The Widower's Two-Step (Tres Navarre #2)(77)

"Of course it may have been dialled months ago," I said, "before Les disappeared. It may have been an ordinary call to a client."

"Mmm."

We drove along, both of us trying to get comfortable with that idea.

We turned past the Plum Creek Dairy Queen.

The boat storage facility was uphill, a good fifty yards from the water. It was a gravel clearing fenced off with chain link and barbed wire with a large drivethrough gate.

Inside were storage sheds of corrugated metal and plywood, each just big enough to house a boat on a trailer. When I drove up, the gate was open and a family was hitching up their outboard to a Subaru fourwheeler. Or Mom was doing it anyway. The two kids were making like a trampoline in the backseat and the dad was studying a Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition in the driver's seat. Allison and I got out and helped Mom get the hitch in place and connect the brake lights. Mom gave us a nice smile and asked if she should just leave the gate open. We said sure.

Les' boat shed was A12.

The chain and padlock on Les' shed door were new. Fortunately the back wall of the shed was not. The metal peeled up easily on the bottom, giving us just enough space to crawl underneath.

The walls of the shed didn't go all the way to the roof. There was about a foot of space at the top to let in light, enough to see by. Les' boat was just like Kelly Arguello had said, a twentyfivefooter with a collapsed mast and the deck covered with a blue tarp.

The tarp was tied on haphazardly but with a lot of knots and enthusiasm. We finally had to cut our way through.

I climbed onto the aft deck, then gave Allison a hand up.

The bench seats on board were white rubbery material embedded with silver glitter.

There was a small empty cabin below, a closet really. No way more than one person could fit down there.

"Okay," Allison said. "So it's a boat. So what?"

"Hold on."

I went below and searched. Nothing. On the tank of a tiny toilet was a copy of Time, August three years ago. Not encouraging.

When I came back topside Allison was prodding the deck floor with her foot. Whenever she pushed down, the blue plastic showed a square of seams about two feet by two feet.

"Life vest compartment," I said.

She and I exchanged looks.

"Why not?" I agreed.

Two minutes later we were sitting on the bench with an unearthed ice chest between us.

It was a green Igloo big enough to hold two sixpacks. When we opened it there was no beer, though. There were stacks of money. Fiftydollar bills, the same as Milo had paid me with. About fifty thousand dollars' worth. There was also a computer printout of addresses—some in San Antonio, some in Dallas and Houston. Next to each address was a date.

In case of drowning, look up addresses. Throw large quantities of money. Les SaintPierre, the safety conscious ship's captain.

Allison hefted a stack of fifties. "What the holy f**k—"

"Later. Right now we get this to the car."

Allison looked dazed, but she helped me repack the ice chest, get it over the side of the boat, then wedge it under the storage unit's tin wall. On our way back to the Audi, each of us carrying one handle of the Igloo, we left the gate open for another family that was coming in to collect their boat.

Maybe they too were stashing money and addresses in their shed.

They smiled and waved their thanks. I smiled back.

Everyone is so damn friendly in the country.

40

The drive back started out well enough. Allison was coming down off her twenty ounces of bad wine and was starting to warm up to the realization that we had fifty thousand dollars stashed under the backseat. By the time we got onto the highway she was recapping the afternoon in glowing terms, throwing out casual insults about her idiot husband and the Avalon County Sheriff's Department. She suggested we drive out to Miranda's gig at the Paintbrush, see if we could find any more deputies to beat up.

"But first better clothes," she insisted. She tugged on my Tshirt sleeve. "I'm not going with this. And you've got to have cowboy boots."

"I've worn cowboy boots exactly once. It was not a success."

"Tell."

"No thanks."

But she kept nagging until, reluctantly, I told her about the photo my mother still shows off whenever I'm foolish enough to bring friends over—me two years old, thighdeep in the Sheriff's black Lucheses, trying not to fall over, my cloth diaper sagging obscenely.

Allison laughed. "You're due for another try."

We didn't tell Rhonda Jean at Sheppler's Western Wear about the diaper photo. We didn't tell her we looked so bad this evening because we'd been breaking into places all around Medina Lake. We just told her we needed a quick change of clothes before the store closed, in fifteen minutes.

Rhonda Jean smiled. A challenge.

Fourteen minutes later she had me outfitted in boot cut Levi's and a cotton pieced red and white shirt and size eleven natural tan Justins. I vetoed the hat and the rattlesnake belt that she promised me she could have engraved with TRES on the back at no extra charge. Allison came out sporting a white fringed shirt and black boots and tightfitting jeans that only a woman with an excellent figure could've gotten away with wearing.

Allison got away with it pretty well.

Rhonda Jean nodded her approval, then sent us on to the cashier. I paid with the last of the fifties Milo had given me at Tycoon Flats.