“You have more staff than we do,” Sheppard said.
“They’ll be on rotating shifts until the curfew’s over at six A.M. Then it’s your turn.”
“We’d need a small army out there to watch every marina plus the docks,” Sheppard said.
“Tough,” Cordoba replied with a smirk. “I’m sure a bright guy like you will figure it out, Shep.”
Sheppard snatched the folder out of Cordoba’s hand. “Then find your own leads, Charlie.”
His nostrils flared, anger burned in his tired eyes. He got slowly to his feet. “At every goddamn step in this investigation, you’ve tried to exclude me, Sheppard. Tonight, I filed an official complaint with the FBI’s southeast division that you and Goot are running a rogue outfit here that has no regard for the rule of law.”
Goot snickered. “No regard for the rule of law? Look who’s talking.”
Cordoba puffed out his chest like a rooster strutting its stuff. “And exactly what the hell’s that supposed to mean?”
“Well, let’s see, Charlie. For starters, we figure you’re the one who released Mira’s name to the press and also you’re the guy who jumped the gun on the release of Adam’s photo.”
“What bullshit. Even if I had done something like that, it doesn’t have anything to do with the law.”
“You need to brush up on your law,” Sheppard told him. “The abduction is federal domain. So if you prematurely released information related to our investigation, Charlie, then you interfered with a federal investigation. It’s enough to get your ass fired.”
Cordoba looked flustered—and confused that the tables had been turned on him. “We’re talking about your rogue outfit, Sheppard.”
“Yeah, yeah. So go do what you gotta do, Charlie.”
“Fuck off, Sheppard,” he barked, and marched out of the room, slamming the door behind him.
“Jerk,” Goot muttered.
Mira shot Sheppard a warning look. “Be careful, Shep. Charlie can throw a wrench into the direction we’re moving in this whole thing.”
Yeah, yeah. Been there, done that. And with more formidable adversaries than Cordoba.
Deserted roads. Clouds thickening in the sky. No stars, no moon. Just darkness and silence. Sheppard welcomed the silence in the night, but not inside the car, where Mira sat stiffly in the passenger seat, her face turned toward the window.
“We made headway tonight,” Sheppard said. “We have huge blocks of information on this guy and all we need to do now is connect everything.”
“I hate to burst your bubble, Shep, but I don’t think it’s that simple.”
“Sure, it is. If we dig deeply enough, connect what we don’t know factually with what you know psychically, we can find this guy.”
“Not without something else happening.”
“Such as?”
“I don’t know. I can feel it, but I don’t know what it is. I guess I’m too beat to intuit much of anything. I wish you had shown me that DVD earlier.”
That explained the odd look she’d given him. “Tina and her people were still working with it.”
“I think he could have been involved in some facet of the movie industry, Shep.”
“You picked that up while you were watching the DVD?”
“No, it wasn’t a psychic feeling. Just… one possibility. It’s almost like he really wanted Suki and Paul to see what an excellent little movie he’d made?”
Sheppard thought of the section of the T. S. Eliot poem that had struck him viscerally. “Between the desire and the spasm, between the potency and the existence, between the essence and the descent, falls the shadow.”
He felt her eyes on him—hot, burning, as if she were actually seeing him for the first time. “Goddamn, Shep. T. S. Eliot? What’s he got to do with our boy Spenser?” Then she snapped her fingers. “The music from Hollow Man, right?”
“Tina made the connection. But I think she’s right. Spenser sets things in motion, then watches how everything unfolds. He’s like the shadow Eliot wrote about.”
“He likes playing God.”
“Exactly.”
She ran her fingers through her hair and turned her face to the rain-speckled window. “We’re doing what he wants us to do, analyzing every goddamn detail of that tape. He’s playing with us. This whole thing is orchestrated.”
“Yeah, but what’s it mean?”
Mira threw out her hands, exasperated. “Eliot felt like shit when he wrote that poem, his marriage was going down the tubes, he was finding religion. The poem became an event and critics and scholars have been analyzing it to death ever since. Our guy Spenser creates an event, the media dissects it, the cops analyze it. But people are suffering because of what Spenser has done. No one suffered because of Eliot’s poem.”
Sheppard lifted his hands from the steering wheel. “Hold on, okay? I’m just saying that ‘The Hollow Men’ symbolizes Spenser’s feelings about himself.”
Mira pressed her fingertips against her eyes and massaged them. “Yeah, it fits.”
It started to rain before he reached Mira’s street, a soft, gentle summer rain that released the wonderful scents of rich earth and salty sea, of an island struggling to recover from the ravages of Danielle. Somewhere out there, Sheppard thought, fruit trees rebounded—papayas, grapefruits, oranges, fields of strawberries. Even the damaged trees exhibited new growth, as though spring had finally arrived.
By the time he pulled up in front of the trailer, the rain came down in earnest, with a strong, steady wind out of the east hurling it against the sides of his Jetta. The windows of the trailer were dark. No cars in sight.
“Didn’t you talk to Ace tonight?” he asked.
“Yeah, I told him I was going to be working with you and Goot at your office. I guess he figured he was off the hook and decided to join Luke in the preserve. He must’ve taken Ricki with him.”
“Shit,” Sheppard murmured. “I don’t like this.”
“Oh, gimme a break.” She sounded irritable. “I don’t need an armed companion, okay? I’ll lock the doors and in few hours, it’ll be light.”
“I’ll stay here,” he said, and killed the engine.
“Excuse me, Shep, but even in the best of times, you didn’t have the right to boss me around. I’ll be fine.” She threw open the door, grabbed her bag, swung her legs out. “Thanks for the ride.”
Before he could say anything, Mira dashed through the rain toward the trailer.
Sheppard sat there for about two seconds, then got out and opened the trunk. He grabbed a backpack that held extra clothes, toiletries, and some computer supplies, and darted toward the trailer. He burst through the door just as she was turning on her flashlight. “I’ll sleep on the couch,” he said.
She shone the flashlight at him. The beam slipped down his body to the spreading puddle of water on the floor in front of him. “Only if you dry off first. There’re towels and an extra toothbrush and other stuff in the bathroom. I’m going out back to start the generator.”
When she returned minutes later, the lights were on and cool air poured through the ceiling vents. They had both changed clothes. Mira wore gym shorts and a tank top that hugged her breasts. Her hair hung loose, damp, and long, brushing her shoulders. He had made up the couch and was fixing mugs of tea laced with strong shots of rum.
“I hope those FEMA tarps hold. Otherwise I’m going to have a flood in the house and in the store,” she said.
“They’ll hold as long as it’s not another hurricane.” He held out a mug of tea. “Salud.”
They clicked mugs. “What’re we drinking to?” she asked.
“Whatever you want to drink to.”
“Eight hours of sleep,” she said.
Sheppard chuckled. “Sounds fine.”
“And finding Adam before this Spenser guy hurts him.”
“He won’t hurt him yet. He still needs him.”
“Hmm. For more media events.” She sipped and made a face. “Da
mn, this is Mamajuana, from the Dominican Republic.”
“It’s strong and smooth.”
“And allegedly an aphrodisiac,” she added.
He didn’t know what to make of that remark, so he let it pass.
“You really didn’t have to do this, Shep. But I appreciate your concern.” Then she yawned, gulped down the rest of her tea, set the mug on the counter. “I’ve got to sleep. Lock the front door, okay?”
He nodded, and she turned and went into the bedroom. He felt mildly encouraged that she didn’t shut him out completely by closing the door.
Sheppard went over to the couch, sat down, and sipped at the tea and rum, listening to the rain as it hammered the trailer. He considered fixing himself another drink, minus the tea this time, but instead, turned off the light and slipped between the sheets. They smelled of Mira, of the soap she used, of her shampoo, her perfumes, her essence. He flipped onto his side and found his gun and cell phone and slipped them wider the pillow. He lay there with his eyes wide open, his desire for her thickening like smoke, memories pushing at him, eating him alive.
“Fuck,” he murmured, and sat up.
Rain smeared the trailer’s windows and drummed the roof with a soft, rhythmic music. He thought of the events in that wind-blown clearing a month ago, of him and Mira in that wooded area only yesterday. He thought and thought and finally got up and went into the bedroom, his cell and gun in hand.
She didn’t move. He could tell by the way she breathed that she was sound asleep. Carefully, trying not to wake her, he got into bed beside her, slipped his gun and cell phone wider the pillow, then pulled the blanket up over his body. He rolled onto his side, draped his arm over her waist, and fitted his body against hers so that they lay like spoons in a drawer.
He wasn’t sure what woke him, maybe a change in her breathing, maybe the wind and rain. But as soon as he opened his eyes, he knew that she too was awake, listening, adjusting to the presence of his body, pressed up against hers.
“What’re we doing, Shep?” Whispered words, almost desperate.
“I’m sorry about what happened that night,” he whispered back, and brought his mouth to the curve of her neck. “I’m sorry for what I said to you when I was talking about seeing that mermaid. Jesus, Mira, I miss you.”
For what seemed the longest time, she didn’t say anything. But she brought her hand to his, covering it, and gradually moved his hand up under her tank top, across the silken smoothness of her skin, to her breast. He pressed his body closer to hers. His feet sought her feet, his toes greeted hers, and she turned onto her other side, facing him, her hands sliding up the sides of his face.
“I hate my life without you in it,” she said. “But I can’t be something I’m not, Shep. I see the weird, the strange, the invisible. It’s not something I ask for. I don’t encourage or nurture it. It just happens to me. It’s what my life seems to be about. I know this makes you uncomfortable and I know you wish it were different, but it’s not. This is what I am.”
He didn’t know what to say. He had nothing to say. He knew all this. And at some level, he also knew that whatever Mira was would conflict always with what he was. But it didn’t matter anymore. Life with her at whatever level that meant was preferable to life without her.
He cupped her face in his hands and kissed her. Her mouth opened against his, her tongue as soft and familiar to him as the pillow that held his head. The days and weeks of uncertainty fell away. They made love quickly, almost violently, as if to reclaim what they had lost that night in the clearing, and in the aftermath, they held hands tightly, the sheets tangled at their feet, the rain outside pounding against the trailer.
She fell asleep in his arms, her breathing soft, even, deep. He adjusted his body to hers and finally let the rum take him away.
Chapter 15
The Artists’ Colony
They were back. The media vans. The paparazzi. They had begun trickling in shortly after the first ferry had docked at 6:40, and now there were probably fifty vehicles crowded in the street, with more arriving by the minute. Suki, standing at the kitchen window with a mug of coffee, watched them gathering in the rain like buzzards at roadkill. Their colorful umbrellas bobbed up and down as they moved around, jockeying for the best view of the house and property. But she was ready for them.
When Blake had brought her home around four this morning, he had told her he thought he could track down more information on Joy Longwood and that he would pick her up around eight. Promptly at 8:05, her cell vibrated and Blake’s number appeared in the ID window. Suki hurried out onto the patio so that she could answer the call without being heard by anyone in the house. The feds. Paul. He hadn’t left last night, but she suspected he would leave now that the curfew had ended for the night. She didn’t much care where he went, as long as it was away from her.
“Hey,” she said softly into the cell phone. “Where are you?”
“Almost there. I’ll meet you at the edge of the woods.”
“Okay.” She slung her pack over her shoulder, shrugged on a poncho, and stepped outside, where the electric cart waited.
The cart was loaded with wood and rolls of wire mesh that stuck out the back of it. Even though part of her route would be visible to the press, the rain created a shimmering curtain that even powerful lenses would have trouble penetrating with any clarity at all. But in the event that any of the media people got a good look at the person in the cart, they wouldn’t see Suki Nichols. Instead, they would see a handyman in a poncho, coveralls, and heavy boots, unloading fencing materials along the side of the property.
She drove the cart as fast as it would go, rain dancing against the canvas roof. Suki stopped at the edge of the property where the pines began. She started unloading the wood, wire mesh, a shovel, and began digging a hole for the first beam. After a few minutes, she dropped the shovel and simply walked into the trees. Blake waited in another electric cart, silently laughing at her disguise.
“Pretty convincing,” he said.
“You think?”
“Take my word for it. Did you get any sleep?”
“A couple of hours. You?”
“The same.”
Once they were in the pines, Suki shed the poncho and coveralls. Underneath, she wore denim Capri pants and a turquoise T-shirt. She folded the coveralls and slipped them inside her pack, then exchanged the heavy boots for sandals, and tugged on a baseball cap. “Voila,” she said.
“That must be an acting trick.”
“Theater, with quick costume changes.”
He brought out a thermos and two ceramic mugs with his company logo on them. “Do us the honors.”
“Gladly. So where’re we going exactly?”
“Well, I was living on Tango when Joy Longwood lived here. Granted, I didn’t know a whole lot of people, but I know a woman who did. She got me—and Mira and Annie—through the time sickness.”
“Wait, tell me more about this time sickness.”
“Before you travel to a foreign country, you get inoculations. Before you travel through time, you should do the same thing, but no one except Wheaton knew that. It’s why he had to bring back five kids before he found the one strong enough to survive the sickness. Annie.”
“But you survived too.”
“Yeah, but I was different. He adopted me. Wheaton hired Lydia to treat these kids he brought back through the mass. I guess she was the equivalent of today’s alternative healer. Anyway, she knew Joy Longwood.”
“Lydia treated her?”
“No, she knew her because Joy was an aspiring photographer and took classes at the Tango Artists’ Colony, where Lydia was a cleaning woman. Today, Lydia pretty much runs the place.”
Suki and Adam had visited the colony shortly after they moved here. They had lunch, she remembered, beneath a giant banyan tree on the outdoor patio, and spent a long time in the gift shop, selecting pieces of island art for the house.
They took the cart as far a
s Tango Sea and Air, then transferred to Blake’s car and drove into the hills at the northeast corner of the island. He turned off Old Post onto a gravel road and a hundred yards later, they passed under an arched wooden sign that read: TANGO ARTISTS’ COLONY. The gravel road twisted through a wet forest of pines, banyans, and acacia trees. Here and there, trees had fallen or been stripped by the storm. But for the most part, the forest here seemed to have emerged relatively unscathed by the hurricane.
The colony, located on fifty acres of prime real estate, was financially self-sufficient, Blake explained. “All its revenue comes from donations and from what the artists produce, the gift shop, theater, the workshops and seminars and summer programs, and so on. They recently started a film program, and I suspect that’s going to be a major moneymaker in the near future. There are forty cabins now where interns live and work. Most of their power is solar-generated.”
“Sounds like they’re light years ahead of what the rest of the country is doing.”
The road emptied into a clearing where a dozen concrete buildings, a few in various states of repair from the hurricane, stood in a half-moon circle, each one painted a different color, with some sort of mosaic or tile design on the front. Each building had a name connected to the island’s history and mythology: Rum Runners, Pieces of Eight, Sirena, Pirates Lair, The Pod. They pulled up in front of Rum Runners, the administration building.
Adirondack chairs lined the wooden porch deck, inviting visitors to kick back and chill. Several people had done exactly that. At one end of the porch, a woman stood in front of an easel, painting. Off to the right, a film crew was shooting in the rain. As he and Suki got out of the car, someone in the crew called out, “Hey, Mr. Blake. Lydai said to tell you she’s in the archives.”
“Thanks,” Blake called back.
They went inside the administration building. Suki wasn’t sure what she’d been expecting, but knew it wasn’t this—an explosion of color, shapes, and textures. Just being in this huge room, bright despite the rain outside, brought a smile to her face and a tidal wave of warmth to the center of her chest. All kinds of art and photographs covered the walls. Rain drummed the pair of skylights overhead. The tiled floors were inlaid with tropical designs—flamingos, lush green mango trees, seagulls so realistic that she wouldn’t be surprised if they suddenly lifted from the floor and flew away. A fountain in the center of the room seemed to grow upward from the floor as though the entire room were something organic, living, sentient.
Cold As Death (The Mira Morales Series Book 5) Page 17
