by PJ Parrish
The pen was a skeleton of rotting old wood. Its shape was hard to discern in the chest-high weeds, but it looked to be a series of fenced areas fronted by a narrow incline that rose about six feet from the ground, like it was meant for loading animals. Louis’s only frame of reference for what he was seeing was a couple old westerns. Hud came to mind, and that scene that had always bothered him, the one where the cowboys were talking about having to shoot their diseased cows, and the stupid animals were crammed into a pit, bumping into each other with panicked eyes.
Mel came up to his side. He pulled a handkerchief from his pants and ran it over his glistening bald head. “Does this look as bad as I think it does?”
“Yeah. Looks like it was abandoned a long time ago.”
They picked their way through the weeds and into the first section of the pen. The ground was sandy dirt, and the high sides of the gray wood made the space feel like a large wooden cage.
The cicadas stopped screeching. The quiet flowed in.
“See anything useful?” Mel asked.
“Not really,” Louis said, his eyes scanning every inch of the fences and sand. “Just some rusted chains hanging on a gate.”
They went into the next section, but it was the same as the first. A narrow passageway led to another pen. It was a maze of rotting wood, weeds, and sand. Then, suddenly, the space opened. They were in a large pen, maybe thirty feet square, with a small listing lean-to tucked in a corner. Another ribbon of limp yellow tape hung from the fence.
Louis went to the center. It looked like a portion of the sand had been scooped out with a shovel.
“This is where he was killed,” Louis said.
“How can you tell?” Mel asked.
The sun was starting its descent. Louis figured Mel couldn’t make out any details now. “It looks like the crime-scene guys might have taken soil samples.”
Louis scanned the ground. It had rained during the last week, so there was nothing left of the prints Barberry had mentioned. There didn’t even seem to be any evidence of blood.
Louis stood still, listening. No sounds now. Even the birds had retreated to their night roosts. There was no feeling, either. And he had always been able to get a feeling about a murder scene in the past. It was nothing he could put his finger on, nothing he could articulate. And he never told anyone about it. But he had learned to trust the weird vibration that sometimes came when he stood in the place where a person had taken his last breath.
But there was nothing here. Except for a strange feeling of something old and buried. Like an abandoned grave or—
“I can’t see it.”
Mel had spoken in a whisper. Louis turned to him.
“Can’t see what?” Louis asked.
“Reggie. I can’t see a guy like him coming out here and whacking off someone’s head. A guy like him wouldn’t even know this place was here. Shit, we barely found it.”
Louis was quiet. He had been thinking the same thing. But how much did Mel really know about this Kent guy?
Louis went over to where Mel was and waited until Mel had lit his cigarette. “What are we doing here, Mel?” he asked.
“What do you mean?”
“Reggie Kent. Why do you care what happens to a guy like that?”
“A guy like what?”
Louis was silent. A hot current started up his neck.
“Gay,” Mel said. “You can’t even say it, for crissake.”
“That’s not—”
“And you’re wondering how I even know a guy like that.”
The way Mel had drawn out the last two words made Louis fall silent again. Mel took a long drag on his cigarette.
“I met Reggie about fifteen years ago, when I was a sergeant with Miami PD,” Mel said. “One of my guys called me on an assault. It was Thanksgiving, and the only reason I was working that night was because I switched with a guy who wanted the day off to be with his family. When I got there, I saw Reggie sitting on the curb, all beat up. The uniform pulled me aside and said the two guys who attacked him were in a bar across the street. The uniform wanted my permission to no-action it.”
Mel blew out a long stream of smoke. “The uniform said it wasn’t worth the paperwork to go arrest them.”
“What did you do?” Louis asked.
“I told the uniforms to leave,” Mel said. “Kent said he didn’t have anyone he could call, so I drove him to Jackson Memorial.”
Mel tossed the cigarette to the sand and ground out the butt with his heel.
“I went back to check up on him the next day,” he said. “Turned out he had a concussion. Almost lost an eye. He was in the hospital for a week. I went back and saw him a couple of times. The nurse told me he never had any visitors. No family, either.”
Louis watched as Mel worked his jaw. It was the same agitated gesture he had done back at the sheriff’s office, just before he told Barberry to “knock off that shit.”
“So, you and Kent,” Louis began. “You became friends?”
Mel shook his head. “Nah. But at Christmas, he sent me a fruit basket at the station.”
Louis smiled.
Mel smiled, too. “Yeah, I took some shit for that.”
“But you never saw him?”
“Nope. But every year, he sent a Christmas card to the station.”
“How’d he find you after you quit?” Louis asked.
“Beats me. Somebody at the station probably told him I had hired on with Fort Myers PD. My home number’s in the phone book.” Mel took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. “I was shocked as hell when he called me. Our paths crossed once a long time ago. That’s all.”
The sun was setting, great streaks of red. Louis wanted to start back so they wouldn’t be caught out there when the dark came. But Mel had pulled out the Zippo and another Kool. The lighter flared and snapped closed with a sharp clink. Mel’s face was lost in the dusk.
Again, the question came to Louis: What were they doing here? What was he doing here? Swann and even Barberry looked down their noses at him because he didn’t have a badge. But he was used to that. He was even used to being the only black guy in a town of whites. What he wasn’t used to was feeling like some kind of insect because he wasn’t wearing the right jacket.
Face it, Kincaid, this isn’t about Reggie Kent. It’s about you not feeling like you fit in.
“I know you don’t want to take this case,” Mel said.
Louis looked at him. Mel was a silhouette, the tip of his cigarette glowing.
“I’m just not sure there’s a case here, Mel,” Louis said. “I’m not sure we can be any good to this Kent guy.”
“Is it because he’s gay? That’s not like you to—”
“No,” Louis said. “That’s not it.”
“What’s bothering you, then?”
“Nothing. Nothing’s bothering me.”
Mel took a long drag on the cigarette. “Something’s eating at you, Rocky. It’s been going on for a while now. You aren’t a barrel of laughs even in the best of times, but lately—”
“Gee, thanks.”
“You know what I mean.” Mel’s cigarette glowed in the dark. “Is it Joe?”
Louis was glad Mel couldn’t see his face. Truth was, it was Joe, in part. He hadn’t seen her in months, and they had barely talked on the phone since Thanksgiving. He loved her, but he had the feeling now that they were drifting, and he wasn’t sure anymore it was toward each other.
“All right,” Mel said. “You don’t have to tell me.”
They were quiet for a long time. A cricket started up nearby. Louis could barely make out the yellow crime tape now.
“I want to try to help Reggie,” Mel said. “And you know I can’t do this alone anymore.”
Louis heard the catch in Mel’s voice, knew how hard it was for him to admit that.
“Let’s give it a day, all right?” Mel said. “See how far we get.”
Louis shut his eyes. No vibration. No feeling. No s
ense of what had happened in this strange place. His intuition was telling him only to get out of there.
“Let’s go,” Louis said. “You better take my arm.”
Mel put a hand on Louis’s sleeve, and Louis led him out of the darkness.
Chapter Six
Louis voted for the Motel 8 in West Palm Beach. But Mel overruled him on grounds that if they intended to infiltrate Bizarro World, they had to be in the thick of it. A call to Reggie led them to the Brazilian Court, a couple of blocks off Worth Avenue. But when Louis discovered the rooms started at $250 a night, they retreated to Ta-boo to regroup. Yuba the bartender suggested they try a place nearby called the Palm Beach Historic Inn.
The small hotel had one double left, a Spartan but immaculate room with twin beds. It was $85 a night, but it was right next door to the police station. There was the bonus of a cozy little bar in the lobby.
That’s where Louis left Mel around ten-thirty, with the last of the Burger King takeout and a second snifter of Rémy Martin. Feeling too restless to go back upstairs and watch the grainy TV, Louis set out on the deserted streets.
He found his way back to Worth Avenue, nearly empty now of cars and people. Drawn by the salty smell, he headed toward the beach, down a long block and under the watchful eyes of the mannequins in Neiman Marcus’s windows. Alone on a bench at the beach, he found himself under new scrutiny, from a Palm Beach PD car that sat at the curb behind him for a full fifteen minutes before it finally pulled away. Louis was certain the cop behind the wheel had called in and someone had told him there was a black dude in town but he was okay.
After twenty minutes, he started back. The last thing he wanted was to listen to Mel snore, so he kept going down Worth Avenue.
The shops were closed, but most of the window lights were still on, some illuminating little velvet cushions imprinted with the outlines of the jewels that had been locked away in safes at closing time. The only sparkle now came from Christmas decorations.
A giant Christmas tree had sprouted in the intersection in front of Tiffany’s, decorated with huge gold and white balls. The small palms lining the avenue had been strung with white lights and lit from beneath by aqua spotlights that made the trees look weirdly fake.
Louis paused. Christmas already?
He walked on. Three years in Florida, and it still took him by surprise. There was no set signal, no warning from the weather, that the holidays were coming. It always left him mildly depressed.
Joe was suddenly there in his head. And their conversation when she had called to wish him happy birthday last month.
Why don’t you come up to Michigan for Christmas?
I don’t know, Joe.
Don’t you miss it?
She had been talking about the snow and all of the seasonal stuff. But he had heard: Don’t you miss me?
Of course he missed her.
He paused in front of a flower shop, looking at a pay phone. It was past midnight, but he was sure she’d be up. She had never been the kind to go to sleep early, even when she was exhausted.
He used his phone card to dial long-distance to northern Michigan. Surprisingly, there was no answer at her cottage. He hesitated, then tried the sheriff’s office.
As he listened to the phone ring, he had the thought that he had become too used to phones going unanswered. Busy… she was always so damned busy now.
She had gone back to Michigan almost a year ago, and spring was spent in a frenzy of campaigning for the sheriff’s position in Leelanau. Their plan to meet in late summer had been postponed as the election neared. She won the election easily, campaigning on an ethics and crime-prevention platform. Because he hadn’t heard much from her since Thanksgiving, he could only assume things were hectic. But a part of him always wondered what the hell the sheriff had to do in a quiet resort town like Echo Bay.
Finally, a woman answered the phone. He knew most of the dispatchers up there, but he didn’t recognize this voice.
“Is Joe Frye there?”
“Sheriff Frye? Ah… yes, I think she’s still here. Who’s calling, please?”
“Louis Kincaid.”
“What is this regarding, Mr. Kinsey?”
“Kincaid. I’m a friend. Just tell her it’s Louis.”
“Yes, sir, Mr. Kinsey. Please hold.”
The woman set the phone down with a clunk. Normally, there was nothing in the background but soft voices and an occasional crackle of a radio, but tonight the line was filled with laughter, tinkling glasses, and Christmas carols.
A party. The department was having its annual Christmas party.
“This is Sheriff Frye.”
“Hey, Joe, it’s me.”
She was almost shouting. “I’m sorry. Who?”
“It’s Louis.”
“Oh. I can barely hear you. How are you?”
There was a sudden burst of nearby laughter, and he waited until it faded before he answered.
“I’m fine,” he said. “Say, listen, I was wondering…”
“Oh, Louis, hold on,” Joe said. Her voice grew muffled, as if she’d moved the phone away from her mouth. “Enough with the mistletoe, Mike. Go pester your wife.”
He waited for her to come back on the line. When she did, it was a shade quieter. She must have found an empty office.
“So, did you decide if you’re coming up for Christmas?” she asked. “We’re supposed to get ten inches. Should be beautiful.”
“I’m on a case.”
“Oh,” Joe said. There was a long—disinterested—pause. “What kind?”
“Cleaning up rich people’s messes. I’m in Palm Beach.”
“Well, at least they’ll pay well this time,” she said.
“I’m not so sure this joker will.”
Another pause. “Why take the case, then, if you dislike the client so much?”
It’s not like you’re driving a squad car that says to protect and serve.
“Mel asked me to,” he said.
“Mel… how is he? I’ve been thinking about him lately.”
“It would be nice if you bothered to ask me how I am,” Louis said.
What a lousy thing to say. What the hell is wrong with me?
“I don’t have to ask how you are,” Joe said. “I can tell by your voice. And I think we already talked about this at Thanksgiving, Louis.”
He was quiet. The background noise was picking up again, and he heard someone launch into a drunken version of “Oh Christmas Tree.”
“What do you want from me, Joe?”
There was a long pause before she spoke. “I want you to want something from yourself,” she said. “And while you work out exactly what that is, maybe we should… maybe I should give you some space.”
They were already fifteen hundred miles apart. How much more space did she think he needed? Still, even as he thought it, he realized he had known something like this was coming. Drifting… they were drifting. He was drifting.
“So, we’re just ending it?” he asked.
Joe sighed. “Louis, this isn’t a good time to talk about this.”
“You’re the one who brought it up, Joe.”
There was a long pause. “I think we need to take a break,” she said finally. “I think we need to find out exactly how we feel about… everything.”
“Does that include other people?” he asked.
Again, quiet on her end. He leaned his forehead against the phone, closing his eyes.
“Okay, then,” Louis said. “Have a merry Christmas.”
“Louis, wait—”
He hung up and walked away from the phone. He went almost two blocks before he paused at the corner of South County Road. The sound of a woman laughing drifted out to him on the warm night. He headed toward the laughter.
Ta-boo was still open. Through the open window, he could see the crowd, two deep at the bar, loud and garrulous.
He squeezed in through the doorway and made his way to the far end near the waitres
s station. Yuba, the pretty Indian woman, was hard at work but gave him a smile as she strained a martini into a glass.
“Heineken, right?” she asked.
“You’re good,” Louis said.
Another smile, and she was gone, sweeping to the other end of the bar to deposit two drinks and returning a moment later with his beer and a frosted glass.
“Should I start a tab?” she asked.
Louis hesitated. “Sure.”
A combo started up somewhere in the back of the restaurant. Through the latticework, Louis could see a couple drift out to the dance floor. The man was a slender white-haired gent in the requisite blue blazer setting off yellow slacks; the woman was tan, blond, and at least twenty years his junior. She wore a tight, low-cut pink dress, and Louis couldn’t take his eyes off her huge breasts even though he was sure they weren’t real.
Yuba returned and set a glass votive before him. She smiled when she saw him watching the blonde but said nothing. She pulled a purple Bic from her vest pocket. Her black eyes danced with the flare of the candle.
“Where’s your friend?” she asked.
His mind was still on Joe, and for a second, he thought Yuba meant her.
“The tall fellow with the yellow glasses,” she said.
“Asleep,” Louis said. “Thanks for the tip about the hotel.”
“You guys didn’t seem like the Brazilian Court types,” she said.
He had the feeling she knew exactly who he and Mel were and why they were on the island. He wondered if she lived here, but he had a feeling that, just like the gardeners and the maids he saw standing at the bus stop, she traveled back across the bridge at night.
“You’re here to help Reggie, aren’t you?” Yuba said.
“Yes,” Louis said.
She grabbed a towel and ran it across the already spotless bar. She was looking for an excuse to linger, Louis realized, but was this about Reggie—or him?
Yuba nodded at his glass. “You want another one?” she asked.
“Yeah, thanks.”
After she had brought the refill and made the rounds of the other customers, Yuba drifted back.
Joe was still there, cluttering his thoughts. He knew beer alone wasn’t going to make her go away long enough for him to sleep tonight. He suddenly wanted a reason to keep Yuba in front of him, wanted the distraction of her lovely face, if only for the next hour.