“When did it rain last?” he called back.

“The night Tatum was killed,” Wainwright said. “But even so, a man bleeds this much, it doesn’t matter. There would still be something to see on this old dried-up stuff.”

Louis turned. “Like spray paint?”

“Spray paint? Why do you think it was spray paint?”

“I doubt he’d take the time to use a brush.”

Wainwright started to stand up with a groan and Louis extended a hand. Wainwright accepted it, rising to his feet.

“I still don’t think the paint means anything,” he said.

“Maybe it does to the killer,” Louis said.

“Then why didn’t he paint Tatum?”

“I don’t know,” Louis said.

Wainwright glanced around. “Shit, I was so sure this was the place.”

Louis wiped his sweating brow. The boat ramp emptied into a narrow channel of mangroves. Louis spotted a beer can in the mangrove roots. From far off came the faint whine of a boat’s motor. Louis thought of the fishermen who had found Quick’s bloated body. They probably thought they were looking at a clot of trash, like the garbage caught in the rocks up on the causeway.

He turned to Wainwright suddenly. “Dan, could you call your office and have them pull the evidence sheet from the Tatum scene?”

Wainwright stared at him. “Why?”

“I got a hunch about something.”

Wainwright radioed in and Louis waited until Wainwright’s man had the evidence sheet. Louis started to speak, but Wainwright held up a hand. “Never mind, I think I just figured out what you’re looking for. Jones, check the sheet of all that garbage we picked up around Tatum on the causeway and tell me if you got a can of spray paint on it.”

They waited. Something splashed. Louis eyed the trees, expecting to see a gator come crashing out.

Finally Jones’s voice came back. “Yes, sir. One half-full can of Krylon spray paint. Black satin. No prints.”

Wainwright looked at Louis. “The motherfucker dropped it in the rain,” he said softly. He told Jones to run the can over to the lab, then signed off. He slid the radio back and looked at Louis.

“Any other ideas?” Wainwright asked.

“Yeah. The Nature Trail,” Louis said.

They backtracked to the trail sign and parked. The trail itself was a primitive, twisting boardwalk of old planks over the swampy ground, seemingly heading nowhere.

Louis opened his shirt, growing hot from the afternoon sun, and wiped his brow with his sleeve. Wainwright forged ahead on the boardwalk, unfettered by the heat, making his way through the tunnel of mangroves like a bear in the woods.

As they walked, Louis eyed the planks for signs of a struggle, drops of blood, ripped clothing, but there was nothing.

“Watch out for snakes, Kincaid,” Wainwright called back. “Don’t worry about the gators. They’re usually asleep in the heat of the day.”

Louis stopped, his eyes darting to the brush. He heard Wainwright chuckle but then go silent as he came to a stop.

“Well, I’ll be damned,” Wainwright said softly.

Louis hurried up behind Wainwright. Wainwright stood next to a sign that said SCENIC OVERLOOK. In front of him was a wooden platform.

“I didn’t even know this was here,” Wainwright said.

“Well, you’re not into this nature shit,” Louis said, walking ahead.

They went to the base of the platform and stopped cold. There were dark brown stains on the gray wooden steps.

“Bingo,” Wainwright said.

Some of the bloodstains were splatters, others streaks. “It looks like he dragged him up,” Wainwright said. “Careful going up.”

Slowly, avoiding the bloodstains, they ascended the ten steps. The platform was about six-foot square and it left them just above the tree line. To the east, across the narrow inlet, there was another body of land. But Louis didn’t focus on it. His eyes were drawn immediately to the large brown bloodstain in the middle of the platform. It radiated out nearly three feet. On one edge of the stain, black overlapped the brown.

“Paint,” Louis said, pointing.

Wainwright nodded.

For several long seconds, neither man said a word. Louis was rooted, unable to take his eyes off the huge brown stain. It was hard to believe Anthony Quick had any life in him when he was thrown into the water.

“Kincaid, over here.”

He looked up to see Wainwright standing by the railing. The rail was peppered with blood splatters and there was one large brown smudge.

“This has to be where he threw him in,” Wainwright said.

Louis stretched to look down into the water, dark as coffee grounds. “Where exactly did they find the body?” he asked.

Wainwright looked around, then pointed to a spot about ten yards away where the mangroves formed a point.

“So the tides didn’t move him,” Louis said. “Your hunch was right.”

“Yeah,” Wainwright said quietly. There was something in his eyes, but he blinked it away. “Well, I guess I’d better get a tech unit out here and call Bledsoe. He and the DA will need to know about this.”

They headed down to the squad car and Wainwright radioed in to his office. Louis leaned against the car, staring back at the wooden platform, trying both to see and not see what Quick must have gone through up there. Had he been able to comprehend what was happening to him as he was dragged up those steps? Had he known his killer? That was unlikely, given the fact that the same man probably also killed Tatum. Unless there was some link between the two dead men. But what could a liquor-store owner from Sereno Key and a computer salesman from Toledo have in common?

“Well, the county guys are on their way over,” Wainwright said. “By the way, Sheriff found Quick’s rental in the Holiday Inn lot, keys on the ground. And they found a clerk who said Quick asked about going fishing. He was supposed to get back by six for some awards dinner but never showed.”

“Can we talk to the clerk?”

Wainwright pursed his lips. “Sheriff says they’re handling it.” He looked out over the water. “Damn,” he said softly. “I hate to have them in on this.”

“This is your jurisdiction, isn’t it?” Louis asked.

“Technically. But I don’t have the men to do this kind of work and that asshole Mobley knows it. I have three uniforms on my little force, Kincaid. None of them has ever done anything harder than trying to take down Levon the other day.”

Louis guessed Mobley was the Lee County Sheriff and that there was some bad blood between the two men. Or maybe Wainwright was just embarrassed about having to admit his department’s inadequacies. The same thing had happened back in Michigan. What was it with cops and turf wars?

“Kincaid,” Wainwright said.

Louis glanced back at him.

“You’ve got good instincts.”

“Thanks.”

“Why’d you give up the badge?”

Louis felt himself tighten. The words I didn’t have a choice came to his mind, but he didn’t say them.

“I needed a break,” Louis replied.

Wainwright was looking at him. Louis waited, hoping he’d let it drop. Finally, Wainwright just nodded.

“Yeah, this shit can get to anybody,” he said.

It had been Margaret Dodie’s idea to bring Roberta Tatum some fresh clothes. Margaret said she didn’t think Roberta had any kin who cared about her—outside of her dead husband and her brother. And it didn’t seem right, she said, that an innocent woman should have to go home wearing dirty clothes. So she had Wainwright take her to the Tatum home and she selected an outfit. She asked Louis to deliver it.

Roberta had eyed him suspiciously when he handed her a blue linen pantsuit, shoes, and underwear. She offered no thanks.

Louis waited for her in Wainwright’s office. He paced, left alone with images of Quick’s splattered blood and Walter Tatum’s battered face. It was unfamiliar and unsettling, and he allowed himself to wonder if, given another twenty years, he would have the same sense of coolness that Wainwright had.