Deep Blue by Randy Wayne White Page A

hair back while he got oriented. “Love, love,
love
the name. A nudist colony, I bet. But”—his eyes took in six mini-cabins, windows dark beneath an awning of coconut palms—“doesn’t look like it’s been open for a while. Hell . . . hasn’t been open since the sixties, maybe. Wow.” He tilted his head and sniffed. “Time warp, man. I bet this is where Elvis lives.”
    â€œMack didn’t mention a price,” Ford replied. “If it’s more than a couple of acres, the land alone’s worth a bunch. So maybe he wants us to invest. Hey”—he was thinking about the UAV, worried someone might come looking, plus he was tired—“I’m not going to stick around. Do you mind catching a ride back?”
    â€œShallow up a tad, man. Why you so jumpy? Never mind—I don’t know why I bother asking. You’re always warp speed when you get back from one of your
lecture
tours.” It was mild sarcasm to preface what came next: “Want to talk about the flying saucer that buzzed your lab? If someone’s after your ass, you can tell me. Or are we just gonna pretend it’s business as usual?”
    Ford, looking toward the cottages, said, “I didn’t know he was bringing them.”
    In a shell parking area, the Lincoln’s dome light showed Mack and two passengers getting out—the ladies from
Tiger Lilly
, Rhonda and JoAnn. Middle-aged; JoAnn thick and busty, Rhonda the opposite. They’d been partners, business and romantically, for a long, long time. A few months ago, Rhonda had begun slipping out to meet Mack when JoAnn was away.
    Tomlinson lowered his voice. “The big guy’s been dipping his willy in the family fun pool. Think she knows?”
    â€œYou’re the expert on double-dipping,” Ford said and checked his watch. It was a little after nine. “Better yet, I’ll jog back to the marina and leave the keys in the truck.”
    â€¢Â Â Â â€¢Â Â Â â€¢
    The property consisted of six tiny cabins built around a commons area—gas grill, a shuffleboard court, orange trees heavy with fruit—and a large one-story clubhouse, CBS brick and stucco, with linoleum floors and tables for potlucks and bingo. Plenty of room to seat fifty or more people. Mack needed a flashlight to find the breaker box because the power had been switched off.
    They toured the cabins one by one, the doors padlocked. Kitchenettes, dusty bamboo furniture, outdated TVs. Single beds, unmade, in a space so small that they took turns having a look.
    Mack led them to a tiny swimming pool, which had been drained. There was a tiki bar on an artificial beach where weeds had battled their way through a foot of white sand. Then back to the clubhouse, which smelled of Pine-Sol, where they sat at a folding table while Mack stood as if calling a meeting to order.
    â€œRemember a few years back when the feds tried to close Dinkin’s Bay to powerboat traffic?” he said. “It didn’t happen. Still hasn’t, but the day’s coming. You can delay the feds, but you can’t win if they want something. And they want control of that bay.”
    Tomlinson’s eyes took in the space around them. “A last lifeboat. Yeah, I get it, man. Is there deeded beach access?”
    Mack continued, “Almost five acres, this building, the cottages, and there’s a small house at the end of the drive. The owner—she’sa widow—she lives there part-time and is desperate to sell. Well . . . she’s willing. The property’s been through the foreclosure process half a dozen times and she’s always managed to keep the dogs away. Old-time repeat clients who’ve been holing up here since her husband—he was a lot older than her—since he built the place back in the sixties. He died a few years back; now most of her repeat business is either dead or dying, so