Marty Ambrose - Mango Bay 02 - Island Intrigue (9 page)

He nodded as he steered the boat toward the marina
docks.

“Here-take the wheel” Nick stepped out of the way
and positioned me in the captain’s chair. “Look, I know
this is a tough situation, but I need you to do as I say for
once.” He stood behind me, his hands on my shoulders.
“I can’t trust you to handle the line, but I don’t want us
to ram the dock either.”

“Okay.” I tried to push all thoughts of Tom’s death
out of my mind. Focus.

Detective Billie moved to the front of the boat. I throttled back the engine on his command, and when we drew
close enough to the dock, he jumped off and retrieved
the rope. He then tied up.

Every movement exhibited his muscular grace and
economy of movement. Strong yet controlled. Intent on
getting the job done and not making mistakes. That was
Nick’s credo-he didn’t like to mess up-whereas I
made a habit of regularly messing up. Except this time.
Aside from the rope debacle, I’d handled myself pretty
well on the boat.

Permitting myself a tiny smile of satisfaction, I cut
off the engine and called down to Kevin. He came up
on deck, his hands shoved into his jeans pockets.

“Is Mom here?” he asked.

“If Wanda Sue was able to call her-” Detective Billie began.

“Kevin!” a woman exclaimed as she came running
toward the dock.

“Mom!” Kevin scrambled off the boat and torpedoed
into a petite woman sporting a honey-colored, retrosixties flip hairdo and candy-cane-pink warm-up suit.
Had to be Wanda Sue’s daughter, all right.

She wrapped her arms around him and nuzzled the
top of his head with her face. “I was so worried about
you,” she said over and over.

I gulped hard, my eyes bordered with tears.

“Thanks a lot, Mallie.” Nick now stood next to me.

“I came along for the ride.” I shrugged, turning away,
not wanting him to see how much I was affected by the
touching scene. I was Mallie Monroe, flaky and carefree,
totally unsentimental, not the type of person to start sobbing over a mother and son reuniting. I didn’t let myself
get involved like that. “It was nothing”

“Not to me-or them”

I didn’t dare look at him. All my defenses were down,
and that could be dangerous. The last time it happened
was Valentine’s Day in Orlando, after my boyfriend de
jour had left to “find himself” out West. I ended up at my
Airstream around 2:00 A.M. with a butterfly tattoo on my ankle and my hair dyed with electric blue streaks.
Fortunately, the tattoo was a wash-off kind and the dye
temporary. A lucky escape.

“Oh, there’s Wanda Sue” I pointed to my landlady,
closing in on her daughter and grandson. Without waiting for a reply, I jumped off the boat and headed toward them.

“How can Sally Jo and I ever thank you, Mallie?”
Wanda Sue gushed as she gave me a long, hard hug.

“No need. I’m just happy that we were able to bring
Kevin home all safe and sound” I smiled down at him.

“I’ll be forever grateful,” Sally Jo joined in. Her face
was a younger version of Wanda Sue’s, all right. Same
wide mouth, snub nose, and over-plucked brows. “My
son means everything to me”

“Detective Billie did all the work. I just … uh …
threw him a rope.”

“She did more than that,” he said as he approached
us, his hard-planed features softened for once. “Let’s
go inside. It’s cold out here, and we need to talk”

“Where’s Tom?” Sally Jo scanned Detective Billie’s
face. He didn’t answer. She bit her lip and blinked several times, her eyes welling with tears.

Wanda Sue looked at me. I cast my glance downward.

Silently we trooped into the marina office, our silence
telling them what they needed to know. Then Kong’s excited yapping greeted me. I scooped him up and clutched
him to my chest. He was the one constant in this crazy,
sad day. My canine life preserver.

The rest of the evening passed in a blur. We huddled
near the space heaters while Detective Billie took care
of the arrangements for the Coast Guard to retrieve Tom’s
body. Eventually Kevin fell asleep in his mother’s arms,
and my head began to droop like a wilted flower. After
the adrenaline rush of Kevin’s rescue, exhaustion hit and
drained the energy from my body.

“Why don’t you go home?” Nick finally said to me.
“There’s nothing more you can do here. After Wanda
Sue and Sally Jo identify the body, I’ll take them home”

I turned to Wanda Sue. “You going to be okay?”

“We’ll be just fine,” she said, her hands trembling.
“We got our boy back-that’s something.”

With leaden feet, I exited the marina office, still
carrying Kong. What had started out as your average
Coral Island morning had turned into a day fraught with
a missing boy, miscast ropes, and a dead man. Major
bummer.

I nuzzled the top of Kong’s head. At least Kevin was
safe. But, then again, his father was dead. And, in spite
of my fatigue, I wanted to know what had happened.

The next morning, I awoke to the jangling of my faux
leopard-skin Princess telephone. It had cost $19.95 at a
discount store and had one of those cheap, shrill rings
that sounded like squeaking brakes on a rain-slick road.
But since I was still living from paycheck to paycheck, it
would do just fine.

“Hello.”

“Mallie, how are you? It’s your mother.”

Oh, no.

“Are you still in bed? What a sleepyhead.”

I opened one eyelid to check the clock on my nightstand. “Oh, yeah. It’s almost six-thirty. The day is practically over.” Kong licked the side of my face, as if to
reassure me. I held the phone up so he could listen.

My mom laughed with a high-pitched twitter. “Your
sister, Paula, is always up with the dawn to jog before
she goes to work. Honestly, I don’t know how she does
it. A full-time job, two kids, and a husband who’s a doctor. She’s remarkable”

I silently mouthed the last two words with her, having heard them a hundred times before.

“We spoke to your great-aunt last night, and she said
you were doing very well in your little newspaper job”
She paused.

“You could say that.” Translated: We’re amazed
you’ve kept this job longer than six months.

“Keep up the good work, Mallie.”

“Thanks.” Translated: We don’t think you’ll last another six months.”

She cleared her throat. Translated: I’m about to drop
a bomb.

“Your father and I … uh … were thinking about visiting you on Coral Island.”

I jerked into an upright position, knocking Kong onto
the floor; he whined in protest. “Oops, sorry.” I whisked
him up into my arms and hugged him.

“Sorry about what?”

“Nothing-I was talking to Kong.”

“Oh … well, anyway, we want to visit Coral Island.
Maybe check it out along with some other Florida locales.” Her tone was so abnormally chipper, it almost
caused sunshine to spill out of the receiver. I looked
around in vain for my sunglasses. “Your father and I
are thinking about buying a retirement home. Nothing
big, mind you. Maybe a four thousand square foot cottage with a swimming pool, cabana, and tennis courtsomewhere on the water with a country club nearby.
The kind of place where we can be part of a community
of like-minded people.”

I gasped. My parents on Coral Island? With no
buffer? “I … I thought you hated Florida. Said it was
full of bugs and displaced crazies.”

“All the more reason for people like us to move
there-we’re dependable, solid, cultured. Just imagine
how much we could improve the tone of life. And
the warm winters would be nice.”

“It does get cold here,” I felt obligated to point out.
“Almost frigid at times.”

“Really?”

“Oh, yes”

Silence. Translated: I know you’re lying, but I’ll just
pass over that for now and wound you very deeply later.

“It doesn’t matter, Mallie. We still want to visit.” Her
tone was firm, final.

Kong hid his head under my pillow. I wanted to do the same. “All right. Let me know when you’re coming,” I managed to get out between clenched teeth.

“It may be sooner than you think.”

Uh-oh.

“Look for us when you see us. Ta-ta.” She hung up.

Ta-ta? I stared at the phone, then fell back onto my
bed in defeat.

It took me three donuts and two twelve-ounce black
coffees to get my equilibrium back after the phone conversation with my mother. Not to mention the “Ta-ta.”
Where did that come from?

By the time I breezed into the Observer office, I was
able to suppress the dread over her possible visit and
even manage what I thought passed for a cheery greeting to Sandy.

“Did your mother call this morning?” she inquired
after one look at my face.

“Does it show?”

Her eyes grew openly amused. “You get this trappedanimal look, and your lips freeze up.”

I flexed the corners of my mouth up and down to get
them to relax again, but the whole lower half of my face
felt as stiff as cement.

“You need to talk to my mom,” Jimmy the Painter
chimed in. Dressed in his white, paint-splattered overalls, he was perched on the side of Sandy’s desk, apparently taking a water break. “She specializes in family
problems. Helps you to clear the negative energy.”

“I appreciate the offer. But I think I’ll do it the old fashioned way-bury my anger in work and then kick
the dog when I get home”

Jimmy looked so taken aback, I hastened to assure
him that I was joking. I’d never take so much as a pinkie
toe to Kong.

“We heard about what happened last night,” Sandy
said, tucking the price tag into the sleeve of her soft
beige angora sweater. “Too bad about Tom. He was a
good guy.”

My mind went back to the scene yesterday, when I
saw Tom’s body splayed against the mangroves. I shuddered inwardly.

“Detective Billie thinks he was probably drinking
too much, fell overboard, and drowned” I sat down at
my desk and flipped through my notes. “What do you
think?”

Sandy tapped her chin. “It’s possible. Tom liked his
beer, but so does every other red-blooded guy on this
island.”

“Not me,” Jimmy said, holding up a bottled water
with a wink.

“You’re special.” Sandy flashed a smile at him, one
of those soft, feminine, I’m-stuck-on-you, intimate-as-
a-kiss smiles. Good for her. At least one of us had a decent male prospect.

“Tom would’ve had to drink an awful lot to fall overboard,” I pointed out.

“True” Sandy turned her attention back to me. “And
I don’t think he was the type to drink that much when he had his son on the boat. Tom was a good father. He
loved Kevin a lot”

My eyes met hers. “If it wasn’t an accident, that means
someone deliberately knocked him overboard.”

“But who?”

“I don’t know. Kevin was the only other person on
the boat…

We stared at each other for a few moments, unable to
say the words aloud.

“It’s time to get Mom on it.” Jimmy stood up and
shook out his tattered overalls. “She’ll be able to tell if
there was foul play.”

“Give her a call, Mallie,” Sandy urged. “Oh, and tell
her to hurry up with Anita’s astrological chart while
you’re at it.”

“I just might.” Hah.

“Might what?” Anita asked as she breezed into the
office, chomping on her gum with loud smacks.

“Uh … I might take an early lunch,” I lied.

“Nobody is going to lunch today when we’ve got a
dead body waiting to make the front page” Anita cackled, or it might’ve been a cough. I couldn’t tell; it hadn’t
been all that long since she stopped smoking, and her
lungs no doubt still contained soot the consistency of
old asphalt. “By the by, nice move last night, Mallie.
Making sure you were on the boat that rescued Kevin.
Got some firsthand coverage there. And you were there
to see his father’s body-even better.”

“I didn’t plan it that way. Nick Billie asked me to go
with him, and I did.”

“Pffft” She waved a bony hand. “You’re a reporter
now. Anytime something happens, you have to think
about how you’re going to get the story. That’s the important thing. If you pass an accident, slow down and
check it out. If you see a bank robbery, chase down the
culprit and interview him. If you see a body-“

“Call the police?” I offered.

“Take pictures.” Anita motioned for me to follow her
into her office.

Groaning inwardly, I rose to my feet and grabbed my
notepad. Sandy gave me an encouraging smile as I trailed
Anita into her glass-encased cubicle.

“Close the door,” she ordered as she tossed her coat
over the top of a battered file cabinet.

I complied, eying the gum wrappers littering the floor
and hoping yet again that I wasn’t stepping on anything
gooey.

“Okay, what happened last night?” She folded her
arms across her chest. Wearing a faded olive sweater
and plaid polyester pants, she competed with me for the
Cheapest Clothing To Keep Warm Award. “Did you get
interviews?”

“Not really. But I did jot down some general notes.” I
held up my notepad.

“That’s something, I guess. Let me see” She snatched
it from my unresisting fingers and flipped through the pages. “This is a start. You can write about Kevin’s
rescue-that’s got real human interest. Local boy and
everything. Talk to his mother-she lives at Heron’s
Landing.”

“What about finding Tom’s body?” I eased into the
plastic chair across from Anita’s desk.

“That’s your lead, kiddo. Knocks those mediocre Town
Hall and Autumn Festival stories to page two. Death is
big news. If you finish it by tomorrow, we’ll make the
Friday deadline for next week’s edition.” Anita tossed
my notepad onto her desk. “Then you can do a follow-up
story this weekend. By that time, cause of death should
be determined, and we’ll know if there was foul play”

“Detective Billie thinks that Tom got drunk and fell
off the boat. Then he probably drowned” I ignored her
criticism of my writing topics. Could I help it that not
much happened on Coral Island that was particularly
newsworthy?