by Tara Lush
Yeah, the last thing we needed tonight was puppy puddles amidst all this chaos. I peered out the window. The sun had recently set, leaving behind silvery blue clouds. “There’s still a little light left. I’ll take him down to the beach for a quick walk. Oh, and by the way. I hired someone to take Fab’s place at the café today.”
“I knew you’d be a great businesswoman. You’re on top of things, LeLa, even when the chips are down. By the time you get back, I’ll have found the scoop on the Fab story. You scoop the poop.”
I grinned and took Stanley’s leash out of my purse.
“I’m telling you, we need to do a book,” Dad called out as I opened the door. That was Dad’s thing—he’d been reading true crime novels and was convinced we should do one together. He wanted to somehow tie crime to Buddhist suffering, and to be honest, I didn’t quite see how that would be a popular niche. I waved and pretended not to hear him.
Stanley and I walked out the back door and within fifty paces, were on the beach. The sand was still damp from the earlier rain, but I was grateful for the silence. There was no one out here, probably because of the rain—although this was one of the least popular beaches on the island. Why, I wasn’t sure, since it was the most beautiful in my opinion. I inhaled salt air deep in my lungs, then exhaled. I repeated this several times. Maybe Dad was onto something with this yogic breathing.
“This is what we needed, right Stanley?”
The Tzu was crouched, peeing on a clump of seaweed. He shook himself and we were off. We worked up to a brisk pace, which surprised me because of his little puppy legs. He sure was energetic, dodging waves and bounding over pieces of driftwood.
Ten minutes of this and my shoulders came unglued from my ears. I would keep Stanley, and I’d be the most amazing dog owner on the island. It would be nice to have a fluffy little companion. Someone to love. Maybe get him one of those colorful bandannas for our jaunts around town. As we walked, I imagined us having all sorts of adventures together. Going to the island’s dog park, cuddling on the sofa while watching Hallmark movies together, and romping on the beach.
Yes, I’d be an incredible dog mom.
I let a little slack on the retractable leash, allowing Stanley to run ahead. He was so adorable with his little tan paws. Well, they were closer to brown from the sand now. Maybe I’d give him a bath when we returned to Dad’s.
Anything to avoid going to sleep. Anything to forget about what I’d seen today.
About ten yards ahead of me, Stanley stopped at something sitting on the beach. He sniffed, then started digging at the wet sand next to the round thing. What was that? I squinted. It was grayish white, about the size of a softball. Probably a rock. I powered toward him, allowing the leash to retract.
I scowled as Stanley growled and pawed at the sand. Was he about to poop? I didn’t bring a bag. If I was going to own a dog, I needed to be better prepared. “What is it, Stan?”
He made a loud snuffle sound and I crouched down.
“Gah,” I reared back, gagging at the sight. And the smell, like dead, rotten fish.
It was a giant eyeball.
Chapter Eight
Feeling equally foolish and queasy, I dialed Noah’s number for the second time today. Since I grew up on the beach, I was used to weird stuff washing ashore. Still, I felt it was my civic duty to tell someone about a giant eyeball.
The call went to dispatch and I groaned silently. This didn’t need to turn into a big deal. All I wanted was to let Noah know. At the very least, I figured he’d get a kick out of it.
“What is your emergency?” The woman’s pack-a-day tone sounded familiar. It was probably Bernadette, the department’s longtime police dispatcher.
“Hey. This is Lana Lewis, Peter Lewis’ daughter. I’m on North Beach. Only a couple hundred feet from the jetty. And there’s a giant eyeball on the sand.”
A pause. “A giant eyeball?”
“Yes. It’s about the size of a softball. It’s blue. I mean, I’m sure it’s some sea creature. Or was from some sea creature. But it’s unusual. I was born here and have never seen anything like this. I mean, I’ve seen a lot of other stuff. Dead jellyfish, wrecked boats, one time a barrel of hashish. But nothing like this.”
“Okay. Giant eyeball, North Beach. Lana Lewis, did you say?”
“That’s me. Owner of Perkatory. I actually was trying to reach the chief.”
“Didn’t you call the homicide in to him earlier?”
I held a squirming Stanley close to my body. He’d wanted to tear into the eyeball, so I’d been forced to pick him up. Who knew that Shih Tzus had such murder in their hearts?
“I did. Yes. Goodness. What a day.”
“You’re not kidding, sister. I’m working split shifts. Listen, an officer will be there soon, okay? And I’ll let the chief know. He forwarded his phones for a half hour. Just hang tight with the eyeball. Or whatever it is. You sure it’s an eyeball?”
I assured her that yes, it was an eyeball, and that I would hang tight. Stanley and I wandered a few paces away to where a child’s lumpy, half-destroyed sandcastle still stood like a sentinel on the beach. I let the dog down and watched as he sniffed the mound.
It didn’t take long for police, including Chief Noah, to arrive.
“We need to stop meeting under these circumstances,” I joked. By now, Stanley and I had parked ourselves on the sand. He was sprawled on his side, sleeping. He was a trooper, that little dog. Not even a giant eyeball would deter him from a beachside nap. A soft, warm breeze rustled his longish puppy fur.
Noah rested his hands on his hips as he watched a crime scene tech snap photos of the giant blue orb. At first, I thought my lame joke had fallen flat, then he grinned.
“Well, that’s something,” he said, staring down at the eye. Which stared back at us. It was an unsettling cornflower blue, almost glowing in the semi-darkness. Disturbingly the tide was coming in, and I’d had a tense few moments while waiting, wondering whether I’d have had to move it from the surf line.
I’d briefly pondered kicking—well, nudging—the eye further up the beach with my foot so there was no danger of it getting wet, but fortunately, the officer, Noah and the CSI tech had arrived.
Noah sank to the ground, sitting next to me.
“I didn’t want this to turn into a federal case. I’d really just intended to call you.”
“You knew I’d get a kick out of an eyeball?” He gave me a little smile, as if we shared a secret. My skin tingled.
“Maybe.” I unsuccessfully fought back a grin. “What do you think it is?”
“Hard to say. Giant octopus? Whale?” He ran his fingers through his short hair. Tonight he wasn’t wearing his glasses, I stealthily studied his eyes, trying to determine if he also wore contacts. “Definitely not human.”
“Obviously. It almost doesn’t seem real. Except for the smell. That’s how I knew it wasn’t a movie prop or something. Gah. I can smell it from here. Well, that and the fact that no movies have been filmed here. But I guess it could have traveled with the currents and washed up. Or something.”
Good lord, Lana. Way to babble like a dolt. Noah and I watched as the tech donned gloves and gently scooped the eye into a plastic bag. I turned away.
It was almost fully dark now—save for the crime scene tech’s flashlight—and a full moon peeked through eerie gray clouds.
“Sorry to call you out for this. I’m sure you were busy, especially after the events of this morning.”
He shook his head. “I’d gotten home and was in the gym at my condo. Trying to decompress. There’s no downtime as chief. This is relaxing out here, though. The beach. The moonlight. Should have come here for a run. Seriously, I’m glad you called.”
“You run on this beach?” Hmm. Maybe I should reconsider Dad’s invitation to those morning beachside Tai Chi sessions.
“Sometimes. My condo’s about a mile away. I usually run in the morning, when it’s even more peaceful.”
<
br /> “Surf. Sand. A giant eyeball. What more could you ask for?” I cracked, trying to distract myself from his biceps. He wore gray sweatpants and a sleeveless black T-shirt. Was that sweat on his skin?
Noah groaned. “You’re something else, you know that, Lana? In the morning you discover the first suspicious dead body on the island in years, then at night you stumble on a giant eyeball.”
“That’s how eye roll,” I deadpanned.
I loved the sound of his laugh. Still, this was dangerously close to flirtation, being here in the dark with the island’s police chief. A handsome, older police chief, exactly the kind of guy I was trying to avoid.
“Well, thanks for coming out. It was a little freaky, seeing this. Or being seen.” I stood, and Stanley snapped to his little fluffy feet.
Noah also rose. “Where’s your car? In the public lot? I’ll walk you.”
“No, it’s okay. I’m parked at my dad’s, he lives down the beach, not too far.” Holding Stanley’s leash tight, I gestured with my free hand.
“Oh. I’ll walk you. I won’t let you go alone. One second.” He waved goodbye to the crime scene techs, then walked over to a detective. They spoke briefly, then Noah jogged back to me.
Our feet crunched against the sand as we walked. Awkwardness hung in the air. It seemed rather familiar to be strolling on a beach under the moonlight. His rich baritone broke the silence, sending pleasurable tingles down the back of my neck.
“Your folks always have a place out here?”
“No. I grew up closer to the café. Downtown Devil’s Beach, in a bungalow on Hibiscus Street. The one I’m living in. I’d already moved away and was in Miami when Mom and Dad built this one here. Dad had picked out the empty lot years ago, and no sooner did they have it built and decorated that Mom had her stroke and died.”
“That’s a real shame. Sorry to ask.”
“Thanks. You wouldn’t know. You’re so new here. Now it’s just me and Dad. I wanted to stay with him tonight because of everything that happened today at the café.”
“Of course. Hey, now seems like a good time to ask: how did you get into journalism, anyway?”
“It’s a little twisted.”
“Oh, really?” His voice deepened.
“When I was fourteen, a friend disappeared.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. Her name was Gisela Sommer. She was my best friend, my first real friend in high school. It was right at the end of freshman year. We both went to a party at some senior’s house downtown, then left. I walked home—to the house I live in now, that’s where I grew up—and she walked in the opposite direction to her house. She was never seen again.”
He blew out a sharp breath. “Lana, that’s disturbing. I didn’t know.”
My stomach clenched. “You should find the case files. Some people thought there was a serial killer on the island. Others blamed her dad, who left a few weeks later for Germany. Some thought it was a custody kidnapping. But that was never proved, and she never contacted me. I think she would have, somehow, had she gone to live in Germany. It was so awful and strange.”
“I probably will. Man, today must have brought back all those memories for you, no?”
“No.” I paused, then realized how my stomach had felt like a brick all day, similar to that awful week she’d gone missing. “Her memory’s always with me. Even though she’d only transferred into the school that year, we were really close. She was the first true friend I’d had. The first one who I talked about adult stuff with, you know?”
“Oh. Wow. You must have been terrified, being that young.”
I could tell Noah was trying to piece together my slightly disjointed story. “I was. My parents wanted to channel my fear into something productive, so Dad helped me get an internship at the Devil’s Beach Beacon. The local paper. I wrote a weekly column from a teenager’s perspective. That summer I wrote about Gisela.”
I fell silent, my entire body tensing up. I hadn’t thought about her, or talked about her, for years.
“I see. So that’s how you got into journalism?”
“Pretty much. Gisela’s disappearance made me want to write about crime and dig for the truth. To tell the stories of victims. That’s why the Miami Tribune job had been so perfect. I could shed light on cold cases, write about unsolved murders, hold police accountable. So, when you ask if today brought back memories?” I paused, trying to answer my own question. “Not consciously. This is an entirely different situation.”
Noah side-eyed me. “Really? Is it? Isn’t trauma still trauma?”
I shrugged, but his question unsettled me. “Perhaps. I feel like I worked through a lot of the feelings I didn’t even know I had about Gisela while covering crime in Miami.”
Noah nodded but didn’t say a word. The awkwardness was back and now my mind was on Gisela. In situations like this where I felt uncomfortable, I defaulted to my old journalist self: fill the air with lots of questions. Or crack jokes.
“Since you asked me a question, I’ll ask you one. Why’d you come to Devil’s Beach? I’d read in the paper that you came from the Tampa Police Department. That’s a pretty big force to leave, especially to take a job on a sleepy island where there’s no crime. Or virtually no crime.”
“I was searching for something a little more low-key. I’d gone through a few rough years heading the internal affairs department in Tampa.”
“Oh. Wow. That must have been something.” The words came out in a serious, inquisitive tone. I’d learned enough about police departments to know that IA cops were often viewed with deep skepticism—at best—by their fellow officers.
“Yeah. It was quite an experience. My philosophy is, and always has been, that law and order is about treating people fairly and equally. That view wasn’t shared by some of my former collagues.” He was silent for a moment, and I became all the more curious about him. “Then some personal stuff happened and I decided to make a change. It was either Devil’s Beach or out of state, and I didn’t want to be that far from my family. I wanted to land at a progressive department where I could make a difference in the community. Partner with social workers and addiction counselors instead of putting people in jail. That sort of stuff.”
My heart swelled as we approached my dad’s house. Noah was an even better human than I thought. “I can understand that part, about whether to stay or go. I had a job offer in D.C., but I couldn’t leave Florida, you know?”
“I do know. I love this state, despite its shortcomings.”
“Shortcomings?” I asked.
He shrugged. “You know. Rampant crime, destruction of the Everglades, unchecked development. Oh, and giant eyeballs.”
A laugh erupted from my mouth. The more I got to know Noah, the more I liked him. Too bad he was ten years older than me, and I’d sworn off dating older men—well, all men, really—after my marriage imploded in Miami. Noah was in his early forties, the same age as my ex. As far as I was concerned, men like Noah weren’t boyfriend material, no matter how foxy.
Still, it was exciting to flirt. Even under these weird circumstances.
We stopped and faced each other. A pang of awareness went through me. I must have been exhausted, because for some reason, it almost felt like the end of a short, yet emotionally intense date. Which was crazy, considering I’d called him here because of a giant eyeball. Or maybe not so crazy, since I hadn’t been in the presence of a man after dark in months.
“Thanks again for walking me. My dad’s house is right there.” I gestured to the giant stone Buddha statue near a palm tree that sat at the short wooden boardwalk leading to the bungalow.
“Anytime, Lana.” His tone was low and growly, awakening parts of my body that I’d thought were long dead. Pure danger, this man.
I chewed on my cheek and to avoid a weirdly intense staring contest here in the dark, my gaze landed on his forehead. It was lightly perspiring. A part of me didn’t want this moment to end. “Hey, it’s warm. Did you
want to come in for a glass of water?”
“Sure, I’d like that.”
We plowed our way up the heavier, thicker sand. At one point, Stanley refused to walk any further and flopped onto his belly. Noah scooped him up. Seeing his big, masculine hands cradle the puppy tugged at my heartstrings, and then I stopped.
“Uh, I should tell you something,” I said.
He came to a halt and turned. “What?”
“My dad. He smokes weed. Pot. Er, marijuana.” Duh. I was a dolt. Noah was a cop with nearly twenty years’ experience. It wasn’t as if he was unfamiliar with the terms weed or pot. “He has a medical marijuana license. I didn’t want you to be surprised, or arrest him or anything.”
“Lana, I know. He told me all about it. His eye pressures and glaucoma. He showed me his license a while back.”
“He did?” I started walking again. “How well do you know my dad, anyway?”
“He’s told me a bit about himself. Not too much about his wife, your mom. He gets too emotional. He’s not ready to talk about that. At least not to me.”
“Wow. I didn’t realize you two were so close,” I quipped.
“We got to talking when he sold me the condo. Said he’s working through the feelings about your mom’s death with his yoga and meditation. But he talked about you a lot.” Noah grinned, and we started back up the beach.
I decided not to unpack that last statement, partially because we were at Dad’s back door and because I wasn’t sure I wanted to know what my dad had told Noah about me. Not only was Dad like me—he often babbled—but his weed-addled mind meant that he occasionally overshared. Noah probably knew all about my birth and divorce, and every detail in between.
“Dad,” I hollered as I opened the door. “I’m here with the chief. The Police Chief. Please tell us you’re wearing pants.”
Noah chuckled.
“C’mon into the kitchen, Chief.”
“Noah,” he corrected sternly.
We walked through the sunroom, followed by Stanley, and found my father in the kitchen. A faint odor of marijuana laced the air.
