James Fellows sat in his padded chair, smoking, long after his wife, Ida, had gone up to bed. And long after he normally would have gone up as well.
He was thinking about the two visits he’d gotten today. One, from that pretty gal who worked for the Jacksonville police. The other … he didn’t know who the other one really was. Just that he wasn’t no claims adjuster. Of that much, he was sure.
Both of them looking into the same set of plates.
Truth was, he didn’t have a clue where they’d ended up. (Though now, after he had seen the picture the woman had brought, maybe he had some idea.)
He surely didn’t want to find himself drawn into some kind of investigation. Hell, these days, he didn’t much like even showing his face in town if it wasn’t totally necessary.
Any more than he liked covering up for someone else’s trouble.
But he was also the kind of man who stood by his friends. He didn’t know just what had been done, but it must be of some matter, he reckoned, if people had come here all the way from out of state.
And he always knew, if there was a fellow who was capable of something, well, the man who drove a car like that, or at least, his daughter’s car, he was it. He’d always been kind of a lit fuse. Not one to hold his liquor well. And now, with what had gone on with Amanda, who could even blame him.
Still, it was one thing when they worked together, something else, given what happened, now …
Fellows picked up his phone and called. The man’s cell phone, the only number Fellows now had. Anyway, this hour, he’d no doubt be asleep himself.
He answered on the third ring, not sounding sleepy at all.
“It’s Buck,” James Fellows said. “Hope I’m not disturbing you none. Just giving you a friendly heads-up. You been driving your daughter’s car around? Down in Florida maybe?”
Vance remained silent for a while before he answered. “Why you asking?”
“These people were up here looking for a license plate. My license plate, in fact. And they seemed to have seen your car. Or hers …” Fellows laughed darkly. “Seems you got yourself in a lick of trouble, huh, partner?”