Candy Apple Red. Nancy Bush

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СКАЧАТЬ it and die,” Dwayne growled. The muskrat took him at his word and moved back. Dwayne gently guided the boat into the bay. Ignoring the signs posted to not feed the wildlife, I tossed the muskrat a piece of crust. He raced over, sniffed it a few times and waddled off.

      “Did you see that?” I demanded, incensed. The flapping ducks appeared more appreciative but Foster, who’d happened to walk by at my moment of generosity, glared at me. I waved sheepishly and grimaced to myself. I wasn’t going to get that free meal unless I changed my ways.

      Dwayne hit the accelerator, trying to outrun the fading light. It wasn’t that you couldn’t boat after dark; it was that you couldn’t go fast. Lake Chinook was only a few miles from end to end, but it seemed like forever at six miles per hour—night speed. We had to slow down as we went beneath the bridge and through the tight curves of Half Moon Bay, a narrow inlet that connected Lakewood Bay to the main lake. As soon as he was able, he punched it up again and we were hurtling across the water.

      “Wait!” I screamed as we neared the looming tree-shrouded cliffs of Cotton’s island, his fortress completely surrounded by the moat of Lake Chinook.

      Dwayne ignored me.

      “Damn it, Dwayne! Slow down! Circle the island!”

      Swearing under his breath, Dwayne did as I requested and we knifed slowly through the restricted speed areas that surrounded all the shoreline. The boat cut beneath the private road that led from North Shore Road to the island and through the fading purple light I glimpsed the path that circled the Reynolds’ private compound. There was the black chain-link fence and I could faintly make out the trail just on its other side.

      I glanced around automatically for the Lake Patrol. They weren’t bad; an offshoot of the sheriff’s office. The Lake Chinook Police Department was another story altogether. Their motto was: no call too small. And they meant it. There was relatively little crime in Lake Chinook, and officers had nothing to do but dispense speeding tickets and M.I.P.’s, Minors in Possession, to underage drinkers and pot smokers. Once in a while they saved a cat in a tree. Their dedication worried me and I steered clear of them on general purposes. Having Booth as a policeman probably contributed to my overall paranoia.

      “We haven’t done anything illegal,” Dwayne pointed out, interpreting my glance around for what it was.

      “Yet,” I said.

      Dwayne smiled to himself. He thought he had me; I could tell. Maybe he did.

      Pulling back on the throttle, he coaxed the boat around the island at the regulation six miles per hour. Neither of us said anything as we both examined the fence, the oaks and Douglas firs with low sweeping boughs, the faint outline of the path, and the glimpses of rooftops: Cotton’s house and garage and outbuildings. The two Dobermans came to the fence and eyed our slowly motoring boat suspiciously.

      I said, “I bet the Coma Kid was running from the dogs.”

      “Wouldn’t you be?”

      “I’m not a fan of dogs.”

      “What’s that kid’s name?” Dwayne asked.

      I shook my head. There was a side of the island that was faced with basalt rock walls. Shivering, I pictured a body falling over that edge, possibly knocking himself out cold on the way, way down to the water.

      Light had faded to a thin glimmer on the western horizon when Dwayne suddenly swung the boat toward the main lake and turned up the gas. We roared across the water, just ahead of complete nightfall. He delivered me back to my place, cutting the engine and letting the hull slap softly on little incoming waves toward the dock. I climbed to the gunwale, expecting to lithely leap ashore but the rocking vessel coupled with my two-and-a-half glasses of wine caused my equilibrium to fail. I stumbled, stubbed my toe on a cleat, cried out, and watched my plastic flip-flop teeter on the edge of my bruised toe. I desperately tried to squinch onto it, but it slid off to slip gently into the murky, algae-furred depths of the lake.

      I stared down in disbelief. “It sank!”

      “It’s only three feet deep here. You can probably find it.”

      Like, oh sure. I’m going to walk along the muddy, duck-poop-slimed bottom of the bay. I silently mourned the loss. The pair had cost me $5.89 at the pharmacy and they didn’t even float.

      “They looked cheap,” Dwayne observed, which pissed me off anew.

      “They’re irreplaceable. I ordered them special.”

      “Yeah, right. Give me a push.”

      My toe was still hurting so I knelt down and shoved his hull away with my hands. When Dwayne’s bow had drifted clear of the shore he began putt-putting toward the West Bay Bridge in the direction of the main lake and eventually his cabana.

      “Want me to come with you Saturday?” he called, his voice clear and loud with the amplification of the water.

      “I have a feeling I’d better go alone. Thanks for the surveillance tour.”

      “Be careful.”

      He switched on his running lights and I watched the red and green and white lights move toward the bridge. I shivered and glanced around. I’d forgotten to leave any interior lights on in the bungalow. Carefully, I picked my way up the moss-surrounded flagstone steps to the back door. It was locked, but it was the same key as the front door and I let myself in and stood silently for a moment, listening hard. Dwayne had spooked me with his warning.

      I counted my heartbeats in my throbbing toe, strained my ears, called myself a fool, an idiot and a hatchery fish. Taking off my remaining sandal, I hobbled across the floor and switched on the lights. The living room burst into view. Not a shadow out of place.

      The file lay on the coffee table where I’d left it. I opened it and shuffled through a few of the papers. Marta had been thorough in collecting the information. Maybe Tess had supplied it. I thought about taking the file to bed and poring over it closely but then I suddenly found pictures of Bobby’s three kids. Faxed copies of grade school close-ups complete with goofy smiles, missing teeth and rooster tufts of hair. The nine-month-old was sitting in one of those baby chairs looking rather surprised.

      I felt a surge of rage directed at Bobby Reynolds. Was I seriously considering delving into this family tragedy? Even peripherally? I thought about Murphy. His acquaintanceship had brought me to this point. It was because of him that I knew anything about Bobby, Cotton and Tess. It was also because of him that I’d first flirted with this kind of work. He was the reason I’d taken criminology classes, the reason I’d come to Oregon, the reason I’d become a process server, the reason I was introduced to information specialist Dwayne Durbin.

      This wasn’t a “take the money and run” case, to quote Dwayne. It was so much more. But I’d promised I’d go to Cotton’s benefit. I could do that much. Then I would wash my hands of the whole sorry affair and let the authorities take over.

      I closed the file almost reverently. I made sure all the locks on my doors and windows were shut tight. Then I checked again.

      For a while I stood looking out my back window at the rippling sliver of moon-striped water, the length and breadth of my view.

      A long, long time after that I managed to fall asleep.

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