by Eddie Jones
Former Wichita police officer facing kidnapping charges …
D.C. police officer pleads not guilty to child abduction …
Ex-Moulton police officer charged with taking neighbor’s daughter across state line …
“Up for a picnic?”
Kat sauntered up the dock wearing a wide-brimmed straw hat and carrying a small cooler. “I got pimiento cheese sandwiches, cola, and we can split a Moon Pie for dessert. I’m betting you’ve never had one of those.”
“Moon pie sounds like the sort of thing my Uncle Eric shovels out of the barn.”
“Mercy me, Kansas. You ain’t lived until you’ve shared a Moon Pie under a harvest moon while cruising down the Savannah River. Stick around long enough, and I’ll show you how to make Moon Pie pudding.”
“Last night at the church, did you have your phone with you?”
She smiled mischievously. “If this is your way of asking for my number …”
“Ha-ha. Very funny.” Not a bad idea, I thought. “Did you?”
“Yes, of course.”
“Mind if I check something?”
I didn’t really think Kat was behind my sister’s kidnapping. At least I hoped not. I’d sort of become fond of her.
Kat’s was an old flip-cover model. I scanned the sent text messages and instantly realized there was no way she could have sent me an email. At least, not from that phone.
“How much do you know about Officer McDonald?”
She put her phone away and parked the cooler beside the dock box. “Not much. Sometimes he and Uncle Phil will wet a hook together, but that’s about it.”
I scanned the marina parking lot. What I needed was a way to run down the few leads I’d come up with. None of them was very solid, but sitting around on a boat wasn’t going to find my sister. “How far away is the Palmetto Island Realty office?”
“Clear on the other end of the island. But then, the island ain’t that long. Why, your family thinking of buying a place?”
“I want to find out if Dad’s job interview is legit. Mom seems to think my father is about to be conned into buying something we can’t afford.” I paused, thinking about how we couldn’t afford any kind of home. At least not until Dad found steady work.
“I can take you up there in our golf cart if you like. It’ll give me a chance to show you some of the funner things on Palmetto Island. Grab the cooler. We’ll make our picnic a road trip.”
As soon as we were out of the parking lot and on the road, Kat looked over at me. “You asked about Officer McDonald earlier. Don’t know if this means anything or not, but one time he almost got written up for something that happened off-island.”
The cooler sat between my feet. I’d looked for a seat belt and couldn’t find one, so I clung to the roof support to keep from getting slung from the golf cart.
“Had something to do with this young country singer named Hank Cash. He was supposed to be promoting his new album, Necking and Pecking on Papa’s New Decking.”
“Officer McDonald?”
“No, silly, Cash. Except right before Cash was supposed to go on the air, his manager phoned the station to say the singer was sick and cudden make it. The interview was a big deal for the station. They had been promoting it for weeks. So to keep from missing out on a big PR coup, the DJ that was supposed to be doing the interview dressed up like Cash, complete with wraparound sunglasses, cowboy hat, and boots. When the limo pulled up in front of the station, the DJ dressed as Cash jumped out and ran inside. The crowd went berserk and stormed the building. A seventeen-year-old girl got trampled during the process and nearly died.”
“Hey, you know, I think I heard about that. Don’t tell me Officer McDonald was the DJ?”
“No, but he was working off-duty and in charge of crowd control, so they blamed him for not keeping folks safe. Later it came out in the papers that Officer McDonald and the DJ were related. McDonald’s cousin is the morning DJ at WSAV.”
Traffic slowed. Kat stomped on the brake and the golf cart nearly slammed into the back of a black SUV loaded down with beach chairs and boogie boards.
“McDonald’s cousin,” I said. “Does he still work at the station?”
“Not sure. Maybe. How come you want to know?”
“Just thinking that if a zombie festival is set to start tonight and Officer McDonald is familiar with publicity pranks, he might be the perfect person to help his cousin dress up like a corpse and stage a mock kidnapping of my sister. At the creek last night he did mention something about the possibility of this being a radio station prank.”
“Why not ask him? His office is close to the Realtor’s office. I can drop you off if you want. Meantime, if’n you don’t mind, pass me a sandwich. I’m so hungry I could eat a buttered monkey.”
CHAPTER TEN
NIGHT OF THE LIVING DREADLOCKS
The golf cart trundled along behind a caravan of vehicles creeping up the island. I reached into the cooler and passed Kat her sandwich, then mentioned it seemed odd to see golf carts on the road with pickup trucks and SUVs.
“Actually it’s the cars that are the problem,” Kat explained. “Up until two years ago, golf carts and bikes were the only things allowed on the island. That bridge you came over on? It used to be a passenger ferry, but folks visiting whined about having to unload their stuff in a parking lot. Sissies. That’s what a vacation is, different than home. So the town council ordered up an amendment to build the bridge. They kept the speed limit at twenty-five, though.” She braked for an elderly woman with a walker entering the crosswalk. “I still say that if you want to find out what happened to your sister, you need to run and see Poke Salad Annie.”
“Like a witch doctor is going to know where my sister is,” I replied.
“Told you, Annie is a Gullah. Never claimed she was a witch doctor.”
“What about that voodoo gumbo you told me she made?”
“That’s just what she calls it. Don’t mean she’s into black magic. Besides which, you’ve eaten angel food cake, I bet. Does that make you an angel?”
“You don’t really think there are such things as zombies, do you? I mean, seriously?”
“What I think dudden matter. You’re the one who said a dead person took your sister.”
The old woman cleared the crosswalk and we sped away.
Kat asked for a water bottle from the cooler. Between sips she said, “Folks in Haiti bury folks alive, did you know that?”
“Are we back to talking about zombies?”
“How it happens is like this. A bokor forces the victim to suck down this stuff called tetrodotoxin. It’s a chemical found in puffer fish.”
I knew what tetrodotoxin was, but I liked listening to Kat talk. She had a funny way of saying things.
“Even just a little bit can knock down the heart rate and make it look like the person has stopped breathing. It leaves a body feeling practically paralyzed. People who don’t know any better think the person has up and died.”
“Good thing I don’t live in Haiti.”
“After everyone skedaddles, the bokor sneaks back into the graveyard and digs up the body. ‘Course they’re not really dead, but the bokor makes like he’s using magical powers to bring ’em back to life. Person coming through a thing like that is gonna do whatever a bokor asks, on account of they don’t want to get planted a second time, know what I mean?”
“How do you know all this stuff?”
“I teach a weekly Bible study for recovering zombies.”
I eyed her skeptically. “You’re kidding, right?”
“Serious as a heart attack. Poke Salad Annie’s in our group. That’s how come I know about her voodoo gumbo. Sometimes she fixes a mess of it for us. If you’re still around this weekend, drop by. Right now we’re using Undead: Revived, Resuscitated, and Reborn as our study guide.”
Kat thrust her left arm out, signaling a turn. As soon as the oncoming traffic cleared, we pulled into the real estate offic
e parking lot.
A Bible study for the undead. Unbelievable.
Palmetto Island Realty overlooked the Atlantic Ocean on one side and a golf course on the other. A hedge of bushes provided a natural barrier between the parking pad and the shaded walkway. Kat parked the golf cart and I swung out.
“I’ll wait for you.”
“No need,” I replied. “This might take a while.”
“Got nothing else to do.”
The rental office was on the ground floor of the two-story building. A sign by a wide staircase invited homebuyers to the second floor. When I reached the top step, the receptionist behind the mahogany desk looked up from her typing. I told her I was there to see Ms. Bryant, that my father was a candidate for a sales position and I thought I would visit their offices. Whoever sent the email of Wendy had suggested Dad’s job offer was bogus. If so, then Ms. Bryant either was involved or might know who was behind it.
The receptionist studied me for a moment as if she couldn’t believe a boy my age would check up on his father’s work application. With a shrug, she gestured toward a waiting area of cushy chairs arranged in front of a large bay window overlooking a putting green. I wandered over and picked up a golf magazine.
In a few minutes a slender, twentysomething young man in a teal sport shirt and tan slacks came out of an office.
He introduced himself as Matthew Carter. “I understand you’re here to see Ms. Bryant and don’t have an appointment. I’m afraid she is busy showing a home. Is there something I can help you with?”
The way he said it made me think that helping me was the last thing Matthew Carter wanted to do. “Thanks, but I’ll wait.”
“She could be gone a long time.”
“I’m in no hurry.”
“How about you just give your name and number? I’ll have her call you when she returns.”
I seriously doubted Matthew Carter III, Senior Sales Consultant for Residential Development, as his name tag said, would pass along the message, but it was obvious the snotty sales assistant didn’t want me hanging around. He jotted down my number and started back to his office.
“You ever heard of someone named Poke Salad Annie?” I asked.
He paused in the doorway of his office. “Oh, sure. Crazy cracker lives in the swamp. Why, you need a hex put on somebody?”
“Can she really do that?”
He tucked the piece of paper with my phone number into his pants pocket. “I’ll see that Ms. Bryant gets the message.” He retreated into his office and closed the door.
“That was quick,” said Kat.
“Ms. Bryant is out with a client. I ended up leaving my number with her sales assistant.”
“That would be Matt.”
“You know him?”
“Matt caddied at the club for a spell. His granddaddy was one of the men who helped start Palmetto Island Resort. Did’n work at the club long, though. Golf pro kept getting complaints about Matt making improper comments toward the members, hitting on their wives and stuff. I might could’ve told them he was a bad seed, but nobody asked my opinion.”
“So you two have a history, I take it.”
“Oh yeah. He thinks he’s the next heartthrob actor. Few years ago, Robert Redford was down here filming a golf movie. Matt got a bit role as an extra. All he had to do was stand in the crowd and keep quiet, but he couldn’t even do that. He kept trying to steal the scene by spouting off one-liners while the actors were rehearsing. Finally he got booted. Next thing I hear he’s up in Wilmington auditioning for a supporting role in a horror movie about some Rastafarians from Jamaica. Night of the Living Dreadlocks, I think it was called.”
“Interesting. Did he get the part?”
“Didn’t ask, don’t want to know.”
Kat reached over and placed the water bottle in the drink holder. I caught a whiff of sunscreen mixed with just a hint of perfume and for a split second my heart skipped a beat.
My sister once complained that I had a heart of stone, that I was uncaring and insensitive to the feelings of others. Feelings are overrated. Feelings get you into trouble. My parents’ marriage was a good example. They’d fallen in love. Fallen — as if they didn’t have a choice, like someone had pushed them. But they did have a choice and that choice had been clouded by feelings, feelings that faded. Now my parents were thinking about breaking up and splitting up Wendy and me. Nope, far as I was concerned, feelings were to be pushed down and ignored and only allowed outside when on a leash.
I’d become very good at burying mine.
“Where to now?” Kat was asking. “Officer McDonald’s office?”
“Sure, if that’s okay.”
“Not a problem, but after I drop you off, I need to be getting back. The man renting the catamaran has phoned twice already to remind Uncle Phil that there’d better not be any problems. He’s coming in and wants everything to be perfect. It’s a boat, for crying out loud, not a Frisbee.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CALL ME CONFUSED
Officer McDonald maintained his headquarters in the west wing of the town administrator’s office. The men and women who hurried through the lobby were slender and fit and dressed in starched brown uniforms. No rubbery bellies or aimless loitering. An informational brochure in the newly carpeted lobby informed visitors that public safety and emergency response on Palmetto Island were handled through a contract with the Savannah Police Department. A framed picture on the wall showed a staff of seven uniformed men and women. Officer McDonald stood in the middle of the front row.
Behind the sliding glass door a woman spoke into a headset. She called codes for various types of emergencies. I waited while she jotted some words and numbers onto a notepad.
Television and movies have distorted our view of detective work. I know this because of my work with the Crime Watchers and the scores of interviews we’ve conducted with real men and women of the law. Less than 10 percent of investigative police work involves the examination of bodies, fingerprints, and blood. Most detectives spend their days filtering through seemingly trivial facts, chasing down leads through minor traffic violations, researching stupid complaints made by John and Jane Doe, and interviewing uncooperative witnesses who don’t have a clue (and don’t care) what real law enforcement officers do.
First responders on all levels are underappreciated, underpaid, and underfunded by the communities in which they serve.
And at that moment I felt a little like an underappreciated police detective. The search for my sister had reached a series of dead ends and nobody, not even my parents, cared. They thought Wendy was hanging out on the beach or at the food court with new friends, but I knew different. I knew she was in serious trouble.
First, the kidnapper had my email address. He or she could have lifted that off the Cool Ghoul Gazette website, sure. But how did the kidnapper know I worked for Cool Ghoul? For that matter, how could anyone on Palmetto Island have known my paying job involved writing articles for the Gazette and my real passion was solving murders by studying television episodes? It didn’t make sense that a local would have known this.
Second, Heidi May Laveau’s body floating up from the deep and grabbing Wendy was for show. Moviegoers may be infatuated with zombies and all things undead, but I knew decomposing corpses couldn’t rise from the grave and go around taking people. So why Laveau’s body? Kat knew more about the dear girl’s background than anyone I’d met. But could Kat have known about my work with the Cool Ghoul Gazette? Maybe she researched me. After Wendy’s abduction, Kat had easily tracked me down at the condo and lured me to the church. Had she been afraid I might go back to the creek with my parents? And if I had, was she worried I’d find the canoe, Wendy, and the person dressed up as Laveau? I had my phone. I could have called my parents and asked them to come back and pick me up. Maybe the church visit was Kat’s way of covering for someone. But who?
The most troubling of all was the knowledge that whoever had Wendy seemed convinced t
hat I could give them life. I could see someone taking Wendy for money, even revenge. But to demand something I couldn’t deliver — that stumped me.
At last the receptionist looked up and slid open the glass. I explained who I was and asked if Officer McDonald was available. She instructed me to have a seat and went back to peck-peck-pecking on her keyboard. Whipping out my phone, I did a quick web search of Officer McDonald.
According to the bio on the Palmetto Island Law Enforcement website, Lieutenant Kevin J. McDonald joined the Savannah-Chatham Metro Police while serving as a Marine Diving Medical Technician stationed at Marine Corps Air Station in Beaufort, South Carolina. He left the Marine Corps with an honorable discharge after eight years of service and was hired as an officer. Upon graduation from the Criminal Justice Academy, he accepted a position as a patrol officer for the downtown precinct. Some months later he was promoted to the rank of corporal and assigned to the southside precinct as an assistant shift supervisor. Six months later, he assumed the rank of operations lieutenant of Palmetto Island.
The picture on the web page showed a younger-looking man with a buzz cut and fewer wrinkles around the eyes. The one item on his résumé that caught my attention was the diving certification. Whoever the individual was that had dressed up as Heidi May Laveau had been underwater a long time — maybe minutes — before snatching my sister.
A door opened. From the hallway an officer motioned for me to follow. Officer McDonald’s office was in the back of the building. He sat behind a metal desk. Without looking up he waved me into a vacant chair and went back to signing a stack of forms.
His was a tiny office with metal file cabinets, beige carpeting, off-white walls, and a window looking onto a parking lot. The room smelled of aftershave and leather. I sat erect in the wooden chair and waited.
Officer McDonald put away his pen and pushed a button on the desk phone. Moments later the officer who had escorted me from the lobby entered the office, took the stack of forms, and left, pulling the door shut behind him.