Pelican Bay by Charlotte Douglas

Author:Charlotte Douglas
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2005-01-10T05:00:00+00:00

Coffee, they say, doesn’t sober you up. It just makes you wide-awake drunk. That’s how I felt as I drove to the station after leaving Bill snoozing in my living room. Pelican Bay had a high percentage of retirees who hit the sheets early, so the post-midnight streets were quiet and deserted. As I crossed the trail, I glimpsed a dark silhouette on its path. Many flouted the sundown closing regulations, so the shadow could have been a cat burglar or an insomniac walking his dog.

When I entered the CID office, Adler sat hunched over his desk, pecking at his sticky keyboard. With the current department budget crunch, new computers had been scratched from this year’s budget. Adler’s sandy hair stood in peaks, as if he’d spent the evening running his fingers through it and coaxing it on end.

“You still here?” I asked.

“I was just leaving you some notes.” He handed me the page the printer spit out.

“I have a few reports to type myself. Bill came in from Boca tonight. Tillett’s alibi is a wash. We can’t prove or disprove.”

Adler’s satisfied grin predicted good news. “I kept drawing blanks on Dorman’s address, until I remembered Tillett said he’s a bodybuilder. Tonight I called every health club and gym in the yellow pages until I hit the Body Shop on U.S. 19, north of the mall. Dorman works out there seven days a week.”

“Was he there when you called?”

Adler shook his head. “It was late and the gym was closing, but the manager furnished an interesting piece of news. Dorman’s new place of employment. He’s working as a waiter until he lands another med-tech job.”

The look on Adler’s face reminded me of Jessica’s when she’d opened her bunny book. “Are you going to tell me or do I have to take you into the back room and beat it out of you with a rubber hose?”

“Dorman’s working at Sophia’s.”

“For Lester Morelli?”

“Yeah. Whaddaya make of that?” Adler ran his fingers through his hair, realigning the vertical tufts.

“Coincidence?”

“You don’t believe in coincidences, remember?” He slipped his jacket off the back of his chair and pulled it on. “I’m going home for a few hours’ sleep. You want me to question Dorman in the morning?”

“I’d planned to interview the staff at Sophia’s tomorrow, so I’ll catch Dorman then. How about running up to Tarpon Springs and checking out Anastasia Gianakis, Vasily’s widow. There was bad blood between her husband and Sophia Morelli. I want to know how bad.”

When Adler left, I sat at my desk and began pounding out accounts of my interviews with Tillett’s patients and staff and Bill’s findings in Boca Raton. By 3:00 a.m., both coffee and Benadryl had worn off. I wandered back to the processing room, located an empty holding cell and stretched out on the metal bunk. If I hadn’t been too tired to scratch, my hives would have kept me awake.

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