A False Dawn (7 page)

SIXTEEN

It was Monday morning, and I rose before dawn.  I sat on the outside steps by the screened porch and laced up my shoes.  The sunrise broke, resembling a ship’s light in a mist over the tree line along the river. 

After a mile or so at a fast pace, I stopped to catch my breath.  I stood there, sweating and watching the silent St. Johns for a minute.  There was the scent of damp moss, orange blossoms, and honeysuckle.  A hummingbird hovered at the opening of a trumpet flower, the bird's throat glistening like a damp ruby in the morning light.     

My cell rang.  It’s chirp out of harmony with the birdsong in the forest.  “You sound out of breath.”  Ron Hamilton said.

“Trying to get back in shape.  Running again.”

“There’s another killing.  Similar MO.  Female.  Young.  No ID.  Raped and strangled.  Could be the same perp.”

“Where’d they find the body?”

“Brevard County.  Not too far from you.  Two teenagers on four-wheelers found the vic.  Word I hear is the feds are making a half-ass effort to look into this one.  Not much is done about it until it grabs the girl next door.”

“What did you come up with on similar cases, missing or unsolved homicides?”

“Florida’s got two things more than any state.  The coastline is the longest and so is the missing persons list.  I tried to triangulate it into stats that would correlate with the ethnicity, age and sex of your vic, and the one found today.  Went back five years.  There are ninety-three reported missing.  Nineteen known homicides.  Out of that number, four people have been convicted.  So that gives us fifteen where the perp or perps are still out there.  In each case, the bodies were found in some remote spots.”

“Was the cause of death the same?”

“Looks that way.  Necks broken.  Raped and sexually mutilated.  But because he’s not killing college coeds, like Danny Rolling or Ted Bundy did, it becomes old news fast.  Look how long the Green River Killer kept killing prostitutes.  The people least likely to be reported missing.” 

“For every girl reported missing, I wonder what the ratio or percentage is of them found alive or dead?  What’s the death quotient?”

“There are girls missing that nobody files a report on because their families live in some other country.  Human trafficking.  Sex slaves.  All here in the good ol U.S. of A.”

“You got it, partner.”

Ron grunted.  “Out of the fifteen we know about, one body was found the first year.  The second year produced two.  The third season, if you will, there were three killings, about one a quarter.  Year number four produced four dead girls.  And this last year there were five.  These killings were scattered in counties from the northern part of Florida to the tip of the Everglades.”

“If all the bodies were found, and it’s the same perp, he’s killing more each year, getting bolder, or an urge can’t be satisfied for as long.  What’d you get on Joe Billie?”   

“The print on the arrowhead could be from Billie.  There’s no record of his prints anywhere.  No criminal record.  Nothing in DMV.  Seems he doesn’t exist.  The blood on the feather you sent matches the DNA of the hair follicle you found on the cot.  Came from the same man, Billie, if that’s his hair.  No hit in CODIS.  Why his blood is on the damn feather, I can’t help you there, bro.  I’ll send the arrow back to you.”

“Did you find anything on Clayton Suskind?”

“Ph.D in anthropology from Florida State University.  Suskind was arrested in last year for unauthorized digging of a national historic site, the protected Crystal River Mounds.  This is probably the biggest Indian burial ground in the Southeast.  He knows, or knew, where to dig.  Collectors pay a lot for this stuff.  The good professor is another missing person who has never been found.”

“Check with the University of Arizona.  See if he’s on staff.”       

#

BACK AT MY HOUSE
, I dialed the Volusia County Sheriff’s Office.  I asked to speak to Detective Slater.  “There was a killing in Brevard County.  Maybe the same MO.”

“We’re on it.  You’re not a cop anymore, O’Brien.”

“Do you know where I can find Joe Billie?”

“Why?”

“He left something with me.  I’d like to return it.  Have you charged him?”

“Not yet.  He’s probably lying low on the Seminole reservation.  Sovereignty and all that shit.  We’re watching him.  Just like we’re watching you.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You know what it means.” 

“Did you come up with an ID on the victim?”

“That’s not your immediate concern.”

“I haven’t figured out your attitude yet, maybe it’s a turf thing, Detective, but your incompetence made it my business.  I assume you haven’t got an ID.  Maybe the killing in Brevard is related.  It might be a way to help ID the girl I found.”

“I don’t need you to tell me how to do my job.”

“I think you haven’t come up with an ID yet or a real suspect.”

“This isn’t CSI Miami, O’Brien.  Push me, I push back.  Promise you that.”

“Here’s a promise:  if you don’t find out who killed the girl, I will.”

He slammed the phone.  I gripped the receiver hard, my knuckles like cotton. 

I looked out at the stillness of the river and thought about my conversation with Ron.  A second murder.  Was it the same perp?  
Atlacatl imix cuanmiztli
I heard her garbled words through the whisper of air from her punctured lung.

The room suddenly seemed cold.    

There was a noise near my driveway.  I picked up my Glock, looked out the window, and saw a car parked under the live oaks at the far end of my drive.  By the time I got to the front door, the car was gone. 

SEVENTEEN

I skipped breakfast the next day, loaded a case of beer and Max into the Jeep and drove straight to Ponce Inlet Marina.  I was looking forward to a quiet Monday on
Jupiter
.  I’d plan to install a GPS system on the boat.

As I walked by the tiki bar, on the way to my boat, Kim, the bartender, smiled one of her thousand-candlelight smiles and held up her hand for me to stop.  She was in her early forties.  Easy smile.  Dark hair and brown eyes that had their own sense of humor.

“Looks like a party,” she said, glancing at the beer and then at me.

“I always seem to get thirsty when I work on the boat all day.”

“Hi Max!”  Kim bent down and picked Max up, kissing her head.  “So you’re the lucky girl who’s first mate.”  Max’s tail wagged nonstop.

“Sean, were you on
Jupiter
a couple of nights ago?”

“No, why?”

“I was closing and thought I saw a light on your boat.  Like a flashlight.”

“Sure it was
Jupiter
?”

“Not positive.  But it looked like it was your boat.”

“Did you see anyone leave?”

“No.”

“Thanks, Kim.”

She set Max on the ground to follow me.  “No problem.  That’s what I’m here for, neighborhood watch.”

The breeze across the Intracoastal delivered the scent of a receding tide, barnacles drying on pilings, exposed oyster bars, and mullet feeding across the mud flats.

The
St. Michaels
had returned.  Nick’s fishing boat, with its Old World look and feel, seemed to rest quietly in its slip.  On the dock next to the boat, Nick's Calico cat squatted on its haunches, chewing a severed fish head.

Jupiter
sat waiting for me like an old friend.  I stepped into the cockpit and began carefully examining everything I owned.  Deck chairs, cooler, ropes, anything that might look out of place.  I raised the hatch to the engine and begin looking for any sign of intrusion or something that didn’t belong in the bowels of
Jupiter
.  Nothing.

I opened the salon door lock and stepped inside, Max following at my heels. 

The first sign.  Max darted around the salon sniffing every piece of furniture.  The fur raised slightly on her back. “What do you smell, Max?  Let’s check below.”

The second sign.  Sherri’s picture had been moved, slightly, but I could tell.  A faint dust line on the shelf gave it away.  If it were not for Kim tipping me off, and Max’s antics, I may not have noticed that someone had been on
Jupiter.  

I examined the rest of the boat and could find nothing stolen.  A few things seemed slightly out of place, but nothing gone.  I would check topside in a moment.  I didn’t think I’d find anything taken from there.  If robbery wasn’t the motive, what was? 

Through
Jupiter’s
portside window, I saw the feet with the flip-flops.  A few seconds later, Nick Cronus bellowed, “Permission to come aboard.”  Nick eased down like a sloth from the dock into the cockpit.  He had thick curly black hair, moustache, smiling dark eyes, and skin stained the hue of creosote.  A lifetime at sea, pulling nets, traps and battling storms had given him a Herculean build tempered with the survival skills of an Argonaut.  Nick was a blend of Zorba and Will Rogers.  He had a string of ex-wives, children, girlfriends, and creditors in his circle of acquaintances.  But he had the heart of a St. Bernard, too, loyal and trusting where his friends were concerned.  I was glad to be included as one of them.

By his slow movement, I could tell he was slightly hung over.  I would wait a few minutes before asking him if he’d seen anyone around
Jupiter.

Max ran out to greet him, her tail fanning.  He leaned down and lifted her up using one hand like a giant with a toy.  He held her over his head.  “Hot dog, you come to sea with me!  I feed you some octopus, give you’re a starfish for a chew bone, and let you bark at the porpoises.  It’d be a good life, yeaaaah!”

He did a 360 spin, holding Max even higher in a Greek dance.  It was more excitement than Max’s bladder could hold.  She let loose a trickle that ran down his arm.  I yelled and Nick laughed.  Max looked dizzy.

“Hot dog!  What you do to me?”  Nick set Max down like he was holding a ten-pound glowing coal.  She looked up at him through sad brown eyes.  “Little one, don’t be ashamed.  It’s often the effect I have on the woman.”

“Let me get you a towel,” I said.

“No, Maxine is trying to tell me something.”

“What’s that?”

“She hates me so much she pee on me, or she say, Nicky my buddy, you need a shower and I’ll encourage you to take one.”  He looked at Max, peeled off his shirt, opened the door from the transom to the dive platform, kicked off his flip-flops and dove into the water.  He swam out about fifty feet and turned over to float on his back.  He bellowed, “What a fine bathtub!”   He turned over and swam like an Olympian competitor back to
Jupiter.

I tossed him a towel. “You’re lucky the tide’s in, otherwise Max urine shower might be cleaner than the marina.”

“I don’t think about it, at least not long enough to stop me from having some fun.”  A gold cross hung from a chain around his neck and winked in the sun as he dried off. 

“Nick, have you seen anybody on my boat, or around it?” 

“Lemme think.  I’ve just been back one day.  Had a little too much Ouzo last night and slept like a dead man.”  He closed his eyes for a moment as if steadying himself.  “When I first brought my boat back to the marina, I was working against the tide.  I remember two people I haven’t seen on the docks walking away from your boat. Man was as bald as an onion.  Couldn’t see the woman’s face, but she had a nice ass.”

I told Nick about the murder, the investigation, Slater, and how I’d become involved.  After I finished, he looked up at me through eyes so dark you couldn’t see the pupil and said, “Wanna beer?”

“It’s a little too early on my clock for a beer.”

“Come fishing with me, storms and shit send your clock in a twilight time zone, man.”  He shuffled into the galley with Max following him, tail wagging.  I could hear him chatting with her like she was human.  He returned with a Corona, popped the top and took a long pull.  “Sean, you got some dick with a hard on for you.  You find a woman ‘bout dead, call for help and he thinks you did it.  What’s his gig?”

“Don’t know, but I do know someone broke into
Jupiter.”

“They steal from you?”

“Don’t think so.  Can’t find anything taken.  But things have been moved.”

He leaned back into the sofa in the salon, held Max in his lap, and propped his flip-flop clad feet up on a shellacked cypress table.  He set his beer on the table and picked at a small scab on his dark forearm.  “Think that cop was the one on your boat?”

“Maybe. Why not search my house?  It’s closer to the crime scene.”

“He coulda been there.  Maybe you just don’t see it yet.”

“Or there could be another reason he was on my boat.”

Nick finished his beer. “What reason?”

“What if he wasn’t hunting for something?” 

“Huh?”

“What if he was leaving something?”