Jewels On Tiger Island
by
Catherine Pickren
Copyright 2013 Catherine Pickren,
All rights reserved.
Published in eBook format by eBookIt.com
ISBN-13: 978-1-4566-2044-8
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.
Chapter One
Fernandina Beach, Florida
First week in September
It was the end of summer, when only a few seagulls hung around to fly and dip into the ocean’s crests to capture some unfortunate fish for the day’s feast. All of the small stores on Centre Street in this small town seemed to be closing their doors for business an hour earlier than usual because the tourist season was coming to a halt, and soon the people on Amelia Island, Florida would be hunkering down for a semblance of “normality”.
Amelia Island, inhabited by eight different flags since the early 1600s, is an island located in Northeast Florida, which lies on the Atlantic Ocean. Fernandina Beach, located on Amelia Island boasts of the Palace Saloon, the oldest saloon in America, built in 1878. Besides fishing, and the paper mills, Fernandina thrives on tourism. Tourists are called “dit-dots,” and they can be spotted immediately by the native-born islanders who have lived and fished here many generations past.
Mary Hancock lived on Amelia Island all of her twenty-seven years. At five feet and nine inches in height, with auburn red hair, brown eyes, and a body women were envious of, Mary knew she was attractive, but she didn’t flaunt her God-given attributes. She had been engaged once. But that engagement was broken and left her broken-hearted after she found out her fiancé went to nightclubs in Jacksonville, Florida three times without her knowledge and had one-night stands with strippers in a night club. She would probably be married to him today if his best friend had not gotten drunk one night and “let the beans spill,” so to speak. Now, she was a freelance writer for a vacation magazine, as well as a contributing editor for the Florida Times Union, located in Jacksonville, Florida.
A man driving a brand new Lexus parked his car in front of the coffee shop on Centre Street, where Mary was sitting. He was probably one of those “dit-dots” who was born with a “silver spoon in his mouth.” The man’s demeanor exuded power and an aura that relayed the message to any onlooker that he was not someone who could be easily fooled. This opinion was further confirmed by Mary when he opened the door of his white Lexus, stepped out onto the hot pavement in his Gucci shoes, khaki slacks and baby-blue polo shirt, and casually lit a cigarette with a monogrammed gold lighter.
Mary couldn’t see the initials on the lighter from the coffee shop from which she was watching this newcomer, but she could surmise he hadn’t been in town long. Being a small island, news travelled quickly when people came and set down “roots,” so this man had not been on the latest gossip news-cycle. He was attractive, though- in his early to mid-thirties with jet-black hair, a square jaw and aquiline nose, brown eyes, very tanned skin, and he stood to be about 6 feet in height. He piqued her interest. Observing that he was crossing the railroad tracks, walking towards Bret’s Restaurant, Mary decided to follow him. She could inconspicuously hang out at the souvenir shop next to the restaurant just to “keep an eye on him” and possibly figure out why this good-looking male specimen would be stopping by here.
Chapter Two
At her vantage point, and after watching him sit at the bar a good five minutes eating pretzels and drinking what looked like a Heineken beer, Mary decided it was time to find out who this stranger was. She would sit at the bar and talk to her bartender friend, Matt, who had worked at Bret’s Restaurant since high school graduation. There was an empty barstool next to this stranger, so Mary could casually strike up a conversation with him and find out his purpose for visiting the island.
The man was well-spoken with a Northern accent, had a pleasing baritone timbre voice, and he was talking to Matt about real estate in the area; especially about waterfront properties that were for sale. Having being born and raised here himself, Matt was pretty knowledgeable on this subject, so he informed this stranger about several ocean-front properties on Fletcher Avenue that were available. The man asked how much the undeveloped ocean-front properties were, and he didn’t even flinch when Matt told him he could buy a seventy-five foot ocean front parcel of land for around $500,000 on the north side, up to nine figures near the Omni Plantation Resort area.
After listening to the stranger and Matt’s conversation on real estate a couple more minutes, Mary thought this would be a good opportunity to interrupt. Not that he would be interested or anything, but she thought she would bring up the fact that the ocean-front home her parents had left her after their deaths in a freak car accident over a year ago, was for sale.
Clearing her throat, Mary said, “Hello. My name is Mary Hancock. I couldn’t help over-hearing your conversation that you were looking for ocean-front properties. I have an ocean-front home that is for sale.”
The stranger stopped eating his pretzel and looked at Mary with such an intense stare that Mary gulped. Mary had never seen a man with such beautiful blue eyes. Maybe she didn’t have any business interrupting the conversation, but since he was on the topic of oceanfront properties, hers was definitely available. She couldn’t afford to keep the property because property taxes had gone up, and they would continue to go up because of the two new schools the county was planning on building on the south side of the island.
Finally, after a pregnant pause, he spoke, “Where is your property located? I might be interested in your property if it will suit my needs”.
Mary gave him the exact address and told him that her property was located on Fletcher Avenue about 4 blocks south from Slider’s Seafood Oyster Bar and Grill. He repeated the address she had given him, took a pen out of his shirt pocket, and wrote down the address on a bar napkin. Standing, and opening up his wallet, he gave Mary a business card; put a five dollar tip on the bar; and said, “It was nice meeting you. Give me a call. I would be interested in looking at your property.” He then nonchalantly strolled over to the cashier to pay his bill and left the restaurant.
Matt broke the silence and said: “That character has a mystique about him that is hard to define. He seems like a nice enough fellow, but I wouldn’t put him in the category of ‘trustworthy persona.’”
Mary laughed and said, “You don’t even trust your own preacher’s friendly visits without thinking he’s coming over to extort more monetary contributions from you to support the church’s coffers. If he bought my house for a reasonable price, I could learn to trust him.”
Looking at the business card, she read, “John W. Fielding, III, Fielding Enterprises, Inc. of Boston, Massachusetts.” A business number, fax number, and cell number were on the card.
Chapter Three
That same day, standing on the back deck of her home, leaning on the old railing-, which was in need of new, white paint,- Mary was looking out at the ocean thinking how nice the weather was with the temperature at 76 degrees Fahrenheit and a calm northwest breeze, when her golden retriever, Prince, began to bark incessantly. Telling Prince to stop barking, Mary opened her sliding glass door to go back into the house. It was around four o’clock in the afternoon, and Mary was expecting her friend, Lucy Robinson, to stop by and visit a while before her five o’clock waitress shift began at the Surf Restaurant. Lucy was twenty-five, two inches shorter than Mary, with dirty-blonde hair, blue eyes and a vivacious personality. Lucy was engaged to Logan White, aged thirty, a computer programmer who worked at Digital Imaging on the island.
Calling