The Bourbon Thief(60)

Levi carefully stepped up to the back door and peered in through the curtains. There was a man standing in the kitchen by the stove. Levi nearly laughed out loud in his relief. The man in the kitchen was black. Levi had nothing to be afraid of.

Levi opened the door.

“Hello?” he said.

“There he is,” the man at the stove said. “’Bout time you came home. I thought I’d have to drink this all myself. Hope you don’t mind I let myself in. Didn’t mean to act like I own the place. Although I do.”

It took Levi a few seconds to translate the man’s words into words Levi understood. He spoke with the accent of the Sea Islands. “This” was “dis” and “the” was “dah” and the words rolled around the man’s mouth thick as taffy.

“Bowen Berry,” the man said. He held out his hand for Levi to shake. “And you the brother who’s not a brother who’s a brother who’s not a brother, am I right?”

It took Levi another second to figure out what Bowen meant by that.

“Yeah, I’m Nash’s half brother who is and isn’t a brother, I guess. Good to meet you.”

The man laughed deeply at his own joke. They shook hands, and in the midst of the handshake Levi made the connection between the man in front of him and the man Tamara had said was the foreman at the cooperage...and the man in the photograph Levi had found in Nash Maddox’s office. Levi’s realization that he had seen this very man naked on the beach was unsettling to say the least. Bowen clearly sensed Levi’s discomfort.

“You gonna let go of my hand or you asking me to marry you?”

“Sorry,” Levi said, releasing Bowen’s hand. “I was trying to figure out where I’d seen you before. I better let Tamara know it’s you. She thinks her mother came here to murder us. You want to stay for a beer?”

“I got something better than that brewing up already.” Bowen nodded toward the pot on the stove.

“Tea? At night?” Levi asked.

“This ain’t your regular tea.” Bowen took the pot off the boil. From a battered old cooler, he pulled out a bag of ice and a plastic pitcher. He poured the ice into the pitcher and poured the tea over the ice. Then he took an amber bottle out of his toolbox.

“What’s that?” Levi asked.

“Bourbon.”

“You’re putting bourbon in iced tea?”

“Putting bourbon in sweet tea, man. That’s my Truth Serum. You gonna love it.”

“Sweet tea and bourbon? Damn, I think I love it already,” Levi said.

Bowen grinned and slapped Levi on the back.

“Go get your missus. I’ll pour the drinks.”

“Nothing spiked for her. She’s too young.”

“She married to you, she ain’t too young for anything.”

Levi started to the front door and stopped. He turned around.

“I don’t know how to bring this up,” Levi began. “But while we’re alone...you should know I found a Polaroid of you and Nash. I’ll give it to you if you want it, but I don’t want Tamara finding anything like that. There’s nothing else in the house I need to know about, is there?”

Bowen shook his head, the grin still on his face.

“I cleaned everything out after Nash was gone. Must have missed that. But let me tell you something, cum’yuh, the only thing your girl needs to worry about in this house is you.” Bowen pointed right at him.

Levi only laughed. “Well, I’d argue, but considering what we were planning to do before you showed up, I’m inclined to agree with you.”

They let Tamara in and she seemed pleased as punch to see Bowen. Apparently they’d been pen pals for a year or more, writing back and forth about the island, about the oak trees, about the bourbon barrel cooperage where Bowen was foreman. Bowen didn’t call it a cooperage, however. It was a “cuppah-rahge” and he wouldn’t say a word about it until Levi pronounced it right.

“Is this Red Thread in the mix?” Levi took a second sip. They sat on the porch, he and Tamara in the swing, Bowen in a chair with his feet up on the railing like they belonged there. They’d left the front door and back door open to air out the house. Tomorrow Levi would run into town and get some box fans. Lots of box fans.

“It’s not.” Bowen raised his hand and shook a finger at him. “Red Thread’s too rich for my blood. I make my own.”

“This is your own bourbon?” Levi asked. Tamara took it from his hand and sniffed it but didn’t take a drink.

“This new kid botched a barrel few years back. I fixed it on my own time. I got the corn mash, the barley...” He sat up and mimed mixing up a cauldron of corn and wheat, stirring it like a witch’s brew. “Then I cooked it real good and put it in the barrel. It’s been in my shed for four years now. Tastes like the real deal. Better, maybe.”

“You ever think of starting your own distillery?” Levi asked. “Now that you know the secret?”

“Ain’t gonna happen,” Bowen said as he took a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket and lit one up. “You gotta have the barrels to make Red Thread. And these barrels are all spoken for. I make them, but I can’t afford to buy one. They out of my price range.”

“They only make a thousand barrels of Red Thread a year,” Tamara said, giving Levi his Truth Serum back. “They use regular white oak from Missouri for the regular bourbon, but the top-shelf stuff has to have barrels from here. Scarcity makes the price go up.”