Hurricane Bay

Sheila had been concerned about him.

But it seemed that Dane didn’t give a damn about her.

Kelsey kicked off her shoes and walked into the kitchen. She opened the refrigerator door, thanking God that she’d taken the time that morning to do a little shopping for herself. Juice, soda, beer and wine. She had a choice.

The heat she’d come from made her opt for a beer. She hesitated, her fingers curling around a bottle, remembering that she’d found Dane swilling the stuff. She moved her hand, choosing a bottle of cranberry-raspberry cocktail instead. No. She wanted a beer, and the fact that Dane had turned into a slug who drank the stuff lying on a lounge chair in the shade shouldn’t keep her from what she wanted.

Why the hell had he made her so mad? Right from the get-go. Okay, she’d been disturbed from the minute she’d talked to Nate, maybe unreasonably angry with Dane before she’d even headed out to speak to him. Why?

Uh-uh, she argued with herself. She wasn’t going to delve into the psychiatry of that one. She hadn’t seen him in years. And still, today…damn, she’d blown it, that was all. She’d meant to talk to him, get information. Everyone knew he’d been seeing Sheila again. Maybe they hadn’t become a twosome, the way they had been when they were young, but apparently they’d still been close. Even Larry Miller, another friend from the early days who she worked with and Sheila’s ex, had apparently known that, because he’d mentioned something about Sheila saying she was seeing Dane again when Kelsey had told him she was heading to Key Largo for her vacation, to spend time with Sheila.

Nate had told her that Dane and Sheila argued the last time he’d seen her. Cindy Greeley, one of her and Sheila’s best friends growing up, had told her the same.

She pulled out the Michelob, twisted off the cap, took a long swig and looked around the kitchen. “Sheila…am I crazy? Are you just being a careless and inconsiderate bitch, the way everyone seems to think? Where the hell are you?”

The air conditioner hummed in reply. No answer there. In the quiet of the early evening, the sound seemed absurdly loud.

She walked to the rear of the living room and opened the glass doors to the patio at the back of the duplex, separated by a small privacy wall from the neighboring side. Beyond stretched the standard-size pool that belonged to both occupants, surrounded by flowering plants and shrubs. The entire yard was surrounded by a rustic wood privacy fence. The backyard was beautiful and peaceful, the high point of the duplex. And actually, on the patio, she could feel a sweet, salt-touched breeze. She was startled to feel suddenly that it was good to be home. And it was still her home, no matter what anyone said—especially Dane.

Not that she had gone so very far. Her section of Miami was only an hour to an hour and a half away, depending on traffic. But life there seemed as different as night and day, even if the temperatures in both places were almost identical and the same flowers bloomed. A short walk from this duplex could bring her to the Atlantic, and she could look straight out from her condo patio and see the waters of Biscayne Bay, heading into the Atlantic, as well. And still, this was so different. She had felt it today at the Sea Shanty, the small-town warmth, the laid-back ease, even with the place crawling with tourists and the main objective among most of the populace being to make money off those tourists. There were other people, as well, retirees, Northerners sick of the snow, and weekenders who had fallen in love with their weekends and made Key Largo their home. She’d always wanted to see more of the world, and she’d gotten to see a lot of it now. Maybe that was why it seemed so good to feel as if she had really come home.

Once upon a time, home had been the pretty white-painted wooden house south on US1 on the ocean side of the island. No more. Her parents had sold the place years ago. They didn’t come back here anymore. In fact, the house no longer existed; it had been torn down to make way for the tennis courts for one of the new hotels. It had bothered her deeply when she’d started driving around today, so much so that she wished she had told her parents she wanted the house when they offered it to her before moving to Orlando.

Too late now.

Like them, at the time she had just wanted to get out of Key Largo.

She knew, of course, that when she’d left, she’d been running away. There had been far too much of Joe here then, and she had needed a new environment. Time could do good things. Now she liked it because there was still a lot of Joe here. Just as she had liked seeing Nate at the Sea Shanty, feeling the sun and the breeze at the Tiki hut bar, knowing that a short walk in bare feet would bring her to the little patch of private beach.

The Sea Shanty was like a bastion of memory. Nate’s dad had run it when they were kids. Now the place was Nate’s. And when she walked in, she really had felt that sense of coming home, of memory, nostalgia and mostly good things. She had felt a sense of poignant pleasure, being there. But then she had spoken with Nate and mentioned how worried she was about Sheila. Nate had started talking, and then she had seen Dane Whitelaw, plastered and vegetating in the sun, sunglasses in place, beer at his side, the picture of total inertia.

Dane Whitelaw, of all people.

Wasting his life. She’d seen it so many times. People who used this little corner of Eden to escape all responsibility, to drown themselves in beer and couch potato themselves into early graves.

And he was lying, to boot. He had seen Sheila, talked to her…done a lot more than talked, by his own admission. Why not? They’d been off and on for years. The worst of it was that he should care, be concerned. Even Larry, whom Sheila had hurt, had been concerned, insisting that she call him if she needed anything, if Sheila needed anything, if there was anything he could do…Sheila wouldn’t even need to see him. If she needed money, he would be happy to help her out. Nate had been concerned, too, shaking his head and telling her that they all worried about Sheila, but hell, what could they do? She was a grown-up.

Nate had told her, too, that Sheila often made dates with her friends—lunch, dinner, drinks, coffee, breakfast, whatever—and forgot to appear. She always had an apology, of course. Even so, Nate had seemed concerned, even as he tried to tell Kelsey that she shouldn’t be. He hadn’t seen Sheila in a week, and she never stayed away from the Sea Shanty that long.

Only Dane seemed indifferent. Crude. It appeared that he had come home just to drink himself into oblivion, and he didn’t give a damn about Sheila or anything else.

And, of course, there was that last page in Sheila’s diary, which she had found beneath the pillow on Sheila’s bed. At first she had shoved the book back under the pillow, surprised that Sheila had kept a diary, then determined that a diary was private and she had no right to read it. But when Sheila hadn’t appeared, she had skimmed through, and then gone to the last page.

Have to see Dane tonight. Tell him I’m afraid.

Private or not, she was going to read every page in the diary. Maybe she should have mentioned it to the police.

No. Not yet, anyway. Not until she knew what was in it herself. She wasn’t airing Sheila’s life to anyone, unless it became absolutely necessary.

There was a knock at the door. For a moment she clenched her teeth, wondering if Dane had decided to follow her back from the Sea Shanty. A man wouldn’t need to be a P.I. to find out where she was staying.

And he undoubtedly knew the way to Sheila’s place.

She marched barefoot to the front door, grateful that the owners of the duplex had done away with the old-time jalousie and put in solid wood doors. She looked through the peephole. Cindy Greeley, now her official next-door neighbor in the duplex where she herself was an unofficial guest, was standing on the porch with a tray of something in her hands.

Kelsey opened the door.

“Did you find out anything?” Cindy asked her.

Kelsey stepped back, letting Cindy enter. Even in her bare feet, she was almost a head taller than the other woman, five-nine compared with Cindy’s petite five-two. The smaller woman was compact, with sun-bleached hair, huge blue eyes and a tiny frame. She looked as if she should be heading off to high school, but she’d always had a terrific head on her shoulders, had made it nicely through college, and now owned eighteen T-shirt and shell shops throughout the Keys that might one day make her rich.

“Did I find out anything?” Kelsey said, her tone both musing and slightly bitter. “Nope. Nothing.”

“I told you,” Cindy said.

“Well, wait a minute. Maybe not exactly ‘nothing.’ I did find out that everyone saw Sheila arguing with Dane, but no one knows where she is now. Except, of course, I’m sure someone is lying. Want to come in and have something to drink?”

Cindy gave her a quizzical look for a moment. “Kind of early for you, isn’t it? You’re the kid who never had anything to drink during the day. And I thought you just came from the Sea Shanty?”

“It’s after five. Isn’t that cocktail hour?”

“Yeah, I guess. Sorry. I didn’t realize how late it was. Daylight Saving Time, you know. Seems it stays light so late. But hey, I told you to try one of those Wind-Runners over there. That should have knocked you for a loop. Didn’t you get one?”

“I ordered one. But I didn’t drink it.”

“Why not? They’re delicious.”

“It spilled,” Kelsey said. “Are you coming in?”

“Oh, yeah, sure. I just made quiche. Thought you might like some.”

“Good, you supply the food, I’ve got the beer.”

They walked on into the kitchen together. “I went down to the sheriff’s department. Sergeant Hansen let me fill out a missing persons report, though he wasn’t real thrilled about it. He didn’t seem to think there was anything odd about Sheila being gone for a week. Usually all you need is forty-eight hours. Here, your remains could be mummified and everyone still thinks you’ll show up when you feel like it.”

“Kelsey, that’s not true. It’s just that…”

“That what?”

“Sheila was living…a certain lifestyle,” Cindy said.

“Still, a missing persons report is important,” Kelsey told Cindy. She looked pointedly at her friend. “And it’s something no one else thought to do.”

“Kelsey,” Cindy said, taking a seat on one of the three bar stools at the kitchen counter, “I’m not sure what to say to make you feel better. You’ve got to realize, Sheila is always going off and not telling anyone.”

“I’m worried because she was supposed to meet me. Here. We made plans. I took my vacation time.”

Cindy shrugged, accepting a bottle of Michelob. “Kelsey, you haven’t seen a lot of Sheila in the last few years.”

“I haven’t seen her at all for at least two years,” Kelsey said.

Cindy spoke slowly. “So you just have to realize—you don’t really know her anymore.”

Kelsey shrugged, feeling the guilt that had plagued her lately over that very fact.

They’d all been friends, growing up. Slightly different in age, but friends because they were islanders, and the area had been pretty darn small back when they’d been kids. She was the youngest, Cindy was one year her senior, Sheila and Nate were the same age, two years older than Cindy. Of their little group, her brother, Joe, had been the oldest—with Dane Whitelaw just one month younger. Then there was Larry, who had been about the same age as Dane and Joe, but he had been a weekender, so he hadn’t really been in the same tight-knit group. Sometimes there had been other kids in the group, as well, guys like Jorge Marti, and even Izzy Garcia.

They’d all grown so far apart over the years.

Well, except for the fact that she worked with Larry, who had been instrumental in getting her into Sherman and Cutty, the advertising and promotions firm where she worked in the conceptual design department. Then, of course, Cindy and Nate were still close friends. And maybe she hadn’t really been that far away, because she had kept up with Cindy. And Nate. Despite the fact that she and Nate had been married and divorced in the blink of an eye. Oddly enough, though totally unsuited to be husband and wife, she and Nate had made it as friends. When she thought back, she was angry with herself for what she had done, marrying him. Of course, she had felt empty then, hurt and very alone. The void in her life had seemed like a bottomless pit. There had been nothing she wanted more then than to get away. And Nate…Nate had never been going anywhere. He’d loved Key Largo and known he was going to stay from the time he’d been a boy. Maybe she had thought of marriage as a means to run away. Whatever her thinking, it had been wrong, and she had done nothing but hurt Nate. Still, it seemed he had forgiven her. And he was happy. He loved his Sea Shanty. Loved fishing, diving, boating and just being in the sun. He had never talked about anything other than living his life right here.

Just as Sheila and Dane had talked about nothing but moving on.

She understood why with Sheila. And with Dane…maybe she understood him, too.

But they’d both come back.

And now she was back here, as well, especially to see Sheila. Except that Sheila had invited her down, sent her the key to the duplex and never appeared herself.

“Have you been out to see Sheila’s stepfather yet?” Cindy asked cautiously.

Kelsey experienced a slight and involuntary shudder. “No,” she said, her admission rueful.

“Well, neither have I,” Cindy murmured. “And he’s actually the man we should be asking about her.”

“I’m surprised she keeps in any kind of contact with him.”

“She has to. They’re connected by her mother’s trust fund.”

“You know what?” Kelsey said, suddenly decisive. “I’m going out there right now.”

“Wait a minute! Why?” Cindy asked. “We’re going to have beer and quiche. Kelsey, you have to eat, you know. You can go out and see Andy Latham anytime. Go tomorrow in the daylight.”

“It’s still daylight now,” Kelsey said. She was already at the door, slipping her sandals back on. “I suppose I really should have gone out there to see him first.”

“Why? Sheila hated him, you know that. If she had plans, she’d never have shared them with him. Not that she really made too many long-term plans. I lived in the other half of the same building, and I never knew what she was doing.”

“You just said she had to keep in contact with him because of her mom’s trust fund. He still might know something,” Kelsey said.

Cindy sighed. “Kelsey, her car is gone, so she obviously drove somewhere. Maybe you should start by looking for the car instead of with her stepdad. Though I still think you’re making a mountain out of a molehill.”

“Cindy, she knew I could only take so much time off. And she really wanted to see me. She was worried about something.”

Cindy was silent, which made Kelsey aggravated—with herself and with everyone else. Maybe they were right. She hadn’t seen Sheila in forever. A sense of guilt had brought her here, but the fact that she was feeling guilty didn’t mean that Sheila had suddenly become responsible, or that she wouldn’t forget her plans with Kelsey the same way she forgot plans with anyone else. Sheila might have talked to her, sounding desperate, then forgotten the plans they’d made just a few minutes later.

“Want to come with me?” she asked Cindy.

“No,” Cindy said with a shudder. “And I really don’t think you should go out there, either. You should wait. Get Nate or someone to go out with you. Dane would go. Dane has actually opened an investigations firm here. This is the kind of thing he does for a living. If anyone can find Sheila, it should be him. Make him go see Andy Latham with you.”

Kelsey shook her head, still feeling the burn of her encounter with Dane. “Hire one drunk to go see another?”

“You don’t understand about Dane,” Cindy said.

“Cindy, you’d champion Dane if he’d just robbed the National Bank.”

“Not true. He’s just…I don’t really know the story, but one of his clients was killed in St. Augustine.”

“Murdered?”

“Not exactly. According to the police, it was accidental manslaughter, or something like that.”

“All right, so something bad happened,” Kelsey said. “Bad things happen in the world. It shouldn’t have changed Dane into a vegetable. Anyway, I certainly don’t want his help now. He was like a slug this afternoon. I’ll be fine by myself. Andy Latham is just scuzzy, not dangerous. I’ll be back soon. Throw some quiche in the refrigerator and I’ll microwave it when I get back.” She was at the door.

“Great dinner companion you turned out to be,” Cindy called.

“Sorry.”

Kelsey, glad to feel that there was something she could actually do rather than sit around and wait for Sheila, let the door close behind her and headed quickly for her car.

She was startled when the door opened in her wake and Cindy came out. “Hey!”

Kelsey paused. “Yeah?”

“Kelsey…he might have been drinking this afternoon at Nate’s, but…why did you call Dane a drunk?”

“Let me see…Nate says he comes every afternoon. He’d had half a dozen beers by the time I got there. He was just sprawled out on a lounge chair when I arrived, looking like his mind had been fried for years. Nate said he’s been back here for several months, and that he’s opened a business so he can look like a solid citizen, but that his heart isn’t really in it.”

“That doesn’t make him a drunk.”

“He sure looked like one today.”

“He goes to Nate’s and drinks club soda most afternoons,” Cindy said.

“Trust me, he was reeking of beer.”

Cindy shrugged. “Okay, maybe he was drinking today. I’ve been known to have a few too many myself on occasion. Whatever. If you want to think he’s a drunk, fine, think he’s a drunk. I still think you’d be better off bringing a big drunk with military training out with you to see a scuzzbag.”

“I’ll be all right. I’ll keep my distance.”

“Honestly, Kelsey, you should wait,” Cindy said.

But Kelsey was already on her way.

“Help me, Dane.”

He could remember her words so clearly, and now, with the lowering sun bringing the onset of evening, he found himself hearing their echo over and over again.

There were things he should be doing. But he had searched the beachfront over and over again, and he had found exactly what he had expected: nothing. The “near storm,” as they were calling it, an exceptionally bad spate of weather that had never actually formed into a hurricane, had come through about a week ago before petering out when it moved north and west over Homestead and the Everglades. There had been no damage to the house, but palm fronds had come down with a vengeance, and the beach had been flooded for twenty-four hours before the water receded.

His first response upon examining the photo shoved under the door had been to search, regroup, search again, then think it all out and search for a third time.

No, his first response had been shock. Then sorrow. Deep, gut-wrenching sorrow.

Then had come the knowledge that he was being framed, and that no matter how hard he searched he wouldn’t find fingerprints or proof of any kind that anyone but he had been on his private beach—with Sheila.

The time for emotion was past. No, maybe it could never be past. But he sure as hell didn’t have time for the luxury of pity, self or otherwise. Nor could he fly off in anger.

Now it was time to spread out further, to figure out what the hell was going on and who the hell had hated Sheila viciously enough to kill her. Who was cunning, cruel and psychotic—and held such a deep and maniacal sense of vengeance against him?

With Kelsey in town, acting like the FBI, he was going to have to move more quickly than he’d imagined. Thankfully he had friends in the right places. But since he was withholding evidence, he’d also been aware that he would have to take everything very carefully. But now…

Now it was different.

He had an almost photographic memory, which was going to stand him in good stead right now. After the initial shock of seeing the photo, he had known just where to begin, starting on the most logical path to carry him in the direction of the truth. Except that, with what he did know, the path didn’t make any sense. He shouldn’t be wasting time, except that sitting here had never really been wasting time.

The water and the peace that could be found on a spit of dock on a little island called Hurricane Bay were always good for rational thinking and reasoning.

And remembering.

The long summer day was ending; at last the sun was beginning to set. This was the time when the world was most beautiful. He remembered, thinking as a kid, that his dad was just crazy. They’d had no air-conditioning, but his father had pointed out that the breeze always came through. The house had seemed a shack, but his dad had pointed out that they didn’t need any art on the walls, because they had the most beautiful vista anyone could ever imagine, every night. All they had to do was sit on the rustic porch and watch the sun set, watch as colors came out over the Atlantic, pinks, reds, golds, yellows. Sometimes the skies would be clear and the blue would turn slowly to strange pastels, then indigo, and then night would fall. Sometimes there would be clouds in the sky, and they would become a billowy cobalt before turning into dancing shadows against the moon. When storms came, it was just as beautiful, if different. The lightning would strike the water like bolts cast down by a furious god, and the trees would whip and bend in the wind.

Everything his father had said was true. Now he knew. Just as he knew that no meal in the world was better than fresh fish, just pulled from the sea and thrown on the grill. Odd that he would come to love this place, Hurricane Bay, when he had been so blind to its charms as a kid. Back then, he’d had no idea how great it was to own a private island.

He was glad he’d had the time to let his dad know how much he appreciated the place and had come to love it.

Sitting on the wooden dock, staring out over the water, he closed his eyes and heard her voice again.

CHAPTER 2

“Help me, Dane.”

Sheila’s voice was an echo in his head. A ghostly reproach.

He didn’t need to keep hearing it. He’d already damned himself a hundred times over.

He’d been sitting here that night, just as he was now, the last time he’d seen Sheila arrive at Hurricane Bay.

But before that…

Would things have been different if he hadn’t seen her in action just that day?

He’d been at the Sea Shanty just before she had come over. He’d been drinking soda water with lime, discussing surveillance cameras with Nate. Nothing big had happened. Nate thought that maybe one of his bartenders had decided he wasn’t quite making it on tips and was helping himself to the till. Dane didn’t intend to work for Nate, and he had no intention of charging for the advice he gave. Sheila had been there, too. She came almost every afternoon at about five.

She never bought her own drinks.

Maybe she hadn’t known he was there. Maybe she had known and hadn’t cared. Once upon a time, way back when, he and Sheila had been something of a twosome. But he had to admit, he’d never been in love with her. From the time he had been a little kid, he’d had a path in mind for himself, a plan for his life. A lot of that had come from Mr. Cunningham and Joe, but whatever the reason, his future had been the burning essence in his mind.

He hadn’t wanted to wind up a fisherman in Key Largo, hoping for a catch, dodging the tourists, sucking up to the tourists, watching restaurant managers come and go.

If anything, he’d been determined he was going to own the restaurants.

And Sheila…

Well, at one time she might have loved him in her way. But she’d been just as intent on her own path. She’d wanted out. And getting out had meant more to Sheila than attaching herself to a man with no specific prospects, even if he had ambition. She’d spent her high school years sizing up the tourists and the weekenders—Floridians who usually lived fairly close to Key Largo, where they kept condos or vacation homes, and left their prestigious jobs in the city on Friday after work and returned Sunday night, ready to go back to work on Monday morning.