“Will you take The Black Rum and go out and try to find Walker and Blake?” Raine asked, wiping back the tears.
“If the Coast Guard doesn’t find them, you bet we will. We won’t have a choice. We won’t let them stay out there like that.”
After Anniston reached the bottom of the last box—a slew of bestselling hardcovers that went back ten years or more—she made a decision. “It’s time to move on to the house. This is just typical stuff any family might keep in their garage. There’s nothing here of value.”
“Yeah,” Garret said in agreement. “Nothing’s surfaced that suggests a sinister plot.”
On the way to the house, Mitch explained about the open window theory in the laundry room. As soon as he got everyone inside, they all four crowded into the twelve by twelve utility room, staring up at the windows.
Garret leaned over the stainless steel washer and dryer that sat directly underneath, ran his hand along the wall. “Are those scuff marks?” He pointed to a few obvious black lines that stood out on the white paint.
Anniston put her hands on her hips and studied the smudges. “I saw those the first time I was here. But if this is the entry point, then someone would’ve had to put the screen back on before the state police got here.”
“Jessup Sinclair did a walk-through after Mom filed a missing persons report. That’s at least a day before the state cops rolled into town,” Garret pointed out. “If we think he’s involved in this, he could’ve messed with the evidence.”
Anniston wasn’t so sure. “No question the guy has a dark past with the highway patrol. But I’m reluctant to hang every single thing that doesn’t add up on the chief of police.”
Mitch looked at his watch, intervened. “We’re on the clock here. We don’t have time to debate the issue. Whether Sinclair covered things up, we may never know. Right now our mission is to comb through as much of the house as time allows.”
On the opposite wall, Raine had been going through the bank of cabinets and drawers. But all she’d found so far were the usual paraphernalia on hand to launder clothes. When she spotted Livvy’s craft corner she took the time to go through the boxes and containers. It was an organized space, albeit small. But Livvy had found a way to cram her supplies into a limited, out-of-the-way nook.
When Raine opened the dryer she discovered where Livvy had done a load of laundry for the kids. Their little shorts and tops were still there, bunched together among the fragrant smell of lavender dryer sheets.
“I don’t think I can do this,” Raine announced. “Everything I touch reminds me that I’ll never see them again.”
“Want me to take you home?” Mitch offered.
Raine puffed out a sigh, scrubbed her hands over her face. “No. No. It’s okay. I’ll buck up. I just have to keep telling myself I’m doing something to help find out who did this to them.”
With that, Anniston ushered them into the kitchen. They divided the room into quarters, each taking a section. They looked behind bowls and dishes, sifted through silverware drawers. They even removed each drawer from its rollers, one by one, turning it upside down to make sure nothing had been taped to the bottom. They scoured the pantry, found a brand new bag of Oreos they passed around to share for breakfast.
Mitch and Garret practically took apart the little corner desk. They found reminders of dental appointments for the kids, a hair appointment for Livvy for a trim, and a notice to Walker that his subscription to Florida Sportsman was about to expire.
With four snooping people, it didn’t take long for them to pronounce the kitchen clear. Following the slate tile floors into the dining room, they repeated the process, combing through the hutch and buffet. But so far the search had yielded nothing.
They rifled through the cabinets under the huge aquarium that separated the middle wall from the living area and focused on making sure the fish tank wasn’t holding back a surplus of secrets.
Leaving nothing to chance, Raine and Anniston even decided to check all the potted plants. Going from banana tree to Norfolk pine and everything in between, they picked up each pretty container to look underneath and came up with nothing.
They checked every cubbyhole in the living room, went through bookcases, even dug into the sofa cushions. They turned the spacious entryway upside down. Even the umbrella stand didn’t escape scrutiny.
But they found nothing that sent up a red flag.
Upstairs, they went through Ally’s and Blake’s rooms, including their closets, before making it to the master bedroom. They dug into the chest and dresser drawers, repeating the standard search for anything hidden on the bottom. They practically disassembled the king-sized bed, lifting the mattress to see what was underneath. But there was no smoking gun diary, or journal, or some slip of paper that shed light on why this had happened.
Garret poked through the nightstand on Walker’s side of the bed and lifted out the only interesting thing he found there. “What the hell? The Successful Guide to Treasure Hunting.” He looked at his brother, then tossed the book to him. “Do you really think Walker had the chops to go after something like this?”
“Huh. There was another hard copy downstairs in the bookcase about the same thing. The Top 20 Lost Treasures of The World. I didn’t think anything about it.”
“Did he ever talk to you about hunting for, you know, treasure?” Garret asked.
“He emailed me a couple of times about the 1715 Spanish treasure fleet. And cornered me once last Christmas, trying to pick my brain about its whereabouts. But he was never specific about anything so I passed it off as nothing more than trying to make small talk at a family function.” Mitch slumped against the wall, looked at the others. “I’m getting a bad feeling about the choices Walker made. What if Walker really did take an interest in the hunt for lost gold? What if the Patagonia Pike is here because of Walker?”
Garret traded looks with Anniston and Raine. “So Walker contacted this Dietrich guy down in South America and got him up here looking for Nazi gold?”
Anniston began to pace in front of the French doors. “Tessa did mention that as a kid Ryan talked about going in search of treasure one day. And he ended up dead. I think we might be onto something. The search for treasure has to be the connection.”
Raine couldn’t imagine it. “But you’re talking about them getting killed over such an innocent pursuit. Would Walker and Ryan actually believe they could find such a thing without having any experience at all?”
Mitch needed to set her straight. “It’s not such an innocent pursuit, especially for someone like Dietrich.” Or for him, he decided, if he was honest with himself. “Most guys have a fantasy, whether it’s quarterbacking in the NFL or pitching in the major leagues, some people dream big.”
“And some people dream about finding gold,” Anniston added. “There’s all kinds of different treasure rumored to be within the Florida Keys. Not just Spanish gold, or Nazi gold. There’s one tale about Confederate gold going missing at the end of the Civil War and historians have long thought that it ended up in the Gulf waters near the Florida coastline.”
“And pirate gold,” Raine tossed out, beginning to think back to another time. “There are plenty of stories floating around here about that.” She turned to look at Mitch. “Remember the big find by an Australian crew back in high school? That’s what got you all jazzed about doing this kind of thing down the road. What were you, fifteen at the time? Those Aussie divers found a Spanish galleon right off the coastline. For months that’s all you could talk about. You must’ve known then that’s what you wanted to do for a living.”
Mitch nodded wistfully at the memory. And realized that’s when everything had changed for him. “From that point on, it’s what I knew I’d be good at, going after sunken treasure.”
“You certainly have given it your all,” Raine declared, as a chunk of resentment fell away.
Garret dragged a hand through his hair. “But the Patagonia Pike specializes in hunting do
wn Nazi gold, they wouldn’t make the trip here for Confederate.”
Alarm tightened Mitch’s face. “That’s right. And Dietrich is not a man you want to mess with. He’s rumored to be the wrong guy to form a partnership with in excavation endeavors because he doesn’t like to share. With anyone. Not a country or a state. This is beginning to make more sense to me. Maybe Walker got a crazy burr up his ass that he could throw in with Dietrich.”
“If only we had something concrete to tie Dietrich to Walker and Livvy,” Anniston stated. “We’d have to get our hands on his email account to see if Walker ever contacted Dietrich.”
“How good is your relationship with Dack Hawkins?” Garret asked. “I know it’s a lot more than your daddy knowing his.” He held up his hands when she started to protest. “Your past is your business. I just want to know if you can get your hands on Walker’s emails.”
Anniston eased back with the attitude. “Maybe. Hawkins might’ve released the house, but he kept the family’s laptops, computers, and their phones. Although he did share the two calls I mentioned the other day. Now that he’s working this as a homicide, though, we’re back to square one. I’ll be lucky to get him to share anything at all. It’s standard policy for cops to dig in and not want to discuss an ongoing investigation. Plus, it’s a great way to stonewall people like me in the business I’m in. It forces me to think outside the box.”
“I’ve no doubt you’ll come up with a way.” Garret moved to the French doors to stare out at the neighborhood and the street below. “I know you said you went door to door to canvass the neighbors. I know they said they didn’t see anything. But what about the house across the street—the one that’s catty-corner from here? It has a security camera installed by the front porch.”
Anniston’s brow tightened. “Where?”
Mitch followed Anniston to the window and watched as Garret pointed toward the intersection at the end of the block—the other side of Blue Fin and Windward. “That house. That camera.”
Anniston thought back. “I knocked on the door once, but no one was home. I’d have to check my notes, but I’m almost positive I learned that it’s a vacation rental, empty now, has been since the end of summer.”
Mitch slapped his brother on the back. “Good catch, but the angle’s all wrong. It doesn’t cover Livvy’s front porch at all, certainly not the side or the back.”
Garret chewed the inside of his jaw. “Doesn’t matter. The angle would capture all the people who drove their car back toward town. They’d have to go directly past that camera to do it. It’s the most direct route back toward the business district. If the same car traveled back and forth on the night they went missing and we eliminate the neighbors—”
“We might have something,” Anniston finished.
“Do you know what a long shot that is?” Mitch argued.
The private eye wheeled on Mitch. “You have a better idea?”
Mitch stuffed his hands in the pockets of his jeans. “Not at the moment. Fine. I’ll go ask if they’ll let me look at the feed that covers, say, two weeks ago.”
“I’ll take care of it,” Anniston promised. “You guys take care of picking up your parents and Jackson and Tessa from the airstrip. I’ve got this.”
“Are you sure?” Garret asked.
But the go-getter detective was already on the phone looking up tax records to see who owned the rental.
Chapter Three - Heat
Garret borrowed Mitch’s rented Titan pickup to haul the family from the little airfield that served the Florida Keys back home to Indigo. Luckily his brother Jackson had been able to get them nonstop tickets from Norfolk to Miami where they’d boarded a commuter jet for the last leg home.
As soon as Garret spotted his parents coming down the steps, he noted how exhausted they looked. Jackson and Tessa had the same worn-out appearance. Ryan’s funeral had obviously taken its toll on Tessa, but the others were suffering from the grief of knowing Livvy and Ally wouldn’t be coming home.
Garret rushed toward his mother. Without a word, he caught her up in a big hug. “I’m sorry, Mom.” He draped an arm around his dad. “You okay? How was the flight?”
“Longest six hours of my life,” Tanner groused. “Remind me again why anyone bothers to go anywhere.”
Garret went over to help Jackson with the luggage. “How are you holding up?” He thumbed a hand over toward their parents. “The media will likely be waiting for them back at home.”
“I know. I’ll try to run interference as much as I can. Dad’s beyond upset. Who knows who he’ll accuse if they stick a microphone in his face. The last thing we need is for Dad to go off on the press.”
Garret related the morning’s events, sticking to the reason they’d gone to Livvy’s. “We went through that house top to bottom for almost six hours, found a few interesting items that I need to talk to you about.”
“Yeah. Well, I need to tell you a few things, too. But it’s not a good idea for Mom or Dad to hear, at least not yet. They’ll likely explode when they do. Now’s not the right time.”
“Is it about Livvy and Nathan having an affair?”
Jackson fumbled the hold he had on his and Tessa’s suitcases. “How do you know about that? I just found out before I left. It was more of a hunch really. How do you know?”
Garret leaned closer, lowered his voice to a whisper. “I found Livvy’s Day-Timer from three years back and thumbed through it. Saw where she’d scribbled in Nathan’s name over and over again with the purpose of meeting up with him, mostly on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Jackson, the thing was hidden behind the water heater in the garage.”
“I had no idea it had been going on for that long. I thought maybe within the last year or so they’d gotten hot and heavy.”
Garret stopped his progress so his parents wouldn’t hear. “From what I could tell flipping through it, their affair goes back to Livvy’s thirtieth birthday. We should probably confront Nathan about it.”
“Yeah. Well, good luck with that. Nathan went out of town on a supposed business trip to Denver, a banking convention. That’s what he told his wife five days ago. When I had some time on my hands back in Nags Head, I called the Chamber of Commerce in Denver. No bank convention in town and hasn’t been since last summer.”
“Nathan lied?”
“Looks that way, since he’s dodging my phone calls and won’t return an email. Funny thing is that was right before the shrimp boat found Livvy and Ally.”
“Do you suppose Nathan is mixed up in this in some way?”
“Why else would he take off like this without a word? What is it they say about coincidences?” Jackson narrowed his eyes as he shot a glance over at his mother. “So we’ll find a quiet spot and talk about this later. Does Mitch know?”
“Are you kidding? I’m not gonna be the one to drop this bombshell. He’ll leap to her defense. There’ll be a scene and he’ll accuse us of disparaging Livvy’s good name. He’d likely punch me in the face if I even tried to bring it up.”
“Okay. We’ll pick the right time to tell him before moving on to Mom and Dad…at some point. But it won’t be today. What were the other items you found?”
“Two books about treasure hunting written by so-called experts in the field. Mitch opens one, I thumb through the other, and you can see where Walker highlighted certain key passages in both books that pertain to going after and acquiring a financial backer.”
“Who would that be? Royce or Dietrich?”
“Mitch and I are leaning toward Werner Dietrich. Why else would he come to the Florida Keys? Another coincidence? I don’t think so.”
“Wow. Okay. I guess we have a lot to talk about. I’ll have to find a way to take Tessa aside and let her know.”
“How’d the funeral go? I didn’t want to ask Tessa outright. But how’d it go with her weird family dynamics?”
“Her stepmother is a piece of work, I’ll tell you that much. Suzanne Connelly tried to run the whole show.
It didn’t sit well with Tessa. She butted heads with that woman over numerous attempts to turn Ryan’s service into a damn circus.”
“What did her dad do during all the head-butting?”
“Mostly stood back and let Tessa take the lead to try and muzzle Suzanne. At least Tessa tried to. We took her father out to dinner last night. Nice guy, by the way, and tried to tell him he ought to do something about the insane amount of life insurance Suzanne has on him. Turns out, it’s something like four million.”
“Holy shit. And?”
“He said he’d think about it.”
“Sheesh. Sounds like he’s not ready to stand up for himself.”
“That’s part of it.”
The conversation came to an abrupt end when their dad grew impatient and laid down on the horn. “What’s taking y’all so long? Let’s get a move on. I’d like to get home sometime today.”
The brothers exchanged amused looks and finished dealing with the luggage. As they stuffed it into the bed of the truck, they agreed to table any more theories about Livvy until later. Jackson made room in the cramped backseat for his mother and Tessa while Tanner crawled into the front to ride shotgun.
The ride home was somber. No one said much. That’s why Garret was surprised when his mother cleared her throat and stated in a clear voice, “Your father and I have decided we’re going to skip having the funerals at Life Stone Church.”
“We plan to pick an alternate location. That is once we find Blake,” Tanner added. “We’ve thought about this long and hard since I confronted Boone that day at the church. If it ended up this way, your mother and I agreed to make other arrangements. We’ve decided not to set foot inside Life Stone ever again as long as Boone is standing in the pulpit.”
Lenore sat with her hands folded in her lap. “We have to consider that maybe he already knew where Livvy and Ally were and that’s why he thought the search was a waste of time. Why else would he derail it like he did? We came to this decision because we don’t want that man anywhere near our daughter and grandchildren.”
The Indigo Brothers Trilogy Boxed Set Page 36