Death at China Rose (Sunshine State Murders) Page 2

  I nodded, but said nothing.

  “Well, that was the last time I saw my niece. That night Rose packed her suitcase and disappeared.”

  I sighed inwardly—again with the disappearing. “No one heard her leave?”

  “Not a living soul. Bambi was asleep in her room and Charlie was passed out on the sofa—no surprise there.”

  “Right,” I said, though it was possible Charlie’s drunkenness had been an act. After seeing his extreme intoxication at the fireworks, no one would have questioned Charlie’s story about being passed out when Rose left. But it was too early for such conjecture. I moved on. “What about Harry? Where was he when Rose pulled her vanishing act?”

  Sighing, Etta shook her head in super-slow motion, looking for all the world like a Sunday school teacher at the end of her rope but determined to maintain the high ground. “I told you before that he lived at 18 Big Pine Terrace, that’s a good mile and a half from Charlie and Rose’s trailer. Why, a marching band could have tramped over the Ridge and Harry wouldn’t have known. But I know one thing—somebody saw something,” she said, tapping the table for emphasis. “You see, Rose and Charlie only had the one vehicle. The next morning Rose was gone, but the pickup was still there.”

  I nodded. “So someone picked up Rose from the Ridge—any idea who?”

  “No, and whoever that person was has chosen to remain silent.”

  “Before, you mentioned some letters from Rose—tell me about them.”

  Etta drank some water. “Around a week after Rose left, Charlie said he’d gotten a letter from Rose, saying she was fine and warning him not to look for her.”

  “That’s all she wrote?” It seemed Rose would have written something for her daughter.

  “I don’t know—I never saw the letter.” Etta added that Rose sent Bambi a card for her birthday in November—or was it a Christmas card? She wasn’t sure. “But after that first year even those small remembrances stopped.”

  “In all this time, did you ever go to the police?” I asked, unable to keep the anger from my voice.

  “Why would I?”

  “Because they could have helped. For one, they probably could have identified the person who picked up Rose at the Ridge. Now I’ve got a snowball’s chance in you-know-where to find the mystery driver.”

  Etta was nonplussed. “Hindsight is all well and good, but at the time I saw no need to air the family’s dirty laundry. And I was so sure that Rose would come back—if not for Charlie, then for Bambi.”

  I crossed my arms and leaned close. “But Rose hasn’t come back.”

  Etta retrieved a flowery handkerchief from her purse and dabbed an eye. “True, but you should remember that I’m only Rose’s aunt. My brother and Charlie were a lot closer to the situation, and neither of them has ever seen the need to inform the police. If they didn’t see the need for police involvement, why should I?”

  I’d gotten the feeling that this family wasn’t exactly close, so I asked Etta if it was possible that Rose had stayed in contact with Charlie and Harry.

  “I suppose so,” Etta admitted, but her sour expression suggested that it was more likely that the sky was filled with flying pigs. “But if Rose was in communication with the boys, why would they keep it a secret from me?”

  “Come on,” I said softly. “We both know that people keep all kinds of secrets for all kinds of reasons.” I waited for a response, but Etta didn’t rattle, just sat there smiling a smile that would sour beer.

  “And how does Bambi fit into all this?” I asked, but Etta just stared. “Surely she’s curious about her mother,” I tried again.

  “Bambi was a child when—”

  “But she’s not child anymore. How old is she? Sixteen? seventeen?

  “Eighteen.”

  “If I were her, I’d be calling the cops every day, pestering them to find my mom.”

  “Bambi isn’t like you, thank goodness,” Etta said.

  “I’m just trying...”

  Etta waved a gnarled hand. “I know that I handled Rose’s disappearance all wrong, but I can’t change the past. Will you find Rose for me?”

  I considered all that Etta had divulged. I knew damn well that there was a lot more to the story. And I didn’t like this woman, who was both too sweet and too sour. Even though I could use the job—my bank account was on life support—I gave her my honest opinion. “Before hiring a PI, you should take this to Sheriff Spooner. If he can’t find anything, then come back to me.”

  “No, no, no!” Etta hissed. “I refuse to involve the police in a family matter.”

  “Sheriff Spooner can be discreet—he can...”

  “I want you, Addie Gorsky, not the police.” She wiped her face with the knotted handkerchief. “Maybe later I’ll call the sheriff, but not yet...not yet. I just don’t want to interfere in Rose’s life or cause problems for her. Why, she doesn’t even have to talk to me if she doesn’t want to—I don’t want to get her in any trouble, but I need to know that she’s all right.”

  This brought out fresh concerns. “What trouble would Rose be in?”

  “I don’t know,” Etta mumbled, her eyes dropping to her lap. “Rose was always an excitable, impulsive girl and sometimes made poor decisions...In high school she experimented with...substances...” The old lady’s voice died off.

  I finally got it. Etta believed Rose had left China Rose under a cloud, perhaps a criminal one. If her niece had been involved in drugs or worse, it explained why Etta didn’t want to bring in the cops. But now it was time to test the woman’s true mettle. Etta clearly believed Rose was living another life somewhere far from Grubber County. A more fatal reason for Rose’s departure had not occurred to the woman.

  “Etta, what if I find Rose and she isn’t all right?”

  “I already told you...oh!” Her face fell as my meaning struck home. “I...I’m sure Rose is all right.”

  “What if she isn’t?”

  Her face took on that determined look again. “I need to know the truth. Will you help me?”

  How could I say no?

  Outside, thunder rolled. The afternoon rain clouds were gaining substance. Soon the skies would open and release the deluge. As Saturday afternoon became Saturday night, a few more elbows bent on the bar. For privacy’s sake Etta and I relocated to the empty banquet room.

  Etta agreed to my terms without argument, probably sensing that I wasn’t in the mood to negotiate. “Now, I need some phone numbers and addresses—let’s start with your brother Harry.”

  Instead of rattling off the information, Etta slid a sheet of paper my way. “This should be everything you need.”

  I did a double take at the huge font. In addition to the contact information, the old broad had printed out directions to China Rose. I had to hand it to her—Etta had come prepared. But when I returned my attention to the paper, I saw a problem. Only Harry’s address at 18 Big Terrace Road was included.

  “I also need directions to Charlie’s trailer on the Ridge.”

  “My goodness, Charlie hasn’t lived up there for years.” Etta explained that after his wife abandoned him and their young daughter, Charlie had moved his trailer close to Harry’s house on Big Pine Terrace. “I don’t have the exact address, but if you find Harry’s house, Charlie’s trailer will be nearby. But chances are, you won’t find either of them at home. My guess is they’ll be out working, probably at China Rose Bar and Bait. Remember what I said about Harry—he gets his dime’s worth of work out of folks, especially if they’re family.”

  “Bambi too?” I asked. “Eighteen is kind of young to be working in a bar.”

  Etta sniffed. “The girl’s old enough to scrub toilets and wash dishes.”

  “Well, I’ve got enough to get started,” I said, closing my notepad.

&nbsp
; “I should warn you that Charlie probably won’t talk to you about Rose. Good luck getting any sense out of Harry—he’s always been a bit of a horse’s patootie. And Bambi was only seven years old when Rose left. What could she know about her mother’s disappearance?”

  Plenty. Children were sponges, taking in everything. They often misinterpreted what they saw, but they saw a lot, especially if it had to do with their parents.

  “When do you plan to talk to them?” Etta asked.

  “Tonight.” Since it was Saturday night, there was a good chance both father and daughter were working at China Rose Bar and Bait—a perfect opportunity for a casual meet.

  “So soon?” Etta’s hand clutched her throat.

  “Soon? It’s been eleven years, Etta.”

  She had the grace to pretend to be embarrassed. “Before you talk to anyone, I must make one small demand.”

  “Which is?” Bells and whistles were blasting in my ears.

  “Keep my name out of this. No one can know that I’ve hired you to look for Rose.”

  “Not even your family?”

  “Especially my family! You can tell them whatever you please to get them to talk, but our agreement stays secret. Trust me, I have my reasons.”

  “You want to share those reasons with me?” I asked, but she just sat there like a sphinx. “Okay, we’ll do it your way—anything else?”

  “Just one thing.” She patted my hand. “Call me tonight, after you’ve talked to them.”

  So Etta planned to keep me on a short leash, as well. Good luck with that—many others before her had tried that and failed. “I’ll call, but it might be pretty late.”

  “I’ll be awake. Old people don’t need much sleep.”

  Was that true? I thought of my dying father, who was full of sleep. The door opened, Annie saying Etta’s taxi was here.

  Etta pushed herself up using the table. She looked around the room and frowned. “I’m sorry, but could you point me toward the door? I’ve gotten a little turned around—you see, I’m blind.”

  * * *

  A few hours later, I made the turn into China Rose Fish Camp and immediately hit a pothole. I slowed the Crown Vic. As China Rose’s main drag, Eula Lee Road left a lot to be desired—it was too dark, too crowded with trees. My cell phone was out, but I had the map I’d downloaded earlier. According to it, China Rose Bar and Bait was a short three miles away, at the end of the road. But instead of the usual excitement I felt at the beginning of a case, my mood was pitch-black, with a pinch of foreboding.

  I tapped the brakes. The road had narrowed even more, and the tree branches reached out from either side to form a leafy canopy. Etta’s insistence on keeping the family out of the loop was a clear danger sign that all was not well in the Ware-Pitts clan. When I was a raw rookie with Baltimore Police Department, I, like most cops, dreaded domestic disturbance calls. Give me an honest bar fight—at least then you knew what you were up against. When family members went to war, they didn’t take prisoners, and God help anyone who got in the way. I’d feel better if Etta had been straight with me, but as it was, I was stepping into the mess blind.

  Blind, like Etta. When I walked Etta to her cab, she explained that she wasn’t totally blind and could still pick out shapes and light, but macular degeneration was a progressive disease—eventually night would fall and there’d be no dawn. I pitied her blindness, but that didn’t change the fact that she was a cagey old lady with a hidden agenda.

  I slowed the Vic to a snail’s pace—the concrete road had transitioned to dirt, a tightly coiled snake that kept me guessing as to what lay around each bend. I checked the time—almost ten. I should have reached the bar by now. Had I taken a wrong turn? I turned on the high beams and forged ahead.

  A few tense minutes later, the road opened up and straightened, giving me and the Vic a little breathing space. I saw lights off to the right. At first I thought it was a street sign but then realized it was a mailbox shaped like a big-mouthed bass. Set back from the road was a double-wide trailer. The trailer’s interior was as dark as the surrounding woods, but its white metal skin glowed like one of those sharp-toothed fish that lived in the depths of the ocean. An old ATV stood guard in the gravel driveway. Was this Charlie’s trailer?

  I parked alongside the mailbox and stuck my hand inside the fish’s yawning maw, finding a week’s worth of junk mail for 4 Big Pine Terrace. I sorted quickly through the mail—most was addressed to “Resident,” but a few pieces bore the name Charlie Ware.

  I looked again at that sad, desolate trailer, a part of me not believing that someone actually lived there. Still, I had to make sure this was Charlie’s place. I parked behind the ATV. If Charlie wasn’t home—as seemed likely—then I could at least get the lay of the land. In my business, information was money and I was dead broke.

  I trudged to the door. The heavy afternoon rain had turned the driveway into a dangerous mud patch, which was rutted with a maze of tire tracks. I knocked and waited. Nothing stirred within. “Charlie Ware?” I called, but again there was nothing. I knocked again, a little harder. This time, the door groaned open.

  Somebody with more sense would have moved on, but I’ve got a thing about open doors. I heard my long-dead grandmother’s voice, speaking in accented English: An open door would tempt a saint, and you, Adelajda, are no saint.

  Right on both counts, Grammy Ludwika.

  I nudged the door open. The smell of stale beer and fermenting food was intense. I moved quickly—nothing untoward in the living area and kitchenette, just a mess that indicated a bachelor’s presence. Obviously Bambi didn’t live with her father, as I tacitly assumed. Lucky for her.

  Next I headed for the single bedroom, which told a more interesting, if more somber story. The room was a shambles. Dresser drawers pulled from their hinges, contents spilled on the floor. The unmade bed was littered with clothes, a mishmash of holey socks and dingy underwear. My unease deepening, I checked the pocket closet—empty, save for a raggedy coat and a couple of shirts. I left the trailer as I’d found it, closing the unlocked door behind me.

  Once outside, I circled the trailer, not searching for anything, but just looking. The small ramshackle shed in the back looked about to collapse on itself. I opened the unlocked door—inside was a hoarder’s wet dream of old tools, rusting bicycles and cardboard mystery boxes.

  I jogged back to the Vic, wondering what the hell I’d just seen. The signs said Charlie Ware had gotten out of Dodge in a hell of a hurry. His reason for leaving might have been totally innocent—maybe he’d won a weekend trip to the Bahamas or his mother had broken her hip. But innocent didn’t happen too often in the PI game.

  I reached under the car seat for the box of ammo. I’d debated whether to bring my piece, but something had told me it might come in handy. With the Glock loaded and discreetly holstered at my waist, I started the Vic.

  The road had widened, but it was still a twisted sister. I was going into a long bend when a dark figure appeared on the right. It was running, straight into my path.

  Chapter Two:

  Deer in the Headlights

  The girl was frozen in the road, one hand grasping a foam container and other her throat. She looked as if she might have stepped out of Tolkien, or maybe a Grimm fairy tale—a pint-sized waif with long mahogany hair and skin burned nut brown from the Florida sun.

  “Are you all right?” I yelled, rushing to the stunned girl.

  Chest heaving, she pushed hair from her face and fixed big brown eyes on me. “I...I think so.” She was older than I first thought, probably late teens. She wore cut-offs and was swimming in an oversized black T-shirt that read China Rose Bar and Bait.

  “Sorry, but you came out of nowhere.”

  She took a backward step, her small body shaking like a leaf in a hurricane, but still clutching the f
oam box.

  “Are you all right?” I asked again.

  “It’s my fault, ma’am.” The slight twang and the ma’am marked her as another child of the South. “Usually there’s nobody on the road—leastwise not this time of night.” She had sufficiently recovered to inject an accusatory tone in her voice, but was still pretty shaken. It occurred to me that something else was going on with the girl, something other than nearly being turned into roadkill.

  “Let me give you a lift—it’s the least I can do.”

  “No, you don’t have to do that,” she said, taking a backward step. “I...I was just bringing Gramps his supper.” She wagged the container for proof, the smell of BBQ sauce and fat wafting upward.

  This must be Bambi Ware. Etta had said Bambi was eighteen, but this girl looked more like fifteen. “I’ll drive you there,” I said, opening the passenger’s door.

  “I can walk—Gramps lives right around the corner.” She gestured vaguely at the road.

  “Come on, do I look dangerous?”

  “You do, a little, but I guess it’s all right.”

  Bambi was right about the house being nearby. After the Vic pulled out of the long curve, lights appeared on the right. “Is that your grandfather’s place?” The lighting was so bright that I was certain we’d somehow reached the bar.

  “That’s it,” Bambi said in a flat voice.

  I pulled into the driveway. In addition to the illumination, the property was covered in lawn ornaments—a chaotic kaleidoscope of gnomes, elves and pink flamingoes. “I’d hate to have his electric bill.”

  Bambi mumbled thanks and bolted from the car before I’d come to a full stop. I watched her at the front door, hoping to get a look at Harry. I saw the container on the floor. I reached for the box, causing the lid to snap open.