“Well, one of Jay’s boats disappeared,” Vanessa said flatly. “It disappeared—and Travis and Georgia were found dead on the beach.”
Katie looked at her sympathetically. “The Bahamian authorities, Florida State authorities, and even the FBI got in on the investigation, Vanessa. There’s a problem with the ocean—when things go down, they may go down miles. There are storms, there are currents. There were no clues on the island.” She cleared her throat. “They, um, never found the rest of the bodies, right?”
Vanessa shook her head. “I’d say they actively investigated for months…maybe even a year. The torsos, hips and legs were never found. God, I can’t even believe I’m saying that!”
“But there was a suspect, right? Carlos…someone?”
“Carlos Roca,” Vanessa told her. “But he was a good guy. A friend.”
“Okay, so, no matter how you might think that he was a good guy, and even if he was a friend, you have to admit, Vanessa, it does appear as if Carlos had already killed Travis, and that when he said he’d take Georgia back to Miami, he was lying. What he did was kill her, get the boat down the beach, find where he’d stashed Travis’s body, and stage the heads and arms. Then he stole the boat and dumped the rest of the bodies into the ocean. Oh, Vanessa, I know you don’t want to believe that. But there’s no other explanation.”
“Carlos would have popped up somewhere. And the boat would have been found.”
Katie let out a long sigh. “Nessa, the boat could have gotten into trouble—and it might have sunk. And Carlos might have gone down with it. God knows where he might have tried to go from Haunt Island. But that boat’s out there somewhere. I don’t know about the bodies anymore—fish are ravenous little creatures, really—and not so little, often. Time, salt water…”
“Isn’t David’s cousin, Liam, a detective now? Could he know something?” Vanessa asked.
“Yes, I talked to him after you called me. He was never in on that investigation. He’d heard about it, of course, but he didn’t have anything to do with it.”
Jamie O’Hara strode down the bar to where the two of them were sitting. “Don’t you be worrying, Miss Loren. If I know my nephew, and I think I do, he’ll come around.”
Katie arched a brow at Jamie. “Uncle Jamie, don’t go getting her hopes up, hmm?”
Jamie winked at Vanessa.
“You think he’ll come around, too, don’t you, Katie?”
Katie frowned. Then she sighed. “Yes, I started on David this morning, so…well, we’ll see. But, Vanessa, I don’t want you to be so—obsessed. I know my brother and David, and I know that they’re fascinated by mysteries like this, but…you have to understand,” she added quietly. “David came home determined to discover the truth behind a ten-year-old murder case because he had been accused of murder.”
“Yes, I know,” Vanessa said. She’d read all about the insanity that had first driven David Beckett out of Key West, and then home. Naturally. She had been friends with Katie O’Hara for years. She had read every word in the papers when the case had been solved, and that had brought her back here. Key West had two of its own native conchs—David Beckett and Sean O’Hara—about to embark on a film project that would bring to light many of the mysteries that surrounded the area throughout the decades and even centuries. David Beckett had a military background, and Sean O’Hara had filmed in many dangerous places, had received a great deal of defensive training and certainly knew how to take care of himself. Beckett also had a cousin who was a detective with the Key West police. They were the right people to at least explore the waters, and the story, and make her feel at the very least as if she were doing all that she could to find out just what had happened to Georgia, Travis—and Carlos Roca.
“Oh, I mean, David’s a great person!” Katie said, quickly defending the love of her life. “You have to understand, it’s not that he wouldn’t care, or that he wouldn’t be horrified—but he’s not FBI, a cop or any other kind of law enforcement.” She brightened suddenly. “Hey, I’ll set up a meeting with Liam. I mean, if Liam gets into it, maybe he could help us out.”
“That would be great—thanks, Katie. I’d like to meet him and hear what he thinks, because I’m sure he had to have heard about it, at least when it was all taking place.”
“Well,” Jamie said, “well and good. Now you can’t sit here in the bar, moping about all day. Go enjoy the fall. Beautiful days we’ve got going here now. Days that are the kind that bring people south. Get—get out of bar, go and do something.”