After Mark’s call Wednesday afternoon Kate asked the Gillmans for the next two days off. She hadn’t seen her folks in a while and planned to visit family and bring the photos when she returned Friday night. She invited me along, but my insurance check had arrived in Tuesday’s mail. I decided to go trailer shopping instead.

I left early Thursday morning for Tallahassee where a dealer sold the same line of camping trailers I’d had before. By five that evening I was setting up house in my new twenty-two-foot Grey Wolf parked among the pines at site 44. Home-sweet-home again.

I was up at daybreak Friday. I hadn’t been fishing since the day my old trailer burned. With Kate away I decided to spend the day wetting a hook. There were only a couple of vehicles in the lot when I arrived at Gillman’s. I grabbed my tackle and headed for the docks.

I did a double-take when I saw Lamar gassing up a boat near my slip.

“Hey, no eyepatch,” I said. A nasty, wide red scar ran from just above his right eyelid to just under the eye, then made a ninety-degree turn and ended at the outside corner. From the looks of it he was damn lucky he still had the eye. “You know, you don’t look as much like Johnny Depp as I thought.”

He glanced my way and grinned. “Morning, Mac. Who?”

“Johnny Depp, the guy who played Captain Jack Sparrow, the pirate.”

“Oh, him. Tonya’s got his poster plastered on her bedroom wall. Thanks for the compliment, I think.”

“How’s the vision?”

Lamar screwed the gas cap on and stepped off the boat onto the dock. “Still a little blurry, but not bad for a scratched retina.”

I started the motor. Lamar came over and freed my bow line while I took care of the stern. “Hope you learned your lesson about using safety goggles.”

“Damn straight,” he said, as I backed out of the slip.

I eased out of the canal, crossed the sandbar, and headed east. I kept about a football field’s length off the beach, content to ride the calm bay at low throttle, enjoying the early-morning cool before the heat and humidity set in like a wet wool blanket. I didn’t have any wire leaders with me, but I decided to give trolling a try anyway. I tied on the biggest deep-running lure I had in my tackle box, opened the bail on my spinning reel, and let the line trail out behind me. I had no idea how to troll, so I ran off about fifty or sixty yards of mono and closed the bail. I propped the rod against the corner of the stern, made myself as comfortable as I could in the seat, and waited.

In a few minutes a boat approached from the east. When it drew closer I saw it was one of Barfield’s boats, about a fifty-footer rigged for longlining. That meant it was headed way out for the deep-water gulf, probably after swordfish or yellow-fin grouper. I wondered if that would be the only haul the boat would be carrying when it returned in a week or so.

I was thinking about Kate and how much I missed her when I heard a rattling behind me. I turned around just in time to see my spinning rod with the hundred-dollar Okuma reel bend, lift off the deck, and slide over the stern into the water. Shit! So much for my trolling skills. I had two other rods aboard, but that combo had cost me damn near two hundred bucks. Well, no use crying over spilt milk—or submarining rod-and-reel outfits.

A few minutes later two more Barfield boats passed by heading for the open gulf. One was also rigged for longlining. The other had several “one-arm bandits” mounted on the rails; its crew was going bottom fishing for snapper or grouper or whatever was in season this time of the year.

I started to rig up again and then decided to hell with fishing. I’d spend the morning taking a little sightseeing excursion around Barfield Fisheries instead. I opened the first beer of the morning and toasted my lost rod and reel. After wishing it a final “bon voyage,” I gunned the throttle.

Approaching Barfield Fisheries from the water was impressive. There were five docks about fifty yards long running parallel to each other and about twenty yards apart. The second and fourth docks were shaped like a plus sign with a big crane sitting in the middle of the cross-member. It was easy to see that the cranes could easily boom over to service the two docks on either side. Sunlight glared off the roofs of the aqua buildings that rose in the background.

Pilings ran along the outside of the two outer docks, with room enough for a large boat to fit easily between the pilings and the dock. But what really grabbed my attention was the vinyl-covered chain-link fencing that ran the length of the pilings and disappeared under the water. Between each dock was a gate rigged with metal framing to raise up and fold overhead like a garage door. When I got to within fifty yards or so of the docks I noticed several anchored buoys with signs that read in big bold letters: NO TRESPASSING BEYOND THIS POINT!

It didn’t take an Einstein clone to figure out the Barfields wanted their privacy. I eased the throttle to idle and quickly rigged up one of my spare rods. I began making a show of fishing, staying in one spot for a few minutes and then puttering along to another. Being as inconspicuous as I could, I snapped several pictures with my cell phone. From this distance the quality would most likely suck, but Kate might be able to do something with them on her computer.

I kept at it for a good half hour, making sure I stayed well outside the warning buoys. I even caught and released several silver trout. A couple of times I noticed men in hardhats staring my way. I waved, hoping they’d take me for a friendly tourist out for a day of fishing. It seemed to have worked because each time they returned my greeting.

Then I noticed a guy at the end of the nearest dock scanning me with a pair of binoculars. I slowly turned my back to him and nonchalantly reeled in my line. I made a show of securing my rod in the rack, putting the motor in gear, and puttering away.

I’d just turned off the TV after watching the late news when my phone rang.

“Mac, I just got home,” Kate said. “Can you come over right away? You have to see these photos.”

“Aren’t you working tomorrow?”

“Yeah, but you’ll really want to see what I’ve got here.”

I couldn’t resist. “Okay, and if we’ve got time maybe we can take a look at the photos, too.”

“Very funny. What happened to Mac the gentleman?”

“Kate the seductress.”

“Just get your butt over here.”

I was dressed and at Kate’s in fifteen minutes. She gave me a quick kiss at the door and led me into the kitchen. On the table was a stack of 8×12 photos. She picked up the top photo and handed it to me.

“Look at this one and tell me who you see.”

I held the photo up and turned it away from the glare of the overhead lights. “I’ll be damned!”

What had been one of the fuzzy Polaroids was now a focused shot of Marilyn Harper and Lamar Randall cuddled side-by-side in a late-model Lincoln Continental. There were trees in the background but no landmarks of any kind that I recognized. Marilyn was behind the wheel, with Lamar so close to her you’d be hard-pressed to slip a sheet of card stock between them.

“Now this one,” Kate said.

Same vehicle, same location, but their arms were around each other and they were clearly lip-locked.

“There’s more,” Kate said, thumbing through the stack until she found what she was looking for. “Here.”

I took the photo and the magnifying glass Kate handed me. A man with long dark hair and a goatee was walking from the Harper’s detached garage toward Tara. Mrs. George Harper was standing in the open doorway, waiting.

“That’s Lamar, too, don’t you think?” Kate asked.

I studied the man with the magnifying glass. “Unless he has a twin brother.”

Two more photos at the Harper residence showed much the same thing, and though the quality wasn’t as good, there was no mistaking Lamar. So much for unrequited love. Mare and Lamar were obviously an item, or had been when Tom Mayo snapped these photos.

Kate opened the refrigerator, grabbed two beers, and handed one to me. “I wonder how long that’s been going on.”

“I don’t know. I couldn’t find any connection between them in the yearbooks I looked through, but Lamar’s had that tattoo a long time. And we know from Bo Pickron that Friendly George was screwing around on Marilyn from the get-go. Maybe she was giving the good mayor a dose of his own medicine.”

Kate took a sip of beer and slowly shook her head. “Lamar. I can hardly believe it. I thought he and Debra were happily married.”

“I’d be willing to bet Lamar’s been Marilyn’s lap dog for a long time. If she asked him to jump, he’d bark, ‘How high?’”

“Maybe. But still, poor Debra.”

I shrugged. “Love is a many-splintered thing.”

We spent the next half hour or so poring over the photos. Mark had been right; some of the photos were still so poor we couldn’t make heads or tails of them. But there was one shot Kate and I both found real interesting. Two men were standing beside the bed of a pickup truck, and from the gesturing that had been frozen in time, they appeared to be arguing. The photo had been taken at a distance, but the man with his back to the camera looked like our newly-discovered Romeo, Lamar Randall. The other person was in shadow, and his face was partially blocked, but Kate swore it was Brett Barfield.

“See the watch on his wrist?” she said, yawning. “See how the watch face is at the bottom of the wrist? That’s how Brett always wore his watch.” Kate yawned again. “I’m sorry, Mac, but I can barely keep my eyes open, and I’ve got to open the store at six-thirty.”

I waited for an invitation to stay the night, but all Kate offered was another stifled yawn.

Mark had made two copies of each photo. We agreed it would be wise if Kate kept one set and Joyce Mayo’s originals, and I took the other set. I still wasn’t convinced my trailer fire was an accident.

“Oh, by the way,” I said, heading for my truck, “tell your brother I said he’s a genius.”

After dinner and drinks at The Green Parrot Saturday evening Kate and I drove back to her house. I’d studied the enhanced photos more that day and had come up with a plan. I still hadn’t replaced the laptop I’d lost in the fire, but Kate said we could use hers.

First, Kate uploaded the photos of Barfield Fisheries I’d taken with my phone to her computer; she’d see what improvements she could make with the Picasa program later when she had time. Next, she downloaded Google Earth to her hard drive, and then I entered the address for the Harper residence. I zoomed in until we had a nice close up showing a matchbox-size Tara and the surrounding property. A narrow dirt road ran through the woods beside the Harpers’ property line. It would make a nice area to park and do some trespass snooping like Tom Mayo had obviously done.

Kate printed out two copies, and then we did the same with the Barfield photos. I was determined to gain access somehow, even if it meant taking to the water like a fish.

“When is Lamar’s day off?” I said as I studied the satellite shot of the Harper place.

“Usually Tuesday or Wednesday. It varies.”

“Can you check the schedule and find out for this week?”

“Sure, but don’t forget that Debra works the night shift at the hospital. If Lamar is still seeing Marilyn Harper he could be going to her place at night, especially now that she’s alone.”

“Good point, and thanks a lot. You just increased my workload.”

Around noon on Sunday I drove to Parkersville. It was time to spend some more plastic. I spent the better part of an hour at Wal-Mart looking at computers and digital cameras, and settled on an HP laptop and a Lumix camera with a twelve-power zoom lens. I’d gotten a good deal on the camper by buying last year’s model still in stock. The leftover cash from the insurance settlement was enough to pay for the laptop and camera.

I pulled out of Wal-Mart and headed for 98. Glancing in the rearview mirror, I noticed a metallic-black Cadillac pull out behind me about a half block back. I was sure I’d seen that car before, or else its clone, a few days ago when I’d met Bo Pickron at Canal Park for our little chat. It had been parked in front of one of the shelters; some ritzy tourists having a picnic or wetting a hook, I’d assumed. There couldn’t be that many Cadillac CTSs in this area. I checked the mirror again.

There were two men sitting in the front, but the sun was glaring off the windshield and I couldn’t make out any features. My gut was speaking to me again, so I hung a right a couple of blocks from the highway. Sure enough, the Caddy followed. I took another right. The car was hanging well back, but it made the turn. I drove downtown, noticed Redmond’s Sporting Goods was open, and made a left and turned into their small parking lot. I got out and headed for the door. Using my peripheral vision I saw that the black Caddy had pulled over and stopped in a parking space about a block and a half back.

Inside Redmond’s, I recognized that the clerk who had tried selling me the snake boots was working behind the counter. “Mr. McClellan, I see you survived your hike into Grand Gator Bay,” he said, smiling as I approached. “What can I do for you today?”

“Just window shopping,” I said, impressed with his recall. I suppose it went with the territory. “Is there a back entrance?”

His eyes widened a bit, but he motioned to a hallway and door at the back of the store with an exit sign above it. “It locks automatically behind you.”

Outside, I cut across an alley and circled back down a side street for a couple of blocks until I was behind the Cadillac. It sat parked a half block ahead. I walked down the sidewalk until I was almost alongside the car. A quick glance told me it was a rental. I rapped my knuckles on the rear fender. Through the tinted glass I saw the guys jerk in surprise. A second later the passenger-side window powered down and a head with thinning, sandy-blond hair stuck out a bit to get a better look at me.

I leaned down a little until I could see them both through the open window. “Can I help you gentlemen?”

Blondie glanced over at the driver, a hefty man with a head full of black hair slicked back like a young Elvis. His body was Older Elvis. Elvis gave a nod to Blondie and opened the driver-side door. Blondie followed suit, unfolding his lanky frame from the car and standing directly in front of me on the sidewalk.

“Yeah, we gotta message for ya,” Elvis said, walking around me until he was beside his buddy.” There was nothing about the voice that remotely hinted of having roots south of the Mason-Dixon Line.

Both wore sunglasses and were decked out in casual trousers, bright print Hawaiian-style shirts, and polished leather shoes. Their clothing might’ve passed for touristy wear in Miami Beach, but here in the Panhandle it was almost laughable. The King looked around my age, Blondie a few years younger despite the retreating hairline.

“What’s the message?” I said, eyeballing one, then the other.

Elvis glanced around at the surroundings while the blond beanpole kept his eyes locked on me. The King turned around slowly until a pistol stuffed in the back of his trousers grabbed my attention. “Lay off,” he said, turning back to face me.

“Lay off? Of what?”

“Don’t play dumb,” Blondie growled, his voice deeper than his stout cohort’s. I guess it had farther to travel up and out. “We know who sent you.”

“Oh, yeah? And just who would that be?” I didn’t have a clue what they were talking about but decided to play along. I hoped they couldn’t see the nervousness I was doing my damndest to keep at bay. If they’d tailed me to Canal Park and had seen me talking with Bo Pickron, that might be enough to keep them in check, for the moment, anyway. Still, I wished to hell I had my shotgun in hand. I made a mental note to reconsider buying a handgun.

Elvis reached into his shirt pocket, pulled out a comb, and ran it through his hair a couple of times, then put it back. My gut tightened, but I tried not to let my eyes show anything. That comb and the one I’d found near my burned trailer were identical twins. “I’m gonna say this one more time,” he said, giving me a stare that even through the shades felt as icy as a cold north wind. “Back off. And tell your boss we’re onto him. Tell him shit sometimes runs uphill.”

And just like that, they climbed back in the fancy wheels and drove away.

Back in St. George I took a chance and called the police department. I recognized Beth’s voice on the other end of the line.

“Is Patrolman Owens on duty today?” I said, trying to disguise my voice.

“Yes, sir, but he’s out right now. I can patch you through if you like.”

I declined Beth’s offer. The last thing I needed was for her or Ben Merritt overhearing J.D. and me talking.

St. George isn’t that big of a place, maybe three miles of highway along the beach from city limit to city limit, but it took damn near an hour of riding around before I spotted J.D.’s blue-and-white a block off the beach on Seventh Street near The Green Parrot. He had pulled over an older-model Toyota and was talking through the window to a young brunette. I slowed down to make sure Ben Merritt wasn’t with him and then pulled to the side of the road behind his cruiser to wait for him to finish the traffic stop.

He looked back at me and held up a finger, either shooting me the bird or signaling he’d be a minute, and continued the conversation with the brunette. Another few seconds passed, then J.D. leaned into the open window, and he and the girl kissed.

I grinned as he approached my truck. “Taking bribes from the public already?”

His face flushed. “No, sir, that was my girlfriend. You didn’t see that, okay?”

“See what?”

He blew out a breath. “Thanks.”

“Your boss man around?”

“No, sir. He comes on at four, then I’m back on at midnight.”

I’d noticed the conspicuous lack of policemen since I’d been in St. George. “Aren’t you guys a little short-handed?”

J.D. glanced toward the highway, looking east to west. “Yes, sir. A couple of men up and quit in the spring. Couldn’t get along with the chief, is what I heard. That’s when I hired on. I heard some talk we’re supposed to be getting somebody else soon, though. The chief likes to run a tight ship, if you know what I mean.”

“Yeah, I know the type.”

“The County sends a car over now and then when we need a break,” J.D. said.

I nodded, remembering that I’d seen a green-and-white cruising the streets of St. George on a few occasions.

J.D. looked down, shuffling his feet. “I been keeping my eyes and ears open like you said.”

“And?”

“I heard Chief Merritt on the phone once. I think he was talking to somebody at Barfield’s. I also seen him with Clayton Barfield, Brett’s daddy. They were talking out in the parking lot back of the station, but I couldn’t make out anything they said.”

I nodded. “Good, keep it up, but be careful.” I looked around. “Have you ever heard Chief Merritt talking to anybody from up north, or hear him mention anything about somebody from up there?” What the hell, it was worth a shot.

“Up north? You mean like Yankees?”

“Yeah.”

J.D. mulled it over a minute. “No, sir, not that I can think of, except maybe tourists down here on vacation. Nothing official-like, though.”

I nodded. “Is there anywhere we can go where we won’t be seen? I’ve got something I think you’ll be interested in seeing.”

J.D. thought for a moment. “Yes, sir, my daddy’s place. Him and Mama are on vacation up at Lake Martin. We can park in the garage, and I got a key to the house. You follow me, but keep back a block or so, just in case.”

I followed J.D. for several blocks through an older residential area of St. George about a half-mile inland from the beach. He pulled into a weathered concrete driveway, got out, and swung open the doors of a detached wood-framed garage. I drove in and parked beside his cruiser, then followed him out a side door to the back of the house. He unlocked the door, and we stepped into the kitchen. It was an older home but clean and well-maintained.

“You want a Coke or something?” J.D. said, opening the refrigerator and grabbing a bottle.

“No thanks.” I pulled a chair away from the table and sat down. He sat across from me, and I slid the manila envelope to him. “Take a gander at these.”

J.D. slugged down about a third of his Coke and began looking through the stack of 8×12s. He gave a low whistle. “Where’d you get these?”

“From Tom Mayo’s widow. She said Tom had been conducting his own investigation because Ben Merritt kept interfering when he tried doing his job.”

Another whistle. “The mayor’s wife and Lamar Randall?”

I took the photos back when J.D. finished gawking at them. “So, we have Chief Merritt sitting in Mayor Harper’s car,” I said. “We have Chief Merritt and Brett Barfield together. Lamar and the mayor’s wife. Lamar and Brett. And you saw Merritt and Clayton Barfield talking behind the station.”

J.D. drained the last of his Coke. “Why do you think Coach Mayo would’ve took that picture of the Barfields’ fishing boat?”

I spent the next few minutes filling J.D. in on what I’d found out for sure, my theory about Clayton Barfield using his fleet of boats to smuggle drugs, and how Ben Merritt might be in on the deal by looking the other way and keeping Brett Barfield out of trouble.

“But why would the mayor have been in on it? Them two families don’t like each other—except for Brett and Maddie, I mean.”

“Mayor Harper stood to lose most of his wealth to Maddie once she turned twenty-one and inherited what her father left her,” I said. “George Harper might’ve been counting on his cut of the drug money as a hedge against that.”

J.D. looked confused. “Call it a retirement fund. And, there’s something else.” I pulled out my wallet and handed J.D. the newspaper photo of Brett. “Look at this real good and tell me who it reminds you of.”

J.D. gave the clipping a quick glance and shrugged. “It’s Brett Barfield. That’s his senior picture.”

I nodded. “But look again. The shape of the face, that cleft in his chin. You’ve seen the Harper Realty billboards around town. Friendly George?”

J.D. looked from the clipping to me, his eyes wide. “Wait a minute, are you saying . . . ?”

“George Harper was Brett’s biological father. Sheriff Pickron admitted it after I’d figured it out. You do know Bo Pickron is Mrs. Harper’s brother, don’t you?”

“Yes, sir.”

“George Harper and Brett’s mother used to date back in high school. They had an affair years ago, after they were both married. My guess is the honorable mayor was paying Chief Merritt to keep Brett out of hot water, and when Tom Mayo busted Brett with the marijuana, Merritt made sure the charges didn’t stick. It wound up costing Mayo his job and maybe his life.”

After emphasizing just how dangerous this whole mess might get if word leaked out, I swore J.D. to secrecy and left. I hoped I could trust him. I’d counted on men younger than him to cover my back in more dangerous situations, but they were highly trained Marines. If this young police officer couldn’t keep his mouth shut, I might wind up in a real world of hurt. Or worse.

I jolted awake. Was I dreaming, or was somebody knocking on my door? I leaned over to the nightstand and squinted at the clock. It was a little after midnight, and I was still groggy from a few too many beers. Another knock. Thinking it might be Kate or Jerry and Donna needing help, I switched on a light and hurried to the door without checking out the window first. Big mistake. I opened the door to face a pistol clutched in the meaty fist of Elvis.

Elvis and Blondie barreled their way in without invitation, Blondie greeting me with a short but effective punch to the solar plexus. I dropped to my knees, gasping for air.

Elvis grabbed me by the hair and jerked my head up until I was staring him in the face. “I don’t think we got our point across in town this aftanoon, friend,” he said and then slammed me upside the head with the gun butt. “Lay off!”

Friend? I thought, as the world spun and the light faded. With friends like these . . .