“Jack Dance. I thought he was making up stories, but later I researched the area’s history on my own. It was all true.”
“Were horror stories a principle topic of conversation with him?”
“Not often. His sexual conquests were more frequent seeds of discussion.”
“Yours, too, I guess.”
“I didn’t have much to say on that subject at the time. Certainly not compared with Jack. He was a ladies’ man, even at that age…” He looked away, and his words trailed off.
“Have many people died on Pelican Key?” Kirstie asked, unwilling to let him slip into memories and silence again.
“Not as far as I know. But they’ve had other kinds of bad luck. Remember those salt ponds near the cove?”
“Sure.”
“Somebody tried using them for salt manufacture about 1800. Went bust a few years later. Before that, the island was inhabited by the Calusas. Now they’re extinct. All that’s left of them is their burial grounds and garbage dumps.” He shrugged. “No one prospers here.”
Kirstie frowned, rebelling against this grim inventory.
“You did,” she said. “You prospered.”
“Me? How?”
“You got yourself some good memories. That’s a kind of treasure. Isn’t it?”
He almost delivered some humorous response, then paused.
“I hadn’t thought of it that way,” he said slowly.
“The island may not have been lucky for other people, but it’s been lucky for you.”
“Yes. Yes, I guess it has.”
She saw him smiling calmly, easily, like a man at peace, but the smile did not reach his eyes.
8
Mile marker 103.
Jack was fifty miles out of Miami, heading south on U.S. 1, driving a stolen Sunbird. The engine hummed and the tires hissed on the pavement, and the endless stretches of the Overseas Highway blurred past.
Through the open window on the driver’s side, warm moist air blew in like wet kisses. Jack tasted salt on his lips and smiled. He’d always loved water, any sort of water. Maybe that was why he’d chosen to drown his first victim so many years ago.
Another green-and-white mile marker slid by. 102. The miles ended at zero in Key West, but he wasn’t going that far.
Far enough, though. Far enough from L.A. and the life he’d led.
He had left it all behind, all the nice things he’d accumulated since his release from prison. His Sony Trinitron. His compact-disc player and mountain of CDs. His expensive wardrobe. His corner apartment with its great view. His car.
Oh, yes, and Sheila, too. Well, that was no great loss.
The feds must be crawling all over his apartment by now, but he wasn’t worried. The only item that could link him with the murders was the syringe, and it would never be found. The law would continue to see him as merely a con artist, a white-collar criminal, hardly a top priority. In a few weeks he would be forgotten. Then he could execute the final stages of his plan.
It had worked beautifully so far.
In Encino, about midway between his home and office, he kept a storage locker, which he’d visited after getting off the bus. He removed two shopping bags, then shut himself in a men’s room stall at Burger King. The first bag contained blue jeans, a denim shirt, and a knapsack; he changed clothes, placing his folded suit in the pack.
The second bag held eyeglasses, a can of mousse, and a thick envelope. He donned the glasses, slicked back his hair, and distributed the envelope’s contents among his wallet and various pockets: ten thousand dollars in twenties, fifties, and hundreds.
When he emerged from the rest room, he was no longer an executive in a business suit; he was a bespectacled youngish man in blue denim, toting a backpack.
A cab took him to LAX, where he bought a one-way coach ticket at the American Airlines counter, paying cash.
His flight was uneventful. The plane touched down at Miami International at 9:47 p.m. Eastern time. He roamed the long-term parking area until he found a Pontiac Sunbird hardtop sedan with an unlocked rear door. Somebody in a hurry had gotten careless.
His Swiss Army knife came in handy when he slipped behind the wheel. An amusingly boyish possession, a relic of his days of camping out on Pelican Key with Steve Gardner, yet practical, too. The knife was innocuous enough to get through airport security, yet potentially useful should one of his victims ward off the needle jab. He had practiced extracting the two-inch spear blade with his thumbnail until he could release it switchblade-fast.
He didn’t need the blade now. Instead he used the built-in screwdriver to pry off the ignition switch, then hot-wired the ignition.
In Florida City, he stopped at a supermarket. His purchases totaled $128. Canned goods predominated: vegetables, fruit, tuna, sardines. Bread, peanut butter, honey. Chocolate chip cookies. Bottled water. No booze-he needed to keep his head clear-and nothing perishable.
The housewares aisle provided him with rubber gloves, paper towels, plastic utensils, and a manual can opener. In the hardware section he picked up wire cutters, a flashlight, and batteries.
After leaving the supermarket he prowled the streets of Florida City in search of a late-model Pontiac Sunbird parked outside. On Tower Road he found one. He removed the vehicle’s front license plate and placed it on the rear of his stolen Sunbird, discarding the hot car’s two original plates.
Then he headed south on U.S. 1, driving just under the speed limit. The highway took him through a few miles of flat, dreary land at the edge of the Everglades, then out over the water and into the Florida Keys.
Now it was shortly past midnight; he’d been on the road a little more than an hour.
A new mile marker expanded in his headlights. 98.
Restless, he turned on the radio. He dialed past melancholy country songs and twittering chamber music till he found some raucous rock ‘n’ roll. The lightning chord changes and racing drums acted on his system like a shot of caffeine. He laid his foot on the gas pedal, then remembered the danger of being stopped by the highway patrol and hastily applied the brakes.
The song ended in a cacophony of percussive clatter and synthesized wails. He left the radio tuned to that station as a news update came on.
A fire in Fort Lauderdale. Multiple-vehicle collision on Route 95. New developments in the investigation of a scandal involving the state legislature. Nationally, a manhunt was under way for John Edward Dance
…
“Jesus,” Jack whispered, and turned up the volume.
“… evaded arrest in Los Angeles and is now believed to be on the run. Dance, thirty-five, is described by authorities as a slick and experienced con artist who once served time for fraud. He is now wanted on charges of multiple homicide-”
All the breath went out of him. He was cold everywhere. A high, tuneless singing rose in his ears.
“… so-called Mister Twister crime spree, the serial murders of women in several southwestern states…”
They knew. Somehow they knew.. request anyone with any knowledge of Dance’s whereabouts to contact…”
He had believed he was wanted only for fraud. He had been wrong. Totally wrong.
The newscaster moved on to a sports update. Jack clicked off the radio with a jerk of his wrist.
This new development changed everything. It meant a larger, more intensive manhunt than he’d anticipated.
