Carolina Isle

by Jude Deveraux

  In spite of her fear, Sara could feel herself relaxing. “How many of your hundreds did you leave them?” she murmured.

  “What hundreds?”

  Sara was too tired to argue. “The ones in your shoes. Each pair you own has a hundred-dollar bill folded under the insole. Two shoes, two one hundreds.”

  “Both of them,” R.J. said sleepily. “Do you mind?”

  “No. They need them.”

  “They have each other. I’ll bet you fifty grand that by Monday your little cousin will no longer be a virgin.”

  “You touch her and—”

  “Keep your knickers on. Mr. President is going to do it, not me.”

  “How did you know about him, about his … wanting …” She was more asleep than awake.

  “To be president? You told me. You’re no good at keeping secrets.”

  “Secrets about the man I love,” Sara whispered, then fell asleep.

  R.J. lay awake for a few minutes, looking at the stars over his head. There was a hole in the porch roof. Yeah, he thought, Charley better get here soon before the old houses rot into a pile. He glanced at Sara, looking at her profile in the dim light. I know who you love, but you don’t know, he whispered. Smiling, he went to sleep.

  In the bushes, their every movement was watched.

  Chapter Twelve

  “I HEAR FISHING BOATS,” R.J. SAID, HIS face close to hers. “I want you on one of them. I want you off this island.”

  Sara opened an eye enough to see that it wasn’t quite daylight, which meant that they’d had maybe two hours’ sleep.

  She was tired, hungry, and dirty—but she still knew a trick when she heard one. R.J. was trying to get rid of her. “And let you have all the glory of solving the mystery?” She hadn’t quite opened her eyes, but she heard him chuckle as he stood up.

  “Today I’ll talk to some of the fishermen and make arrangements for the lot of you to return to the mainland. Are you going to lie there all day?”

  “Maybe,” she said, stretching, her eyes still closed. It was cool and pleasant in the early morning on the porch and she didn’t want to face reality.

  “Sara,” R.J. said in a tone she’d never heard before, “if you don’t get up, I’m going to join you on that couch. Think we’ll put on a show for the neighbors?”

  She refused to let him bully her. “Naw,” she said lazily, “they only look out the windows to see dead dogs.”

  When she heard him chuckle again, she opened her eyes. He was looking down at her in the way she’d seen him look at several women, but she didn’t react as they did. She knew what happened to women who fell for that come-tome look. Sighing, she sat up and looked out at King’s Isle. There was no one in sight, just a lot of empty-looking old houses.

  As she remembered Fenny Nezbit’s dead body and all that the four of them had done to conceal it, Sara had to fight down the fear that rose in her throat. She ran her hand through her slightly greasy hair, and her tongue over teeth that felt as though they had green stuff growing on them. “Does prison have a bathroom?” she asked. “I need a bath, some deodorant, and clean clothes.”

  R.J. didn’t seem to have heard her as he looked out at what they could see of the town. For all their ordeal, he didn’t seem to have changed much. How was it that men could sleep in their clothes and wake up with them unwrinkled? And why did the stubble on his cheeks only make him look more rugged? If he stepped onto a fishing boat right now, he’d look like one of them.

  Reluctantly, she got up. Minutes later, she was following him along the same road they’d been down the night before. Each step took them farther away from Phyllis Vancurren’s house, farther away from Ariel and David. “Think they’ll be all right?” Sara asked.

  “I think they’ll be ecstatic. They have enough money to live on for a few days, so they can do what people like them are so good at doing: nothing.”

  “You don’t like them much, do you?”

  “Who was it who came up with that idiot scheme of trying to make me think the two of you were each other?”

  “It wasn’t about you,” Sara said, but then thought better of it. As far as she could piece together, Ariel had seen R.J. at a party in New York, thought she was in love with him, and so had asked Sara to change places with her. And because Ariel thought she needed Sara with her, she’d arranged for the four of them to go to King’s Isle together.

  “If it wasn’t about me, then who was it about?” R.J. persisted. “You and the prez? You wanted to be part of his snobby little set so much that you tried to make a fool of me?”

  Sara was too tired to put up with his accusations—and she wasn’t about to try to defend herself. “Did you forget to take your arthritis medicine this morning, old man? Is that why you’re so cranky?”

  “No,” he said slowly. “I’m trying to be unpleasant enough that you’ll go back to your friends.”

  “Won’t work,” she said, giving a huge yawn. “I’m used to your bad temper. Besides, who said they can go back? If anyone is going to get us out of this mess it’s you, so I’ll stick with the winner.”

  “I’d think that was a compliment, but that would mean the world is ending, so I know it can’t be.”

  “Where are you taking us?”

  “To breakfast. That sound good?”

  “And how do you plan to pay for it? Washing dishes?”

  R.J. held up a folded hundred-dollar bill.

  “Does that mean you gave Ariel and David only one bill?”

  “Nope,” he said. He was walking so fast she was having trouble keeping up with him.

  “You lied to me, didn’t you?”

  “Nope.”

  “When we get out of this I’m going to quit working for you.”

  Turning back, R.J. smiled. “Belt.”

  “What?”

  “You think you know all about me because you snooped in my closet and found out that I keep emergency money inside my shoes. But you didn’t find out that all my belts are custom made and they have money in them too.”

  “I have never snooped in your closet! If you remember, you told me—” She cut herself off. What did it matter now? “How much do you have?”

  “Humph!” R.J. said as an answer. “There’s the restaurant for the fishermen. It opened at four A.M. Ready?”

  Sara was still thinking about how to defend herself from his accusation of snooping in his closet when she saw the fishermen leaving the open restaurant. She then realized that maybe they could leave the island after all. If R.J. had a few hundred, maybe it would be enough of a down payment for an escape.

  “You can go,” R.J. said softly, looking at her. “I’m sure I can work out a deal.”

  The vision of Fenny Nezbit dead in the bathtub sat down in front of her eyes. If she left the island, she could get help. She could return with a whole herd of lawyers. She could … she glanced up at R.J. If she left, she’d be leaving him here alone at the mercy of the police. “I think you should send Ariel and David,” she said. And if they left the island, what would the police do to her and R.J.?

  “I’ve thought better of the whole idea. We’re being watched and I think we’re expected to try to leave on a fishing boat, and if we did try, they’d put all of us in jail. Minutes later, they’d find the body and we’d never get out of here alive. I think it’s better for us to stay in sight, so we can keep our freedom, such as it is. Everything we do that we shouldn’t do needs to be done in absolute secrecy.”

  “I agree,” Sara said, relieved that she wasn’t going to have to choose between staying and leaving.

  He held the door to the restaurant open to her and as they entered, silence fell over the customers. There were eight Formica-clad tables, all but one full of men wearing heavy trousers and boots, ready to go out on their boats. Sara looked at the clock. It wasn’t 5:00 A.M. yet. She gave as much of a smile as she could manage to the men in the restaurant and to the waitress behind the counter. No one smiled back. The men looked d
own at their food in silence and the waitress turned to the coffeepot.

  They sat at the empty table and R.J. picked up the menu that was stuck between the napkin holder and the ketchup bottle. “I think I’ll have the special,” he said in a normal tone of voice, as though they weren’t sitting in a silent restaurant.

  Sara had to work to focus on the menu. The special was two fried eggs, two pieces of bacon, two link sausages, a biscuit, three pancakes, orange juice, and coffee. Before she thought about where she was, she said, “I can see you’re sticking to your diet.”

  Two tables away, a couple of men gave little guffaws of laughter. She looked at R.J. in surprise and he smiled at her, pleased.

  “And what are you going to have?” he asked. “Your usual bowl of sticks and twigs?”

  There was more laughter, a bit louder this time.

  “Sticks and twigs describes your last girlfriend’s figure,” she said with her teeth clenched, as though she were angry with him. “I’m going to have scrambled eggs and plain toast, that is if you don’t mind that Phyllis doesn’t cook them.”

  “Leave her out of this!” R.J. said, but loud enough for everyone in the restaurant to hear. He leaned toward her. “If it weren’t for her, we’d—”

  “What?” Sara said, leaning forward so their noses were almost touching. “Be sleeping on outdoor porches? What I want to know is why you didn’t take her up on her offer last night.”

  “And leave you to wander around outside by yourself? All of us were looking everywhere for you. And all because you’d had a jealous fit over a very nice woman who—”

  “Nice! I know exactly what part of her you think is ‘nice.’ She—” Sara broke off because she realized that the people around them had started talking again. The men were chuckling and she could hear the name “Phyllis” now and then.

  “Good,” R.J. whispered. “Very good. I think that acting training of yours paid off.”

  “Who was acting?” she said, looking down at the menu. When she looked back at him, he was staring at her with wide eyes. “Don’t kid yourself. I’m not in the least jealous of your women.” When he started to say something, Sara nodded toward the approaching waitress.

  “So what will you two be having this morning?” she asked, her face serious.

  “Phyllis Vancurren on a platter,” Sara said sweetly.

  The waitress didn’t miss a beat. “And you?” she asked R.J.

  “I’ll have the same,” he said, his eyes on Sara.

  “Okay, that’s two ham sandwiches with a side of gravy,” the waitress said.

  Everyone in the restaurant, including Sara and R.J., burst into spontaneous laughter.

  When they left the restaurant, the fishermen waved at Sara and R.J. as though they were one of them, as though the men understood what was going on between the two. When Sara paid the check—she was, after all, still R.J.’s assistant—she’d asked the waitress where the Nezbits lived. “We want to apologize about the dog,” Sara said, her eyes downcast.

  When she looked up, the waitress was looking at Sara as though she didn’t know if she was lying or crazy. It came to Sara that if the town was in on what was being done to them, it was because they were being threatened. By whom? With what? she wondered.

  The waitress gave her directions. “It’s about three miles,” she said, but she didn’t offer transportation.

  Outside, R.J. was waiting for her. “Three miles, right?”

  “Yes,” she said. “Did you ask?”

  “I asked directions and that took some doing, as all of the men wanted to run away from me. Someone has warned them not to give us a ride off the island. Can you walk in those shoes?”

  “Not well. Toothbrush and toothpaste, of course, and a decent pair of shoes that I can walk in. They head my list of wants.”

  R.J. looked down the main street of town. There wasn’t a store open yet. When he saw Sara was taking off her shoes to go barefoot, he smiled. “Good idea. I think I’ll do the same.” He untied his leather brogues—no sandals for him—stuffed his socks inside, tied the shoes together, then took her sandals from her and tied his laces around them. “Together at last,” he said, holding up the four shoes.

  “You’re incorrigible,” Sara said, but she was smiling.

  “No, actually, I’m the world’s greatest lover.”

  “You wish. Stop that and tell me what you found out.”

  “Nothing.”

  “Nothing really, or nothing you’re going to tell me?”

  “What do you think Fenny’s wife is like?”

  Sara knew she was going to get nothing more out of R.J., but she trusted him. She thought he had managed the fake argument in the restaurant deftly. If anyone had seen them outside last night, R.J. had covered it. He said that Sara had run out in a jealous fit and they’d all had to look for her.

  “I don’t think anyone knows that Nezbit is dead,” R.J. said.

  “Or that he’s missing.” They were on an old, pot-holed road, surrounded by overhanging trees and there seemed to be no one around, but she still lowered her voice. “What do you think they’re afraid of?”

  “The judge. The police. Maybe Lassiter. One thing for sure is that no one is willing to help us.”

  “You’d think there would be at least one rebel among them,” Sara said. “One person who was willing to stand up to them.”

  “He’d have to have no family who could be threatened, and he’d have to not care if he lived or died. It’s my guess that the residents like it here and don’t want it to change. They have rent-free housing, plentiful food, friends. What more is there in life?”

  “Toothpaste,” Sara said and R.J. laughed.

  “You think that’s the road?” he asked, nodding toward a dirt road that turned off to the right.

  “I hope so. My feet are bruised and raw,” Sara said.

  “I’ll kiss them to make them better.”

  “I’d rather have a pair of sneakers.”

  “Where’s your watch?”

  “Now that I know how much it costs I’m afraid to wear it. It’s safe inside my— It’s safe.”

  “Mind if I look and see what time it is?”

  She shook her head at him, but he was making her feel better. His jokes were making her forget the seriousness of the situation they were in. While they were in the restaurant, she’d had a vision of those fishermen carrying a noose, coming to lynch her and R.J. for killing their dear friend Fenny Nezbit.

  After a while, they came to a narrow road with a beat-up, old mailbox at the end of it. In barely discernible letters, they saw the name Nezbit.

  Sara hesitated.

  “I want you to go back to Ariel,” R.J. said quietly. “Just go down this road, take a left and—”

  “I know the way,” Sara said, her hand shielding her eyes from the sun. “Do you think she’ll meet us with a shotgun? Do you think—” She broke off because she saw a pickup truck coming toward them. It looked to be traveling at the speed of light, with gravel flying behind it in a storm, and the tail end skidding back and forth.

  “Get down!” R.J. yelled, then pushed Sara into a deep ditch. He jumped in beside her, put his arm over her head, and ducked down.

  “Do you think they saw us?” she whispered.

  “I hope not,” R.J. said, but in the next second the truck came to a skidding halt in front of them. R.J.’s body was nearly over Sara’s in protection.

  “What you doin’ down there?” came a woman’s voice. “I thought you was gonna come see me.”

  They looked up to see a thin woman, with her head half out of the truck window, looking down at them. She had on haphazardly applied makeup and hoop earrings that reached her shoulders. Her face was so sun damaged that she could have been anywhere from thirty-five to fifty.

  “Well?” she said, “you comin’ to my house or not?”

  “You’re Mrs. Nezbit?” R.J. asked, standing up in the ditch, reaching down his hand to help Sara up.
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br />   “That’s the burden the good Lord put on me and I bear it as best I can. You gonna stop hidin’ in the ditch with the snakes or are you gonna come to my house?”

  “With you!” Sara said, jumping out of the ditch and onto the road.

  R.J. was beginning to recover himself and he started toward the other side of the truck. “This is very kind of you to invite us to your house and especially to pick us up.”

  “I didn’t come to get you. I’m on my way into town. That girl that come with you is givin’ New York makeovers, clothes and all. I’m on her list so I gotta go. You two can take care of my young ’uns while I’m in town. I think it’s the least you can do after what you done to my poor dog. That was a good animal.” She wiped at her eye and managed to smear a full inch of black eyeliner across her temple.

  “Mrs. Nezbit,” Sara began, “I really don’t think we can—”

  “Now don’t you go gettin’ uppity with me, or are you jealous of your sister? Just because she has the talent don’t mean you don’t have some somewhere. That’s all the time I got to stay here helpin’ you. Go ask Effie what to do. She’s as smart as any of Fenny’s kids are. See ya someday,” she said with a cackle of laughter, then took off in a flurry of gravel and dirt.

  When Sara stopped coughing, she looked at R.J. “Ariel is …”

  “Making over the entire island,” R.J. said in wonder.

  “As you said, my cousin has a backbone of steel.” There was pride in Sara’s voice, and wonder. Ariel had said she could be a style consultant, but Sara had laughed at her.