“For God’s sake,” Rosa said.
“See? I made you laugh.”
“You most certainly did.” She poked one big toe out of the water and found herself picturing it with a tag.
Wow, she thought, that’s pretty fucked up. Definitely time for a career re-evaluation.
“Don’t forget,” Yancy was saying on the phone, “Stripling tried to kill me, too. As his only surviving victim, I intend to present myself to the county grand jury as a well-groomed, credible witness. Attempted murder is also an extraditable offense.”
Rosa didn’t want to derail Yancy’s enthusiasm, yet she feared that his value to prosecutors would be small given the messy circumstances leading to his demotion from the detective squad to roach patrol.
“You heard from Neville?” she asked.
“Not yet,” Yancy said. “I’m hoping he’s just laying low.”
“I feel terrible about Coquina’s house. The whole roof blowing off—that was insane.”
“It’s what hurricanes do.”
“It wasn’t the hurricane, Andrew. It was us.”
Rosa said good-bye and put down the phone and closed her eyes. She was smiling when the candle burned out.
Neville wasn’t worried for himself. It was Driggs who was in danger.
“Some bod mon lookin’ to kill you so do wot I say. Now get in!”
The monkey made a fuss but eventually he curled up inside the backpack, which Neville zipped up snug. He threaded his arms through the straps and rode his bicycle to the conch shack. Half the thatching was gone, so he sat on the shady side of the bar. A muffled chitter came from the backpack when Neville set it on the stool beside him.
Everybody in the place was talking about the storm, sharing damage reports, gossip, whose husband spent the night with who. Neville ordered fritters and out of guilt he slipped a small one to Driggs. The air was thick as glue, like always after a hurricane.
Egg came limping down the road, but Neville didn’t get up to leave. He was from Andros and Egg wasn’t. The others sitting at the conch shack were locals, too. If Egg got a notion in his fat skull to start trouble, he would be heavily outnumbered.
Like a half-wit he sat down squinting in the hottest patch of sun. When he finally spotted Neville he hitched around to the shade.
“Mon, I shoulda kill you down on de beach,” he said.
Neville stayed cool. He was still sore from the beating outside the trailer.
“Utter night at my old lady’s place, ’member dot? She say it was your fucking monkey did a number on my cock.”
“Wot! Ain’t my monkey, mon. I give ’im up as pay fuh summa her big woo-doo.” Neville snuck a glance at the backpack. He prayed Driggs would stay quiet.
To Egg he asserted, “Dot monkey belongs legal to her, not me.”
“When I find ’im I’m gon rip ’is head off.”
“No way! He wort good money. She dint tell you he was in de movies with Johnny Depp?”
Egg was conscious of his outsider status on the island. He lowered his voice. “I seen dot wicked ape run off wit you. Don’t lie. Give ’im up and we be done wit dis foolishness.”
“Mon, wasn’t fuh me you’d still have his filty teet in you! Lucky f’you I walked in dot shack when I did.” Neville was startled by his own strong words. The plastic fork in his hand was shaking.
“Okay. I guess you wanna die,” Egg said.
“Dot’s you, mister! You beeda one must wants to die coz dot’s wot hoppen to men who lay in bed wit de Dragon Queen.”
“Oh bullshit.”
“Axe anybotty on Lizard Cay! Go on,” Neville said. “Lisbon Jones. Duncan Roxy. Lightbourne Carter, too. All strong young fellas come under her spell and now dey stone dead. Go look in de graveyard up Prince Hill, you dont believe me.”
“I ain’t under nobody’s spell,” said Egg, without much zip.
“Listen to some hard truth, mon.”
Egg said Neville was a lying sonofabitch, but he didn’t hit him. “Somebody stobbed my boss in de back and put ’im in a wheelchair. Wot you know ’bout dot?”
“Mr. Chrissofer got stobbed?” Neville acted shocked.
“And why you hongin’ wit dot white mon, anyhow?” Egg asked.
“Wot white mon?”
“One you was wit at de old lady’s place. One who took off yest’day in boss’s plane.”
From the corner of his eye Neville caught movement—Driggs fidgeting inside the zippered satchel. Egg didn’t notice.
“Who I choose to hong wit is my bidness,” Neville said.
“Had de hawt Cuban girlfriend.”
“Yah, I know who you mean. Dot white mon? He a cop from Florida.”
Egg frowned. “A cop? No way.” Sweat was beading on his prunish little ears.
“He gon put your boss mon in a U.S. prison,” Neville said ominously. “I was you, I’d get my ahss back to Nassau look f’nudder job.”
Egg gimped off at a brisk clip. Neville finished his fritters and paid the bill. On the bike ride to the dock he stopped to open the backpack. Out squirmed Driggs, funky-smelling and carping as he climbed to Neville’s shoulder. He was having a bad time kicking the nicotine.
One of the conch boys in a Whaler took them up the skinny creek where Neville had left his boat during the hurricane. For bailing rainwater Neville had brought two bisected milk jugs. He handed one to Driggs, who hurled it back at him. He grabbed the monkey by the scurfy ruff and said, “Stop dis shit, or I drop you at Mr. Egg’s. He boil you in a goddamn stew!”
It took more than an hour to empty the water and mangrove leaves from the boat. The engine kicked over on the first try and before long they were in open water, needlefish scattering like shooting stars ahead of the bow. In a drooping diaper Driggs stood all the way up front, a single upraised paw shielding his wide eyes from the glare.
The tide was high, so Neville was able to run the flats all the way back to Rocky Town. He kept his face turned away, toward the ocean, as he passed by Christopher’s house.
Twenty-eight
Caitlin Cox was in the shower when she heard the phone ring. She hoped it was her stepmother calling to report a bounteous transfer of funds into Caitlin’s checking account. Caitlin and Simon had already listed their house and were looking for a much bigger place down in Palmetto Bay.
Two hundred grand was the amount Caitlin had been led to expect from her late father’s offshore stash. A fatter chunk would be coming a bit later, when the life insurance company paid off on Nick’s $2 million policy. Half of that was going to his one and only daughter, who could expedite its delivery (Eve had explained at their reconciliation lunch) if she quit making wild accusations about the manner of her father’s death.
And Caitlin stopped, like, right away. The anticipated windfall had brightened her attitude toward all humanity; Simon said she was like a new person. When he got home from work every morning Caitlin would have two bagels thawing for him in the toaster oven. It was like being married to a geisha!
His job was night security on a movie shoot. Swill was the name of the film, about two guys and a hot vampire chick who open a juice bar on South Beach. As a surprise Simon brought Caitlin to the set, and the coolest thing happened—they asked her to play a customer who gags on a blood-and-banana smoothie. It was a short scene, no speaking lines, but still she was over the moon.
Although Simon earned a decent wage, he and Caitlin hadn’t saved enough for a down payment on a fish tank, much less a house. For upward mobility they were relying on the money from Eve. But when Caitlin stepped out of the shower, she saw Simon holding her cell phone like it was a lit stick of dynamite.
“Is it her?” she asked.
“No, sweetheart, but you better take it.”