Skink--No Surrender by Carl Hiaasen Page B

of a small brackish bay. What had awakened me was the whale song coming from my phone.
    “Hi, Mom,” I said.
    “Where are you?”
    “On my way to find Malley.”
    “Richard, have you lost your freaking mind?”
    She’d already spoken to Blake’s father, who had been puzzled to hear about the nonexistent camping trip.
    “Don’t be mad at Trent,” I said. “It’s a hundred percent my fault.”
    “You come home right now!”
    “I can’t, Mom.”
    “Let the police handle this!”
    “No, we’ve waited long enough.”
    “Richard, I swear—”
    “It’s fine, okay? Totally under control.”
    “But who are you riding with? Who do you even know that’s old enough to drive?”
    “Mom, it’s—”
    A hand darted hawk-like through the open window and snatched the phone. Mr. Clinton Tyree was now calmly speaking to my mother.
    Unbelievable.
    “Ma’am, I want to assure you that Richard is safe and well supervised. He and I have set out to find your niece, God willing. I completely appreciate your concerns—do you have a pen or pencil at hand? I’m going to give you a phone number. The gentleman on the other end will tell you as much about me as he prudently can. He has an outstanding background in law enforcement, so please give him your complete attention. Richard will be in touch with you later. He is a promising young man, as you’re surely aware, and he deeply regrets deceiving hisstepfather, necessary though it was. Now, here’s that phone number.…”
    That’s when I understood how Skink had gotten elected governor. He was smooth as silk when he chose to be. He said goodbye to my mother and handed me the phone.
    “Where are we?” I asked.
    “The wrong damn place. I’m sorry.”
    We drove along the waterfront for maybe half a mile. Then he pulled over in the shade of a concrete span, four lanes across. It was tall enough for any tug or deepwater fishing boat to pass under; even a sailboat could make it through.
    “That used to be a drawbridge,” he said dejectedly. “Long time ago.”
    The new bridge arched from the mainland to a barrier island where the shoreline bristled with private docks. Once upon a time it was all mangroves. On the Gulf side of the island was a tourist beach. I only knew that because a small plane was flying back and forth, pulling a banner advertising “Happy Hula Hour” at some tiki bar.
    “This is where I thought your cousin might be,” Skink said. “But last time I was here, there weren’t any high-rises. It was a quiet place.”
    To myself I counted six condo towers, lined up like smokestacks.
    “Wonder when they took out the old bridge,” Skink said. He was seriously bummed.
    “Hey, we’ll just keep looking,” I told him. “There are plenty of other islands.”
    “The old snowbirds who own those condos, they don’t like waitin’ on a drawbridge. That’s why it got torn down. Don’t want to miss that early-bird special at the Macaroni Grill. Ha!”
    He kept on muttering like that until I turned up his driving mix again. Then he settled down. I even made him smile by guessing the title of an incredibly old Bob Dylan number called “Subterranean Homesick Blues.” Skink asked how in the flippin’ world I knew that one. I explained that my father had loved Dylan and lots of old bands, and that the day after Dad died, I’d downloaded his whole playlist to my iPod.
    “Yeah? Then let’s hear it,” Skink said.
    So there we were, rolling along the interstate through downtown Tampa, rocking out to my dad’s music. Sometimes when I’d look over at the governor, I couldn’t believe he was seventy-two. Other times he looked about a hundred and ten. Now he was like a teenager, shaking a fist and howling the lines in a Pearl Jam song. We had the volume cranked up so loud that I didn’t hear my phone ringing.
    Later we stopped for lunch at a beachside café in Clearwater, where I got to see Skink eat a meal that didn’t have to be skinned or plucked. It