Key West

by Stella Cameron

  Nice chest.

  She glanced around again. A door led to what was probably the bathroom. Everything else was right here, including a Murphy bed pulled down from the wall and neatly made, a tiny sink and stove with minuscule cupboards above, a prehistoric refrigerator that clanked, an open laptop computer on a table built into a corner—and a very large, black Harley-Davidson parked crosswise, and filling almost every inch of spare space.

  “Ι’m not your man,” Talon said.

  Adrenaline ebbed, and exhaustion crowded in its wake. “I’m not looking for a man,” Sonnie said. “I’m looking for an investigator. Roy told me you’re an investigator.”

  She’d seen him on a number of occasions and noticed he was a big man, a big, muscular man with dark curly hair on the wrong side of too long. She also noticed he might be good-looking without a few days’ growth of beard and a tendency to appear too bored, or too cynical to wear any particular expression.

  He wore an expression now. The man was angry.

  “Did you hear what I said?” She was angry, too. So she’d interrupted his cozy evening with his bike. He was mooching off of Roy, and refusing to do anything for himself. That was what this was all about. He was probably every bit as good at his job as Roy suggested, but he was lazy.

  “We already had this discussion,” he said. “And I already told you I can’t help you.”

  “Won’t help me.” Her stomach contracted. “Because you’re too lazy to help me. That’s it, isn’t it? You’re one of those men in some sort of second childhood. Riding around on the bike you couldn’t have when you were the right age to have one.”

  His dark brows shot up.

  He had light brown eyes, or hazel, maybe. And she’d definitely gotten his attention. Sonnie shifted in her soggy sandals. Her clothes weren’t just wet; they were also growing cold.

  “Why would a supposedly normal woman decide to come to the home of a man she doesn’t know in the middle of the night and insult him? Push him?” Talon’s South Carolina roots became more pronounced as his temper deteriorated. He stepped closer, so close she could see the faint sheen on his chest, beneath smooth black hair. “Are you fearless? Or stupid?”

  “I’m…” Oh, no, she wasn’t going to admit to being desperate. “I’ve got to find something out and I’m not getting anywhere on my own because I don’t know how. There. Absolute honesty. And I trust Roy. He said I could trust you, too, so I do.” Brave words. Α pity they didn’t make her feel more confident.

  “If you were absolutely honest, ma’am, you’d have finished what you started to say. You’re desperate. Isn’t that what you mean?”

  A mind reader. She thought for a moment before saying, “Close. You seem like a smart man. You’ve got to know I wouldn’t come to you like this if I had anywhere else to turn.”

  “Thank you,” he said, with that smile that touched only one side of his mouth—and only slightly. “Flattery like that could go to a man’s head.”

  She didn’t want this—this banter. Maybe she just wanted to close her eyes and be silent, feel nothing, think nothing.

  The sensation of a large hand closing on her upper arm jolted her, and she realized she had actually closed her eyes. She stared at him.

  “Are you okay?” He was too close. “Sοnnie? Υοu’d better sit down.”

  Drawing herself up straight tοok effοrt. “I’m just fine, thanks.”

  “I doubt it.” He kept his grip on her arm. “Υou’re exhausted, and you’re wet. When did you eat?”

  “Εat?” She wanted tο hire him as a detective, and he’d decided to become a standin mother? “I eat regularly. Are you going to take my case?”

  “Sit down.”

  “I don’t—”

  “Sit down. You’re about to collapse, and I don’t feel like picking you up.”

  He led her to a sagging chair draped with a brown-and-orange afghan, and plunked her on the seat.

  “I’m sorry.” She had no right to come here like this. But she would do what she had to do. “I’ve probably shocked you, turning up like this.”

  “lt takes a lot to shock me. This isn’t the way you are, is it? Not really.”

  She coughed into a fist. “Annoying, you mean? It doesn’t matter how I really am. I have to find some things out. I came back to Key West thinking…I probably wasn’t thinking. That’s the trouble now: I didn’t think anything through. Because I suddenly knew what Ι wanted to find out. I just came without figuring out how I’d do that.”

  “So you told Roy all about yourself and he elected me your right-hand man.”

  “No.”

  “No?” He retrieved a denim shirt from a hook on the wall and pulled it on, but not before Sonnie caught a glimpse of a tattoo on one shoulder. “No, you didn’t tell Roy, or no, he didn’t elect me?”

  “Either. Neither. I mean I didn’t tell Roy much except that I’m in trouble. Maybe in danger. I could be. I don’t know.”

  He stopped in the act of buttoning the shirt and let it hang. He approached until he stood at a bottom corner of the bed. So large a man who could move so silently disconcerted Sonnie. He sat down and leaned toward her. Their knees almost touched.

  “What kind of danger?”

  She jumped, then laughed, felt foolish.

  “I’m not for hire. Let’s be straight about that. But I am interested in what makes a woman like you act out of character. You’re scared out of your wits.”

  Sonnie shook her head, spraying drops of water from her hair. “I’m not the kind who gets scared.”

  Talon rested his hands on his knees. Spots of moisture had hit his shirt and begun to spread. “So you often change your mind about going home. You bang on strangers’ doors instead—in the early hours of the morning?”

  “Of course I don’t.”

  “Okay.” He drummed his fingers. His hands were huge. Not meaty. Lean, but with wide palms and long fingers—and prominent tendons extending to powerful forearms. Strong hands. Α strong, strange man who kept a Harley-Davidson in the middle of his living room and played eerie violin music.

  “If you aren’t afraid of something, and you’re here by mistake, we don’t have anything else to talk about, Sonnie.”

  She didn’t have a right to be here. He owed her nothing. If he wasn’t interested, he wasn’t interested.

  “Hmm?” He leaned closer. “Do we?”

  “I have a house here on Key West,” she said, avoiding his eyes. “That’s where I’m living.”

  He crossed his arms.

  “After we spoke this evening, I went back there. I went inside and felt as if there was someone there.” Sonnie did look at his face then.

  The expression in his eyes changed subtly. “Felt?”

  “How do people ever explain these things without feeling foolish?”

  “If they do, I’m less likely to take them seriously.”

  “So you do take me seriously?”

  “I didn’t say that. It was just a feeling?”

  He would never give her the smallest break. “Α door slammed upstairs.”

  “Υοu’re living there alone?”

  “Yes.”

  “Probably a draft.” His stillness didn’t help her discomfort. “Either from an open window or when you opened the front door.”

  Mentioning a light she might or might not have seen was out of the question. “Probably.”

  “But because of other things you know, you’re afraid it might not have been.”

  The beating of her heart pounded at her eardrums. “I’m just going to tell you what I need to find out. Okay?”

  He bent a very long leg and rested a bare ankle on the opposite knee. He did not encourage her to continue.

  “I want to knοw if I’m a wife or a widow.”

  “If the people who abducted your husband don’t make further contact, that’s something you may never knοw. Not for sure.”

  “How…Sonnie hesitated, made to get up. “I didn’t tell<
br />
  Roy—”

  “No, you didn’t.” He shrugged and indicated the computer. “I did a little checking.”

  “And found out my history? On the computer?”

  “Not hard if you know where to look—and have some connections. Don’t worry. Most people don’t knοw. But the question’s the same. What I said about your husband’s abduction.”

  Face-to-face with voicing at least a facsimile of what she believed, Sonnie felt as if her diaphragm had been cut out. She would not say that what she needed most was her memory.

  “Isn’t it true?”

  “It may be. If he was really abducted.”

  Another subtle shift in expression. His eyes narrowed then, and his nostrils flared.

  “I don’t think the crash I had near the airport—Smathers Beach—was an accident. I think I need to find out if someone tried to kill me, and I can’t risk asking anyone I knοw for help.”

  “So you’re trying to dump a guilt trip on me. I’m supposed to take you on because I’m too honorable to let you go it alone.”

  Sonnie stood up. “I hadn’t thought about it quite like that. But, since you mention it, won’t it make you feel bad if you send me away now and you read about my murder in the morning?”

  Four

  “Hello, hello, hello.” Α white-haired woman wearing a yellow muumuu that reached her ankles slid sideways through a gap in the fence between Sonnie’s house and the pink stucco immediately to the west.

  “Old friend?” Roy said.

  “No.” Sonnie watched the woman advance. “Although…I think I do remember her. She used to wave from a distance—pretty much like she’s waving now.”

  “Mrs. Giacano? Yes, it is you; of course it is.”

  Sonnie, with Roy beside her, stopped reluctantly at the foot of the steps to the veranda and said, “Good morning.” It was a good morning, the sun so bright it made her squint. Except for leaving scattered red poinciana petals like a telltale fingerprint, the storm of the night before might never have happened.

  The woman arrived before them. Up close she was younger than she had appeared at first.

  “You probably don’t remember me. No, I see you don’t. It’s just Ena. From next door. We only met a few times in passing. But then, you and that handsome husband of yours were always so busy. I didn’t like to push myself. And I never saw you when he was away.” She tutted and shook her head. She held a long florist’s box. “I’m certainly sorry about those dreadful people. The ones who kidnapped him. Imagine that—kidnapped. How long has it been now? Eight months? How are we supposed to feel safe in our own homes when a man like that is snatched away and there isn’t a word more heard?” She paused for breath. “I wanted to come sooner—once I saw you here again—but I don’t intrude. There hasn’t been any news, has there? About your husband?”

  Sonnie took an instant to recover from the onslaught and say, “No, no word.”

  “Fancy that. And such a talented man. I just know he was about to make a comeback. And he will. You just wait and see. I was telling Edward—he’s my lodger Edward Miller”—she pointed toward her own house, at a man playing with a small dog near the front door—“I told Edward how Frank Giacano will show up one of these days and he’ll take his rightful place. He’ll be number one, and you’ll be proud to be beside him. The cameras are so kind to him. Not that they have to be kind. He’s so handsome.” She rolled her eyes. “Those Italian good looks. No wonder all those women run after him. Charisma, that’s what it is. And when they let him go, he’ll be even more mysterious.”

  Sonnie felt her fingernails digging into her palms but couldn’t relax enough to uncurl her hands. All she could think to say was, “Yes, yes.” This woman was one more of Frank’s fans. She probably bragged about living next door to him.

  Ena closed in on Sonnie and stared hard at her face. “Oh, you poor dear,” she said, shaking her head and sighing. “What a mess you’ve made of yourself.”

  “If you’ll excuse us, ma’am,” Roy said, gripping Sonnie’s elbow, “we wouldn’t want to take up a busy woman’s time.”

  “Not at all,” Ena said, batting a soft hand from a loose wrist. “Being neighborly is close to being godly in my book. I suppose you have to wait a while before having plastic surgery. Didn’t I hear that?”

  Sonnie’s scars, the ones not hidden by her clothes, felt as if they swelled and throbbed. “That’s right,” she said. “Thank you for coming over.”

  “Oh, it’s nothing. You poor girl. All you have to do is shout and I’ll be here.” This time Ena studied Sοnnie’s legs. “I’ll be more than glad to run errands, too. Save that leg—and your foot.”

  Sonnie’s heart pounded. She said, “Thanks.”

  Ena peered at Roy. “Don’t I know you? Where have I seen you?” Her unlined face bore the sheen of some lotion or cream. The white hair was a platinum bleach job taken too far.

  Roy, who religiously avoided the sun, wore a straw Stetson. He also wore Western boots with tooled-silver toe caps. “Well, ma’am—”

  “Ι’m Ena Fishbine, but it’s just Ena.”

  “Well, Ena, I reckon you may have seen me. I’m Roy Talon. I own the Rusty Nail on Duval.”

  Ena shuddered and averted her face. “A bar. No, I wouldn’t know someone from a bar. I don’t believe in imbibing.” She returned her full attention to Sonnie, who noted a flush on the woman’s face. “I want you to let me do what Ι can to help you. There isn’t any task I won’t tackle. I noticed you haven’t gone through and taken off the dustcovers yet. Probably hard to do with all the worry about your husband. Let me help you.”

  “I hadn’t planned—”

  “You look awful, dear,” said Ena. “My, oh, my. What’s happened to your hair, your clothes…your sandals?” Sonnie couldn’t think how to respond.

  “Got caught in the storm last night,” Roy said, and Sonnie noted that his drawl was more pronounced than his brother’s.

  “Well,” said Ena, ignoring Roy. “I’m sure you don’t need me making you feel even worse, Mrs. Giacano. Some secrets are meant to be kept.” She gave Roy a rapid, sideways glance. Then she pressed the florist’s box into Sοnnie’s arms. “I promised I’d make sure you got these. I’ll check back on you later, help you get settled in.”

  “Oh, you don’t have—”

  “That’s what neighbors are for,” said Ena, already making for the gap in the fence. “You need a friend. A good friend. Then you won’t want to spend nights in bars. I’ll be back. I’m coming, Edward.”

  Roy gave a low chuckle and said, “Yup, you’ve got to give up all that drinkin’, Sonnie. Shouldn’t be a problem with Just Ena’s help.”

  She grimaced and led the way to the house. “She’s a victim of her tongue. I do seem to recall her now. One of those people with a heart of gold—according to people around here. Not that I ever got to talk to many of them.”

  Roy leaned around her to open the door, and she forced herself to walk in without hesitation. “Thank you for bringing me home,” she said. “And thank you for allowing me to spend the night.”

  Roy chuckled some more. “We were glad to have you. But that brother of mine made it pretty clear you’d be staying. Chris in his forceful mode isn’t someone you buck. Good to see him that way again.”

  When she frowned at him, Roy smiled. “Good to see my brother worked up about something. It’s not easy to get him riled up these days, but you sure managed. Only gets ruffled over things that interest him. Like the Harley. Had to put a wider door in that shack he calls home, just so he could sleep with that bike where he can see it. Yep. In fact I don’t recall the last time I saw him like he was when he brought you over. I’d say you got him interested enough to be ruffled, all right.”

  There hadn’t been any discussion since Chris Talon had all but marched her to the back door of the Rusty Nail in the small hours of the morning and hammered with a fist until Bo appeared, with Roy close behind him. Talon had thrust Sonnie at
the two men and told them she needed a bed, and that she needed “to be saved from herself—and me if she tries to make me responsible for her again.”

  She grew hot all over at the thought. Roy couldn’t be farther from the truth about Talon’s feelings about her. He considered her a nuisance. She said, “Thank you for putting up with me. I’ve been such a burden to you.”

  “Nope.” Roy shook his head. He’d removed the hat, and his red hair was still damp from the shower. “Not a burden at all. There’s plenty of room, and we like company. Sonnie, why don’t you stay on with us until you’re on your feet again? Chris was right to bring you to us last night—this morning. We didn’t talk much, but you were so scared.”

  “I was embarrassed at disturbing everyone. Thanks, Roy, but I need to make myself settle in here.”

  “I don’t push people. And my brother never used to. You must have hit a nerve. But you can change your mind and come to us anytime. Pick up the phone and I’ll come get you. Understand, now?”

  “Thanks, Roy, but I—”

  “Don’t say what you won’t be doing. Just leave it that you can. Okay?” He looked at the box in her hands. “You going to open that? I’ll be takin’ a look around the house before I go.”

  She started to protest but he was already starting up the stairs. “Your brother must have said something to you about me being scared,” she called after him, annoyed that Talon would wait until she was shut away in Bo and Roy’s guestroom, then spill everything she’d told him in confidence. “It’s not true.”

  “All Chris said was that you might be a bit too uptight to be alone here yet. That’s all. And how you’d gotten jumpy here last night and gone to him.”

  Increasingly irritated, she followed up the stairs. “In other words, he did say I was frightened.”

  “You were, weren’t you?” He’d reached the landing that circled the second floor.

  “No.” Why pretend? “Yes, I was. But I…Well, when I met him last night I hoped he would help me, and when he wasn’t interested, I think I was confused. I went back to see if I could convince him I wasn’t a flake. Hah! Great job I did. Look, Roy, this isn’t your problem. You’ve already done too much for me.”