Deep Waters

to get the land at reasonable rates."
    "Naturally," Elias said. "And they had selected you to help them pick up the first big parcels in a discreet manner."
    "I realize now that the man who called me was probably Rick Swinton, although I can't prove it. At any rate, I saw my chance to pull off the deal of a lifetime. Gwen and I still owned that old campground on the bluff, you see. It was the one piece of property we didn't sell at the time of the divorce. We both knew it might be very valuable in the future, so we agreed to hang on to it together,"
    "I know," Elias said.
    "Prime view land. Naturally the developer wanted it. I figured all I had to do was get Gwen to sell me her half-interest. Then I could turn around and sell the whole parcel to the developer."
    "For a small fortune?" Charity clarified.
    Leighton shot her a quick glance. "Let's just say for a very nice chunk of change. But before I could make my offer to Gwen, she showed up with those damn Voyagers. I couldn't figure out what the hell she was doing. Then I realized she had to be using the cult to milk investment funds out of people dumb enough to believe alien spaceships would come to take them away."
    "Did you approach her about selling you her half-interest in the campground?" Charity asked.
    "Of course." Leighton waved a hand. "Figured we could do business together, in spite of the past. Whatever else she was, Gwen was a real first-rate businesswoman."
    "What happened?" Elias asked.
    Leighton shook his head. "She admitted up front that she was running a con on the Voyager crowd. Said they were all getting what they deserved. I told her I wanted to buy out her half of the campground. She agreed, provided she could use the property until the fifteenth of August. She said that by the middle of August she'd have collected the money she needed to finance some investments she had in mind. We had a deal. Or so I thought."
    "She agreed to let you buy out her half-interest in the campground?"
    "Right." Leighton mopped his brow again. "I offered her a fair price for her share."
    "You mean you offered her a price based on land values in the current Whispering Waters Cove real estate market." Elias took a sip of his wine. "Not what the land would be worth to a major resort developer."
    Leighton scowled. "Business is business."
    Elias shrugged. "Water is water, but no two waves are the same. Some break harmlessly against the shore. Others conceal riptides that can carry the unwary out to sea."
    Leighton looked briefly baffled. "Uh-huh. Well, to make a long story short, Gwen came to see me a couple of weeks ago. Said she'd heard the rumors about the resort development. Said the fact that you were here in town, Winters, meant that something really big must be in the air. I thought she was going to renege on our deal."
    Charity toyed with her fork. "But instead she just raised the price for her share of the campground, right?"
    Leighton frowned. "How did you know?"
    "I sort of saw it coming," Charity said gently.
    "Wish I had." Leighton sighed heavily. "Gwen wanted five times what I had offered her for that land. I said it wasn't worth it. She claimed that, based on what she knew about Elias Winters, it was worth ten times as much as she was asking."
    "You let her convince you that even if you paid her five times the value of her share of the campground, you would still make a fortune when you sold to the developer?" Charity asked.
    "I know it sounds stupid in hindsight." Leighton's soft, plump hand bunched into a thick fist. "But it wasn't just Gwen who kept the pressure on. I was getting almost daily calls from the representative of the phony developer."
    Elias watched him. "Swinton?"
    "Probably. He kept increasing his offer for the land if I could just get title to the whole piece. He said his people wanted to be certain they could get that one parcel. Said the developer was willing to pay top dollar for the old campground if the deal was handled quietly so as not to drive up the values of the surrounding properties."
    Charity watched him intently. "So you kept upping your offer to Gwendolyn?"
    Leighton shuddered. "I told myself I had to get hold of that land, whatever it took. It was like a fever or something. I lost my sense of perspective. Then the developer's representative called again. Offered to make me a partner in the resort deal."
    Elias watched him intently. "All you had to do was put up a large chunk of investment cash, right?"
    Leighton closed his