Joe nodded, adding fiercely, “Just try it without me.” He returned to the subject at hand. “Anyway, one weekend we were working much further south, near Everglades City. Sophie was doing some turtle spotting while we toured some of the wetlands for my research. We had camped overnight and the next morning Sophie went wandering on her own. She found a sandy beach area and was about to sunbathe when she saw trash littered about and realized people were around. She followed the trash trail to give them a piece of her mind and came upon a camp in the middle of a barren sandy area with strange looking equipment set up in the middle. Nobody was around so she went over to have a look. Just as she got there two guys showed up, armed to the teeth and began interrogating her. She got frightened and started backing up. In the meantime, I was worried that she would get lost so I tracked her and was just in time to trip her to the ground as they took aim and fired.”
Chase almost choked on his drink.
“I grabbed her and we ran like hell. Once we got back into the swamp we had no trouble eluding them.”
Chase was incredulous. “They were going to kill you?”
Joe shrugged. “I got Sophie back to camp and calmed down, then I went back for another look. They had broken camp and gone. The only things left were the trash and these.” Joe produced a small piece of gold metal with the initials DB stamped into it and some sandy looking bits of coral.
Chase examined one. “She had some of these in her trinket box at the house. What are they?”
Joe frowned in thought. “I'm not sure, but I think they're fulgurites. Fulgurites are a natural silica glass that are fused by the heat of a lightning strike. These are sand and are pretty commonly found on sandy beaches around here, but the ones Sophie took home with her are not sand. They are rock, and as far as I could tell, they were of a rock not commonly found around here. The night before, when we camped, there was a bad lightning storm, but not where we were. The full force of the storm evidently hit that other camp, while only a short distance away we got nothing. We weren't on reservation land but we were in a spot where you don't usually find other people. When we got home I notified the tribal elders and did some checking in the scientific community. I got nowhere. I was told there were no scientific studies of any kind, either privately or government funded, in the area.”
“What about this thing?” Chase was turning the piece of metal over in his hands.
“I don’t know. Why don’t you keep it? Perhaps you can find out more about it. I hit a dead end.”
Chase tucked it into his shirt pocket. “Did you make a report?”
“Yes, but the cops weren't real interested. Everyone was long gone and it was a difficult area to get to. They put it down to us busting in one some drug meeting of some kind and told us to stay closer to civilization.”
“But you didn't buy that?”
“No. I went back to the area a few days later on my own and scouted around a bit. The equipment that Sophie described intrigued me. I found nothing except for some more of these fulgurites. They were scattered over quite a wide area. I collected a few samples and did some more traveling to see if they had just moved camp somewhere else, but I found nothing. Sophie was pretty pissed at a total stranger so casually willing to snuff her out. She'd never had anything remotely violent happen to her before and she stayed good and mad. She kept the rock-like fulgurites to remind her and she was going to do some checking on her own.” Joe was pensive, remembering.
“Shortly after that I had a project on the west coast to supervise and I spent a lot of time over there just running back for the occasional day or two. Sophie and I kept in touch, mostly by phone. She became obsessed about finding out what was going on out there. I tried to dissuade her but I was kind of distracted and I really didn't think she'd find out anything anyway. I thought she’d eventually get bored and drop it.”
Joe dropped his head in his hands, his torment evident.
“The night she died I had just got back from another trip and we went to Singer Island for dinner. She seemed much more her old self and we had a quiet dinner catching up on gossip and then went for a couple of after dinner drinks and a stroll on the beach. She didn't mention the subject until we were almost home and then she said she'd found someone who knew what was going on out in the wetlands that day and as soon as she could meet with them she'd let me know what was said so I could inform the tribal elders.”
Joe raised his head, looking directly at Chase. “We'd had dinner and drinks and I was tired. It's no excuse I know, but I didn't pick up on it at all. I didn't even ask her who the person was. I dropped her off at your place and that was the last time I saw her alive.”
Chase laid a hand on Joe’s shoulder empathizing with his pain. “Thanks for telling me Joe, but I don't see where that leaves anything, or the reason for this Indian cloak and dagger stuff.”
Joe’s voice became hard. “I think she met that person that same night and that person killed her because she knew too much about what was going on, whatever that might be. I tend to agree with the police now, she must have gotten into the middle of some kind of drug deal.”
“But she was struck by lightning.”
Joe sighed. “Yes, I know.” He smiled slightly. “But I’m stubborn and evidently, whoever did this didn’t think anyone would question it. I picked up where Sophie left off and since then I've had nothing but trouble. Tires slashed, attempted mugging, phone calls at all hours, mailbox vandalism, you name it, it's happened recently.”
Chase was encouraged, but wary. “Is it possible they were coincidences, kids, acting wild, people who don’t like Indians, that sort of thing?”
Joe shook his head. “No way.”
Chase contemplated the end of his cigar. “I knew it. I just knew it. So now it begins.” He looked up at Joe. “Have you found out anything new?”
“No, but I could with your help.”
“How so?”
“I’m an Indian. I can get all the information I want out here but not in your territory. Oh, people are friendly enough but not very helpful. Old biases die hard. They seem to think giving me information can cause trouble. You could make things a lot easier if we teamed up.”
Chase stuck out his hand. “I have nothing else on my agenda.” The two men shook hands and Joe continued.
“I intended to have those fulgurites analyzed for content but the ones you’re looking at are the only ones left and they’re just sand.”
“You lost them?”
“No. Someone broke into my office. They made it look like drugged out kids looking for cash and vandalizing the place, but they also stole the fulgurites. Do you still have the ones Sophie kept?”
“Yes. As a matter of fact I just stashed everything of hers in the attic.”
“Good. No one would think to look there. Tomorrow I’ll take you to the campsite and after that we’ll head up to St. Augustine. I’ve got a friend up there who’s the local expert on this kind of thing. That way we’ll keep it kind of private instead of going through a formal lab with a paper trail. Okay?”
“Sure. I don't know what you expect to find but I'm game. Now if you don't mind, the sun's going down and the mosquitoes obviously prefer me to you. Besides, I have a hot date.”
Fifteen
Shanna sat in her boss's office, legs lounged comfortably over the side of her chair, swigging from a bottle of imported beer. Not very ladylike perhaps but it had been a tough day and Dominick had provided the beer, although she was sure it was going to cost her somewhere along the line. Dominick never did anything for nothing.
The last client had not left until six. She was to meet Chase in the Mangrove Cafe at eight and that didn't give her time to go home and change. Not a good way to start off a first date, but she could freshen up here and at least she wouldn't have to deal with rush hour traffic. Shanna wondered why she was concerned. It was not really a date after all and she was
having second thoughts about becoming mixed up in this Sophie thing.
As Dominick put down his phone, Shanna pounced. “You rescheduled Mrs. Cleary again today. That's the fourth time. If you don't see her tomorrow she's going to get another lawyer and you'll lose the case.”
Dominick was unmoved. “I'll go to her house if I have to.”
Shanna had expected this response. Dominick was predictable. “You're driving Pauline crazy with your diary. It's about time you stayed off the golf course a bit and paid attention to business. These people want to see their lawyer, not the staff.”
Dominick was only listening with one ear. “Yes, boss. Speaking of work, did you get the response to that divorce petition done yet?”
“Which one?”
“Mitchell.”
“Yes, it’s drafted. It's also due, but I can't get Carole in here. She won't agree to the drafted answers even though it’s standard language. You've got some difficult clients, but this one is something else.”
Dominick pointed a finger at her. “Just file it. I can amend it later. I'll take care of Carole.”
“Yes, I'm sure you will.” Shanna was well aware of her boss’s lecherous intentions toward any halfway attractive woman who came within range. He wasn’t even particular about age. "But make sure you wait until she's divorced and no longer a client, okay?”
Dominick gave her his lecherous expression and then became gleeful. “We're going to make a bundle on this one. They both hate each other and her husband just hired one of the best divorce lawyers in the county.”
“Oh, you mean you're actually going to have to work for your money on this one?”
“Funny. Carole tells me that her husband is worth a fortune. It will take months to sort out the financials. By the way, speaking of financials, I need you to notarize an affidavit tonight. The client was supposed to come in and sign a final hearing affidavit today and he didn’t make it. I must have that tomorrow when I head down to court.”
There it was. There was always a price. “Tonight! Oh no, I have a date.”
“C'mon,” Dominick wheedled. “You know I can't do it, I'm a guest speaker at the Bar Association meeting tonight and he lives up this end. Take your date with you. He is presentable isn't he?”
Shanna ignored that remark. Dominick couldn't understand that she preferred the company of real people to the plasticized social set of the legal beagles which she avoided whenever possible. She sighed and capitulated. It wasn’t like she didn’t have the time to kill. “Okay. Who and where?”
“Myles Hickman. He lives on Jupiter Island.”
Shanna straightened up in surprise. That was the client Chase had asked her about earlier and while she had demurely avoided the question, she hadn’t known he was a client either, and Shanna knew all the clients. This was not only coincidental, it was not run of the mill. “Dominick, I haven’t prepared any affidavit for a Myles Hickman. Is he a new client?”
Dominick became busy shuffling papers, a sure sign he didn’t want to talk. “Yes and no. He’s a friend of mine, who got served divorce papers recently and I met with him while you were at that seminar on legal research last week. Like most of our clients, he left everything until the last minute so I had Pauline type up the affidavit.”
Shanna watched Dominick while pretending to finish her beer. Pauline couldn’t type her own resume, let alone spell it and what’s more, no Hickman file had come across Shanna’s desk to be logged in. A mystery. Intriguing. Things had been dull around here lately. Now that Shanna’s curiosity was aroused by both Chase’s inquiry and Dominick’s weird behavior, she was eager to meet this mystery man.
Shanna, knowing well how to play Dominick, pretended nonchalance. “That’s going to be at least an hour out of my date.” She didn’t want to tell him it was a new date and get into that conversation. Shanna liked to keep her private life private. A difficult task in this office, but she succeeded to an extent.
Trapped, Dominick capitulated. “Okay. I’ll pay for your time. Deal?”
Now that was unusual. Suspicious, Shanna held out her hand. “Alright. You pay up front though, or else I’ll never get it, and next time make better plans will you?”
“Can I give it to you tomorrow? I’m short of cash today?”
Shanna shook her head. “No good Dominick. You tried that the last three times. You want me to go, you pay now.”
Shanna watched in silence, hand still extended, as Dominick made a show of locating some cash. Parting Dominick from his money was harder than it must have been for Moses to part the Red Sea. This time Shanna won.
They locked up the office and headed their separate ways.
Outside, Shanna looked at her watch and decided to deliver the affidavit before meeting Chase. If she were a little bit late, well, hopefully that would keep him on tenterhooks. He deserved it anyway, she had never met such an exasperating, sexist man.
Myles Hickman lived on Jupiter Island. Shanna had arched her eyebrows in surprise at this. A brief review of Myles’ financial affidavit before she left revealed that Myles Hickman was director of the turtle rescue center, but according to his financial affidavit he didn’t have the kind of money it took to live on Jupiter Island, anywhere near.
Sixteen
Mick stood well back in the shadows, barely visible. His black leather duster contributing to his invisibility. The collar was turned up and on his head he wore a knotted black scarf. He licked his lips and sniggered as he watched, enjoying the sound of meaty thumps that came from a few feet to his left. The moans had mostly stopped now. A soft mewling pleading had taken their place. Mick relished this more. He sniffed loudly, the cocaine still working in his brain and stepped back startled in case he was heard. He needn’t have worried. The two junkies he had hired for a crack rock were impervious to anything but the job at hand and as for the lawyer, well he resembled nothing more than an amorphous slab of meat. The two derelicts wielded baseball bats with machine-like nonchalance. They felt no pity or remorse. They lived only for the crack.
Mick flinched as bright headlights lit up the alley. He melted further back into the shadows. The lights had not caught him but they had stopped the two hired thugs in a freeze-frame, bats lifted, dull confusion preventing them from movement. The car stopped. The driver’s side door opened and the driver started to climb out.
Like automatons, the two junkies turned and advanced on the new arrival. They swung their bats with the same precision with which they had just beaten their inert victim half to death. The hapless driver’s windshield starred and then shattered. The bats pounded on the hood and doors. Dents appeared all over the erstwhile spotless Lexus. The driver disappeared back inside his car. The engine revved, gears gnashed and the car shot backwards at an alarming rate of speed, disappearing out of the alley in seconds.
Mick cursed. The driver would call the cops, probably had a cell phone. They had little time left. He signaled to his two henchmen that it was time to quit and held up two little plastic baggies like a carrot to a donkey. The men grabbed the bags and vanished.
Mick walked over to the bloodied remains messing up the sidewalk and kicked viciously at the area of his head. That would fix him. Mick wanted to kick him again, but he didn’t want the man to die. He was unconscious anyway. There was no fun in kicking an inert lump. It couldn’t beg or whimper or plead. Mick knew there was always the possibility the beating could be traced back to him although with the cops around here it was almost a sure thing that it would not. Mick didn’t want to spend any time in jail.
Too bad the lawyer couldn’t have seen him watching. Oh well. He would put it together if his brain ever operated normally again. He would be out of business for a long time. Nobody said “no” to Michael O’Shaugnessy. Mick hawked and spit in the man’s face then walked away, quickening his pace as he heard the wail of approaching sirens.
&nbs
p; Seventeen
Shanna was in a hurry so she took I95 up to Hobe Sound and then headed east, crossing the bridge onto Jupiter Island. Besides, she really loved that stretch of road where the trees formed a graceful, lacy arch overhead. It was almost worth the drive just for that.
Once on the island she headed north watching the east side of the road for landmarks that Dominick had given her. The residents of Jupiter Island weren’t big on displaying their addresses out front like the common folk. She found the place without too much difficulty and whistled silently to herself as she turned into the driveway, which kept going and going. Not an easy task when you were already on the beach road about fifty feet from the ocean. She was heading north but it appeared that the property stretched south for quite a way too. Eventually, a slight turn to the east and Shanna pulled up in front of an imposing mansion, not to her taste. It was a larger replica of the housing style popular with the yuppies at the moment, pink with lots of glass, but in Shanna’s mind unattractive and of no particular style.
Shanna grabbed her briefcase, noting as she climbed them, that the front steps were marble, and rang the bell. Eventually, the door was answered by a butler/houseman, white and English speaking no less. Shanna was impressed. No stranger to mansions, she had spent several years working for estate attorneys in Palm Beach, Shanna was aware that most domestic staff these days were either Hispanic, black or Asian. They were less expensive and could be made to work longer hours for fewer benefits.
Having handed over her card, Shanna was left to cool her heels in a monstrous hallway. It ran the length of the house from west to east and the east wall consisted entirely of glass running two stories high and displaying a magnificent view of the grounds and ocean beyond. She inspected the hallway. Again, not to her taste. While an obviously indecent amount of money had been expended on the furnishings and artwork, it was all ultra-modern and stark. There was no softness or warmth in the room. Just as she was examining a particularly ugly painting of three triangles, Shanna heard footsteps and turned, with a smile preparing to greet her client.
Yokche:The Nature of Murder Page 6
