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  “Too interesting to pass up.”

  “That’s what Billy Wayne said. That he saw curiosity all over my face.”

  “That’s why you’re a terrible poker player.” Ray laughed. “But, got to admit, I’m curious, too. Not to mention that, from what McCracken said, the pay is good.”

  “We’re leaving in a few minutes.” I glanced at my watch. “We should be there before five.”

  “Pancake and I’ll start sniffing around. I’ll call McCracken and get the paperwork going.”

  “Sounds good.” I ended the call.

  Nicole showed up. I hopped in.

  “Where to?” she asked.

  “Ray’s.”

  And we were off. Gravel pinged the undercarriage and a thin dust trail lifted in our wake as she turned north toward state highway 121 and, after a few dips and turns, I-10.

  “How’d it go?” Nicole asked.

  “Interesting.”

  “That doesn’t tell me much.”

  “He’s an odd cat. Certainly doesn’t look the part. More like a shy, quiet college kid. Maybe only high school.”

  “Who just happens to rape and murder?”

  “Well, since you put it that way.”

  She whipped around an eighteen-wheeler, the turbulence rocking the Mercedes, before she settled back into the right lane. The speedometer read 95.

  “I still think I should’ve gone in with you.”

  “If you had, you’d wish you hadn’t. Lots of very angry and unhappy folks inside. And that’s just the guards.”

  She gave me a look. The one that said I was a wimp. That she could’ve handled it. Probably true, but still. I started to suggest she keep her eyes on the road but thought better of it.

  “So, do we have a job?”

  “We do. Ray said it was too interesting to pass up.”

  She smiled. “I agree.”

  Again, it should have taken six hours to reach Gulf Shores. For Nicole, four hours and forty-five minutes. She actually got pulled over for speeding. Eighty-five in a sixty-five zone. While the officer extricated himself from his patrol car and sauntered up to her side of the Mercedes, I gave her a bunch of grief, to which she replied, “Watch and learn.” Really?

  She undid a button and thrust out her chest, smiled that smile, and got a warning. Are you kidding me? I’d probably be hauled back to Union Correctional, but she not only got off, the patrolman actually, I swear to God, apologized for stopping her.

  Not sure what I was supposed to learn from all that, since I lacked the required physical attributes, but I had to admit, it was impressive. Infuriating, but impressive.

  She smiled and thanked the officer, promised to hold it down, and we were off. Two miles down I-10 we were back up to 85 and cruising.

  We reached Gulf Shores around four thirty, where we found Ray and Pancake in Ray’s office—the round teak table on his deck. Both had computers open. A rock, painted like a sea otter, sat on a stack of papers near the center of the table. The umbrella offered shade and a soft on-shore breeze made the deck tolerable. Still hot, but not a true sauna.

  Pancake held a beer in one hand, a stack of papers in the other. The road rash on his cheek was healing nicely. A nearly empty can of Mountain Dew sat near Ray’s laptop. He was intently typing something so said nothing, but rather waved us to sit. We took the two empty chairs.

  In the corner behind Ray, a white marker board stood on a lightweight aluminum easel. I recognized Pancake’s block script in bright red.

  Billy Wayne’s Timeline:

  #1—August 2014—Marilee Whitt—Apalachicola

  #2—November 2014—Wanda Brunner—Santa Rosa Beach

  #3—December 2015—Loretta Swift—Pine Key

  #4—February 2016—Noleen Kovac—Pine Key

  #5—March 2016—Sara Clark—Pine Key

  #6—March 2016—Misty Abbott—Defuniak Springs

  #7—July 2016—Della Gibson—Lynn Haven

  Before, the victims had been an abstract. A group of unknown people that offered no real hint to the level of Billy Wayne’s damage to his corner of the world. Even reading about them in the pages Pancake had printed felt distant. Not real. Like a term paper or something. But seeing the names listed, in stark red letters, the dates of their demises, like an obituary, brought a degree of focus. And sadness. Each had been living a normal life, and then Billy Wayne showed up. Just like that, their individual movies ended. With a terror I knew from the materials I had already read. Sitting here, looking up at that board, I felt as if I was in the presence of true evil.

  Nicole felt the same. I knew from the way her hands squeezed my arm, the way her eyes widened as she studied Pancake’s chart.

  And yet, when I recalled sitting there across from Billy Wayne, seeing his round childlike face, easy demeanor, almost innocent eyes, his small, delicate hands casually holding the phone, he seemed incompatible with such depravity. Yet, I knew it was true. That those hands had murdered—how many? Seven? Five? Did it really matter in the scheme of things?

  The thought crossed my mind that Billy Wayne might be playing us. Maybe he really killed each of the people on the list. Maybe he was simply bored in prison and this was a game he wanted to play. Maybe he was looking for extra privileges. Or visits from newspaper and TV people. Maybe he needed to rekindle the notoriety that had once haloed him. Maybe he wanted to make fools of us all.

  What did he really have to lose? And as he had said, he had time.

  Ray dragged me from those thoughts.

  “How was the trip?” Ray asked.

  “Harrowing,” I said

  He raised an eyebrow.

  “Nicole’s driving.”

  “Wimp,” she said.

  “She did get pulled over though. On I-10.”

  “Really?” Pancake asked.

  “I was only doing eighty-five,” she said with a head shake.

  “Didn’t get a ticket,” I said.

  “I can’t imagine why they let her off.” Pancake laughed and looked at her. “Darling, I want you to be my chauffeur.”

  She smiled. “As long as I don’t have to drive that behemoth you call a truck.”

  “Uh, never mind.”

  “How did things go with Billy Wayne?” Ray asked.

  I told him more of our conversation. “He’s a bright guy. And he’s adamant about not telling us the name of the victims he says weren’t his work.”

  Ray nodded.

  “Where do you want to start?” I asked.

  “Pancake and I’ve been looking into the victims, but we have more to discover. And I want to wait until we get the contract and the retainer before we move forward.”

  “How long will that take?” I asked.

  “I suspect we’ll be good to start our planning tomorrow.”

  “One thing,” I said. “Billy Wayne said he wouldn’t reveal the names because it could make things tough for him in prison.”

  “How so?” Ray asked.

  “He wouldn’t say.”

  “What I have so far,” Pancake said, “is that the father of Della Gibson in Lynn Haven is a local prosecutor. Sara Clark in Pine Key was the wife of a cop. And Misty Abbott in Defuniak Springs had a brother who’s a guard over at Took Correctional in Daytona Beach.”

  “Any of them could make things uncomfortable for Billy Wayne,” Ray said. “With a simple phone call.”

  “They’d do that?” Nicole asked.

  Ray shrugged. “Sure. Law enforcement types take care of their own. One, or more, of these guys could have a line to the guards at Union. And prison guards only need the slimmest excuse to lean on the inmates.”

  From what I saw at Union Correctional, that seemed plausible. The few guards I saw looked like they weren’t overly thrilled with their lot in life. And with a captive audience, I suspected they wouldn’t hesitate to flex their authority from time to time. Newspapers and TV often promoted such tales, sometimes almost gleefully to make a point, but seeing the environ
ment firsthand added credibility to those stories. Being confined to a cage was bad enough, but if that confinement included beatings and stabbings and worse, that could truly be a living hell. Not that I felt all that sorry for Billy Wayne, but even he shouldn’t be tortured. Much.

  “Makes sense,” I said. I stretched. “Anybody else hungry?”

  “I am,” Nicole said.

  I looked at Pancake. He was always hungry. But to my surprise he shook his head, saying, “Me and Ray had pizza an hour ago.”

  “Actually, you had a pizza and a half,” Ray said.

  Pancake smiled. “Man’s gotta eat.”

  I stood. “We’ll head over to Captain Rocky’s. Be happy to bring something back.”

  “We’re good,” Ray said. “Let’s meet here tomorrow around noon and plan our approach.”

  “Will do.”

  Nicole scraped her chair back and stood. “Come on. Feed me.”

  “Yes, ma’am. Whatever you say.”

  “Whatever?” She smiled. “In that case, after we eat, I have a few more instructions in mind.”

  Am I the luckiest SOB on the planet?

  CHAPTER SIX

  NICOLE AND I shared a Cobb salad and a pair of shrimp tacos before Pancake’s goofy-ass, grinning face lit up my iPhone screen. I licked my fingers, wiped them with a napkin, and grabbed it from the table.

  “Changed my mind,” he said. “I’m hungry.”

  Of course he was. I couldn’t remember a single minute of any day he wasn’t.

  “What would you like?” I asked.

  “A ribeye with Bordelaise sauce, potatoes au gratin, Caesar salad, and Bananas Foster.”

  “You have the wrong number.”

  “And you need to upgrade your menu.”

  “Never heard you complain before,” I said.

  “That’s ’cause the price is right.”

  “Not to mention the food. All your favorites.”

  “Hard to argue with that,” he said.

  “What’ll it be?”

  “Surprise me.” Then he said something to Ray I didn’t catch. “Ray’ll have the same.”

  “Will do.”

  I waved Carla over. “Pancake’s hungry.”

  “I’ll alert the media.”

  “Ray, too. Maybe a pair of oyster po’boys.”

  “That means extra oysters on both and a pile of jalapeños on Pancake’s.” She nodded. “I’ll have them up in a few.”

  While Nicole and I waited, we talked about the case.

  “What do you make of this?” Nicole asked.

  “I’m not sure. Basically, we’re being asked to prove a guilty man is only partly guilty.”

  “I’d say he’s beyond guilty. Partly or otherwise. He’s a serial killer, after all.”

  “Billy Wayne’s an unusual character for sure. In spite of his history, he actually comes off as a pleasant guy.”

  “Not the word I’d choose,” she said.

  “Maybe not the best choice. But he’s smart. And, believe it or not, engaging, even charming on some level. I can see how he talked his way into those women’s lives.”

  “My image of him doesn’t include charming.”

  “If you saw him, you might feel differently,” I said. “Baby faced. Innocent-looking. He even has small hands.”

  “And that’s important how?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “It’s just that, as he held the phone, his hands looked more like they should be playing a piano than strangling someone.”

  “But he did. Several times.”

  “The point is he’s not a brute. Definitely not a snarling animal. That’s what makes folks like him so dangerous. Serial killers aren’t the creepy, crawly miscreants folks picture. At least not visually. Like Ted Bundy. Smart, pleasant, charming.”

  “Scary thought.”

  I nodded. The oyster po’boys arrived. Along with a large bag of extra crispy French fries and onion rings. Because an overloaded oyster po’boy was never enough for Pancake was Carla’s take.

  On the way out, I grabbed a bottle of Patron tequila from the bar.

  “Put this on my tab,” I told Carla.

  She laughed.” Everything’s on your tab.” She nodded at the bottle. “You two have a nice evening.”

  Nicole took the tequila from me. “Once I get some of this in him, he’ll be defenseless.”

  Carla laughed. “Go get him, girl.”

  Nicole did. Eventually.

  We dropped the food by Ray’s, and then drove to Nicole’s place out on The Point, a pricey enclave off Peppermill Road in Perdido Beach. The multimillion-buck mansion didn’t belong to her, but rather to her uncle, Charles Balfour. The home sat thirty feet above the Gulf, a gently sloping collection of sand dunes and sea oats separating it from the sugary beach. We stayed there a lot. More so than my place, which was nice and also on the beach, but several million dollars less impressive.

  We shed our clothes and sank into the deck jacuzzi, where we consumed half the Patron. Didn’t take long before I was indeed defenseless and at Nicole’s mercy. She took advantage. Twice. First there in the warm water, then on the cool sheets of her bed.

  Now she lay in the crook of my arm, her cheek against my chest. Neither of us spoke for a while, letting our hammering hearts return to normal. I could feel her warm breath against my skin.

  Finally, Nicole spoke. “I’ve been thinking about Billy Wayne.”

  “You were thinking of Billy Wayne during that?”

  “I can multitask.”

  I was sure I had some incredibly witty comeback, but if so, it evaded me. I simply said, “What about Billy Wayne?”

  “It makes no sense that he won’t reveal the names of the two victims he denies are his. Or who he thinks killed them.”

  “His thinking is that if we uncover the truth, he’ll simply have to agree with our findings. Our independent investigation. And not make waves or put himself in any danger.”

  “Which means that the killer is someone who could do Billy Wayne harm.”

  “Like a prosecutor or a cop or a prison guard?” I asked.

  “Exactly.”

  “The question then becomes, which of those had a motive to kill?”

  “And frame Billy Wayne,” she said.

  “Which would actually be clever.”

  “How so?” she asked.

  “If I wanted to off someone, and a serial killer was at work in the area, the best cover would be to make it look like the victim was simply another one along the trail.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind.” She pinched my ribs. “In case you ever get mad at me.”

  “I’d need a serial killer first.”

  “That could be difficult. This is Alabama, not Florida where they have plenty to go around.”

  “Maybe we could borrow one,” I said.

  “Like a cup of sugar?”

  I laughed. “More like an exchange program. We can ship them a couple of liquored-up good old boys complete with pickup trucks, and they could send us a serial killer.”

  “You’ve thought about this,” she said.

  “You brought it up.”

  “No, you did.”

  “Regardless, the next question,” I said, “besides the motive, is who could effectively frame Billy Wayne? His DNA was found at each crime scene.”

  “True.” Her hand slid across my chest. A finger made small circles.

  I went on. “If we assume Billy Wayne’s telling the truth, who could commit a pair of murders, and then plant evidence? Who would have access to Billy’s Wayne’s DNA?”

  “You mean other than Billy Wayne himself?” she asked.

  “You saying he really did do all the murders and is simply messing with us? Playing some sort of mind game?”

  “Don’t you think that’s possible?”

  “Sure do,” I said. “But that’s not how I read him.”

  “Then that leaves lovers, or friends, or his cleaning lady. Someone with access
to his toothbrush.”

  “I’d bet on the cleaning lady. Not sure what her motive would be though.”

  She laughed. “Maybe she got tired of picking up his dirty underwear.”

  “Speaking of DNA.”

  “You’re gross.”

  “You started it. Again. But, getting back to reality, I’d suggest someone like a cop, or a prosecutor, or even a prison guard—though that would be less likely, I imagine.”

  “Or someone at the crime lab,” she said. “Wouldn’t they handle all the evidence? Couldn’t they mix it up?”

  “Good thought.”

  “Of course it is,” she said.

  “I’d bet on the cop. The crime lab doesn’t seem reasonable. For that line of reasoning to be true, a lab tech, say a DNA analyst, would have to kill two people in Billy Wayne’s hunting grounds and then manipulate the evidence. To me, that would be far-fetched.”

  “Unless it’s a conspiracy of sorts,” Nicole said. “The killer had help inside the lab. Someone who would plant evidence for him.”

  “Or her.”

  She hesitated as if considering that. “I don’t think so. This is a guy deal.”

  “We get blamed for everything.”

  “Not without reason. It’s all that testosterone. Guys are serial killers.”

  “Aileen Warnos was a chick,” I said. “And in Florida.”

  “She was pissed. At men in general. Her victims were simply opportunity.”

  “I didn’t realize you were such an expert on serial killers.”

  “I can read.” She pinched my ribs again. Harder this time. I was sure it’d raise a bruise. Maybe collapse a lung. I took a deep breath. Everything seemed to be in working order.

  “A local cop makes the most sense,” I said. “More so than a lab tech, or a prosecutor, or a guard. He’d already be in Billy Wayne’s domain and would have easy access to the crime scenes and the evidence.”

  “The only place with more than one killing was Pine Key. Where the cop’s wife was killed.”

  “That’s what I’m thinking. If Billy Wayne’s being truthful, the first Pine Key victim could be his; the other two could’ve been done by someone else. Like the cop. He’d have the DNA from the first victim and could plant it on the other two.”

  “Clever.”

  “Sure is.”

  “I mean you coming up with that’s clever,” she said.