“I might take you up on that. Dave always asks, but somehow Nick dognaps Max and brings her down here.”
Kim grinned. “That’s because the tourist chicks stop and talk to the nice man with the brown-eyed doggie. I’m not sure if Nick’s using Max or if it’s the other way around. I’ll walk her tonight for you if—”
“Kim, turn the volume up on the television.”
She looked over her shoulder, found the remote and raised the volume. A reporter stood in front of a home with police and emergency vehicles in the background, lights flashing, police officers moving in and out of the frame.
The reporter said, “… and police say she was unconscious and not breathing when they arrived. Paramedics did find a weak pulse, and she was resuscitated then rushed to Memorial Hospital where she is listed in critical condition. Earlier today, Elizabeth Monroe’s daughter, Molly, was buried at a funeral attended by more than three hundred people. She and her longtime boyfriend, Mark Stewart, were shot to death in the Ocala National Forest. A former San Quentin prison inmate, Luke Palmer, is being held as a suspect in the case. Police are saying Elizabeth Monroe’s situation may be the result of a suicide attempt. Just outside of Lake Mary, this is Steve Eldridge reporting.”
“Oh my God,” Kim said, turning back to me as I was walking out. “Sean!”
I’d left a few dollars under my unfinished beer and ran toward Jupiter.
SIXTY-FOUR
Jogging down the long dock towards Jupiter, I could see lights glowing from Dave’s boat. A smaller light illuminated the salon of Nick’s boat, St. Michael. I had no idea which one Max had picked for her sleepover. I stopped halfway there, dialed directory assistance and asked to be connected to Memorial Hospital emergency room. A woman answered. I said, “I’m calling in reference to Elizabeth Monroe. How is she doing?”
“Are you a family member?”
“Yes.”
I was placed on hold for more than a minute, and then another woman, an ER nurse, came on the line. “The patient’s in IC right now. She’ll be in there all night.”
“Can she speak? Could you put the phone to her ear for me?”
“I’m sorry, she’s not conscious. I’d suggest that you call in the morning. Tonight she needs rest… and…” She stopped
“And what?”
“Prayers wouldn’t hurt.” I heard paging on an intercom. “I need to go now.”
As I got closer to Gibraltar, I saw the glow from two cigars. Dave and Nick were sitting in the cockpit, smoking cigars and drinking Jameson. Max was stretched on her side in a deck chair fast asleep. She raised her head when I said, “Max, are you chaperoning these two guys?” She jumped off her chair and scampered to the dock.
I picked her up, stepped down into the cockpit and sat in the chair that she’d been occupying. Nick said, “No matter how much luvin’ I put on hot dog, she says her heart’s for Sean. In a way, Max reminds me of those lovely brown-eyed ladies I used to meet crusin’ into ports. They’d be serving you drinks all night, big smiles, big boobs. I had big ideas. But come closin’ time, their hearts belonged to some sailor they fell in love with while he was on leave. Always some guy who promised he’d return one day. In the meantime, he’s gettin’ laid in Hong Kong.”
Dave said, “I’ve been following the news. The killings and the stories around them are all over CNN and the rest of the news outfits.”
I said, “Molly’s mother, Elizabeth Monroe, is in IC tonight. Cops say it may be a suicide attempt. I’d gone to the funeral with her, and then left her at her home a few hours ago.”
“What’s her prognosis?” Dave asked.
I told him what the nurse told me and added, “Elizabeth was depressed, which is natural, but she didn’t seem on the verge of trying to take her life.”
Nick said, “That is not good news. I pray for her recovery. Inside the woman’s mind, it’s complicated, you know?” Both of Nick’s thick eyebrows arched.
I said nothing.
Nick sighed. “Even you, Sean, a man who looks into eyes and sees things most people don’t, even you can’t know what makes a woman tick.”
Dave shook his head, “You’ve got more to tell us, Sean, right? You look like a man who was left at the station and his luggage is on the train leaving him behind.”
I pulled out one of the sketches. “I want to find this guy.” I went over everything Luke Palmer had told me. Dave and Nick listened without interruption.
Dave puffed his cigar, his mind crunching the implications. “So, in addition to the Midsummer Night’s Eve fairy fest, Palmer says he ran across devil worshiping, two guys out of the movie Deliverance running meth labs, some fairy girl’s grave and the shooting of Molly and Mark, all while pursuing a story from Ma Barker’s 1935 shootout in a house on the edge of the forest.”
“Yes,” I said. “He’s in county lock up. Molly’s in a grave and her mother’s in the hospital.”
Nick said, “But he didn’t tell you where the loot is buried.”
“No, he didn’t.”
Dave sipped his Jameson. “Palmer told you that the fraternity of Lucifer lovers was led by a guy dressed in all black clothes that night. Maybe he’s part of the three men present when Molly and Mark were killed.”
“Maybe, but I’d think that Palmer would have mentioned that.”
“Could be there wasn’t sufficient light. Palmer told you that the top warlock wore a hat similar to the farm hats the Amish wear.” Dave picked up the sketch. “What if this man is the same one that killed the goat and touched the knife to the girl that was tied to the posts? Palmer couldn’t have seen his features nearly as well as he could see the shooter in broad daylight.”
Nick said, “At night, nobody but cats and owls see things well.”
I said, “Palmer’s got a good eye. You’re right, it was dark and he did, no doubt, fear for his own life watching a goat being sacrificed and pissing off a bunch of devil worshipers. In my former career, I’ve interviewed a dozen witnesses who saw or didn’t see a dozen different things at the same moment a crime happens. But something tells me the guy in the drawing isn’t in any of the circles Palmer observed in the forest. The sketch isn’t of the two meth guys. Palmer would certainly know that. The man in the drawing probably wasn’t part of the hippie rainbow people because Palmer was there and saw most of them fairly close. He made a positive ID of Frank Soto. We saw Soto in the picture from Molly’s camera. The guy whose face we can’t see in that picture might be the same one that’s in the composite sketch. We do know the man in the photo wore a gold watch and a wedding band.”
Nick took a puff off his cigar. “I think we need to send a priest into that fuckin’ forest. He needs to sprinkle holy water over every tree. Sean, this is some deep shit, the devil people, the rainbow people, the story you told about the crazy old lady and her son shootin’ it out with the FBI. This whole damn thing is nothing but a bunch of friggin’ crazies. You better not go back in that forest unless you take an army with you.”
I smiled. “How long have you been puffing that cigar?”
Nick looked at his cigar, his eyebrows rose, he shrugged. “Maybe forty-five minutes.”
“Plenty of time for lots of saliva to soak into the leaves and tobacco. Lots of Nick Cronus DNA leaving its mark.”
Nick grinned. “Yeah, and I got cigar smoke in my moustache. Means nothing.”
Dave said, “It means something if Sean’s referring to the cigar Luke Palmer said he saw the guy in the back of the car toss out.”
I said, “If it matches the DNA from the cigar found in the shit hole where Molly and Mark were tossed, we know Palmer’s telling the truth. It would corroborate his story that a car did pass by him in the forest carrying three men, probably the same three present when Molly and Mark were killed. And, it would at least prove one of them, perhaps the guy in this picture, is the killer.”