2 Lowcountry Bombshell

by Susan M. Boyer

  “Loose ends,” I said. “I hate to leave a puzzle with just a few missing pieces.”

  He shrugged. “Makes no difference to me. You won’t live to tell. After I’m gone, they’ll never find either of us. And they’ll think Elenore killed Norma Jeane here.”

  “Why would they think that? If she isn’t your mother—your accomplice—why would she kill Calista?” I asked.

  His eyes glittered like a snake’s. “She’s Roy Lee’s mother.”

  Roy Lee. The one person I hadn’t profiled. Damnation. “I can see why Elenore would want to kill you. Where did you bury Roy Lee? Since I’m gonna be dead soon and all. Wow me with how smart you are.”

  His cold, smug little smile told me he was a true believer in his own brilliance. “Roy Lee isn’t buried anywhere. He spent some time in a freezer in a storage building in Mt. Pleasant. There may be a piece or two of him still there. It’s hard to tell, really. The yoga instructor from Vermont was in there, too. Every now and then, I feed a hand or a chunk of leg to an alligator. In different parts of the county, of course. The freezer is almost empty now.”

  Bile rose in my throat. I focused on keeping my voice calm. I squinched my face with doubt. “Elenore as Calista’s killer? That doesn’t play.” I resisted the urge to tell him Sonny and Mack already knew all about him. It worked in my favor that he thought I’d come by and caught him by accident. He had no idea backup was on the way.

  He shrugged. “The way I see it, the theory will be she holds Calista responsible. Calista got all that money. Her son has disappeared to—who knows where? Calista had that crazy Marilyn obsession. Hell, the old woman’s crazy, too. That’s what I would think, anyway. Based on the evidence they’ll find. She did buy the enema bag, after all. Come to think of it, they may think she killed me, too and somehow did away with me. If I have time, after I deal with the two of you, I’ll leave some breadcrumbs in that direction. I must say, brainstorming with you is quite productive.”

  Calista said, “You put that horrid thing on my shopping list!”

  “Of course I did,” Poteat said. “Who else?”

  Calista oozed wrath. “And you set poor Elenore up to take the fall for you from the very beginning—you’re the one who introduced me to her. You suggested I hire her. You killed her son and did horrid things to him and now you’re making her out to be a killer for no more reason than it’s convenient.”

  I tried to keep my voice casual. “Does Elenore have any idea she’s here as a pawn in your twisted plot?”

  “Nope. She’s just cleaning house. Grateful for the work. She doesn’t know a thing.”

  My whole body itched to lunge at him. “It’s such a shame you didn’t think to get rid of the Mini Mart’s security footage. You might have gotten away with all of this.” The minute the words were out of my mouth, I wanted to call them back. I needed him to keep feeling confident for a few more minutes.

  He scowled. “Roy Lee screwed me over on that. He was supposed to bring me the DVD. Told him I’d pay him a hundred thousand dollars. I couldn’t ask the store manager for it. There was no case at that point—Roy Lee was still alive. Besides, I was undercover narcotics.”

  “You killed him because he didn’t bring you the DVD?” I asked.

  “I would’ve killed him anyway. He saw me in the store the night Joe bought the winning ticket. I was a regular. He didn’t know I was an undercover cop. He was a loose end. I don’t like them either.”

  I focused on keeping my expression one of rapt attention and hoped he’d keep on talking.

  He said, “Roy Lee and that DVD needed to disappear. I thought he had it, just didn’t bring it with him. Maybe he thought he’d jack up the price. But he’d had an attack of conscience. Stupid of him to meet me, that being the case, but there you go. I figured I’d find it in his apartment after I killed him. But it wasn’t there. I would’ve bet Elenore had it, but didn’t even know. That’s why I arranged to make her acquaintance. Are you saying Patel still has it?”

  I tried to look defeated. “He’ll find it soon enough.” I willed him to believe it was missing.

  He smiled. “No one knows where it is, do they? That means the cow has it after all. Probably in a box of things she collected from Roy Lee’s apartment.”

  “So, Calista coming back here, hiring SSI—that was just a happy coincidence for you?”

  He laughed again, shook his head. “It was convenient. But I’ve been planning how to get my money back ever since Calista left town. I’ve followed her—electronically of course—everywhere she’s been. I waited for her to settle somewhere. If she hadn’t come back to the lowcountry, I could’ve transferred or gotten work with another security company wherever she landed. I just bided my time, built my resume. Then, when she started building her house, I got a friend at Dixon Hughes Goodman to recommend SSI.”

  I nodded, tried to look impressed. “And you took up yoga as well?”

  His body shook with a silent chuckle. “It’s great exercise. The one thing she did, everywhere she went was find a yoga instructor. So, I found one who looked like me and had no family to speak of, and became him. Of course, he relocated from Vermont—you know, to that freezer I mentioned. And then he—I—went to work in Mt. Pleasant. The rest was easy. She needed a friend.”

  “You are one more piece of work,” I said. “But you missed your true calling. You’d have made a great actor. You sure played a gay yoga instructor convincingly. Must’ve been all that undercover work.”

  He sneered. He held his hands at hip height. He had a gun. He was ready to draw. I was going to have to shoot him. Part of me really did want to. I’d rarely met a man who was more in need of shooting. But the better part of me loathed the idea of taking a life. I didn’t know if I had that in me.

  His eyes held mine.

  He would be fast.

  Could he get a shot off?

  A rustling noise came from down the hall. And the sound of…hoofs on tile? Grunting? What in this world?

  Poteat narrowed his eyes.

  Something was coming fast.

  I pivoted back out of the doorway and against the wall just in time to avoid being trampled by three wild hogs. They knocked the door wide open. I risked a peek.

  The pigs charged Poteat. “What the bloody hell?”

  He fired twice. Wood splinted. Fragments of doorframe flew. A piece caught me in the arm.

  I crouched low. One of the swine knocked Poteat sideways.

  He fired a round at the hogs, then two at me. Missed. He was still off balance. I couldn’t count on that lasting.

  I braced and fired at Poteat. Three shots. He jerked and went down.

  Things went fuzzy. I stared at him, numb.

  The hogs sniffed him and poked at him with their snouts. He didn’t move.

  His gun had slid outside the ring of swine. I grabbed it and laid it with mine on the bed. Then I untied Calista. She sobbed hysterically.

  “Shh…shh. You’re safe. It’s over.”

  When I had her untied, she curled into a ball.

  “Where’s your robe?”

  “Hook. Bathroom door.” She shivered, her teeth chattering.

  I picked up both guns, gave the hogs a wide berth, and stepped into the bathroom. The “cocktail” Poteat had been preparing for Calista had been in a big pink enema bag. Three empty vials labeled chloral hydrate were on the side of the sink. I shuddered, grabbed the robe and went back to Calista.

  “Here, let’s get you into this. Help is on the way.”

  Calista’s sobbing subsided. She stared at the pigs, who still poked at Poteat. “I don’t think we need any help now.”

  “Nevertheless—”

  “Liz,” Blake shouted from the back door.

  “In here.” I sat down on the bed beside Cali
sta and hugged her tight.

  Blake and Rodney came in, guns drawn.

  They stopped and stared at Poteat and the hogs.

  “I had to shoot him, Blake. He would have killed us both.”

  He cocked his head at me. “And the hogs?”

  I shrugged. “They acted on their own recognizance.”

  And then twelve pissed off Marines landed.

  THIRTY-FOUR

  I slept in Sunday. I treated myself to eggs benedict with a mimosa for brunch. The heat wave had broken. It was still plenty hot, but with the breeze off the ocean, it was comfortable enough under the shade of the jasmine-covered pergola to eat on the deck. Colleen joined me.

  “Are you okay?” she asked. “You’ve never taken a life before.”

  I pondered for a moment. “I did what I had to do. It was him, or me and Calista. Niles, Poteat, whatever his name was—he was pure evil. But there’s a piece of me that feels wounded, like maybe something with big teeth took a bite out of me. I’m afraid that might not heal. Maybe it shouldn’t. Killing shouldn’t come easy.”

  Colleen’s eyes looked troubled. “I wish I could have spared you that.”

  “You sent the hogs, didn’t you?” I asked.

  “Well, there is precedent.”

  “I’m sorry. What?”

  “Swine have been used to cast out demons before. The story’s in three of the four Gospels.”

  I threw back my head and laughed. “Are you quoting scripture now? Is there a deeper message?”

  “No. I just used what was handy. I could hardly do the roman candle thing in Calista’s house. I’d have burnt up everything inside the concrete shell. We needed a distraction.”

  “Thank you.”

  “I’m glad I could be there.”

  “I guess I’ll have to revise my position on the hog issue.”

  “I’m sure they’d appreciate any pull you might have on town council in their favor. They’re really harmless, except to demons, of course.”

  I sipped my mimosa.

  “You’re in love with Nate, aren’t you?”

  “I’m afraid I am.”

  “It’s the real thing.”

  Behind my Wayfarers, my eyes watered. “For me, it is.”

  “I so want you to be happy. But you need to stay here.”

  “I have no intentions of leaving.”

  “You say that now, but most people will do anything for true love.”

  “Most of the people I love are right here.”

  “And we will always love you, regardless,” she said. “It will be easy to justify leaving. But I can see alternate scenarios.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I can see what happens if you leave and someone else takes your town council seat. It will go to election. Your replacement will advocate limited development. After a few years, he’ll wear folks down, talk them into it. There’ll be a lot of money on the table. After the first two resorts, there will be a bridge. Things will never be the same here.”

  “Colleen, I promise, I’m not leaving. But I have to wonder, what is so special about Stella Maris that you’ve been sent here to protect it? I mean, I know why it’s special to me. But there are so many awful things going on in the world…”

  “And there are legions of guardian spirits at work. Some with more success than others. They don’t send newbies to the Middle East. Even spirits with eons of experience can’t change human hearts. Our success depends on motivating humans. That’s not always easy.”

  “Is Stella Maris sacred ground?”

  “The whole earth is sacred ground, the moon, the stars, galaxies you’ve never dreamed of.” She faded away.

  The door opened behind me and Nate walked out onto the deck. “Mind if I join you?”

  I gestured to a chair. “Would you like some brunch?”

  “No, thanks. I ate breakfast on the road.” He settled into the chair to my left, and turned it slightly to face the beach. “Blake filled me in on last night. Are you okay?”

  “I will be.”

  “He also told me they got the final coroner’s report on Jim Davis. No news there. He was murdered, the suicide staged. Ryder Keenan’s been released. That recording you made no doubt expedited that. They found Poteat’s storage unit.”

  I shuddered.

  Waves tumbled over each other and raced to shore. A flock of sea gulls flew by.

  I sipped my mimosa and waited. After a while, I grew impatient with waiting.

  “You didn’t drive all the way from Greenville to tell me what Blake told you,” I said. “Was there something you came to say?”

  “Yeah. I’m just working out how to say it.”

  “Are you about done yet?”

  “Not quite.”

  “I’m going to fix another mimosa. Are you sure you don’t want one?”

  “Best I keep a clear head.”

  I shrugged and went into the kitchen. When I returned, he was standing at the edge of the deck, hands in the pockets of his khaki shorts. I set down my glass and arranged myself in my chair. His long, suntanned legs were quite a distraction.

  Finally, he spoke. But I couldn’t make out what he was saying. He was talking into the wind.

  I squared my shoulders, stood, and walked over to stand by him at the rail. “I’m sorry. I didn’t hear what you said.”

  He turned towards me and wrapped an arm around my waist. He tipped my chin up, swiped my sunglasses, and tucked my hair behind my ear.

  I searched deep pools of blue for answers.

  He took a deep breath. “I said, ‘I love you, Liz.’”

  I smiled and shook my head slowly. Tears brimmed in my eyes. I reached up and held his face with my hands. “I love you, too. Why was that so hard?”

  “Because I’ve never said those words to a woman before. I’ve never felt this way. Honestly, I always believed I never would. I just didn’t think I had it in me. You make me…irrational. I don’t like feeling irrational.”

  I laughed. “I hope you’re not expecting me to apologize.”

  He grinned. “No. I’m not complaining. I’m just trying to explain. I’m accustomed to being in control of my emotions. Friday night…”

  “I’m not apologizing for that either, just so you know.”

  He scowled at me.

  “Well, I’m not apologizing for having a good time, anyway. I am very sorry for some of the things I said to you on the way home. I don’t even remember everything I said to you.”

  “Probably best we both forget it. You had a lot of tequila in you, and you were mad as fire. That’s a bad combination.”

  I hugged him close. “Forgive me?”

  “If you forgive me.”

  “Done,” I said.

  He let go of me with one hand and ran it through his hair.

  I pulled back. “What’s wrong?”

  “I don’t want to be your back-up plan.”

  “Nate, that’s crazy. You know you’re not my back-up plan. It’s painfully obvious to the casual observer that I’m not in love with Michael Devlin. If I wanted him, I’d be with him right now.”

  His forehead wrinkled. “Logically, I know that’s true. But I also know that you stayed in Greenville for Scott. You stayed away from here because of Michael. Your feelings for the two of them were powerful enough that you changed your life for them.”

  “And that’s something I never should have done.”

  He shrugged. “But you did. And I can’t help feeling that means your feelings for them were stronger. That scares me.”

  “Nate, it’s not that at all. I think it just took me a long time to grow up. Marrying Scott—I probably did that in part because Michael hurt my heart so
bad. I did love Michael once, but it was not the same thing at all. What I felt for him, that wasn’t grown-up love. And it was all knotted up with loving this salty piece of ground. I didn’t even know who I was yet when I was with Michael. It was so long ago.”

  He nodded. “I know that in my head. But, like I said, you make me irrational. I want to haul you back to Greenville just like I hauled you out of The Pirates’ Den Friday night.”

  Things inside me twisted like wrung out laundry. “This is my home. It’s my place in the world.”

  He nodded. “I know. But I feel like Greenville is my place. Being here…it feels like I’m wearing someone else’s clothes.”

  Tears slid down my face. “I don’t know how we resolve this.”

  “No, no, no…please don’t cry, Slugger.” He pulled me to him. For a long time we held onto each other. “All I know for sure is that I love you.”

  I pulled back to look at him. “I love you, too. So much.”

  “Then we’ll figure the rest out as we go.”

  “All right,” I said. “We’ll think of something tomorrow.”

  “Do you have any more of that champagne?”

  “I surely do.”

  “Why don’t we take it upstairs?”

  I gave him my best come-hither smile and we went inside.

  Reader’s Discussion Guide

  or

  Things to Chat about While Sipping

  a Refreshing Beverage if You’re so Inclined

  1. Do you believe in Doppelgangers? Have you ever met someone who was the spitting image of you or someone you know?

  2. Do you think it’s possible Marilyn actually has distant family members somewhere, perhaps unaware of the connection, who resemble her?

  3. Calista is emotionally isolated because of her background, but also because of her wealth. She comments to Liz that “…everyone thinks they want to win the lottery. … If you have great wealth, you have to spend your whole life guarding it from all the people who want to take it away from you. … Almost anyone can be bought for the right price.” Do you think she’s right?