“Protection? The cashier said that little fight you had only lasted a second. She told the deputy you dropped the guy with one kick.”
“I guess.”
“She said it was like something you’d see in a kung fu movie.”
The woman was silent, her expression impenetrable.
“Based on that,” he continued, “it doesn’t sound like it’d be too easy for anyone to lock you in a room.”
“He said it was my idea.”
“Your idea?”
“He said I was his fiancée. He said when he found me, I was sitting in the middle of a road. I remember that. It was a gravel road. It was near where the car wreck was. He claimed it had happened more than once, me losing my memory. He said he was hiding me so I wouldn’t end up in an asylum. For a while, I believed him. But now I think he just wanted … you know. To use me.”
“For sex?”
“Yeah.” Her voice turned cold. “He’s going to pay for that.”
“We’ll see.”
“You know what did it, Detective? What kept setting off the alarm bells in my head?”
“What?”
“Personality.” She sat forward, eyes burning. “Character.”
“Explain.”
“I reasoned it out. If you lose your memory … if you can’t remember anything about your past, even your own name, that shouldn’t mean you lose your personality. I mean, lose who you are … the kind of person you are.”
“Makes a kind of sense.”
“He kept telling me I was his fiancée. But after a while, after living with him out there, I started monitoring my own behavior. My thoughts. My reactions. And I began to wonder…”
Jardine got it. “You began to wonder how—”
“I began to wonder how a personality like mine would ever agree to marry a personality like his.”
This woman is smart, Jardine thought.
“How much do you remember about your past?” he asked. “I mean, right now? I can tell you’re not from around here. Your accent. Any idea where you’re from?”
“Somewhere up north. I remember the leaves changing color in the fall. But that was when I was young. I remember an older woman looking after me. I remember calling her Nonna. That’s what Italian kids call their grandmas. My past … it comes back in flashes, little pieces … you know, like a TV screen when the signal gets disrupted.”
“Pixels.”
“Yeah. But you know, I think I was…”
“What?”
“Might have been the navy, somewhere around here, but…” She was visibly struggling. “You know, I’m almost sure I was some kind of cop.”
“This isn’t making a lot of sense.”
“I know I was someone else. Not some half-mental bimbo, living in the bush, engaged to that creep. I was definitely someone else. Something else. I need you to help me find out who I am.”
“The deputy says you weren’t carrying any ID.”
“No. I don’t even own a purse. Roland told me my name was Lisa. Lisa Green. But that never sounded right.”
“Middle name?”
“He said ‘May.’”
“So … Lisa May Green?”
“Yeah.”
“Date of birth?”
“No idea.”
“Be straight with me, Miss Green. Are you on drugs?”
“Not now. He had me on pills back at the beginning. I don’t know what they were. Some kind of tranquilizer.”
“Well, let’s see what we can find out. Your friend Mr. Lewis isn’t talking.”
“Not my friend.”
“I get it. The thing is, even though you demolished his knee, he refuses to press charges. Maybe that’s understandable, based on what you’ve told me. The owner of the store doesn’t want to press charges either. I guess she was impressed by her cashier’s story. So, technically, you’re free to go. On the other hand—”
“I don’t want to go. I want to know who I am.” The uninflected tone, the searchlight eyes—Jardine didn’t know what to make of this woman.
“If you consent, I can take your fingerprints.”
“Do it.”
Jardine live-scanned her prints. He fetched her some coffee and fed the prints into the NCIC system. While he was waiting, he also ran “Lisa May Green DOB u/k.” There were a few hits on the name—but the only one that matched the woman’s apparent age was a Fort Myers woman who had died in a car accident three years ago.
After several minutes, there was a hit on the prints.
They matched a Customs officer who had gone missing in February.
The officer’s name was Sarah Jane Lockhart.
But there was more.
While the detective was pondering this unsettling development, Lieutenant Powell, district 7’s OIC, interrupted him. “Call for you, Jardine.”
“Who is it?”
“FBI.”
* * *
Jardine returned to his desk.
“You mentioned a car wreck. Where was that?”
“I don’t know. When we left this morning, Roland told me we were driving on something called Loop Road. Does that mean anything?”
It did mean something. In early February, one of Jardine’s fellow detectives had been called to investigate a collision at mile 7 on County Road 94. The road was a twenty-four-mile-long track through Big Cypress National Preserve known locally as Loop Road. A few miles of it were paved, but most of it was gravel, dirt, and potholes. Normally a vehicle accident would be something for the traffic unit, but this one had been different. An old jeep and a panel van had collided head-on and at high speed. No air bags, and no seat belts. Three dead, and no survivors. All of the deceased had been identified. The driver of the jeep was a local antigovernment redneck, well-known to the police. The vehicles had caught fire, and the van had been gutted so thoroughly that it eventually required a DNA database search to identify the other two bodies. They were both from up north, either New York or New Jersey, as Jardine recalled. The interesting thing was that they were reputed Mafia associates.
Jardine filed that last thought away for follow-up.
“You were right, by the way,” he told her. “About your background.”
“I’m a cop?”
“Close as … Your name is Sarah Jane Lockhart. You were a Customs officer in Miami. The report says you disappeared right after an overseas operation. And it says something else. Something I’ve never seen before.”
“What?”
“Everything I’ve just said is redlined, and it came with a notice: ‘Restricted—no media release. Report any contact to…’ No name. Just a phone number in D.C.”
He let that sink in, watching her for a reaction. But she just stared into the distance, her expression concentrated, as if racking her brain for an explanation of what he’d just said.
After a few seconds, she turned back to him. “‘Lockhart.’ That sounds almost familiar.” She studied his face. “Something’s wrong. What is it?”
Apparently she was better at reading faces than he was.
“At first, you were presumed dead.”
“At first?”
“You went missing on February sixth of this year. But on February twelfth, the Palm Beach Police issued a warrant for your arrest.”
“Palm Beach? Arrest for what?”
Finally, a reaction.
Jardine took a deep breath before replying. “Two counts of first-degree murder, and one count of kidnapping.”
The searchlights locked on him. “That can’t be.”
“You’re the primary suspect in the murders of Kenneth and Darlene Eden of Palm Beach, and the possible kidnapping of a baby. I guess because of the kidnapping, and because you’re a federal law enforcement officer accused of serious crimes, the FBI’s involved. But an alarm must have gone off when I ran your prints, because they called me first. Agents are on their way.”
“I didn’t kill anyone.” Sarah Lockhart spoke slowly, pronouncing e
very syllable. “And I sure as hell didn’t kidnap a baby! And what does that mean—possible kidnapping?”
“I don’t know.” He rose from his chair. “I plan to check on that.” He nodded to the female deputy he had earlier alerted to wait nearby. “Obviously we’re going to be speaking with your Mr. Lewis. Meanwhile, I’m sorry, Ms. Lockhart, but…”
The substation had a single holding cell. It was unoccupied. Jardine locked her in, and the female deputy remained to keep an eye on her.
Nothing about this case made sense, Scott Jardine told himself, and he was determined to get to the bottom of it.
Lieutenant Powell was in his office. Jardine quickly briefed him. “Belrose and I want to talk to this Lewis guy. He’s at Community, in Naples. Do you mind calling the boss and bringing him up to speed?”
“No problem. You go.”
8
Jardine and his partner, Eric Belrose, headed for Naples Community Hospital, where Roland Lewis had been sent by ambulance. Belrose had accompanied Jardine when he’d doorstepped the woman who had abducted her kid from France. And it was a good thing he had, because the lady had become pretty hysterical during their interview. She was terrified they’d come to take her boy away, and it had taken some time to explain that they had only been assigned to locate her and the child. What happened next was for her own lawyer, the State Department, and the French authorities to sort out. Looking back, it probably would have been better to have had a female officer with them, but Eric had been a good fit because his grandfather had been a French notaire, he’d spent several summers in France when he was growing up, and he actually knew a bit about French legal procedure. He had handled the crisis well and Jardine was grateful for that.
Rolling west on the Tamiami Trail, Belrose braked for an otter that was humping its way across the highway from one swampy strand to another. “Now there’s something you don’t see every day,” he commented as he flicked on their emergency lights to alert an oncoming car.
“What?” Jardine looked up from searching the contact list in his phone. “Oh, an otter.”
“Yeah. About as rare as a panther these days. Haven’t seen one of them in years.” Belrose was a dedicated outdoorsman whose brother ran a swamp buggy tour outfit.
“Saw one today,” Jardine said.
“Where?”
“She’s sitting in our holding cell.”
“Like that, huh?”
“Wait till you meet her.” Belrose had been in a back office, working on another file, while Jardine was dealing with Sarah Lockhart.
Jardine dialed his phone.
“Who’re you calling?”
“Mark Clifford.”
Clifford was the detective who had investigated the collision on Loop Road. When he answered, Jardine skipped the small talk and got to the point.
“Remember that two-car wreck you attended on the Loop back in February?”
“Yeah. What about it?”
“I want you to pull the file. I’ll be in later today to take a look at it.”
“Why?”
“I might have something.”
“What?”
“Maybe a passenger in the back of the van.”
“The M.E. would’ve found something.”
“Maybe he wasn’t looking in the right place.”
“What are you getting at?”
“Maybe someone was in the back of that van … someone who got out before the wreck went up in flames.”
“No sign of anyone else at the scene.”
“Did you actually look?”
Silence.
“Did you check the road surface in each direction?” Accusation crept into Jardine’s voice. “Did you look for footprints? A trail of blood? Search the bush? Anything like that?”
“No.” Clifford sensed he might have missed something, and now his back was up. “There was no reason to! Anyway, by the time I got there, a half dozen traffic cops had walked all over the scene.”
“Well, I’d like to see the file anyway!” Jardine snapped.
“Help yourself! I’ll leave it on my desk.”
“Thanks.” With an impatient stab of his finger, Jardine ended the call.
“What’s with you, Scottie?” Belrose asked. “That didn’t sound like you.”
Jardine sighed. “I know. I’ll apologize when I see him.”
“Panther lady really got to you, huh?”
“Yeah. Guess she did.”
He settled back in his seat.
To think.
* * *
When the detectives arrived at the hospital, Roland Lewis was about to be released. Jardine and Belrose found him in the ER, sitting in a wheelchair next to a bed. His left leg wasn’t plastered, but judging from the bulge in his jeans, it was wrapped up pretty thoroughly. A pair of crutches was leaning nearby.
“They’re letting you go already?” Jardine asked, after they’d introduced themselves. “I guess it wasn’t as bad as the witnesses said.”
“Depends on yer point ’a view,” Lewis growled.
“We hear you don’t want to press charges.”
“That’s right.”
“Why is that?”
“My decision.”
“And … your reason for that decision?”
“My decision,” Lewis repeated.
“Okay. But maybe she wants to press charges. We hear you started the fight.”
“She say that?”
“No. But the cashier saw it all.”
Silence.
“Okay. What about this woman? Lisa Green? What is she to you?”
“Talk to her.”
“We have. Looks like you might have a problem.”
“Did she file any kinda complaint against me?”
“No.”
“Am I under arrest?”
“No.”
“So, end ’a discussion. Why don’t you guys leave me alone?”
“How’re you getting home?”
“I was just gonna call someone when you showed up.”
“We can give you a lift as far as Everglades City, if you don’t mind a quick detour on the way.”
“What kinda detour?”
“I just need to pick up a file.”
“Okay. Thanks.”
They loaded Lewis and his crutches into the back of their unit and made a side trip to the sheriff’s main office. Belrose stayed with Lewis while Jardine went in. Mark Clifford was nowhere to be seen, but the file was sitting on his desk.
Within minutes, they were back on the road.
For a while, they rode in silence. Jardine was doing a quick scan of the traffic file, but he spotted nothing beyond what he already knew. He set it aside for a careful read-through later.
He called back to Lewis. “Mind if I ask you something about Lisa Green?”
“What about her?”
“According to police records, a woman from Fort Myers named Lisa May Green died in a car accident three years ago.”
Silence.
“Old flame of yours?”
A beat.
“I thought you said I wasn’t under arrest.”
“That’s right. You’re not.”
“Then why the questions? Can’t two women have the same name?”
“Sure. Let’s just say you might be a person of interest in our investigation. We thought you’d want to cooperate with us up front and clear yourself.”
“Clear myself of what?”
“Aiding and abetting a wanted fugitive.”
“Fugitive? Who’s a fugitive?”
“Looks like Lisa Green is.”
“What’s she wanted for?”
“Some heavy stuff. But here’s an interesting thought: you might be the first person in the history of the State of Florida to be convicted of false imprisonment of a federal fugitive. How does that sound?”
Roland Lewis didn’t say another word for the rest of the trip.
They made the turn onto Route 29 and headed s
outh, toward Everglades City.
“Where do you want to be dropped off?” Belrose asked Lewis.
“Right Choice market.”
“Hoping for a rematch, huh?” Jardine interjected. “I’d love to see that.”
“My truck’s there,” Lewis muttered, clearly resenting Jardine’s mockery.
When they pulled up in front of the supermarket, Jardine got out, opened the rear door, and helped Lewis out of the car. As he passed him his crutches, he said, “About that knee…”
“What about it?”
“How far do you have to drive?”
“A few miles.”
“Your friend Lisa said you live somewhere down Loop Road.”
“Yeah.”
“How far down?”
“’Bout mile 8.”
“That’s over thirty miles from here. Your truck’s an automatic?”
“Manual. Why?”
“Are you kidding? How’re you going to drive it safely with your leg like that?”
“Not a problem.”
“Sorry. Big problem.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning if you drive it now, my partner and I will have to report you as an unsafe driver. The last thing you need is a run-in with Highway Patrol. You’d better get it towed.”
Jardine smiled as they drove away, leaving Roland Lewis staring after them.
9
“Why didn’t you call?”
Jardine was furious.
While he and Belrose had been playing footsie with Roland Lewis, he’d lost his prisoner.
Unknown to him, back in the holding cell at the substation, a young woman’s memories had been steadily filtering back. Slowly at first, then with gathering momentum, and finally in a dizzying cataract of sound and sensation and image, Sarah Lockhart had reentered her life.
When Jardine and Belrose returned to the office, they discovered that Sarah had been taken to the hospital.
“We were at the hospital!” Jardine was right in the female deputy’s face. “Why the hell didn’t you call us?”
“No, you weren’t.”
“Weren’t what?”
“At the hospital. They took her to Regional.”
“That’s not an answer! What happened?”
“I went to the restroom. When I got back she was lying on the floor, covered in vomit. She was unconscious!”
“Okay. So you called an ambulance. But you didn’t call us?”
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