Hurricane Bay (33 page)

They left the office and headed out to the reception area. “I dislike sounding clichéd, Dane, but you're not planning any vacations or anything, are you?” Hector asked.

“Am I planning on leaving town? Definitely not. But I sure as hell hope you're looking for Andy Latham, not wasting time suspecting me.”

“We are. And I assume you'll be doing the same. In town, of course.”

“Yes.”

“I'm going to need a lot more against Andy Latham to hold him, much less to get the D.A.'s office to put together a sound case. So far…well, I hope you can give me more than the fact that you don't like him and his stepdaughter hated him. And that he dumped dead fish on your property, and people
think
they saw him sneaking around.”

“He may have been hanging around the strip club where one of the other girls who was killed worked. Where she was working the night before she disappeared.”

Hector stopped in the hallway, staring at him again. “And you have found this out…how?”

“One of the girls thinks she may have seen him.”

Hector was still staring at him. “I spent days at that strip club.”

“You had nothing to give the girls. I brought in pictures. And you know as well as I do that girls practicing prostitution on the side aren't going to talk to the police.”

As they were standing there in the hallway, Dane's cell phone began to ring. He ignored it for a moment, staring at Hector.

“Answer it.”

He did. It was Jorge, and he was excited.

“Marisa says she has definitely seen Andy Latham at the club.”

Hector was still watching him, and Dane was pretty sure he had been able to hear Jorge's words.

“Thanks, Jorge.”

“What now?” Jorge asked.

He winced. “Marisa may be asked to testify.”

“She will have to go to court?” Jorge sounded alarmed.

“She's legal, right?”

“Yes.”

“Then there's no problem, Jorge.”

“I pray that you are right.”

Jorge hung up. His last words sounded as if he felt he had somehow been betrayed. Unfortunately there was no way for Dane to call him back and reassure him.

“You heard?” Dane asked Hector.

Hector nodded.

“Gary Hansen put out an APB on Latham last night.”

Hector arched a brow. “That's good. But now the APB will have to be amended. He'll be wanted on suspicion of murder.”

They walked out to the reception room. Larry, Nate and Kelsey were there. Kelsey's red, tearstained eyes widened at the sight of him. Larry was ashen. His eyes were red-rimmed as well.

“It's Sheila,” Larry said. “Oh, God. It's really Sheila. I had hoped…knowing Sheila…I just kept believing that she'd walk back in, irritated that we were so worried. That she would say she had just gone off to Paris or Rome…or, hell, Tampa. But it's Sheila….”

He was going to break down again. Kelsey put an arm around him.

Larry covered his face with his hands.

Hector stood by him, his features both sympathetic and resolute. He was a homicide detective, a man who had been the bearer of such news before.

“Thank you very much for coming down. You were called in as the closest to kin we could find. I'm sorry, very sorry. And I assure you, we are doing everything we can to catch the killer.”

Larry nodded, getting a grip on himself.

“We're free to go?” Nate asked.

“Of course. I'll know where to find you when I need to ask more questions.”

“We all have cell phones,” Nate said.

Hector stared at Dane. “We'll catch him.”

“You need to find Latham.”

“Oh, we will.” Hector was still staring at him. He turned and walked back toward the autopsy rooms.

“Let's get back,” Nate told him.

“I need a drink,” Larry murmured.

“We'll get Cindy…break it to her and go to the Sea Shanty. We'll be together.”

The three of them rose.

“Kelsey,” Dane said, “drive with me.”

She looked at the other two, worried.

“Drive with me,” Dane repeated.

“Go with him,” Nate told her. “Larry and I are all right. We'll pick up Cindy and meet you at the Sea Shanty.”

“All right,” Kelsey murmured.

As they stepped out to the parking lot, the sky was overcast. “Looks like we're in for some weather,” Nate said.

But none of them cared about the weather anymore, even when it started to spit and sprinkle as they parted, walking to their cars.

“We'll be right there,” Kelsey called as the two men walked off. “They look like a pair of lost puppies,” she said to Dane.

“And you…you're all right?”

She gazed at him ruefully. “No. But I'm not going to fall apart. I'm too busy being angry at myself right now.”

“Trust me,” he said. “Everyone has regrets.”

Help me, Dane.

As they drove, silent tears trickled down Kelsey's cheeks. She wiped them away angrily. “There are people who will say she was asking for it. They'll never know what a horrible childhood she had, that she was always running. She was always trying to escape, always trying to get somewhere.”

“Yes,” Dane said softly.

She stared at him suddenly. “My God! You don't know.”

He almost veered off the road. “Know what?”

“About Cindy.”

“What about Cindy?”

“They're picking her up from the hospital. They thought they heard someone in the yard again last night, and all started running around. From what Nate told me, she ran right into one of the storm shutters and knocked herself out.”

“They thought they heard someone and started running around outside again?” he said with distress.

“I guess Nate went out one way, and Larry and Cindy went out the other, trying to catch whoever it was.”

“They should have kept still and called Gary Hansen,” Dane said, dismayed. “They might have caught him.”

“So you think someone really was out there—even though the police had been by already?”

“I don't just think it was someone, I think it was Andy Latham,” he told her.

“But if it's Andy…Sheila is dead.”

“Hector just made the same point.”

“So…?”

“Dammit, Kelsey, don't you see? You're in danger.”

“Why me?”

“Who the hell knows?” he asked her. “Because you went after him. Because you were her friend. Because he's psychotic. Perhaps because he thinks she might have said something to you. I don't know.” He paused and looked at her. “I don't know, but you're staying with me and close to me. All right?”

She didn't look his way. She was staring out the window. She had to be afraid.

She had seen Sheila's morgue photo.

“Kelsey?”

“Yes, of course, I'll stay with you.”

“We have a bit of a detour to make. It will only take a few minutes.”

She glanced at him at last.

He reached in his pocket and handed her his cell phone. “Call Jorge. Tell him we're on our way to the gas station to meet him. I need to see Marisa.”

She frowned but did as he asked.

 

They arrived at the Sea Shanty later than the others because of the “detour” they had taken. They had met Jorge, who was upset about Sheila but understood Dane's need to see Marisa.

They had driven to the neat little house on the outskirts of town, and she had met the young Latina stripper, who was strangely shy, incredibly sweet, and stalwart despite her fear of the authorities when Dane explained that it was imperative for her to contact Hector Hernandez and explain to him that she had seen Andy Latham at the club.

Jorge listened quietly the whole time. When Dane had finished, the girl rose and told Jorge that she wanted to go right away. She had a friend at the house, so she could leave. She wasn't due at work until later.

Kelsey still didn't entirely understand what had been happening.

“Why is she afraid to go to the police?”

“Her son was just smuggled in from Cuba.”

“But…he's her son. Won't the immigration laws protect him? Does he have a father back in Cuba, or family that will fight for him?”

Dane shook his head. “No.”

“Then I'm sure he'll be all right.”

Dane looked at her, and she knew that he didn't want to betray a confidence, even to her. And then she understood.

Jorge Marti had smuggled the boy in.

“Oh,” she said softly. She didn't intend to make Dane say more. But she felt a strange warmth inside. She was proud of Jorge. The world could be awful. What had happened to Sheila was beyond awful.

But there were wonderful people in the world, as well.

“They'll have reached the Sea Shanty before us,” Dane said. “Let's just say we stopped for gas.”

“Sure.”

The others were indeed there. Cindy hopped up and hugged Kelsey tightly, then did the same to Dane. They didn't speak about Sheila right away, and Kelsey quickly asked her how she was.

Cindy was dismissive of her own injury and as distraught as the others about Sheila. Kelsey saw, when they took their seats at the table, that she had finished her first beer and was pouring her second.

Kelsey, at the end of the table, frowned with concern as she watched her. “You just had a major crack on the head. Should you be drinking like that?”

“I don't know any other way to drink,” Cindy said, trying to speak lightly.

“Cindy…”

“I didn't take any of the pain medication they sent home with me. I'd rather douse myself with beer.”

“But if you have a concussion…”

“I'm fine,” Cindy insisted. “I was fine last night, but they wanted me to stay for observation. They observed me. I'm fine. I don't even have a knot on my head anymore.”

“You're sure you hit the hurricane shutter?” Kelsey asked.

“What else? I was running around barefoot like an idiot.” She paused and actually smiled. “Kelsey, it was just a comedy of errors. Nate went out the back. In beautiful blue boxers, I'll have you know. Larry was following me—in the buff, except for a sheet. It all happened so fast. We wanted to catch the bastard. Larry tripped on his sheet, on the way out. He was cute as could be,” she said, trying to make Larry smile. She glanced at him affectionately where he was seated at the rough wood table beside her. “Naked as a jay, tummy down on the sheet. Great butt, Larry. Just thought you should know. Anyway, stupid me, I kept going, I was running, and…pow, I went down.”

“You didn't see the hurricane shutter?” Kelsey asked.

“If I'd seen it, I wouldn't have slammed into it.”

Dane, next to Kelsey, leaned forward. “I think she's trying to find out if you're certain that you were hit by the hurricane shutter.”

“Well, what else could it have been?” Cindy asked.

Dane looked at Nate and Larry.

Nate shrugged. “I found her under the shutter.”

Larry seemed to emerge from his fog enough to join the conversation. “Nate had just reached her when I managed to wrap the sheet around me again and get out there, but yes, the hurricane shutter was right there.”

“And had anyone tried to jimmy the lock?” Dane asked.

Nate and Larry looked at each other.

“I don't know,” Nate admitted.

“You didn't call Gary Hansen's office?” Dane said.

“Shit, we called an ambulance. We were worried about Cindy. We went into the hospital with her.”

“And later…?”

“Later we were half dead, and we fell asleep…and then we got the call about Sheila,” Nate said.

“But…you still haven't called the cops to check the yard?”

“Jesus Christ, Dane!” Larry exploded. “We just found out that Sheila is dead.”

“Murdered,” Nate said, staring at his beer.

Dane leaned forward. “And I intend to see that her murderer is caught,” he said angrily.

“All of you, stop it,” Kelsey protested.

“Dane, call the cops now—they'll go out and look around. Maybe Gary can even post a man at the duplex.”

“Yeah, he will. The police are on the lookout for Latham,” Dane said. “Excuse me while I make that call.”