going to do?” Leslie’s voice was softer.
“I’m going on a field trip.”
“Without a badge, I don’t know how far you can get with these people before they have you arrested, or worse. Be careful, Sean.”
I chased two aspirins with orange juice two weeks beyond its expiration date. As I started for the shower, the phone rang. It was Nick. “You sound like I woke you.”
“Someone else beat you to it.”
“What’s wrong, man?”
“I hate funerals.”
“Know what you mean. Hey, some people were hanging by your boat.”
“Who? You talk with them?”
“Kim saw them.”
“What’d she see?”
“They weren’t messin’ with your boat. They were asking questions about you?”
“They? Who? What kind of questions?”
“Don’t know. Kim told me to tell you if I saw you. Been tryin’ to call you. Thought somebody killed you and tossed you in the river. Almost got on my bike and run out to your place, but I’d had too much Greek wine.”
“How did Kim describe these people? Was one bald?”
“It was a he and a she. Two of ‘em. And they were from the FBI.”
The throb above my left eye became more pronounced. I popped a beer, sipped it on one side of my mouth, and thought about taking another aspirin.
TWENTY-THREE
After resting my jaw for three days, I was becoming anxious to do what I knew in my gut I had to do. It was the feeling I got before combat during the first Gulf War. It was the mood that came over me when the hunt was closing in on a suspect in the streets or corporate offices of Miami.
I made arrangements for my neighbor to take care of Max while I was away. I didn’t know if I’d be gone a few hours or a few days. I did know that the FBI was interested in me, but why? The stories were now being carried by the national wire services. There were rumblings of a serial killer loose in the sunshine state, the land of Mickey and Shamu. The feds were being more reactive than proactive.
My immediate decision was whether to let them come find me, or go to them. I thought about it for less than a second before turning south on Highway 27. I wedged the Glock out of sight between my seat and the gearshift console.
I unzipped all of the windows on the Jeep and invited the wind along for the ride. The air was cool and mixed with smells of fresh plowed earth and orange blossoms. I drove through cattle country, sliced by drainage canals and dotted with orange and grapefruit trees. It was a cloudless morning, the sky deep blue, almost as if a bottomless indigo blow was covering the earth.
Glancing in the rearview mirror, I saw a car following about a quarter of a mile behind me. I accelerated from fifty to sixty-five. My cell rang. I didn’t recognize the number. I did recognize the man’s voice.
Floyd Powell, the commercial fisherman, said, “I run into my nephew this morning. We got to talkin’ about that killin,’ you know, the one with the girl. He told me he was frog giggin’ near there that night. Had his light on the bank where the frogs is at, and he says he seen what he thought was two people having sex higher up on the bluff. Says it wasn’t but a few seconds later when he saw a car headin’ down the dirt road toward State Road 44. Bobby said he thought it was odd ‘cause the driver never turned on his lights until he was on blacktop.”
“Can your nephew identify the guy?”
“Says he was too embarrassed to look good when he caught ‘em in this light.”
I thanked Floyd Powell and hung up. Now I knew why the girl I’d found hadn’t suffered a broken neck. The perp was frightened by the boat lights and fled the scene.
The approaching car in my rearview window caught my attention, but the driver kept his distance. Then I kicked the Jeep up to more than eighty miles an hour. It didn’t take a full mile for me to be certain that I was being
“I’m going on a field trip.”
“Without a badge, I don’t know how far you can get with these people before they have you arrested, or worse. Be careful, Sean.”
I chased two aspirins with orange juice two weeks beyond its expiration date. As I started for the shower, the phone rang. It was Nick. “You sound like I woke you.”
“Someone else beat you to it.”
“What’s wrong, man?”
“I hate funerals.”
“Know what you mean. Hey, some people were hanging by your boat.”
“Who? You talk with them?”
“Kim saw them.”
“What’d she see?”
“They weren’t messin’ with your boat. They were asking questions about you?”
“They? Who? What kind of questions?”
“Don’t know. Kim told me to tell you if I saw you. Been tryin’ to call you. Thought somebody killed you and tossed you in the river. Almost got on my bike and run out to your place, but I’d had too much Greek wine.”
“How did Kim describe these people? Was one bald?”
“It was a he and a she. Two of ‘em. And they were from the FBI.”
The throb above my left eye became more pronounced. I popped a beer, sipped it on one side of my mouth, and thought about taking another aspirin.
TWENTY-THREE
After resting my jaw for three days, I was becoming anxious to do what I knew in my gut I had to do. It was the feeling I got before combat during the first Gulf War. It was the mood that came over me when the hunt was closing in on a suspect in the streets or corporate offices of Miami.
I made arrangements for my neighbor to take care of Max while I was away. I didn’t know if I’d be gone a few hours or a few days. I did know that the FBI was interested in me, but why? The stories were now being carried by the national wire services. There were rumblings of a serial killer loose in the sunshine state, the land of Mickey and Shamu. The feds were being more reactive than proactive.
My immediate decision was whether to let them come find me, or go to them. I thought about it for less than a second before turning south on Highway 27. I wedged the Glock out of sight between my seat and the gearshift console.
I unzipped all of the windows on the Jeep and invited the wind along for the ride. The air was cool and mixed with smells of fresh plowed earth and orange blossoms. I drove through cattle country, sliced by drainage canals and dotted with orange and grapefruit trees. It was a cloudless morning, the sky deep blue, almost as if a bottomless indigo blow was covering the earth.
Glancing in the rearview mirror, I saw a car following about a quarter of a mile behind me. I accelerated from fifty to sixty-five. My cell rang. I didn’t recognize the number. I did recognize the man’s voice.
Floyd Powell, the commercial fisherman, said, “I run into my nephew this morning. We got to talkin’ about that killin,’ you know, the one with the girl. He told me he was frog giggin’ near there that night. Had his light on the bank where the frogs is at, and he says he seen what he thought was two people having sex higher up on the bluff. Says it wasn’t but a few seconds later when he saw a car headin’ down the dirt road toward State Road 44. Bobby said he thought it was odd ‘cause the driver never turned on his lights until he was on blacktop.”
“Can your nephew identify the guy?”
“Says he was too embarrassed to look good when he caught ‘em in this light.”
I thanked Floyd Powell and hung up. Now I knew why the girl I’d found hadn’t suffered a broken neck. The perp was frightened by the boat lights and fled the scene.
The approaching car in my rearview window caught my attention, but the driver kept his distance. Then I kicked the Jeep up to more than eighty miles an hour. It didn’t take a full mile for me to be certain that I was being
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