Ron Base - Sanibel Sunset Detective 01 - The Sanibel Sunset Detective (12 page)

A large silver canister-like vacuum stood next to the kitchen counter. They had mostly finished in here. The sink sparkled through the dimness. No human head occupied that gleaming cavity.

In the dining room, workmen used small shovels to lift lumps of congealed blood into plastic containers lined with heavy-duty bags. Others worked on mopping up the dark brown dried blood smeared throughout the room.

“We use enzyme solvent to liquefy the blood so we can get it off the floor, along with urine and other potentially infectious materials or OPIM, as we like to call them.”

“An acronym Ray would love,” Tree said.

“You can impress him at Fun Friday.”

“I doubt anything I do or say is going to impress Ray Dayton.”

“You know he’s jealous,” Todd said.

“Of me? You’re not serious.”

“He’s got a crush on your wife.” Tree looked at him. Todd shrugged. “Therefore, he’s jealous of you. You can see that, can’t you?”

“I’d like to think he hired Freddie for her brains and ability,” Tree said.

“He did. But in the meantime, he thinks he’s fallen in love with her.”

Tree decided it was time to change the subject. He nodded in the direction of the table where he had found the woman’s torso. “How long do you think she was dead?”

“The body starts to decompose within fifteen minutes after death,” Todd said. “So by the time we got here, I’d say she’d been dead for a couple of days.”

“Do the police have any idea who she is?”

“If they know, they’re not telling us. Of course, they don’t tell us much of anything. I hear you were looking for a short sale when you found the woman—or were you playing detective?”

“I don’t know if I would call it playing,” Tree said.

Todd laughed. “Don’t worry. Your secret’s safe with me. The cops probably don’t believe you, anyway. So what about it, Tree. You serious about this detective thing?”

“Look at me. I’m standing around watching you guys clean up OPIM.”

“Whatever went on in here, it doesn’t look as though anyone actually occupied the place. Or else they recently cleaned it out. There’s one other thing.”

Todd led him to the back of the house into a recreation room. It, too, was empty except for a hospital gurney in the middle of the room.

“What’s that doing here?”

“We wondered the same thing. When we got in here, I thought for sure they were using the place as a meth lab. We do a lot of those, let me tell you. But it was clean, nothing like you usually run into when you find a house they’re using to make street-grade methamphetamine, really nasty stuff like acetone, methanol, ammonia, benzene, iodine and hydrochloric acid. It all leaves a toxic residue that coats every surface and stays in the air, so there’s no doubt about what’s gone on.”

Tree ran his hand along the gurney. “So what did go on here?”

“We know one thing.”

“What’s that?”

“They used the place to amputate a woman’s head. Someone was a very unhappy camper.”

____

Tree got out of his Tyvek suit and the shoe covers and gloves and placed them in a plastic container. Todd said goodbye and went back inside. Tree stood on the drive inhaling fresh Florida air. The elderly woman with the Jack Russell came along the street. She stopped when she saw Tree. The dog yapped a couple of times and bounced around on the sidewalk, delighted to see him. The woman did not seem nearly so pleased.

“Sure, I remember you.” She eyed him suspiciously. “The guy looking for the short sale.”

“That’s right,” Tree said. “Tree Callister.”

“They mentioned you on the news last night.” A black mark against him.

“I don’t know your name.”

She looked him up and down carefully before she said, “Myrna.”

“Well, Myrna, I’m still interested in this house.”

She looked surprised. “But they found a dead body—well, I guess it was you, wasn’t it? You found a dead body.”

“A terrible experience, no doubt about it. But it’s still a lovely house, and a good deal is a good deal. But I hear conflicting stories about who owns it. That guy in Orlando you talked about, you sure he’s the owner?”

“As far a I know. But then as far as I know usually isn’t so far at all. Talk to the real estate people. They can set you straight, I suppose.”

“I talked to them. They don’t want to say too much about the ownership. I keep hearing the name Michelle Crowley.”

“It’s like I told you before, never heard that name. Not unless it’s the housekeeper.”

“There’s a housekeeper?”

“Used to be. Saw her come and go a few times. Figured that’s who it was. Haven’t seen her for a couple of weeks, come to think of it. Why? You interested in a housekeeper?”

“You never know,” Tree said. “I wouldn’t mind getting in touch with her to see if she’d be interested in staying on if I decide to buy.”

“I think she works part time at Jerry’s.”

“Jerry’s Supermarket?”

“In the coffee shop.”

“How do you know that?”

“I saw her there,” Myrna said.

16

H
alf of Jerry’s was a supermarket, the other half a cheerful coffee shop where the locals congregated for breakfast and gossip. The place had pretty much emptied out by the time Tree got there. Two waitresses chatted against a sideboard at the back of the room. No sign of an African American waitress who might be Michelle Crowley.

Disappointed, he took a table by the window. One of the waitresses broke off her conversation, grabbed a coffee pot off a warmer, and hurried over with a menu.

“I’m Liz,” she said. “Your server will be here in a moment.”

“You’re not my server?” Tree said, taking the menu from her.

“This morning Michelle will be pleased to help you.”

Minutes later, Michelle appeared from the back, smoothing her hair, straightening her apron before heading to his table. She fit the description Elizabeth Traven provided for Mickey Crowley, except tinier and cuter. Tree made his reading glasses disappear.

“Hey there, I’m Mickey,” she said. “Have you decided on anything?”

“How’s your smoked salmon omelet?”

“Looks like you’re up for a little experimentation first thing in the morning,” she said with a grin.

“I’ve decided to live a little more dangerously.”

“Isn’t that just how we all live here on Sanibel? A little more dangerously? So go for it, man. Walk on the wild side. Order up that smoked salmon omelet.”

Impish humor played in her eyes. There was a wry twist to that full mouth.

“Guess I’d better order it then, otherwise, what are you going to think of me?”

“Seeing as how that’s what you’re having, nothing but the nicest things.” She gave him one more smile before plucking the menu from him and sashaying away.

He reminded himself that this young, sexy woman may have shared a house with a headless corpse. Maybe she helped remove the head. He reminded himself a couple of more times watching her serve other customers. Then she came back with his omelet.

“I forgot to ask you what kind of toast you wanted. But you look like a whole wheat kind of guy, so I brought you whole wheat.”

“As it happens, I am a whole wheat kind of guy,” he said.

“I can tell that about customers.”

“What kind of toast they like?”

“What kind of people they are.”

“What kind am I?”

“The flirt kind,” she said with another grin. Her eyes flashed again, and she was gone. Was he? The flirt kind? It had been a long time since anyone accused him of that. He bit into his omelet. Don’t let her distract you, he told himself. He was a detective, not a flirt. Flirting was part of his clever disguise.

“What did you think?” she asked when he finished.

“The walk on the wild side was worth it,” Tree said.

“It always is, man. It always is.”

“You think so?”

“Hey, when you’re my age, why not? What have you got to lose?”

“What? You think I’m too old for the wild side?”

“Are you kidding? You’re the man who ordered the smoked salmon omelet aren’t you?”

“I’m the guy.”

“Then you don’t just walk on the wild side, my friend, you
run
.” They both laughed, and then she was all business: “Can I bring you anything else?”

“Just the check.”

She pushed the check onto the table. “There you go.” She heaved a sigh.

“Long day?” Tree inquired.

“I got one of these boyfriends—I guess you’d call him demanding. I don’t get all the sleep a girl should.”

“Too much walking on the wild side?”

“Something like that,” she laughed. “Anyway, I’m off at four today, so it’s not so bad.”

Tree slipped out from the table and got to his feet. “You made it very pleasant,” he said. “Thanks.”

“Make sure you leave me a million dollar tip,” she said.

“Done.”

“That’s my man.”

____

Michelle Crowley had a demanding boyfriend? What about her beloved husband, Dwayne, cooling his heels up at Coleman?

Back at the office, he googled Michelle Crowley’s name but that didn’t yield anything. She wasn’t on Facebook or Linkedin or any of the other social networking sites that he could easily access.

He ran Dwayne Crowley through the inmate locator on the Coleman Prison website. Dwayne was there all right. The inmate locator didn’t give much information. Dwayne Robert Crowley was twenty-nine years old and would be released sometime this year.

He had more luck at Prisonlife.com. Dwayne had listed himself on the website’s Pen Pals section. His photo showed a pumped, pasty-faced guy—a face fearsome enough to cause widows to faint and orphans to break into tears. What was visible of his right shoulder was adorned with tattoos like black flames.

“This open-minded individual is a Leo who loves to laugh almost as much as enjoying seeing others laugh,” he wrote. “I love life as I look at it as a GRAND ADVENTURE.”

His message continued: “I enjoy working out, cooking, outdoors, traveling, listening to music, reading and love pets. Since my incarceration, I have brightened my horizons by taking vocational classes and am currently taking a course to be a professional fitness trainer.

“In the last year I have strived to better myself mentally as well as physically, but still feel incomplete and hope to find that special someone to share some time with while I get through these long, lonely days and nights. Could that someone be you?

“I would love to get to know a woman who is also open-minded, understanding and who would love to share a laugh with a kind-hearted guy. I know you are out there in hopes of crossing each other’s paths, so I’m sending this SOS in search of that special someone.”

Hard to resist a loving soul like Dwayne Crowley. Every woman’s dream man. Never mind that he was sitting in a maximum security prison. A minor impediment to true love. Hopefully, a prospective partner would not be put off further by the fact that wonderful Dwayne supposedly was married to loyal Mickey, presumably unaware that her husband was sending out SOS messages to “that special someone,” not his wife.

17

A
couple of minutes after four o’clock, Mickey Crowley, still in her uniform, came down the ramp from Jerry’s and walked to a dusty black pickup. She unlocked the door, got in, and then drove out onto Periwinkle Way.

Tree followed her east off the island. Mickey drove along McGregor Boulevard onto Summerlin Trail, and then headed south on Tamiami Trail.

By the time Tamiami Trail became Ninth Street and the well-appointed shops and restaurants of downtown Naples, dusk was falling. Mickey turned left at Tenth Street and went down a block or so before swerving into an apartment complex.

Tree parked his car in time to see Mickey hurry up a flight of stairs in a two-storey block adjacent to the street. Halfway along the walkway, a shaft of yellow light appeared, and Mickey disappeared into it.

Tree went back to his car and got in. From this vantage point, he had a good view of Mickey’s apartment. Maybe this was where she lived, and she was home for the night watching
Dancing With the Stars
. Here he was sitting in the dark, feeling like an idiot.

His cell phone rang. He looked at the readout: Freddie.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m on stakeout,” he said.

“You’re on what?”

“Stakeout. I’m watching someone’s apartment.”

“Where?”

“In Naples.”

“You’re watching an apartment in Naples?” Freddie was not doing a great job keeping incredulity out of her voice. “Why are you doing that?”

“It’s Mickey Crowley, the woman Elizabeth Traven hired me to look into.”

“You found her?”