Rolly was as scared as a squirrel halfway across a turnpike. He was out on the Gulf of Mexico in a thirty-foot, fiberglass cabin cruiser named Miranda built in the early eighties. The wind was howling and driving the rain sideways, and the boat was dropping into twelve foot troughs. Rolly was an avid diver and a skilled sailor who had been caught in bad weather before, but he had never experienced anything like this.
He laughed at his own stupidity, as the boat lurched and slammed into the waves. How could he have expected David to keep his presence a secret? He'd had no choice but to run. There wouldn't be any bail or probation this time. He would go to prison!
Rolly figured that he would never get out of Florida in his car, that his only hope of freedom would be Mexico. But now, it looked like he might not make it across the Gulf. What a fool he'd been. What a stupid fool!
He wrestled with the wheel, struggling to stay on the southwestern course.
I shouldn't have taken the money!
I shouldn't have moved here!
No. That was bullshit.
No matter what, the Keys were the best part of his life. Rolly remembered how difficult it was growing up in Boston's North End.
His father had taken off when he was four, and he and his mother had ended up on welfare. She sank into a deep depression, from which she never recovered.
•
Rolly remembered her sitting there, mesmerized by the TV, in an apartment full of clutter. Paths wound through piles of junk from one darkened room to another.
Once in a while, she spoke to him.
He would have left, but there was no place to go.
His school life had been another kind of hell, controlled by a macho Italian gang. To fit in and survive, he'd learned to act as tough as the rest of them, but he lived in constant fear of being exposed.
When he finally graduated, he had immediately found a clerical job in a hospital and escaped to Brookline, far away from the North End.
The Art Institute was nearby and he registered for a course in oil painting. It had been necessary to change his schedule and work nights, and it took every extra dollar he had to pay for the twice-a-week classes.
That was where he met Marc Solomon, the rich and talented instructor's assistant and "star" student...who was openly gay. Rolly hated his guts.
•
The violent squall on the Gulf seemed to come out of nowhere, the sea suddenly rising up to an impossible height before him.
I only wanted to pay off the damn boat! Maybe I paid for my coffin, too...
* * * * *
YOU ARE READING
Castle Cay
Mystery / Thriller"When her best friend is murdered, Julie O'Hara, a body language expert, packs up her suspicion and flies to Boston for his funeral. Who could have killed rising artist Marc Solomon, and what does Castle Cay, the Solomon's mysterious Caribbean islan...
