Whispers and Lies Read online

  “You’re crazy.” Reluctantly I rolled my eyes toward the tree. “Oh, my God. You’re right.”

  Lance laughed so loud, he startled the nearby egret, who soared gracefully into the air, like a giant paper plane. “Ain’t nature grand?”

  “They’re called screw palms,” I whispered.

  “What?”

  “You heard me.”

  “You’re kidding me, right?”

  “Honestly. That’s their name.”

  “Screw palms?”

  “I couldn’t possibly make up something like that.”

  Lance shook his head, grabbed my elbow, picked up the pace of our walk. “Come on,” he said, laughing. “All this talk about screwing is making me hungry.”

  “YOU SHOULD HAVE SEEN this city twenty years ago,” I was saying between bites of my hamburger. “Half these storefronts were vacant, the school system was a disaster, race relations were a mess. About the only business that was doing well was the drug trade.”

  “Really?” It was the first time since I’d started my verbal tour of Delray that Lance had shown any real interest. “And how’s the drug trade doing these days?” he asked, surveying the line of motorcycles parked outside the large front patio where we were sitting. “I mean, where would a person go if he were interested in such things?”

  “Jail, most likely,” I said as Lance’s lips curled into a grudging smile.

  “Cute. You’re very cute.”

  My turn to smile. Cute had never been a word used to describe me.

  We watched a middle-aged man whose ragged, gray ponytail extended halfway down the back of his black leather jacket as he wiggled his sagging gut between two chairs. Grandpas on wheels, I thought, taking another bite of my burger, wondering how anyone could wear leather in this heat. “Now, of course, the city’s completely changed.”

  “And what changed it exactly?”

  I paused, trying to choose between the short and long answers, deciding on the short. “Money.”

  Lance laughed. “Ah, yes. Money makes the world go round.”

  “I thought it was love.”

  “That’s because you’re a hopeless romantic.”

  “I am?”

  “You’re not?”

  “Maybe,” I admitted, squirming under his sudden scrutiny. “Maybe I am a romantic.”

  “Don’t forget hopeless.” He reached across the table and peeled several sweat-dampened hairs away from my forehead with a gentle but confident hand, as if he were teasing a bra strap off my shoulder.

  I lowered my gaze to the table, the tips of Lance’s fingers lingering on my flesh even after he’d removed his hand. “What about you?”

  He lifted a sauce-coated sparerib from his plate to his mouth, tearing the meat off with one neat tug. “Well,” he said with a wink, “I love money. Does that qualify?”

  I took a sip of my beer, held the ice-cold glass against my throat, trying to ignore the perspiration trickling into the deep vee of my white T-shirt.

  “Wow! Would you look at those babies!” Lance exclaimed, and I saw that Lance’s attention had been captured by the two shiny black motorcycles with chrome-plated monkey-hanger handlebars that had just pulled up in front of the restaurant. “Aren’t they beauties?”

  “Harley-Davidsons?” I asked, pulling out the only brand with which I was familiar, trying to sound interested.

  Lance shook his head. “Yamaha 750cc Viragos.” He punctuated his sentence with an appreciative whistle.

  “You obviously know a lot about motorcycles.”

  “A bit.” He raised another barbecued rib to his lips, then slowly and meticulously stripped it bare.

  I thought of Alison. She would have polished off those ribs in a heartbeat. “Maybe we should call Alison. See how she’s doing.”

  Lance patted his cell phone, which lay on the table next to his plate. “She knows my number.”

  “It’s been over an hour.”

  “She’ll call.”

  I rubbed the back of my neck, the sweat coating my fingers like shellac. “Has your family been very worried about her?”

  He shrugged. “Nah. They pretty much know what to expect by now.”

  “Which is?”

  “Alison’s gonna do what Alison’s gonna do. No point arguing. No point getting in her face about it.”

  “But you obviously felt concerned enough to fly down here and see for yourself.”

  “Just checking to make sure she’s okay. I mean, she comes to Florida, doesn’t know a soul …”

  “She knew Rita Bishop,” I said, recalling the name of Alison’s friend.

  “Who?”

  “Rita Bishop.” I wondered if I had the name correct.

  Lance looked confused, although he tried to hide it by tearing into another rib. “Oh, yeah, Rita. Whatever happened to her anyway?”

  I realized I’d forgotten to ask personnel to find out where she’d gone. “I don’t know. Alison couldn’t locate her.”

  “Typical.” Lance released a deep breath of air. “It’s hot,” he said, as if noticing the temperature for the first time.

  “I think it’s sweet that you were concerned about your sister. I didn’t think you were that close.”

  “Close enough to worry.” He shrugged, an increasingly familiar gesture. “What can I say? Maybe I’m a romantic after all.”

  I couldn’t help but smile. I liked Lance for worrying about Alison’s welfare. “It’s nice you could take the time off work.”

  “No problem when you’re self-employed.”

  “What is it you do?” I tried to remember if Alison had ever mentioned her brother’s occupation.

  Lance looked surprised by the question. He coughed, ran his hand through his hair. “Systems analyst,” he said, so quietly I almost didn’t hear him.

  My turn to be surprised. “They teach that sort of thing at Brown?”

  “Brown?”

  “Alison said you graduated summa cum laude.”

  He laughed, coughed a second time. “Long time ago. A lot of beer under the bridge since then.” He hoisted his mug into the space between us, finished what was left in his glass, and swiveled around in his chair, looking for the waiter. “You ready for another one?”

  My own mug was still half-full. “I’m fine for the moment.”

  “Another draft,” Lance called to a bald and heavily tattooed waiter resting against the far wall. FEAR was stamped in large blue letters along his right forearm; NO MAN was imprinted on the other. Charming, I thought, noticing a man nursing a beer at a small round table in the corner, a red bandanna wrapped around his forehead like a blood-soaked strip of gauze. Long, calloused fingers stroked a beard that was dark and scruffy. The man was staring at me, I realized, thinking there was something disturbingly familiar about him, trying to remember if and when I’d seen him before.

  “How’s your burger?” Lance asked, swatting a buzzing insect away from his head as he squinted into the sunlight.

  “It’s fine.”

  “Just fine? My ribs were fantastic. I’m thinking of ordering another pound.”

  I glanced at his empty plate. “Are you serious?”

  “I’m always serious about what I put in my mouth.” His tongue lapped some errant sauce from his upper lip.

  Was he flirting with me? Or was the heat starting to affect my brain? Should have worn a hat, I could almost hear my mother say.

  I looked away, my eyes pulled back toward the man with the red bandanna. He cocked his head to one side, then raised his beer mug in a silent toast, as if he’d been expecting me to look his way again. Where had I seen him before?

  “So, tell me what you think of my baby sister,” Lance instructed as the waiter approached with his beer. Lance gulped at its large head, chewed it as if it were solid food.

  “I think she’s great.”

  “She involved with anyone special these days?”

  “Not to my knowledge.”

  “She tell yo
u about her ex-husband?”

  “Just that he was a mistake.”

  Lance laughed, shook his head.

  “You don’t agree?”

  “Seemed like a nice enough guy to me. But, hey, what do I know? She’s the one who lived with him. Although Alison doesn’t always know what’s good for her,” he added, his face darkening as a cloud passed by overhead.

  “I don’t think I agree with that.”

  “I don’t think you know Alison as well as I do.”

  “Maybe not,” I conceded, deciding to shift the focus of the conversation away from Alison. “What about you? Any sweet young thing on the horizon?”

  “Not really.” Lance allowed a slow smile to creep across his lips. “Actually, I’ve always had a thing for older women.”

  I laughed. “You should drop by the hospital one day. I’ll introduce you to some of my patients.”

  Lance stretched his neck back over the top of his spine and poured half his beer down his throat. “So, what’s the story on this guy who sings here every Thursday night?” he asked, as if this were the most logical of follow-ups.

  I glanced at the large cardboard cutout of a Las Vegas—styled Elvis impersonator—long sideburns, rhinestone-studded, white jumpsuit, flowing cape, classic karate pose—that greeted patrons at the door to the restaurant’s interior. “He’s a Delray policeman, believe it or not.”

  “Is he any good?”

  “Very good.” I’d heard him the time I was here with Erica. I gasped, suddenly realizing where I’d seen the man with the red bandanna before. I’d seen him with Erica Hollander. My eyes shot toward the corner of the patio, but the man was no longer there.

  “Something wrong?” Lance asked, signaling the waiter for another half order of ribs and two more beers. Clearly we weren’t going anywhere anytime soon.

  “Will you excuse me a minute?” I was already out of my chair and heading for the washrooms at the back of the restaurant before he could answer. I needed to splash some cold water on my face. The heat was definitely getting to me.

  The interior of the restaurant was soothingly dark and, while not exactly cold, considerably cooler than outside. I passed the large bar, its barstools constructed from the old hoists of the former gas station. Most people ate outside, but a few wooden tables hugged by leatherette furniture were scattered around the room for those who preferred not to see what they were eating. “The pig place,” people called Elwood’s, with affection. I wondered, as I brushed by another potbellied biker, if they were referring to the menu or the clientele.

  I spent the next few minutes in the washroom, trying to convince myself that my mind was playing tricks on me, that the heat plus my overly active imagination had deceived me into thinking that the man with the red bandanna and scruffy goatee was anything but an overly familiar stereotype. Of course I didn’t know him. Of course I’d never seen him with Erica.

  Except even as I was trying to convince myself I was seeing bogeymen who didn’t exist, I knew the truth—that I had seen the man before, seen him with Erica, and not just once, but several times. And not only here, I realized, as a series of suppressed images assaulted my already spinning brain, but much closer to home. Hadn’t I seen him coming out of the cottage on several mornings with his arm around Erica’s waist? Hadn’t I heard the unmistakable sounds of a motorcycle disappearing down the middle of a darkened street on several evenings? And did the fact he was back mean Erica was back as well?

  I sprinkled water on my neck, dabbed a few drops behind my ears, as if it were perfume, stared at myself in the grimy mirror over the sink. My mother stared back. “Dear God,” I said out loud, realizing how much her features were starting to intrude upon my own.

  Except for the eyes in the back of her head, I thought ruefully, remembering her terrifying admonition when I was a little girl. There’s no point in trying to fool me, she’d warned. I see everything. I have eyes in the back of my head.

  Too bad I hadn’t inherited those, I thought, returning to the patio. My table was empty, and I looked around for Lance.

  I saw the man with the red bandanna first. He was standing by the row of motorcycles parked along the curb, one hand resting on a pair of steel handlebars, and he and Lance were having an obviously serious conversation. I watched the man lean forward to whisper something in Lance’s ear, before climbing on his bike and backing out into traffic, acknowledging me with a barely perceptible nod of his head. Lance remained where he was, as still as the cardboard-imitation Elvis, his fists clenched tightly at his sides.

  “What was that about?” I asked when Lance returned to the table.

  “What was what about?”

  “That guy you were talking to.”

  “What about him?”

  “How do you know him?”

  “I don’t know him.” Lance’s eyes squinted into the sunlight.

  “You were talking to him.”

  “I’m a friendly guy.”

  “Don’t play games with me, Lance.”

  “What kind of games?” Lance leaned back in his seat, ran his tongue along his lower lip.

  “Look, that guy you were talking to is bad news. He was involved with my previous tenant. I think he’s been phoning me,” I said, realizing this was true.

  “You think? You don’t know?” Lance looked amused.

  “I’m not sure,” I backpedaled, beginning to doubt my instincts.

  “Sorry, sweetheart, I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about.”

  “Why were you talking to him?”

  “Why is it so important?”

  “What were you talking about?” I pressed, my voice rising in frustration.

  “Hey,” Lance said softly, his hand reaching across the table to stroke my arm. “No need to get upset. It was nothing. I was just telling him how much I liked his bike. That’s all it was. You okay?”

  I nodded, somewhat mollified. Already I was starting to feel foolish about my outburst.

  Lance picked up his cell phone. “Time to give Alison a call.”

  FOURTEEN

  Alison joined us at Elwood’s within minutes of Lance’s call, her migraine blissfully vanquished. “Those pills you gave me were a godsend,” she told me repeatedly, looking radiant in her blue sundress, as she simultaneously wolfed down an order of spareribs and chewed on a mouthful of french fries. I marveled that she managed to do so with such grace. I also marveled that her headache had had no effect on her appetite. Indeed, she seemed in better shape than I did. “Are you okay?” she asked me as Lance was settling the bill.

  “Me? I’m fine.”

  “You’re so quiet.”

  “Terry thought she saw some guy who was involved with her last tenant,” Lance interjected.

  “Really? Who?”

  I shook my head. “It probably wasn’t him. Must be the heat,” I demurred, now almost convinced I’d been mistaken.

  “It’s a scorcher all right.” Alison looked around the patio, still crowded at almost three o’clock. “Okay, so where should we go now?”

  I suggested a visit to the Morikami Museum and Japanese Gardens, something I thought would be both soothing and interesting, but Alison said she wasn’t in the mood for museums and Lance reiterated that nature wasn’t his thing. So instead we went for a long walk along the Intracoastal Waterway and took a boat ride on the Ramblin’ Rose II, then sat on the seawall at twilight and watched the bridge as it opened for a small parade of magnificent yachts on their way to the Bahamas.

  “Did you know that alligators move really fast?” Alison asked later, apropos of nothing at all, as we strolled along Seventh Avenue, heading for home. “And that if you’re ever being chased by one, you should run in a zigzag, because alligators can only move in a straight line?”

  “I’ll keep that in mind,” I said.

  “What’s the difference between alligators and crocodiles?” Lance asked.

  “Crocs are nastier,” Alison said with the sweetest of smi
les. She stretched her arms toward the sky, as if reaching for the full moon that dangled precariously overhead. “I’m starving.”

  “You just ate,” I reminded her.

  “That was hours ago. I’m famished. Come on, let’s go to Boston’s.”

  “I’m game,” Lance said.

  “You two go. I’m exhausted.”

  “Come on, Terry. You can’t poop out on us now.”

  “Sorry, Alison. I have to be up really early in the morning. What I need now is a cup of herbal tea, a soothing bubble bath, and my nice comfortable bed.”

  “Let Terry go,” Lance urged his sister softly.

  “Did you have a good time?” Alison stared at me expectantly, the fat yellow moon reflected in eyes as eager as a child’s. “Three words.”

  “Yes,” I answered truthfully, dismissing any lingering concerns about the man in the red bandanna. I’d done my best to forget about him during the long afternoon, but like a bad penny, he kept popping up. “Yes. Yes. Yes,” I said, banishing his image altogether.

  Alison wrapped me in a tight embrace, several loose tendrils of her hair tickling my cheek, sneaking between my lips. “See you later, alligator,” she said, kissing my forehead.

  “In a while, crocodile,” I answered back, watching them until they turned the corner and were swallowed by the night. I could hear Alison laughing in the dark, and I wondered briefly what she found so amusing. The echo of her laughter pursued me down the street, bouncing off my back like sharpened stones.

  What’s the difference between alligators and crocodiles? Lance had asked.

  Crocs are nastier, Alison had replied.

  My house was in total darkness. Normally I leave at least one light on, but Lance had ushered me out so quickly, I’d obviously forgotten. Proceeding cautiously, my eyes scanning the ground in case Bettye McCoy had returned with the dogs from hell, I zigzagged up my front path, mindful of hungry alligators that might have strayed dangerously off course.

  Feeling both relieved and foolish—foolishly relieved?—I unlocked the front door and flicked on the light switch, my eyes sweeping across the sofa, the Queen Anne chairs, the painting of peonies on the wall beside the window, the Christmas tree in the corner, the numerous presents beneath it, the daunting parade of Santas and reindeer and elves Alison had lovingly assembled.