Shark River

6

W e sat, sipping our drinks, and took care of the uneasy formalities of strangers newly met. I listened to her thank me over and over again, and deflected her apologies for stopping by when it was so late.

Then we both began to relax a little as our exchanges became more personal and personable, her recounting what had happened that afternoon, the way she felt when she first saw the men in ski masks, me not saying much. When I could, I asked questions. I was interested in who she was, why the kidnappers had targeted her.

I sat and listened, then, as the diplomat’s daughter told me, “My father was in D.C. for, what? Like sixteen years and spent eight working in the basement of the White House, part of the staff, so I got to know three presidents pretty well. Two of the three, you couldn’t ask to meet nicer men. I mean, really cool guys. The kind you’d trust for a father or a grandfather. The third one, though, he was a pompous asshole.”

“Your father worked for all of them?” I’d switched off the lamp and sat, alternately, looking at the water, then at her. Lindsey Harrington’s blond hair looked satin white in the peripheral light, her face, delicate, pale, very young. The moon, low on the horizon, created a corridor of color on the water, silver and brass.

“No, just two of the three. He did, like, political analysis stuff, administrative stuff. I’ve never really been sure. The way he puts it is, picture the White House as a major corporation-which it is-so my dad would be like the equivalent of a department head in one of the smaller departments. He does it ’cause he loves it. It’s not because he needs the money, that’s for sure.”

I watched the girl sipping at her beer, combing bangs back with nervous fingers while she told me about Hal Harrington. She explained that, back when her father was still in his late twenties, he’d gotten a job with one of the early computer companies as an unskilled laborer. He’d done the grunt work, unloading boxes, muling bundles of electrical conduit and parts. In his spare time, though, he’d studied the whole field, the way it was headed, liked what he saw and began to invest right there on the ground floor. Not only that, he invented what Lindsey described as a “little doohickey,” a plastic sleeve that was a docking device for computer chips.

She told me, “Dad got the thing patented, and every computer company in the world uses it, so he was, like, a multimillionaire before he was twenty-five. Then, somehow, he got interested in politics, began to finance certain candidates, and ended up working in the basement of the White House for no salary. He moved me to D.C. with him. We had this really awesome suite at the Willard Hotel, and I attended this, like, really hotshit private school, Sidwell Friends, and hung out at 1600 Pennsylvania, when I could, which is how I got to be friends with all those presidents. Except for one of them, who was a creep, a genuine self-important dick, and his wife was even worse. This one time, we were in the state dining room, which is by the colored rooms, and my boyfriend-”

I interrupted. “Colored rooms?”

“Yeah, near the South Portico, the rooms are named after colors-Red, Green, Blue, Vermeil. It really is a cool place. Particularly if you are, like, totally into history, which my father is, so he made me study it, which could be a drag, but sometimes I actually enjoyed it. Anyway, we were at this boring-as-hell dinner, and my boyfriend went looking for the head. He opens a door by the colored rooms and catches the First Lady sneaking a cigarette. She, like, totally lost it, was screaming, swearing; almost had him arrested.

“Her famous brat younger sister was right there; witnessed the whole thing. And her famous neurotic poodle. Spend any time at all around the White House, and the first thing you learn is don’t judge anyone by their politics. As my father likes to say, ‘D.C. is the only place in the world that has assholes on both sides of the crack.’ ”

We were sitting at a white wicker table, drinks in hand, looking at a cusp of waning moon that was encircled by rainbow colors, the upper stratosphere showing ice crystals. She had her keys and cell phone before her on the glass top.

These days, it’s impossible for me to look at a frail moon without feeling wistful and a little lonely. It reminds me of a long-gone friend.

It was nearly 1:00 A.M. I’d been listening to her talk for an hour, but was relaxed and enjoying it. She was one of the troubled ones, a person driven by family demons, but still cognitive and aware, and she had a self-deprecating sense of humor that I liked. Remembering that Tomlinson had mentioned she’d had a substance abuse problem, I’d amended my offer of a beer, saying maybe she’d prefer water or a Coke? But no, beer was just what she needed, she said, and with a rueful laugh added, “I’m a crack addict, not an alcoholic.”

I said, “There’s a difference?”

“Oh yeah. No one’s ever tried to steal a vase out of the West Wing to trade for beer.”

I couldn’t get used to her voice. She looked twenty-two, twenty-three-I really can’t tell ages anymore-but she sounded sixteen or younger. It didn’t mesh with consistent patterns of articulate thought and her world-weariness. She had a way of sighing, of looking off into space, that suggested emotional scarring and a loss of resolve or of confidence that originated in the marrow.

What surprised me most about Lindsey Harrington, though, was this: I liked her. Liked her despite her age and mall-girl vocabulary.

Initially, she’d hoisted a couple of red flags by saying, “I noticed you the day you got here, the first day you showed up on the island. You and that sweet old hippie with the really kind eyes. But you’re the one who really caught my attention. It’s not just that you’re so big. Kind of wide and rangy and bearlike. It was, like, I don’t know, something about your face and those wire glasses. Like if I was going to choose an ideal professor? You’d be the model. Real bookish and safe, but with enough testosterone flowing through that body to make it interesting.”

Transparently ingratiating, I thought at first. Not just in speech, but in body language. Sitting there in the weak light, braless in her thin T-shirt, breasts swinging and showing cleavage when she leaned toward me to laugh or lift her glass, nothing else on but running shorts, looking into my eyes with her sad, rich-girl face, not caring what I saw.

When strangers who happen to be female are so obviously demonstrative, I’m quick to retreat.

But, no, that’s the way the girl was, apparently. She spoke spontaneously, no editing whatsoever. Had nothing to hide, so nothing to fear. Same with her appearance. The rainforest humidity had made her hair wild as a lion’s, ribbed and curled, but she’d done nothing to try and contain it.

At one point, she said, “At the White House, some of the staff would go fucking nuts when I refused to wear makeup or a bra, any of that crap. Lipstick’s the only thing I like because it comes in flavors. To this day, you mention my name to the basement drones and they’ll roll their eyes. It got so I felt like I wasn’t welcome anymore, so I stopped going. Then my dad got assigned to foreign service, and that’s the last time we lived together. That was six years ago, so I was…” She had to think about it. “Sixteen or seventeen.”

I asked, “Are you still close?”

She chuckled, toying with the cell phone. “We were never close. My father’s one of the world’s greatest men, but the only time he ever shows, like, real emotion or, you know, like, concern, it’s when I do something that he thinks is outrageous. The men I choose to sleep with, some of the causes I support, it drives him crazy. Know why I think it is, Doc?”

I said to her, “The reason you choose to do outrageous things? As of now, I’ve got a pretty good guess, but you tell me.”

“What I think it is? It’s, like, I’ve spent so much of my life having to associate with fucking fakes and political con artists that I’ve become, like, militantly natural. I want to live in a mountain cabin and grow my own tomatoes and curl up with my dogs by the fire. I want to walk around naked and take showers in the rain. If I never see another man wearing hair spray and a vote-for-me smile, it’ll be just fine with me.” She looked at me through the light for a moment before she added, “Know what my new motto is? Give me a man who prefers blow jobs to blow dryers. Catchy, huh?”

Another warning flag-and unexpected, despite the gradual and increasing hand and eye contact between the two of us. She was a patter and a toucher. I was surprised that I’d misjudged her intent.

I stood and said, “I think I’ll get another beer. You ready?”

Her eyes hadn’t wavered from mine. “Yeah. I’m ready. That was my point. But somehow I just offended you.”

“Nope. Just surprised. And thirsty.”

I came back with a Diet Coke but didn’t sit. I said to her, “I think it’s late, and it’s been a very tough day for both of us, so it’s time you headed home. Grab your stuff, and I’ll walk you back.”

She reached and took my right wrist in her hand, stopping me, swinging hair out of her face, eyes tilted upward, looking out from beneath pale eyebrows, “Mind if we spend the next couple of minutes talking like adults?”

I said, “That’s what we were doing until just a moment ago, Lindsey. I’m curious. I was enjoying the conversation. You’ve got a good brain; a quirky, funny sense of humor. Why’d you decide to make such an obvious pass? Is it some kind of test?”

She was still holding my wrist. “I’m too obvious? Maybe you don’t like it when the woman is the aggressor. Some men don’t. Is that the problem, Doc? Or maybe you’re hung up on the age thing.”

“Nope. The body ages a hell of a lot faster than the brain, so it’s neither one. Problem is, we don’t know each other and we don’t have a relationship. So there’s nothing to be aggressive about.”

She nodded and said, “Ahh-h-h-h,” releasing my hand. “The moral, prudish type. I don’t meet many of you.”

“Lindsey, my friend, suddenly, we’re both doing a very bad job of reading one another. And we were getting along so well.”

“So maybe you just don’t find me attractive.”

“Let’s see, you’re five-seven, five-eight, great body, great face. So what’s not to find attractive? I’ll tell you the problem if you want.”

She sat back and gave a pouty sigh. “I don’t have anything else to do. Go ahead.”

“Okay, it’s simple. When I meet a man or woman whose behavior crosses normal boundaries, it scares me a little. I start asking myself, Why? So what I do is stop, take a step back and analyze. Slightly more than six hours ago, a man in a ski mask took a shot at a woman who was standing right beside you. Could be he was taking a shot at you; who knows? Maybe you’re still in shock. Maybe you feel like you owe me something. After what you went through this evening, there are so many valid reasons for you to be vulnerable, fragile, and not yourself that I’m not going to risk imposing.”

“Imposing on me. Right. ”

“Sorry, but it’s the truth. Not for your benefit, it’s for mine. I’ve got rules and I try to follow them. I need to be selfish that way.” I thought for a moment, and took a sip of Diet Coke before I added, “My conscience has more than its share of scars, Lindsey. It can’t tolerate many more. I like you. You’ve made me smile a couple of times. But I’m not interested. Not now. Probably not ever. And do us both a favor-don’t push it, please.”

She sat in her chair, looking out through the screen, drink in hand. She turned her head toward me briefly, and in her little-girl voice said, “You’re serious. You really are.”

“Yeah, I’m afraid I am. I’m flattered. You’ve got all the great genetics, all the soft and interesting parts in the right places. I look at you sitting there, your hair, the way you look in that white shirt, and it’s… well, let’s just say that you have an impact. The way you look, I mean. I can feel it in my stomach.”

“A Boy Scout,” she said. “Jesus Christ.”

“I’m no Boy Scout. Believe me. Anything but.”

Once again she reached out and touched her fingers to the back of my hand. I’d already noticed that her nails were short, no polish. “It’s not like I’m bragging, but I’ve never had any guy say no to me in my life. Ever.”

“I don’t doubt that for a moment.”

“Want me to tell you what the attraction is? To you, I mean. And you’ve absolutely fucked it up, by the way. You have zero chance as of now.”

“Sorry to hear that, but I’m still interested. Why?”

I could feel her fingernails moving over my skin, but then they stopped and clawed down, her brief punishment. “This afternoon, when we’d finished our run, Gale and me, out there on the dock, uh, I’ve had such an absolutely shitty year. The only times my father came to see me was twice back when I was in rehab, and that was because someone overheard me talking about committing suicide. Not that I was really thinking of it. I wasn’t. It was just talk, you know?

“But these four weeks on the island, I really think it was starting to change me. Maybe the discipline. Running, lifting weights, working my ass off every day. Eating right, getting in shape, talking to my shrink on the phone every single night. I started to feel some pride in what I was doing. Some confidence, too. Things were starting to seem okay to be me. Like I’m not such a goofball fuckup after all.”

She scratched her check absently, thinking about it, looking outward but staring inward, processing the experience. “For the first time since I was a little girl, the world was starting to seem like a pretty good place. A safe place. When Gale and I were standing there watching the sunset, that’s exactly what was going through my mind. The world really is a cool place.”

I said, “Then all of a sudden, you look up and see two men in ski masks, one of them carrying a weapon.”

She nodded. “Exactly. The world didn’t seem so safe anymore.”

She went on. “What I felt was so weird. Like fear so strong it was almost… umm, like getting an electrical shock, but slower with the feel of the electricity moving through my spine. Or like someone’d squirted ether up my nose. I was frozen, couldn’t move. You know those terrible nightmares where you try to run but can’t? Same thing. I wanted to run but couldn’t, wanted to scream but couldn’t, and then the guy shoots at Gale and I felt my bladder go. Standing right there, I pissed my own pants. That really… really-” She stopped momentarily, her voice breaking, sighed heavily, looking away from me so I couldn’t see her face. “It really did something to me. For the first time in my life, I felt like a piece of meat. Something that could be… I don’t know, it was like those news videos you see after a flood. All the dead and dying animals. Like I could be killed and left to bloat in the sun. I was no longer the eccentric daughter of the great man. I was a female animal and about to die-and that’s when… that’s when…”

She stood and stepped to me, weeping softly now. Placed her hand on my shoulder as she said, “That’s when I saw you, Doc. Looked and saw you charging like one of those football players on TV. You had this expression on your face, complete focus, and it was like I was looking down from way up high, totally in slow motion, and that’s when I stopped being scared. I had urine dripping down my leg, but I knew everything was going to be okay. I don’t have a clue why, but that’s the way I felt. You looked a hell of a lot bigger and meaner than the guys with the masks, but it was more than that. Like I told you, I noticed you right away, your face, big and safe-looking, and I knew you were going to save us. I just knew it and I was right.”

Her hand had moved to the back on my neck, massaging it, and I let her. In her small voice, she said, “So you want to know my motives? Real simple. I came here to thank you in the best way I know how. I wanted to take you to bed and do absolutely anything you want me to do, then put you to sleep with my body still on you. You saved my life, and I don’t think I’ll ever be the same again. Maybe you’ve got to experience your own death to realize how much you really do want to live. For all that, I figured I owed you a big favor. Figured that now it was your turn to feel safe and protected.”

I stood slowly, feeling her fingers slide down my back to my hips and stop there. I took her by the shoulders, squeezed, leaned, and kissed her on top of the head. She was still weeping, her body spasming softly, and she fell comfortably against my chest, my right hand patting her rhythmically between shoulder blades. I said, “A generous offer, lady, but a bad idea. You need to go home, get some sleep.”

She buried her nose and face against me, then into me. I listened to a muffled question. “You sure? Last offer. They’re flying me out tomorrow first thing. They haven’t even told me where.”

My fingers were still drumming on her back. “Sorry, yeah, I’m sure. I may kick myself in the morning, but I think it’s the right thing to do.”

“You know, they say that the way you’re patting me right now? It reminds us of our mother’s heartbeat back in the womb, so it comforts us when we’re scared. If I promise to be good, and if I promise not to hurt your bad arm, you think we could lie down on the couch for maybe ten minutes? I could use some comforting. Something important happened to me today, and I’m not sure what. It’s maybe the only way I’m going to be able to sleep tonight.”

As I held her, I glanced at my watch: 1:45 A.M., nearly moonset over the Gulf. Two more days until the new moon. “What will the deputies do if they check your bed and you’re gone.”

“I left a note just in case, told them I went out for a walk. This’d be the last place they’d think of checking.”

“Ten minutes and no more,” I told here. “But the couch in there isn’t very comfortable.”

When I awoke, the porch screen was a black scrim of drooping palms and stars, no moon. Lindsey was cupped against me, back to stomach, like a spoon, air whistling softly through her nose when she breathed.

Somehow, my left hand had slipped up under her T-shirt, my fingers spread to hold the warm weight of her left breast.

I told myself I should take my hand away, but I didn’t.

Then I told myself it was alright not to remove my hand because my left arm was finally comfortable, no longer throbbing, and it was medically permissible not to move my hand as long as I held her in a friendly, nonsexual way.

I lie to myself so often and so successfully that I’m amazed that I even bother to continue to try to live up to my own flawed values.

I lifted the palm of my hand away from her skin, leaving only my fingertips to touch her softly, feeling heat and perspiration on the heavy underside of her breast. Then my thumb and middle finger found her nipple, first tracing the denser skin of the aureole, before rolling the nipple gently, feeling it react, the tip of it growing, becoming erect and slowly heated in my hand.

I felt Lindsey stir, then press her hips back into mine, rotating slowly and pushing, exploring me with her buttocks.

Thus I knew she was awake.

Heard the little-girl voice say, “Hey, buster. You’re no carpenter, so what you doing with a hammer in your pocket?” She had a furry, sleepy laugh.

I removed my hand from under her shirt immediately, got up on my good elbow and said, “Sorry. I was being stupid there for a minute. Which means you need to get off this couch right now because-” She flopped over to face me and pressed her hand to my lips before I could finish. “You think too much, Doc. Know that? Shut off your brain for a little while. Put it on autopilot. Your body knows what it wants to do. Stop being such a nerdy pain in the ass.”

Then she put her hand behind my head and pulled my face to hers, touching my lips with her tongue, moistening them, searching, as her free hand moved downward over chest and abdominal muscles. Her fingers found the elastic of my shorts, then they found me, moving to explore, her fingers spreading as wide as they could to hold me, her thumb moving in slow rotary massage.

“Do you like this?”

“Yes.”

“I’m not hurting your arm?”

“My arm? I’m not thinking about my arm right now. No, you’re not hurting my arm.”

“What about this? You like this?”

“Oh yeah.”

She stood suddenly in the gray light. I watched her step out of her shorts, then strip the T-shirt over her head. She was ivory-colored in the darkness, sculpted white and hard, skinny-hipped with ski-slope breasts and very long nipples. She shook her yellow hair free as she leaned to help me shimmy out of my shorts, then used her left hand to hold me erect and perpendicular as she mounted me, sliding slowly down onto me, wincing as her body stretched to fit itself.

She sighed, shuddered, eyes closed, her hair long and breasts hanging down as she began to lift and roll, her pubic bone moist and hard, seeking friction with mine. I heard her whisper, “The astronaut position. I like this.”

“Huh? Astro-what?”

“You’re the astronaut, laying back in your seat. You get to reach up and play with all the knobs and buttons you can find.”

More than an hour later, in the master bedroom by now, the sheets soaked with sweat, when we both thought we’d done everything possible to one another and given everything twice over, the girl, whose feet were beside my head on the pillow, removed her mouth from me, poked her head up with prairie-dog surprise and said, “Houston, this is Apollo. We’ve got liftoff again. ”

I haven’t had much experience with the morning-after awkwardness of a one-night stand for the very simple reason that I rarely, rarely do one-night stands. Fortunately, though, there was very little awkwardness. Not between Lindsey and me, anyway.

I walked her home in the silver, predawn dusk amid tittering birds and the seawind rustling of morning palms. We hadn’t gotten much sleep, but she was energized, full of fun. Seemed to be completely at ease. She kept her voice low, chatting about the modern ceremony we had to complete: exchanging phone numbers, cell phone numbers, e-mail addresses.

Guava Key’s paths are illuminated by moon-globe lamps that create little islands of light along the paths. In the light of one, she allowed me to see her theatrical expression of shock when I told her I didn’t have a cell phone. “My God! When you’re shopping, or cruising the malls, how can you make calls?” and shook her own cell phone at me.

She had that unusual gift for satire and self-deprecation. “Know something, Doc? Yesterday was a hell of a complicated day, but I feel better than I’ve felt in a long, long time. I’m not sure why. I’m glad we met, that much I can tell you. Not just because you saved our asses, either.”

I told her, “Why do I have to keep reminding you? I didn’t save anybody. That’s your official response, okay?”

Her laughter was a whispered sound and private.

“Whatever you say, Ford. But I’m glad you did.”

I was feeling much better myself. Our lovemaking had been unexpectedly comfortable; a mix of tenderness and passion that left us both panting, then laughing. Usually, when I do something that breaches my own code of behavior, I get a niggling case of the guilts. Not now, though. I felt energized and content. The gray, residual depression caused by my run-in with the kidnappers had been swept away.

I wrapped my arm around her, steering her down the dark path. For some reason, something she said came back; I remembered her telling me, Maybe you’ve got to experience your own death to realize how much you want to live.

Oddly, as if prompted by my own thought chemistry, Lindsey told me, “The reason I feel the way I do-it’s a kinda fresh start feeling, like nothing I’ve experienced before. I really could have died yesterday, but I didn’t, so this is like the beginning of my new life. Used to be, I always had this urge in me. Destructive, you know? It was like an itch, something I had to scratch or just go nuts. But I don’t feel it now. That weird urge to piss people off and fuck up my life. Anger, I guess. Contempt for everything, but now it’s gone. Like it was never there.

“Then being with you in bed, it was like, wow! Not because you were great-don’t get me wrong, you were just fine-but because it was like my first time, only better. What I felt, all those sensations, I really appreciated them, you know? They meant something. It was fun. ”

“I’m happy to play even a small role,” I said wryly.

She gave me a slap on the butt. “You did more than just play a role, come on. In fact, you may be a big part of the reason I feel so good. It’s more than knowing I coulda been killed. What it may be? It may be because I’ve had lots of lovers, and I’ve had a few really close guy friends. But I’ve never been with a guy who was both. I think that maybe, just maybe, you’re going to be the first.”

I thanked her, but was thinking, Slow down, lady. Slow down.

I got a couple hours’ sleep before the phone beside my bed rang. I picked it up to hear Lindsey say, “Hey, Ford? They’re making me leave already. Shit! We just figure out what parts go where, that they make a nice fit, and we’ve already got to say good-bye. I’d ask you to come along, but they won’t even say where they’re taking me. Bastards!”

She sounded disappointed but not surprised. Like that sort of thing had been a part of her life before. She told me the whole operation, chopper and all, had been arranged by her father, and would I mind meeting her at the helipad because the cops weren’t going to let her out of their sight even for a few minutes.

While I was brushing my teeth, the phone rang again. It was Tomlinson. It must have been a good night for him, too, because there was renewed energy in his voice. “Marion, holy moley! that sister of yours is something. Has an absolutely fabulous spirit, man, lots of heavy mojo vibes. No sex; didn’t even try. But she has a real godliness about her, plus she is built like a brick shit house! We got in the hot tub. She brought this little, tiny, tiny bikini, and we stayed up talking until five. Smoked a couple fatties, drank some wine-you know, really getting to know each other, exploring each other’s heads. That woman is smart, she’s funny, she’s unspoiled-got what we Zen folks call ‘the crazy wisdom.’ ”

I said, “Crazy, huh? Then at least the two of you have something in common. And Tomlinson? Please don’t refer to her as my sister.”

He hooted. “Lighten up, Doc! We need to get together so you can go over these papers Tucker left her. I’ve read through them a couple of times. Kind of interesting, really. Old Florida stuff, from back in the cowboy and rumrunner days. The feel of it I’m talking about. Hey, Doc, I don’t remember-when the old man died, did he leave a will?”

I said, “No. Tucker died intestate. His ranch, most of it he’d already sold off to residents of a trailer park down in the Glades. Nice people-you met them a couple years back. They’ve really fixed it up from what I hear. The ranch house and the barn went to me because I was his only heir. Supposedly his only heir, anyway. I’ve never even gone down to look at the place. The trailer park people take care of maintenance. In return, I pay them a fee.”

The tone Tomlinson used was as close as he can come to being businesslike. “Okay, then I think one of the letters Ransom received can serve as his actual will. If someone decides to get attorneys involved, I mean. It’s a handwritten instrument, and it’s kind of fun, really. What it amounts to is, Tucker left some money for you two, but you’ve got to find it first. He hid it because he was paranoid about this old enemy of his, an island dude named Benton, beating you to it. Sounds just like that wild old gunslinger, doesn’t it?”

Oh yeah. Trying to manipulate people from the grave-that sounded just like Tuck.

I told him, “Trouble is, Tomlinson, I don’t want anything to do with it. I think you know why. So do me a favor and tell Ransom that the money’s all hers. Whatever it is he left. And I’ll give her the house and barn down in Mango, too. You think we ought to take her word that she’s Tuck’s daughter? Or maybe I should ask her to do a DNA before I transfer the papers.”

“If those eyes of hers aren’t proof enough, the conversation I had with her last night was. Isn’t it weird how people from the same family have similar vocal inflections, move and walk and even write like one or both of their parents? She wrote her address for me-Cat Island in the Bahamas. Used Tucker’s sloppy, curvy block print.”

I didn’t think there was anything weird or unexpected at all about genetics determining characteristics and behavior, but I said, “Oh yeah, the similarities can be eerie.”

“Believe me, compadre, she’s Tucker Gatrell’s daughter.”

“Okay. Then she can have the house if she wants. I’ve got the deed in the fireproof box in my lab. But I’m not going on any of Tucker’s snipe hunts. I still have that fish count to finish up”-I glanced at my left arm; it was throbbing again, but not bad-“and I’m not in the best of shape.”

“She’s counting on you, Doc. The woman’s got enough psych-up energy for ten people. The way she looks, the way she acts, can you believe that she’s got two kids? She was a middle-aged housewife, for God’s sake, before she kicked out her good-for-nothing husband and took her life back under control. What I’m saying is, she’s strong, man, very strong. In other words, partner, I don’t think she’s going to take no for an answer. And keep in mind, she really did come through when you needed her yesterday. If you catch my drift.”

I said, “You’re not suggesting that she’d try to leverage me, are you? Threaten to go to the cops and tell them the truth?”

Listened to Tomlinson say, “Probably not,” but I was thinking: Of course she would. She’s Tucker’s daughter.

Thirty minutes later, standing, waiting on luggage to be stowed aboard an orange, multipassenger Bell helicopter, I perceived an unmistakable chill from the two women deputies who’d stayed the night on Guava Key and stood guard over the girl.

Well, they’d supposedly stood guard.

One of them was Deputy Walker, who hadn’t exactly been my advocate during the interrogation the night before. I’d avoided her questions, true, and we certainly hadn’t struck up even a conversational friendship, but that didn’t explain her behavior or the behavior of her fellow officer.

As Lindsey and I approached the helipad, they seemed to make a point of ignoring me, and when I asked, “Is Waldman still around?” Walker shrugged and turned away.

I’m not a stickler for mindless social ceremony, but neither do I allow rude behavior to go unquestioned.

I moved close enough so she couldn’t ignore me. “Maybe you didn’t hear my question. Is Doug Waldman still on the island?”

There was something in her expression and her tone akin to contempt. She braced both hands on the gunbelt around her waist and said, “Why? You had your chance to cooperate last night.”

I took a couple of slow breaths before I said, “So maybe you got a lumpy bed and couldn’t sleep. Or the husband and you had a fight over the phone. What I’ll do is give it one more try. Is Waldman around? I want to ask him something about the investigation.”

The deputy told me, “We can handle it, believe me. We don’t need your assistance,” and walked away.

I received the same strange, inexplicable animus from Gale Storm, who touched me on the shoulder and, when I turned around, said, “Thanks for the help yesterday. I appreciate it.” But her tone said she wasn’t thankful and her quick, limp handshake told me she couldn’t wait to get away.

“No need to thank me,” I replied. “From what I saw, you handled yourself pretty well in a situation most people can’t even imagine. You’ve got nothing to be ashamed about.”

That seemed to infuriate her. “Ashamed? Why the hell would I be ashamed?”

I was tempted to say because she froze and lost her weapon, but instead I said, “Exactly the point I was making. No reason at all.” My shrug tried to tell her, How would I know anyway?

But she wouldn’t drop it. She was wearing navy blue shorts, gray Izod shirt, and a golf visor, plus the same little gray belly bag. She’d either retrieved her weapon from the dock or she’d found a backup. She removed the visor, wiping her forehead, as she said, “Look, before I went into the private sector, I graduated from the FBI academy at Quantico and three or four other schools you wouldn’t even know about. If there’s one thing I don’t need it’s some fisherman trying to insinuate that I somehow blew an assignment. So please don’t.”

Was everyone on the island in a foul mood? Or maybe Storm had received some kind of royal ass-chewing from Lindsey’s father. No way of knowing, but this time I wasn’t going to let it pass. I said, “One thing I can say for you, Ms. Storm, is you’d be a great train engineer.” When she raised her eyebrows quizzically, I added, “You’re always on time and on schedule. Your afternoon runs? I could set my watch by them. Plus you never varied your route. Not once. Just like you were on tracks. Very dependable. And predictable. I guess I wasn’t the only one who noticed, huh?” Then I looked into her face until she turned away.

Then Lindsey was beside me. She grabbed my hand and began to steer me away toward a hedge of hibiscus that separated the grassy landing area from the bay. She said to me, “I don’t care how shy you are, how proper, I’m not leaving without a good-bye kiss.”

I let her pull me along, saying, “What the hell’s wrong with these people? Yesterday I was a hero, today I’m poison. Even your bodyguard-what did I do to make her mad?”

“Gale?” Her expression said it was unimportant, why waste the energy? “Don’t worry about her. Gale’s always pissed off about something. It might be that she’s jealous.”

“She’s jealous because of me?” I smiled. “I don’t think so. She hasn’t shown the slightest interest. But I’m flattered you’d think that.”

“Not you, you big dope. She’s interested in me. She’s been wanting to come on to me for, like, the last month, but couldn’t work up the nerve. Too professional, probably.” She turned to face me, laughing. “That’s hilarious! Gale interested in you? She’s gay. Man, are you out of it sometimes.”

“Yeah, I don’t doubt that, but the question’s the same: Why would she be jealous? Unless you told her about last night. Which you didn’t

… did you?”

“I don’t tell her anything. She always, like, goes straight to Dad.” She paused for a moment. “Now that you mention it, though, um-huh, she is acting weirder than usual.”

Lindsey was still thinking about it. She stood close enough to speak confidentially. “Or it could be because of Dad. Yeah, that might be it. My father spoke to her this morning on the phone and had her close to tears, he was, like, yelling at her so much. I was in the next room and could hear him. That’s how pissed off he was.

“Same with the two women cops. With them, what happened was, my dad did a conference call this morning. Them and their boss at the Sheriff’s Department, Dad’s point being that they hadn’t done what they were paid to do, which, when you think about it, they didn’t… .” She let the sentence trail as we were approached the bushes. She turned to me again, made herself as tall as she could be on tippy-toes. Held my right hand to her chest as she kissed me gently, then harder. “I like you, Ford. We need to get together soon. Real soon.”

“It’s something to think about.”

She kissed me again. “No, it’s not. You think way too much. That’s your problem. Like the shoe commercial: Just do it.”

Smiling, I used my good hand to hold her away momentarily. “Okay, sure, you’ve got a point, so we’ll get together. But you know what I’m thinking about right now?”

In a torch singer’s smoky voice, she answered, “If it’s the same thing I’m thinking of, we’ve only got about five minutes, so drop your shorts and let’s get started,” then laughed at her own parody.

“No, what I’m wondering is how’d your dad know the two women cops screwed up? They were assigned to guard you, but you snuck out. How could he know that? That’s my point.”

She made a face and shrugged. “I’ve never figured out how my dad knows all the things he knows. I quit worrying about it long ago. He’s always watching me, always finding out stuff.”

I experienced a slow, uncomfortable dawning. “You mean he knows and the deputies know where you went last night, where you stayed? That we were together?”

“Maybe not but it’s possible. They usually keep track of me every damn second of the day. The bodyguard I had before Gale, she was like that, then Gale, and always because of Dad. They bug my room, bug my phones, tail me when I’m out. Because of the drug thing, only that’s not going to be a problem anymore. I’m serious, Doc, I feel like I’ve changed.”

“Phone?” I said, thinking of the cell phone she’d carried with her. I was aware of a satellite surveillance system, controlled by the National Security Agency, known as Echelon. An NSA operator could sit at his little screen in Fort Meade, Maryland, tune in on a cell phone conversation on the other side of the earth. Could also use the conversation as an effective direction finder; laser in on the precise location, know what street they were on in Singapore or Perth, know if the person using the phone was turning right or left. It was that exact.

Lindsey said, “I don’t know how he finds out all the stuff he does, but don’t worry about it. Plus, who cares? The only thing I really care about right now?” She gave me a slowly lingering kiss, then a slap on the butt. “All I care about is you calling those numbers I gave you, letting me know when we can get together again. You promised, so don’t forget, damn it.”

I was nodding, still considering the probabilities. “Yeah, it would have to be the cell phone. You wouldn’t even need to add a mini-transmitter into something like that. Just dial in on the phone’s preprogrammed number. Or… yeah, maybe they would have to install one more little chip.”

“Ford! You are going to call me. Leave a message at the numbers I wrote down, let me know where you are. I’ll call you here on the island, just as soon as I get to wherever in the hell it is they’re taking me. But if they won’t let me call, don’t think it’s because I don’t want to.” She had gray-green eyes with flecks of gold on the iris. Looking at me, her expression became affectionate, her eyes intense. “I like you, Ford. It’s nice not to feel that itch. That destructive itch. I want to stay in touch.”

I became certain that someone had eavesdropped via the girl’s phone a few minutes after I watched the chopper bank away, swinging northward, gaining speed, when I was summoned to the island guests’ services desk.

Someone had called my room three times; left the same name, the same number.

The first two message slips were blank, but the third read, “Hal Harrington wants to discuss recent Apollo mission. Call immediately.”