Page 22 of Ground Truth

“Call me Margo. Everyone does.” She tilted her head, rounded her lips, and popped out three quick smoke rings. The gentle breeze pushed the rings out of shape as it lifted them toward the afternoon sun.

“Margo, Greta Reed’s sister is Hanna Campbell. She was unable to reach out to her sister until recently. She didn’t know Greta had died. As you can imagine, she’s bewildered and distraught and looking for answers,” Gaspar said. “We’re hoping you can help us give her some closure.”

Gaspar hated asking witnesses and family members to help with closure. In his experience, and he’d had way more than most, closure was a myth.

Survivors moved on, sure. Life kept going whether they wanted it to or not. But he’d learned long ago that people get through grief, not over it. The years make grief bearable as the loss is pushed deeper into history. But closure was just a word people used. What did that even mean?

Margo narrowed her eyes against the rising cigarette smoke. “Not sure how I can help. Like I said, I didn’t know Greta had a sister.”

“You two weren’t close, then?” Drake asked.

“We were. I mean, Greta was relatively new here. She moved to Orlando after her first husband died in a car crash. She wanted to get away from the things that reminded her of him, she said.”

“She’d been married before?”

“Yeah, about a year or so. She moved to Orlando for a fresh start and a new job. Then a few months later, she married Phillip Reed.” Margo’s eyes narrowed against the irritating smoke. She already had more wrinkles than a woman her age should have. “He was a transplant surgeon from Atlanta. A great one, by all accounts. The only thing bigger than his reputation was his ego. He was overwhelming. Greta was overwhelmed by him, I think.”

“Why do you say that?” Gaspar asked.

“Greta was fragile. She’d had a lot of tragedy in her life. Her mother was killed by a drunk driver. Then her husband died in another car crash. She was spooked. Nervous about everything,” Margo said. “She felt more comfortable being with Phillip than looking for another man, I guess.”

“Why?”

“He was familiar. They’d dated in high school or something,” Margo explained, talking around the cigarette she still held between her lips.

Gaspar nodded. “Where did they live?”

“A gated community north of town. On a golf course. They both liked to play golf. Phillip traveled a lot and Greta liked the security. We run into some scary people in this job, and she was still a little terrified of everything and everyone,” Margo said, stubbing out the butt in the ashtray. “I can give you the address. But the house went into foreclosure when Greta and Phillip died. It’s been sold. Someone else lives there now.”

“Tell us about the boating accident. What happened there?” Gaspar asked, sensing that she was about to bolt.

“It was all over the local news. We did a segment on it, too. You can find the video online, I’m sure.” Margo shrugged. “Supposed to be some sort of romantic getaway. Phillip rented the boat. Neither one of them knew how to sail, but they thought it would be fun to try. Didn’t work out that way, though.”

“What happened?” Gaspar asked again. He’d read the news accounts online. But there was always more to every story.

Margo cocked her head as if she were thinking about what to say. She reached into her pocket for the cigarettes, drew another into her mouth, and used the butane to light up.

When she had the smoke going again, she said, “Like I mentioned, the boat was rented. Later, we learned that it wasn’t in great shape.”

“In what way?”

“Just old and not well maintained. It was a sailboat, but it had an old motor, too. It was way under powered. When the surprise squall popped up, the winds blew the boat too far out. When it capsized, they simply couldn’t get back to shore, I guess.”

“Was the boat equipped with life vests?”

“According to the boat’s owner, there were life vests aboard. Nobody can say whether Greta and Phillip were wearing vests when the boat went down,” Margo said, finishing the cigarette and stubbing the butt into the ashtray again, joining a dozen others exactly like it.

“So a tragic accident, then,” Gaspar said. “No foul play suspected.”

Margo shook her head. “None as far as I know. I suppose if the bodies ever turn up, they may find something to suggest otherwise. But after all this time, that’s not likely.”

“Where did they find the boat?”

“South of Sarasota. And quite a long way out into the Gulf, too. You can ask the FWC. They’ll have reports and you can talk to the agents who handled the case.”

“FWC?” Drake asked.

“Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission,” Gaspar explained. “Do you know the officer’s name?”

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