Chapter 92

I gave some serious thought to pulling Randy Ralph over, jerking him out of the truck and beating the crap out of him. We were finding all kinds of crap he did wrong but I still couldn't pin the rapes on him. Instead I went back to the Railroad B&B for Wilson.

"So what the fuck would he pick up at the docks and deliver to a taco truck?" I asked Wilson.

"Maybe they are distributing drugs," was his answers.

"If it was drugs they would never throw them over a fence and hope their man is the one who comes along. Not to mention when he delivered the package, he didn't walk out with a bag full of money. I think he got the payment on the first visit, but it still wasn't a ton of money," I said.

"Maybe it's not drugs," Wilson said.

"Yeah, I'm beginning to think so as well." I said. "We still got his ass on the boat business."

"But, do we really want him for that?" Wilson asked.

"If it's all we can do, then yes by God we do," I said.

"We are going to give him and Brian a chance to explain?" Wilson asked.

"Of course, then we are going to hang their asses," I said. It sounded real good at the time.

The next morning I was up at seven am. I raised the motor from the front wheel and rode to the airfield. It was only a little more difficult that usual. When I got the Chickadee in the air I felt a hell of a lot better. I put the plane in slow cruise and found the air currents over the ocean and rode along with them. They carried me north for quite a ways before I turned around to head home. I had to add a little throttle in order to make it back after a 90 minute ride.

Once I had the plane back in the hanger and the fuel checked I headed home. I had used only four gallons. I was well within range for the five gallon tank to make the bird legal. Of course I had no plans to change mine out.

I started the ride home on the trike. I pedaled a few time then hit the power. The trike took off at a clip about twice what I pedaled. I have to admit it was kind of fun. I mean zipping along at twice the speed, was exciting but it wasn't giving me any exercise. The power ran down about half way home. It would still run too fast to catch the pedal up to the speed of the freewheel so I just let the power drain away. It seemed to be totally out. A couple of miles from the marina so I took over the pedaling. I stopped to lift the motor off the tire so it would have less drag.

I made it back to the compound without any problem. I could see that it was going to work out fine once I got a good battery. I went inside the barge to order a battery. I was right in the middle of reading about batteries and how to wire them when Wilson rushed in.

"Guess what?" he asked.

"Please no guessing games," I said.

Wilson put his laptop down on my desk in my unit of the barge. "Take a look. This clown got arrested last night driving drunk through New Wales. He ran into a road block being set up by the sheriff. They took him in and had to inventory his shit. I saw the mug shot and read the inventory from the police report"

"Well the mug shot fits our description, but so do a dozen other guys," I said.

"How many of them have a bottle of Flunitrazepam in their pocket. It's illegal in this country," Wilson said. "The cops got him and they have the drug. I'm just not sure they know anything else."

"Let me take a shower and dress you gather up the shit we have and lets go down and kick this guys ass." I was a little depressed and Wilson knew it.

"Boss, I know you wanted to catch him. I'm sorry." Wilson said.

"That's okay, we can get his ass on the rapes anyway. I just can't testify about them, he isn't the one." I said.

I managed to talk to the Sheriff like I was still a Sheriff myself. After he saw all the evidence, he went right to the SBI with it. I asked that he keep me out of it and he did. It was easy, he wanted all the credit. I went home feeling remarkably good, considering I had spent weeks and lots of resources for nothing.

Of course there was still the issue of Brian and Ralph's boat thefts. I decided to confront the two of them. Since Ralph was on the road running his delivery business, I decided to go with Brian.

We found him by using his phone as a marker. He was on the pier at Jefferson Island when I ran him down. "What you doing Brain?" I asked. When I walked up to him.

"Just sitting here thinking out how shitty my life is," he replied.

"Well it's about to get worse. They arrested your friend. The one who worked for the fisherman's cooperative," I said.

"What you meant that guy was no friend of mine. He was Chrissy friend. The rumor is he is going down for some rape thing out here on the island." he said.

"News travels fast," I said.

"New Wales isn't a very large place. Word is also the Jefferson Island Trust is going to take a hit," he informed me.

"I wouldn't be surprised," I said.

"So how does Chrissy know him?" I asked.

"You need to ask her that," Brian said.

"Brian your name is going to come up in the investigation, if I file a complaint. You know that night you and Chrissy raped me?" I said.