by Sherri Bryan
Charlotte lay, wide-awake, and thought about everything that had happened since the arrival of Tom’s family in St. Eves. She hated anything to upset the harmony of the town, and since they’d turned up, there’d been mayhem and drama at every turn.
“Y’know,” said Nathan as he sat next to her on the bed, munching on his grilled cheese and ham sandwich, “it’s a real shame we couldn’t get any clean fingerprints from anything at the café. They would have linked everything together nicely.”
“Assuming that the attacker and the killer are the same person, of course,” said Charlotte. “Oh my gosh, I wish I hadn’t said that! I was just getting used to there being one crazy person on the loose, but I think I’ve just convinced myself that there may be two!”
“Would you just listen to yourself?” said Nathan. “Is it any wonder that you worry about everything so much? Of course the attacker and the killer are the same person — stop thinking that way.” As he hugged her, he wasn’t about to tell her that he’d had exactly the same thought the moment she’d called him from Lulu’s. Kissing the top of her head, he smoothed her hair with his hand. He couldn’t bear to think about what might have happened if Ryan hadn’t been passing by the café when he had, and he’d been into The Bottle of Beer earlier to thank him in person. Before he’d left, he’d secretly left a huge tip in the jar bearing Ryan’s name.
“Well, I’ve got some reports to read before I come to bed,” said Nathan, washing down the last of his sandwich with a swig from his beer bottle. “I’ll look at them downstairs, though, so I don’t disturb you. By the way, I need to be at the station early tomorrow, but I’ll be sure to leave quietly. I don’t want to wake you — it’s the only day of the week you get a chance to stay in bed.”
“No, I need to be up early tomorrow too,” said Charlotte, suddenly yawning widely. “I’ve got the pest control guys coming in to do the annual treatment. I did tell you about it.”
“Oh yeah, I forgot,” said Nathan. “OK, well in that case, I suppose I’ll see you in the morning? I’m setting my alarm for around six. You want me to wake you?”
“Yes please. I want to get in early to see if I can fix the damage to the awning…you know, just try and make it as weatherproof as possible.” She yawned again and her eyelids began to droop.
“OK, I’ll do my best not to wake you when I come up,” said Nathan. “Now try to sleep…and try to stop worrying!” He put his arms around her and kissed her goodnight.
“Yum, you taste of grilled cheese and ham,” she said sleepily, her head against his shoulder and her arms locked around his neck. “I knew there had to be a reason why I love you so much…mmm…cheese and ham…and God bless Pippin.”
“Charlotte, you’re rambling,” Nathan said loudly, but it was too late.
She was already dead to the world.
Chapter 11
Charlotte arrived at the café at half-past six. Everywhere was shut, except the Mini-Mart, which opened early on Saturdays to accommodate the numerous deliveries they took in. She waved to Yolanda and Adam, bringing the bike to a stop just outside
“How are you? How’s Pippin?” they asked, squashing her in a double hug.
“I’m fine, thanks and I’m picking Pippin up from the vet later. The awning is in a real mess, but it could have been much worse, so I’m not complaining.”
“We popped into The Bottle of Beer last night — I think Will must have told the whole of St. Eves about Ryan’s heroics!” said Yolanda.
“Good, I’m glad,” said Charlotte. “He’s amazing.”
“Mornin’ all.” A cheery deliveryman approached, wheeling a sack truck towards the store. It was laden with goods and Charlotte guessed it was a good time to let Adam and Yolanda get on with their work.
“Morning, and bye! I’ll see you later.” She got back on her bike and cycled the short distance to the cafe. She chained her bike to the railings at the entrance to Pier 4 and opened up the doors.
She looked briefly at the ugly slashes in the polythene window of the awning, before looking away quickly. She’d deal with that later. She filled the kettle and hunted around for a roll of tape while she waited for it to boil.
Under the circumstances, she would rather not have had to come to the café at all this morning but the pest control treatment was an annual necessity for any establishment at which food and drink were served, albeit a minor inconvenience.
When the pest control company arrived, she armed herself with a cup of tea, the roll of tape, her tablet and a notepad and took a chair outside to begin the painstaking task of taping up the cuts in the polythene window. It took almost an hour, and when she stepped back to admire her work, her heart sank a little. Covered in ugly patches of tape, the window looked like something out of a slasher movie and she made a promise to herself that every spare bit of cash she earned would go towards the cost of restoring the awning to its former glory.
A glance at her phone told her it was only quarter-to eight so she sat on the terrace with her cup of tea, watching the marina come to life. As the time moved on, more and more people surfaced and began to go about their daily chores. Most of them knew nothing about what had happened the previous evening and stopped outside the café, pointing at the damage to the awning and ooh-ing and aah-ing at the police officer stationed at the entrance to Pier 4, whom Nathan had insisted accompany Charlotte to work.
“Are you sure you don’t want a cup of tea or coffee, or anything?” Charlotte asked PC Milton.
“No, I’m fine, thanks, Miss,” he answered. “You just pretend I’m not here.”
Easier said than done, thought Charlotte, as groups of tourists lined up to have their photographs taken with the young police constable.
She had some time to kill before the treatment was finished, so she sat down to search for some new dishes for her specials board.
As she swiped through a food website, she remembered seeing a recipe earlier in the week for ham baked in ginger beer and set about trying to find it again. The ingredients were simple, but there was particular spice the recipe called for and, for the life of her, she couldn’t remember what it was.
She trawled through a dozen websites, none of which had the recipe she was looking for. Suddenly, she slapped herself on the head. “Oh my gosh, I’m such a dope. Why don’t I just look at my browser history?” she said aloud.
She tried to recall when she’d seen the recipe but all she knew was that it had been within the last week. She went back to the previous Saturday and began searching.
Something unfamiliar caught her eye and she stopped scrolling. She clicked on the link to the website and when she saw what it was, immediately knew that she hadn’t been the one who had visited the site.
Scratching her head, she looked at the date on which the site had first been visited, and realized that the only person who’d used the tablet on that day had been Rachel Potts…but she’d wanted to use it for work. Hadn’t she?
She thought back to the previous Sunday. She remembered how upset Rachel had been and recalled thinking that it must have been a message from someone that had caused her to become so angry. She knew now that wasn’t the case.
The website she was looking at hosted high-stakes poker games.
“Oh my God! Charlotte, are you alright?”
Charlotte turned to see Garrett and Laura standing on the other side of the polythene window.
“Why didn’t you call us? Why did we have to hear about this from Nathan?” demanded Garrett.
“Well, he shouldn’t have worried you,” said Charlotte, crossly.
“For heaven’s sake! We’re your godparents! Are you sure you’re alright?” Laura repeated, before bursting into tears and throwing her arms around Charlotte’s neck.
“What happened, exactly?” Garrett shook his head as he surveyed the damage to the awning again.
Charlotte recounted the events of the previous evening to her godparents, leaving out the more distressing details for L
aura’s sake.
“And that’s about it.” She finished with a shrug. “I’m sorry I didn’t call,” she said, patting Laura’s heaving shoulders, “but I just went straight home from here with Nathan and went to bed. I didn’t even think about calling — I didn’t really think about anything except Pippin — I wasn’t thinking straight.”
“But you’re okay?” snivelled Laura. “You’re sure?”
“Yes, I’m okay.” Charlotte smiled. “I was a bit shaken up yesterday, but I’m okay now.”
Laura dried her eyes and took a deep breath to steady herself. “And the police have no idea who it was?”
“No, they dusted for fingerprints, but couldn’t find anything clear. All they have to go on is what I’ve told them, which is that even though I couldn’t see the attacker’s face, they’re obviously very strong because they put up a real fight against Ryan, and they were much smaller than him…”
She stopped, suddenly recalling the TV programme she’d watched the previous evening and her blood ran cold. “Oh, no! It can’t be...”
She reached for her tablet and typed into the search bar, scrolling down the list of results. “It can’t be…it can’t be.” She clicked on one of the search results at random and reading the article that appeared.
“Bella Potts, Regional Junior Judo Champion, celebrates her fifth successive win of the year, and her 11th victory in a row. Bella, pictured here with her coach and trainer …”
Charlotte gasped as she read the article, all the missing pieces of the puzzle finally slotting into place. “Oh my goodness, it all makes sense now! Look, can I call you later?” she said to Garrett and Laura. “I need to speak to Nathan, urgently.”
She did a couple more searches, her mind racing, then swiped her phone and prayed that Nathan would pick up. She was just about to hang up when he answered
“Hi, I was just on the other line. How’s the bug massacre going?”
“Oh, Nathan! I wish you wouldn’t call it that — it freaks me out. Listen! I think I know who the killer is! Can you come down to the café? There’s some stuff I’ve found online that you need to see. I can come to the station if you’d prefer, but I can’t leave right now.”
She looked up to see the pest control guys standing in front of her. “Hang on a minute, can you?” she said to Nathan.
“We’ve finished, so we’ll be going now, but here’s your certificate,” said the guy who she assumed was the boss. “I should leave it a while before you go back inside, though. It’s not dangerous, but the fumes might get down your throat and start you coughing. Here’s our invoice.”
Charlotte put the phone to her ear again. “Listen, can I get back to you in a bit? And for goodness’ sake, don’t do anything until I’ve spoken to you, okay?”
She hung up and wrote a cheque, her mind on other things as the pest control guy chatted away happily about how much he loved his job. On any other day, Charlotte would have been delighted to listen to him, even engage him in conversation, but today she couldn’t wait to get rid of him.
“Thanks very much,” she said as she pressed the cheque into his hand and willed him to turn around and leave, which, thankfully, he did.
Immediately, she pressed redial and Nathan answered on the first ring. “Okay, so what’s going on?”
Chapter 12
At the cottage, Rachel Potts was just waking up. It was half-past ten and she didn’t feel at all well. She ached all over and was sure she had a temperature. As she got out of bed, her legs felt weak and she stumbled, putting out her hand to stop herself from falling.
She hoped that she wasn’t getting the ‘flu. A serious viral infection some years before had left her with a greatly reduced immune system and it always took her ages to get rid of even the slightest cold.
There was no sign of Ellis, but the smell of bacon told her that he was cooking breakfast.
She pulled on a dressing gown over her pyjamas and went into the kitchen, stopping in the doorway in amazement. Everyone was sitting around the kitchen table, tucking into bacon and eggs. Everyone except Bella.
“What time d’you call this? I’ve been up for hours,” said Ellis as he handed her a mug of coffee. “Want some breakfast?”
This was creepy. This was not a normal Potts family scene. For starters, everyone was smiling. Even Brandon looked happy and was actually eating his breakfast without looking at his phone.
“Okay, what’s going on?” said Rachel as she lowered her aching body into a chair. She winced as she sat down.
“Nothing’s going on. We’re just having some breakfast.”
“Why does everyone look so damned happy?” she asked, feeling anything but.
Ellis looked at his wife. Her face was tired and yesterday’s mascara smudged under her eyes only served to exaggerate the dark circles that were already there. Her pale green eyes were dull and the lines at the side of her mouth seemed deeper today. As she shook her heavily highlighted hair from its ponytail and massaged her forehead, she looked as though she was carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders.
“We’re allowed to look happy, aren’t we?” he replied. “God knows, it’s about time we were, but if you need a reason, how about…we’ve got money coming our way — even more when this cottage business has been resolved — and it’s a beautiful day?”
Rachel put her head in her hands and closed her eyes. “Have we got any paracetamol? I think I must be coming down with something. I feel bloody awful.”
“I’m sure we’ve got some upstairs. I’ll get you some when I’ve finished my breakfast. I’m almost done,” said Victoria.
“You’ll be okay to take me into town later, won’t you, Mum? You were going to get me that new phone I wanted,” whined Brandon. “I can’t keep using this one — it’s got a crack in it from when Bella threw it across the room.”
“Yes, yes, we’ll see. Don’t go on, Brandon — just give me five minutes peace, will you?” Rachel snapped and Brandon’s bottom lip immediately made an appearance.
“Anyway, where’s Bella?” asked Rachel.
“Dunno,” said Greg. “She went out this morning with that weirdo. Although, come to think of it, he didn’t look so weird when he called round for her. He wasn’t wearing any makeup.” He mopped egg yolk off his plate with a slice of bread. “He’s got a great big bandage over half his face, though. Don’t know what the hell happened to him.”
“Here, take two if you’re feeling really bad.” Victoria passed a strip of paracetamol across the table, and Rachel popped them out of their plastic bubbles, swallowing them straight away with a gulp of coffee. “What’s wrong with you anyway? Hope it’s nothing contagious.”
“No idea, but I feel like I’m on fire and freezing at the same time, I ache all over, and my head feels like it’s about to explode.” Rachel pulled the dressing gown around her and rubbed her hands up and down her arms in an attempt to warm herself up.
“Fresh air, that’s what you need,” said Victoria, who had no time for sickly people. “Get up those stairs and get yourself under the shower. Then go for a walk along the sea front. You’ll feel better after that, I promise.”
A rapid rat-tat-tat on the door made them all jump. Ellis pulled the blind to one side and cursed. “For God’s sake! What now?”
“What is it? What’s wrong?” said Rachel.
“That damn policeman’s here with his sidekick, DS Prude,” said Ellis. He assumed that any woman who didn’t fall under his spell when he turned on the charm, must be frigid.
“What do they want?” asked Rachel.
“How should I know?” Ellis stomped to the front door. “Whatever you’re here for, can it wait? We’re in the middle of breakfast.”
“Good morning, Mr Potts,” said Nathan with a cheery smile. “Sorry to disturb you on a Saturday, and no, I’m afraid it can’t wait. Is your wife in?”
“Yes, why do you want to know?”
“Well, I’d like to speak to her, if I ma
y? Do you mind if we come in?”
“She’s not well,” said Ellis.
“Perhaps I could speak to her myself?” Nathan was courteous, but insistent.
Ellis sighed and stood aside to let Nathan and Fiona pass. Despite throwing his best smile at the female detective, she completely ignored him. He slammed the door and followed them into the kitchen.
“Good morning, everyone.” Nathan greeted the family politely. “My apologies for disturbing your Saturday morning.”
“Well?” said Ellis.
“As I said, it’s actually Mrs Potts I’d like to speak to with some further questions. A few things have come to my attention over the past day or so, which I hope she’ll be able to clarify for me.
“Mrs Potts, your husband tells me you’re unwell? Are you feeling up to answering some questions?”
He was interrupted by the sound of shouting outside the front door, followed by the whirlwind arrival of Bella, with Ryan bringing up the rear.
“What the hell are you playing at?” Bella stormed into the kitchen and thrust a book under Ellis’s nose.
“Stop shouting! Your mother’s got a headache. What are you talking about?” Ellis took the book from her and glanced at it. “I’ve no idea what am I supposed to be looking at,” he said, passing it to Rachel.
With a shaking hand, Rachel took the book from him, avoiding Bella’s icy glare.
“Well, what’s been going on, Mum?” Bella was in no mood for pleasantries.
“Look, maybe I should go…” Ryan began to say, but Bella turned and grabbed his arm.
“No way, you’re staying right here. Maybe then you’ll believe how vile the people in this family really are.” With her hands on her hips and her foot tapping madly, she looked from Ellis to Rachel. “Well?”
“Bella, I have no idea what you’re talking about and, if it hadn’t escaped your attention, the police are here so, whatever it is, perhaps it could wait until they’ve gone?” Rachel couldn’t keep the tremble from her voice.