual impact of just being near him.

  “See, you’re a lucky man without even gambling, Mr. DeRoca,” her escort called to Cole and left them alone.

  She ran right into his arms. Lifting her off her feet, he held her tight and kissed her hard. They seemed to breathe in unison, both suddenly out of breath. Cole’s body felt as hard as the wood he crafted with his callused hands, which skimmed her back and cupped her bottom.

  “Mmm,” he said finally, “I’m getting sawdust all over you.”

  “I don’t mind.”

  “Yeah, but a little more of that and you’ll be a walking giveaway of what happened in here, with sawdust all over your backside.”

  She felt herself blush hot. This was crazy. She was hardly a teenager like Lucinda, and when she had been, she’d never felt like this.

  “Besides,” he added, whispering now, “this place may have eyes and ears, for all I know, so save anything privileged for when we go to lunch. Let me wash my hands, and I’ll get out of here for a while.”

  But the moment he returned, another man appeared with a quick knock on the door frame. “Mr. Verdugo told me that when the banging stopped—” Bree bit her lower lip and flushed again “—to tell you two that lobster salad and wine is waiting for you on the stern deck.”

  Bree was both touched and annoyed. She wanted to get away with Cole, to tell him things about her trip across the state that she’d been afraid to say over the phone, in case Josh could eavesdrop somehow. For one moment, she sensed Cole tense up and thought he was going to refuse the offer, but she was wrong.

  “That’s really nice of him,” Cole told the man, who was also rather muscle-bound and the right height for her attacker. “I need to keep my nose to the grindstone here to meet the deadline for the party cruise anyway. Tell him thanks.”

  At least, Bree saw when they walked out onto the open deck, the table was set for only two. It was as beautifully arranged as everything in cane country had been, and spoke equally of money and power.

  Cole signaled her to keep quiet, then picked up his plate and wine, motioning for her to do the same. They carried them off the boat onto the dock, down to the wooden stairs meant for boarding smaller boats without gangways. They put their food down and took off their shoes as she filled him in on Josh’s denial he had anything to do with Daria’s pregnancy. Dangling their feet in the water, they had their private, impromptu picnic.

  “That was a nice table for two,” she admitted as they kept an eye on the boat.

  “For all I know,” Cole told her through a big bite of lobster salad, “the table was bugged.”

  “We’re both getting paranoid.”

  “Just careful.”

  “But we’re eating Verdugo’s food, drinking his wine.”

  “He’s not going to poison anything except the gulf and people he hooks on gambling. He thinks he can buy anything. Tomorrow night he’s invited the powers-that-be in the area—us, too, if we want to go—for a cruise party. If
he could pay for individual pro-gambling votes, he would.”

  “How is your paneling deadline going, then?”

  “I’ve had two holes in wood that I thought were just knots, but they weakened the entire plank as if I’d exploded a piece right out of it. I’ll have to complain to my supplier.”

  “That reminds me, another thing Josh told me is that he’s the one who got Sam the job blowing up the bridge in Sarasota.”

  Bree thought again of how the newspaper headline had described her report to the Clear the Gulf Commission: Bombshell. Her eyes lifted at the sound of a commotion down the dock, and Cole turned toward it, too. Two young men in an old rowboat had somehow hit into the end of the dock and staved a hole in their hull. They were cursing, laughing and bailing madly.

  “Need some help?” Cole called to them.

  “No, we’re okay!” one called back, still laughing.

  Bree gasped. “That’s it.”

  “That’s what?”

  “I know the police said they thought they’d found the place where Mermaids II scraped the concrete breakwater and sank, but the newspaper also said someone on the shore near Marco Pass thought they heard a bang. Of course, that could have been the dive boat hitting the wall during the thunderstorm. We saw that the stern had been broken.”

  “Yes. So?”

  “I guess, in that storm, the stern could be heading in first. But what if a detonator cap was set to go off and that’s why she—the boat and Daria—went down there? We should have looked more carefully, and so should the police. Once we found Daria, no one looked further at that piece of the stern to see if it was broken or blown in.”

  “And if explosives were involved, that would mean Sam Travers is, too?”

  “Yes, or one of his men. I told you Ric could have easily gotten into my apartment with his ladder, then worn his diving and painting gloves so he didn’t leave prints.”

  “So that Gator Watering Hole coaster could lead to him. But that’s a stretch to tie him to being the father of her baby.”