Killer Honeymoon (14 page)

“What’s his name?”

Dr. Glenn hesitated. “I don’t want to cause him any problems if he’s an innocent person.”

Savannah gave her a long, searching look. “Dr. Glenn, if you wouldn’t allow this man into your organization, you must have had a pretty good reason.”

“Actually, I didn’t have a solid reason,” she said. “I just had an instinctive distrust of the man. I rely on my hunches. They’re usually accurate.”

“Mine too. And if you had a sense this man was a problem, that’s enough for me to conduct a discreet investigation of him. Don’t worry. It won’t come back to you or your organization.”

Dr. Glenn thought it over for what seemed like forever to Savannah. Finally she said, “Okay. His name is Hank Jordan.”

“Does he live here on Santa Tesla?”

“Part-time, I believe. If I remember correctly, he said he works as a handyman at one of the motels on the other side of the island.”

“Do you recall which one?”

“No, I’m sorry.”

Savannah stood to leave. Once more she looked around the office and its sparse furnishings. Something told her that this was one charitable organization that spent every available cent on the work at hand, and not on anything frivolous . . . like a comfortable chair for its president.

She glanced up at the picture of the mother sea lion and its baby, and she decided that she liked Dr. June Glenn. A lot.

“Thank you for the good work you’re doing here,” she said. “Some friends of mine gave my husband and me a honeymoon stay at the lighthouse. The next time I go up in the light, I’ll look down on those beautiful beaches and think of you keeping them that way.”

Dr. Glenn stood, too. She smiled and nodded. “And I thank you for the work you’re doing. It was terrible what happened to Amelia, and what happened to William, too, for that matter. I hope you catch the person or persons who did it. Threats and violence are no way to get what you want in this world.”

Savannah sighed, thinking of all the abusers she had arrested when she’d been a police officer. They were individuals who believed that threats and violence were
exactly
the way to get what they wanted.

“I wish everyone lived by your code, Dr. Glenn,” she said. “There’d be a lot less pain and misery in this sad ol’ world of ours.”

S
avannah and Dirk dropped by the “vacation compound,” where the rest of the gang was hanging out, expecting to find them all lounging beside the magnificent pool. They couldn’t imagine anybody resisting that temptation.

But when they got out of the Jaguar and walked down to the pool area, they found no one at all swimming, sunning, or bubbling in the hot tub.

So they headed up to the house.

When they walked into the kitchen, they saw Tammy and Waycross huddled together at the table. Their heads were nearly touching as they laughed and talked. Both were working away at their computers. Sheets of paper were spread out around them—bits and pieces of information that the two of them had collected, relating to their numerous suspects.

“Hey, just look at those younguns,” Savannah whispered to Dirk. “Ain’t they sweet?”

“They are,” Dirk replied. “An airhead and a carrottop. They’re perfect for each other.”

“Shhh,” Savannah said, poking him with her elbow. “You’ve gotta stop calling her that. She’s smarter than three of you and one of me all rolled up together.”

“Three of me and one of you?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m not sure, but I think I was just insulted.”

“Maybe you could locate two more of you and the three of you could decide.”

Tammy spotted them and said, “Hey, you honeymoon lovebirds! What are you doing back here again?”

Dirk walked over to her and tugged on a strand of her hair. “We wanted to find out what you two dug up for us and to give you another shopping list.”

“ ‘Shopping list’?” Waycross asked.

“A list of stuff we want you to find out for us.”

Waycross’s ruddy face lit up with a big smile. “You betcha. This spyin’ on folks and finding out all their dirty laundry’s fun! Of course, we do the same thing back home, too, but we don’t get paid for it.”

Savannah walked up behind him and put her hands on her brother’s shoulders. When did this little freckle-faced, curly-headed kid, who had been so dear to her heart, become a man? She could distinctly recall wrestling with him in Granny’s backyard . . . and winning, too.

Feeling the rounded hardness of his muscles under her palms, she knew such victories were forever in the past. Now she was “Big Sis” in name only.

Dirk walked to the other side of the table and sat down. Savannah joined him.

“So, what’ve y’all got for us there?” Savannah asked them, nodding toward the mess of strewn papers.

Waycross reached for some that were closest to him and shoved them across the table to her. “This stuff is about your designer purse knockoff guy.”

“Not just purses,” Tammy said. “Watches, scarves, wallets, you name it. They were even selling fake perfume that had carcinogens in it! Can you imagine? He’s got an army of fly-by-night vendors who unload tons of it in Los Angeles and New York City. It’s very big business.”

“Yeah, we found Amelia’s report on the Internet and watched it,” Waycross said.

In a sad tone, Tammy added, “She was a really pretty lady. Had a passion for what she did, too. You could see it all over her. She was really enjoying exposing that guy.”

“Yeah, well,” Dirk said, “it might’ve gotten her killed. I’m fairly sure that’d come under the category of ‘Not Worth It.’ ”

“You said yesterday that Xenos is out on bail. Do you know where he’s staying until his trial?” Savannah asked.

“Of course I do.” Tammy reached for another piece of paper and gave it to Savannah. “There’s his home address in Malibu.”

“Malibu, huh?” Dirk said. “Who’d think fake Chanels and Rolexes would sell well enough to buy a place in Malibu?”

“Some people wanna look like caviar on a bologna budget.” Savannah folded the paper and stuck it in her pocket. “They think they’re just buying a purse to impress their girlfriends, but a lot of that money’s going to organized crime. In Xenos’s case, some of it’s finding its way to the Middle East and anti-American terrorist groups.”

“So much for a cute, little, victimless crime,” Dirk said. “Personally, you couldn’t give me one of those knockoff girlie purses.”

“How about a fake Rolex?” Waycross asked him, a grin on his freckled face.

Dirk hesitated, thinking it over. Then he glanced at Savannah and Tammy, who were giving him a don’t-you-dare look. “Nope,” he said. “You couldn’t give me one of those crummy things. No way. I’d rather be dragged across an anthill. Killer ants! Naked!”

“Eeew.”
Tammy wrinkled her nose. “There’s a visual I could’ve done without!”

“What sort of record does this Xenos guy have?” Savannah wanted to know.

Waycross gathered up a stack of papers. “Let’s just say, if we taped these-here papers together, our good buddy would have hisself a rap sheet a lot longer than your arm.”

“Assaults galore,” Tammy said. “He’s been arrested twice for murder, but he never went to trial for those. He’s served a total of seven years.”

“Lovely,” Savannah said. That was just what she wanted, to chase down and question some terrorist-funding thug on her honeymoon.
Or any other time, for that matter,
she thought.

“Maybe we won’t even have to look for him,” she said, thinking aloud. “With any luck, it’ll be this crazy conservationist.”

“Conservationist?” Tammy was all ears.

“That’s right,” Dirk said. “We need to talk to a dude named . . .” He turned to Savannah. “What was it, Van?”

“Hank Jordan. From what I heard, he’s a handyman for a motel on the other side of the island. He’s been involved in animal protection groups that use violence to make their points.”

Tammy started clicking away on her computer. “I love animals as much as the next person,” she said, “and more than some. But I never understood the people who do that awful stuff in the name of compassion. Don’t they see how they’re undermining their own cause?”

“Reckon some folks can’t see the nose stuck right there on the front of their faces,” said Waycross.

Tammy laughed uproariously.

Savannah smiled and shot a look at Dirk, who rolled his eyes.

Waycross had made a halfway-good funny, but it wasn’t all
that
funny. Unless, of course, the Love Bug had nipped you behind the right ear.

“Let’s see who can find ’im first,” Waycross challenged Tammy as his own fingers started to pound away on his keyboard. He grinned across the table at Savannah. “She done taught me all of her tricks, and now it’s gonna come back to bite ’er.”

“You don’t know them all, buddy boy,” Tammy said. “I could still show you a thing or . . . Oh! Wait! I’ve got him!”

“Dang it!” Waycross closed his computer with a snap. “She’s just too good for me.”

Oh, Lord
, Savannah thought.
Do we sound as sappy as that? Heaven forbid.

“Well? Where’s he at?” Savannah asked Tammy.

“The Island Lagoon. Just like you said, on the other side of the island. Although, I’m looking at a picture of it here on a travel advisory site, and I don’t see an oversized mud puddle, let alone a lagoon.”

Waycross leaned across her shoulder and stared at her screen. “There it is.”

“Where?”

“In the logo. It’s one of the
O
’s.”

Tammy squinted at the screen. “That’s a pretty bad logo.”

Waycross nodded. “And a pretty bad motel, too. Me and Tammy could go check it out for you, if you want us to.”

“Why, Brother Waycross,” Savannah said, her drawl thick, “are you suggesting that you’d like to take my pretty young assistant to a seedy motel?”

Instantly Waycross turned as red as his curls. “No! Of course not! I’d never take Miss Tammy here to no nasty motel! I mean, I wouldn’t take her to . . . I mean . . . shoot. You know what I mean.”

Tammy reached over and patted him on the shoulder. “I know exactly what you mean, and so do they. Don’t let them tease you. Once they get started, they don’t know when to quit.”

“Tell me about it! You oughta growed up having her for a big sister! It was awful! She was bossy and kept after me all the time to do right. She was worse than Granny!”

“You got me back, putting that frog in my underwear drawer.”

He snickered. “Yeah. That was a good ’un. It was worth that trip behind the henhouse with Granny and her hickory switch.”

They heard the sound of voices coming from the living-room area, and footsteps. Ryan and John had returned.

They walked into the kitchen, greeted all sitting at the table, then raided the refrigerator.

John began assembling ingredients from the cupboard and refrigerator, including a cucumber, some mint, ginger ale, and a bottle of some sort of alcohol from the bar. “Anyone for a Pimm’s?” he offered.

“Is it booze?” Tammy asked.

He smiled. “Most assuredly.”

“Then no. We’re working,” she replied with utmost seriousness.

“So you teetotalers won’t go for a beer either?” Ryan asked as he pulled one out for himself.

“No way. Dulls the senses,” Tammy said. “But I’ll take one of those herbal teas. They have ginseng. It helps me think clearly.”

“By all means, get her two,” Dirk whispered, low enough for only Savannah to hear.

Savannah kicked him under the table.

Ryan reached inside the refrigerator for the bottle of tea. “You got it, Tammy. Anybody else?”

“A Coke for me,” Waycross said. “Make it a Dr Pepper, if you’ve got one handy.”

Still bent over, his head inside the refrigerator, Ryan looked around the door, bewildered. “Say what?”

Savannah translated. “Down where we come from, ‘Coke’ is sorta a generic term for all soft drinks. You gotta specify which one you want.”

“O-o-o-kay.”
Ryan closed the door. “I’m fairly certain that I speak better Mandarin than I do Southern. I feel like I need one of those pocket translators when I’m with the Reid clan.”

Ryan distributed the beverages, then popped his beer and took a long swig.

“Since when do you drink beer?” Savannah asked, watching him. “You’re more of a wine-sorta guy.”

Ryan pointed to Dirk. “Your hubby there wore off on me.”

Dirk grinned and shrugged. “What can I say? It was that hot day him and me were fixin’ the faucet on the back of your house. I offered him one, and that’s all it took.”

John walked up with his drink—an unusual-looking cocktail, with a spear of cucumber for a stirrer.

“What the heck is that?” Savannah asked.

“ ’Tis a Pimm’s, love. Would you like to try it?”

“She’s working,” Tammy interjected, just as Savannah had held out her hand to John.

Savannah pulled it back. “I guess not. I’m afraid I may have overtrained my assistant here.”

“Well,
I’m
not working, and neither is his nibs there.” John nodded toward Ryan as he pulled up a chair and sat down at the table. “Though we certainly gave it the old heave-ho.”

Everyone looked to Ryan for clarification. “We checked around, like you asked, and found that your friend William Northrop hasn’t hired any protection of any kind. At least not for the past year. So we asked him if he wanted to hire us as bodyguards. It seemed like a reasonable proposition, considering all that’s gone on around him lately.”

“Wait a minute . . . you two actually went to see Northrop?” Savannah said, more than a little surprised.

“Knocked him up about half eleven,” John said.

Again, they looked to Ryan.

“Dropped by his house at eleven-thirty. Presented our case to him. He said, ‘No,’ in no uncertain terms.”

“Actually,” John said, “a few of the terms he used when addressing us were distinctly rude.”

Dirk cleared his throat. “I didn’t know you boys were that hard up for work. Things a little lean in the bodyguard biz right now?”

“Not at all,” John replied. “We just wanted to get inside—infiltrate, if you will—and find out whatever we could about him.”

“It’s just as well,” Ryan said. “I didn’t feel so great about the plan anyway. I’ve never offered to protect someone with the express purpose of spying on him.”

“True,” Savannah said. “I’m pretty sure that’s on the list of ‘Bodyguard No-Nos.’ Don’t spy on your client and try to collect damning evidence against him.”

“Here,” Tammy said, “I’ve got directions for you to the motel where that weirdo is.”

“What motel?” Ryan asked.

John set down his Pimm’s. “What weirdo?”

“A dude on the other side of the island,” Dirk replied, “who thinks it’s okay to bomb laboratories. Stuff like that.”

“We’re headed over to rattle his cage a bit,” Savannah told them.

“You want some backup?” Ryan asked.

“I don’t think he’s
that
weird, but thanks for the offer,” Savannah replied.

She heard the sound of shuffling, scurrying feet behind her and turned, knowing whose footsteps it was. That was a beloved sound—one she’d known since childhood.

“Granny,” she said as her grandmother walked into the kitchen, shopping bags in each arm. “I thought you were in one of those cottages taking a nap.”

In an instant, Ryan and John slid their alcoholic beverages beneath the edge of the table. Gran was hell on “demon rum.” She felt pretty much the same way about beer, wine, margaritas, and daiquiris—even though she had been known to order a Shirley Temple served in a pineapple, with a little paper umbrella, when she was out of town. She would splurge and order one of those concoctions when she wasn’t in any danger of being spotted by her minister’s wife.

Well trained by Gran and Savannah, respectively, Waycross and Dirk jumped up to relieve Gran of her burden. They set the sacks on the counter and returned to the table.

Immediately Gran dug in and started taking out grocery items and putting them in the refrigerator and inside the cupboards. “Can you believe,” she said indignantly, “that there’s nary a box o’ grits on this entire island? I know, ’cause I had that taxi driver take me to all six grocery stores before I finally gave up the search.”