Page 55 of The Castaways
“I would figure it was your business. I wouldn’t interrogate you.”
“That’s not what I’m doing.”
“It sure as hell sounds like it.”
“Okay, well, while I’m at it, I have another question.”
Addison held eye contact. “What would that be?”
“In the bag of the items the Coast Guard recovered was Tess’s phone.”
“You have the phone. You just said you checked it.”
“It went missing the day she died. That night. And you were at the Drake house. Did you take Tess’s cell phone? Do you have it?”
Addison’s nostrils flared, ever so slightly. “No.”
“I need you to tell me the truth. The phone could have clues still on it. I didn’t look at her text messages, for example.”
“Why not?”
“I didn’t have time. I was dealing with Andrea.” The Chief paused. “Do you have the phone, Addison? Just tell me.”
“No.”
“Okay,” the Chief said. He was sure now that Addison did have the phone, but what could he do? Get a search warrant? Turn the phone into evidence? Let the whole island know that Tess’s and Greg’s deaths were, maybe, more than an accident?
“If you find the phone…” the Chief said. “If for some reason Phoebe has it, or it turns up…”
“You’ll be the first to know,” Addison said.
The waitress approached timidly with the jalapeno poppers. She looked nervous. It was the Mafia Table replete with men speaking in angry whispers. The Chief waved her in. Food, yes, hurry, put the plate down, the Chief was starving. He ate when he was nervous or stressed out, and he was both things in extremis right now. He popped a popper right away, then regretted it. The popper was filled with molten lava that branded his tongue with a sizzling hiss. He gasped and nearly spit the glowing coal into his napkin, but both the waitress and Addison were watching him. If Addison could bluff, so could he. Thumbs up! Delicious!
“Another beer,” he whispered. “Please.”
“And a drink for me,” Addison said.
Just like that, the moment was past, the topic was kaput, and to revisit the question of the cell phone or the reason for Addison’s phone calls would seem aggressive. The Chief would not be able to uncover anything. Addison, despite his diminished appearance, was cunning—that Ivy League education meant something, as did the charm, the business acumen, the money, the languages, the connections. Addison was as slippery as a fish, but he would not get caught like a fish. There were two types of men, cops and robbers, and Addison… well, the Chief hated to say it, but he was a robber. The kind who stole a man’s money and his property. Greg had been a robber, too, the kind who stole a woman’s heart. The Chief was a cop through and through, but that didn’t mean he would prevail. Going head to head with Addison, he almost certainly would not.
“Want a popper?” the Chief asked, secretly wishing Addison would end up with a sore, dry spot on his tongue like the Chief now had.
“God, no,” Addison said.
And they both chuckled.
Jeffrey said, “Sorry I’m late.”
He had not left Delilah at home at night since Greg and Tess had died, he said, because he was worried about her. Crackerjack Delilah, the bat out of hell, Joan Jett meets Julia Child, a woman formidable in a dozen different ways—and she was a mess now.
“I can only stay for one beer,” Jeffrey said.
Jeffrey was a cop also, the Chief thought. He was a cop’s cop, incorruptible.
“I’m sorry to hear about Delilah,” the Chief said. “I miss her cooking.”
“I miss her cooking, too,” Jeffrey said.
“Have a burger,” the Chief said, nodding at his own plate, half demolished.
