Hamilton

On a Lee Shore 15 - Pursuit

   Cara stumbled into the bungalow, the spring-loaded front door slamming shut behind her with a pop like rifle shot, sending yet another jolt to her already ragged nerves.  But never mind that, she was home and all was quiet, except for Frank Sinatra’s oaken-timbre crooning of “In The Wee Small Hours” and the buzz of cicadas from the trees outside.  Regrettably though, the sense of relief that hit her bloodstream like an opiate, would prove short-lived, for only moments later, it was destroyed by a commotion in the darkness to her left.  Swinging his legs off the couch, her father pulled his unbuttoned shirt closed while his companion, Paula, struggled behind her back to re-fasten her bra.

   “Seriously, guys, what the hell??” she spat in exasperation.

   All her father could manage was a mumbled apology and Paula blushed red enough to be seen in the dim light.  Cara headed directly for her room, the only place in the universe she imagined might offer refuge from this disconcerting scene.  She went over to her dresser, found two Ativans, popped them dry, flopped on her stomach on the bed, pushed her head deep into the pillow and awaited unconsciousness.  

   Time passed, the drug took effect, her mind wandered and she relaxed.  “Whatever.  Another one,”  she thought.  “That stupid idiot.”

    It wasn’t as if she’d heard his bed creaking and them moaning.  He’d spared her that anyway.  Paula had nice ones.  She wished she did.  Well maybe if they had twenty years taken off.  

   “I’m half Hispanic,” she thought.  “Aren’t Hispanic women supposed to have big breasts?”

   Women were attracted to Dad.  She’d give him that.  She wasn’t inclined to give him credit for much else at the moment.  Paula was well preserved for a forty-something.  He could seem so helpless.   But she knew his conniving mind.  He had a way of  talking you inside out.  Making you feel like a germ in a petri dish after awhile.  She’d grown up with him and was immune.  As smart as she knew Paula to be, she would see through him, at least eventually, and hold her own.  Paula and Dad.   On second thought, this could only improve things.  Paula was the strong, no bullshit type.  Dad was the weak, total bullshit type, at least for the last few years he had been.  If it took, this could be a good thing.  For her Dad anyway.  Her thoughts became less and less coherent as she drifted.  

   But before the medication could take her completely under, she remembered what Miles had told her at work.  Once again, she heard him in her head:  

   “Not much.  I’ve got to go down to Key West on Wednesday night …”

   She grabbed her phone off the nightstand and texted Shannon.  

   “You up?”

   As she waited, it occurred to her, she’d never heard the front door open or shut, which meant that Paula was still in the house.  She got up and peeked out into the darkened great room.  No one.  There was dim light coming from under her father’s door.  She moved over to the window.  Paula’s car was still outside.  

   “Nice,”  she thought.  “I busted them and they’re still going to. ”

   “Yeah,”  came Shannon’s reply.

   Cara called her.

   “Hey.  Wednesday night,”  Cara blurted out.  “He told me he’s going to Key West on Wednesday night.”

   “So.”

   “So… he was lying. “

   “Are you sure?”  asked Shannon.

   “As sure as I can be.  It was the way he said it.  Anyway, I think it’s worth a shot to follow him.  See what he does.”

   “Okay.  Get the night off.  When did he say he was going down there?  Where would he be leaving from?”

   “I don’t know,” Cara replied.   “We’ll just have to wait.  You hang out near his apartment.  I’ll work like normal, in case he comes into the bar.  If he comes in and I’m not there he might get suspicious.  If he does come in, when he leaves,  I’ll make some excuse and follow him and call you.  If you see him leave from his apartment, you follow him, call me when you’re sure he’s not coming to the bar and I’ll leave and join you wherever he ends up.”

   “Great.  Where’s a good place to watch his door?”  Shannon asked.  “So I can stay in my car.”

   “Watch him from the next street over.  It’s called Wolfe St. - one block over from Aliceanna where he lives.  You can sit in your car and watch between the houses.”

   “By the way, we hooked-up tonight,” Cara interjected.

   There was a pause.  “You and Miles?  How’d that go.”

   “I was scared at first.  Then it came time... and I wanted to.  Just to get at him,”  she was silent for a moment as angry tears emerged, burning her eyes.

   Shannon seemed to know.   “Are you okay?” she asked.

   “Yeah.  And I think I will be.  God, I hope we find something out on Wednesday.  I’ll be okay as long there there’s something we can do.  If not, I don’t know what…  I‘ll tell you more later.  I can‘t stay awake any longer.”

   “Be careful.”

   “I will.  By the way, Paula is in my Dad’s room.”

   “Heh.”

   “Someday maybe I‘ll learn…” she said.  “I’ll pay more attention to what people are trying to do to me than what I’m trying to do to them… When I was in college, I went out with this one guy… really controlling.  At first I was enjoyed the attention… enjoyed being an object in his possession.  He seemed so pleased to own me.  Told me I was beautiful all the time.  Just looked at me and told me I was beautiful.  He said it until I just didn’t hear it anymore… Then I really noticed it…  how much he tried to control me. I swear he looked through my email.  He’d tell me what to wear so he could parade me around.  I had a really good friend… a guy… we used to talk all the time.  But I couldn’t let the guy I was with know about him.  Everyone I liked he didn’t want around… always found something wrong with them.   People would try to me friend on MySpace.  Back when people used MySpace.  Ha.  If they were guys, I just wouldn’t respond because he would be able to see them when he stalked my page.  If they were girls that knew guys, I wouldn’t respond, ‘cause he could click through and see them.  I knew they‘d be hurt, but I was scared how he’d react. “

   “That’s fucked  up…”

   “Shannon.  Good ol’ Shannon.  Always willing to listen…”

   “You’re delirious.  Go to sleep.”

   She obeyed.  She hung up and went to sleep.


   Wednesday night came.  She had been working for a few hours when her phone rang.  She broke off the conversation she was having with an overly attentive forty-something to snatch it up from behind the register.  

   “He’s headed north up Route One… I’m three cars behind him… I’d bet anything he’s heading for Swan’s Wharf… where Katie saw him.  Get you’re ass up here.  Head up towards Swan’s.   I’ll text you if he goes somewhere else.”

   Now Cara began her preplanned performance.  A few minutes delay, trying to act normal, pouring beers, taking food orders, making small talk, then slowly she began to quiet down.  She made a show of leaning on one arm against the bar, waited for a few customers to notice and then headed for the ladies room and stayed there a while, flushing the toilet a few times before she walked out.  Trying her best to look pale and drawn, she walked over to Jake.

   “I just threw up,”  she said.

   “Damn, Cara.  Get the hell out of here.  Go home.  Call me if you need tomorrow off, Manny’ll cover for you.”

   The trick to looking sick is to look disoriented.  Cara grabbed her things and moved toward the door, stumbling once for affect.  Outside she checked to make sure no was around, ran for her jeep, jumped in, ground gravel off the lot and sped up the long drag that led to Route One.  Once she was on the highway, she called Shannon.

   “Where is he now?”  she asked.

   “He’s going to Swan’s… he’s gotta be.  He just turned onto Sea Pines.”

   “Where can I meet you?  Where should we park?”

   “The first left off Sea Pines just before the marina.  I’ll go way back.  I’ll be in my car.”

   A burst of adrenaline exploded into her blood commanding her heart to pound.  Expecting fear to follow, she was surprised to find that she felt, instead,  a momentary ecstatic thrill that quieted into reckless determination.  She was calm and ready.  The palm trees on either side of the highway,  rather than standing still awaiting her as she sped on through the dark, seemed to be sucked behind her through her headlights and southward.  At last, she hit Layton and veered right, towards the water and after a few zigzagging miles, she found Sea Pines Boulevard - a half mile from the marina.  She slowed down, shut off her lights, continuing until she found the last street on the left and turned onto it.  There was Shannon’s car at the dead end of the street.  She pulled in behind it.

   “Is he here?”

   “Yeah.  We can cut between these houses and over onto the hill overlooking the marina.  There‘re hedges up there we can hide behind.”

   “Good.”

   They picked their way through the dark on the spongy crabgrass in the damp soil of the neighborhood yards watching out for dogs, fences and other obstacles, staying out of sight of the marina.  Cara raced along after Shannon, head ducked down, looking over to her right at marina, watching for people under the lights on the jetty, making sure they weren’t seen - there was no one.  A few more strides and she careened face-first into the grass, smacking the side of face against a rock.  She had tripped over Shannon who had tripped over the head of a sprinkler jutting out of a yard.  Shannon cursed breathily.  Cara reached up to the side of her face and felt the warm sticky blood ooze.  They both got up and ran on.

   Reaching the top of the little slope they slid down onto their bellies to the ground on either side of a junction box in a gap in the hedge overlooking the marina, out of  the glow of the marina lights.  There was Miles’ BMW, parked on the marina lot at the opposite end.  They could see his white shirt reflected in the light in the driver’s seat of his car.  Within minutes, as the dew on the grass beneath them soaked into their clothes, another car drove up and then another.  The drivers got out and Miles got out and they all gathered behind the BMW.  The girls could make out Miles, and the heavyset, balding man from the bar the night Katie died and a third man, with a shock of black hair, dressed in light-colored hospital scrubs carrying a stainless steel box.  Shannon and Cara looked at each other.  If there was any doubt remaining about Miles, it was gone now.  

   The three men made their way down the marina jetty and turned together toward a large sailboat, at least 60 feet in length, about 25 yards down the jetty and clambered aboard.  On deck, they stopped and conferred for a moment before descending, one-by-one, down the main hatch.   The man in the scrubs carried the box down.  Seconds later, Cara and Shannon, 100 yards away, saw a light come on through the starboard porthole.  

   For the next the two hours, Shannon and Cara lay in the grass.  Time passed slowly and about half way in, Shannon was startled to hear heavy, rhythmic breathing and then a snort.

   “Hey wake up!” she hissed.  “What are you?  Fucking narcoleptic?”

   “Sorry…”  Cara replied.  “I think I passed out from the excitement.”

   “Keep your voice down, for God’s sake.”

   More waiting.

   At last, they heard the hatch creak open and saw the three men emerge.   The fat, balding man from the bar was now carrying the box.  They climbed off the vessel and made their way to the cars.  The fat man helped the scrubs-clad man load the noticeably heavier box into the trunk of a Lexus.  

   “We gotta get back to our cars, so we can follow them.”  said Shannon.  “I’m not interested in where Miles is going.  Let’s follow the other two.  You take the fat guy in the pimped Escalade.  I’ll take the guy with all the hair in the Lexus. ”

   Cara agreed.  “I’ll remember where that boat slip is.  We’ll want to check on that later.”

   Down the hill, they retraced their steps back through the yards to their car, being careful to remain hidden behind the slope of the ground.  Jumping back into their cars, they both turned around towards Sea Pines Boulevard, lights off, engines idling, waiting for the cars to come out of the marina lot.  Miles’ BMW came out first, followed by the Escalade, then the Lexus.  

   At the entrance to Route One, the Escalade headed north, while the Lexus and BMW turned south.  Shannon followed south.  Cara turned right, following the fat man.  She followed him confidently, knowing that he couldn’t possibly recognize her car, but she still kept distance between her car and his car knowing he was probably a pro and could spot a tail.  On and on they raced through the night.  Twice she thought she’d lost him and she sped up, desperately scanning right and left.  If she lost him now, would there be another chance?  Then his car would reappear and the chase was back on.  Her heart pounded and, veering in and out of traffic, she realized now and then that she’d forgotten to breathe.  At last he pulled off the highway, down a side street, lined with businesses, tacky tourist signs glowing right and left, and into the parking lot of a bar, a real shit hole. The Bergin Hunt & Fish Club.  He went in.

   “What the hell am I supposed to do now?” she muttered.

   Reluctantly, she pulled into a convenience store parking lot next door.

   “Great.  Here I am in an open vehicle, at night, in the worst area in the Keys.”

   Still, if not now, then when.  So she stuck it out.  An hour passed.  Feeling exposed as it grew closer and closer to midnight, she slid the seat back and slumped as close to floor as she could, out of sight watching the door of the bar as best she could through the Jeep’s open door.  Midnight.  One o’clock.  She was determined.  One-thirty.  Two.  Customers walked out, were thrown out, carried out, but still no fat guy.  A half hour past closing time, out walked the fat man through the back door along with another man.  The fat man held a stuffed envelope in one hand, slapped his companion on the shoulder with the other and with a beefy guffaw, headed for his SUV, got in and drove out into the dark streets.  

 Cara sat up, re-adjusting the driver’s seat, and took off after him.  About five more miles up Route One he pulled off and wound through a residential area stopping in front of an upscale condo complex.  A really nice place.  Not the kind of place one would expect a patron of the Bergin Hunt & Fish club to live.  After pulling into a parking spot in front of the building, he got out.  Cara came to a stop along the curb on the other side of the street.  Hauling his bulk out of the Escalade seemed to have been a difficult task for him and  he paused to rearrange himself.  Something further down the sidewalk drew his attention, making him look toward the easement which ran perpendicular to the sidewalk, between his condo unit and the next.  He walked down the sidewalk and turned right into the easement and disappeared from sight.  Cara watched.  A muffled pop and a orange-red flash flickered briefly from the easement onto the cars the parking lot, making her start violently in her seat.  She stared dumbly ahead, her mind frozen.  From the easement emerged a male form in a black athletic jacket, zipped to the neck, jeans, and a baseball cap pulled down casting a shadow over his face.  Casually, he tucked a 9- millimeter behind him, into his belt under his jacket, and walked off into the darkness.  

   It was her father.  



   “Seriously, guys, what the hell??” she spat in exasperation.

   All her father could manage was a mumbled apology and Paula blushed red enough to be seen in the dim light.  Cara headed directly for her room, the only place in the universe she imagined could offer refuge from this disconcerting scene.  She went over to her dresser, found two Ativans, popped them dry, flopped on her stomach on the bed, pushed her head deep into the pillow and awaited unconsciousness.  

   Time passed, the drug took effect, her mind wandered and she relaxed.  “Whatever.  Another one,”  she thought.  “That stupid idiot.”

    It wasn’t as if she’d heard his bed creaking and them moaning.  He’d spared her that anyway.  Paula had nice ones.  She wished she did.  Well maybe if they had twenty years taken off.  

   “I’m half Hispanic,” she thought.  “Aren’t Hispanic women supposed to have big breasts?”

   Women were attracted to Dad.  She’d give him that.  She wasn’t inclined to give him credit for much else at the moment.  Paula was well preserved for a forty-something.  He could seem so helpless.   But she knew his conniving mind.  He had a way of  talking you inside out.  Making you feel like a germ in a petri dish after awhile.  She’d grown up with him and was immune.  As smart as she knew Paula to be, she would see through him, at least eventually, and hold her own.  Paula and Dad.   On second thought, this could only improve things.  Paula was the strong, no bullshit type.  Dad was the weak, total bullshit type, at least for the last few years he had been.  If it took, this could be a good thing.  For her Dad anyway.  Her thoughts became less and less coherent as she drifted.  

   But before the medication could take her completely under, she remembered what Miles had told her at work.  Once again, she heard him in her head:  

   “Not much.  I’ve got to go down to Key West on Wednesday night …”

   She grabbed her phone off the nightstand and texted Shannon.  

   “You up?”

   As she waited, it occurred to her, she’d never heard the front door open or shut, which meant that Paula was still in the house.  She got up and peeked out into the darkened great room.  No one.  There was dim light coming from under her father’s door.  She moved over to the window.  Paula’s car was still outside.  

   “Nice,”  she thought.  “I busted them and they’re still going to. ”

   “Yeah,”  came Shannon’s reply.

   Cara called her.

   “Hey.  Wednesday night,”  Cara blurted out.  “He told me he’s going to Key West on Wednesday night.”

   “So.”

   “So… he was lying. “

   “Are you sure?”  asked Shannon.

   “As sure as I can be.  It was the way he said it.  Anyway, I think it’s worth a shot to follow him.  See what he does.”

   “Okay.  Get the night off.  When did he say he was going down there?  Where would he be leaving from?”

   “I don’t know,” Cara replied.   “We’ll just have to wait.  You hang out near his apartment.  I’ll work like normal, in case he comes into the bar.  If he comes in and I’m not there he might get suspicious.  If he does come in, when he leaves,  I’ll make some excuse and follow him and call you.  If you see him leave from his apartment, you follow him, call me when you’re sure he’s not coming to the bar and I’ll leave and join you wherever he ends up.”

   “Great.  Where’s a good place to watch his door?”  Shannon asked.  “So I can stay in my car.”

   “Watch him from the next street over.  It’s called Wolfe St. - one block over from Aliceanna where he lives.  You can sit in your car and watch between the houses.”

   “By the way, we hooked-up tonight,” Cara interjected.

   There was a pause.  “You and Miles?  How’d that go.”

   “I was scared at first.  Then it came time... and I wanted to.  Just to get at him,”  she was silent for a moment as angry tears emerged, burning her eyes.

   Shannon seemed to know.   “Are you okay?” she asked.

   “Yeah.  And I think I will be.  God, I hope we find something out on Wednesday.  I’ll be okay as long there there’s something we can do.  If not, I don’t know what…  I‘ll tell you more later.  I can‘t stay awake any longer.”

   “Be careful.”

   “I will.  By the way, Paula is in my Dad’s room.”

   “Heh.”

   “Someday maybe I‘ll learn…” she said.  “I’ll pay more attention to what people are trying to do to me than what I’m trying to do to them… When I was in college, I went out with this one guy… really controlling.  At first I was enjoyed the attention… enjoyed being an object in his possession.  He seemed so pleased to own me.  Told me I was beautiful all the time.  Just looked at me and told me I was beautiful.  He said it until I just didn’t hear it anymore… Then I really noticed it…  how much he tried to control me. I swear he looked through my email.  He’d tell me what to wear so he could parade me around.  I had a really good friend… a guy… we used to talk all the time.  But I couldn’t let the guy I was with know about him.  Everyone I liked he didn’t want around… always found something wrong with them.   People would try to me friend on MySpace.  Back when people used MySpace.  Ha.  If they were guys, I just wouldn’t respond because he would be able to see them when he stalked my page.  If they were girls that knew guys, I wouldn’t respond, ‘cause he could click through and see them.  I knew they‘d be hurt, but I was scared how he’d react. “

   “That’s fucked  up…”

   “Shannon.  Good ol’ Shannon.  Always willing to listen…”

   “You’re delirious.  Go to sleep.”

   She obeyed.  She hung up and went to sleep.


   Wednesday night came.  She had been working for a few hours when her phone rang.  She broke off the conversation she was having with an overly attentive forty-something to snatch it up from behind the register.  

   “He’s headed north up Route One… I’m three cars behind him… I’d bet anything he’s heading for Swan’s Wharf… where Katie saw him.  Get you’re ass up here.  Head up towards Swan’s.   I’ll text you if he goes somewhere else.”

   Now Cara began her preplanned performance.  A few minutes delay, trying to act normal, pouring beers, taking food orders, making small talk, then slowly she began to quiet down.  She made a show of leaning on one arm against the bar, waited for a few customers to notice and then headed for the ladies room and stayed there a while, flushing the toilet a few times before she walked out.  Trying her best to look pale and drawn, she walked over to Jake.

   “I just threw up,”  she said.

   “Damn, Cara.  Get the hell out of here.  Go home.  Call me if you need tomorrow off, Manny’ll cover for you.”

   The trick to looking sick is to look disoriented.  Cara grabbed her things and moved toward the door, stumbling once for affect.  Outside she checked to make sure no was around, ran for her jeep, jumped in, ground gravel off the lot and sped up the long drag that led to Route One.  Once she was on the highway, she called Shannon.

   “Where is he now?”  she asked.

   “He’s going to Swan’s… he’s gotta be.  He just turned onto Sea Pines.”

   “Where can I meet you?  Where should we park?”

   “The first left off Sea Pines just before the marina.  I’ll go way back.  I’ll be in my car.”

   A burst of adrenaline exploded into her blood commanding her heart to pound.  Expecting fear to follow, she was surprised to find that she felt, instead,  a momentary ecstatic thrill that quieted into reckless determination.  She was calm and ready.  The palm trees on either side of the highway,  rather than standing still awaiting her as she sped on through the dark, seemed to be sucked behind her through her headlights and southward.  At last, she hit Layton and veered right, towards the water and after a few zigzagging miles, she found Sea Pines Boulevard - a half mile from the marina.  She slowed down, shut off her lights, continuing until she found the last street on the left and turned onto it.  There was Shannon’s car at the dead end of the street.  She pulled in behind it.

   “Is he here?”

   “Yeah.  We can cut between these houses and over onto the hill overlooking the marina.  There‘re hedges up there we can hide behind.”

   “Good.”

   They picked their way through the dark on the spongy crabgrass in the damp soil of the neighborhood yards watching out for dogs, fences and other obstacles, staying out of sight of the marina.  Cara raced along after Shannon, head ducked down, looking over to her right at marina, watching for people under the lights on the jetty, making sure they weren’t seen - there was no one.  A few more strides and she careened face-first into the grass, smacking the side of face against a rock.  She had tripped over Shannon who had tripped over the head of a sprinkler jutting out of a yard.  Shannon cursed breathily.  Cara reached up to the side of her face and felt the warm sticky blood ooze.  They both got up and ran on.

   Reaching the top of the little slope they slid down onto their bellies to the ground on either side of a junction box in a gap in the hedge overlooking the marina, out of  the glow of the marina lights.  There was Miles’ BMW, parked on the marina lot at the opposite end.  They could see his white shirt reflected in the light in the driver’s seat of his car.  Within minutes, as the dew on the grass beneath them soaked into their clothes, another car drove up and then another.  The drivers got out and Miles got out and they all gathered behind the BMW.  The girls could make out Miles, and the heavyset, balding man from the bar the night Katie died and a third man, with a shock of black hair, dressed in light-colored hospital scrubs carrying a stainless steel box.  Shannon and Cara looked at each other.  If there was any doubt remaining about Miles, it was gone now.  

   The three men made their way down the marina jetty and turned together toward a large sailboat, at least 60 feet in length, about 25 yards down the jetty and clambered aboard.  On deck, they stopped and conferred for a moment before descending, one-by-one, down the main hatch.   The man in the scrubs carried the box down.  Seconds later, Cara and Shannon, 100 yards away, saw a light come on through the starboard porthole.  

   For the next the two hours, Shannon and Cara lay in the grass.  Time passed slowly and about half way in, Shannon was startled to hear heavy, rhythmic breathing and then a snort.

   “Hey wake up!” she hissed.  “What are you?  Fucking narcoleptic?”

   “Sorry…”  Cara replied.  “I think I passed out from the excitement.”

   “Keep your voice down, for God’s sake.”

   More waiting.

   At last, they heard the hatch creak open and saw the three men emerge.   The fat, balding man from the bar was now carrying the box.  They climbed off the vessel and made their way to the cars.  The fat man helped the scrubs-clad man load the noticeably heavier box into the trunk of a Lexus.  

   “We gotta get back to our cars, so we can follow them.”  said Shannon.  “I’m not interested in where Miles is going.  Let’s follow the other two.  You take the fat guy in the pimped Escalade.  I’ll take the guy with all the hair in the Lexus. ”

   Cara agreed.  “I’ll remember where that boat slip is.  We’ll want to check on that later.”

   Down the hill, they retraced their steps back through the yards to their car, being careful to remain hidden behind the slope of the ground.  Jumping back into their cars, they both turned around towards Sea Pines Boulevard, lights off, engines idling, waiting for the cars to come out of the marina lot.  Miles’ BMW came out first, followed by the Escalade, then the Lexus.  

   At the entrance to Route One, the Escalade headed north, while the Lexus and BMW turned south.  Shannon followed south.  Cara turned right, following the fat man.  She followed him confidently, knowing that he couldn’t possibly recognize her car, but she still kept distance between her car and his car knowing he was probably a pro and could spot a tail.  On and on they raced through the night.  Twice she thought she’d lost him and she sped up, desperately scanning right and left.  If she lost him now, would there be another chance?  Then his car would reappear and the chase was back on.  Her heart pounded and, veering in and out of traffic, she realized now and then that she’d forgotten to breathe.  At last he pulled off the highway, down a side street, lined with businesses, tacky tourist signs glowing right and left, and into the parking lot of a bar, a real shit hole. The Bergin Hunt & Fish Club.  He went in.

   “What the hell am I supposed to do now?” she muttered.

   Reluctantly, she pulled into a convenience store parking lot next door.

   “Great.  Here I am in an open vehicle, at night, in the worst area in the Keys.”

   Still, if not now, then when.  So she stuck it out.  An hour passed.  Feeling exposed as it grew closer and closer to midnight, she slid the seat back and slumped as close to floor as she could, out of sight watching the door of the bar as best she could through the Jeep’s open door.  Midnight.  One o’clock.  She was determined.  One-thirty.  Two.  Customers walked out, were thrown out, carried out, but still no fat guy.  A half hour past closing time, out walked the fat man through the back door along with another man.  The fat man held a stuffed envelope in one hand, slapped his companion on the shoulder with the other and with a beefy guffaw, headed for his SUV, got in and drove out into the dark streets.  

 Cara sat up, re-adjusting the driver’s seat, and took off after him.  About five more miles up Route One he pulled off and wound through a residential area stopping in front of an upscale condo complex.  A really nice place.  Not the kind of place one would expect a patron of the Bergin Hunt & Fish club to live.  After pulling into a parking spot in front of the building, he got out.  Cara came to a stop along the curb on the other side of the street.  Hauling his bulk out of the Escalade seemed to have been a difficult task for him and  he paused to rearrange himself.  Something further down the sidewalk drew his attention, making him look toward the easement which ran perpendicular to the sidewalk, between his condo unit and the next.  He walked down the sidewalk and turned right into the easement and disappeared from sight.  Cara watched.  A muffled pop and a orange-red flash flickered briefly from the easement onto the cars the parking lot, making her start violently in her seat.  She stared dumbly ahead, her mind frozen.  From the easement emerged a male form in a black athletic jacket, zipped to the neck, jeans, and a baseball cap pulled down casting a shadow over his face.  Casually, he tucked a 9- millimeter behind him, into his belt under his jacket, and walked off into the darkness.  

   It was her father.  



   “Seriously, guys, what the hell??” she spat in exasperation.

   All her father could manage was a mumbled apology and Paula blushed red enough to be seen in the dim light.  Cara headed directly for her room, the only place in the universe she imagined could offer refuge from this disconcerting scene.  She went over to her dresser, found two Ativans, popped them dry, flopped on her stomach on the bed, pushed her head deep into the pillow and awaited unconsciousness.  

   Time passed, the drug took effect, her mind wandered and she relaxed.  “Whatever.  Another one,”  she thought.  “That stupid idiot.”

    It wasn’t as if she’d heard his bed creaking and them moaning.  He’d spared her that anyway.  Paula had nice ones.  She wished she did.  Well maybe if they had twenty years taken off.  

   “I’m half Hispanic,” she thought.  “Aren’t Hispanic women supposed to have big breasts?”

   Women were attracted to Dad.  She’d give him that.  She wasn’t inclined to give him credit for much else at the moment.  Paula was well preserved for a forty-something.  He could seem so helpless.   But she knew his conniving mind.  He had a way of  talking you inside out.  Making you feel like a germ in a petri dish after awhile.  She’d grown up with him and was immune.  As smart as she knew Paula to be, she would see through him, at least eventually, and hold her own.  Paula and Dad.   On second thought, this could only improve things.  Paula was the strong, no bullshit type.  Dad was the weak, total bullshit type, at least for the last few years he had been.  If it took, this could be a good thing.  For her Dad anyway.  Her thoughts became less and less coherent as she drifted.  

   But before the medication could take her completely under, she remembered what Miles had told her at work.  Once again, she heard him in her head:  

   “Not much.  I’ve got to go down to Key West on Wednesday night …”

   She grabbed her phone off the nightstand and texted Shannon.  

   “You up?”

   As she waited, it occurred to her, she’d never heard the front door open or shut, which meant that Paula was still in the house.  She got up and peeked out into the darkened great room.  No one.  There was dim light coming from under her father’s door.  She moved over to the window.  Paula’s car was still outside.  

   “Nice,”  she thought.  “I busted them and they’re still going to. ”

   “Yeah,”  came Shannon’s reply.

   Cara called her.

   “Hey.  Wednesday night,”  Cara blurted out.  “He told me he’s going to Key West on Wednesday night.”

   “So.”

   “So… he was lying. “

   “Are you sure?”  asked Shannon.

   “As sure as I can be.  It was the way he said it.  Anyway, I think it’s worth a shot to follow him.  See what he does.”

   “Okay.  Get the night off.  When did he say he was going down there?  Where would he be leaving from?”

   “I don’t know,” Cara replied.   “We’ll just have to wait.  You hang out near his apartment.  I’ll work like normal, in case he comes into the bar.  If he comes in and I’m not there he might get suspicious.  If he does come in, when he leaves,  I’ll make some excuse and follow him and call you.  If you see him leave from his apartment, you follow him, call me when you’re sure he’s not coming to the bar and I’ll leave and join you wherever he ends up.”

   “Great.  Where’s a good place to watch his door?”  Shannon asked.  “So I can stay in my car.”

   “Watch him from the next street over.  It’s called Wolfe St. - one block over from Aliceanna where he lives.  You can sit in your car and watch between the houses.”

   “By the way, we hooked-up tonight,” Cara interjected.

   There was a pause.  “You and Miles?  How’d that go.”

   “I was scared at first.  Then it came time... and I wanted to.  Just to get at him,”  she was silent for a moment as angry tears emerged, burning her eyes.

   Shannon seemed to know.   “Are you okay?” she asked.

   “Yeah.  And I think I will be.  God, I hope we find something out on Wednesday.  I’ll be okay as long there there’s something we can do.  If not, I don’t know what…  I‘ll tell you more later.  I can‘t stay awake any longer.”

   “Be careful.”

   “I will.  By the way, Paula is in my Dad’s room.”

   “Heh.”

   “Someday maybe I‘ll learn…” she said.  “I’ll pay more attention to what people are trying to do to me than what I’m trying to do to them… When I was in college, I went out with this one guy… really controlling.  At first I was enjoyed the attention… enjoyed being an object in his possession.  He seemed so pleased to own me.  Told me I was beautiful all the time.  Just looked at me and told me I was beautiful.  He said it until I just didn’t hear it anymore… Then I really noticed it…  how much he tried to control me. I swear he looked through my email.  He’d tell me what to wear so he could parade me around.  I had a really good friend… a guy… we used to talk all the time.  But I couldn’t let the guy I was with know about him.  Everyone I liked he didn’t want around… always found something wrong with them.   People would try to me friend on MySpace.  Back when people used MySpace.  Ha.  If they were guys, I just wouldn’t respond because he would be able to see them when he stalked my page.  If they were girls that knew guys, I wouldn’t respond, ‘cause he could click through and see them.  I knew they‘d be hurt, but I was scared how he’d react. “

   “That’s fucked  up…”

   “Shannon.  Good ol’ Shannon.  Always willing to listen…”

   “You’re delirious.  Go to sleep.”

   She obeyed.  She hung up and went to sleep.


   Wednesday night came.  She had been working for a few hours when her phone rang.  She broke off the conversation she was having with an overly attentive forty-something to snatch it up from behind the register.  

   “He’s headed north up Route One… I’m three cars behind him… I’d bet anything he’s heading for Swan’s Wharf… where Katie saw him.  Get you’re ass up here.  Head up towards Swan’s.   I’ll text you if he goes somewhere else.”

   Now Cara began her preplanned performance.  A few minutes delay, trying to act normal, pouring beers, taking food orders, making small talk, then slowly she began to quiet down.  She made a show of leaning on one arm against the bar, waited for a few customers to notice and then headed for the ladies room and stayed there a while, flushing the toilet a few times before she walked out.  Trying her best to look pale and drawn, she walked over to Jake.

   “I just threw up,”  she said.

   “Damn, Cara.  Get the hell out of here.  Go home.  Call me if you need tomorrow off, Manny’ll cover for you.”

   The trick to looking sick is to look disoriented.  Cara grabbed her things and moved toward the door, stumbling once for affect.  Outside she checked to make sure no was around, ran for her jeep, jumped in, ground gravel off the lot and sped up the long drag that led to Route One.  Once she was on the highway, she called Shannon.

   “Where is he now?”  she asked.

   “He’s going to Swan’s… he’s gotta be.  He just turned onto Sea Pines.”

   “Where can I meet you?  Where should we park?”

   “The first left off Sea Pines just before the marina.  I’ll go way back.  I’ll be in my car.”

   A burst of adrenaline exploded into her blood commanding her heart to pound.  Expecting fear to follow, she was surprised to find that she felt, instead,  a momentary ecstatic thrill that quieted into reckless determination.  She was calm and ready.  The palm trees on either side of the highway,  rather than standing still awaiting her as she sped on through the dark, seemed to be sucked behind her through her headlights and southward.  At last, she hit Layton and veered right, towards the water and after a few zigzagging miles, she found Sea Pines Boulevard - a half mile from the marina.  She slowed down, shut off her lights, continuing until she found the last street on the left and turned onto it.  There was Shannon’s car at the dead end of the street.  She pulled in behind it.

   “Is he here?”

   “Yeah.  We can cut between these houses and over onto the hill overlooking the marina.  There‘re hedges up there we can hide behind.”

   “Good.”

   They picked their way through the dark on the spongy crabgrass in the damp soil of the neighborhood yards watching out for dogs, fences and other obstacles, staying out of sight of the marina.  Cara raced along after Shannon, head ducked down, looking over to her right at marina, watching for people under the lights on the jetty, making sure they weren’t seen - there was no one.  A few more strides and she careened face-first into the grass, smacking the side of face against a rock.  She had tripped over Shannon who had tripped over the head of a sprinkler jutting out of a yard.  Shannon cursed breathily.  Cara reached up to the side of her face and felt the warm sticky blood ooze.  They both got up and ran on.

   Reaching the top of the little slope they slid down onto their bellies to the ground on either side of a junction box in a gap in the hedge overlooking the marina, out of  the glow of the marina lights.  There was Miles’ BMW, parked on the marina lot at the opposite end.  They could see his white shirt reflected in the light in the driver’s seat of his car.  Within minutes, as the dew on the grass beneath them soaked into their clothes, another car drove up and then another.  The drivers got out and Miles got out and they all gathered behind the BMW.  The girls could make out Miles, and the heavyset, balding man from the bar the night Katie died and a third man, with a shock of black hair, dressed in light-colored hospital scrubs carrying a stainless steel box.  Shannon and Cara looked at each other.  If there was any doubt remaining about Miles, it was gone now.  

   The three men made their way down the marina jetty and turned together toward a large sailboat, at least 60 feet in length, about 25 yards down the jetty and clambered aboard.  On deck, they stopped and conferred for a moment before descending, one-by-one, down the main hatch.   The man in the scrubs carried the box down.  Seconds later, Cara and Shannon, 100 yards away, saw a light come on through the starboard porthole.  

   For the next the two hours, Shannon and Cara lay in the grass.  Time passed slowly and about half way in, Shannon was startled to hear heavy, rhythmic breathing and then a snort.

   “Hey wake up!” she hissed.  “What are you?  Fucking narcoleptic?”

   “Sorry…”  Cara replied.  “I think I passed out from the excitement.”

   “Keep your voice down, for God’s sake.”

   More waiting.

   At last, they heard the hatch creak open and saw the three men emerge.   The fat, balding man from the bar was now carrying the box.  They climbed off the vessel and made their way to the cars.  The fat man helped the scrubs-clad man load the noticeably heavier box into the trunk of a Lexus.  

   “We gotta get back to our cars, so we can follow them.”  said Shannon.  “I’m not interested in where Miles is going.  Let’s follow the other two.  You take the fat guy in the pimped Escalade.  I’ll take the guy with all the hair in the Lexus. ”

   Cara agreed.  “I’ll remember where that boat slip is.  We’ll want to check on that later.”

   Down the hill, they retraced their steps back through the yards to their car, being careful to remain hidden behind the slope of the ground.  Jumping back into their cars, they both turned around towards Sea Pines Boulevard, lights off, engines idling, waiting for the cars to come out of the marina lot.  Miles’ BMW came out first, followed by the Escalade, then the Lexus.  

   At the entrance to Route One, the Escalade headed north, while the Lexus and BMW turned south.  Shannon followed south.  Cara turned right, following the fat man.  She followed him confidently, knowing that he couldn’t possibly recognize her car, but she still kept distance between her car and his car knowing he was probably a pro and could spot a tail.  On and on they raced through the night.  Twice she thought she’d lost him and she sped up, desperately scanning right and left.  If she lost him now, would there be another chance?  Then his car would reappear and the chase was back on.  Her heart pounded and, veering in and out of traffic, she realized now and then that she’d forgotten to breathe.  At last he pulled off the highway, down a side street, lined with businesses, tacky tourist signs glowing right and left, and into the parking lot of a bar, a real shit hole. The Bergin Hunt & Fish Club.  He went in.

   “What the hell am I supposed to do now?” she muttered.

   Reluctantly, she pulled into a convenience store parking lot next door.

   “Great.  Here I am in an open vehicle, at night, in the worst area in the Keys.”

   Still, if not now, then when.  So she stuck it out.  An hour passed.  Feeling exposed as it grew closer and closer to midnight, she slid the seat back and slumped as close to floor as she could, out of sight watching the door of the bar as best she could through the Jeep’s open door.  Midnight.  One o’clock.  She was determined.  One-thirty.  Two.  Customers walked out, were thrown out, carried out, but still no fat guy.  A half hour past closing time, out walked the fat man through the back door along with another man.  The fat man held a stuffed envelope in one hand, slapped his companion on the shoulder with the other and with a beefy guffaw, headed for his SUV, got in and drove out into the dark streets.  

 Cara sat up, re-adjusting the driver’s seat, and took off after him.  About five more miles up Route One he pulled off and wound through a residential area stopping in front of an upscale condo complex.  A really nice place.  Not the kind of place one would expect a patron of the Bergin Hunt & Fish club to live.  After pulling into a parking spot in front of the building, he got out.  Cara came to a stop along the curb on the other side of the street.  Hauling his bulk out of the Escalade seemed to have been a difficult task for him and  he paused to rearrange himself.  Something further down the sidewalk drew his attention, making him look toward the easement which ran perpendicular to the sidewalk, between his condo unit and the next.  He walked down the sidewalk and turned right into the easement and disappeared from sight.  Cara watched.  A muffled pop and a orange-red flash flickered briefly from the easement onto the cars the parking lot, making her start violently in her seat.  She stared dumbly ahead, her mind frozen.  From the easement emerged a male form in a black athletic jacket, zipped to the neck, jeans, and a baseball cap pulled down casting a shadow over his face.  Casually, he tucked a 9- millimeter behind him, into his belt under his jacket, and walked off into the darkness.  

   It was her father.