by Robert Lane
“Tuesday,” he said, “wouldn’t put up with rowdies, but they’d come down in March—what the hell did she expect? I know we ain’t the Lani Kai, but we ain’t Disneyland either, man. You gotta go north for that kiddie shit.” I assumed he meant Walt Disney World, but I didn’t make Daniel as one who’d squabble over geography or proper corporate names.
“Anything else you heard or might recall that would be beneficial to me?”
“Nope.” He brought his right fist up to his chest and suppressed a beer belch. “They did say…” He paused as if he expected another burp, but it didn’t come. “They did…that means I think heard Randall mention…no, it was Zach. Yeah, Zach said it. No way would Randall say it—he’s too tight, you know? Randall runs like a river. All smooth like, but you never know what’s around the bend, know what I mean? One moment you’re enjoying the scenery, and the next you’re in the fight of your life. You ever do any white water rafting?”
“What did Zach say?” A middle-aged woman with a pleasing figure in tight jeans strolled past us.
“Goddamn, you see that?”
“It’s a wonderful world, Daniel. Stay with me. What did Zach say?”
“Zach? Oh, yeah. Not to me. But they came in one night, and Zach asked Randall if they were going to the farm.”
“They got land up in Ohio.”
“Yeah. I took copies of their driver’s licenses. Had to, even though they was always cash. Tuesday wanted to be able to locate anyone in case they did damage. Anyways, Randall said yeah, something about going to see Wesley—said they’d be back for dinner. I thought, is he gonna fly up there and back, you know, Ohio, in one day just to see some guy? But then Randall asked Zach if he put gas in the car, and I wondered if Randall was talking about meeting this guy at some local place, you know?”
“Wesley. What did he say about Wesley?”
“I dunno. I just remember hearing the name. I had a friend once named Wesley, and I figure that’s why I remember that. Wesley Varker. Sweet Lord, did he ever have one hot seventy-two Camaro.”
I leaned closer into Daniel. “Tell me everything.”
“White, with a mean blue streak down the middle of its hood and—”
“Wesley, Daniel. Not the wheels.”
“Okay, throttle it down there, man. That’s really it.”
“Last name?”
“Naw. You spotted that broad just now, right? Damn, she has to be pushing fifty and to sport new high beams like that? And those jeans? That’s hot, man. These older babes, you know, are just starting to wake up to—”
“Look at me, Daniel.” He refocused his eyes on mine, but I suspected it had been a long time since he hadn’t had any sea fog in his vision. No matter how close anyone got to him, or where he sat on the stool, he’d always be far away. “Tell me about the farm.”
“I just did.”
“What else?”
“Like what?”
“They mention any roads?”
“Don’t think so.”
“How long it took to get there?”
“Not really. Like I—”
“Think, Daniel.”
He backed away from me, reached for his drink, took a slow sip, and said, “That’s it. Nothing. Got it? Randall said he’d be back and that—”
“When was he?”
“What?”
“Back, Daniel. When did Randall get back?”
“I dunno—”
“Think. You do know.”
“Dude, whatcha do, chew through your leash this morning? I was off a few hours later. I don’t know when he came back. You got it? I’m empty here, man. Bottom of the well. Zippo. Empty. Gonesville.”
I was done with Daniel and wanted to run a search on any properties belonging to the Colemans in Florida. I thanked him for his time and started for the door.
“Hey,” he said from behind me. I turned around. He held his mug in the air. “You good for this, right?”
“I got it.”
I went outside to the side deck, which fronted a canal, and took a seat at a table under an umbrella with a vodka name on it. A snowy egret greeted me. “Sorry, buddy. Nothing for you.” The bird showed no expression as it took a tentative step closer to me.
I called Mary Evelyn, Garrett’s secretary. She knew that Garrett, who practiced law in Cleveland, and I did jobs for our former colonel. Colonel Janssen didn’t know she knew, but that was his problem.
“Mr. Travis,” she proclaimed, interrupting the second ring.
“I’m sorry. He’s not here. Can I get Jake for you?” I asked.
Getting Mary Evelyn to address me by my first name represented a rare failure in my life. She knew this and relished the game. She was eastside Cleveland, never-married, last-generation Catholic. Current culture had all but extinguished her kind. Maybe the government will grant her people casinos one day. She had slipped once and uttered my first name, but it had been accompanied by weakness on my part, and we’d never mentioned it. Like a time-out during a children’s game.
“Would you like to speak to Mr. Demarcus?”
She knew that if I didn’t want to play with her, I would’ve called his cell.
“No,” I replied. “It’s just that I’ve been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer—not much time I’m afraid—and if I could just hear my name from your lips. The doctor said sometimes the strangest kind acts can cure us. I freed a butterfly, talked a stranger into recycling, and sold my possessions to support homeless cats. You’re my last hope.”
“My sister was recently diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.”
I couldn’t take the chance. “I’m sorry. I had no idea.”
“No, wait just a minute. That might not be right. I think it was a pancake dinner she was inviting me to. Yes, I believe that was it. This Saturday at seven. St. Bartholomew’s.”
“That’s below the belt.”
“Mr. Travis, there are no rules in our battle. You, of all people, should know that. I’ll get Garrett for you.”
“Garrett. See? You do it for him.”
“I do.”
“Actually I called to ask a favor of you,” I said, and explained what I wanted. I asked her to check on any Coleman property within a two-hundred-mile radius of Fort Myers and to use the titled property in Ohio as a base. I told her to check under other family names as well. She asked what other family names, and I replied that I had no idea.
“Maybe a ‘Wesley,’” I said.
“Wesley? Anything to go along with that?”
“Wesley makes the very best?”
“Hmm…I could use some cocoa beans. That’s all you got?”
“Bottom of the well,” I replied, stealing Daniel’s phrase.
She said she’d get right on it, and I doubt she hesitated a second before giving it her full attention. I called the Hoover Building and asked for Natalie Binelli, the FBI agent who had put the cuffs on Raydel Escobar. She had been engaged in undercover work while I’d sought to recover the stolen Cold War letter. We had met in Escobar’s kitchen, and I shoved her into a wall and threatened to break her wrist unless she dropped her Glock and cooperated. I nearly had broken her wrist. I got her voice mail and left a message.
My next call was to Brian Applegate, an intelligence geek at special ops at MacDill Air Force Base. He said he’d get back to me. I had hesitated to call him, as I didn’t want to put him in an uncomfortable position, but he could take care of himself. On more than one occasion, he had refused to give me information. Other times he had proved invaluable. I doubted the Colemans would be on the national security radar, but I wanted to cover all bases and knew that US intelligence was the largest radar on the planet. Colonel Janssen wasn’t an option. He’d made it clear that he wouldn’t get involved in our extracurricular activities. He had intervened once. Never again.
I went back inside to say good-bye to Grouper. The lady in the Conch Republic baseball cap behind the bar told me he’d stepped out for a few minutes. Daniel was gone
as well. I walked out and realized that Grouper hadn’t answered my question about Tuesday. I’d have to catch up with him later; I didn’t have the time now. Missing people are like drifting rafts on the ocean. Every second the chance of finding them blows farther into the hostile sea. I wondered whether Jenny was even still breathing. I tried to kill the thought, but it doesn’t work that way. I didn’t make it more than ten feet before I spun and went back into the restaurant.
I gave Baseball Cap a twenty and a ten to cover my—and Daniel’s—tab.
CHAPTER 13
Jenny
I smell, but not like me, she thought, or anything I thought I could ever smell like. Even after days without a shower—not that I would know what that’s like. I smell like this place. Stale.
No. Not stale.
Quiet. Can one even smell quiet?
Forgotten? That’s it.
I smell forgotten. I didn’t even know “forgotten” had an odor. Well, there you have it, children. My God, the stuff in this world that you’ve got to pick up on your own.
She couldn’t figure out how they knew she’d been with Billy Ray. Had to be my cheer T-shirt with my name on it, she thought. And I worked so hard for it. Were they watching that night? No way. Did they get there before the detectives? The one with the goofy shoulder said they never found my T-shirt. Maybe a bird took it. Who knows? She’d grown weary of thinking about it. Grown weary of thinking about anything.
And what’s with Zach? One day on a boat, and he remembers me? I told him I had visited my aunt—and he filed that? Well, after all, I remember him. He was cute. Still is. I don’t think he’ll hurt me, but I won’t hesitate on him. She went over it all again in her head.
He had called a few nights ago—how he had her number she didn’t know, but Cami had snuck it onto her Facebook page a couple of years ago when they’d gotten into that tiff over asking Sean McCann to the Valentine’s Day Sadie Hawkins dance. Zach had told her to come down quick to the Laundromat. “I got something for you—can’t leave. I’m at the corner, waiting for a ride.” At first she didn’t remember him, but then it kicked in. Seriously curly hair. “What are you even doing in Florida?” she had asked, but the line was dead. She darted out of the house and spotted him at the end of the street by a blue van. “Jen, over here,” he’d said. And like an idiot, she thought, I went straight to the van, thrilled to see a somewhat familiar face. Whoopee, girl, your Florida experience getting better by the minute.
She never saw the other man approach behind her but felt a pair of hands on her back. Her face hit the gray cloth seat, and the stub of a stale French fry found her left eye. He scrambled in behind her and shut the door. He wore a green mask. He tied her hands behind her back and bound her ankles while Zach drove. She was too confused to feel fear. They questioned her about the money. “What did Billy Ray say? Where is it? We saw the car,” Zach had said. “It was busted open.” They questioned if she knew Billy Ray from back up in Ohio. “Did you run together? Plan this whole thing out?”
“Are you nuts?” she retorted. “Zach, what are you doing?” She thought they’d let her go once they realized she didn’t know anything. After all, this was Zach, one of Orry’s buds. Right? That’s what she told herself, although she remembered asking Orry about Zach after the day on the boat. He said his other friend had invited Zach at the last moment, and Orry didn’t really know Zach.
Then they had stopped, and the taller one with the mask said he was tired of wearing a mask and blindfolded Jenny. That’s when fear came around fast—like that sucker was just waiting to club her over the head. They talked about their portion of the money, as if it weren’t all theirs. After a while, Jenny had realized they were no longer discussing Billy Ray—as if she were Dorothy, and by melting Billy Ray, she had done them all a favor. Hello, she’d thought. I took this guy out last night, and you obviously knew him pretty well. Anyone care?
They didn’t. But they cared—and cared deeply, Jenny realized—about the money.
And who had beat them to it.
She stood and walked to the refrigerator. She opened the bottom freezer drawer and pulled out one of the three bottles of water she had placed inside. Not yet frozen. Slush. She tied a strap from the boat cushion around the cap and swung it in the air. Pathetic, she thought. Like a Neanderthal swinging a club. But at least Neanderthals had those spiked things. She put it back.
She paced. She sat.
The Adirondack squeaked.
Jenny leapt off the chair and went to her knees. Exposed rusted nails, firm when Ike was president the first time around, bridged divorced pieces of wood. She grabbed the left arm of the chair and jerked it back and forth, up and down, side to side. Really? Stupid thing acts like it can’t support a fly, but you go to tear it apart, and the old warrior gets an attitude. Still, she thought, I’ve got nothing else to do. She finally dislocated the arm from the rest of the chair and pounded the nails on the concrete floor.
She reached into the freezer and grabbed the bottle that was tied with a strap. How to do this? She notched two small holes into the topside of the bottle as it rested between her bare feet. She worked the head of a nail into each hole. She placed the bottle in the freezer against the side wall and pushed two other bottles up tightly so the bottle with the nails wouldn’t roll. The nails limped off to the side. Idiot. They need to be in deeper; otherwise, it’ll have no strength. She repositioned the nails and the support bottles.
For the uncountable time, she thought, What do they think I did or know? I told them Grease Boy said he had two hundred and whatever big ones. Is that it? They think I took the money? And what? Keeping me here will break me? She played “Run” in her head to keep her thoughts from wandering down dark paths.
She did some push-ups and sit-ups. Gotta keep in shape. She checked her bottle in the freezer. Calm down. Ice takes time. She envisioned her weapon and wondered whether the strap would hold. Could she use it on Zach? Hell, yeah. That slimeball tricked me. But she hadn’t seen him since that first night. It was always Green Mask who brought her food and escorted her to the outhouse, which was seventeen steps away. She managed to stretch it to twenty-one steps; she figured the extra steps were good for her and prolonged her fresh-air time. Another major bummer, she thought. My skin’s going to turn plaster pale. I wanted to get one of those rich native tans, like Aunt Sus—just Susan, you dimwit.
Is my life in danger?
Holy moly, girl. Where did that drop from?
Face it, she thought. It’s been there all the time. She wondered what her father would say, for in Jenny’s mind he had never lied to her. She could hear him now: Be strong. Take it in with strength.
They were approaching the marina just as a summer squall erupted and threatened to blow the water clean out of Buckeye Lake. Instead of his usual cautious, slow approach, her father took the Trojan in hard and fast. She was certain they would crash into the dock. Larry screamed the Trojan’s engine in reverse at the last moment. “When things kick up,” he’d told Jenny when she’d asked why he’d gone in with such speed, “you need to take it in with strength. The tougher the weather, the stronger you drive. Remember that, Jen. When it’s nasty, be strong and take her in with strength. Be nasty right back.” He had let her steer the boat several times, but Jenny couldn’t imagine ever being good enough to race the boat into the dock. She didn’t comprehend the reasoning.
She got it now.
Pretty boy or not, when my bottle’s ready, the first guy through the door gets it. Besides, he’s the worst enemy—someone who posed as a friend. Then what? Run? I’ll worry about that later. Right now, she thought, it’s focus time.
Nasty right back.
CHAPTER 14
After I left Grouper’s place, I drove to Water’s Edge, Susan’s bar. It had no parking, so I pulled into a spot in front of a Wings store. I made certain my front bumper made contact with the CUSTOMERS ONLY; ALL OTHERS WILL BE TOWED sign and strolled across the street. I wanted to fi
ll Susan in on my trip up north. She was a blur behind the bar.
She didn’t slow down to address me. “Find Jenny,” she commanded as she worked three glasses in a row on the counter.
“I’m doing what I—”
“Now.”
She dropped two drinks in front of a couple, and the lady practically had hers at her lips before Susan’s hand was off the stemware. She spun around to finish the third. From behind her, a man with his eyes glued to her ass instructed her to “go easy on the ice, babe.” Her jaw clenched, and her hand tightened around the glass.
When I’d first met her, she’d told me the ones who come directly from the airport are the worst. Their senses quickly overdose on the blue sky, palm trees, endless Gulf, alcohol, and girls in thongs. Susan said the newbies are easy to spot; they chatter like chipmunks on weed into their phones. She spun around, placed the hurricane glass in front of the man, and worked her way down the bar, taking orders. It wasn’t the time or place. I walked out and onto the public beach on the other side of the pier.
The sinking summer sun hadn’t surrendered any of its intensity. I crouched in the shade of a deserted beach umbrella. On the Gulf, a listing sailboat came about, its spinnaker dancing in front of the sun like a ballerina flirting with a spotlight. A black skimmer approached me as if I were its long-lost buddy. Must’ve been my day for birds. I dialed McGlashan but got his voice mail. I was halfway through leaving a message when he called.
He asked me how I’d enjoyed my trip up north. I thanked him for greasing the rails with his call to the Hocking County sheriff. My sarcasm didn’t escape him.
“They didn’t plug you, right?”
He reiterated that Jenny was eighteen, and while her encounter with Billy Ray put her disappearance into question, she was free to travel. The department didn’t view her absence as a crime. I asked him when I could talk with his partner, Detective Eric Rutledge, and listen to the interview tape. He said Rutledge was due back from Vegas that evening, and he’d see what he could arrange. We disconnected, and I headed back to the condo.