“I’ll take your questions,” he told her.
“I’ll be right back,” she told him. She turned the key, entered the hallway and ran up the stairs. She returned within a minute flat, an envelope in her hands.
He grinned. “You are on the ball,” he told her.
“I swear, we’re good at what we do. I’m good at what I do. Honestly.”
“I believe you.” He cleared his throat. “I’m still waiting to hear back from Jaden and Ted.”
“Of course. Um, well, see you then.”
The door was still ajar. He opened it for her, and she entered the hallway. He watched as she ran up the stairs. The door closed behind her, and Sean pushed it so that it would close firmly and lock. He turned away and headed for his own place.
He barely knew her.
If he’d admitted it to himself, that didn’t matter. He wanted her to be everything that she seemed. He wanted to know more about her. Everything.
Two people had died. Maybe a third.
And the mystery was intriguing. The only way to really understand it, to try to figure out what could have happened, was to follow the same trail.
They would do so.
Two boats.
He’d make sure that Vanessa was on his.
And that Jay Allen wasn’t.
That night, it was the heads.
Vanessa was sound asleep, and the world was pleasant and dark, and then the darkness began to lift. She was walking along the shore, and it was beautiful, pristine white sand, the ocean in all its glorious shades of aqua and blue, light and deep. She heard the sound of the waves and felt the sand and the pleasant wash of the waves over her toes.
And then she reached them. Georgia’s head, with her arms in front of her, stuck out of the sand, and Travis’s head, his arms in front, as well.
“Vanessa, see! I told you I wasn’t lying!” Georgia said angrily.
“And I don’t play bad practical jokes on people,” Travis said. “Why didn’t you all look for me, why did you just assume I was being an ass?” Travis demanded.
“Oh!” Georgia said. Her arms moved in the sand with the exclamation, and she pointed down the shore. “They were having champagne. They were celebrating. And they all got mad at me! Then Carlos…”
“Then Carlos what?” Vanessa cried out.
“Carlos…Carlos…” Georgia said. “I don’t know. Come help me. Oh, wait. I can’t get out of here. I have no legs. I have no torso. Why didn’t you believe me, Vanessa, why didn’t you believe me?”
“Be careful. They’ll get you, too,” Travis warned. He blew a lock of his hair out of his eyes. “They’ll get you, too.”
“And you can be with us, just heads, talking heads, sitting in the sand,” Georgia said.
“We have arms,” Travis reminded her.
“Yes, we have arms,” Georgia agreed, and they both waved their hands in the air.
“Be careful, Vanessa, be careful, you need the truth, or you can join us…heads and arms and hands, hands and heads…here, in the sand.”
“In fact,” Travis said, “you need to come closer and closer….”
She awoke with a start. She was shaking, clammy with sweat. She inhaled on a deep breath and wondered if the nightmares would ever stop.
It was day. She glanced at the cheap alarm on the bedside table. Almost 9:00 a.m. She would get up, walk down to the Internet café, read some e-mails and drink lots of coffee. A shower would be wonderful, so wonderful now.
She ran her hands over the bed as she pushed herself from it. She frowned as her hands went over something gritty.
Sand.
She jumped out of the bed. There were a million explanations for it. She’d spent the day diving. There was dirt and sand everywhere.
The pile on her bed was pristine and white.
With a shout of irritation, she whisked it off the bed and to the floor, and hurried into the bathroom.
There were tons of explanations….
Yeah, right. The explanation, ridiculous and horrible, that came to her mind was simple and sad. Georgia and Travis were haunting her. They blamed her for not doing more. They…
They needed the truth, justice, closure.
Somehow, she had to give it them.
Before she became nothing more than a head and arms in the sand herself.
6
One o’clock rolled around and Sean, Jay and David went to film at Marty’s place. Marty told them that they didn’t need to pay him for an interview on his love of pirates and the sea, but they insisted and he shrugged it off. He seemed pleased enough to meet Jay, and he was more than helpful as they set up for the shoot in his eclectic house. When they were set, Sean did the questioning, admitting to himself that the questions Vanessa had written were excellently phrased and led Marty quickly in the right direction.