“Why doesn’t everyone sit, and I’ll get some drinks and snacks,” Katie suggested.
Great! Vanessa glared at her, feeling as if she had suddenly been thrown to the wolves.
But she was the one who wanted help!
She sat stiffly, folding her hands around her knees as she looked at the three. “Perhaps this is way out of bounds. But I don’t know where else to go from here.”
“Start at the beginning,” David suggested. “Sean has told us what you want us to do—but start back at the beginning, the film shoot you did, everything that happened that night and everything that happened after.”
Vanessa decided to start out looking straight ahead, and then she decided to speak as naturally as possible and not avoid anyone’s eyes. “I’ve loved Key West since I was a child, since my father first brought me down here. When my friend Jay Allen came to me saying that he wanted to make a film, the first thing that came to my mind was the story of Mad Miller, his mistress, Kitty Cutlass, and the murder of poor Dona Isabella. Everything went fine, and we were down to a skeleton crew—Georgia and Travis, the last characters who remained alive, Jay and myself, of course, two young production assistants, Bill Hinton and Jake Magnoli, and Barry Melkie, our soundman. Zoe was everything as far as props, costume and makeup, with the help of Bill and Jake. Oh, and of course, Carlos Roca. Lew, our Bahamian guide, was there, too. That night, we had just about wrapped, and I was by the fire… Jay was there, I’m not sure who else at first, but everyone was just winding down. Suddenly, Georgia came screaming down the beach—she’d seen heads sticking out of the sand, arms. She described a scene that was the exact one in which we found her and Travis the following morning.”
“You found Georgia and Travis?” David asked.
She nodded gravely.
“You found the bodies?” Sean asked.
“I did,” Vanessa said. “Lew and Jay came quickly down to the beach, then the others…and then the Bahamian authorities.”
“Let me see if I’ve got this straight, though,” Sean said. “Georgia and Travis were found dead. Georgia had been running down the beach. Where was Travis?”
“No one knew,” Vanessa said.
“Then why didn’t you look for him?” Sean asked.
“Frankly, we thought he was part of a huge prank being pulled on Georgia. Jay was aggravated with him. We did go down the beach—Lew, Jay and I—and there was nothing there. Except—”
“Except?” Liam asked.
“The sand where we later found the two had been churned up. It looked as if maybe there had been something stuck in the sand.”
“And that didn’t bother you?” Sean asked.
“We were filming a horror movie. We thought that someone was playing an elaborate prank, and, as I said, that Travis was involved in the prank. I’m afraid that a lot of pranks are carried out on film sets,” Vanessa said evenly. She took a deep breath. “Anyway, Georgia was in terror—she wasn’t going to stay on the island. She was having an absolute fit, so Carlos said that he could take her into Miami and head back first thing in the morning. We all thought it was best. But Georgia and Travis were found on the beach, and Carlos and the boat disappeared.”
“I’m not sure there’s much of a mystery there,” Sean said. “Apparently, Carlos stole the boat after he killed the two.”
“I don’t believe it, not for a minute,” Vanessa said. “The police, the Coast Guard, the FBI—every known agency looked for the boat and Carlos, but it was as if they had vanished. What you don’t understand is that Carlos Roca wasn’t capable of doing something so horrible. He was one of the most gentle people I’ve ever met.”
“I wasn’t in on the investigation, but I do remember it,” Liam said. “And I’m sorry to tell you this, but most of those law-enforcement agencies believe that Carlos Roca did murder the two young people and steal the boat.”
“I don’t care what they believe!” Vanessa said.
She was surprised when Sean said, “Of course, there’s another scenario. Someone else hijacked the boat, someone who might have already taken Travis. That person either killed Carlos first to take control of Georgia or had Carlos knocked out somewhere. Then did the grisly deed on the island and dumped Carlos in the Atlantic.”
David leaned forward. “Okay, here’s the curious part—where was Travis? Had he been killed and his body hidden? And was it possible for someone to have killed him, hidden his body and managed to go after Carlos and Georgia in the boat, get back to the island without being seen, find the one body, stage the gruesome death scene, and then get rid of Carlos? And how, with the alarm that must have gone out, could they have gotten away with the boat? Everyone in the Bahamas, South Florida and all of the Caribbean would have been on the alert.”
“Well, stealing the boat, gassing it up, changing it—that seems the easiest part of it,” Sean said.