Damn it!
Squires hadn’t thought of that and he felt sick again. What if the gator had eaten the Mexican girl’s body? Or even a few pieces? The cops would come storming back here with search warrants and handcuffs, and that would be the end of him.
Jesus Christ, he couldn’t let that happen. Not with the Bible-freak girl still around to testify that she’d seen him drag that heavy sack to the water. If it wasn’t for her, it would be easy enough to play dumb and let the cops blame the V-man. Or any one of the hundreds of other drunken Mexicans who lived in the area. That would be the natural direction to go. Wetbacks killed wettails, right? It happened all the time.
Squires took a look around. The girl had disappeared. Where? She had been kneeling by Carlson. Didn’t seem the least bit concerned that the cops could ask for her ID, find out she was an illegal and take her skinny ass into custody. Not just illegal but underage at that, which meant she’d probably end up in some state orphanage.
Stupid little Mexican.
Squires felt pressure building in his head again as he fumed about the girl, a nobody wettail who could have him jailed if she decided, maybe even send him to the electric chair. It made him furious to think that one little Mexican had so much power over him.
Squires became even more determined to fulfill his fantasy…
A voice interrupted. “Why were you staring at that child? What’s going on in the twisted brain of yours?”
Squires realized the hippie was talking to him. He turned, surprised, and a little pissed off. He studied the hippie, seeing the seriousness in the guy’s Jesus-looking eyes, also seeing how scrawny the dude was, easy enough to snap the man’s body in two if he wanted.
“She’s a chick, not a child, you dumbass,” Squires said to him, and then enjoyed the guy’s reaction.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” the hippie said, but in a sort of testing way.
“Bullshit, I don’t. You ever seen a boy with pretty little knockers so firm they could poke your damn eye out?”
The hippie took a step toward him. “Why would you even say something so disgusting?”
Squires was loving the look of outrage. “Because it’s true,” he told the guy. “Tonight, that little girl and me had a nice conversation while she was in the trailer taking herself a bath. That’s some tight little ass she’s got for a wettail that young.”
The hippie said, “Wettail?” then started walking toward Squires, the dude’s eyes a little crazy. “You lay a hand on that girl, I’ll see you in prison. You stay away from her or I’ll…”
“Or you’ll what? Try and scratch my eyes out?” Squires used a Screw you smile to make the guy madder, hoping the dude would take a swing at him while there were plenty of witnesses right there watching.
“Have an illegal Mexican girl squeal to the cops?”
The look of frustration on the hippie’s face was an awesome thing to see. “Go ahead, tell the cops I was watching the girl take a bath. Let’s see how long it takes for them to ship your little pal’s ass back to shithole Mexico.”
Squires flipped his middle finger at the dude, turned and made a quick trip to his double-wide, where he hid the cash he had stolen from the hippie and the hippie’s asshole friend.
He stuck the money under the false bottom of a drawer, with stacks of twenties, fifties and hundreds he and Frankie had amassed from selling Gator Juice. Probably more than fifty thousand there.
Frankie would know the exact amount. Harris Squires seldom had the patience to count it.
An hour later, with all the lights and cameras and Florida Wildlife vehicles arriving, Harris was thinking that killing an alligator was a bigger deal than killing a person.
He had overheard one of the cops telling a reporter that unless it was a life-or-death situation, harming or harassing a gator could mean a year in jail and up to a four-thousand-dollar fine.
Good. He hoped they took Ford away in handcuffs.
It didn’t look like it was going to happen, though, the way the cops had been treating the bastard. They’d hauled the drunk, Carlson, away in an ambulance, but not before Carlson had told them that Ford and the hippie had saved his life. Carlson was probably the only witness the nerd needed, but the little Bible-freak girl had seen the whole thing, too. Not that she’d stuck around long after the ambulance left.
Where was she? Squires was getting nervous, thinking that maybe the girl would grab her things and disappear from Red Citrus. Or maybe the cops had taken her away to question her privately.
Damn it! That was a possibility. Could be she was telling them right now what she’d seen Squires doing the night before.
No telling how long before the little brat talked, if it happened. It was something he would have to deal with later, though, because what Squires was doing right now was sitting in the backseat of a squad car, answering questions. There were two cops, a chunky guy in uniform and a Latin-looking woman wearing a white blouse tucked into a dark skirt, a regular professional ball breaker. Squires knew it the moment he set eyes on her.
The woman cop, whose name was Specter, was making notes as Squires told her his version of what had happened. In his version, he had been the hero, not Ford, which didn’t get a response from the woman, and that worried him. Had they put him in the squad car to ask about the gator? Or to question him about what he had dumped into the pond the night before? Or maybe, just maybe, one of the nosy cops had taken a peek into his double-wide trailer and seen the steroids kitchen with its propane tanks and chemical jars everywhere.
Squires was feeling twitchy as the woman finally sat back to comment instead of just asking questions. She turned toward the backseat and said, “It’s strange-the man the alligator attacked? The victim had no recollection of you being involved in any way, Mr. Squires. Dr. Ford and Dr. Tomlinson both tell stories that are very different from yours. I’m wondering why that is.”
The hippie was a doctor, too?
Jesus Christ, Squires thought, there must be colleges out there giving diplomas away to any idiot who can fill out the forms.
Squires told the woman, “Let me tell you about that guy, Carlson. He’s lived here for more than two years. He’s a drunk and a paint huffer. He’s out of his mind most the time. You know what a paint huffer is?”
The woman wrote something on a pad before she replied, “We’ve got another problem. Do you have any idea what that problem might be?”
Squires could feel his heart pounding in his chest. He looked out the window, seeing a tow truck in the bright lights, where a Wildlife cop was taking video as the crane winched Fifi slowly off the ground, all twelve or thirteen feet of her.
Squires was wondering if the back door of the squad car had locked automatically. If not, maybe the smartest thing he could do right now was make a run for it. Hide out for the night, then call Frankie and have her take him to the hunting camp, a place where he could hide and think things over in peace.
Squires put his hand on the door handle, thought about it another few seconds, then changed his mind. Once Frankie heard what had happened, she’d flip out. Hell, the woman would probably turn him over to the cops herself. Besides, how far would he get with a pulled hamstring?
Squires rubbed at the back of his leg and said, “All I know is, if I don’t get some ice on my leg, I’m not going to be able to walk tomorrow. How screwed up is that? I help save the life of one of my drunken tenants and I end up crippled for a week. I’m a professional athlete, which I don’t expect you to know. I’m training for the Mr. South Florida, which is in Clearwater Beach, this June, so an injury like a pulled hammie can be pretty serious if I don’t take care of it.”
The woman cop said, “Just a few more questions, Mr. Squires. There’s something else I want to ask you about, this problem I mentioned-”
Squires felt himself getting mad, which he knew wasn’t smart, but he couldn’t help himself from cutting her off, saying, “Miz Specter, we’ve all got problems. All I know is, I need some ice. I save a man’s life, now you’re talking to me like I’m some kind of criminal. I don’t want to get tough about it, but you’re on my private property. And if I need medical attention-a bag of ice, I’m saying-then I should be able to-”