Matecumbe (4 page)

“Hi, there. Can I sit with you and buy us both some coffee?” he asked.

As soon as Melissa answered quickly in the affirmative, she smiled, almost blushing. And although Joe’s sudden appearance came too close on the heels of thoughts she did not yet want to share with him, Melissa was immediately turned on by his presence.

In the daylight, he looked to be a slightly different person. Still handsome, with the same bedroom eyes, he seemed more normal without his “Smoky” hat. He was once again wearing a policeman’s uniform, but Melissa could see his hair now, a curly brown with light strands of gray on the sideburns. He seemed more vigorous and less stilted than he had last night. She wondered what he would be like when not on duty, as if any policeman, married to the structure and discipline of his job, could ever be away from duty.

Melissa felt a strange comfort in sharing her table with this powerfullooking man whose smile radiated all the good things that a man could be. Seeing him again caused her whole body to glow. It was like walking into a warm room after an outdoor stroll on an icy evening.

Melissa told him that she felt just fine now and was hoping she could put last night behind her and complete her plans to stay in Islamorada for a week of sun and relaxation.

“How long will it take them to fix the pier?” she began.

“When I talked to Larry Basson, the owner of the Seascaper, early this morning,” Joe related, “he told me he intended to hire a crew as soon as possible. He said he’d pay them whatever it takes to get the pier fixed in time for January and February, the heart of the winter season. It’ll cost plenty to repair it in just two or three weeks, but the pier is one of the reasons that the Seascaper is so popular.”

“I guess,” Melissa informed, “that you know already what the waitress told me. The power outage last night knocked out the lights on the pier, and that’s why the boat crashed into it.”

“Oh, yes, and the lack of lights might result in an insurance payment delay for the Seascaper. Seems there’s some question as to whether the electric company has some liability. But Basson said he’ll fix the pier anyway and worry about insurance later.”

Melissa felt relieved that “her” pier would once again be in operation, even though she wouldn’t be able to walk on it any more during her current vacation.

Joe had already begun his second cup of coffee before he hit Melissa with the big news of the morning.

“We found out that the two guys on that boat were from Philadelphia, just like you,” he stated, nonchalantly, without further comment. Joe paused for another sip just then, as if he were waiting to assess the truthfulness of Melissa’s immediate reaction.

“What? . . . Where in Philadelphia? . . . What neighborhood are they from?”

“Both of them lived in the same building on Pine Street. I think the number was seventeen hundred and something. Is that anywhere near you?”

“No, not really. I live in a section called Logan. Pine Street is in downtown Philadelphia, what the natives call Center City. What were the names of those two men?”

“Baron Marshall and Jayson Harris,” Joe recited, “two guys with police records for dealing in drugs. Marshall was thirty-eight years old, and Harris was thirty-two.

“I imagine,” Joe continued, “that I would be derelict in my duty if I didn’t ask you if you knew either of them.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Well,” Joe went on, seemingly embarrassed now, “the Monroe County detective that I talked to this morning speculated that you might have been waiting for them on the pier, that you were out there to signal them that it was safe to dock. And perhaps the three of you intended to load the bales of marijuana into your car.”

“Are you serious? That rental car of mine is a hatchback. It doesn’t have a trunk. It wouldn’t even hold one bale of marijuana. And do I look like the type of woman,” Melissa responded, raising her voice slightly, her eyes narrowing, “who would be involved with drugs? Of course I don’t know those men. I never heard of either of them.”

“Now just calm down, Miss Tomlinson. I certainly don’t have any personal belief that you knew the two men. My gut feeling is that you were not a part of their operation, and I gave that opinion to the detective. Also, from the way you reacted just now, my law enforcement experience tells me I’m right—you didn’t know the two men.”

Shaken slightly, Melissa felt she was on the verge of being terribly upset. But she knew that she would have difficulty complaining as strongly as she may have desired. Joe’s apologetic, sincere little speech in her defense couldn’t be countered with too wild an outburst. She wondered, though, if she could ever achieve friendship with a man whose suspicious nature probably churned continually for twenty-four hours of every living day. Maybe her aversion to policemen was justified after all.

Melissa still wanted to defend herself, however, and she soon began to spew forth words for the sake of talking. Emotional release was replacing all traces of calm.

“First of all, don’t call me ‘Miss Tomlinson.’ I dislike that as much as being called ‘Hon’ or ‘Babe.’ Since I’m no longer married, you can’t really call me ‘Mrs. Tomlinson,’ so I’d appreciate a simple ‘Melissa.’ And I guess I should be thankful for your vote of confidence. I just wish I could prove to you somehow that I didn’t know those two men.”

After Joe made several additional reassuring remarks, Melissa seemed to regain her composure. She even contemplated, ever so daringly, that perhaps she should utter a tiny lie and tell Joe that she really did know the two men—just to be ornery—to see if he could find it in his heart to punish her.

“If naughty Melissa were ever to act like a bad girl,” she whispered to her conscience, “Joe would be one of the few men she’d let give her the spanking she deserved.”

“I’m here in Islamorada to try to relax this week, Joe,” she told him. “But instead of being able to forget all about my divorce, I seem to be adding to my list of things to worry about. One part of me now is begging to get on a plane for Philadelphia as soon as possible.”

“That’s not necessary at all, Melissa,” Joe responded, reaching to pay for both their checks with one of his credit cards. “Look, I’m satisfied that you’re as uninvolved with the two dead men as you say you are. I’m willing to put up a ‘Case Closed’ sign as far as you’re concerned. Just like with all the other tourists who come to Islamorada, my only concern now is that you enjoy yourself and tell your friends about what a great place this is to have a vacation. If you want, I’ll walk out of your life right now. But before you say ‘that’s a good idea,’ I do feel somewhat guilty about how upset you got when I asked you if you had known the two dead men.

“So,” Joe concluded, and this time it was his turn to fight back a blush, “would you like to have dinner with me tonight? Aside from feeling I owe you something for getting your vacation off to a bad start, I’ve found I really do enjoy your company. And we won’t talk business at all—I promise. We’ll just be two unattached people having a fun evening together.”

Unhesitatingly, Melissa agreed.

For the remainder of the day, while she sunned herself by the freshwater pool, swam a few laps in the saltwater pool, and fed bait-sized shrimp to the friendly egret, she thought of nothing but her upcoming date with “Joe The Cop,” as she referred to him inwardly. Her overall impressions of Joe were positive. She knew, though, that it often took time, much time, before she could be sure that a prospective love interest didn’t have a Jekyll and Hyde personality.

As she continued to contemplate her date, Melissa searched her memory but couldn’t recall, even in high school, ever having gone out with a guy who had so many muscles.

“I think I’ve succeeded in getting what I was fantasizing about this morning,” she told herself. “I just wish I could forget completely about that dreadful boat accident. But I can’t help thinking that he just wants to keep an eye on me, to see if I’ll slip and say something that’ll lead him to think I knew the two dead drug dealers.

“However,” Melissa concluded, as she ended her day in the sun and began to shower and prepare for the date, “I’ll give big, handsome Joe the benefit of the doubt. Who knows? We may eventually live happily ever after—but it would have to be in a place somewhere other than Islamorada,” she daydreamed, once again. “Though this is a great place to visit, it’s much too far south of my professional ambitions.”

While slipping into her lacy camisole, Melissa reasoned that if Joe weren’t so attractive, or if he were a woman detective, she’d probably check out of her room at the Seascaper right away and drive straight to the airport in Miami.

Instead she looked admiringly at her reflection in the mirror. Her slight new sunburn glowed on her shoulders and neck, contrasting with the white sheerness of her camisole.

“Now I know what all of those other women mean,” she reflected, “when they say they made the biggest mistakes of their lives by letting their brains follow their sex organs.

“Melissa the snob,” she said, while looking in the bathroom mirror and giving herself a talking-to, “meet Melissa the common, average, everyday, boring woman.”

Shortly after the brunch came the first big dinner date. And since her romantic experiences had been limited to only a handful of suitors, Mary Ann feared that she wouldn’t remember how to act while being courted by an eligible man. These feelings of insecurity were further compounded by her embarrassment that Paul’s had been the wallet she had found in the church. Would he possibly be interested in her if he knew that she had almost stooped to stealing? She had, almost. But in the end she did the right thing and returned the wallet. There was nothing to be ashamed of.

She congratulated herself for having the foresight to have one of her teeth pulled a week earlier. The dentist wanted to save the tooth, but that procedure would have cost Mary Ann more than a week’s salary. Her mouth felt fine now, and since the painful tooth had been far back in her mouth, no gap would be visible when she smiled.

Looking pert and radiant in her navy blue suit and yellow blouse, Mary Ann noticed that throughout their dinner, Paul Reynolds seemed to be staring at her in an approving manner.

Mary Ann believed that she was still thin enough to attract men. Though admittedly not as tall as she’d like to be, Mary Ann knew that her long, dark, curly hair seemed to add a few inches to her five-foot-two-inch frame.

Almost all the men she had ever dated had complimented her on her cute face. The high cheekbones prompted her ex-husband to nickname her “Cherokee.”

Mary Ann was hoping that Paul would be unlike the last two men in her life, who showed only a short-lived interest in her. Both of these “prospects” had, no doubt, been chased away by the relationship restrictions of raising four young girls.

Paul, at five-foot-eleven-inches, was the tallest man she’d ever dated. He managed a local bank branch, was a widower ten years older than Mary Ann, and had no children.

Mary Ann had never before dined at a fancy French restaurant, and she had never tasted champagne. She decided afterwards that she liked both.

She couldn’t help, though, equating the high prices on the restaurant’s menu with the hard goods from her household budget. The cost of their dinner entrées would have gone a long way toward the purchase of two more beds for the girls. Mary Ann, too, was tired of sleeping every night on the cloth strips of a folding beach chair.

Eating on real china and using heavy silverware was also a treat. The plastic-like plates at home had only one virtue—they were unbreakable.

Mary Ann’s attraction to Paul was increasing, and she enjoyed being alone with him during dinner. He seemed genuinely interested in her daily routine and life with the girls. Speaking about them so much made something inside of her miss their company.

Mary Ann remembered her last family dinner—at a restaurant outside Philadelphia. She had taken the girls to a Japanese steak house almost a year ago, courtesy of a radio station contest she had won. The girls all laughed when the Japanese cook, in the midst of his knife-flipping performance, took an egg out of his pocket and rolled it on the table.

“Japanese egg roll,” the cook smiled.

At the end of Mary Ann’s first evening with Paul, as she kissed him good night on the steps of her apartment, she became certain of at least one aspect of this advancing relationship.

Thinking about Paul’s easy smile, wavy hair and sparkling blue eyes, Mary Ann admitted to herself that she was falling hard for this new man in her life. His kiss sparked a part of her she thought she had long since buried.

“I may not be in love yet,” she analyzed, “but I’m definitely in lust.”

The light, pinkish sunburn covering her cheeks created a strong measure of radiance on Melissa’s face. Even the most expensive of makeup preparations could never produce an equivalent glow.

Fluffy bangs, dangling earrings, and a touch of lipstick all added to her breezy, somewhat racy look.

She was also hoping to exude an air of confidence spiced with a pinch of youthful bearing—neither of which could be derived from cosmetics.