Florida Is Murder (Due Justice and Surface Tension Mystery Double Feature) (Florida Mystery Double Feature)

by Diane Capri

  “That means I have to testify?”

  “You’ll have to no matter what, dear. They’ll just subpoena you. You might as well go to them first and get something out of the deal. So all I need is the thumbs-up from you, and I’ll be on my way. What do you say?”

  I pushed my fruit bowl away. I’d lost what little appetite I’d been able to muster at the thought of looking again at Zeke Moss, Cesar Esposito, and Benjamin Crystal. Yet if I could help keep them away from girls like Sunny ... hell, yes. “Go for it, Jeannie.”

  She came over, bent down, and gave me a smothering hug. “Just think, honey, the Gorda will be all yours. You’ll be able to buy your brothers out.” Standing and putting her hand on one hip, she asked, “Don’t you think it’s time you got back to work? I think you need to get outside and get on the water again.”

  I nodded. “You’re probably right.”

  She collected her things and turned toward the door. “You want to know something really stupid, Jeannie? I don’t think Patty Krix ever did double-cross Neal. I think this whole thing started to unravel because of Neal’s paranoia. When Neal surfaced that day out on the Top Ten, Patty was talking to the Coast Guard, but Neal didn’t know that—he just assumed she was calling Crystal. He didn’t have to kill her.”

  “He didn’t have to try to steal that money, either. Don’t you think about him anymore. Time to move forward.”

  I stood in the doorway watching her walk down the brick path. She turned, glanced down at the river, smiled, and waved, calling, “I’m out of here. She’s all yours.” Jeannie turned back to me. “On second thought, Seychelle, you could probably use a few more days off.” She winked and disappeared around the side of the Larsens’ house.

  I stepped outside and looked toward the river. There, tied to the dock, was a nearly new thirty-six-foot catamaran, and B.J. was standing in the cockpit wearing only flower-print surfer trunks and a smile.

  After examining the length of the boat, I squinted at him. “You didn’t steal it, did you?”

  “Belongs to a lady friend of mine. She once said if I ever wanted anything, all I had to do was ask. So I asked. I’m headed down to the Keys for a few days. I sure could use a hand. You interested?”

  ***

  With her shallow draft, B.J. was able to take that cat far into the backwaters of Florida Bay, anchor off little no-name keys, and zigzag back to the coast to find the few rare patches of sand along the Atlantic side of the Florida Keys. I slept in the spare cabin, alone in a queen-size bunk, and B.J. pretty much left me to my thoughts, giving me some of that infamous space he was noted for. We avoided people and civilization and ate what we caught, though my appetite for most good things seemed to have vanished. I had to admit that all that fresh food BJ. was making me eat, along with the fresh air and sun, was starting to make me want to rejoin the human race, but I just couldn’t muster up the desire for much of anything. There was something, some sour taste, in the back of my throat that I could not wash away no matter how many ice-cold Coronas I swallowed.

  It was that black pit, taunting me again.

  One afternoon when we’d returned to the boat after an afternoon’s snorkeling, and B.J. was down in the galley cooking up the grouper he’d just speared with his Hawaiian sling, I rinsed off under the sun shower we had hanging on the afterdeck, then toweled off my white nylon swimsuit. I helped myself to a Corona and, on an impulse, took the two photos out of the side zipper pocket of my shoulder bag: the photo of my mother and the three of us kids, and the picture of Neal and me in the Dry Tortugas. I went up forward to sit in the netting between the pontoons. I’d thought about those photos lots of times over the last few days, after Neal was really dead and finally gone. I’d thought about him and me and Ely and my mother and the choices we’d all made. I’d come close to pulling the photos out of my purse several times, but I just hadn’t felt up to looking at them yet. What was different now, I didn’t know, except that I wanted to make that sour taste vanish, and maybe I had to look at the dark places to make that happen.

  The sun was about thirty minutes off the horizon, and the gray-green scrub on the key looked inflamed in the golden rays. Around the south side of the island, on the ocean side, the little breakers foamed bright white, almost luminous. In close to the island, the shallows glowed pale lime, gradually deepening out in the channel between the keys to a deep cobalt blue. A little dark pointed head lifted out of the water over the seagrass beds—a sea turtle surfacing for a breath.

  “Are you okay?”

  BJ.’s voice startled me.

  “Yeah. I was just looking at these old pictures.” Actually, I hadn’t looked yet, I was just holding them— clutching them so tightly, I suddenly realized, that I was bending the paper.

  Around the south side of the island, the surface tension caused by currents of the swiftly rising tide smoothed the water to a glassy sheen and was broken only occasionally by the fins of a large school of tarpon as they rolled in the pass.

  “I’ve been thinking a lot about my past. You know, how I got here to this place, today. How things might have been different if I’d made other choices.” The school of fish moved closer to our anchorage on the inside of the pass. “My mother always wanted me to be an artist. I wasn’t really all that good, though.”

  “Very few of us ever turn out to be what our parents want us to be,” he said. “They try to do the best they can, but it’s not about them in the end. It’s about us.” He put his hand on my shoulder and began massaging the knotted muscles in my neck, trying to knead away the tension. His voice was soothing, but I felt my stomach muscles tightening at his touch. I opened my fingers and looked at the smiling faces in my hands. In just a few years, I would be the same age as my mother when this photo was taken. For the first time, I saw the resemblance that people often remarked upon, the maple-colored skin, the same-size white tank suits, the shoulder-length sun-streaked light brown hair.

  She was staring directly at the camera, and I noticed the deep lines at the corners of her eyes, the furrows in her brow. Though the weather in the photo was bright and sunny, in her eyes I saw the dark squall of her painting.

  “We have expectations,” he said, “but then we discover life is full of hurts and disappointments and shortcomings.”

  I nodded and took a swig from my beer. “Yeah, I’ve had a few of those lately.”

  “What makes you so hard on yourself?”

  “Me?” I cocked my head to one side. “What do you mean?”

  “You’re a smart, funny, talented, beautiful woman. Aside from being a terrible cook, you’ve pretty much got it all.”

  A smile touched the corners of my mouth for a little while, but as we sat quietly watching the sky turn violet, the sour taste returned.

  Neal looked so damned cocky and happy and pleased with himself in the other photo. We’d made love that morning and made pancakes for breakfast before going ashore and exploring the ruins of an old fort down in the Dry Tortugas. It was funny that I even remembered we’d eaten our last papaya that day, feeding each other spoonfuls of the juicy pink-orange flesh dripping in lime juice.

  “Neal saved my life down there, B.J. He didn’t have to come back and put that regulator in my mouth.”

  “No, he didn’t.”

  “It’s funny in a way. Crystal said he was a romantic, that he would come back for me—and he did. He died because he came back to save me.”

  “Yes, I know.” He kissed the side of my head and smoothed back my hair. “And you should be happy for him.”

  I turned to face him, puzzled. “What do you mean?”

  “Seychelle, do you really think Neal was all that content with who he had become? The Neal we knew back when you first met him was a guy who was struggling with lots of inner demons, but he was trying, really trying, to be good for you. I don’t know all his history—I don’t even know if his history would explain it—but for a while there, with you out of his life, the demons took over. He did th
ings that he could never erase. I think he went a little crazy hiding up there in the Larsens’ house watching you and thinking about all that money out there, with him the only one who knew where it was. Finally, at the end, you gave him a chance to get his senses back, to do an honorable thing.”

  I reached over my shoulder and stilled his hands. “So you’re saying I should forgive Neal, is that it?”

  He laughed softly and exhaled in a deep sigh. Before he could say anything more, I turned to him.

  “Please, don’t say anything for a few minutes. I want to tell you something. Just listen, okay?” I took a deep breath. “The summer when I was eleven, my mother asked me to go to the beach one day,” I began.

  ***

  When I’d finished, we both sat in the netting, quiet for several long moments. Finally I said, “I was just a little kid.” I squinted at the horizon. “I didn’t know much about who my mother was. These past few weeks I’ve come to see just how dark her bad days must have been. No wonder she couldn’t climb out.” My voice cracked, but I swallowed and licked my lips. I felt like a huge stone was pressing on my chest, preventing my lungs from inflating. Clutching the photos and knowing in my own way that I was speaking directly to them, I said, “I miss her so much.” The school of tarpon had reversed their direction and were moving off, back toward the slick water of the pass. “I forgive ...”

  I couldn’t get the rest of it out, but he knew what I meant. I forgave all of us.

  The photos fell into the netting when I stood up and clambered out of the bow hammock and dove off the starboard hull. I had to get away, be alone. As though in one of the annual lifeguards’ qualifying races, I swam the crawl stroke with everything I had, all out, feet pumping, arms arcing out of the water and slicing back in with barely a splash. Each breath felt like burning sandpaper in my throat as my head rolled out of the water, gasping out of the corner of my mouth. I was headed out to the pass, to the dark, swift-moving currents, to the blue-hole depths where shadows lurked.

  When I could no longer see the bottom and the surface of the water bulged smooth and taut, I kept at it, swimming with every ounce of energy I possessed, and still I stopped making any progress through the pass. The incoming tidal current sweeping through the narrow cut was just too swift. I flailed with all my strength, but I did not move an inch over the bottom. Finally, I took several short quick breaths and dove, angling downward, ears popping, lungs straining.

  I opened my eyes and saw the huge silvery silhouettes gliding around me, unafraid, oblivious to my presence. Without a mask and with very little light underwater the enormous fish seemed to appear as if by magic, looming out of the shadows swirling and swimming around me in an underwater ballet. The tarpons’ scales, great round glistening disks, shimmered in the dark water finding and reflecting the last rays of the dying day. With their low-slung jaws and big dark eyes, the huge fish might have looked evil were it not for their total indifference.

  I reached out to touch a fish as it passed so close to me, but as if with some unique schooling perception, the fish’s impressive body turned just out of my reach. As he turned, so did the dozens of others around him, and I wondered if it was that primordial cooperation that we’d given up to gain our free will.

  My head broke the surface, and I let out a whoop so loud, it startled the egrets nesting in the mangroves on the bayside of the key. The two birds took to the air, bouncing off the tiny elastic limbs of the tree. I floated peacefully, surrendering to the current carrying me back to the boat.

  B.J. stood up forward on a pontoon, leaning out over the water, his arms wrapped about the lower shrouds. Even at this distance, silhouetted against the coral-colored sky, his white grin glowed against his dark skin. He lifted an arm in a wave and hollered that dinner was ready. I began to stroke my way back to the boat with a different sort of urgency. All my appetites had returned.

  THE END

  Florida Is Murder

  A Continuing Conversation With Diane Capri and Christine Kling

  What do writers talk about over a glass of wine or a leisurely dinner? When two authors have known each other as long as we have, the conversation ranges widely but always returns to our love of reading and writing our stories. Book lovers are like that the world over, we’ve found. After all, that’s why you stopped by, isn’t it? Come on over. Pull up a chair. Relax. Join us while we share some things you’ve not heard about us before. Let’s see....where were we?

  Diane Capri: Chris, you’ve been a boat bum for decades. I’ve noticed that boat lovers seem to be voracious readers, too. Why is that?

  Christine Kling: I think it has to do with the fact that we live off the grid when we’re aboard. We aren’t dragging around a long extension cord and there is no cable that reaches out to sea. When you’re cruising on a sailboat, there is lots of time because it is a very slow mode of travel, and slowing down your speed and your body clock just puts you in the mood to get lost in a book. There’s a bit of a chicken and the egg thing here in that I’m not sure which comes first, loving boats or loving books, but I guess the part of people that makes them attracted to both is that part in us that makes us dreamers. To love books, you have to have the imagination to play the whole story out in your head - to see it in your mind’s eye. And boaters are always dreaming about being captain of their own ship off in some exotic land performing acts of courage. Even if you have a little plastic boat like I do, you still dream that you’re Captain Jack Sparrow.

  So that is my story of what draws me to books and reading. How about you, Diane? What were the first books you loved? Were you a reader as a kid?

  Diane: You bet I was. Reading has changed my life many times. I’ve always loved reading and I can’t imagine a life without books. Early on, I read everything: cereal box labels, fliers delivered to the house, Mom’s magazines and Dad’s newspapers. I can remember being a small child riding in the back seat of the car and reading every single sign along the highway. We took a lot of long car trips back then and my parents, bless them, managed not to kill me for being such a pest. My mother loved reading and read to us from the moment we were born. Maybe even before. Reading has always been as natural as breathing for me. But as we grew older, Mom was constantly looking for ways to amuse us that weren’t expensive. The library was a natural option. There were no bookstores in our small town, and of course, that was long, long before e-books made getting a book any time, any where -- even in the middle of the ocean -- possible. So once a week, we’d traipse over to the library, spend hours choosing our books and proudly pop our library cards down on the checkout table. It was great fun for all of us. I worry that moms and kids don’t do that sort of thing as much any more. Of course, we didn’t have as many other amusements available to us when I was a kid. Reading transported us to other worlds and other lives and was ever so much more fun than watching TV. Except for Perry Mason. I’m persuaded those old TV re-runs are at least part of the reason I became a lawyer where I really learned to write.

  Now out there in the middle of the water, with no one to save you from whatever terrors you find between the covers of a good book, Chris, don’t you worry about great white sharks and perfect storms? What was the most harrowing sea adventure you’ve ever survived? And did your love of reading help at all?

  Christine: Ah, storms. Right now I am sitting on my boat tied to a mooring in Man O War Cay in the Bahamas. I’ve got my morning coffee and toast, the sun is burning off the night’s chill and drying the dew on the decks, and the wind is barely ruffling the flag at the stern. Have you ever noticed how difficult it is to think about storms when the weather around you is lovely? (Yeah, the human ability to forget pain is the only reason there are second children). I’ve been very lucky in my sailing. I haven’t ever experienced a real gale at sea. I’ve crossed the Pacific Ocean to New Zealand, sailed from California to Panama, cruised most of the Caribbean and Venezuela, and yet, the most wind I’ve experienced at sea has been about forty knots. But bel
ieve me, that is very scary. The odd thing is that I kind of enjoy being pushed to my limits like that. You have to think on the fly. One time when I was traveling with my husband and my ten-year-old son en route down to the Virgin Islands, we got hit by a severe squall that blew out our mainsail. At that point, you have to adapt to the new circumstances. What do we do now? There is something exhilarating about having to make it up as you go along - and again that might be something that also attracts me to writing.

  What is it about your character (you, not the fictional ones) that attracts you to writing? Is it that exhilarating fear of facing the blank page and not knowing if you will be able to do it again?

  Diane: Oh, man! I’m always full of bravado when I’m pumping up my courage -- “I’ve done this zillions of times before, of course I can do it again!” -- but the fact is the message never quite seems to seep down to the fingertips, you know? In some ways, writing the first book was easier because I had never written a novel before and the challenge was simply to finish the book. Each book after that brings a totally different challenge, doesn’t it?

  Christine: Yes, sometimes it does seem like in this business, the more you know, the more you learn how much you don’t know. To be a writer you have to have the confidence and courage that somebody out there will actually want to read your stories (and somehow push that courage down to your fingertips :-), but at the same time we tend to be shy and even somewhat fragile in that when things in our careers take a downturn, it’s quite easy to decide that’s it! I’m a fraud, I never could write, I should just quit! I’m sure you know what I mean. Quick story: my first four books were published by Ballantine Books and after the first one was published, my first editor was let go, and I was assigned to the under-30 up and coming movie-star-handsome editor. We never really hit it off and he wouldn’t communicate with me. I’d go to conferences and discover he was there even though he had never even told me he was going. I’d email him and he wouldn’t answer my emails. When I sent him the manuscript for my fifth book, I waited and waited. After four months, I finally worked up my courage and wrote him saying that I had fulfilled the option clause of my contract, and that I was withdrawing the book from consideration to publish it myself. I was terrified that I had made the biggest mistake of my life! But in the end self-publishing that book and then getting the rights back to my Seychelle books and self-publishing them has been the best thing I’ve ever done for my career. I now have more readers than ever before and if that’s not the measure of success, I don’t know what is.