There were only a few cars in the lot—at four p.m., I wasn’t expecting many—but one of them was a red Mustang convertible. It had South Carolina plates. Perhaps Karl’s brothers had accurately intuited that his missing sports car was with his waitress girlfriend.
I didn’t think it’d be a good investigative move to show up at a club I’d never set foot in and ask her questions about her dead boyfriend. That kind of thing made witnesses bolt, especially a witness who had inexplicably retained the dead man’s thirty-thousand-dollar car. I scribbled the plate number in my notebook and got back on the road.
Going to Charleston wasn’t easy. They say people who’ve lost a limb can still feel it. They can tell you what position their phantom limb is in, and feel pain in it. My life up there was like that: a phantom family living in the house we’d lost. At this hour on a Friday, phantom Elise was on her way home from work, listening to classical music on WSCI, 89.3 FM.
Thoughts like this were why I didn’t like long drives.
I scrounged for a CD in the console and popped Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers’ greatest hits into the player. Elise had never shared my enthusiasm for that band, so it worked pretty well to numb the phantom pain.
The address Roy had given me was in one of the gated communities on the islands. Golfer paradise. It was exactly where I’d expect someone to live if the word “investor” was part of their job title. I was glad to get off the highway before I got too close to my old exit.
The road wound through a thick growth of palmettos, oaks, and hickories. At a couple of bends, the dense woods opened onto pools of water dotted with cypress trees draped in Spanish moss. I rounded another bend and saw the gatehouse. It looked like a Swiss chalet and was tastefully accented with summer flowers. When I pulled up at the window, the slow blink of the uniformed man inside reminded me what a piece of crap I was driving. I also got self-conscious about Tom Petty belting out “Refugee.” I turned it down to a more civilized volume.
The guard disappeared with my license for a second. When he came back to return it, he said, “Mr. Porter will see you.” He sounded surprised as he pressed the button to open the gate.
I emerged beside a rolling green golf course with a clubhouse that could’ve passed for one of Queen Elizabeth’s country getaways. Beyond it, the ocean glittered. As I followed my GPS, the houses got larger and the yards got deeper. All of it was lush and beautiful in the way a place can only be if you hire a team of landscapers to curate every blade of grass.
Mr. Porter’s home was one of the biggest yet, set on a low hill, its rising half-circle drive lined with palmettos. I didn’t see a single dead frond on any of them. I pictured his squad of gardeners sending guys scooting up the trunks like ninjas to remove anything unsightly. I parked my piece of junk at the bottom of the drive, where I hoped no one in the house would see it, and started the hike to his massive front door.
As I got closer, I heard shouting coming from inside. It sounded bad. I couldn’t see anyone through the sparkling glass on either side of the door, but somewhere in there, two men were snarling at each other. I touched the doorbell, figuring they’d stop when I rang. Then I would pretend not to have heard.
They didn’t stop. The door swung open, revealing a smiling fortysomething man in a tux. “Ah,” he said. “Leland? Collin Porter. Pleasure to meet you.” He reached out and gave me a firm alpha-dog handshake. He was a sturdy guy with a weathered face. As we crossed the marble entryway, I saw what the shouting had been. In a room off to the side, Scarface was playing on a TV screen the size of my car. I didn’t see anyone watching it.
I followed him into a kitchen. The ceiling looked about fourteen feet high. On the other side of the kitchen island and its vast expanse of some fancy stone, a plate glass window showcased the ocean view. French doors led to a deck big enough to host a wedding on.
Something moved at the corner of my eye.
“Oh, Anthony,” Porter said. “Get Leland a drink.”
The other guy, walking toward a built-in bar, was also wearing a tux.
I said, “Thanks for making the time, Mr. Porter. I can see you folks have plans this evening.”
“Oh, it’s no trouble. Thanks for driving up. I’m always glad to get a deal closed.” He reached for the envelope, and I handed it over. “What do you take? Something light, since you’re driving? Gin and tonic?”
“Thank you much. Yes.” Roy had schooled me on the rule that barring medical orders, drinks offered by clients couldn’t be refused. I figured I could get away with just a couple of sips.
Anthony had turned his head to make sure he got the order right. My gut sank at the sight of his face. We’d worked together in Charleston. He had to know the circumstances of my departure. Everyone there did. I hoped he wouldn’t mention it to Porter.
I said, “Hey, Tony! How you been? Still with the solicitor’s office?”
“Oh, yeah. Same old, same old.” He looked at me for about half a second too long. Then he crossed the room with my drink, almost tripping on a rug that appeared to be the hide of an animal about the size of an elk.
I would not have pegged Tony as a pink-cummerbund man, but that’s what he had on. The color reminded me that his last name was Rosa. I asked, “You two gentlemen going to a wedding or something this evening?”
Porter looked up from the papers he was
