Burden of Proof

by Davis Bunn

  On Monday morning he was the hotel diner’s first customer. The banked-up stress and fatigue felt like tight electric sparks shooting through his brain. His hands trembled slightly, and his eyes felt grainy. Even so, nothing seemed to affect his appetite. He worked his way through a Spanish omelet, home fries, sausages, toast, and two glasses of milk.

  When the waitress cleared away his plates, Ethan brought out the notepad and pen from his room. On the first page, just below the Holiday Inn logo, he wrote his future ex-wife’s full name. Angelina Grace Devoe. She would return from Europe tomorrow. It was a date etched in his memory, almost as vivid as the gunshot he had never actually heard.

  The previous time, Gina had phoned him from her parents’ home. There was a new note to her voice, an eagerness without reservation or any hint of doubt. Ethan promised to meet her in three days, once he finished his last week of work at the Holiday Marina.

  Gina drove up with him for Adrian’s funeral and heard his decision to drop out of school and take a world tour of his own. She responded by promising to wait for him.

  And she did. For three and a half years.

  They met occasionally. Every four or five months, she flew out to wherever he was surfing and working at some menial job. Four times in four years, he flew home. He claimed it was because he missed her. And he did, in some vague fashion. But mostly it had been to test the waters. See if he was ready to reenter the world he was running from. Things like responsibility. Family. A regular job. A paycheck.

  An hour later, Ethan was still sitting there, staring at Gina’s name written on the otherwise empty page. He sighed defeat, rose to his feet, paid the cashier, and departed. He checked out of the hotel, returned to the rental house, packed his meager belongings, and drove straight to the Jacksonville airport.

  The travel websites that had driven down the cost of airfares were a thing of the future. Ethan paid an eye-watering sum for a last-minute return flight to Newark.

  When he landed in New Jersey, he debated taking a limo. But an ad in the arrivals terminal claimed a bus left for Atlantic City every twenty minutes. He joined the line of other dedicated gamblers heading for the end of the road.

  Ethan’s first stop was a First Union branch between the terminal and the boardwalk. The duty manager offered empty congratulations at the news of his win and helped him open an account.

  Any concerns Ethan had over being treated as a gullible youngster were erased the moment he presented his tickets to the Trump Casino cashier. Ten minutes later he left with a cashier’s check, which he took straight to the bank. Ninety minutes later, he had completed his rounds and was back on the bus. He did not even stop to eat until he had checked in for his flight.

  He grabbed a burger at the terminal diner, then bought an AT&T long-distance card from the news agent and claimed a pay phone by the terminal’s side window. There were very few things he missed from the new millennium. But owning a cell phone would definitely have made his next steps a lot easier.

  One positive outcome of Ethan’s enforced delay was having time to plan. At the top of that list was gaining the help of a local security specialist. The only investigator he knew personally worked for Adrian’s firm. Gary Holt was a former cop, a highly decorated gold-shield detective who had spent twenty years in white-collar crime. After taking his retirement, Gary had earned his private investigator’s license and went to work for Adrian’s firm.

  Gary’s father was a full-blood Seminole and considered by many to be the finest fishing guide in Florida. Adrian had befriended Gary soon after joining the firm, and together with Ethan they had spent countless weekends trolling the slow-moving Saint Johns River for sturgeon, rainbow trout, and large-mouth bass.

  Gary was tied up with pretrial testimony and tried to put Ethan off until the following week. The PI’s tone of voice said it all. He was a busy professional who did not want to make time for Adrian’s kid brother. But Ethan pushed hard, and the investigator reluctantly agreed to meet him in two days for an early lunch.

  Ethan hung up and dialed information. When the operator came on the line, he said, “This is going to sound crazy.”

  The New Jersey operator had the metallic voice of someone long dead. “Hon, crazy is the only way to define my day. Do you want a number or not?”

  “Yes, I want a number. But I can’t remember the name.”

  “Then you’ve got yourself a problem.”

  “It’s a hotel in Jacksonville Beach. It’s old and really nice.”

  “Not a lot to go on.”

  “The name is old-fashioned too. I remember that much.”

  “Do you remember the name of the lady you took there? That’s the important question.”

  “It was my brother. His firm put him up there while he looked for a place to live—”

  “Could it be Casa Marina?”

  “Wow. You’re good.”

  “Tell that to my boss. Hold for the number.”

  By the time Ethan finished booking a room, his flight was being called. He spent the two-hour journey working on his timeline. He knew it was mostly just a hypothetical exercise. Even so, it helped frame the coming days in manageable segments.

  The drive to Jacksonville Beach was awful. The airport was north of the city, and to reach the beach meant passing through downtown at four in the afternoon. The heat was stifling, made worse by near one hundred percent humidity. Ethan kept all his windows down, but by the time he reached the Saint Johns bridge he had sweated through his shirt.

  When he spotted the sign on Atlantic Boulevard, Ethan felt as if the Jeep turned of its own accord.

  Tom Bush BMW had fueled the dreams of Jacksonville youths for years. Adrian drove a Lincoln and considered Ethan’s fascination with Beemers to be a serious character flaw.

  There was a brand-new BMW 633i in the showroom window. That particular machine had been Ethan’s dream ride since he caught the car bug at the ripe old age of seven.

  A couple of the salesmen drifted out of the rear shadows, but Ethan suspected it was to give his Jeep a closer look. They watched him enter the showroom, and all but one drifted away. The salesman whose turn it was walked over with the sort of smile he would offer every wistful youth. “Help you?”

  “Yes.” Ethan walked over to a vacant sales desk and opened the canvas satchel he had taken to New Jersey. “I need you to look at something.”

  “Kid, I’m really sorry, but this is a cash-only business . . .” The salesman’s sneer vanished when he realized what Ethan held out for his inspection. “What are those?”

  “First Union deposit slips,” Ethan said. He pointed to the clock, which read ten minutes to five. “I need you to get on the horn and do whatever it takes so I can drive out of here today.”

  Three hours and fourteen minutes later, Ethan drove his first-ever BMW from the lot.

  First Union had acquired First Atlantic Bank of Jacksonville, which gave them a branch just four blocks from the dealership. The branch manager agreed to stay open long enough for the salesman to rush Ethan over and obtain the necessary cashier’s check. By this point, Ethan had decided a flashy new 633i would only confirm his brother’s fear that he was dealing drugs. He and the salesman reviewed options. Ethan settled on a sensible ride, but one with a serious kick.

  The three-year-old 535i had only 6,500 miles, a grey metallic exterior, saddle-leather interior with Recaro sports seats and, as the salesman put it, all the necessary bells and whistles.

  Driving from the car lot, seeing the Jeep rust bucket in his rearview mirror, hearing the engine growl as he accelerated into traffic—all of it was good for a shout of pure, unbridled joy.

  The Casa Marina was one of the oldest hotels in Florida, founded in 1925 and renovated every decade or so—compliments of the two-fisted beating all oceanfront hotels received from tourists and the weather. Ethan had no trouble with the check-in process because the bank manager had phoned ahead to confirm that his checks and credit were both good.
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  The floors of his corner suite were peg-and-groove Florida mahogany, the furniture heavy Spanish oak. He had a four-poster bed and a lovely two-way view over the beachfront in the last light of a very long day. Ethan ordered a room-service dinner, spent half an hour in the deep bath, and almost fell asleep over his meal.

  He woke at six the next morning, after the first real rest he had obtained since the transition. He ate another room-service meal, dressed in his last clean shirt and trousers, and beat the rush-hour traffic into Jacksonville. His first stop was the same men’s store where Adrian had sent him. The gun-to-his-head prices only slowed him down a little. From there he walked to First Union’s main office and asked to speak to one of their brokers. A quick glance at his current balance was enough to bring out the division chief.

  “Ethan Barrett? Reginald Firth. Are you related to Adrian?” The broker was in his mid- to late thirties and was already balding. His three-piece herringbone suit and pale complexion suggested he had recently arrived from somewhere farther north.

  “He’s my brother, and I need to know you won’t speak to him about anything that happens here.”

  Reginald halted in the process of shutting his office door. “Can I ask why?”

  Ethan knew the broker saw a know-it-all college student and did his best to stifle his impatience. “I want to tell Adrian in my own time, in my own way.”

  They remained standing in the middle of Reginald’s office. “Tell him what?”

  “That I’m doing this for both of us. I want both Adrian and Sonya to be co-owners of this account. And they don’t know anything about it. Yet.” When Reginald started in on another question, Ethan cut him off with, “Sorry, I don’t have the time to go into further details.” He handed over a sheet of notepaper. “I want you to buy shares in these companies.”

  Reginald slowly rounded the desk and waved Ethan into a chair opposite. “IBM is a sound buy. But these other two . . . Nintendo, did I say that right?”

  It was the only clear recollection Ethan carried from that last fateful year, how he and Adrian had become hooked on the brand-new concept. “It’s a maker of electronic games. This year they’re coming out with their own hardware system. It’s going to remake the gaming industry.”

  “You’re sure about that, are you?”

  “I am. Yes. They’re a Japanese company. But they’re listed on the AMEX. I checked.”

  “And this last buy?”

  “Motorola has brought out the first general-release cell phone. Another game changer.”

  “Those things weigh a ton and cost a fortune.” Reginald flipped the paper onto his desk. “Nobody outside a few Wall Street jokers would dream of shelling out for one.”

  “Adrian has one. And I’m not here to ask your advice. I want you to buy shares. A hundred and fifty thousand dollars on each company.” He waited as Reginald wrote down the figure. “One question. If I short a stock, how long can I hold it?”

  Reginald took his time answering. “If your account holds the full market value of your short, then as long as you want. But normally—”

  Ethan waved that aside. Nothing about this conversation had even a nodding acquaintance with normal. “I want you to short $150,000 worth of Apple.”

  The broker laughed out loud. “But they just fired Steve Jobs!”

  Ethan nodded. He had read about that on the flight south. “Exactly.”

  “With that hippie gone, they’ll take off like a California bottle rocket.”

  “I disagree.” When Reginald looked ready to argue, Ethan rose to his feet. “I expect those deals to be executed by close of business today. Now I’m due at my next appointment. Where do I sign?”

  C

  HAPTER

  FOURTEEN

  The Jacksonville of 1985 was gradually emerging from its sleepy, slow-moving past. Adrian had moved here because he was as ambitious as he was impatient. He left law school already looking to become partner, which meant finding a good firm in a city that was on the move.

  Ethan’s destination was a new business-technology park rising from what had previously been a river port. The rusting warehouses and cranes were gradually being torn down and replaced by gleaming new waterfront buildings. Only three were completed, and they were surrounded by raw earth and construction noise. Ethan parked in the visitors’ lot, entered the central building, and asked the receptionist to page Sonya. He took a couple of steps toward the exit, ready for a quick retreat, and steeled himself for what would happen next.

  The first time he and Sonya met had pretty much defined their relationship from that point on. Ethan had shown up for dinner dressed in his standard college-casual garb—faded surfer T-shirt and cutoffs and sandals. As usual, Adrian made some caustic joke about Ethan’s inability to dress for the occasion, then ignored it as inconsequential. Their relationship was not defined by clothes. Sonya’s response was completely the opposite. She thought Ethan’s attire showed her and their upcoming marriage a severe lack of respect.

  But even in that first meeting, Sonya’s hostility went far deeper. She saw in Ethan a young man who was completely uninterested in making the most of his life. She listened to him talk about college and loathed how he took that opportunity for granted. She thought he showed contempt for the investment his late parents had made in his future. In short, she despised his attitude and everything it represented.

  Adrian watched in dismay as his brother and future wife fought their way through dinner. Their tight little snips grew into a full-fledged verbal battle. Ethan had finally stormed out and not spoken with Sonya again until the rehearsal dinner.

  This time around, the shock of seeing Sonya again was worse in some ways than Ethan’s first meeting with Adrian. Sonya Barrett, rising star in the world of microbiology and brain chemistry, was almost beautiful. She carried herself with a model’s erectness. Her ice-blue eyes held a Nordic chill. Her hair was dark, her face unlined.

  As he watched her cross the building lobby, Ethan knew he had been right to come.

  Sonya wore a crisp white lab coat with her name sewn into the pocket, and an expression that showed him angry distaste. “What are you doing here?”

  “Five minutes,” Ethan replied. “Please.”

  “Adrian said he bought you new clothes.” She crossed her arms. “You clean up okay, I’ll give you that much.”

  “This is very important, Sonya.”

  The young receptionist pretended not to listen to them between answering calls.

  Ethan asked, “Can we step away?”

  Reluctantly she followed him over to the corner, where a trio of potted palms offered a hint of privacy. “I need to get back to the lab, Ethan.”

  He said, “You were right about me.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I was getting ready to walk out. Leave school, leave Florida, take off and surf the world.” Ethan had spent the drive over debating how he might break through to her. Now that he was here, now that she was actually listening, he still had no idea. Except to give her the unvarnished truth.

  “You’ve spent your entire university career floating.”

  He nodded. Remember, she had told him. Looking at her now, seeing everything that might still happen if he didn’t get it right, if he didn’t save his brother, if he didn’t . . .

  “What has gotten into you?” Sonya leaned closer. “Are you ill?”

  “No. Well, yes. But it’s not . . .” He unfolded his bank statement and passed it over. He realized his hands were shaking. “I need to show you something.”

  “What is this?”

  “I’ve started investing. I’ll explain everything later. But for now—”

  “Is this drug money?”

  “Adrian asked me the same thing.”

  “It’s the natural response, given what we know of you.” She studied him. “Is it?”

  “No, Sonya. This is legit. And it’s only the beginning.”

  “Why are you showing me this?”
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  “Because I want to invest in your group.”

  Sonya opened her mouth. Closed it. Opened it again. “I don’t . . .”

  For the very first time, Ethan glimpsed beneath her frigid exterior and saw the woman his brother loved. The burning intensity, the incredible intelligence . . . the heart.

  “If I’m right, I’m going to make a lot more. It’s yours—all of it. In a month. Maybe six weeks.”

  She said weakly, “What is going on?”

  Ethan glanced around the empty lobby. The receptionist continued fielding calls. They were isolated by the Muzak and the shrubbery. The afternoon glare through the side windows bathed them in a heat that defied the AC’s wash.

  “Ethan!”

  So he began. But he did not tell her everything. Not even close.

  He did not tell her about Delia. Or about Adrian’s death.

  Midway through his description, Sonya sank into a corner chair. Ethan lowered himself to the edge of the coffee table. The setting sun beat on the back of his head and shoulders. But that was not why he was sweating.

  He talked about his life. It was the clearest way he knew to make the transition real for her. How he had returned after four years from surfing the globe. How for a while the hunt through various island jungles was enough. How he loved the island hopping. How the job he held the longest was as dockhand on a luxury yacht owned by the Lichtenstein royal family. How he walked off the boat in Tahiti and spent six and a half months playing a modern-day Gauguin. How in the end, he woke up one morning, just another beachcomber sleeping in a thatched hut at the shore, and . . .

  Nothing. The joy of surfing, the fire of discovery, the sense of adventure . . . gone.

  He left his boards and his clothes, took only his passport and his last seven hundred dollars, and flew back to Florida. Married his college sweetheart. Divorced seven years later. He spent the next twenty years doing precisely what Sonya had accused him of. He floated.

  He got a job managing the Sebastian boatyard. He bought part ownership in a couple of small local companies—surf shops and board manufacturers. He surfed the local breaks. He made friends who wandered through their days with the same scattered emptiness as he did. Until the cancer came. And when the doctor told Ethan he was on final approach, what he felt most of all was . . .