I avoid media types. It’s an old habit. Putting my name or face out for public scrutiny is unwise when you’ve lived the life I have lived. When a guy has determined enemies, he protects his privacy with determination.
The woman, though, didn’t have a problem with it. She had handled the reporters politely and with just the right amount of professional reserve. I was impressed.
“That’s why I had to get out and go roaming tonight,” she was explaining now. “I decided to risk surprising you to see the amazing Dinkin’s Bay”—she smiled—“where bottlenose dolphins walk by moonlight.”
The woman glanced at Tomlinson, and I could tell that she hadn’t expected me to have company—for good reason. I had dropped more than a few hints during our hours together, telling the lady that I lived alone, wasn’t dating anyone special, and that I usually worked late in the lab—if she ever happened to be in the area.
Not that I had anything sexual in mind.
Right.
Now here she was, and her uneasiness was palpable.
Tomlinson has an uncanny ability to read people. He helped the woman relax by making her laugh, saying, “Know what the weird thing is? When I tell people about the dolphins, they don’t believe me. But the moment Doc says it, it’s like gospel. I just don’t get it.” He leaned toward Emily. “From what I’ve heard, you’re an educated woman. Any insights into how some people can be so damn misguided?”
Emily laughed, then asked if we’d take her outside to see the area where the dolphins had come ashore. She was wearing hard-soled shoes, not heels, but I told her it was a bad idea.
“It’s all muck and mangroves,” I explained. “Your clothes would be a mess. Plus, the mosquitoes. It’s no place for a lady at night.”
That earned me a smile and another potent look. “Thanks for noticing. After the way I was dressed this morning, I went out of my way to look like a woman tonight.”
For an instant, I wondered if the woman wasn’t being a little too obvious, then decided it was okay. I liked her, she liked me and was letting me know it. Nothing wrong with that. “You succeeded,” I told her.
“Then I’ve already had a good night,” she replied. She held my gaze for a moment, then turned to Tomlinson. “Doc told me that you found pieces of crabs’ legs and carapace when you checked the area. But, to him, that wasn’t enough proof the dolphins were feeding. What do you think?”
Tomlinson had been doing some staring of his own, and I was relieved to hear him say, “I always defer to Doc in matters that require a brain but not much heart. But what I really think is, I need to get going. It’s sushi night at the Stone Crab. And Rachel told me they just got in some fresh conch from Key West.”
“But wait,” Emily said as she watched him get to his feet. “You mentioned something I wanted to ask about. Were you practicing deep theta-wave meditation? I wanted to hear more.”
Now she definitely had Tomlinson’s attention. “It sounds like you know something about the subject.”
“At home, I’ve got a few four-hertz theta tracks. But I prefer the higher frequencies.” She included me in the conversation with a look. “The higher frequencies are associated with brighter colors, feelings of well-being. After what we found in that gator’s stomach, I went straight home, showered and put the headsets on.”
Tomlinson was smiling, and I could sense that his determination to exit courteously had been replaced by a growing interest in Emily.
“Biofeedback and brain harmony,” he said. “We are chemical-electric beings, grounded only by spirituality. Kindness and passion in most of us. Lust in a few cases, too. Quite a few, from what I’ve seen in this part of the world.”
I said, “Lust?” aware that Tomlinson was an expert at planting subliminal suggestions into the heads of unsuspecting females.
Emily was laughing, a smart lady who apparently had pretty good antennae of her own because she took control of the conversation, saying, “I’ll discuss the subjects of passion and lust with Doc—if he’s interested. But not in mixed company, thanks. The thing I wanted to ask about is, if you were listening to a theta track, I’m guessing you’re upset about something. Doc told me a little bit about what happened last night. The gator attack and the girl disappearing. Not everything, of course. He’s a hard one to get to open up. He mentioned he had a best friend. That’s you, I take it.”
Tomlinson grinned, and said, “It requires someone who’s forgiving. And not easily bored.”
“Then it is you. How do you get him to talk?”
Tomlinson came close to winking at me as he replied, “I fed him psychedelic mushrooms once—by accident, of course. And once I got him stoned on some very fine weed—same thing, by accident. At best, even when high I would describe him as vaguely chatty. But in a very careful way.”
Emily was having fun with this, but I felt like they were teaming up when she asked, “You don’t smoke, Doc? Or is he kidding?”
I had opened a Diet Coke because all my beer was gone. Compliments of Tomlinson, of course. I shook my head slowly, no, took a sip and listened to Emily talk.
“I guess I’m surprised—that’s not a judgment, by the way. Personally, I can’t believe it hasn’t been legalized. It makes me feel all loose and relaxed. I laugh a lot. And act stupid. I think it’s good for people like us to act stupid sometimes. Don’t you . . . Doc?”
Now the expression on Tomlinson’s face was telling the world I’m in love, which is why I spoke up, saying, “You mentioned sushi night at the Stone Crab? They close at nine, don’t they? You’ve only got two hours.”
The restaurant was only five minutes away on a bike. He knew exactly what I was telling him.
Tomlinson countered, “We could all go. I could tell Emily about Tula. Maybe later we can even drive across the bridge to Red Citrus and have another look around. I like this woman, Doc. What’s your last name?”
“Marston,” Emily said, watching my friend’s face. “Emily Marston. Or Milly. Or Em. Or whatever you want.”
Tomlinson let that settle, retreating into his brain to think about it. “Marston, that’s not very tribal-specific. You have olive eyes ... no, gray-green. Polish, maybe, which tells me Chicago, or maybe Detroit. A bit of Irish, too, plus some German? Doc,” he said to me, “this person is intuitive. She has a gift. I think she can help us find the girl—after I fill her in.”
Once again, the woman took charge, making me her ally by saying, “Nice try, but Marston isn’t my maiden name. Another night, maybe. Until then, Doc can fill me in just fine. We have a lot to talk about.”
“Well . . . all righty, then,” Tomlinson said, aware that he’d just been dismissed. His inflection, though, suggested a truce but not capitulation.
“Doc could use some downtime,” Tomlinson offered, getting to his feet. “The dude has been pretty restless himselflately. He doesn’t have to say anything. Everyone at the marina can tell. He spends time looking at maps and listening to foreign news on his shortwave. He works out harder, he drinks fewer beers. The one sure sign?” Tomlinson gave me a knowing look. “His lab begins to smell of a very specific kind of oil that folks like me don’t associate with fish and boats.”
“Oil?” Emily said, confused, then sniffing. A moment later, I was taken aback by the look of recognition on her face. “Oil,” she said. “Yeah, I can smell it. Very faint, but it’s there.”
I stood and opened the screen door. “If you think of it, you might stop by the 7-Eleven and buy some beer. See you in the morning—but not too early. Okay? ”
Tomlinson was laughing as he headed out the door but turned to say to the woman, “Or maybe I’ll see you two at the Rum Bar later. We just got in a shipment of twelve-year-old Fleur de Caña from Nicaragua. Really superb stuff.”
I was heartened by Emily’s green-eyed gaze and by her response: “It’s entirely Doc’s call. Whatever he’s up for, I’m with him.”
Whatever concerns I had about Emily Marston’s vulnerability were s
et free when she slipped her arm through mine as we walked toward the marina and she told me, “I didn’t divorce Paul because I was unhappy with him. I did it because I was unhappy with myself. Oh, I pretended it was his fault. Came up with all sorts of reasons why we had to end the relationship and move on. He’ll always be the professor. To him, I’ll always be the student. And another big problem was . . .”
I waited through several seconds of silence before I told her, “Talk about it or don’t, that’s up to you. I was impressed by the way you stood up for him, after your argument this morning. That was nice. Unusual for an ex-wife or -husband to do.”
It was as if she didn’t hear me because she picked up the thread, saying, “For some reason, I want to be honest with you about what happened, Paul and me. One of the problems was, he doesn’t enjoy physical contact—not really. Not with me, anyway. But not with anyone, I think. I’m amazed at how many people dislike being touched. Aren’t you?”
No, but I didn’t say it. Instead, I walked and listened, giving the woman time.
It took a while. Finally, she asked, “Know what I was doing, Doc? I was making excuses. I was using a device that doesn’t make me look very damn nice at all. I blamed Paul to justify what I did. The truth is, I ended the marriage because I wasn’t happy and I wanted out. Blaming him was a way of getting what I wanted.”
I replied, “I think it’s common for the species Sapiens to do whatever it takes to justify pleasure by manipulating our own guilt. Don’t be so hard on yourself.”
“But that doesn’t make it right,” Emily countered. “Seriously, I’m not trying to punish myself. For me—and it drives me nuts sometimes—for me, the way my mind works, it’s important to get the facts straight. My dad used to say something that was cute at the time, but now it makes sense. He’d say, ‘You lie to your friends and I’ll lie to mine, but let’s not lie to each other.’ I try not to lie to myself, Doc. I think that’s maybe what he meant.”
I smiled and said, “The age difference between you and Paul wasn’t a factor?”
“Fifteen years is just about perfect,” she replied. “It puts the male and the female at about the same level of maturity.”
“You’re not joking.”
The woman said, “Maybe twenty years. It depends on the guy,” but didn’t hit it too hard, which told me the subject was unimportant to her.
We were walking through the shell parking lot, toward the marina docks, after stopping to admire the lady’s new car. It was a midsized Jaguar, black and tan, that didn’t mesh with her occupation or her probable income. Now I could see boats moored in rows, windows glowing, and an American flag at the end of the dock, flapping in a star-bright breeze.
I said, “Are you always this frank?” letting her know that I appreciated it.
“Doc,” she replied, “I’ll be twenty-eight in October, and I plan on living to be a spry and very active ninety. I don’t want to live a screwed-up, unhappy life. Or a selfish life. We receive peace in exchange for helping others. I really believe that.” Then she grimaced and said, “Jesus, I didn’t mean that to sound so naïve and girlish. Did it?”
“You have it all planned out,” I said.
“It’s not being selfish,” she replied, “to take responsibility for our own lives. And that’s the only plan I have. This morning, when you laid that poor woman’s bones on the tarp and I saw that ring, I felt so goddamn sad I wanted to cry. Did it show?”
I lied. “No.”
Emily said, “It was my wedding ring I was looking at. That’s the way it felt. My ring finger, and I had been swallowed by something as predatory as any alligator that’s ever lived.”
“Predatory?” I said.
“By fear,” she said. “I think fear rules unless we fight it. But not many people do, you think? We just go with the flow, doing what’s expected. Letting our lives drain right down into the gator’s belly.”
“Some, maybe” I said. “I’m in no position to judge.”
“Well, that’s not for me. I’m going to try my damnedest to live a life that matters. Cut the safety net and throw it away. Which sounds idyllic, but it’s actually scary shit when I think it through. That’s what I plan to do, Doc. In fact, I’m already doing it. Starting two weeks ago.” She leaned her breast into my arm. “If I have regrets later, it’s not because I was afraid to, by God, try something new.”
I patted the lady’s hand and steered her past the bait tank, toward the bay, where dock lights were tethered to black water, golden shards roiled by wind. The fishing guides were in, their flats skiffs rocking in a buoyant line, and a whisper of big band music seeped from one of the sleeping yachts, out of sync with the tapping flagpole halyard.
It was a little after seven p.m. on a Wednesday. A quiet time at Dinkin’s Bay.
I was feeling good. The decision that Emily would come to my bed had just been made without even discussing it—an exchange made via silent subtext. The unspoken dialogue that takes place minute to minute between fertile males and females, generation after generation.
This female had not only said yes. She had fronted the wordless invitation. She had also put me at ease by allowing me to fish for answers to unspoken questions.
Was she emotionally stable? Yes.
Did the age difference matter? No.
I was enjoying the moment, aware that it was among the rarest of transitional times. I would soon undress this woman. “Unveil her,” in Tomlinson terms, for the first time. And there would never be another first time for Emily and myself.
There was no rush, no need for more complicated sexual maneuvering. I could luxuriate in what was to be. I’m no romantic, but I do love women. Hidden beneath a cotton blouse, bound by elastic, what would Emily’s breasts look like unveiled in the back-bay light of my bedroom? Her hips, her thighs ... and what subtleties of layered coloring in the lady’s shadowed triangle?
“Did you hear what I said, Doc?” Emily asked, nudging me. “You just disappeared on me. Where’d you go?”
I noted the lady’s intuitive smile, which told me she knew full well where my mind had gone—probably because her mind had been there, too.
Yes, I was right, because she turned to a subject that had all the freeing implications of seeing the bones of a dead woman’s hand. The bawdiest of sexual behavior can be excused—even celebrated—by reflecting on unexpected tragedy, the inevitability of death.
As I had told Emily: People do whatever it takes to justify pleasure by manipulating our own guilt.
“I was thinking about the Guatemalan girl,” she said. “I asked if you’d read the story in the Naples Daily News last week. It was about human trafficking. I’m interested because I joined the Florida Coalition Against Human Trafficking. I’ve been to only two meetings, but I’d like to get a lot more involved.”
I said, “A biologist doing social work?”
“I can’t think of a better cause.”
I said, “When I put that together with you new car, it suggests to me you’re wealthy. Isn’t that an oxymoron? Wealthy biologist?”
“Normally about now,” she smiled, “I would get very self-righteous and ask what money has to do with a social conscience. But you guessed right, our family has money. My father did well for himself. Maybe I should have mentioned it. He’s an ornithologist.”
I replied, “A wealthy bird-watcher. Another oxymoron.”
“Oh, that is the least of the mysteries about my dad,” the woman said, giving my a searching look. “He gets a big kick out of telling people that bird-watching was an inexpensive hobby—as long as you had a passport and your own private jet.”
I was struck by the mix of her inflections. Emily said it in a joking way, but she also seemed to be baiting me with information that invited further investigation.
Because I couldn’t discern her purpose, however, I dodged the temptation. “So your paternal family has money,” I said.
Emily replied, “My grandfather left me a trust fund
when I turned twenty-one. Not a ton of money but enough. Paul had a problem with that. He’s a nice man. He really is. But he has ego issues. Would you have a problem if your wife had a lot more money than you?”
I found the word “wife” startling so shrugged and dodged that question, too. “The human-trafficking thing,” I said, “I’ve always had an interest. Probably because I worked in Central America for several years. I spent some time in Africa, too. Tell me what you know.”
A moment later, I had to ask, “Why are you smiling?”
“Because you’re funny,” Emily said. “The way you guard your secrets by asking questions. Your interest is real, though—that’s makes it okay for some reason. You care about people. I can tell. By the way, you left out the time you spent in Southeast Asia and Indonesia and a bunch of other places, too.”
Before I could reply, the woman told me, “I know more about you than you realize—including all the traveling. I already told you, I’ve read your research papers. In your writing, the really interesting stuff is always between the lines. Like when Tomlinson mentioned the smell of oil in your lab. I recognized it. I know what kind of oil it is. Do you want me to tell you?”
It was gun oil and specialized solvent. Tomlinson had surprised me by mentioning it. He had never mentioned it before.
“The pumps and aerators in my lab require special lubricants,” I said. “There’s no mystery about that.”
Emily replied, “Really?” to let me know that she was aware that I was lying. “You became sort of a hobby of mine, Dr. Ford. Paul embarrassed me so bad this morning when he mentioned it—which was precisely what he intended to do. Not that there’s a lot out there about you. Only two photos. That’s all I could come up with on the Internet. And I’m pretty damn thorough when I get on a research binge. Does that bother you?”
“Money and the attention of a beautiful woman,” I said, turning to face her. “Why would that bother anyone?”
“I’m not beautiful,” Emily said, her face tilting suddenly downward. “You don’t have to say that. We’re both pragmatists. People like us prefer the truth. I might be handsome on a really good day, but I’m not beautiful. I never have been. So there you are. I came to terms with it long ago.”
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