by Jaden Skye
“Go ahead, talk,” Cindy said. “I’m all ears.”
“I don’t know where to begin,” said Dalia.
“Start at the beginning,” Cindy said.
CHAPTER 3
“No one ever believes this could happen to them. I still don’t believe it. ”
“I know,” said Cindy.
Dalia took her head out of her hands then and looked up at Cindy keenly.
“Yes, you do know. You see right through things, don’t you? You always did as a kid in school, too. You’d never take no for an answer. I remember you were always looking behind all the corners for all kinds of facts. ”
“I need information now,” Cindy said, “I want to hear everything you can tell me, even things you may not think matter.”
“Ames owns and operates a huge cargo fleet, and I own an art gallery in town. It’s his second marriage, it’s my third. He has a son from his first wife, Elizabeth, who lives nearby. Ames loves his son, he sees him a lot. ”Dalia spoke as if she were reciting these facts by heart. She must have repeated it many times during the investigation, Cindy thought. “We have a full, rich, beautiful life,” she went on. “This is an incredible place and there are plenty of wonderful people around us. There are also others who are not so great. It’s natural. ”
“Inevitable,” said Cindy, shocked to realize that Dalia had been married three times and was only in her thirties. “I had no idea you were divorced twice,” she said softly.
“How could you know that?” Dalia quipped, “we’d completely lost touch. So, I made some mistakes. Made some bad choices. It didn’t matter. This marriage made up for it. It was great. ”
Cindy took a deep, sharp breath. “What happened? I read all the articles, but I want to hear it from you. ”
“The papers lie,” said Dalia. “Don’t pay attention to what you read in the papers.”
“I pay attention to everything,” said Cindy.
Dalia smiled. “That’s the Cindy I remember,” she said. “Okay, it’s almost three weeks now since Ames went missing. The day he disappeared everything was fine, there was absolutely nothing out of order. Ames told me he was going out sailing with Dale, one of his business partners, that afternoon. They both belong to the International Yacht Club and love to sail. I told him to have a great day and expected him back for dinner.
He never came home. He still hasn’t. ”
Cindy hadn’t heard those details. “Have they questioned Dale?”
“Yes,” said Dalia fitfully. “It turns out he wasn’t on the island that day.”
Cindy was startled. “Ames lied to you?”
Dalia shook her head forcefully. “It wasn’t a lie. Sometimes he made plans that didn’t pan out and then he’d just do something different. He’d tell me later. It wasn’t a big deal. He told me everything. We didn’t keep any secrets. ”
“Had he actually made plans with Dale for that day?”
“Of course he did,” Dalia insisted. “Dale was questioned and said something came up at the last minute and he cancelled. He doesn’t live on the island. He and Ames own a fleet of cargo ships. They ship nutmeg, rum, island spices. This is known as Spice Island. ”
“I know,” said Cindy.
“Dale lives off the island and Ames is based down here, overseeing everything. He loves it here. ” Dalia bit her lip, her eyes teary. It appeared as if it were hard for her to keep going over the story again and again.
Cindy laid a hand on her wrist.
“When Ames didn’t come home and didn’t answer his cell phone for hours, I called the police and reported him missing. It was about ten o’clock at night. ”
“It must have been awful,” Cindy said softly.
Dalia’s eyes filled with tears.
“Horrible, terrible. The police came right away. They’ve been scouring the island, every last inch of it. People have been helping from near and far. Search teams have roamed over all the beaches, the waterfalls, the harbors. ” She could hardly catch her breath. “Ames is well known. He’s a public person and a good man. He helps lots of locals. He lives a big life. What happened to him, Cindy? ”
The starkness of Dalia’s question hit Cindy like a punch in the gut.
“I wish I knew,” said Cindy.
“So do I,” said Dalia, “but one thing I do know – he’s still alive. I’m sure of it. ”
The edgy power in Dalia’s voice startled Cindy.
Dalia sighed. “Even though Ames was happy most of the time, at moment she would sit on the beach and stare out at the ocean, with a very bleak look in his eye,” said Dalia. “What am I doing with my life? he’d say. Does it make any sense? Ames left his whole family behind and never bothered calling or checking in on any of them. The island does that to you. It makes you forget everything. He missed his baby brother Laramey, though. Once in a while he said that to me. I told him to call him, but he couldn’t. ”
Cindy interjected quickly, “If, by any chance, Ames did call his brother, “she said, “is there any possibility he might have returned home to see him?”
Dalia laughed at that. “None at all. He was done with his family. Completely done. In fact, I never met one of them, he had absolutely no interest in inviting them to the wedding, or introducing me. He had a twin sister too, Clea, that he told me about. He’d been estranged from her also, for years. ”
Dalia sighed.
“The police are getting ready to stop the search,” Dalia continued in a feverish tone. “They can’t. We can’t let them. He’s here somewhere and we have to find him. Time is of the essence. This is the beginning of the rainy season. There’s no way I’m letting this go. ”
Cindy wondered for a moment if this was just desperation speaking.
“You’ve had the best possible help with this, Dalia?” Cindy asked.
“I have,” Dalia said. “I have no complaints about the police or the search teams on the island. But there’s always one little detail that’s easy to miss. It can make the whole difference. We need a fresh eye— someone out of the box, who sees this from a different perspective. ”
“Me?” said Cindy.
“Yes,” Dalia said.
Cindy took a long drink of her chilled lemonade. It was sweet, sour and cooling.
“Did you love him?” Cindy asked suddenly, surprising both of them.
Dalia was taken aback. “Yes, very much. Not did I love him — do I love him? I adore him. He’s wonderful. Our marriage is fantastic. We’ve learned our lessons and finally know what it takes now to make a marriage work. ” Dalia’s large green eyes were flashing. “I want him home!”
For a second Dalia looked like a little girl, petulant, banging her fist on the table, demanding that life go her way.
“Time is of the essence,” Dalia repeated, heatedly. “Listen,” and she leaned closer to Cindy, “this island isn’t as peaceful as it looks. There’s been other trouble here recently. There was another case of a disappearance three months ago. A guy was kidnapped. The police couldn’t find him fast enough and when they did, he was dead. ”
Cindy was startled. She hadn’t heard about that.
“This guy was also in the shipping industry. Doesn’t that tell you something? ”
“Tell me what?” asked Cindy. “Was there a connection between him and Ames? Was he someone you knew? ”
“We didn’t know him, but we knew of him, saw him around. It’s a small place, and people recognize each other. After they found the body, the police investigated the case and said he was involved with the drug cartel. The guy owed money he couldn’t pay. They said it was pure coincidence that he and Ames disappeared a few months apart.
But I don’t believe in coincidence. I’m not a person who believes what they tell me, either. Like you, I think for myself. People lie. Do you realize that? ”
“Yes, I do,” said Cindy.
Dalia smiled. “Good. Then you know that we have to keep searching, and find Ames fast. ”
&
nbsp; “Ames was never involved in anything shady?” Cindy looked at her carefully.
“Never,” Dalia said.
“Are you sure?” Cindy continued. “You know there are secrets we keep, even from ourselves.”
“I’m telling you, never,” Dalia said. “He didn’t have to. He was incredibly successful, had everything he needed — and more. There are people around you can talk to about him. They may be of help, know something. I’ll give you their names. The police spoke to them already, but you are different. You can interview them in your own special way. Maybe they’ll tell you something different, maybe you’ll discover a detail the police missed. ”
“I need the police records,” Cindy said. “All of them. Including of the guy who turned up dead. ”
“I’ll get them for you, it’s no big deal. I told the police you were coming, said I was bringing a private detective down. They didn’t like it, but they have to cooperate. The Chief of Police insisted, he’s a good friend of Ames. I’ll introduce you to the cops in charge of the case. ”
Cindy took another deep breath, and tried to speak in a matter of fact manner.
“Dalia, why are you so sure he’s alive?”
“It’s not even a question in my mind,” Dalia said breathlessly. “I feel it at night when the sun goes down, I feel it in the morning. The first week, I couldn’t sleep at all, I was so devastated. Then, when I suddenly realized he was still alive, I was able to sleep, to eat, to think clearly. You have to believe me, Cindy. A wife just knows these things. ”
“I know she does,” Cindy said. She remembered how she knew right away that Clint had died. Not only that he’d died, but that it wasn’t an accident, that he’d been murdered.
“You’re right, Dalia,” Cindy said, “deep down, a wife always knows.”
CHAPTER 5
Cindy decided to spend the rest of the afternoon looking over each room in the house, examining Dalia’s photo albums, and reading the articles Dalia had collected from many newspapers and magazines.
The articles all basically said the same thing: that Ames had been a good man and the search for him came up with nothing. There was lots of speculation about what happened though. Most agreed there had been an accident, Ames had probably drowned at sea. Cindy shivered when she read that — it was so reminiscent of Clint. Apparently, Ames spent a great deal of time on his boat sailing, both with friends and alone. The day he disappeared, his boat was found unmoored in the waters, drifting alone. That was the main clue they focused on.
The afternoon he disappeared had suddenly grown windy and many thought Ames might have been drinking and fallen over board. Some suggested that he was out on deck, near the edge of the boat and had a dizzy spell. A couple of articles quoted Ames’s physicians saying that he’d complained of dizziness in the past month or so. One article speculated about suicide.
But there was no note, nor had Ames ever displayed any signs of depression. Everyone said he was vibrant and active, involved in life to the brim, and that his cargo fleet was thriving. No one could even think of any enemies he might have had, who would have made life hard for him.
It was all just a little too perfect for Cindy — not only the articles, but the intense foliage, beaches and beauty of the island. Cindy couldn’t help but wonder what lay under the veneer of this ideal life that Ames had publicly constructed. It wasn’t hard for Cindy to imagine that someone here on the island might have wanted to do him harm.
Cindy read through the articles a couple of times. Everything seemed set in stone. She couldn’t allow these pieces to prejudice her, or close her mind to other possibilities. Dalia was right to bring in someone new, someone who didn’t know Ames or the island.
Dalia was mostly silent at dinner with Cindy on the patio. She seemed tired and uneasy, picking at her food and attempting small talk without much success. A small muscle under her eye twitched and stopped and then started again. Now that Cindy had settled in, and the excitement of her arrival had passed, it was as if a cloud had come over Dalia. All during dinner she seemed to be in a fog. Cindy well understood what she must be feeling.
“It’s okay,” Cindy had said to her at one point, “we can eat quietly. I know how hard it can be to keep up social chatter after something like this. ”
Dalia looked at her appreciatively. “You’re kind, Cindy,” she said softly, “and you’re smart.” Then she handed her plate to Rosa, who slid on and off the patio, bringing food and taking it away.
Cindy couldn’t quite get used to Rosa, the way she appeared from out of nowhere and then disappeared into the background again. She never smiled and still hadn’t met Cindy’s glance.
“Rosa’s odd,” Cindy said to Dalia, after Rosa had left the patio, her hands full of plates.
“No, she’s just very quiet and shy. Rosa was badly beaten as a child, when Ames found her and took her into his home and rescued her from hell. She’s worked for him as a housekeeper for years, but he’s like a father to her, and she adores him. She’s very upset and confused that he’s missing now. ”
“I guess so,” Cindy said and the two of them finished their dinners, in silence.
After dinner, before going to bed, Cindy took a long bath in the wonderful Jacuzzi in her room. She appreciated the time alone and being able to unwind. When she got out of the bath, she dried herself, slipped into a flowing robe and looked at herself in the long mirror on the wall. To her surprise, she looked quite different from even a few months ago. Her long blonde hair was still thick and wavy, but the young, slightly hesitant woman with the fluttering eyes that used to greet her in the mirror had disappeared. She looked taller, more shapely and forceful. Her eyes were clearer and her lips fuller as well. Cindy barely recognized herself for a moment. There had been an incredible transformation, and she felt it was far from over yet.
She turned away from the mirror and went out onto her patio. Incredible stars spread over the sky, like a sparkling canopy of light, greeting her. Gazing up at the sky, Cindy thought about how much Clint would have loved it here. They would have gone snorkeling, listened to Calypso, gone to a fine restaurant, danced, made love.
Cindy could almost feel his energy around her, and wondered if he had any idea of where she was now and what she was doing. Clint had always loved Cindy’s adventurous spirit, but neither of them ever imagined she’d be involved in solving crimes. Would he think she was crazy taking this case on? Or would he approve of her coming back down to the Caribbean, trying to help? It seemed natural to her, as if her own life had prepared her for this unexpected next step. It seemed impossible to return to life as she knew it. And she couldn’t imagine what else she could be doing.
It was destiny, Cindy then decided, that had brought her down here now.
*
When she awoke early the next morning, Cindy was excited to get going and speak to the police. She dressed in white slacks and a short sleeve, paisley, silk shirt with a light sweater over it. She didn’t have to put on much, makeup either. Already her skin had a lovely glow from being outdoors and in the sun. To look professional, she pulled her long, flowing hair back and tied it at her neck.
After a quick breakfast, she and Dalia got into the car and drove through a narrow road, flanked by fragrant bushes, into town. In less than ten minutes they were at the police station, a small, two story building— made of white stucco. The day was fresh, clear and beautiful, a perfect day to be in the ocean, swimming, snorkeling, surfing. Not a day, Cindy thought, to be searching for the possible remains of your friend’s husband.
“I’ll introduce you to the police,” said Dalia, “then I’m going back home. They’ll bring you back when you’re ready. ”
“Fine,” said Cindy.
When they walked into the main office of the station, two cops were standing there, waiting.
Dalia walked up to them, quickly. Obviously, she knew them well. Cindy walked close beside her.
“Mattheus, this is Cindy,” Dalia spoke to
the cop on the right. He was a good looking guy in his late thirties, sun-tanned, with blue eyes, and dark hair.
Mattheus seemed taken aback when he saw Cindy. He extended his hand.
“Hi,” he said, gruffly.
Then Dalia turned to Cindy. “Cindy, this is Mattheus’s partner, Sand.”
Sand, a local, was probably mid-forties, heavier, with big muscles, narrow eyes and a slight paunch.
Sand didn’t shake Cindy’s hand, just shook his head and laughed. “This is the new detective on the case?”
“This is it,” said Dalia, routinely.
“So, you think a woman’s going find something we didn’t?” Sand went on.
“I just want a fresh eye,” said Dalia. ”
“Yeah, yeah,” said Sand, disparagingly. “We know. The chief of police said to do what you want. Your husband was a big guy on the island, so now the Chief’s pacifying you. ”
Cindy didn’t like Sand, and she could see the feeling was mutual. Clearly, he was threatened by her presence.
Mattheus interrupted. “Okay,” he said, pointing to a chair, “You can sit down here, let’s talk.” His voice had a rough edge.
“I’m going back now,” said Dalia. “When you’re finished, you can drive Cindy back to the villa.” Then, she suddenly turned and left. Cindy sat on the chair Mattheus motioned to. He sat opposite her, tapping his fingers on the desk. Sand sat across from the two of them.
“I’m leaving this to you,” Sand said to Mattheus. “You fill the little lady in.”
Cindy felt her jaw tighten. “I’d appreciate that. I know you’ve gone through everything, but Dalia just wants a fresh eye. ”
Both Sand and Mattheus laughed.
“How fresh, honey?” Sand asked.
“That’s enough, Sand,” Mattheus interrupted. “I’ll take care of this.” Then he turned to Cindy. “So tell us more about you. What’s your background? ”
Cindy took a deep breath. “I was a researcher at a large newspaper in New York, tracking down leads.”
