“So?” Rory said, giving Harry a cool, appraising look. “Do we have a deal?”
“Talk to Spencer,” Harry said. “He’s the deal maker.”
“Yes?” Rory said, extending a hand to Spencer.
“Yes,” Spencer said. “I’ll walk you to your car, and we can discuss terms.”
The men were walking toward the parking lot, looking backward at the boat, talking quietly. Go already, I thought. Leave. My nerves were shot. I was ready to collapse.
“The terms are cash,” Harry bawled suddenly. “Tomorrow. No later than noon. I wanna wrap this up and get back to Nashville. Noon, you hear?”
The men kept walking without turning around. “Harry,” I said. “Call BeBe. Tell her we’re even. And tell her you owe me a new pair of shoes.”
53
Weezie
I found Emma straightening up in the galley. “You were wonderful,” I gushed. “The appetizers were just right—elegant and understated. We really can’t thank you enough for helping out.”
She held a champagne flute up to the light, polishing it with a soft cloth. “You’re welcome. It’s kind of my swan song, you know? You think he bought it?”
I rubbed the knotted muscles in my neck. “I hope so. Spencer just called. Rory gave him the deposit check. Fifty thousand dollars. It’s a cashier’s check, so I don’t think it can bounce. Now all we have to do is get through tomorrow and we’re home free.”
“Yeah,” Emma said softly. “I’m kinda sad about moving on. I didn’t think I would be, but I am. This place has been home for nearly two years. And I’m gonna miss working for Doobie. He really is a sweetheart. Those crab quiches were his favorite. The brownies too, although, since it was you guys, I didn’t use his favorite ingredient.”
“I appreciate that,” I said wryly. “So, Emma, what will you do now? I mean, until BeBe gets back to Savannah and gets Guale reopened? Have you made any plans?”
“For the short run,” she said. “One of the waitresses at the Sand Bar is getting married this week. I can stay in her condo until they get back from their honeymoon, and I’ll pick up her shifts at the restaurant too. In fact, as soon as I finish cleaning up, I’m going to her bachelorette party.”
“I’ll finish up here,” I told her. “You’ve done enough for today.”
“Well,” she hesitated. “I guess that would be all right. I’ll probably just crash with a friend tonight. But I’ll be back first thing in the morning to pack up all my stuff.”
“Fine,” I said. “We’re supposed to close the deal by noon tomorrow.”
I took my time straightening up the galley. Everything fit neatly into its own tidy little compartment. Too bad life wasn’t like that, I thought. I was spritzing the stainless-steel counters down with glass cleaner when I felt the hairs on my neck prickle.
I whirled around. Liam was standing in the doorway, his sleepy brown eyes taking it all in. He wore tight blue jeans, no shirt, no shoes. He was deeply tanned, slim, buff, and deeply troubling.
“That was some performance you gave today,” he said.
“Thanks.” I put away the glass cleaner, under the sink.
“All done,” I said brightly.
“Where’s your boyfriend?” he asked.
“Harry?” I started to say that he wasn’t my boyfriend, but then thought better of it. “He went with Spencer, to make sure all the paperwork is ready for tomorrow.”
Liam nodded. “Five million dollars. That’s a hell of a lot of money.”
“It’s not as if we’re stealing it from Rory,” I said. “He stole that money from my friend. And from Spencer. Their life’s savings. And he’s done the same thing to other women. He’s a criminal. And that money is theirs.”
He ran his hand over the gleaming countertop. “But the Reefer ain’t theirs. It don’t belong to them.”
I frowned. “I thought you understood. We’re not really selling it to Rory. As soon as he takes possession of it, and his check clears the bank, there’ll be an anonymous phone call to the cops. Notifying them that the yacht has been stolen. Doobie gets his yacht back. We get our money. All is well.”
“Yeah,” he drawled. “I understand the plan. I just don’t know that I really want to go along with it. You know?”
I felt a chill start to work its way up my spine. “But you agreed,” I said finally. “You told Emma you’d help out. Look, if you’re afraid you’ll get in trouble…”
He took a step closer and ran his finger down the strap of my sundress. “Oh, I’m not afraid of trouble. Tell you the truth, it kinda turns me on. How ’bout you?” he asked, raising an eyebrow. “You getting turned on?”
I could feel his hot breath on my neck. I took a step backward, but now I was flat against the sink, with no place to hide.
“This whole situation makes me intensely nervous,” I said, telling the truth. “In fact, this conversation is really, really making me nervous.”
“You’re cute when you’re nervous,” Liam said, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear. “In fact, you’re pretty damn cute all the time. What’s a hot little number like you doing with an old fart like Harry?”
“Look, Liam, what is it you want from us? Money? I can talk to Harry. Once the deal cleared, we intended to pay you for your help.”
“Money’s good,” Liam said, looking down at me through those sultry, half-closed eyes. “But y’all are expecting a big payday tomorrow, and all because I took your mark out on the Reefer today for a sea trial. Without me, none of that would have happened.”
I took a deep breath. “Actually, we could have taken the boat out without you. Harry can run a boat. He’s a charter-boat captain. But that’s beside the point. You did help us out, and we do intend to pay you.”
“I had a different deal in mind,” Liam said. “Cutting out the middleman, you might say. Dealing directly with the buyer.”
“You can’t,” I blurted out. “It’s all set. Rory made a deal with us. If anything changes, he’ll get suspicious and take off. You don’t understand him. He’s a criminal. In fact, we’re pretty sure he’ll try to pull something to cheat us.”
“Shh,” Liam said, pressing his finger to my lips. “You’ve got such a pretty little mouth. But you’re talking too much. Thinking too much.” He wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled me to him, and then he was kissing me, pushing his tongue into my mouth, moving his hands up, cupping my breasts.
“Liam,” I said, shoving him away. “Stop it.”
“Come on,” he said, catching my wrist and holding it tightly. “You saying you’re not turned on? You saying you haven’t been thinking this whole time about how you could cut Harry and the rest of them out of this deal and keep all the money for yourself?”
“No!” I said, trying to wrench away from him.
He grabbed my shoulders and pinned me against the counter. “I have,” he said, breathing fast. “If anybody’s gonna make any money off the Reefer Madness, it’s gonna be me. If anybody’s gonna sell her, it’s gonna be me. Now, sweet thing. What’s it gonna be? You gonna stick with Harry and go home poor? Or are you gonna let Liam show you the good things in life?”
“You can’t—” I started.
“Oh yeah. Yeah, I can,” he said calmly. “And I will. You said it yourself, Rory wants this boat. He wants it bad. He don’t care who he has to pay to get it, or what he has to do. It’ll be easy. You tell me where Rory’s staying, I’ll call him tonight, tell him the terms have changed. It’s you and me he’s dealing with now. No broker. No Harry. And if he buys from us, the price is, say, half a million less.”
I felt myself go absolutely cold. Here I’d been worrying about Roy Eugene Moseley finding us out, and all the time Liam was waiting in the wings, just waiting for a chance to pounce. On the boat. On the money. On me.
Harry, damnit, I thought, get back here. Now.
“Whatcha thinking, sweet thing?” Liam was standing in the doorway again, his thumbs hooked in the waistb
and of his jeans. I could tell he was watching his own reflection in the glass of the porthole over the sink, admiring himself.
Suddenly, I started to get pissed. Oh yeah, I thought. Yeah, Liam. You are such a badass hottie. I bet girls have been telling you your whole life what a badass you are. How could anybody resist?
“I’m thinking…why not?” I shrugged.
“You’re in?”
“Yeah.”
“Allll right,” he said, giving me a high five. “This calls for a little celebration.” He grabbed my hand. “Follow me.” He led me through the narrow hallway, in the direction of the master stateroom.
Oh God, I thought. He’s gonna drag me into the stateroom and rape me.
“Where we going?” I asked, digging in my heels. “Look, I think you’re cute and all, but I’m not really ready to take this to the next level this fast. And Harry’s coming back. If he comes back and catches me with you, I don’t know what he’ll do. That wasn’t all an act with him today, pushing me around. He’s got a temper. And I’m afraid of him.”
“Shit,” Liam said. “Old fart like that? I could kick his ass up and down this boat. Relax,” he said, tugging at my hand again. “Just a little party. Nothing serious. Come on, I’ll show you.”
He pushed open the door to the master stateroom. “In here,” he said. “Hell, Weezie, I’m not gonna rape you. I never had to force a woman in my life. I just want to show you something.”
Reluctantly, I followed him into the room. He pulled open a sliding door. It was a closet, full of men’s clothes. He kneeled down and pushed aside a suitcase. For a moment, while he was down on the floor like that, it occurred to me, Hit him! Hit him on the head and run for your life. But before I could even look for something to hit him with, he was standing up, holding out a blue Adidas gym bag.
“What’s that?” I asked.
He took the bag over to the bed and dumped it out.
“Doobie’s stash,” he said, turning to give me a big grin.
It was a supersize smorgasbord of controlled substances. There was a gallon-size ziplock bag of marijuana. A sandwich baggie of white powder. And a dozen bottles of pills in rainbow colors.
“How’d you know where it was?” I asked. “Emma said Anya turned the boat upside down, looking for wherever Doobie was hiding it. And she never found it.”
“Who do you think got it for him?” Liam said. “He couldn’t risk carrying stuff on him, flying down here, going through Nashville and Atlanta, with airport security searching all over his ass. And Anya watched him like a damned hawk. Never left him alone for a minute once they got to Lauderdale. This way was much easier. He’d give me a call, tell me they were coming down, and I’d take a little trip to the candy store.”
“Wow.” My mind was racing. How in the hell was I going to get out of this?
He picked up the big baggie. “Some excellent Jamaican. I scored it on our last cruise. And the coke’s righteous. Doobie hooked me up with a guy who gets primo stuff. Or maybe you like ’ludes?” He cocked his head and gave me a wink. “So what’s your pleasure?”
“Oh.” I winced. Think fast. Say something. “Damn. The truth is, this stuff makes me nauseous. I’ve been like this ever since college. I smoke the slightest bit of weed, and I puke my brains out. Same thing with coke. But I wouldn’t mind a drink.”
“Not much of a party that way.”
“I don’t care what you do,” I said generously. “What I’d really love is a cosmopolitan. Do you think we have the stuff onboard to make a cosmo?”
“Oh, yeah. Anya drinks ’em all the time. What a hypocrite. It’s okay for her to get tight on vodka, but let Doobie smoke a little weed to relax and she freaks.”
I started stuffing the drugs back into the gym bag. “If you tell me where everything is, I’ll make us a pitcherful. Do you know if there’s any triple sec?”
He reached out and grabbed the baggie of marijuana. “You sure you don’t want any of this? It’s really good shit, guaranteed to mellow you right out.”
“Positive,” I said. “I guess liquor’s my drug of choice.”
“Whatever,” he said, busying himself rolling a joint. “Everything’s in the liquor cabinet in the main salon. I’ll be up in a minute.”
I found the liquor and Rose’s lime juice in the cabinet under the wet bar in the salon, right where Liam had said I would. I held the cocktail shaker up to the light. It was Baccarat, with a sterling-silver top. Very nice. I poured in the vodka, triple sec, cranberry juice, and lime juice, and added some crushed ice. After a vigorous shake, I poured myself a hefty drink for courage and knocked half of it back in one long gulp. Then I took the bottle of pills I’d palmed from Doobie’s stash and poured out half a dozen blue tablets. What they were, I didn’t know and I didn’t really care, as long as they made Liam go nighty night. I smashed the pills with the bottom of the vodka bottle, put them in the cocktail shaker, and gave it an even more vigorous shake.
Footsteps. My hands were shaking again. On second thought, I crushed two more tablets, put them in the bottom of an empty martini glass, poured out another drink, and gave it a vigorous stir.
“Here you are,” Liam said, walking into the salon. He was wearing shoes now, and an unbuttoned shirt, had a lit joint in his hand, and his eyes had gotten even sleepier, if that was possible. “Find everything you need?”
He reached out for me, and I handed him the martini glass.
“Yeah. Try this. It’s kinda my specialty.”
“Pussy drink,” Liam said. But he took it and sipped. “Different. You put something different in it, right?”
“It’s my secret ingredient,” I said, giving him a wink. I took a dainty sip of my own drink and waited.
He sprawled himself out on the banquette, picked up the remote control, and turned on the television. It was tuned to MTV, and a trio of Latino girls dressed in white patent-leather bikinis were writhing around on the floor in front of a huge neon crucifix, while a menacing-looking black guy dressed as a Trappist monk sang a rap version of “Faith of Our Fathers.” I wondered if Spencer had ever seen this video. I’d have to remember to ask him. If I got off this yacht in one piece.
“Come sit right here by me,” Liam said, patting the banquette.
I stayed where I was.
He took another slug of the cosmo. “Come on,” Liam drawled. “I won’t bite. We’re gonna be partners, right? You and me. Partners gotta be tight.”
I picked up the cocktail shaker and perched on the edge of the banquette. “Let me top you off,” I said. “Partner.”
54
When the phone rang in the motel room, I regarded it with deep suspicion. Anybody who knew me would be calling on my cell phone. And then I looked at the cell phone, sitting on the nightstand, and realized I’d let the battery go dead.
“BeBe?” The voice was whispered, barely audible.
“Who is this?”
“It’s me, damnit, Weezie.”
“Why are we whispering?”
“I’m in trouble,” she whispered. “Get over here. Now. Bring Harry and Spencer.”
“They’re not here,” I said. “Where are you? What’s wrong?”
“I’m on the yacht. Get here now.”
And then she hung up.
Get there how? I wondered. Granddad and Harry had the Buick. I’d been sitting around the motel room all afternoon, going bonkers from boredom and nerves. I grabbed my purse and was almost out the door when it occurred to me: disguise. Reddy could still be skulking around the marina, watching the Reefer Madness.
Cursing, I called a cab. I pulled the dark wig over my own hair, and shoved some socks in my bra. There was no time for any more extensive costuming. I just barely had time to put on the yellow platform heels before I heard the cab tooting its horn.
“Bahia Mar marina,” I told the driver. He turned and stared at me.
“You working?”
Oh. He thought it was that kind of business.
“Everything’s an emergency with you people,” he muttered, but ten minutes later he was letting me off at the marina.
“You want me back in an hour?” he asked, giving me a wink.
“No,” I said. “My pimp’s picking me up.”
I clomped as fast as the platforms would take me to the end of the dock where the Reefer Madness was tied up. I gave a furtive look up and down the dock to see if anybody was watching, then boarded quickly.
Up close, the splendor of the Reefer Madness took my breath away. It made Roy Eugene’s Savannah yacht, the Blue Moon, look like a bathtub toy. Everything was white and gleaming and smelled like money. And there was nobody around.
The sundeck was deserted. I kicked off the platforms and tiptoed around to the bow of the boat. Nobody there either. Back in the stern, I eased open the door to what looked like a living room. “Weezie?” I whispered.
“Get in here.” An arm reached out and grabbed me.
“What the hell?” Weezie was sitting on a huge black leather banquette, next to a strange man who’d been hog-tied with a series of brightly colored bungee cords.
“It’s Liam, the first mate,” she whispered.
“What happened to him?” I asked.
I could tell she’d been crying. “He, he, was groping me. Kissing me…”
“So you tied him up? That seems a little extreme, Weezer.”
“He was going to double-cross us!” she exclaimed. Even though it was uncomfortably warm in the room, she was rubbing her arms and her teeth were chattering. “He said he and I should go to Reddy and make a deal with him ourselves, without Harry or Spencer. And if I didn’t go along, he’d rat us out to Reddy. And I was scared. He was going to ruin everything.”
“So then you tied him up,” I said, nodding approval.
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