Hell's Bay (10 page)

A violent encounter. A suspect let go. Nothing definitive, but it sent a prickle across Sugarman's shoulders. Maybe Mona Milligan knew something after all. Small-town cover-ups happened every day.

When he pushed further back, broadened his search to the months and years before her death, looking for anything on Abigail Bates or Bates International, that's when his heart began to rev and his focus tightened.

Bates International was a Fortune 500 company. Originally based in tiny Summerland, Florida, its corporate head-quarters was now in nearby Sarasota, with branch offices in Manhattan, Chicago, Paris, and Beijing, and its 139,000 employees scattered across sixty-three countries. Bates International had hundreds of smaller companies sprouting off the corporate trunk. Companies that manufactured fertilizers and a variety of chemicals: vitamin supplements, biofuels, processed grains, oil seeds, feed ingredients to farmers and live-stock producers, corn milling, a range of sweeteners like malitol, sorbitol. Oil and gas leases, mining, drilling. Marketing and trading electricity. Pig farms, dairy farms, cattle ranches, vast corn farms. Poultryand meat-processing plants. A food giant with its fingers in dozens of lucrative pies.

Estimated earnings of 67 billion the previous year. A personal net worth that put Abigail Bates at number fourteen among the wealthiest Americans.

She was also a member of the Business Round Table, an in-nocuous-sounding organization that required more Googling. Turned out the Round Table was composed of 120 CEO's of America's most powerful companies. The group met three times a year to discuss governmental policy and put forth recommendations. Position papers that lobbied Congress and the White House for certain business objectives. Though Sugar paid little attention to business affairs or national politics, even he recognized a dozen names on the Round Table list.

This wasn't some old lady in a canoe.

Sugarman would bet there was a smaller round table in some penthouse somewhere. Just three or four people. They didn't put out papers and they didn't do press releases. He knew it was a corny conspiracy view, something left over from reading Ayn Rand at an impressionable age. But it was a lifelong suspicion that at the top of the pyramid three or four people were calling the shots, nudging the world's center of gravity this way or that for reasons only they understood. If that was true, then Abigail Bates was the kind of person who'd be in that penthouse suite. She might even sit at the head of the table.

The prickle became a bloom of belly heat. Thorn's newly discovered grandmother was one of America's elite. The small-town sheriff in charge of the investigation had dismissed the only suspect, a man who'd had a violent encounter with the deceased. Six months later, two members of Abigail Bates's family appeared suddenly, ready to take a voyage on Rusty Stabler's houseboat. As they came aboard, Abigail Bates's son announced to Thorn: I'm your uncle John. Your granny is dead.

Sugar paused a moment and tracked back through the articles. One thing had snagged his attention. Minor point, perhaps.

The different surnames confused him. Abigail Bates's son was named Milligan. It took Sugar another ten minutes combing through databases and websites before he got the answer. In a rare interview with an academic business journal, Abigail explained that she'd held on to her daddy's name out of respect for his legacy. Leopold Witherspoon Bates. A cattle rancher, and the son of Leopold senior, the family patriarch. Leopold senior was a pioneer cattleman who in his ninety years had amassed a vast herd that roamed over thousands of square miles in central Florida, land he'd accumulated when that part of the state went for pennies an acre.

John Milligan and Thorn's mother, Elizabeth, the kids of Abigail Bates and Edwin Andrew Milligan, took their daddy's name. Mother Bates, Daddy Milligan. But it was Bates land and Bates cattle and the Bates ancestry and empire building that was the backbone of the modern-day Milligan family.

At eleven-thirty Sugar dialed the home number for Deputy Rachel Pike of the Monroe County Sheriff's Office. Twenty years earlier they'd both joined the department the same month and had survived their rookie year in large part by sharing their daily trials at breakfast each morning at Craig's Diner. Friends ever since. Even with Sugar spending the last decade freelancing in private law enforcement, and Rachel sticking it out in the public sector, rising slowly but steadily through the ranks, they'd kept the lines open.

Rachel snapped up the phone on the second ring.

“What's up, Sugar?”

Sugarman faltered for a moment. He still wasn't used to caller ID, the edge it gave to the person answering the phone.

“Nothing major,” Sugar said. “Well, all right, it might be major. It's a Thorn thing.”

“What's the idiot gotten into now?”

“This isn't his fault. Something happened. Asteroid out of the blue.”

“It's never his fault. The poor guy.”

Sugarman explained the deal, concise but detailed. When he was done, Rachel was silent.

“You don't buy it? Your Geiger's not clicking?”

“Oh, it's clicking,” she said. “For one thing, what's a lady that age doing in a canoe by herself?”

“That's a question.”

“And what causes a violent confrontation between some young guy and an eighty-six-year-old woman?”

“Another thing I'd like to know.”

“A woman with that kind of power and influence, why didn't I hear about it, why wasn't it front-page news?”

“It got coverage in the big papers—
Miami Herald
,
NewYork Times
, Boston, Washington—back in the business section mostly,” Sugar said. “Seems Bates International doesn't court publicity.”

“And with a VIP like her, Sheriff Timmy is running the show? No big guns from outside?”

“Yeah, I was curious about that. Didn't turn up anything about the Feds being involved, or FDLE, or anybody higher up than DeSoto County Sheriff's Department. That's another thing I'd like to ask in person.”

Rachel was quiet for a moment. In the background there was a clinking noise that sounded ceramic, like she was brewing tea.

“And if the Milligans wanted to contact Thorn, why not pick up a phone? Why the surprise attack? Go for a week on a boat out in the Everglades, all isolated. What's that about?”

“Thorn wondered the same thing.”

“Okay, granted, something's peculiar. I wouldn't bet my house on it being criminal, but it's worth a sniff. What can I do?”

“Maybe a phone call.”

“Sheriff Timmy?”

“Yeah, like prepare the ground. Invoke professional courtesy. Tell him I'm working for a member of the Bates family. Which is true.”

“Small-town cop to small-town cop, put the moves on him.”

“A little sweet talk. That voice you use on the sheriff when he's pissed.”

“You noticed that?”

“Oh, yeah. That's one hell of a soothing purr. You got that down.”

“Maybe Timmy's a sexist. He doesn't like lady cops. That happens.”

“I got confidence in you. If I could get a look at any evidence reports, prints, fiber, fingerprints, medical examiner's testimony. Those eyewitnesses, their names. You know, the basics.”

“You don't want much.”

“Whatever you can do, Rachel.”

“Calling me this late, why the hurry?”

“I'm thinking I'll drive up tonight, get busy on it first thing tomorrow.”

More clinking. Then he heard her sipping and setting down the mug.

“One other thing.”

“Let me guess. You want me to run somebody through the National Crime computer?”

“Actually three people.”

“Let me get a pencil.”

Sugarman gave her the name he'd discovered in his research, the suspect who'd been let go: Charles M. Kipling, Jr. And John Milligan and his daughter, Mona. Priors, DUI's, anything that popped up could be interesting. After a little good-natured resistance, Rachel agreed.

“You settle things with the pilot over his daughter?” she asked. “That legal mess.”

“Our lawyers are hashing it out.”

“So this is a good time to be out of town. Change of scenery.”

“Exactly.”

“Plus Thorn is your buddy.”

“He is that.”

“Even though he's almost got you killed a few times.”

“He means well.”

“Funny you should call, Sugar. I was thinking about you just today.”

“Yeah?”

She laughed. A throaty, full-bodied sound. “Don't get in a sweat. I'm not hitting on you. I was thinking of you in a strictly professional sense.”

“You need a private investigator?”

“No, we've got an opening. A couple of grades up from your old job.”

Sugar was silent, looking at the walls of his shabby office. Rent due next week. His in-box empty. Out-box the same.

“So, does the silence indicate you're considering it?”

Sugarman sighed.

“I'm kind of used to making my own hours. Coming and going.”

“Just thought I'd mention it. Sheriff always liked you. A lot of people around the department think highly of you. Include me on that list.”

“Okay, Rachel. I will. I'll think about it.”

“So I'll call Timmy tomorrow morning. Purr in the good ol' boy's ear.”

“Thanks, Rachel.”

“And you think about that job. I looked through the candidate files, and, just between you and me, totally off-the-record, I think you'd have a damn good shot.”

After Sugar hung up he sat at his desk and looked around his office for a while, listening to the late-night traffic out on U.S. 1. Somewhere down the highway a siren whooped once—a traffic stop—probably some drunk racing back to Miami, jigged when he should've jogged. He thought of that world—a paycheck every two weeks, the routines, the camaraderie—versus the job he had now, chasing down run-away girls who were pissed off when they were found.

For some reason a poem popped into his head, something from a million years ago in high school English. Two paths diverging in the woods. And he remembered the guy decided to take the one less traveled. Was that the right decision? Going down the weedy path, not the trampled one?

He sat for a while longer thinking about the poem, about paths in the woods, weedy ones and clear ones. Something to talk over with Thorn. Though he knew what Thorn would say: Why the hell take either path? Forge off into the vines and brambles, that's where the cool stuff was.

Sugar locked his office, got in his car, and drove back to his house to pack an overnight bag. It was four or five hours up to Summerland. He could be there by dawn.

 

 

 

 

At 3
A.M.
, without a word, Rusty tapped me on the shoulder and relieved me at the wheel. I went to my cabin, set the photograph face-down on the tiny dresser, and fell into my bunk and into a sleep full of armadillos and leathery crackers on horseback riding through scrubland so gray and desiccated it looked like a desert on some distant moon. There was no story to my dream, nothing I remembered when I woke at 6, just a jittery assortment of disconnected images of harsh people living in an even harsher landscape.

I showered, dressed, slathered sunscreen on my legs and the rest of my exposed flesh, then climbed down the ladder to the main deck.

Teeter was at work in the galley. He wore a tall red chef's hat and white chef's jacket with red piping, white, stiffly pressed pants and a red apron, and a bright red scarf knotted around his throat. He was moving with an unhurried economy, sliding from one dish to another, tending several simmering pans, three bubbling pots, sprinkling, stirring, adding ingredients. Aromas like no breakfast I had ever inhaled. One look, and I knew Teeter had gone overboard. Beyond overboard.

“Where's the roast pig?”

He shook his head several times. Irony wasn't one of his conversational skills. He used a pair of tongs to move a half-dozen kielbasa sausages out of the skillet onto a warming tray.

Every countertop, tabletop, side table, and even the bar was covered with plates of food.

“Did we get some new arrivals last night?” I said. “An army, maybe?”

He shook his head again. The red chef's hat was nearly a foot tall and pleated on the sides. It wobbled as Teeter filled a platter with Belgian waffles and set it beside another plate stacked with Swedish pancakes. There were flaky fruit-filled pastries of every size. Bowls of applesauce and jellies and jams. A dozen beautifully fried crab fritters. Cinnamon rolls, biscuits, a serving dish of oatmeal with blackberries on top, a pot of cheese grits, French toast, lemon bread, strawberry crepes, bacon, Canadian bacon, three different types of sausage, bagels, blueberry muffins, a large iced bowl of shrimp cocktail. The omelet pan was greased, and bowls of diced mushrooms, grated cheese, scallions, and jalapeño peppers stood ready beside the stove. A large warming tray was full of scrambled eggs sprinkled with spices I couldn't identify.

“People get hungry out on the water,” Teeter said, when I looked up from taking inventory. “Breakfast is the most important meal.”

“There's only seven of us,” I said.

“You think I overdid it?” His eyes were misting. He ducked his head with a flash of shame.

“No, it looks great, Teeter. Just great.”

“I made everybody's lunch, too,” he said, still looking down at the deck. “In the coolers. Sandwiches and cookies. Some fruit tarts with special icing.”

“Above and beyond the call, Teeter.”

I knew exactly the capacity of our refrigerators and ice chests and was fairly sure without even taking a look that Teeter had depleted the larder by at least a quarter on this one meal alone. We had twenty-odd meals to go before we were scheduled to return to civilization.