Chapter 18
A herd of wild hogs charged out of the jungle so close to the rear bumper that one or two hit it, shaking the wagon like a baby’s rattle. I didn’t care. They could rattle away the whole night as long they weren’t Chad pursued by an assortment of bad guys with guns and knives. The relief was so great I burst into tears. The thunder of hooves faded. Tears continued to drip. I’d been so cocky, so full of myself, asking questions all over town as if I were some kind of genuine investigator, when I was nothing but a silly girl who designed costumes and suffered from delusions of grandeur. It was now painfully apparent I wasn’t cut out for this line of work. I couldn’t even tell Chad from a wild hog!
I turned off the engine and slid over into the passenger seat. I fished around in my purse for a tissue and dried my tears. As far as Chad was concerned, the hog incident was going to be nothing more than a funny story. Hilarious. And thank God it was too dark for him to see my tear-ravaged face. Or discover the horrible truth that all my thoughts had been for him. I’d never even considered the threat to myself until long after the last faint sounds of pigs crashing through the underbrush had vanished, leaving nothing but chirping insects and the soft rustling of small creatures of the night.
I might have looked calm, sitting there in the front seat waiting for Chad, but my nerves were still doing some kind of frenzied street dance. When the driver’s side door cracked open and a shadow loomed outside, I had to jam my hands over my mouth to keep from crying out. Chad? It had to be. The blasted man moved on cat feet, I hadn’t heard a thing.
“Good girl,” said his voice as the shadow slid behind the wheel. “You actually got old Bess turned around.”
“Old Bess?”
He patted the steering wheel. “Ranchers tend to treat their vehicles like the horses they replaced, so, yeah, we call her Bess.”
“We, uh, had a disagreement or two,” I conceded, “but she was pretty tolerant of my mistakes. Sorry, Bess,” I added, imitating Chad by patting the dashboard.
“Heard the pigs,” he said as he eased Bess onto the dirt road. “Give you a scare?”
“I thought it was you,” I admitted in a very small voice. “Being chased. So, yes, it gave me a scare.” Maybe by tomorrow I could make a funny story of it, but tonight I stuck to the bare facts, hoping Chad didn’t sense just how terrified I actually was.
“Sorry, kid.” He patted my shoulder, I swear the same way he patted Bess. “I forget you’re a city girl. Haven’t spent much time in the real Florida, have you?”
Which was all too true. Even most native Floridians, let alone snowbirds, never venture out of the thin veneer of civilization that lines Florida’s coastline. We never stray into the vast interior of ranch land, farm land, tangled jungles, and swamps that are home to a million alligators, deer, black bears, wild hogs, and a multitudinous army of smaller creatures. There are even a few magnificent Florida panthers, so scarce now that sighting one is worthy of a spot on the evening news.
“Look for a street sign,” Chad said, interrupting my wandering thoughts. “I need to tell the cops how to find the house.”
We were driving on asphalt now and I did as Chad asked, somehow surprised that this side of the river had little green street signs exactly like those in town. I didn’t plan to let Chad get away without telling me what happened back there, but at the moment I kept my mouth shut. If I pelted him with questions, I came across as just another nagging female. Give him space, and I hoped he’d open up on his own.
We drove the eight miles back to my car in silence. Chad parked but left the motor running to keep the chill out. “Your guess was good,” he said. “And you can tell Koonce his instincts were right on. Hopefully, he has insurance to cover the cash he laid out, because I’m pretty sure the cops will match up the jewelry to stuff that’s been stolen.”
“What did you see?”
“More than I expected to.”
“Chad?” He was teasing me, darn it, drawing out his tale for maximum effect.
“I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but there was a pretty good argument going. I had a feeling the boss was none too pleased about the goons using Pete Koonce as a fence.”
“You saw the boss?”
“I saw somebody who was acting like a boss. Could be he was only the highest ranking gang member present. There were three guys sitting around a table, drinking beer. The boss guy remained standing. There were a bunch of items laid out on the table, mostly larger than jewelry. Heirloom plates, cups, clocks, candlesticks, silver. Quality stuff, all of it. And against the walls—flat screens, PCs, X-boxes. You name it, they had it. I figure Koonce was a trial run. They were hoping to sell him the antiques as well, but the boss guy was wary, thought they ought to sell farther away from home.”
“You got all this without hearing a word?”
“Not my first surveillance and I’m good at body language. Can even manage a bit of lip reading occasionally. Besides, I knew how I’d handle it if I was in charge.”
Great. My hero wasn’t government, after all. He was fresh out of jail.
Mentally, I swatted myself with a phrase from Gramma Wallace, who lived long enough to see me graduate from college. Get thee behind me, Satan. Bad thoughts about Chad I didn’t need. Positive, Gwyn. Think positive.
“So we’ve really done it,” I breathed. “We’ve found the gang that’s been doing all the burglaries.” Boone would be ecstatic. If he didn’t freak about me following men into the deep, dark woods with only a drunk at my side.
“That’s not all.”
“There’s more?” My voice whooshed out on a note of disbelief.
“Yeah. I recognized the boss guy.”
“Well?” I longed to swat him.
“Eric Johnson.”
“What?”
“Prince Charming himself. Guess you were right about that too, sweetcakes. Good instincts. The guy’s a crook.”
Oh. My. God. Letty was saved. She’d never marry Marshall now.
“Look, kid, let me take care of telling the cops. I’ll keep your name out of it if I can. Better for me if your cop doesn’t know I dragged you into the woods with me.”
“He’s not my cop.”
“Yeah, well, that’s not what I heard. Better safe than sorry, and all that shit.”
He had a point, and not just about Boone. Mom and Scott would go ballistic if they knew. But Crystal . . . I rather thought she’d enjoy my night’s adventures. I mean, I had to tell somebody, right? What was the point in having all this fun if nobody knew?
“Fine,” I agreed. With my hand on the door handle, I added, “Any more surprises?”
“Nope, that’s it. Goodnight.”
Like the good gentleman he’d been raised to be, Chad waited until I drove toward the Bypass before he started up old Bess. I was all the way down the block before I realized that at no time had he driven recklessly, slurred his words, or in any manner appeared to be drunk. Strange guy, Chad Yarnell. A lot more complex than the fun-loving boy I used to worship.
Chad was sitting in Bess, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel when I opened the shop the next morning. He unfolded himself from the wagon and glared through the glass door as if I were opening five hours late instead of five minutes. Great. Cranky Chad was back. In fact, he looked even worse than usual.
Crystal, who had already heard the whole story over breakfast in her apartment, startled Chad with an elated high five. “Way to go!” she cried. “Letty owes you big time.”
Chad looked from Crystal to me, shrugged. “O-kay,” he drawled, “looks like what I have to say is for the both of you. So listen up.”
He checked the store for customers, but all was quiet. “I’ve just pulled an all-nighter with the local cops. Your guy’s not as stiff-necked as old Brannigan,” he directed in an aside to me. “Quite a few of the burglaries were in the county, and Talbot actually called the sheriff and the staties. The Feds will probably be in it next,” he muttered
, half to himself. “After a pretty hot discussion, there was general agreement we could have more going on than a burglary ring. We need to hold back, let things play out, see if we can catch the whole gang on multiple charges.”
I loved the “we.” Chad, the supposedly unemployed civilian, was in this up to his neck.
“What about Letty?” Crystal demanded.
“That’s a bit tricky,” Chad conceded. “Have they set a wedding date?”
“Just ‘soon’. That’s all I can get out of her.”
“Seems like she ought to be safe until the wedding,” Chad said. “Why kill the goose that lays the golden egg? So tough it out, girls. We can’t risk her giving the game away. I promise I’ll keep an eye on her. So will the cops. We won’t let anything happen to her.”
“Shit!” Crystal, expressing her opinion.
I echoed her sentiment. Chad’s logic was sound, but I couldn’t help feeling we were playing Russian Roulette with Letty’s life.
I also found it interesting that Chad seemed to have a good deal of credibility with local law enforcement. Even with a cop newly arrived from Nebraska. Unless Chad was lying through his teeth, no one seemed to have questioned his story about the house in the woods.
“By the way, Gwyn,” he added, “I kept your name out of it. Told them Koonce called you, and you called me because you knew I had some experience in surveillance, and that was it. I did the tail alone.”
“Why didn’t Pete dial 911?” Crystal asked.
“Too conscious of his image,” I told her. “Afraid to have egg on his face if the guys were legit. He wanted me to consult Boone, but Boone wasn’t—“ Oops.
“You called Talbot before you called me?” Chad was staring at me like I had two heads.
“He–he’s the police,” I stammered. And Pete said—“ Why Chad would ever think I’d call him first I couldn’t imagine, but the look on his face shut me up fast. Without a word he turned and stalked out. We heard the squeal of Bess’s tires as he reversed and sped off through the parking lot.
“Do you think he’ll still keep an eye on Letty?” Crystal asked, looking as if she were about to cry.
“Maybe. Probably,” I added on a stronger note. “Under that street bum façade I suspect he’s a do-gooder at heart. He’d have to be to survive government service all these years. You have to believe in what you’re doing or you burn out fast.”
“Yeah? Well, look at him. Poster boy for burnout.”
I sighed. “Right. Fine. Okay. He’s still the best we’ve got. It’s not like we can protect Letty all alone.”
“Maybe you need to make peace. You know, go out to the houseboat and—”
“Crystal King,” I sputtered, “pimping me out to save Letty is going a bit far, even for you.”
“Sorry,” she muttered. “I didn’t mean you had to go that far.”
“You haven’t seen the way he looks at me, particularly when he’s drunk.”
“Really?” Crystal perked up. “Two guys in the same month? Wow, Gwynie, you’re actually getting a life.”
A suitable retort was on the tip of my tongue, but three young men walked in looking for outfits for Tampa’s Gasparilla Days Festival, which was coming up at the end of the month. Costumes, a gang of thieves, con artists, murder, the threat to Scott, the threat to Letty. I was going to have to dredge up the girl who was strong enough to be an undercover informant for the FBI. The girl who’d sent her lover to jail for life. The girl who became a woman who turned her back on passion of any kind.
Until Martin Kellerman was torn apart by twin diesels and I was certain it was murder.
A second interview with Vanessa had been on my To Do list for days now, but I’d gotten nowhere. It was time. I’d have to accept Chad’s theory that Letty was safe. There was a murder to solve.
Mom helped. With a few well-placed phone calls to her network of acquaintances at the Yacht Club, we tracked the Widow Kellerman to her weekly appointment at Beauty is Us, an upscale salon tucked among the elegant boutiques in downtown Golden Beach. Making no effort to disguise myself behind a magazine, I sat in the waiting area, never taking my eyes off Vanessa through cut, blow dry, pedicure and manicure. She shot me occasional dirty looks but succumbed to the inevitable as she ran out of excuses to stay. Her golden perfection shone as we settled onto a shady bench in the park-cum-parking area across the street from the salon.
“I’m sorry to keep after you like this,” I said, “but I know you want to figure out how Martin died, and sometimes the police just don’t get it. I mean, they see things in black and white, and the world’s just not like that, I’m sure you’ll agree. So I told my friend, the Chief of Police—you remember him from the Fund-raiser?” She nodded, making a face that was a nice combination of chagrin and disgust. “Well, he hasn’t been in town long, and I offered to help out, figuring the locals would talk to me more readily.”
The cloak of deception slipped over me so easily I could hardly believe it. Of course Boone wasn’t going to be happy if my lies ever got back to him. And nothing ever stayed secret in Golden Beach.
“So?” Vanessa challenged. “I’ve already told the police everything I know. What more can I say?”
“I assume you knew about Martin’s allergy?”
“Of course.” I could tell she was about to do a bolt. She didn’t like the way my questions were headed.
“You must have tried to figure out how peanut butter got on board Rainbow’s End. That’s only natural.”
She looked down her nose. “You’re not much of a detective. Obviously, someone put peanuts or peanut butter on the Christmas Tree. There isn’t any other explanation.”
“And who do you think would do such a thing?”
“Or maybe it was in Santa’s pocket,” she declared, giving me a look that was as nasty as it was smug.”
We locked gazes, glaring. I gritted my teeth, reminded myself why I was here. Scott, this was about Scott. My voice had a decided edge as I asked, “Anybody else?”
“Try John Baird or his prissy little wife. They thought they had a lot to gain.” Vanessa smiled. I truly hadn’t thought her evil before, just a woman out for what she could get, but there was something about that smile . . .
“I’ve heard rumors,” I said, “about you and Jeb Brannigan and my brother Scott. And, oddly enough, Sherry Lambert. Any of that true?”
“Ask your brother.”
“I did. He says the four of you had some good times. The trouble is, some people think Jeb and Scott capable of hastening Martin’s death so they could enjoy his money as well as his widow.” Kinda strong, but the woman annoyed me. No matter how deep I probed, I couldn’t find a single vibe that broadcast, grieving widow.
Instead of exploding in my face, Vanessa fluttered her frankly fake eyelashes. “How flattering,” she cooed. “Those darling boys. To think one of them cared enough—”
“Watch it!” I barked. “One of those boys is my baby brother.”
“Such a darling,” she murmured, her big blue eyes going wide in intimate recollection.
The bitch was taunting me, rattling me so badly my mind balked over a suitable retort. The only way to save face was to wind things up. Vanessa’s confirmation put the final nail in Scott’s coffin. No way around it. No matter how certain I was that Scott was innocent, he and Jeb had a perceived motive. They were both in trouble.
“Thanks very much,” I said, standing up. “I appreciate your time.” We headed for our cars, which, thankfully, were parked in opposite directions.
As I walked, a sudden shiver rippled up my spine. There was something I’d missed. Or was it that fleeting glimpse of evil beneath Vanessa’s salon-perfect façade?
Evil. Evil in Golden Beach. Con artists, grand theft, burglaries . . . murder. Whole families of criminals traveling the country, following the seasons, following names on a list of “marks.”
What if . . .
No way. I was pie-in-the-skying again. Conjuring clo
ud pictures, trying to fit pieces from three different puzzles into one frame.
Just the same . . .
I headed back to the shop while my brain juggled a whole new set of possibilities.
Chapter 19
The problem with having an active imagination is that it won’t let up. It defies logic, defies sensible advice. Sometimes it defies all reason. Physically, I sat on my nicely padded stool the next morning, answered the phone, and rang up a few minor accessory sales while a myriad what ifs continued to swirl through my head like taunting wraiths left over from Halloween. I wanted everything neatly sewn together into a tidy Gwyn Halliday creation. And I could do it, every ragged bit of patchwork stitched into a single crazy quilt of speculation. As long as I ignored common sense and court-proof evidence.
Fine sleuth I was. Just manipulate the facts, ma’am. Create a cloud castle to fit your theories. Sherlock Holmes is spinning in his grave. And that groan echoing through my head was undoubtedly Boone’s, while the chortles of mirth came from Chad, who was likely humoring me for his own amusement.
“Letty didn’t come for her reading,” Crystal announced, interrupting thoughts I was happy to drop. “She always comes in on Wednesday morning, never misses.”
“Why don’t you call her?”
Crystal tugged at a giant yellow hibiscus on the front of today’s caftan. “I don’t want her to think we’re intruding. I mean, she wasn’t happy with my last reading. Maybe she isn’t coming back.”
Not good. We might have alienated Letty just when she needed us most.
“It’s all my fault.” Crystal’s voice wavered. She gulped, rubbed a hand over her eyes. “When I came here I told you I did light-hearted fortunes only. I lied. I told Letty what I saw and I messed up everything. What’re we going to do?” Her question rose to a wail—cut off by the ringing of my cellphone.
“You know an Alexis Lippincott?” barked my favorite baritone. No hello, how are you, it’s Boone. Just a few stark words that sent red-light warnings skittering through my brain.
Death by Marriage Page 18
