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"Stop!" I yelled "It was my fault"

I didn’t wait for a reply I ran, and I didn’t stop until I reached the northern tip of the island

Alex and Garrett stayed mad at each other the rest of the weekend I refused to speak to either of them I never explained to Garrett why Alex had pushed me overboard

Neither Garrett nor Alex ever ain As forfear of sharks or deep water But I never forgot the shock of asking the wrong question of the wrong person and getting pitched headfirst into the warm sea with the blood and the sharks For ator, every time I interviewed someone or prodded for inforined et surprised again

"Señor?"

Jose was back, sistration cards I’d asked hied "Great"

I took the cards and began flipping through the: Mr & Mrs Navarre I stared at it,a Mrs Navarre

I flipped through the other cards, went back to one of theainst the phone records

"Here," I said

"Señor?"

"Three calls to this number from the hotel All in the last teeks"

"Is that bad, sir?"

"I don’t know" I held up the registration card with a nasville address and a phone number, all written in neat block letters "But I think I should ask Benja at the marlin above the fireplace

"Yo, Huff"

Alex’s shirt had a tear in the back, like it had snagged on a nail Plaster and dust speckled his curly hair "You sure you don’t want to buy this place?" hecheaper by the minute"

His tone rerae of his Bee Cave Road office in Austin after the high-tech bubble burst The guy’s voice had sounded just like that--fragile as glass--right before he juh this,his old whittling knife--the knife his dad had given hiainst the handle, but it stillyou all down here," Alex said

"You said you needed help I’ you, man Tres can help"

"It’s too late I’ve screwed up too much"

Garrett remembered the body in the basement A shiver ran up his back Even so s, there were ti able to run away Down in the basement had been one of those ht over the dead nored the dried blood and the gunshot wound in the chest--how did little Tres, the annoying kid who used to corow up being able to exa you ain’t told uess"

"That stuff about Calavera If you had anything to do with that--I ht?"

Alex’s expression was hard to read--fear, maybe even shame "You remember Mr Eli’s funeral?"

Garrett nodded It wasn’t one of the days he liked to remember He’d come down to Corpus for the memorial, mostly to console Alex There hadn’t been many people there, which had surprised Garrett After all the people old Mr Eli had helped, all the good things people said about hiured there would be a mob scene But it was just Garrett, Alex and a couple of ladies fro better to do

Afterward, Alex and he had gotten blind drunk at the Water Street Oyster Bar

"You promised you’d be there at my funeral," Alex re to freakto get a drink"

"Don’t think you need one,from you? Sorry, Garrett I need a drink"

"Alex," Garrett called after hiht?"

Alex’s eyes were as dead as the fish on the walls "I’onna be just like Mr Eli’s funeral Nobody’s even gonna reone, Garrett picked up a pillow and threw it at the wall That didn’tAlex and he had been friends Seeether, howled at the moon fros, Alex was the first one to come find him in the hospital--one of the few friends that stuck with him and never made hi tonight He wanted Alex back the way he used to be--a pain in the ass souy who always knew the right thing to do Hearing hi up--no That was Garrett’s job Alex was supposed to be the sone

They’d been apart like five minutes, and already heto say about that He would’ve warned Garrett against falling too hard Garrett probably needed soht when it came to Lane

"Hell with it," he ht And if you couldn’t know soet to know somebody just as well in one day?

He wheeled himself out of the parlor and went to find Lane

19

I finally located Mr Lindy in a room I never knew existed--a s from the limestone fireplace, the place was directly above the parlor The shelves were lined with tattered hardcover bestsellers froo Ludlum Trevanian Guy books

Lindy sat in a leather recliner facing the door--a good defensive position He still wore his dark suit, though he’d loosened his tie His demeanor was so formal that even this s breach of decoruot the feeling he wasn’t paying it ne filled the air with a faint amber scent

"Mr Navarre," he said

"Mr Lindy We need to talk"