Poisoned by the Pier

by Ellen Jacobson

  The only reason that Scooter was wrinkle-free for the memorial service was that Nancy took pity on him and offered to iron his outfit. That was the thing about her—she had these moments of thoughtfulness that made you forget all those other moments of crankiness, at least for a little while.

  We headed to the public docks at the waterfront park to board the boat that would be taking the group out into the bay for the ceremony. I was impressed with how Norm had transformed his run-of-the-mill charter boat into a charming setting to celebrate Emily’s short life. Ropes of greenery were tied around the railings with bows, yellow rose petals were scattered on the deck, and there was a framed picture of the young woman displayed in the main cabin flanked by those flameless candles that wouldn’t burn the boat down if they fell over.

  Jeff stood at the top of the boarding ramp, greeting everyone as they came on board. He looked terrible—dark circles under his eyes, ashen skin, and trembling hands. Even his misshapen ear seemed larger than normal.

  In addition to Norm and his nephew, Liam, who was helping crew the boat, approximately fifteen people were in attendance. I looked around and saw Ned and Nancy sitting on a bench in the stern, their clothes ironed to perfection. I was pleased to see Penelope carrying trays laden with hors d’oeuvres and miniature cupcakes down below. Ever since the residents of Coconut Cove realized that Penelope had been the intended murder victim, business at her bakery had picked back up. Jeff had arranged for her to cater the memorial service, which I thought was touching, considering the circumstances of Emily’s death.

  I heard Penny’s Texan twang before I saw her. She was at the bow chatting with Ben. I was impressed with how well he had cleaned up. Tidy shorts and a shirt with a collar. Even his normally greasy hair was freshly washed, and there was a noticeable absence of grease stains on his hands.

  Mike was standing on the dock, pacing back and forth and talking on his phone. After a few moments, he ended the call and gave Jeff a thumbs-up before he hoisted himself on deck. I groaned as I saw Chief Dalton shaking his hand. Just what we needed, Mr. No Comment on board. Then I saw him go over to Penelope and whisper something in her ear. That’s when it hit me—the burly man was here to protect her. A sober reminder that the murderer was still on the loose.

  “Did you see Alan?” Scooter asked as he handed me a glass of white wine. “He looks, um…”

  I caught the photographer out of the corner of my eye. “I can’t believe he went through with it.” The mild-mannered man waved before snapping a picture of us. Despite the fact that he was wearing his usual ensemble of gray clothes, which normally caused him to blend into the background, today he stood out for the wrong reasons. His formerly gray hair was now chestnut.

  “Is that one of those DIY men’s hair dyes?” Scooter asked.

  “No, I think he paid good money at the salon for his new look.” I watched as Alan flitted around the deck, chatting with people. He was exuding confidence, and every word he said could be heard clearly. No more mumbling. I shrugged. “Maybe it was a wise investment. He certainly seems to be feeling good about himself.”

  Scooter ran his fingers through his hair. “Do you think I need to color mine? Between the gray hairs and my beer belly, I’m beginning to look like my father.”

  “First of all, you don’t have a beer belly. You’re just a little bloated, and that’s from all the rutabaga. And second, you only have a few gray hairs on your temples, and it makes you very distinguished looking. I always thought your father was a handsome man, and you are too.”

  “All right, folks,” Norm said. “We’re going to get under way.”

  Liam was untying the dock lines when a woman came rushing up. “Wait for me!”

  “Is that Wanda?” I asked. “Shouldn’t she still be in the hospital recovering?”

  After the woman had clambered on board, Alan made a beeline for her. “How dare you blame me for what happened to you!” Wanda shrank back against the railing. “I was out of town at a wedding when you were poisoned. Ask the chief. He can back me up.”

  Penelope came to Wanda’s rescue. “Why don’t you come down below and sign the memorial book?”

  As the two ladies walked away, Alan shouted, “You haven’t heard the last of this!” Who knew that hair dye could completely transform someone’s personality.

  * * *

  The conditions were perfect—no wind and calm seas. Norm motored the boat across Sunshine Bay and dropped anchor in a quiet cove. Jeff stood at the bow while everyone gathered on deck. “I want to thank you all for coming this evening. It means a lot to me. One of the things that’s impressed me ever since I moved to Coconut Cove is how kind, caring, and supportive everyone is. I know that Emily would be touched to see this turnout.” He pressed his hand to his lips, gazed up at the sky, and blew a kiss. “I know that she’s up there looking down at us…”

  His voice cracked as tears formed in the corners of his eyes. Mike clasped his shoulder before handing him a napkin. “Thanks, mate,” he said. After dabbing at his eyes, he took a deep breath. “I was so lucky to have been married to Emily, even if it was for a short time.”

  The crowd started murmuring. “Did he say married?” I whispered to Penny. “I thought they were engaged. He introduced her to me as his fiancée, not his wife, when you were showing them boats.”

  “It’s news to me,” she said. “Do you think they eloped?”

  “When would they have had time to do that before her death?”

  Scooter nudged me. “Shush. He’s still talking.”

  Jeff was holding up the framed picture of Emily. “Would anyone like to come up and say a few words about my beloved wife?”

  There was an uncomfortable silence as everyone looked at each other. Truth be told, no one had really known her.

  Ned came to the rescue. “I suppose I could say a few words. I first met Emily when Penny brought her into the marina office to introduce her. She was a sweet young woman, always very polite. She seemed very interested in Coconut Cove, asking questions about what it was like to live in a small town on the mainland. And, um…she was, um—”

  Nancy chimed in. “She was punctual.”

  “She was?” Ned asked.

  “Yes. One day she said she’d be by the office at three in the afternoon to pick up some papers, and she was there at three on the dot.” Nancy frowned. “Oh, wait a minute. I think that was another young woman. Never mind.”

  Ned looked flummoxed. Then he raised his glass. “Here’s to Emily.”

  “I knew Emily better than anyone here,” Alan said as he pushed his way forward to the front of the boat. “In fact, I took the photograph that Jeff’s holding. See that smile on her face? She was smiling at me.”

  “Listen, mate,” Jeff said, fury burning in his eyes. “She married me, not you. Understand?”

  The rest of their conversation was drowned out when Norm started up the engine. “The sun is going to go down soon,” he said while Liam pulled up the anchor. “We’re going to head out to sea now so Jeff can scatter Emily’s ashes as the sun sets.”

  While everyone stayed on deck sipping wine and gossiping about Jeff and Alan’s altercation, I went down below to use the head. As I was washing my hands, I heard the door to the adjacent cabin creak open.

  “Where did you put them, mate?” That was definitely Jeff.

  “The urn is in that bag in the corner,” the other man replied. He sounded like Mike.

  “Okay, I see it now. What about the paperwork?”

  “My guy is going to deliver it when the boat docks,” Mike said.

  “And it looks legit?” Jeff asked.

  “That’s why you paid extra. No one will ever be able to tell it apart from the real thing.”

  “It better work or I’m taking you down with me.”

  “No need to threaten me. I had enough of that from old man Van der Byl.”

  “Fine, you’re right,” Jeff replied. “It must be the stress of it all. Why don’t yo
u give me a few minutes to get myself together, and I’ll join you back on deck?”

  By this point, I was getting very uncomfortable. Bathrooms on boats can be very cramped, and the one on Norm’s boat was no exception. I had wedged myself in between the tiny sink and a towel rack, but my right leg was beginning to fall asleep. Hopefully, Jeff would leave soon so I could sneak out without him seeing me.

  “There you are,” a woman said. “We need to talk.”

  Great, just what I needed. Another tête-à-tête with Jeff while I stayed in hiding, wondering what it was about marine toilets that made them smell so bad.

  “What are you doing here, Wanda?” Jeff asked.

  “You didn’t think I’d miss out on saying goodbye to her, did you? I’ve known her for longer than you have.” She began sobbing.

  “Give me a break. You haven’t spoken with her since she was a child.”

  Wanda blew her nose. “That doesn’t mean she still wasn’t special to me.” The tone of her voice turned steely. “It’s awfully convenient that you and Emily were married, isn’t it? Especially as it means you’ve inherited everything. No need to eliminate any other…um, what’s the best way to describe it…competition?”

  “Just keep your mouth shut, do you hear me?” Jeff hissed.

  “Sure, just as long as the monthly payments from the estate continue.”

  “You greedy little—”

  Before Jeff could finish his thought, Liam came down to tell him that the sun was about to set. After a discreet interval, I opened the door and sneaked up onto deck. When I got there, Jeff was leaning over the stern rail, scattering Emily’s ashes while the soundtrack to Mamma Mia! played in the background.

  “Where have you been?” Scooter whispered as he handed me a memorial program. The front featured a picture of Emily, the same as the framed one that Jeff had been holding earlier. She really had been an attractive girl, I thought. Long dark hair, striking green eyes, flawless bone structure…wait a minute, something was so familiar. What was it? Then it hit me—Emily was a younger version of Wanda. The similarities were unmistakable. They must have been related, but how?

  Wanda had roots on Destiny Key before she had moved to Coconut Cove twenty-five years prior. Emily had lived on Destiny Key. Wanda had mentioned how her sister had committed suicide after she found out that her husband had had an affair, leaving a four-year-old daughter behind. Could Emily have been Wanda’s niece? Could what she had written in her journal have been about the present-day death of Emily and not about what had happened in the past as she had previously told me? If so, and Emily had been killed by mistake, did that mean Wanda had meant to kill Penelope? What was the connection between the three women? And who had poisoned Wanda, and why?

  16

  POISONING IS SO EXHAUSTING

  I tried to get a few quiet moments with Chief Dalton as the boat made its way back to Coconut Cove, but he rebuffed me. “Now’s not the time or the place, Mrs. McGhie,” he said. “But I promise you, I’ll speak with you and your husband once we’re back on shore.”

  “Scooter? Why do you want to speak with him?” I asked.

  The burly man’s reply was what you would have expected: “No comment.”

  Since he was being so uncooperative, I decided to tackle Wanda instead. She was the key to it all. I had a hunch that if I could figure out exactly what her relationship to Emily had been and how Penelope factored into things, then I’d be able to solve the case.

  Of my four original suspects, I had more or less ruled Alan out. While there certainly was a dark side to him that one rarely saw, I wasn’t convinced that he would have attempted to kill Penelope merely because she didn’t want to date him. He was also in the clear when it came to the poisoning of Wanda. If his wedding photography alibi hadn’t been watertight, the chief wouldn’t be letting him run around loose.

  Mike was obviously a sleazy lawyer, but he didn’t appear to have any reason to want Penelope dead. However, he did know the details of the Van der Byl estate, which could shed light on things. I made a mental note to try to worm that information out of him later. He had seemed ready to share some juicy details while Scooter and I were eating ice cream, but the discovery of Wanda collapsed on the ground had proved to be an untimely interruption.

  That left me with Jeff and Wanda. In my gut, I knew that one of them had done it.

  Here’s the problem with my gut. It’s very good at telling me when I’m hungry, and it’s very good at nudging my intuition in the right direction. What it’s bad at is follow-through. It sparks ideas in my head, but then it stops providing me with useful information and instead goes back to whining about the lack of potato chips and Hershey’s Kisses in its life.

  I’d say things like, Gut, how could Wanda be the killer, as she herself was poisoned? And it would reply in a low, gravelly voice, Hungry! Very, very hungry! Then I’d try something like, Gut, why would Jeff want to kill Penelope? What’s in it for him? And then I’d get another unhelpful reply: Feed me! Feed me now!

  Darn it. I was going to have to sort this out by myself, no thanks to my annoying gut. I needed to get the killer to confess. It was that simple. I’d start with Wanda, see if I could get her to break. If not, then I’d move on to Jeff.

  * * *

  People are more likely to confess if they’ve had some wine, right? Makes sense to me. So I brought a glass of a lovely zinfandel, filled almost to the brim, over to Wanda. She was sitting by herself up at the bow.

  “How are you holding up?” I asked. “You must be exhausted. Poisoning would do that to a person, wouldn’t it? Exhaust them, right?”

  Wanda took a healthy slug of her wine. “Poisoning is a little more serious than that. I could have died.”

  I felt my face grow warm. Poisoning was exhausting—what a stupid thing to say. “You were lucky that little girl found you when she did.” There, that sounded better, didn’t it?

  “I really was,” she replied, guzzling down more wine.

  “Poor Emily. If only I had found her sooner.” Wanda gave me a pained stare. “You were related, weren’t you?” I asked gently.

  She emptied her glass. “How did you know?”

  “I didn’t until I saw you next to her picture. The resemblance is uncanny.”

  “You should have seen her mother.” She wrapped her arms around herself. “We looked so much alike. There were times people couldn’t tell us apart.”

  “So Emily was your niece?”

  Wanda twisted her body and rested her head on the rail, staring vacantly out at the water. “Yes, she was.”

  “Why did you pretend like you didn’t know her?”

  “I didn’t have a choice.” She glanced at her empty glass, then leaned toward me. “That’s not entirely true. I did have a choice. A choice between money and family. I chose money.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “After my sister killed herself, I threatened to expose him. To tell everyone about his affair. It would have ruined his social standing on Destiny Key.” Her eyes narrowed as she spat out her words. “And he couldn’t have that. No, not him. He wrote me a check, put me on the next ferry to the mainland, told me never to return and never to contact Emily, otherwise I’d be penniless. The checks kept coming and I kept silent.”

  The night had turned cool after the sun had set. I shivered in the light breeze. Wrapping my pashmina tightly around my body, I considered what Wanda had said. Had the money she’d accepted from her brother-in-law been worth being separated from her niece?

  Scooter poked his head out of the pilot house. “Are you two ladies okay out there? Why don’t you come inside with the rest of us? Penelope’s serving cupcakes and coffee.”

  “You’re having a cupcake?” I asked.

  “Jeff’s been telling us about Emily’s sweet tooth,” Scooter said. “The cupcakes are in her memory. I couldn’t really refuse, could I?”

  Wanda’s eyes welled up with tears. “Think of all the birthda
y cakes I missed as she was growing up,” she said quietly.

  I squeezed her hand, then turned to my husband. “I think we’re going to stay out here. Save me a cupcake, though.”

  “Okay. Norm says we’ll be docking in about twenty minutes.”

  “It’s ironic that Penelope provided the cupcakes for Emily’s memorial,” Wanda said between sniffles.

  “How exactly does she fit into all this?” I asked.

  “I’m surprised you haven’t figured it out,” Wanda said. “You seem to have figured everything else out.”

  “Hmm, let’s see. Your sister was twenty-five when she, um, passed away. And Emily was four at the time.” Wanda nodded. “Her death would have been shortly after she found out that her husband’s mistress was pregnant, right?”

  “That’s correct. She suspected he had been cheating on her for a while, but it wasn’t until one of the nurses at the local clinic let it slip that the young woman who ran the bookmobile was expecting a child that the penny dropped. That’s when she realized he was the child’s father. He had been the one to set up the bookmobile program. Living on a small, out-of-the-way island meant that many of the residents didn’t have access to a library. So he donated money to buy an old bus, had it refitted for use as a mobile library, and hired a young woman from the mainland to run it. He spent most of his free time helping her out, and one thing led to another.”

  “And that young woman was Penelope’s mother,” I said.

  Wanda took a deep breath, then exhaled slowly. “Yes, she was.”

  “So that means Penelope and Emily were half sisters.” Wanda nodded. “Did they know they were sisters?”

  “As far as I know, Penelope never knew. Her mother did the same thing I did, accepted his blood money. She got checks every month, just like me.”