"It's your party."

Leroy Purcell walked over to the kitchen, s.n.a.t.c.hed a roll of paper towels out of its holder over the sink, and tossed it to Sonny. While Sonny put pressure on his flowing red nose, Purcell located a bottle of bourbon and mixed it with ice and c.o.ke from the refrigerator. He walked over and sat in a chair with its back to Susan's bright view of the Gulf. He said, "Sit down." I didn't see any reason not to, so I sat on the sofa and looked out at the beach. Purcell said, "Now, this is more like it. That f.u.c.king place you're staying is for s.h.i.t." He gestured at the room. "These people got some G.o.dd.a.m.n taste." He sipped his sweetened bourbon. "Tell me, McInnes, what do you think you know about me that makes you so p.i.s.sed off?" I looked at him. "What does Susan Fitzsimmons tell you about me?"

I said, "Who is Susan Fitzpatrick?"

"Funny." He said, "Susan Fitzsimmons owns this house, and she's a client of yours. And I think that you think she and that white trash waitress from the Pelican's Roost may have seen something last Wednesday night at a house down the beach from here." He stopped for me to agree with him. I picked up a throw pillow and put it behind my head. He said, "I'm here to work something out. I really don't know what your clients saw or didn't see. I'm just here for some friends who don't want any trouble. What I want is to meet with Fitzsimmons and the girl and straighten this out."

"Explain the problem to me. What are you going to straighten out?"

"Then she is your client."

I repeated, "What are you going to straighten out?" He didn't answer. I said, "You know what I think? I think you're scared s.h.i.tless because you think someone saw you up to no good, and you don't know how to find them. Look, I admit Susan Fitzsimmons has been both my client and my friend for a long time. If you've got half a brain, you could find that out in an hour anyway. But she's never laid eyes on you, and, if I have anything to say about it, she never will."

"So you're not going to let me meet with her?"

"Nope."

Purcell rose up out of the chair. "Maybe I should convince you."

"Maybe you should kiss my a.s.s."

He walked toward me. I sat still. The former football hero stopped a foot from the sofa and took in a deep breath. "McInnes, all I want is a meeting. And all you gotta do is say yes. It'll save your client a load of grief down the road. And it'll save you an a.s.s whipping right now. Think about it." He smiled. The man was thinking about hurting me, and it seemed to put him in a better mood. "h.e.l.l, McInnes, I can see you're a pretty good-sized guy.

Probably push around the Nautilus machines pretty good. Probably in a spinning cla.s.s down at the f.a.gs-are-us sportsplex. But you caught Sonny by surprise. If I hadn't stopped him, you'd be dead now. And you need to understand that, even if you think you're tough, I got fifty pounds of muscle on you and Sonny."

I said, "You've got fifty pounds hanging over your belt," and, as soon as I got the words out, I realized I might have gone too far.

I could feel the violence arcing like static electricity between Purcell and Sonny over my head. I could see him breathing hard, trying to regain control.

Purcell raised his gla.s.s and downed what was left of his drink in one swallow; then he turned and threw the empty gla.s.s at the kitchen sink from across the room. The crystal tumbler hit dead center on the stainless steel sink and exploded on impact.

Purcell's eyes moved around the room and over Susan's things. He was thinking; he was breathing deeply and thinking. Finally, he said, "You don't understand what the f.u.c.k you're in, McInnes. You may not believe it, but me and Sonny are about the most reasonable people you're gonna meet on this thing."

"Yeah." I said, "You and Sonny got reasonable written all over you."

Purcell huffed and shook his head. "Boy, there's tough and there's bad and there's just plain evil. Old Sonny there is tough. I'm tougher, and I got a Super Bowl ring to prove it. But we can bring somebody into this thing whoa"believe mea"would scare the living s.h.i.t out of the toughest sonofab.i.t.c.h I ever saw on a football field. I make a phone call and say it's out of my hands, you're gonna get to meet a mean-a.s.s spic who'll slice you open and play with your guts while you're still alive and watching. Crazy f.u.c.k'll do the same and worsea"perverted s.e.x stuff with knives and spikes, s.h.i.t like thata"to the Fitzsimmons woman and that trailer-trash girl." He paused before he said, "This is your last chance to settle this normal."

Purcell paused again to let me think about that. And I did, but the whole thing sounded like a lame horror story concocted to scare me into bad judgmenta"not to mention my concerns with Leroy Purcell's definition of "normal." The threats were over the top. They were ridiculous. But... Purcell said this alleged boogeyman was Hispanic, and the cold puffy stare of the fat guy on Dog Island kept haunting me.

I shook it off. "Bedtime stories."

Purcell looked surprised. "Huh?"

I explained. "You're full of s.h.i.t."

Leroy Purcell pulled a nickel-plated Colt .45 out of his waistband and chopped at my face with the barrel. I ducked and he missed, and it occurred to me that maybe I should have let him hit me. Maybe it would have been better to let him vent some violence without pulling a trigger.

Purcell raised the .45 again but not to swing it. He pointed the muzzle at my face and c.o.c.ked the hammer. The room grew still. Purcell breathed hard against an adrenaline rush, and in the short eternity between his breathsa"when I waited for the bullet aimed at my eyesa"the only other sound was the soft hum of Susan's refrigerator.

The room faded. I was focused on the gun in Purcell's giant hand, and my only conscious thought was to wonder why I hadn't noticed the refrigerator noise before.

The moment pa.s.sed, and a dark mist seemed to lift. The battle-scared ex-jock rolled his shoulders to relax the muscles in his thick neck. He said, "Sonny?"

"Yessir." Sonny sounded excited now.

"You got the lighter fluid?"

"Yessir."

"Use it."

Sonny appeared in the corner of my eye. I kept looking at the volcanic muzzle of Purcell's .45. Sonny moved to the wall opposite Susan's circular stairs and stopped in front of Bird Fitzsimmons' wall-sized painting of seash.e.l.ls. Now I looked. Sonny pulled a yellow and blue squeeze can of lighter fluid from his back pocket.

"That painting's worth a fortune. The artist is dead." It was a stupid thing to say, but it was what I said. I looked up at Purcell. He had backed off a step and lowered the muzzle to point at my chest. The Sat.u.r.day cookout smell of charcoal lighter fluid filled the room, and I looked over to see Sonny squirting the painting in big dripping circles.

Purcell said, "We're done here. You can leave if you want to." I sat still. He walked over to the painting and pulled a Zippo from his pocket like the one Peety Boy had used to light his Camel. "Just remember, all you got to do is set up a meeting with the Fitzsimmons woman and the waitress. We'll work everything out, and they'll be safe." He spun the little black wheel on the lighter with his thumb and turned the flame all the way up. "You tell 'em. n.o.body's safe. Nothing they got is safe until we work this out."

And Leroy Purcell, former All-American tailback for the University of Florida, set fire to Susan's most cherished remnant of her dead husband's talented life.

I shot off the sofa and ran toward the deck, and they let me. Sonny and Purcell were already on their way out the back when I got the double doors open.

Behind me, flames shot eight feet in the air, scorching the walls and threatening the house. The painting was engulfed in fire. Unable to grasp it bare-handed, I grabbed a lamp and swung it in a hard upward arc against the lower edge of the painting. The flaming square flew off the wall and crashed onto the carpeted floor as I jumped out of the way. The top left corner was untouched. I gripped it and ran across the carpet and through the doors and swung a double handful of flames over the railing and onto the sand below.

Back inside, the carpet smoked, and the wall was too hot to touch. I splashed pans of water on everything and called the fire department.

Then I called Susan.

chapter thirteen.

The flirtation was gone. Susan sounded dead inside. "I know it's just a painting, Tom. And I'm so thankful that you're okay. But... oh G.o.d, Tom. What do we do now?"

"Well, we d.a.m.n sure don't agree to let you and Carli meet with him. I'm going to put Joey on it. We'll bug Purcell's house and where he works and every other d.a.m.n thing we can think of to find out what he's up to. And, if he even gets close to hurting you or Carli, we'll kill the sonofab.i.t.c.h." Susan didn't respond. I was mad and getting carried away, and Susan understood and let me do it. It's what angry, overwhelmed males do instead of crying. I took a few breaths. "Susan, I know and you know you're reacting to more than a ruined painting. Even if it was one of Bird's best. So go ahead and feel bad for a while, and let me take care of this. I know it doesn't look like I'm doing much of a job so far. But every time I stumble into a mess, we know a little more." I stopped and tried to focus. "I'm going to get off and call Joey now. Take care of yourself and take care of Carli. I'll see you in a few days. And, by the way, I'm going to take you up on your offer to stay in your house here on the island. I don't seem to be especially invisible in my little house down the beach, and it'll save us eight hundred a week for me to stay here." She agreed, and we said good-bye.

It was past five, so I decided it was okay to locate a bottle of scotch and pour some in a gla.s.s. I sat on the sofa and waited for the Apalachicola Volunteer Fire Department. Thirty-two minutes after I dialed 911, half a dozen barbers, merchants, and mechanics came rushing through Susan's kicked-in door in full fireproof regalia. We talked. A couple of them felt the wall. One checked out the electrical system, as best he could. We talked some more, and I almost told them about Leroy Purcell. But I realized it would be my word against his. And it occurred to me that the worst he'd face was financial responsibility for what he would almost certainly claim was an accidental fire.

Whether it made sense or not, I decided to hold off inserting the law into my relationship with Purcell. So I told the part-time firemen of Apalachicola that I'd been trying to remove a smudge from the frame around the painting with some cleaning fluid I had found under the kitchen sink. I said I'd stopped to light a cigar and the whole thing went up in flames. That seemed to satisfy them. They got to give me a lecture, and I got to keep my run-in with Purcell private.

After the firemen departed, I sat and sipped my scotch and realized that maybe I didn't want anyone to know that I wanted Leroy Purcell dead. Right thena"at that momenta"I wanted and expected something terrible to happen to Purcell in the future, and. when it did, I didn't want anyone looking too closely at me.

Joey answered his cell phone on the second ring. "Yeah?"

I said, "It's me."

"What's wrong?"

"How'd you know something was wrong?"

An edge had crept into Joey's voice. It was as close as he ever got to sounding panicked. "Are the women okay?"

"Oh. Yeah. Yeah, Loutie and her guests are fine. I'm over on St. George at Susan's house. I had some trouble."

"You sound like your puppy died. And I thought you were gonna stay away from Susan's house. h.e.l.l, you should've known they'd be looking there, Tom. I mean, s.h.i.t, I'm guessing you're okay, or I wouldn't be running off at the mouth. You are okay, aren't you?"

"Yeah, Joey. I'm fine. I'm about as p.i.s.sed off as I've ever been in my life, but I'm fine."

"As p.i.s.sed as you've ever been is pretty p.i.s.sed."

I didn't say anything.

"What do you need?"

"Is our boy Hayc.o.c.k in his cottage?"

"He's there, and he's got a little stringy-haired woman in there with him. I sneaked up to the house and checked on 'em a little while ago and was sorry I did. The two of 'em were buck naked and tangled up, banging away like a couple of stray dogs. I'm telling you, after seeing that, I need to go watch some hogs humping to put the romance back in my life."

"So it looks like he's staying put for a while?"

"Yeah," Joey said. "I don't think he's going anywhere tonight."

"Come over, then. We've got a lot to talk about."

I hadn't thought about the ferry and whether Joey could even get off the island. More than an hour after Purcell's and Sonny's exit, I was still pumping too much adrenaline to think about much but murder. So I wasn't surprised when Joey walked into Susan's charred living room.

I was sitting in the chair Purcell had used. Joey stopped in the middle of the room and surveyed the black mess where Bird Fitzsimmons' painting had hung. "What the h.e.l.l happened?" I raised a gla.s.s of scotch, tipped it at him, and took a swallow. "d.a.m.n. When you told me you had some trouble, I figured you got your a.s.s whipped or something. What'd they do? Try to burn the place down?"

"You ever hear of a p.r.i.c.k named Leroy Purcell? Used to play for the Cowboys."

"Yeah. He's a sc.u.mbag." My giant friend paused and looked stunned. "Purcell was here? He did that?"

"Yeah. He was here, and he set fire to Susan's favorite painting by her dead husband. And came real close to burning the whole place down. It's supposed to be a lesson about what he'll do to everything Susan owns if she and Carli don't meet with him to discuss the guy he murdered in front of Carli."

Joey stood and walked to the kitchen. When he came back he had a gla.s.s full of ice cubes, which he covered with amber whiskey from my half-empty bottle.

"s.h.i.t, Tom. I've been hearing rumors about Leroy Purcell ever since he left the pros. It's pretty much common knowledge he likes to hang out with hoods and gamblers and that he's gotten a.s.s deep in a lot of shady deals down here in Florida." Joey stopped to turn up his gla.s.s. He was not a sipper. Joey drank scotch the way he drank beer and orange juice and everything else. He swallowed a mouthful of whiskey and said, "The guy had about a million opportunities to make an honest living when he came back from the pros. They love the b.a.s.t.a.r.d down here. But, word is, he likes the action. Likes the dangerous reputation." Joey clinked the ice in his gla.s.s and looked out at the night. "So it was Purcell who Carli saw shoot that guy in the beach house?"

"Yep."

Joey cussed, and shook his head, and drank more scotch.

I asked, "Can you let go of watching Hayc.o.c.k for a few days?"

"I can do whatever you need me to do."

"I want to know what Purcell's doing. I want to know who he talks to, where he goes, and who he's sleeping with. I want to know everything I can about what he's up to. Because we've got to know if he's getting close to finding Susan and Carli."

"I'll bury him in bugs. Get his house and his car. Tap his phones. But I'm gonna need to pull Loutie off guard duty to help with this if you want me to keep covering Hayc.o.c.k. I can put another man on Susan and Carli if you want."

"Yeah. Do that. The whole point is to keep them safe. In the meantime, we've got to find a way to stop Purcell for good."

Joey looked up. "Short of killing him." I didn't say anything, and Joey noticed. He seemed to think about that, then he asked, "Did you report him setting the fire?"

"No."

Joey thought a little while longer. "Does anyone know you two had this run-in?"

I said, "Just the guy who helped him set it," and Joey slowly nodded his head. Joey knew that Susan didn't need or deserve any more pain in her life. If it came to it, Joey would snap Purcell's neck without thought or regret. Now, though, as the idea of murderous revenge turned real, I began to hope it wouldn't come to that.

Joey shook his head. "Ain't this some s.h.i.t?"

Joey was eloquent, and he was right. This was indeed some s.h.i.t. I said, "You think your buddies on the Panama City force could tell us whether Purcell is mixed up with the Bodines?"

Joey stood and walked to the kitchen phone. He punched in a number and spoke quietly into the mouthpiece.

A fresh whiskey and I walked out on the deck. Bird's seash.e.l.ls were ash, but their charcoal frame drew a black square in the sand where it had landed and burned. Small flaps of charred canvas ruffled and skitted down the beach ahead of the breeze and disappeared into the dusk. Leaving my drink untouched on the railing, I wandered back inside as Joey was thanking Detective Coosa for his help.

I looked at him. "Well?"

"The rumor is Purcell runs the Bodines up there around Panama City. Coosa didn't know anything about Apalachicola."

"Okay, then see if you can find out who runs the Bodines down here. We need to know whether Purcell is the King of the Jethros or just one of several. I want to know if he's messing around in somebody else's backyard. Can you do that?"

"Probably. One way or another." Joey sat back on the sofa. "Look, I got something else to tell you. I got a name on the fat guy Hayc.o.c.k smuggled in." He paused to drain his drink. "It took a few tries to get to the desk at Captain Casey's Inn without somebody around, but last night I checked out the card filea"they ain't even got a computer. It's gonna turn out to be some kinda alias, but the guy's name on the card was 'L. Carpintero.'" Joey spelled the last name. "Mean anything to you?"

"Nope. But I'll make a note. It may fit in somewhere if we find out something else."

Joey got up to leave, and I walked with him to the door. He asked why he hadn't seen my Jeep outside when he drove up. I told him about Purcell commandeering the vehicle, and he offered to get me a car. I shook my head. I could have one brought over in the morning.

At the door, Joey hesitated. "It never would've entered my head that Leroy Purcell would be blowing people away. I thought he just liked hanging out with hoods. Trying to look tough."

"Murder and arson with Sonny the Psycho to back him up. Not to mention him threatening teenage girls. Not exactly what I'd call tough." I said, "A real All-American, huh?"

Joey said, "Yeah, a real All-American a.s.shole."

Susan had abandoned her house in a hurry. The bathrooms were ready for the morning shower she took instead at Loutie's house after fleeing killers in her own home. I lay on Susan's bed and breathed in the smell of her and tried to think. Outside, through the windows I had stood before while Susan slept, the sunset splashed the horizon with oranges and pinks and purples and streaked the ocean with jagged ripples of molten silver and gold. I rolled off the bed, stripped, walked into the bathroom, and turned on the shower. As the water began to heat and steam clouded the ceiling, I looked at the guy in the mirror. I wasn't impressed.

The shower felt good, and it kept on feeling good until Susan's water heater was drained and tepid. I found a box with some of Bird's old clothes in it and put them on. My stuff was back on the guest room bed at pastel h.e.l.l, and I didn't feel like hiking.

Back downstairs, I found my unfinished drink and poured it over the weathered banister and into the sand below. Sharp white p.r.i.c.ks dotted the eastern sky above a smudged black horizon, and the approaching night washed the sky with charcoals that faded overhead to the soft gray tones of summer flannel. In the west, the last thin blue tint of daylight hung in a crescent-shaped curtain above the horizon.

I went in search of a hammer and nails, which I found in a combination laundry and storage room under the stilted house. After nailing Sonny's kicked-in door shut, I went to bed. Susan's pillow held the soft feminine scents of her shampoo and cologne and makeup and some other girl smell I couldn't identify. An overwhelming loneliness enveloped me like a physical presence, and I fell asleep.

I was up before the sun with more than four hours sleep, but less than I'd had the night before. It was as if my mind were signaling that my level of screwed-upness had digressed, but not to the depths I had occupied before finding some sort of redemption in helping Susan and Carli.