Bahamarama, page 7
part #1 of Zack Chasteen Series
“I don’t know anyone looks like that.”
“Not many people do,” I said.
“Uh-huh,” said Ricky. I could hear him talking to someone, saying, “You got a pen? Gimme a pen. Anybody got a fucking pen, for Chrissake?”
And then he was back, talking to me: “What did you say your name was? I’m gonna have to file a fucking police report and I know they’re gonna want to talk to you.”
I hung up the phone.
11
It was almost midnight when I checked into the Los Altos Inn, the place where Barbara had booked me. The bellman seemed put out that I had no luggage he could carry. He also seemed a little sniffy about the way I looked, as if the Los Altos Inn wasn’t used to guests whose afternoon leisure activity involved getting their skulls cracked and who showed up muddy and barefoot. After he finished the walk-through and filled the ice bucket, I rifled through my pocket for tip money. I had hundreds and twenties and a lone one dollar bill. I gave him the single. He didn’t even say thank you and good night.
My room turned out to be the master suite—two bedrooms, living room, a wraparound balcony looking out on the Intracoastal Waterway, and a sprawling bathroom with his-and-hers sinks, a phone by the john, an old-fashioned bathtub, a Jacuzzi perched on a platform, and a shower that could fit the entire starting lineup of the Florida Marlins, along with backups in case someone slipped on the Italian marble floor and got hurt. There was original artwork on the walls and the kind of expensive, muted lighting that would make even thrift-store furniture look good.
I checked the back of the door to see if the maximum room tariff was posted. It was—$1,250 per night. But that included a continental breakfast, so I figured all I had to do was eat about a thousand blueberry muffins the next morning and maybe I’d be getting full value.
I knew Barbara meant well, God bless her, but the whole production was wasted on me. I could slip on the silk bathrobe, tune in the plasma TV, drink Moet & Chandon out of the minibar, order every blessed thing on the room service menu, and it would still come down to the fact that I was sitting in a $1,250-a-night suite all alone, passing time, waiting for whatever might happen next. It was just a fancified version of Baypoint.
I spent a couple of minutes wandering room to room and taking in the view. There were all kinds of glorious rigs moored in the marina below—some outfitted for fishing, some for cruising, some for just piddling around. Just the sight of those boats made me wistful for my own. I’d start shopping around after I signed a contract to sell the place in LaDonna.
I took a long, hot shower and washed my shirt and my jeans after I got finished washing myself. Then I put on the silk bathrobe and hung my clothes on the balcony to dry. I went to the minibar and was delighted to see it contained several Mount Gay miniatures, so I poured two of them into a glass and stood on the balcony drinking it, listening to my clothes drip-drip onto the tile, and looking at the big boats some more.
When I walked back inside to visit the minibar again, I noticed the message light blinking on the telephone. Had the phone rung while I was in the shower? I picked up the receiver and punched the button that said “message center.” Nothing happened. I punched it again and got a busy tone. I hung up the phone, waited a few seconds, and then tried again. There was a beep when I punched the button and then dead air. I have no patience when it comes to these things and telephones in particular infuriate the hell out of me. I pounded the button panel with my fist and then the phone began to ring.
“What?” I barked into the receiver.
Silence from the other end. And then, “Well, that is certainly no way to greet the love of your life, now is it?”
Some men go for legs in a woman, others obsess over breasts and behinds. Me, I’m a voice man. I’ve been hopelessly infatuated by countless women after nothing more than a few seconds of listening to them talk. And I think I first fell in love with Barbara the morning she called to book her office party on Miz Blitz. Yes, the British accent was alluring, but it wasn’t just her highbrow Surrey entonements that got my sap rising. Barbara sounded smart, and I like smart women. But she also sounded funny and down-to-earth and comfortable in her own skin. Can someone extract all of that from a mere snippet of conversation? Sure, if you’re a connoisseur of women’s voices, like I am; if you’re a man who willingly submits himself to rapture by a female’s dulcet tones. I once actually looked up the word “dulcet” in Webster’s to see if that aptly described Barbara’s voice. “Sweet . . . pleasing to the ear,” it said. Which was accurate enough, but Barbara’s voice carried with it a certain indelible sultriness, too. Hell, she just talked every bit as sexy as she looked, and that’s why I had fallen in love with her.
“Hey, baby,” I said. “Just having a little problem with the phone. Sorry about that.”
“Mmmmm,” she murmured, and even that sounded fetching. “You sound funny. Is everything OK?”
“Had a little dental work done, that’s all. Everything’s fine.”
I thought I’d spare her the details. She had enough on her mind with the photo shoot. I’d tell her everything when I got to Harbour Island . . . if I got to Harbour Island. I was counting on Charlie Callahan to work some magic to make it happen. And if not magic, then something felonious would have to do.
“I called earlier, hoping I’d catch you. Twin Air had an 8 P.M. flight to North Eleuthera and there was an empty seat, a cancellation. You could have been on your way to join me tonight, but now I’ll just have to wait until tomorrow evening to feast my eyes upon you.”
“I’m working up a pretty good appetite, too.”
Neither one of us said anything. It felt good being connected, even if it was just by phone.
“Speaking of food, Chef Ludo went all out tonight. Grilled triggerfish with a sweet potato souffle. Spiny lobster drizzled with a lemon-vanilla sauce. Jerked pork loin atop a mango puree.”
“You ate all that?”
“Just the lobster.”
“I’d have gone for the triggerfish. Just to get at the sweet potatoes.”
“I know. That’s what I told Ludo. Don’t worry, he said he’d make them again just for you,” said Barbara. “So, you enjoyed the ride down?”
“What a limo.”
Thought I’d spare her the details about Chip and the limo, too.
“Were you surprised?”
“You have no idea. How’d you arrange that?”
“Through Lord Downey. I stopped in to see him shortly after I arrived on-island.”
“He set it up?”
“Yes, I suppose. Or one of his people did. I mean, I mentioned to him that I was having difficulty finding a driver, and when I returned to the Albury that evening there was a message saying that the arrangements had been made, and that I should leave payment here at the front desk. So I wrote you that note and stuck it in there with the money.”
“When was that?”
“It was . . . it was Wednesday. Why? Was there a problem? Did you not get the money?”
“No, I got it Everything’s fine, just fine,” I said. “How’s Lord Downey, anyway?”
“Not too well, I’m afraid. He’s failed miserably since you and I visited him the last time we were here. Indeed, I don’t think he even remembered me dropping by to introduce you to him.”
“I have a knack for making highly forgettable first impressions.”
“I beg to differ on that. But it is a pity how he seems to have aged so very quickly.”
“Well, he’s getting up there. What would you guess—he’s seventy-five or so?”
“At the very least. He once courted my mother. Still, he has always been so . . . so vital. And now . . .”
She let it hang. She took a deep breath. And then she said: “Zack, there is one thing I must tell you.”
“Okay, lay it on me.”
“Bryce is here.”
At first, I didn’t know who she was talking about. And then it sank in. Bryce Gannon, the photographer. Barbara’s former fiancé. The guy she dumped just before I waltzed into her life.
“What a coincidence,” I managed to sputter.
“Not really. I asked him to come here.”
“You what?”
“Zack, I had no choice. After I got rid of the original photographer and his crew—they were horrid, absolutely horrid—I needed help and I needed it in a hurry. Bryce dropped everything he was doing and caught the first plane over from London.”
“Always at your service.”
“Now, Zack, don’t get petulant on me. It really doesn’t suit you. I assure you that there is absolutely nothing between Bryce and myself.”
“Does he know that?”
“Of course he does. This is a shoot, strictly business. He is a professional. I am a professional. And we are both very grown up about this.”
“Okay, then I’ll be grown up about it, too. It’s just kinda weird, that’s all.”
“Hang around magazines long enough and, I assure you, it will seem absolutely normal. You want weird, you should see the models the other photographer hired.”
“Real lookers, huh?”
“If you like slut-chic.”
“I’m a big, big fan.”
“Well then, you would have been in heaven. Those girls looked like they had been living off cigarettes and methadone for the last six weeks,” Barbara said. “Perfect for some urban-industrial shoot. But not for Bahamarama.”
“For what?”
“Bahamarama. That’s what we are calling the entire photo spread.”
“Did Bryce Gannon come up with that?”
“No, actually, I did. Don’t you like it?”
“Sounds very festive.”
“Well, I happen to think it is perfect. Tropical fashions, fun in the sun. But those other models, they just wouldn’t do,” Barbara said. “Fortunately, Bryce took a quick spin around the island and found several local girls—fresh and natural, full of life—and I think we have managed to salvage that. Bryce is quite the genius at spotting talent. He is really saving me on this one.”
Grown up. I was going to act grown up.
“That’s nice,” I said. “I look forward to meeting him.”
My mouth hurt even more just from saying it. Barbara let out a long yawn.
“Sorry, darling, but I’m exhausted. I know you must be, too.”
“I could stand to stretch out for a little while.”
“Kisses then.”
She made smacky-mouth sounds into the phone. I made some back.
“Can’t wait to see you,” she said.
“Me, too.”
Barbara hung up the phone. I got more rum from the minibar.
12
I don’t think I got more than two hours’ sleep. The bed was too big, the mattress too comfortable. Every time I started to nod off I kept seeing the shovel right before it hit my head. Then my jaw started throbbing. And then I started worrying about how I was going to get into the Bahamas without my IDs. And then my jaw started throbbing even more.
I spent Saturday morning doing something I do only under circumstances of extreme duress—I shopped for clothes. Not that I had much choice. My shirt and jeans hadn’t cleaned up all that well. Wanting to get an early start, I had taken them off the balcony and put them on before they were totally dry. And now they were beginning to sour. My face alone would scare people off—both eyes were full-on black now, the gash a scabby mess. But to wear that funkified outfit on the airplane would be to prompt my fellow passengers to bail out over Bimini.
The marina near the Los Altos Inn had a ship’s store, a decent one, and there was an end-of-summer sale going on. Never mind it was the middle of August, which in Florida means there’s still another good three months of summer before the two-day interlude that passes for fall. The owner was just being hopeful, I guess. So to help bolster his spirits I bought a canvas duffel bag, three Tarponwear shirts (two white, one blue), a white Patagonia polo, three pairs of khaki cargo shorts, a leather Orvis belt with bonefish imprinted on it, a longbill fishing cap, and a pair of Reef Riders, the best boat sandals ever made.
“Rough night?” asked the clerk when I paid, studying my banged-up face.
“Yeah,” I said. “Undertipped the hotel bellman and he lashed me with a garment bag.”
I went into a dressing room, changed into shorts and one of the Tarponwear shirts, and dropped the old clothes into a Dumpster on the street. I walked down U.S. 1 to the Beachside Mall, my new canvas duffel bag slung over my shoulder, my new cap keeping my chiseled visage well shaded, and my size-thirteen dogs happy to be out of the Top-Siders and breathing free in new sandals. I went straight to Burdines and bought a blue blazer (gentlemen must wear jackets for dinner at the Albury Beach Club), a white Oxford button-down, a blue Oxford button-down, a blue-and-white pinstriped Oxford button-down, two identical pairs of khaki pants, two pairs of linen pants, and two linen shirts. It wasn’t a particularly cutting-edge wardrobe, but I liked to think that the sheer force of my personality, combined with my elevated sense of style and the way in which I wore the clothes, transformed the look into something that defied all couture boundaries and bespoke the manly essence that is Zack Chasteen. Then again, I have always lived in a state of mild delusion. All told, the little shopping spree cost me $946.18. Of Barbara’s money.
I stopped in at a bookstore and scoped out the magazine rack. They had the most recent issue of Tropics, stuck way in the back behind Travel & Leisure and Condé Nast Traveler and all the city magazines. It’s tough being a small publisher in the magazine business. Barbara has carved out a niche for her titles and certainly holds her own against the competition, but it’s not as if Orb Media has endlessly deep pockets. It can’t fork over twenty thousand dollars to a bookstore chain just to make sure Tropics gets favorable rack placement for a particular issue. And then there are the distributors to pay off on top of that. So I grabbed the dozen or so copies of Tropics from the back and stuck them up front. Then I took a copy for myself, paid for it, and walked back out into the mall.
This issue of Tropics had a cover story on private island retreats in the Grenadines—Petit St. Vincent, Palm Island, Salt-whistle Bay—and a feature about the Cockpit Country of Jamaica. But I flipped straight to the Publisher’s Letter. Barbara smiled out at me from the page, her head cocked slightly to one side, her thick black hair pulled back and temporarily at bay. The photo had been taken on the beach in Cancún, where Barbara had attended the annual Caribbean Tourism Organization convention. I didn’t read the Publisher’s Letter. I just looked at Barbara’s photo. She looked great, far too beautiful to be a magazine publisher, far too beautiful to hang out with the likes of me.
I drove the man from Michigan’s F-150 to the airport and left it in long-term parking. A shuttle bus took me to General Aviation where Charlie Callahan was already on the tarmac, standing by his eight-seat twin-engine Navajo, ready to go.
Charlie was wearing his uniform—red flip-flops, faded madras shorts and a T-shirt that said: “I’m the fucking pilot. You got a problem with that?” Just to make it look even more official, Charlie had pinned army-surplus gold braid epaulets to the shoulders of his T-shirt. The six other passengers—three young couples from Tampa off for a week of diving and fishing—were already inside the plane. From their wide-eyed expressions, I could tell they were entertaining serious doubts about the likelihood of their surviving the flight. Had I not known Charlie for better than twenty years, and been comforted by the knowledge that he had spent the last twelve of them sober, then I might have had some doubts of my own. But he was a steady hand, a good man in a tight spot, and his getup was a clever piece of marketing that branded him as a bona fide Colorful Character. Charlie would get us there safe and sound. The folks from Tampa would return with stories that began “You shoulda seen the guy who was our pilot . . .” And the leg-end of Sorry Charlie Callahan, along with his lucrative charter business, would continue to flourish.
I told Charlie about my i.d. dilemma.
“No shit,” he said.
“Exactly the kind of problem solving I knew I could count on you for,” I said.
“How those knees of yours, Zack-o?” Charlie asked.
“Only hurt when I breathe air.”
“You know, you oughta sue whoever it was invented Astro-Turf. That shit has fucked up too many careers.”
“While I’m at it, maybe I oughta sue whoever it was who invented football. Figure if it didn’t exist I’d have found a real career.”
“Well, count me in on the class-action. I’d be retired by now if I could stop betting the games.”
“What the hell would you do if you retired?”
“Fly airplanes and chase women. Only I wouldn’t have to work so hard at it as I do now.”
He opened a compartment by the nose of the plane and put my bag in it.
“Look, Charlie, if you think it’s going to be a problem, me not having identification and all . . .”
“Won’t be any problem. Got it all figured out. That’s why I asked about your knees. See, on the approach to North Eleuthera, I’ll bring ’er in real low over the salt marsh. You swing out on the struts, then jump. How’s that?”
He might have been serious. With Charlie, it was hard to tell.
“Just get your ass in the plane, Zack-o,” he said. “We’ll think of something.”
13
I rode copilot, as the plane lifted off the runway, and Charlie set course due east from the mainland. I stretched my legs, looked out the window, and let my mind wander. There’s something about flying off the coast of Florida that does the soul good. Just when you’re convinced that greed and stupidity have ruined the entire state, you look down on that deep-blue ocean, and think: Well, things aren’t all that bad. Okay, so maybe the dunes have been bulldozed, condos block the afternoon sun, and hatchling sea turtles, disoriented by all the lights, crawl out of their nests, head to U.S. 1, and get flattened. From the air, at least, the Atlantic still looks unblemished, its vastness rendering the concrete-armored coastline puny and impermanent.
