Randy White - Tampa Burn

He was already slogging away when I called, “How about a beer later?”

Over his shoulder, he replied, “You betcha. After you talk to her, raise me on the VHF. Or my brand-new cellular phone. I can’t wait to hear how my pal screwed up this time.”

Pilar was visibly uneasy now that Tomlinson was gone, the two of us alone near the big wooden fish tank on the lowest deck of my stilt house. Though she was within arm’s reach, her uneasiness created a distance that seemed an insular vacuum. It made a wall of those few feet.

Communication is as rare as conversation is routine. She manufactured conversation to make the wall between us less evident. For a wall to exist, we had to have once been intimate. That was something she seemed unwilling to acknowledge.

Tomlinson was apparently a comfortable subject. She spoke of how unusual it was for her to like and trust a man so quickly. She’d liked him immediately when she met him in Masagua. She liked him even more now, she said.

When she asked, “Does he have family?” I got the impression that she was actually asking if he had a wife or lover.

Maybe that’s why I replied with several harsh truths that I seldom share. “He has a daughter, Nichola, who refuses to see him. He has a brother who’s a heroin addict-Rangoon, if he’s still alive. His father’s gone native somewhere in the Amazon basin. He was a paleontologist. A brilliant one before he disappeared.”

That jolted her. “So strange. So tragic.”

I nodded. “A century or so back, his family accumulated a fortune on a couple of patents. Something to do with a synchronizing device that allowed airplanes to fire machine guns through spinning propellers. It made the killing ratios huge. The First World War alone, it had to account for thousands of dead. Some fortunes, I guess it’s heirs that pay the price.”

“I’m surprised a man like Tomlinson would accept blood money.”

For some reason, her elevated opinion of my friend, even though accurate, continued to irk me. I am often asked how Tomlinson makes a living. I always evade. It’s something never discussed around the marina. This time, though, I answered with another harsh truth.

“He doesn’t accept family money. Hasn’t since he was a teenager and found out the source. By then, though, he’d spent a bundle, so he still feels like he’s stained for life. When he told you about the crop he was growing on the islands? That’s how he’s made his living ever since. Smuggling dope. Selling drugs. Sails to the Yucatan, sails back. Or sometimes as far south as Guyana. He’s gone into the rum business, too. Something legal, finally.”

I paused, startled by the perverse pleasure I took in telling her that. Yet it didn’t trouble her. Even though the illegal drug trade has made chaos of Latin America’s economy, she seemed to approve. I could see it in her expression, just as I could also see that I’d been diminished in her eyes by my small betrayal.

That’s exactly what I’d done, too-betrayed the confidence of my best friend.

In an idiotic effort to redeem myself, I added quickly, “Not that he needs to do that anymore. It’s a long story, but he also has a huge following as a Zen teacher-people who’re devoted. He could probably double his great-grandfather’s fortune within a few years, they’re so many. If he pushed the money thing. Which he’d never do. The man’s motives are pure. No one doubts that.”

Talking once again like I was Tomlinson’s friend.

Pilar said, “He’s a religious leader?”

“Through his writings, his teachings. You really have no idea. He’s always been that way, but then word about him began to spread on the Internet.”

“I guess I should find that surprising,” my former lover said, musing. “But I don’t. There’s something very powerful about the man. Spiritual. When I met him in Central America, I felt it.”

I told her, “Oh, there is, there is. Everyone says the same,” as I walked to the wooden fish tank. I put my hands on the rim and stared down into a world that I have always preferred because of the precise interlinkings, and clarity.

I had the skimmer net now, cleaning out the detritus of shrimp husks and bits of fish scale, while snappers, immature grouper, and tarpon spooked below, their dense muscularity crackling.

I pretended to concentrate, perplexed by my reaction.

It was summer dusk, and mosquitoes were moving over the water out of mangrove shadows. Light in the western sky beyond the mangroves, beyond the marina, had an oyster sheen. High clouds to the east still reflected a rusty, mango band of sunset upon cumulus canyons.

Eastward, if viewed from that high vantage point, was central Florida, cattle pasture, citrus, and saw grass. A hundred miles beyond were the condominium reefs of Palm Beach, Lauderdale, Miami.

Different beaches. Different light. Different molecular makeup, in scent and feel, to the sea wind. Visible from the cumulus towers was an entirely different species of Florida.

Tomorrow, we would be there.

I asked the lady, “Hungry?” eager to change the subject.

She shook her head. “I haven’t wanted food since I went into his room and found him missing. I don’t need to eat. I have a room at Sundial Resort on… is it Middle Gulf Drive? I think I’ll go there now. I’m exhausted.”

I said, “I can see that. Tired because of the trip? Or maybe it’s the company.”

She refused to be drawn into that discussion. “I’ll call you in the morning. We can talk about what time we should leave for Miami. Do you know your way around the downtown area?”

I replied, “I don’t know my way around the downtown area of any city in the world.”

She didn’t smile. “In that case, we’d probably better leave early. It may take us a while to find the restaurant where we’re supposed to be.”

I agreed and told her that I’d walk her to her rental car. I put down the skimmer net and turned her easily by touching her elbow. I guided her instantly shoreward, along the boardwalk toward the mangroves, by touching her elbow a second time. Suddenly, I knew how people with communicable diseases feel.

I wanted to ask her, Why? Why was she reacting this way? She wasn’t just cool, she was icy. Tomlinson was right. There was more than just a touch of distaste. What the hell had I done to offend her?

I wanted to press it, but the timing didn’t seem right. Instead, I stuck to the subject. I told her what we had to focus on now was finding Lake, staying smart and negotiating his freedom. So the first thing we had to do, I told her, was make a decision. Was she absolutely certain she didn’t want any kind of official help? I added, “Professional help, I’m talking about.”

Walking, still maintaining a measured distance between us, she said, “I don’t see how it’s possible. The American FBI, Florida law enforcement agencies, they certainly have no jurisdiction over a kidnapping committed in Masagua. Even if they did, I wouldn’t risk getting my son killed.”

Her tone seemed unnecessarily sharp, and I matched it when I replied, “He’s my son, too, remember. That’s why I want to consider all the options. Review all the assets to make sure we bring him home safely.”

“Biologically, you have taken the role of his father. Of course. I’m also aware that in the last two years or so, you and Laken have developed a… well, at least a friendship through your correspondence. But let’s be clear about one thing, Marion. When it comes to Laken’s well-being, I make the decisions.?Claro? I welcome your advice, your input. But I have final say.”

She’d stopped in the mangroves where the boardwalk exits onto the edge of the gravel parking area near the gate to the marina. Mosquitoes had been trailing us in an orbiting veil, and now they began to vector, flea-hopping off clothing, seeking skin.