“Because you obviously care way too much about this Garrett guy everyone’s been talking about. And my mother’s statements could probably secure his time in jail, couldn’t it?”
I didn’t answer. I wasn’t going to tell him outright I had no intention of telling the police what Marlene had said.
“Fine. Don’t tell me. I’ll just take my mom down to the station—”
“Can you give me a few days? Then you can take her down. If Garrett is the killer, he’s in jail anyway. It’s not like a few days will do any harm.”
Eli thought about this for a minute. “I’ll give you two days,” he said. “Then I’m taking her down to the station.”
Two days wasn’t much, but it was all I had. “Deal.”
“And thank you, by the way, for hanging out with my mom. She’s been really lonely lately.”
“Maybe you should hang out with her more often,” I said, still a bit irritated that he was trying to oust Garrett as the murderer.
“I would, but I can’t. With practice and all of these games, I barely have time to shower and eat.”
“Well, it was my pleasure. You have a wonderful mother.” I put the car back into gear. “Now if I may? I have to go find a killer.”
“Maybe you should let the police—”
The rest of his sentence was drowned out by Cherry Anne’s engine and the squeal of her tires as I drove away.
21
The Three Amigos were packing up their fishing gear when I pulled into the parking lot of Golden Rock Pond. It was practically empty minus a few trailers and pickup trucks.
I waved as I parked next to their old pickups with Vietnam Veteran license plates.
“Hey guys,” I said stepping out of the car.
“Sweet ride, young lady,” the black guy with white hair, a white mustache, and an eyepatch said.
“Thank you. We’ve never met before, but I’m Rylie Cooper. I’m one of the summer park rangers for Prairie City.”
“You’re the girl in the video with the snake, right?” the one with a limp said. “I saw it on the YouTube.”
“The one and only.” I smiled. At least he hadn’t called me the snake wrangler.
“I’m Luther,” the guy with the eyepatch said. “And these guys are Ray and Tom.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet the three of you.” From what I could surmise, Ray was the tallest in a worn leather jacket and Tom was the one with a limp. Both of their white mustaches quirked up into big smiles.
“What can we do for you?” Tom asked.
“I don’t know if anyone has spoken to you yet, but I wanted to ask if you saw anything out of the ordinary about a week ago. One of the other rangers and I were patrolling around the time we think Boy Boy Johnson was killed.”
“Well it’s about damn time someone asked what we knew,” Ray said. “Them idiots don’t even realize they have good informants right under their noses.”
Luther let out a laugh. “Don’t mind Ray. He’s had a bad day of fishing, that’s all.”
“I had a better day than you, you old pirate.”
Tom shook his head at the other two. They were like the sweet old grandpa versions of the Three Stooges. “We saw Boy Boy that morning with the man they have in jail if that’s what you’re asking.”
“Just the two of them?” I asked. Maybe they’d seen them with the guy Boy Boy had murdered.
“Yep just the two,” Tom continued as the other two looked on. “They were launching that tiny little boat, sipping their coffee.”
“We didn’t know it was Boy Boy until after they found him dead,” Luther said in his deep crackly voice. “We thought he was some tired clown-looking guy.”
“Tired? Why do you say tired?” I asked.
“He kept stumbling. Couldn’t keep his eyes open but a fraction,” Ray said. “The other guy was wide awake though. We can relate. Sometimes when we get out here that early, it’s hard to keep our own eyes open.”
He hadn’t been tired. He had been drugged.
“And did you see them actually get into the boat together?” I asked.
“Sure did. It was a tight fit with all that crap they were carrying,” Ray said.
“What kind of crap?”
“Oh fishing tackle and the like,” Tom said.
“Plus that black bag.”
The one with the head. I shivered.
“You all right?” Luther asked.
“I’m good,” I said. “Thanks.”
“And then we didn’t really watch them much since we were setting up for the day. It wasn’t until we saw the rangers—probably you and your partner—talking to them that we realized the one wasn’t there anymore,” Ray said.
“We assumed he was in the truck sleeping off whatever night he’d had before,” Tom said, his tanned face turning white. “We never thought he’d have drowned in front of our very eyes.”
I knew the feeling.
“It was kinda like that one time in Nam when the three of us were hiding from Charlie in that lake, and we all had reeds to breathe from,” Ray said.
“And mine filled with water and I nearly drowned,” Tom said. “I’m just glad you boys saved me so I could get back to see my wife and kids.”
“It wasn’t even an option. We couldn’t leave without you. Not when we’d have to face Celia’s wrath,” Luther said with a nudge to Tom’s arm.
“Anyway, that’s what we saw,” Tom said.
“What about the guy we talked to on the ramp. Did you notice anything about him when we were done speaking with him?”
“Just that he tore out of here really fast. His boat almost came off the trailer when he made the turn,” Ray said. “We should have known then something was going on.”
“Thank you for your help. And for your service.”
They all stared at me with big eyes.
“What?” I asked.
“We don’t often get thanked for our service,” Tom said. “Vietnam was a war no one wanted. People have said some pretty cruel things to us over the years.”
“Well, that’s not who I am. My dad served too before I was born.”
Luther smiled a big smile.
