Billy found Jack Landry’s cottage . . . no problem.
It was stuck at the end of a once-paved road, now well into disrepair. Great chunks of asphalt were missing, crumbled, leaving only sandy holes to bite at his Jeep’s tires.
But the Cherokee handled them pretty well—just as long as he went slow.
First thing he noticed as he came to the small place: it was about as isolated a joint as he had seen out here. Farther along the coast of the inlet, he could see really serious houses, waterfront mansions—complete with their private docks, boathouses, and expansive windows looking out to, he guessed, the east and the rising sun.
So—why are there no other places right here?
Good question, he thought. Could be no decent foundation to build on—not a spot for anyone’s dream waterfront home. Maybe a flood issue? That does happen out here.
Or maybe owned by some eccentric who liked the isolation amid the sandy hummocks—and for some reason did not want to sell. Just let this little cottage be here.
He pulled close to the place, killed the ignition, and got out.
No police tape here, he saw.
Which—based on what Chief Bristow had told him—made sense. No evidence of a crime, so this place—not a crime scene. Just awaiting the next of kin to come check out the weathered cottage. Get what they could.
Like Landry’s daughter, who, according to her, he rarely ever saw.
And Billy also doubted he’d find anything of interest, at least about the man who supposedly vanished at sea.
He walked up the two splintery steps to the front door . . .
* * *
The door was locked. But he saw that it was the type of flimsy lock and doorknob arrangement that could be easily jimmied open. Billy hadn’t done that, well, in a long time. But it was an old trick he’d learned when he did his own stay behind bars.
Actually, considering his stay in prison for fraud, he often thought of it as a very useful education. The school of hard knocks . . . squared. Let’s just say he graduated magna cum laude with a degree in useful shadiness.
He guessed there must be another door around back.
But to get to that, he had to step off the small porch, down to the sand, and tromp around back, past a white propane tank showing its age with exposed rusty spots.
He had to admit—as he got to the back—the view here, looking over the dunes more like rolling waves and the tall waving stands of phragmites . . . beautiful.
Not a bad place to escape from the world.
Billy wondered: Did Landry own it? Rent it? All things he needed to look at.
More notes for the notebook he did not have.
He walked to the back door. The entryway was raised about a foot, as if a step should have been there but never got put in. The windowpanes of the door were smeared. One of those things that just never got cleaned.
But he could just see inside a small kitchen area. A mug sat on a table. Maybe the morning coffee from when Landry headed out for his early morning of fishing.
He tried the doorknob. Also locked. But in this case, wobbly, as if not terribly interested in keeping the door shut or locked, it seemed to be missing a needed screw.
He kept playing with it, rattling it . . . then a bit more forcefully.
Until it simply popped open.
Billy thought: Well, that was easy.
And he walked into the missing man’s home . . .
* * *
The refrigerator was stocked with, well, what he imagined any old guy living on his own kept. Some milk, nearly gone, probably turned into a white sludge by now. A container of OJ. Egg carton with two eggs. The usual condiments. Something in tinfoil that Billy didn’t unwrap. Slice of pizza? Half a burger?
The freezer with an assortment of items ready for the microwave and a decidedly downscale and solitary dinner.
Then out of the kitchen, just steps away, over the creaky wood floor, he walked into the bathroom. A tight shower stall. To the right, the lone bedroom, also small. Bed unmade. Sure. Why make it?
A table with a book. A nearby closet.
But Billy sailed on to the living room.
There was a TV. Flat-screen, of course, but the smallest you could actually buy. Despite the isolation, he must get cable here. An easy chair: modest, no recliner. Footstool. A small table to the side with two wooden chairs.
He’d need to go check out the bedroom. But Billy had the sudden feeling that this place—so far—said absolutely nothing about the man. About as generic and empty as it could be.
Then considering his chat with Will at the marina, he thought, Why not indulge suspicions?
Maybe . . . too generic?
But then he saw the one thing that looked different from anything else in this bland cottage.
A small bookshelf with three nearly full rows of books.
And maybe with the idea that it might have something to say about the man, he walked over to it, bent down, and scanned the spines of the books.
* * *
The top row—fiction, Harlan Coben. Good mystery writer, Billy knew, having read one of his books a long plane ride ago.
A few older books, even a pair of Ian Fleming’s hardbacks with original dustcovers.
You Only Live Twice and Thunderball.
Billy had read those too—would have been decades ago.
Below that, a shift to biographies and histories: The Life of Ulysses S. Grant alongside volumes on the Civil War. Stephen Ambrose on World War II. Then a few books that, well, didn’t fit the mold.
One simply titled, The Mob in Manhattan. Next to it, another book on crime, The Havana Connection. Last, one with an intriguing title: The Oath. With the subtitle How the Global Crime Syndicate Built Its Empire.
Empire. Billy knew that organized crime was pretty powerful. But empire?
He slid that one out.
A clearly well-read volume, pages dog-eared. Yeah. Sure. Never a bookmark around when you need one.
He was about to put it back when he saw that the back of the bookcase—a cheap piece of what looked like thin plywood—was loose. Like it might pop off. Or rather, it already had come off and had been haphazardly hammered back into place.
And Billy, trying to be as observant as possible, saw through an opening in the back a sliver of what should have been the wall behind the bookcase.
But it wasn’t the wall, which in this room was painted a faded lime green.
As if anyone would like that color.
No. Something metallic, a dull gray.
But there was only one way he’d get to see what it was.
Probably nothing, guessing that this room backed up to some kind of crawl space with the small boiler, a water heater.
Only one way . . .
* * *
Books are heavy. Billy knew that, which was one reason why he chose to patronize libraries versus bookstores. Boxes of books could weigh one down, especially if you had a reason to move around quite a bit.
So, this bookshelf—when he started to nudge it away from the wall to cantilever it out so he could satisfy his curiosity about what was behind it—took a lot of grunting and full-body shoves.
But it moved. And as it moved, whatever was behind it became visible.
Billy saw—flush against the wall—a safe.
He took out his phone and turned on its flashlight. To see: a combination lock—old school—the name of the safe and its combo lock visible as well: Yale.
And he knew, as far as investigating what it held, what secret about the missing Jack Landry, it would require skills that Billy did not have.
It was so tempting. He even reached out, gave the dial a twirl.
But he also knew . . . a safe like that, hidden? Might contain some mighty interesting things.
He used his phone to take a picture of the safe and its lock.
And while Billy didn’t know how to crack it, there were people who did.
But for now, he put his phone back into his pocket and pushed the bookcase back into position. The nondescript cottage was now back to being just that.
Its secrets were safe for now.
A place that looked like it held no secrets or revelations. And yet, behind the shelves of books, it clearly did.
He stood up to head out for now. Thinking of what was next in his little investigation—and the prize at the end of it all keeping him motivated. A nice amount of cash and the possibility of his own place, his own restaurant . . . once again.
* * *
He went out the front door. Immediately he spotted a car in the distance. It was so empty out here that seeing that car, just sitting there, facing the cottage at a distance . . . made him stop.
No houses near the car, just more dunes and grass. The road it sat on . . . barely that.
He kept his eyes on the car. A black sedan, facing this way. An Audi S8 maybe? Hard to tell. But an impressive vehicle, even at a distance.
He had the immediate thought: whoever was in that car may have even followed him.
So, what now?
Get back in his Cherokee, turn back to the pitted road, drive toward it?
Somehow that didn’t seem like such a good idea.
But another idea did: he was all alone out here. Again, not a good idea, either.
And when he thought of what Will had said at the marina—that, sure, he knew where Landry went that day, that Landry had most certainly talked about it with Cioffi—Billy had to wonder: What have I wandered into here?
Certainly not the way he had expected his week off to go.
He took the two rickety steps down to the sandy path, his eyes still on that sedan.
Billy slid out his phone as circumspectly as he could—after all, you don’t want to alert someone following you, spying on you, to know that now you are worried, that maybe you are thinking of gingerly hitting 911 on the keypad.
Which would—no doubt—summon Chief Bristow to see . . . well, what? There was a car parked in the distance? That it seemed to be watching him?
And then her likely question: You just broke into Landry’s cottage here? Really?
Still—it felt better holding the phone in his hand.
As he reached the driver’s side door, one hand to the door latch, the headlights on the ominous sedan came on. Then he could see a bit of movement.
The car moving.
For a moment he thought, Whoever this is . . . is driving straight here.
But no. The car did a sharp, broken U-turn, back and forth until it had turned completely around, then pulled away fast, kicking up a spray of sand from its back tires.
Billy wondered: Who the hell was that?
Why were they looking at me?
And why am I standing out here exposed?
He popped open his car door, slid in. Shut it. Hit the lock button.
Then he had the important thought: I could use some help with this . . .
He pulled away from the cottage, turning around, avoiding the tall grass that closed tight around the narrow road and property.
Driving away from Jack Landry’s cottage, he thought, What’s with that safe in the wall?
To know any more, he’d have to be back soon . . . hopefully without his sinister escort.