Deadly Catch (23 page)

What if it wasn’t a suicide at all?

I drove to the post office and checked my box. Credit card offers and the new
Leatherneck
magazine. No insurance check, but it had only been two days since the adjuster had examined the burned hulk of my camper. With everything that had happened, it seemed more like two weeks.

Around noon I called Bo Pickron on his personal cell number. This time he answered, and as he had business to attend to in St. George, we agreed to meet by the seawall at Canal Park at three. The business, he told me, was visiting his bereaved sister and helping her with funeral arrangements. I was waiting when he drove up in his SUV.

I offered my hand and told Pickron I was sorry about Friendly George. He shook my hand, grunted, and walked out onto the seawall. I followed. It was around ninety degrees and humid, but a brisk westerly breeze helped. A small flock of gulls waddled out of our way, and a couple of terns that had been mingling with them lifted their wings and rose up and out over the canal.

“Why didn’t you tell me about Tom Mayo coming to see you the same day he had his so-called accident?” I said.

Pickron stopped, folded his arms across his chest, and stared out at the horizon. “You didn’t ask.”

“I talked with his wife yesterday. She said Mayo suspected that Ben Merritt was up to something, and that Merritt was always kissing up to George Harper.”

To my surprise the sheriff didn’t say anything, just gazed over the water and nodded.

“She said Merritt wouldn’t let her husband do his job properly, so Mayo started snooping around on his own to see what he could find out.”

Pickron unfolded his arms and pointed toward the western tip of Five-Mile Island. “George saved my life out there once. I was eleven or twelve at the time. Him and Marilyn were having a picnic on the island and let me tag along. They were lying on the beach working on their tans while I was swimming. I got caught in a rip and tried to fight it and wound up going under. George swam out and somehow found me and pulled me to shore.”

It was a touching story, but I wondered what it had to do with anything. “Tom Mayo took several photos. I’m having a specialist do some enhancing.”

Pickron nodded, still staring out to sea. “Make sure you keep the originals.” He turned and started back to his vehicle.

“Do you think it was a suicide?” I called after him.

He stopped in his tracks and turned around. “We’ll find out.” Then he climbed into the SUV and took off.

I rented a room for a weekly rate at the beachside Sandcastle Motel and then drove to Kate’s. I gathered my clothes and other gear and stowed them in my truck. Back inside, I set the spare key Kate had given me on the kitchen table and locked the door behind me. I called Gillman’s Marina to let Kate know where she could find me, then drove to the grocery store, bought a couple of six-packs, and headed back to my room.

I put one of the six-packs in the small refrigerator, then kicked off my shoes and walked down to the beach with the other. I sat on the sand just out of the surf’s reach and popped open a beer. I took a sip and gazed at Five-Mile Island in the distance, trying to make sense of my brief conversation with Bo Pickron.

He hadn’t questioned anything I’d said. It was almost like he’d come to the conclusion that I was right, without saying so. He hadn’t denied meeting with Tom Mayo, hadn’t shown surprise that Mayo had been sticking his nose in Ben Merritt’s business or that he’d taken photos to back up his suspicions.

Had Pickron listened to Tom Mayo’s spiel and then decided not to follow up on anything Mayo told or showed him after learning Mayo was killed on his way home? Or, had he given Mayo the same brush-off he’d given me: “This doesn’t prove anything”?

So, Harper once saved Pickron’s life. Bully for him. But what was Friendly George supposed to do in front of Bo’s sister, let him drown? Okay, maybe that was a little harsh, but Pickron knew Harper was a philandering SOB, and it was his sister that Harper was running around on. Was family-by-marriage just cause to knowingly look the other way when your brother-in-law was screwing around on your blood sister, and padding the pocket of the man covering up for his illegitimate son?

Three beers later I still had no clue.

That evening I was propped up on the bed watching the local ten o’clock news when headlights flashed through the drawn curtains. A car door closed, and a few seconds later someone rapped lightly on my door. Great. I’d left the shotgun behind the seat of my truck. I got up and eased across the room, peeled back the edge of the curtain, and glanced out. It was Kate.

I slid the chain latch free and opened the door, just then remembering I was wearing only my skivvies. “Hold on a second, I’m not dres—”

Kate pushed through the door, wrapped her arms around my neck, and kissed me hard on the lips. “I miss you already, Mac,” she whispered and kissed me again as she kicked the door shut behind her. She put both hands on my bare chest and backed me toward the bed until my legs buckled, then curled up in my lap and crushed her lips against mine.

It had been a long time, and all the gentleman drained out of me in those few seconds. I wrapped my arms around Kate, returning kiss for kiss, then slid a hand underneath her shirt and cupped a braless breast. She shuddered when I gave the nipple a gentle squeeze.

Kate pushed away and stood silhouetted in the glare of the television. She stepped out of her flip-flops, lifted her shirt over her head, and slipped off her shorts and panties in one swift motion. She pressed her hands against my chest again and pushed me flat on the mattress.

My skivvies were off in a flash. Kate lay prone against me, panting. To hell with foreplay; maybe next time. I ran my hands down her back and cupped her firm butt. Just as I was ready to position her above me, she giggled.

“What’s so damn funny?” I was at full attention and loaded for bear. I’d never claimed to be the world’s greatest stud, but I’d never had any real complaints to speak of, either.

“I’m sorry, Mac,” Kate said, putting a hand to her mouth to stifle another laugh. She grinned. “It just dawned on me that here we are, naked in bed together, about to make love, and I don’t even know your real first name.”

“Mac.”

Her eyebrows arched. “Mac?”

“Okay, MacArthur. MacArthur Andrew McClellan. And don’t even think about laughing.”

Kate bit her lower lip. “I won’t, I promise.” She brushed her lips against my cheek. “Nice to meet you, MacArthur.”

“Mac.”

“Okay, Mac.”

“So, what’s yours?”

Kate pushed up on her elbows and smiled, her breasts still pressed against my chest. “Kate.”

I slapped her playfully on the rump. “Come on, I told you mine, you tell me yours. Fair is fair, as long as we’re playing doctor.”

“It’s Kate, I swear. No Katherine, no Katrina, no middle name. Just Kate Bell.”

“Nice to meet
you
, Just Kate Bell.”

Nearly every business in town closed Monday afternoon at two o’clock for Mayor George Herman Harper’s funeral. I hadn’t heard anything regarding the autopsy from Bo Pickron yet, but I figured he had to know the results since the medical examiner’s office had released the body to the family on Saturday. I drove to Parkersville that morning and bought a pair of appropriate slacks, a dress shirt and a matching sports coat. At one-thirty I stopped by Kate’s, and we rode together to the funeral.

We had to park almost two blocks away, and it was standing room only inside St. George United Methodist Church. St. George. How fitting. In a back pew a kindly older gentleman surrendered his seat to Kate. I stood behind her, leaning against the rear wall of the sanctuary.

Kate was attending out of respect for Maddie. I was there to people-watch and see who might strike up a conversation with who after the service. Outside, the humidity was oppressive, and the temp was pushing the mid-nineties. With the big double doors of the church standing wide open so those who couldn’t find room inside to sit or stand could hear, it was sweltering. I unbuttoned my coat and undid the top two buttons of my shirt, glad I’d opted out of wearing a necktie.

After all the preaching, praying, singing, and several eulogies from the upper crust of St. George’s political and social world, I grabbed Kate by the arm and led her to a shady spot under a sprawling live oak a few yards from the front steps.

“Dang, Mac, what’s the big hurry?” she said, rubbing her arm just behind the wrist.

I wormed out of my coat and loosened the cuffs of my shirt. “I was about to get heatstroke in there,” I said, rolling the sleeves midway up my arms. “Besides, this is a good spot to see who all’s here. If you notice anybody talking to somebody interesting, let me know.”

We could’ve saved ourselves the trouble. The receiving line looked to be a mile long, snaking around the side of the church as person after person waited to pay their personal respects to the grieving Widow Harper. From where I stood, she seemed to be holding up much better than she had at her niece’s funeral.

Bo Pickron was there, just as he’d been at Maddie’s funeral, standing straight and tall in support of his sister. The only interesting thing Kate or I noticed was when Ben Merritt approached the bereaved Mrs. Harper. The sheriff of Palmetto County conveniently found someone to hold a conversation with as the St. George chief of police took Marilyn Harper’s hand and whispered something in her ear.

After that little show, Kate and I left.