Assassins and Liars

by Charles Dougherty

  "Mary Beth? What's going on?"

  "It's a long story. The main thing is there are two people looking for me. I need to get off the island."

  "Okay. I'm ready to go; I finished my business. Can I pick you up?"

  "Not a good idea," she said. "Too much chance they're watching you from somewhere. They were in a little rental speedboat."

  "Our neighbor said there were three of them. Two men and a woman."

  "He's right. There were. The woman's dead. This is her phone. The other two are in town; we're staying in touch by text. They're watching the waterfront for our dinghy. Don't go there."

  "What do you mean, 'we're staying in touch by text?'"

  "Yeah, we are. They think I'm her."

  "Where are you?"

  "Not far. I'm at the beach bar around the point from Princess Margaret beach. The one behind the big reef at the west end of the anchorage where you are."

  "They can't see that from town. I can — "

  "No. There's more, but I'll tell you later. Go back to the boat. I'll swim out; I shouldn't be more than a few minutes behind you. We need to get the hell out of here. Please?"

  "Let's go," I said. "See you in a few minutes."

  I put the phone in my pocket and fired up the outboard, heading back to Island Girl. I thought about taking the outboard off the dinghy and stowing it for sea, but decided that might be risky if Mary Beth was right. They could be watching Island Girl from a number of places.

  We could tow the dinghy until we were out of sight of town and then bring it aboard. There was still the question of how Mary Beth could get aboard with no one noticing, though. I shrugged that off for now. We would think of something.

  I tied the dinghy to the stern rail and climbed aboard Island Girl. Uncovering the sails, I got them ready for a quick departure.

  I just finished folding the mainsail cover and stashing it in the port cockpit locker when I heard Mary Beth call my name in a quiet tone.

  "Yeah," I said, standing up.

  "Don't look around," she said. "Pull the dinghy along the starboard side."

  "Okay," I said, turning to untie the dinghy painter. She gave me a big smile. Her head was tucked under the bow of the inflatable.

  "How are we going to get you aboard?"

  "If you put the dinghy on the starboard side, Island Girl will block the view from town. I'll just roll into the dinghy and lie flat, and you can tow it along shore until we're far enough out. Then let Island Girl drift while we bring it aboard, okay?"

  "Okay." I untied the painter and pulled the dinghy around as she suggested, making it fast to the side of Island Girl with bow and stern lines.

  She rolled into the inflatable. "Thanks, Finn."

  "Glad to see you," I said. "I'll just motor down to the cove off Moonhole — only be a few minutes."

  "Whatever you think," she said.

  13

  Ten minutes later, we stowed the dinghy and put up the mainsail. There wasn't much breeze yet, so we resumed motor sailing along the south shore of Admiralty Bay.

  "Okay," I said. "Now tell me what happened."

  "Not long after I got back from taking you to the ferry, I was hungry, so I made an early lunch. There were two men who came aboard, and a woman who waited in their boat. I broke the first one's nose and gave the other a good shot to his family jewels. Before they recovered, I took off.

  "When I went topside, the woman was there, holding a gun on me. I dove over the side and swam as far as I could underwater. By the time they regrouped, I was hiding in the undergrowth along the beach.

  "They rode around the anchorage for a while, looking for me, then they dropped the woman on the beach and headed for town. She was standing there looking at Island Girl when I broke her neck and took her phone. They kept texting updates to one another every ten or fifteen minutes. That's about it."

  "Did you recognize them?"

  "No. They weren't from Sisyphus, if that's what you were thinking."

  "Too bad you didn't get to question the woman."

  "It would have been too risky. As it was, I was lucky to get the drop on her before people started coming to the beach club."

  "Did you bring her phone?"

  "Yes, but it's a prepaid throwaway." Mary Beth pulled a plastic bag with the phone in it from her pocket. "No numbers in the directory except the other two."

  "Names?"

  "Derek Jacobs and Len Woods. The woman was Kathy, but I don't have a last name for her."

  "You said she had a pistol."

  She reached behind her back and pulled a Glock 19 from her waistband. She popped the magazine and racked the slide, catching the extra round that ejected from the chamber. "Want it?" she asked.

  "Not much," I said, noticing how familiar she was with the pistol. "You might as well hang on to it until we're sure we're clear of the two men, but we should ditch it in deep water. More trouble than it's worth, down here."

  She nodded. "Thanks for saving me again, Finn. I owe you twice, now."

  "Glad to help," I said. "You sure you don't want to tell me what's going on?"

  She frowned for a few seconds. "I'm still trying to work it out. I'd rather wait until I've got a better idea myself. Is that a problem for you?"

  I shook my head. "I'm a good listener, when you get ready."

  She nodded. "I know you are. I appreciate your patience with me. I hope I haven't screwed up your business here."

  I shook my head. "Nope. Got done way ahead of time. That's why I'm back early."

  "My good fortune. I wasn't looking forward to sleeping on the beach for a night or two."

  "Guess it was meant to be," I said.

  "You believe in luck?"

  I shrugged. "I believe stuff happens that's beyond your control, stuff you can't anticipate. It can be good or bad, depending."

  "Depending on what?"

  "Mostly on how you react to it, I reckon."

  "Did you hear about the murders?" she asked.

  I gave her a blank look and shook my head, poker face in place. "What murders?"

  "In Kingstown, this morning. I heard about them on the local TV news; it was playing at the beach bar."

  "You were in the bar?" I asked.

  "I was hiding in the scrub outside. Five men killed in a waterfront bar that caters to merchant seamen. Three in the bar with their throats cut, two in the office shot with a pistol that belonged to one of the men out front."

  "There are some rough places in Kingstown," I said.

  She looked into my eyes for several beats. She reached out and took my right hand, holding it in her lap. "I gathered that. I was worried about you." She squeezed my hand.

  "Thanks, but I'm okay. They say anything else about the murders?"

  "That's all they talked about. One of the men, a guy named Willi Dimitrovsky, was suspected of drug smuggling and money laundering. The U.S. has been trying to extradite him. The others were his bodyguards. Except the bartender. He just ran the bar for him."

  "Who found them?"

  "The barmaid. She was in the ladies' room when it happened. She heard the scuffle, but she was scared, so she stayed put until it got quiet."

  "Smart lady."

  "Yeah. She said they were just getting ready to open for the day."

  "Any clues to who did it?"

  "They're looking for a drunk who was seen in the area. He'd booked a room in a hotel across the street a little while before it happened. The desk clerk said he smelled like he worked on a fishing boat."

  Neither of us said anything for a couple of minutes. I broke the silence. "About time to raise the jib and kill the diesel."

  She jerked, startled, and gripped my hand.

  "What's wrong?" I asked.

  "It just hit me. We didn't clear out with customs and immigration," she said. "What can we do about that?"

  "There are other places before we leave the waters of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. We can clear out at Union Island and then go t
o Grenada."

  She sighed. "That okay with you?"

  "Sure," I said. "Let's get some sail up. We'll anchor for the night somewhere down near Union Island and clear out in the morning." I tried to retrieve my hand, but she held on, looking at it and frowning.

  "That's dried blood around your fingernails," she said, turning my hand over and looking at my wrist and the inside of my forearm. "Did you cut yourself?"

  "No."

  "What happened?"

  I shook my head. "Let's raise that jib."

  "Finn? Did you have trouble of some kind?"

  "I'm okay, Mary Beth. Let it go. No more questions, okay?"

  "Aye, skipper." She dropped my hand and stood. "Let's get that jib up."

  14

  Once we were clear of the southwest tip of Bequia, we took up a southerly course and trimmed the sails. We settled in on a nice beam reach, making about five and a half knots. There was a moderate chop — just enough to keep the spray flying and break the monotony.

  After a few minutes, Mary Beth asked, "You hungry?"

  "I could eat," I said. "You cooking? Or am I?"

  "I'll cook. I'm starving. Those bastards interrupted my lunch."

  "Yeah, I noticed. I didn't take the time to clean up before I took off to look for you."

  "That's okay. I'll get beans and rice cooking and straighten up below. Want a beer or anything before I get started?"

  "No, thanks. I'm okay for now."

  She went below and rustled around in the galley for a few minutes. I saw her lock the pots in place on the stove-top. She released the latch, allowing the stove to swing in its gimbals. Then she moved forward, disappearing from my view for a minute or two.

  She poked her head through the companionway and smiled at me as she tossed her stale sandwich over the side. Ducking below again, she washed the dish that I saw on the cabin sole, putting it away. Then she stuck her head up again.

  "You okay for a little while?" she asked.

  "Sure. Why?"

  "I want to rinse off the salt and put on dry clothes while our dinner cooks. Maybe do a little laundry, if we can spare the water."

  "Go for it," I said. "We can fill the tanks in Grenada easily enough."

  I sailed along, enjoying the ride. The water pump cycled a few times as she showered and washed out her clothes.

  While I had a little time to myself, I retrieved my satellite phone and sent a quick, coded text to my client. News of my success would have reached them already, but they needed to know I was in the clear. I debated adding a question or two about Mary Beth and then thought better of it. I pressed send and waited while the text went. Then I powered off the phone and put it away.

  I was leaning back and steering with my foot when Mary Beth popped up on deck in her bikini, arms loaded with wet clothes. She fished around in the cockpit locker for the hank of small stuff that served as a clothesline.

  Standing on the cockpit seat next to me, she leaned her hip into my shoulder to steady herself and reached up as high as she could stretch. She tied the clothesline to the backstay. Stepping out onto the side deck, she unrolled the line until she reached the weather shrouds. She looped the line around the shrouds a few times and carried it on up to the headstay. She tied the other end there.

  "You must have had a lot of dirty clothes," I said, when she came back and picked up the first few items to hang on the line.

  "Mostly yours," she said, giving me a hard look. "That stuff in your duffle bag reeked of dead fish and cheap liquor, like a drunk who worked on a fishing boat."

  She finished hanging out the laundry and went below to check on our dinner, leaving me to ponder our situation. We both killed people in the last few hours, but I didn't plan to tell anybody about my activity. Mary Beth described sneaking up behind that woman and breaking her neck like it was no big deal.

  But then the woman threatened Mary Beth, at least arguably. My victims didn't have an inkling that I was coming for them. Did that give Mary Beth some kind of moral advantage? Maybe. Then again, she'd drawn me into her mess, whatever it was. I didn't want her to poke her nose into my business.

  I did what I went to Kingstown to do, and I left no evidence to connect me to the deaths. There would be no repercussions, unless Mary Beth voiced her suspicions to someone. Even then, I could argue that there were lots of drunks who smelled like dead fish.

  I was less comfortable that the body Mary Beth left on the beach wouldn't be connected to us. A brawl in Puerto Rico was one thing; those men attacked us, and we didn't kill anybody. In the case of the woman Mary Beth killed, though, the optics were different.

  To a witness who saw what happened on the beach, the woman was standing there minding her own business and watching the boats. Mary Beth attacked from behind, broke her neck, and hid the body. She also stole the woman's phone — and her pistol. But the pistol might be a liability to Mary Beth. Who could say she didn't have it when she attacked the woman?

  "Penny?" Mary Beth said, putting two bowls of beans and rice on the bridge deck and climbing into the cockpit.

  "What?" I shook my head, frowning.

  "For your thoughts. You looked miles away." She handed me a bowl and a spoon and sat down, squeezing up against me.

  "Yeah, I guess. Pondering our situation."

  "What about it?"

  "You did hide her body, right?"

  "As best I could. Dragged it into the scrub and brushed out the tracks with palm fronds. Why?"

  "Wondering if we're going to have any trouble, that's all."

  "It was self-defense," she said.

  "Maybe. But — "

  "Hold on a second, Finn. They boarded our boat at gunpoint. Don't you dare give me any crap after what you did."

  "Take it easy," I said. "I'm not going all moral on you. And you have no idea what I did or didn't do in Kingstown."

  "Bullshit, Finn!"

  I put a spoonful of beans and rice in my mouth and chewed, buying a few seconds. When she didn't say anything, I spoke.

  "You have your suspicions about me. You think I killed those people. I get that. But you need to know that whatever I might have done, I'm clean from the standpoint of hard evidence. There's nothing to connect me to them. No witnesses, no fingerprints, nothing."

  "So?"

  "So, I understand you killed that woman because she was a threat to you."

  "Kathy," she said. "Her name was Kathy."

  "Did you know her?" I frowned. "I thought you said — "

  "No, I didn't know her. But the least I can do is call her by her name. It makes it seem less…"

  "You always call your victims by name?"

  "Are you fishing?"

  "Yes."

  "Well, stop. That's rude. I'm not ready to share that much of my background with you yet."

  "Yet?"

  "Yes, yet. The time may come. And don't forget, she was the one with the gun."

  "Let's back up a second, Mary Beth. I didn't mean to start an argument with you. I'm just worried about what an eyewitness to what happened on that beach might tell a cop." I stopped speaking and held her gaze for a moment.

  "There wasn't anyone there but the two of us."

  "Okay. But if somebody had seen it, from what you told me, you were the aggressor, as far as what happened on the beach."

  She chewed her lower lip for a few seconds. Then she nodded. "Yeah, okay. I get it. You're worried we're going to get questioned?"

  "It could happen," I said. "We don't know who saw what, as far as our departure. Let's say you're right, and nobody saw what happened on the beach. Somebody will find her body. Somebody may have spotted you hanging out in that area, even if they didn't connect you with her. Somebody — maybe just our nosy neighbor on the next boat — saw us leave. See what I mean?"

  "Yeah. So, what should we do?"

  "We need to get our act together, that's what. If the cops show up with questions, we shouldn't have any loose ends."

  "You think they
will?"

  "They might. Bequia and Union Island are part of the same country. Neither one is very big. They could have put out the word to watch for Island Girl. We could get some questions in the morning when we clear out. Or not. Better to have a plan, though, in case they ask."

  "You've done this kind of thing before," she said.

  "No comment."

  "Finn, I'm sorry I got you mixed up in my mess. You've been good to me. Maybe I should just bail out in Union Island."

  I shook my head. "I don't think so. We're in this together."

  "I'm fond of you, Finn. I know you're fond of me, but you don't need this, believe me. Cut your losses."

  "Too late," I said. "And yes, I'm fond of you, but that's got nothing to do with it. We need each other to weather this little blow. Then we'll see about parting ways, if you want. Okay?"

  She set her bowl down and snuggled up against me, her head on my shoulder. "Thanks, Finn. Parting ways isn't something I want. I guess it's time for me to tell you about what's going on with me."

  15

  "I don't even know where to start, Finn. My life's such a mess."

  She was looking at me, waiting for a reaction. I kept my expression blank and gave her a little nod. After a few seconds, she spoke.

  "My family — my parents, that is — were involved in organized crime. Mostly gambling, but once you're over the line, there aren't really any distinctions. Crooked is crooked, you know?"

  I nodded.

  "Later on, I found out they were into drugs, prostitution, you name it. My father wasn't, like, the Godfather, but he was definitely one of the lieutenants. I grew up in the middle of it all. Didn't really know the difference, I guess. There was lots of money, but everyone I knew had rich parents. My friends and I, we were spoiled brats. Except for my brother. He was different, but we'll get to that.

  "When I was starting my senior year in college, I came home for a weekend visit and found my parents dead. Not just dead, but butchered. It was like something out of a horror movie. I freaked out and ran, but I didn't have a clue. Got in my car and took off. Nowhere to go, no money, except credit cards. I stopped for gas that night and discovered that the cards didn't work anymore. I was sleeping in my car somewhere in Alabama, begging and stealing gas money, when my brother found me."