Skinny Dip

  “The joys of island living,” she said.

  “Old Neil was right. Rust never sleeps.”

  Stranahan was wearing cutoff jeans and no shirt; dripping sweat, grease smeared like war paint on his face and chest. Joey asked if he wanted some help, and he said what he really needed was dynamite.

  “That bad, huh?”

  “I’ll fix it eventually,” he said, twirling a mallet. “In the meantime there are some delectable bran flakes in the cupboard.”

  Joey asked to borrow his cellular. He pointed to the boat, where the phone was recharging on the battery plug, and went back to banging on the generator. Twenty minutes later, Joey returned with a pitcher of tea and a bowl of fruit from the kitchen. They walked down to the dock and sat down, Joey tickling the water with her toes. Strom blinked at them from the shade of his favorite palm.

  “I’m getting worried about using my credit card,” Joey said.

  Stranahan assured her that American Express didn’t know that she was missing, and didn’t care as long as the payments got made. “They don’t read the newspapers. Unless somebody calls up and cancels the card, it stays active,” he explained.

  “The balance is automatically deducted from a private money-market account, but the monthly statement is mailed to the house. What if Chaz gets nosy?”

  “Another reason we should work fast,” said Stranahan, “before the billing cycle ends. He’ll probably just toss the statement into the trash, but if he opens it, then we’ve got a problem. He’ll see that you’re continuing to spend money.”

  “Yeah. Neat trick for a corpse.” Joey turned her face upward and squeezed her eyes closed. “The sun still hurts.”

  “It hasn’t even been a week. Next time we go to the mainland, we’ll find you some cool shades.”

  She said, “I dreamed about Chaz again last night.”

  “Killing him?”

  “Worse.” Joey rolled her eyes. “Can you believe it, Mick? Even after what he’s done, I’m still having sex with the guy in my sleep.”

  “It’s emotional withdrawal, that’s all. Like when you try to kick caffeine, suddenly the whole damn world smells like Folger’s.”

  Joey worked her lower lip. “Maybe I actually loved that creep up until the end. Maybe it was more than physical, and I can’t admit it.”

  Stranahan shrugged. “Don’t look at me, I’m the crown prince of dysfunctional. What’s important is figuring out how you feel about him here and now, before we make another move.”

  The dog ambled over and stretched out on the warm planks beside Joey. “That was my brother I called earlier,” she said. “The people who take care of my money contacted him because someone saw in the paper that I was lost at sea. Corbett told them to sit tight. They can’t do anything without a death certificate anyway.”

  “Chaz hadn’t called to snoop around about the trust?”

  “Nope. My brother was surprised, too.” Joey smiled ruefully. “In a weird way, I wish Chaz had done it for my money. Then I could almost understand,” she said. “But killing somebody just to be rid of them—man, it’s hard not to take it personally.”

  “That’s not why he did this, Joey. You’ll see.” Stranahan put an arm around her, and she let her head drop lightly against his shoulder. “What does Corbett think you should do?”

  “He likes the idea of me driving Chaz clinically insane,” she said. “Float around like a ghost, he says, until the bastard loses his marbles.”

  “It could happen.”

  “Oh, guess what else?” Joey lifted her head. “This detective keeps calling Corbett to talk about Chaz—the same guy Corbett spoke with on Monday, and now he’s calling back, leaving messages.”

  Stranahan said, “So the heat’s on, just like you wanted.”

  “It would be fun to think so.”

  And one more reason to be careful, thought Stranahan. The trick would be putting the cop into play without exposing themselves. “Did your brother tell you the detective’s name?” he asked.

  “Rolvaag. Karl Rolvaag,” she said, “with a K, not a C.”

  “I’ll be damned.”

  “I even wrote down the phone number,” she added, “in lipstick, unfortunately, on the deck of your boat.”

  “No problem,” Stranahan said cheerfully.

  “What’s so funny?”

  “Chaz. He thinks the cop is the blackmailer. On the phone this morning he even called me Rolvaag.”

  Joey was delighted. Then: “Hey, wait a minute. You talked to Chaz and you didn’t even tell me?”

  “You were sleeping,” Stranahan said.

  “So what!”

  “In a languid state of undress. Frankly, I was intimidated.”

  “Mick.”

  “That’s a compliment, by the way.”

  “Was I snoring?”

  “Moaning, actually. If I’d known you were dreaming about Chaz, I would have thrown you under a cold shower.”

  Joey took a playful swing and he caught her fist with the palm of his hand. “Go wash up. I got you all grimy.”

  She said, “Buddy, if you’re not careful . . .”

  Giving Stranahan a look that reminded him of Andrea Krumholtz, his very first girlfriend, on the night she’d slipped off her bra and tossed it out a window of Stranahan’s father’s car. For Mick, sixteen at the time, it had been a sublimely instructive moment.

  To Joey he said, “Guess I’d better get back to work.”

  “You sure about that?”

  “There’s five pounds of lobster in the freezer. It would be a mortal sin to let it spoil.”

  She said, “Okay. Go fix your stupid generator.”

  Stranahan finished the job two hours later, arms aching, knuckles raw. He went looking for Joey to give her the news, but she wasn’t reading in bed, or sunning on the seawall, or roughhousing on the dock with the dog. In fact, she wasn’t anywhere on the island.

  Strom wagged his nub but offered up no information. The Whaler was still tied to the pilings, so Stranahan wasn’t completely shocked to throw open the doors of the shed and find the yellow kayak missing. By then Joey was so far gone that the hunting scope was useless in spotting her. He climbed the roof to better scan the water, but all the bright specks turned into sailboats and Windsurfers and water bikes. He thought about taking the skiff and hunting her down, but he also thought about how bone-tired and grungy he was, and how good a cold beer would taste.

  As soon as he hopped off the roof, the Doberman started yipping and whining reproachfully, nipping at his heels all the way to the kitchen.

  “Oh, shut up,” Stranahan said. “She’ll be back.”

  Fourteen

  Mick Stranahan’s sister was married to a lawyer named Kipper Garth, inept in all aspects of the profession except self-promotion. He had been one of the first personal-injury hustlers in Florida to advertise on television and billboards, attracting a stampede of impressionable clients whose cases he dealt out like pinochle cards to legitimate attorneys in exchange for a slice of the take. As even his rivals conceded, Kipper Garth helped to pioneer the preposterous notion that finding a good lawyer was as easy as dialing up a plumber in the Yellow Pages.

  It pained Stranahan that his sister Katie had fallen for such a shyster, and that she’d stayed with him despite serial philanderings, scalding IRS audits and a ruinous gambling addiction. A cranial injury inflicted by a jealous husband had forced Kipper Garth into an early retirement, and in short order he’d burned up the family savings wagering on British cricket, a sport he never bothered to understand. In the face of bankruptcy he had reopened his practice, inspired by advanced pain medication and a fresh marketing angle. A new series of TV commercials featured him tooling around a law library in the same wheelchair to which he had been confined during his homebound rehabilitation. The aim was to present himself as both lawyer and victim, qualified by empathy (if not expertise) to specialize in disability litigation.

  Always a trend hound, Kipper
Garth had come across a newspaper article about a pair of lawyers who drove around South Florida scouting restaurants, shops and office buildings for wheelchair accessibility. If a place didn’t have the required ramps or lifts, the lawyers would recruit a disabled person—often a friend or relative—to sue. Typically the case would settle before trial, the owners of the building eager to avoid headlines implying they were callous toward the handicapped. The scheme was perfectly suited to Kipper Garth’s singular talent and soon he was back in tall cotton, overseeing half a dozen runners who scoured the tricounty area for wheelchair-ramp violations.

  Throughout good times and bad, Mick Stranahan contrived to avoid his sister’s husband, and timed his visits to Kate’s house on days when Kipper Garth was gone. Kate was always happy to see Mick, though she maintained a long-standing ban against discussing Kipper’s multiple character flaws. Theirs was one of those marriages that Stranahan couldn’t hope to understand, but he had come to accept it as unbreakable. He saw no reason to inform Kate that he now required her husband’s slithering assistance.

  “Sorry, Mick,” Kipper Garth told him. “No can do.”

  Stranahan was skeptically inspecting the wheelchair slanted in a corner of his brother-in-law’s spacious bayfront office.

  “I still need it on occasion,” Kipper Garth said preemptively. “I get spells.”

  A putter was propped against one of the wheelchair’s tires; three shiny new golf balls were lined up on the carpet.

  Stranahan sat down in front of the desk. “Does the bar association know you can walk? Or is there no rule against impersonating a cripple on TV?”

  Kipper Garth bristled. “It’s what they call a ‘dramatic re-creation.’ ”

  “Try ‘misrepresentation,’ ” said Stranahan, “with the stink of fraud. How about it, jocko? Are you going to help me, or do I make the phone call?”

  “Katie would never forgive you.”

  “She did the last time.”

  Kipper Garth’s neck turned crimson. Many years earlier, Stranahan had voluntarily testified against him in a grievance hearing that had unfolded poorly for the lawyer. Disbarment had seemed inevitable, until a cuckolded husband had beaned Kipper Garth with a jai alai ball, knocking him out of action and thereby sparing the Florida Bar a mountain of paperwork.

  “Mick, this really isn’t up my alley.” Kipper Garth, smoothing his necktie and brushing invisible lint from his lapels. “Here”—he reached for his Filofax—“let me give you some names.”

  Stranahan leaned over and grabbed his wrist. “It’s boilerplate, jocko. A first-year law student could do this blindfolded.”

  Kipper Garth pulled his arm away, though not too assertively. He knew enough of his brother-in-law’s volcanic history to avoid physical confrontation. He also knew that the wheelchair caper was but one of many transgressions that Mick had learned about and, strategically, kept to himself.

  Stranahan unfolded a yellow piece of lined paper and pushed it across the desk, saying, “That’s everything you’ll need.”

  The information seemed innocuous and straightforward. Kipper Garth was sure that his secretary could format a suitable document with the office software. “All right, Mick, I’ll do this for you,” he said, motioning toward the double doors. “Go ahead and bring her in.”

  “Who?” Stranahan said.

  “The client.”

  “Oh, she’s not here.”

  Kipper Garth looked puzzled. “Why not?”

  “Because she’s missing.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Well, she is and she isn’t,” Stranahan said.

  “You mean, like, Amelia Earhart–type missing or escaped prisoner–type missing?” Kipper Garth was clutching to the hope that his brother-in-law was joking.

  “It’s complicated,” said Stranahan.

  “But I’ll need a signature, obviously.”

  “Tell you what. Just leave that part blank.”

  Kipper Garth felt his gut tighten. “The signature is supposed to be witnessed.”

  “I was counting on the blind loyalty of your secretarial staff. Hey, I almost forgot—date it in early March, would you?”

  “For next year?”

  Stranahan said, “No, this year. Date it four weeks ago.”

  His brother-in-law’s voice deflated to a plaintive rasp. “Mick, come on, I could get prosecuted for this.”

  “Aw, they wouldn’t do that to a man in a wheelchair.”

  “I’m serious! The shit hits the fan, I’ll deny everything.”

  “I would expect no less,” Stranahan said.

  Kipper Garth held up the yellow paper and shook it. “What the hell’s this all about? What have you got yourself into?”

  Mick Stranahan glanced impatiently at his wristwatch. “We’re wasting precious time, jocko,” he said. “Chop chop.”

  For the second day in a row, Charles Perrone called in sick to the water district. Ricca came over and brought him lunch—a ham sandwich, nacho chips and a lobster salad. What the neighbors might think of his voluptuous female visitor was no longer high on Chaz’s list of concerns; he had more urgent problems.

  “What’s the matter?” Ricca asked.

  “You name it.”

  “Wanna talk?”

  “Nope.”

  He led her to the bedroom and undressed her. Twenty-five minutes later she rolled wearily off the mattress and re-fastened her bra. “I’m sorry, baby. I gotta get back to work.”

  Chaz Perrone flicked at himself, as slack as a noodle, under the sheets. “I can’t fucking believe this.”

  “Hey, it happens to all guys. Like I said before.” Ricca was in the bathroom, trying to sound as if she wasn’t disappointed. She emerged brushing her hair with military briskness. “You’d tell me if there was someone else, wouldn’t you, Chaz?”

  “Jesus.”

  “I don’t want to be the last to know.”

  He said, “Keep talking and I’ll be shopping the Internet for an implant.”

  She picked up her handbag and kissed him on the nose. “You’ll be okay, baby. You’re just having a tough time moving on, that’s all.”

  “Don’t start. I’m begging you.”

  “After the memorial, you’ll be good as new,” Ricca said. “Once you say good-bye to Joey, it’s back to your old studly self.”

  Chaz scowled. “I already said good-bye.”

  “I don’t think you have. I think that’s the problem.”

  Minutes after Ricca departed, Chaz heard Tool come in the front door. He poked his anvil-size head in the bedroom and asked with dull indifference if everything was cool.

  “Yeah. Peachy.”

  “Who was the girl? I seen her car here before.”

  “Grief counselor,” Chaz said.

  Tool eyed the doctor’s trousers and boxer shorts, which were crumpled in a heap by the bed. He said, “When my momma passed, they sent a Pentecostal preacher by the house.”

  “Everybody’s got their own way of coping. Did you find your stick-ems?”

  “Just one so far. But it’s brand-new.” Tool pivoted to exhibit the shaved spot where he’d slapped the fentanyl patch on his shoulder blade. “Maybe I’ll go crash for a spell,” he said.

  Charles Perrone waved. “Sweet dreams.”

  He waited until Tool disappeared into the guest room, then reached into the nightstand and took out his new gun. Overwhelmed by the selection at Wal-Mart, he’d gone to a pawnshop in Margate, where an imaginatively tattooed neo-Nazi had sold him a basic Colt .38. Sitting in bed now, Chaz hefted the blue-plated pistol from one hand to the other and wondered about its murky provenance. For all he knew, it could have been used in some vicious robbery, or even to kill a person. There was a box of hollow-point bullets in the drawer, but Chaz was hesitant to load the weapon. He’d once heard on CNN that homeowners who buy guns for protection are about fifty times more likely to shoot themselves, or be shot, than they are to cap an intruder. Since he’d never f
ired anything more powerful than a BB rifle, Chaz inserted the bullets with the utmost care.

  After returning the .38 to the drawer, he sank into a melancholy rumination. What if flaky Ricca was right? He’d purged every remnant of his dead wife from the house, and still his pecker remained obstinately on strike. Although he’d never confess it to Ricca, the only time Chaz experienced the slightest twitch of spontaneous lust was when he thought about Joey. That morning in the shower, for example, he’d been going over the crime moment by moment in his head—why, he didn’t know. Remembering the tang of the ocean; the drizzling rain on his face; the amber lights lining the rails of the deck; the low, heavy drone of the ship’s engines.

  And Joey’s ankles. That’s what had done it for him—remembering how silky and warm her ankles had felt when he’d grabbed them. God, what outstanding legs!

  Feeling a blissfully familiar pulsation, Chaz had peeked down to greet his little perpendicular accomplice. Avidly he had hunched over on himself, kneading and tugging to no avail, until finally the hot water ran out and all was lost.

  So, it’s possible that Ricca is right, he thought. Maybe his subconscious hadn’t yet let go of Joey, though it was only the sexual part of the marriage that he missed. Otherwise I’m as steady as an ox, Chaz assured himself; I did what had to be done. Sooner or later his wife would have caught him screwing around and, out of spite, ratted on him for faking the Everglades data. She would have ruined everything—his credentials as a biologist, his secret pact with Red, his whole golden future.

  Because she knew the truth. Of course she did. Hadn’t she seen it with her own eyeballs, him forging the water charts?

  I only did what was necessary, Chaz thought, and I could do it again.

  On impulse he snatched the phone and dialed a golfing buddy, a well-known wild man on the weekend club scene. “You know those pills you tried to feed me at Richardson’s bachelor party? I’ve got a friend wants to try the stuff.”

  “A friend. Sure, Chaz.”

  “Jesus, they’re not for me! My wife just died, in case you hadn’t heard. What kind of a heartless prick do you think I am?”