It was hot outside, even in the deep shade beneath the porch roof. But there was a breeze off the ocean that now and then evaporated perspiration on his arms and face and cooled. He settled into the webbed aluminum lawn chair, propped his good leg up on the wooden porch rail, and watched a tan and shapely woman in a red bikini dashing in and out of the surf far down the beach. She was animated and loud; she swayed her hips in exaggerated motion when she ran, and her shrill, desperately happy screams carried to Carver on the breeze. Some great time she was having, everything about her shouted. Trying to impress someone Carver couldn’t see. Her hair was long and dark and flew wildly with each foray into the waves. Carver enjoyed watching her.
One of the woman’s shrieks trailed off, then was continued by the phone inside the cottage.
Carver lowered his leg, pushed himself up out of the light-weight chair, and limped inside with his cane. Because he was in a hurry, he allowed the screen door to shut too fast and it nipped him on the right heel. Hurt like crazy for a second or two. He didn’t need another bad leg.
He snatched up the receiver and snarled a hello, still mad at the door.
“Carver?”
“Yeah.” He recognized McGregor’s voice. Wished he hadn’t picked up the phone.
“Whazza matter? You sound outa sorts and outa breath.”
“Just giving the place a quick coat of paint; you interrupted me.”
“Nice you can still joke,” McGregor said. “Now here’s something to cheer you down: your ex-wife’s been by to see me and threatened to tell Adam Kave you’re the father of one of his son’s victims. The poop’d hit the propeller then, hey? I thought she lived in Saint Louis; how the hell she even know you were on the case?”
“She’s been reading the Florida papers to keep track of the hunt for Paul Kave. When she read I’d been hired by the Kave family, she figured out the rest.”
“Well, I got her promise to stay clear of the case for a while. Scared shit out of her with the official-police-business line, then played nice cop and asked for her cooperation. It won’t last long, though; she’s too smart to buy it. I was very impressed. You seem to attract smart women, Carver. And good-lookers. Guess it’s that opposites thing. Anyway, you’re gonna have to talk to her, see she keeps her mouth shut.”
“I’ve already talked to her.”
“So talk again. Fast and hard. Do whatever you got to fast and hard. Damn it, she’s your ex, Carver; you oughta be able to control her.”
“Yeah, that’s logical.”
“You’re the only one’s got a chance, pal. I could tell that after spending fifteen minutes with the lady. She’s worried all to hell about her daughter.”
“My daughter, too,” Carver said.
“Sure. What’s happening with the all-American Kave family? Not exactly Ward and June Cleaver and the kids, hey?”
Carver told him about Dewitt’s fight with Mel Bingham, and Nadine talking with Paul. He didn’t mention he was trying to set up a meeting with Paul through Nadine or Emmett Kave.
“Sounds like an ordinary tiff over pussy,” McGregor said. “We checked Bingham. He’s a senior at Florida State, going back soon for the fall semester. Working toward a degree in biochemistry. Normal asshole college kid. Drives a Jeep and thinks he’s living a beer commercial. Family’s well off, but not like the Kaves. Maybe he’s chasing the daughter for her money. Seems he dated Nadine all through high school and for awhile when she went to college, but the past several years she’s been spreading it around. Kind of wild, but no legal trouble. A minor drug charge two years ago, but it was dropped. One fella after another for her, though. Until Joel Dewitt. You’d think a girl like that, her money and looks, could do better than a guy like Dewitt. I can see why her mother wishes Dewitt would get run over by one of his used cars.”
“Could be they’re in love.”
“Uh-huh. I was younger, I’d try to move on that Nadine. Put it to her like one of her daddy’s jumbo hot dogs and change both our lives for the better. Hey, maybe you oughta try getting to her, Carver.”
“You’re twisted in a lot of ways,” Carver said.
“It’s the world made me that way,” McGregor said, agreeing and not caring. “What I am’s a realist. Better for you if you were one too. If you’d spent another five years on the force as a real detective, you’d be one. Then you’d see life the way it is: damned yeast pile, Carver, and it’ll fester till the planet quits spinning.”
It scared Carver to think McGregor might be right. And it bothered him that he’d developed a modicum of compassion for Paul Kave, and a loathing for the police lieutenant stalking him. What had started out so simply had become a horrendous tangle of emotions and confusion, thanks mainly to McGregor, who seemed to care about nothing so much as McGregor.
“Buncha hypocrites out there in the world, Carver,” Mc shy;Gregor said. “Specially here in Florida. It’s all that fundamental religion bullshit; them people won’t fuck standing up ’cause somebody might see ’em and think they’re dancing. At least I know what I am and accept it. Tell you the truth, kinda enjoy it now and then. Like this gamble I’m taking on you.”
“I admire your honesty,” Carver said. Damned if he didn’t.
A car drove up outside and parked, its tires grinding on the sandy soil alongside the cottage. Carver heard its engine race, then die. Dust from its arrival drifted like a heat-spawned apparition across his field of vision outside the window.
He moved a few feet to the left and saw Laura’s tiny blue rental car. The driver-side door opened and she climbed out, glanced at the ocean and perhaps the young woman romping in the surf, then strode toward the cottage. She was wearing a plain navy blue dress today, and dark high heels. The wind grabbed at her hair and ruffled it, like the hair of the girl down the beach. She touched it lightly with spread fingers and smiled absently, as if luxuriating in the breeze’s caress. Something in Carver moved.
“Thing is,” McGregor said, “you gotta corner that ex-wife of yours and work on her. Tell her any fuckin’ thing, but keep her away from Adam Kave. Will you do that?”
“If I can find her,” Carver said.
As he hung up, she was peering into the dimness through the screen. She knocked on the door. Wanted in.
“I phoned you earlier,” she said, when he’d called for Laura to enter and she stood a few feet inside the door.
“Did you? I just got here, haven’t had time to check my calls.”
“It’s warm in here.”
“It doesn’t have to be. Switch on that air-conditioner.”
She walked to the window unit, studied the controls for a second, then turned it on High. The compressor clunked on and the blower began a wavering, powerful hum. She closed her eyes and sucked in some of the cool, filtered air, then moved away from it. She seemed instantly refreshed, oddly invigorated. Or had she been that way since she’d entered?
Some of the cool air found its way across the room to Carver. “Why’d you call?” he asked.
“We need to talk.”
“About Ann?”
“About what you’re doing. About you. I talked to Lieutenant McGregor in Fort Lauderdale. I don’t like him. Or trust him. Being around him makes my flesh creep.”
“And he thinks he won you over.”
She walked to the water-stained chair Carver usually sat in after swimming and lowered herself onto it, then folded her hands in the lap of the blue dress. As if she were planning on staying awhile.
“What’s Sam Devine think about you coming to Florida?” Carver asked.
Her hands tightened on each other, fingertips whitening around pink-enameled nails. “We argued about it. He tried to talk me out of it. Then he wanted to come with me. I think he would have, but he’s wrapped up in a case with the Highway Department. Something about land acquisition.”
“And you came anyway.”