Pepper didn’t learn the final punch lines to the Greenhead Snatcher case until he was at Harvard, up to his neck in his new life of studies and team workouts and trying to make a few new friends in all the chaos.
In early September, Pepper got a late-night phone call from Delaney Lynn. She said she was loving Nashville and was playing anywhere in town which would let her on stage. Paying her dues and finding her way. She sounded a little drunk and very happy.
Delaney told him she’d been writing a ton of songs about some Cape Cod guy she kinda used to be in love with. “Keep an ear out,” she said. “Next time you hear my voice, it’ll be on the radio…”
She also told Pepper she’d gotten a big surprise which was helping her survive financially in Nashville. For stopping Gus Bullard, the police had awarded her two-thirds of the $100,000 reward in the Greenhead Snatcher investigation.
The other third of the reward was given to a woman who’d called in information about the white van after the first kidnapping, which the police admitted was very valuable. The woman had apparently even made a watercolor painting identifying the kidnapper, Leo Flammia. That woman was grateful to get recognition of her efforts to help, but she donated her share of the reward to the Susan G. Coman charity. “Because she’d just beaten cancer herself,” Delaney told him.
“Perfect,” he said.
In mid-September, Pepper received another random surprise. It was a letter—the first piece of old-fashioned snail mail he had received at college. From young Zula Eisenhower, of all people.
The letter was a piece of paper cut down to the size of a napkin. It said:
You win, Pepper!
Good luck up there. Stay out of the hospital if you can. But I’m not counting on it, haha.
Your friend always, Zula.
Taped to the letter was a one-dollar bill, the amount of their playful bet.
Fricking Zula… The fourteen-year-old kid deduced that Pepper found the two Emmas before the police had? That the official story from the final night at the Big Red Yard had a hole in it? And how was she the only one?
He’d have to keep an eye on that Zula. She was a hot ticket…
But Pepper didn’t find out that later-breaking news until weeks later, after his summer had ended.
Back on the Saturday afternoon in July that Pepper washed his truck and had the water fight with Angel, he eventually put away the hose and other cleaning tools. He was happy his truck looked decent again.
A while later, Pepper stood on the deck behind the Ryan family house. He noticed the deck’s gray paint under his bare feet had worn down to the wood. His dad and his brother weren’t home yet, so he was alone as night approached.
He stood in the warm breeze looking out across their small backyard, to the beach and the water beyond. Sailboats and motorboats carved silver lines on the surface of the bay. He arched his body in a big yawn.
Tomorrow morning, Pepper was going fishing with his dad and Jake. Jake had called in a favor from a buddy and borrowed a Parker 26 sport boat. They were going out for stripers. It was a chance for him to start rebuilding his relationships with his dad and Jake and to be a family again for a little while, before he got on with what life held next.
Pepper guessed the Ryan men would be more talkative than usual. They all knew that soon these family activities would stop for a while, or maybe longer.
Change. It only moved in one direction.
Pepper would make one request on the fishing trip—no talk about the Snatcher case. All of that was done. He needed time to heal and even forget a bit.
Especially the brown van incident. Pepper was the only person alive who knew what’d really happened that evening. It was a one-man secret, the only kind which ever got kept. He figured he’d have to keep the secret for the rest of his life. How he wasn’t a hero for stopping Leo Flammia’s brown van. That he was a fluke, and almost a total failure. Wonderboy? What a joke…
But Pepper didn’t know yet that something else would happen to him on Cape Cod almost exactly eight years later, which would force him to relive the details of the brown van incident and to second-guess everything that had gone down, and why.
Standing on the deck looking out at the greenish blue water, Pepper realized he was finally excited for college. To drive over the Sagamore Bridge and head north to face his new set of challenges. Earning his spot on a Division 1 hockey team—a big step up for him. And proving he could compete in the classroom with Harvard’s best and brightest. At least there’d be no kidnappings and dead bodies at college, right?
He’d give that new life his best shot.
Pepper stretched his arms overhead as far as he could, aggravating his injuries. All his little points of pain, every one of which he deserved.
He knew he’d changed that summer. Maybe he was still a bit too cocky for his own health. But he’d learned that growing up was about tackling problems, not about focusing on himself. It was a scary world which needed scarier good guys to step up and make sacrifices.
But I have less respect for myself now, he realized. And less faith in the world around me. Those truths hurt more than his bruises and stitches.
Pepper suspected life would get easier as he got older. Controlling his damned temper. Facing down fears. Bouncing back from failures.
And hopefully embracing his own complicated mix of strengths and weaknesses which made him who he truly was, deep down inside.
And the decisions too. All the people and things you decide to keep or lose along the way. It had to get easier. It made all the sense in the world to him, standing on the worn deck of his family home, watching the far edge of the Atlantic Ocean blend to nothingness against the evening sky.
But Pepper was only twenty years old, back then.
Thank You
Thank you for buying this book. Pepper Ryan and his friends (and some enemies) will be back for new adventures soon.
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Acknowledgments
Thank you to my first and best early reader, Karen Fagan. And to generous early readers Erin Fagan, Matt Fagan, Anna Fagan, Judy Manso, Paul Donahue, Julie Piantedosi and Cindy Bohne. To other fans of Pepper Ryan who read, encouraged or pushed me along the way to get this book completed.
To independent editor John Paine, for his ongoing editing wisdom. To Damon, Alisha and the rest of the team at damonza.com, for their striking cover design.
To the Kill Tide Arts and Craft Festival in Brewster, MA for inspiring this book’s title.
To Yankee Magazine, From the July/August 2013 issue, “Beasts of the Northern Wild—All About Greenhead Flies,” by Annie Graves (July 15, 2013) for all that anyone would want to know about greenheads flies.
To Police Detective Adam Richardson and his excellent The Writer's Detective Bureau podcast and Facebook Q&A group.
To Jeff Perry of the Barnstable County Sheriff’s Office for helpful jurisdictional information.
To our faithful deliveryman at Townsend Energy for the inside scoop on his oil delivery truck.
About the Author
Timothy Fagan has always loved to read suspenseful books that make you laugh out loud in public. Now he loves to write them.
Timothy previously spent twenty years as an attorney and executive in the financial services industry, focusing on securities regulatory m
atters across North America, Europe and Asia-Pacific. He grew up in British Columbia, Canada and currently lives near Boston, Massachusetts, USA.
Kill Tide is the second book in the Pepper Ryan Thriller Series. The first in the series, Killing Shore, won the 2019 Best Thriller Award by TopShelf Magazine.
For more information about Timothy Fagan, his upcoming books and other projects, please visit his website: www.timothyfagan.com.
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Also by Timothy Fagan
Another adventure in the Pepper Ryan Thriller Series
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