“The name of the place,” Jenna said, all wine-woozy, “is Otter Creek Village. Three miles off State Road 84, it says here. Near the old bombing range.”
“I can find it.”
“He grew up not far from there,” Jenna said. “And his family had a cabin out at Sawgrass.”
“Okay, I’ll look around out there tomorrow.”
“Thank you, Brian,” Jenna said. She kissed him lightly on the lips and snuggled against his shoulder. Keyes slipped his right arm around her; it was a brotherly little hug, not a very good one. He wished he weren’t so damn nervous. Still, he was thrilled to be there, alone with Jenna and no crazy Wiley, just old JT singing “Fire and Rain” on the stereo. Keyes loved the scent of Jenna’s neck, and the sweet narcotic sound of her breathing. He could have stayed that way for hours, hopelessly consumed by her presence, clutching her like a bedtime doll. With Keyes, nothing had changed; as for Jenna, it was hard to tell.
“Brian?”
“Yes, Jenna.”
“I’m getting sleepy.” She looked up from his chest. “I think I’d better go to bed.”
She uncurled like a cat, stretching the lavender leotard in a dozen breathtaking ways. She closed the coffin, yawned, and said, “Well.”
Keyes waited, clinging to hope.
But then she said: “It’s time for you to go home and get some rest.”
“Good idea,” Keyes said with a brave smile.
He drove off in a pinprickly sweat—euphoric, suicidal, utterly confused. All over again, he thought. God help me.
10
Overnight the weather cooled, and a fresh north wind brought an early whisper of winter.
Brian Keyes awoke at dawn, surprised by the dry chill. He slipped into blue jeans, foraged for a sweater, and went outside to crank up the car. The old MG was a marvelous summertime sportster, but on cold mornings the engine balked. Keyes let it warm for a full ten minutes. He used the time as unwisely as possible, reliving the dinner with Jenna and devising romantic strategy.
From Miami he took the turnpike north to Road 84, a clamorous truck route that runs cross-state from Fort Lauderdale. Despite the gray gauze in the sky and the whipping wind, the highway was clogged with boxy Winnebagos, custom vans, and station wagons dragging metallic-purple bass boats—the usual weekend lemmings.
Over the years civilization doggedly had followed Road 84 toward the lip of the Everglades. Heading west, Keyes could chart the march of the chain saws and bulldozers. What once had been misty pastureland and pine barrens were now golden-age trailer parks; medieval cypress stands had been replaced by 7-Elevens and coin laundries. And spreading like a spore across the mottled landscape was every developer’s wet dream, the condominium cluster.
Later as he walked along the dike, hands in his pockets, Keyes marveled at the contrast: to the western horizon, nothing but sawgrass and hammock and silent swamp; to the east, diesel cranes and cinderblock husks and high-rises. Not a hundred yards stood between the backhoes and the last of South Florida’s wilderness. It had been a while since Keyes had driven this far west, and he was startled by what he saw. No wonder Skip Wiley had been so pissed off.
Keyes was nearly two miles from where he’d parked the car when he came to the Otter Creek condominium. He smiled, remembering Wiley’s snide column. “Talk about false advertising. There’s no creek, and there’s damn sure no otters—no live ones, anyway.”
Otter Creek Village consisted of three cheerless buildings set end-to-end at mild angles. Each warren stood five stories high and was painted white with canary-yellow trim. Every apartment featured a tiny balcony that overlooked a notably unscenic parking lot. From the dike Keyes could see a solid acre of shuffle-board courts, crisp formations of aluminum lounge chairs, and a vast ulcer-shaped swimming pool. In the center of the complex, surrounded by a twenty-foot chain-link fence, was an asphalt tennis court with faded lines and no net. The entire recreation area was outfitted with striped table umbrellas, sprouting like festive mushrooms from the concrete.
But Otter Creek was quiet today. No one floundered in the pool, and the shuffleboard courts lay deserted; the cold weather had driven the retirees inside. Keyes finally spotted one old gentleman, bundled in fluorescent rain gear, walking a hyperactive terrier along the banks of a murky manmade canal. “Great fishing in your own backyard!” is what the Otter Creek brochure promised. Keyes didn’t know much about fishing, but he had grave doubts about any creature that could procreate in such fetid water.