Chapter Seven

Tony Rolf sat in the small salon of his sailboat home. An empty box of Just For Men hair color sat on the chart table before him. He had returned to the boat after his encounter with the woman, making one stop at Walmart on the way. There he bought a baseball cap, the hair dye—a medium brown—and a tanning lotion to use on the exposed portions of his body. Now he studied the results in a handheld mirror. An entirely new person looked back at him. He added a Tampa Bay Rays baseball cap to complete the new look and smiled at the result.

Across the marina Harry walked slowly toward his boat. He had invited Vicky to come with him, offering to cook her dinner, but she had declined, telling him that she needed to be alone, needed time to think everything through.

As Harry neared his boat a voice called out: “Hi, stranger.”

Harry followed the sound and found Meg Adams sunning herself on the forecastle of her sailboat. She was wearing a bikini small enough to make Harry forget—at least for the moment—all the unpleasantness of the day. “You look absolutely fetching.”

“That was the intention,” Meg said. “Want a drink?”

“Very much, thank you. Do you have something strong, like Jack Daniel’s?”

“Only wine, I’m afraid. But good wine, if that makes a difference.”

“I have Jack Daniel’s . . . your boat or mine?”

“I like yours. It’s roomier.”

“Then grab a bottle of wine for yourself and come join me.”

Meg stood, making the bikini she was wearing even more alluring, and slipped on a T-shirt that went almost to her knees. It was a tease, he thought, one that forced him to remember what lay beneath.

Harry waited while Meg collected her wine, and together they boarded his boat and made their way to the galley. Harry poured a heavy dose of Jack Daniel’s over ice, then held up Meg’s wine to the light.

“Châteauneuf-du-Pape,” he said. “You weren’t kidding when you said a bottle of good wine. I’ve seen this go for $350 a bottle.”

“This isn’t quite that good a year,” she replied. “But it wasn’t a bad one either. I think this set me back about fifty-nine bucks.”

“So you’re serious about the wine you drink.”

Meg waited while he uncorked the bottle and allowed it to breathe. “Wine is one of the things I take very seriously,” she said.

“What are the other things?”

“You discovered one a few nights ago; now you’ve learned another.”

“And . . . ?”

“And now you’ll have to wait and see what else you can learn.”

Meg took her glass and entered the salon. When Harry followed he found her tucked into one end of the sofa with her legs curled beneath her.

“Let’s play house,” she said teasingly. “How was your day, darling?”

“You don’t want to know.”

“That bad? Then sip your drink and forget about it.”

Harry paused a beat, then said, “You pay pretty close attention to what’s going on in the marina. Have you noticed anyone paying close attention to me?”

“Other than the women I’ve seen checking you out?”

Harry ignored the tease. “This would be a man, slender, about five eleven, medium build, blond hair, extremely pale complexion.”

“You’re serious, aren’t you?”

“Deadly serious,” he said. He filled her in on the deaths of Mary Kate O’Connell and Lilly Mikinos.

“And this guy works for the Church of Scientology?”

“Yes, he works for the office of church discipline. I’ve heard that the church keeps close watch on its members and have people whose job it is to confront those who stray across the line, whatever that line is.”

“A few years ago I took one of their courses, sort of on a lark, and I didn’t see any of that. Of course, all the people in my class were like me—they were just beginners.”

Harry struggled to hide the alarm bells that had suddenly gone off. “And you didn’t go on with it after that first class? Scientology, I mean.”

“No, although I admit there was quite a selling job by church members. They really push you to take the next level of courses. And I’ve got to tell you, they are pretty pricey. But it just wasn’t for me. It was too rigid, too dogmatic. The members that I met were so insistent that the church’s way of life was the only way you could live, and I’m too free a spirit to ever buy into that.”

“How about the other people in the class, did many of them go on to another course?”

“Oh, yes, I’m sure many of them did—at least half, I’d say.” She watched Harry’s eyebrows rise. “Most of the people I met were very needy. They were searching for something that was going to turn their lives around. And that’s what Scientology promises to do.”

“Hey, I’d like to turn my life around . . . especially after today.”

“Then sign up.” She offered up an impish grin. “After a year you’ll have more wisdom than Buddha. It’s guaranteed.”

* * *

Regis Walsh sat behind his oversized desk, his chair tilted away from the only illumination in the room. He heard a light knock on the door and pressed a button on his desk that buzzed it open.

Tony Rolf stepped through the door and closed it behind him.

“Take a chair, Tony.”

Rolf’s eyes darted around the darkened room.

“You’re always so cautious, Tony.”

“That amuses you?”

There was an edge to Rolf’s voice that Walsh did not like. He chose to ignore it for the moment. “It doesn’t amuse me, it surprises me. This should be the one place that you feel safe.”

“I don’t feel safe anywhere.” Rolf paused, then added, “Or with anyone.” He stepped forward slowly and sat in the chair he’d been offered.

“That’s a very disturbing statement. You should know that you’ve always been a very valued and trusted member of our small family. We’ve all relied on you during difficult times.”

Rolf stared at him but remained silent. Walsh found it unnerving, something he was unaccustomed to feeling in his own office. “Don’t you have anything to say?” he demanded.

“I’m just thinking.”

“Thinking about what?”

“About all the criticism you heaped on me when things didn’t go perfectly.”

“It was only the death of the girl and the shooting of the retired police officer that upset me. It all seemed unnecessary and it presented some potential difficulties for the church—serious difficulties.”

“It’s hard to judge if something is necessary or not when you’re sitting behind your desk and not out there when it’s happening.”

Walsh glared at him. “Don’t presume to lecture me, Tony. Not about this or anything else where the good of the church is concerned.”

“What about the good of Tony Rolf?”

Rolf was glaring right back at him and it caused Walsh to visibly squirm in his seat as he realized how dangerous the moment was. “I’m always concerned about that—always.”

“How would you feel if I told you it was necessary to kill another 1.1 last night?”

“Who?” Walsh’s voice was little more than a whisper.

“A turncoat bitch named Lilly Mikinos. You remember her? It was a little more than a year ago. A Greek priest showed up in the center of our community and took her away. And we did nothing.”

“Why did she have to die?”

Rolf seemed momentarily confused by the question. “She had been talking to that cop, Doyle, and his female partner. When I confronted her about what she had been telling them, she attacked me, screamed at me. She knew who I was, even with the dyed hair, and I knew she would turn me in to those cops as soon as she could.” His voice had been rising with each statement. Now it became soft again. “I knew she’d even drag the church down just to get me. There was that kind of hatred in her eyes. I’ve seen that hatred before in the eyes of rabid animals and I knew there was only one way to stop her.”

Walsh was silent for almost a minute. “I want you to leave the marina,” he finally said. “It’s too dangerous for you there. I’ll arrange for a church apartment where you can lay low for a while. Then we’ll put you on the Freewinds and get you out of this area.”

Tony stared at him. “Freewinds? Where Mary Kate O’Connell was supposed to go for auditing?” He gave Walsh a knowing look that ended in a bitter smile. “I’ll have to turn you down on that. I don’t need an ocean voyage.”

Again Walsh found himself squirming in his chair. He felt he had to get them off the subject or risk . . . what? “Let’s just put that conversation aside for now,” he offered. “We can talk about it later. What’s important is finding a way to keep you safe.” Walsh picked up his phone and placed a call to Ken Oppenheimer. “First let’s get you into a safe apartment or house.”

* * *

Oppenheimer entered Walsh’s office at seven the following morning. Like Walsh he was unshaven and groggy from lack of sleep. “He’s in a house in Safety Harbor,” he began as he took a chair, “and he seems quite paranoid. He made some obscure comment about the house being better than Freewinds that I just ignored. Frankly I’m a bit concerned about his stability.”

Walsh snorted, and told Oppenheimer about his earlier meeting with Rolf.

“Jesus,” Oppenheimer said. “That’s two murders and one attempted murder. And we’re getting very close to being accomplices, if we aren’t already.” He ran a hand over his face. “Have you thought about turning him in to the police?”

“I’m afraid it’s too late for that. We sheltered him after the first killing. We could probably argue that he was only a suspect then and we helped the police as much as we could, but now . . . I think we’ve lost that argument.”

Oppenheimer leaned forward, clearly anxious, and asked: “What have you got in mind?”

“I think we have to get him the hell away from here. Either that or . . .”

“Eliminate him?”

Walsh shook his head. “I don’t even want to discuss that possibility.”

Oppenheimer nodded his head slowly. It was clear they were already discussing it. It was also clear that it might be the only way he and Walsh would survive this madness Rolf had created.