Death In A Deck Chair

by Georgia Kains

  “No one is on the right channel. Half of them are off the radio altogether. This isn’t our usual port, and I can’t get in touch with anyone in charge.”

  Preston held a small suitcase and shifted from foot to foot as if debating his next move. Workers scuttled about everywhere. Their presence appeared to have temporarily frozen Preston. All it would take was one of them asking his purpose for being out there, and he’d be busted.

  “What if he gets away?” I said.

  Silas tossed his hat onto the hook where the binoculars had been and hung his jacket next to it.

  “That’s why I’m going to go and detain him.”

  “But—”

  “I have a responsibility to the safety of my crew and guests. And to the residents of our port of calls.”

  Was there anyone this man didn’t feel responsible for?

  “All right, I’m going with you,” I said.

  “Oh, no you’re not.”

  “Oh, yes I am.”

  “No. You’re staying right here.”

  “But, Silas, he might have a gun.” Yet even as I said it, I realized that Preston probably wasn’t armed. So far, his weapons—a household chemical and a spray tan booth—had been ones of convenience and desperation. And we’d gone through a metal detector when we boarded.

  “All the more reason for you to stay here. Safe.”

  “But—”

  “Not happening, Piper.” He unlocked a red box on the wall and pulled out what appeared to be a pink makeup compact.

  “What, are you going to give him a makeover when you catch him?”

  “It’s a stun gun,” he said, pointing to a lightning bolt emblem on the side and metal prongs protruding from the end. “It was on sale. And before you even have to ask, no, I’ve never had to use it.”

  He checked the power on the device and holstered it behind his back belt loop before yanking his shirt over it.

  “What are you doing?” I said. “You’ll zap your butt cheek off.”

  “It’s not on. I’ll only use it if absolutely necessary. Now, you stay here.”

  “Fine.”

  Silas took off, and I shoved the binoculars to my face to keep watch on Preston.

  Even from a distance, I could tell that Preston practically quivered with indecision, hunched behind the crates.

  The single entrance to the dock was gated. A woman in a polo shirt and Bermuda shorts sat on a stool at the checkpoint under a large, angled umbrella to block the sun, whose sweltering rays threatened to sizzle every inch of exposed skin even though it was still mid-morning.

  She was engrossed in a newspaper and paying little attention to the goings-on around her. Hardly an intimidating security presence. Still, Preston would have to walk through that one spot.

  With more and more crew members exiting the boat and workers rushing to and fro along the dock, chances grew that someone might spot Preston. He seemed to realize the same thing. Just as Silas ran down the gangplank off the boat, Preston dashed to a different area, adjacent to where he’d been but hidden from its view. Silas went to the spot where Preston had left, only to discover him missing. I tried to signal to Silas the direction Preston had gone, but there was no way he’d be able to see me through the glare off the gleaming glass window of the bridge. Silas rotated in a slow circle, but Preston eluded him.

  I tried to keep track of Preston through the binoculars, but he’d moved again. Where had he gone?

  Dang it. If Preston escaped, this ordeal would never end.

  My elbow ached from holding my arm at an awkward angle. I set the heavy binoculars down. Right as I did, there was a quick, jerking motion in my peripheral vision on the dock. I whipped my head around in time to see Preston sneak up behind Silas and whack him over the head with a broken-off piece of one of the pallets. Silas staggered to the side, and Preston landed another blow.

  Silas dropped like a puppet with its strings cut.

  “Oh my gosh. Silas!”

  He wasn’t moving. I banged on the window to try to get the attention of someone on the dock. Anyone. But I could hear the noisy waterfront sounds through the glass—forklifts beeping, waves lapping, boat horns honking and music blaring over the loudspeakers. No one could hear me. And no one had seen the attack.

  Silas’s body lay limp behind the stack of crates. Preston calmly stood up and adjusted the button on his shirt.

  I grabbed the binoculars and took off running, ignoring the strange looks and shouts of surprise from my fellow passengers. The gangplank swayed side-to-side as I jostled across it and made a dash for the spot where Silas lay sprawled out. He was breathing fine and already wincing from the pain of the massive welt that was surely forming on the back of his head.

  “I’ll need this, thank you,” I said, wrestling the pink stun gun out of his pocket and making sure the thing was switched on.

  “Mmm, Piper?” He stirred at the sound of my voice.

  “Shh.” I scaled the pile of towering pallets until my elbows could rest on the top. (Seriously, you could use the things for just about any purpose. At Missy Arlington’s wedding on Tybee Island, she threw a hissy because her Manolos kept getting sand in them, so I crafted a makeshift stage out of—wait. Focus, Piper. Focus.)

  I hefted the binoculars to my eyes, and from my high vantage point, it didn’t take long to spot Preston skulking along the edge of the dock toward the woman at the gate. His passport was already pulled out.

  “Hey!” I yelled as I clambered down from my perch and hightailed it across the dock. “Stop him! Don’t let him leave!”

  Preston and the woman were locked in a cordial disagreement as he waved his passport in front of her and she shook her head. Yes, hold him there.

  But then Preston caught sight of me. He jostled past the woman, knocking her off her stool in the process, and took off at a sprint.

  The woman shouted for him to stop as I streaked past her, hot in pursuit.

  “We know what you did, Preston!” I yelled. “Don’t make this worse than it is.”

  I was only fifteen or twenty feet behind him as he dodged around benches and knocked trash bins in his wake. We were close to a farmer’s marketplace, and I was gaining ground. But if he reached the crowded vendors and stalls, he’d have plenty of hiding spots.

  My flimsy pair of flip-flops were doing little to protect my feet and were only slowing me down. I kicked them off and hurtled after him, wielding the stun gun in front of me like a knight’s lance.

  Berzap!

  A white hot arc of electricity sizzled across the metal prongs as I lunged at Preston and shoved it hard against the exposed flesh on the back of his arm. He flinched and tripped, shrieking in pain. I zapped him again as he lay there on the ground. Then he shot his hands in the air to surrender. I pulled the stun gun away but kept it at the ready.

  “All right.” He gasped for air and rubbed the spot I’d zapped with a grimace. “I surrender.”

  A group of onlookers had gathered around us. Someone hollered to a police officer on the far side of the market, and she rushed over.

  “Are you okay, ma’am?” she asked.

  “Yes. I—”

  “Piper!” Silas ran over to us and keeled over, out of breath. “What were you thinking? You could have been killed.”

  Preston practically snarled at me as the officer slapped a pair of cuffs on him. Suddenly, my insides were simultaneously blazing hot and full of ice water. Everything around me spun in loop-de-loops, and I felt my body sway from side-to-side. Full-on sprinting a quarter mile after skipping both this morning’s breakfast and last night’s dinner had been a poor choice.

  Silas scooped his arms under my torso right as my knees buckled. My head was spinning and swimming and—ooh!—little sparkles danced around the corners of my eyeballs.

  “Do eyeballs have corners?” I mumbled.

  “What?” Silas shifted me in his strong arms.

  “Mmm.” I reached up and patted his cheek. “You’re
so hot.”

  I giggled and then passed out cold.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  A streak of sunlight battered its way into my cracked eyelid. I attempted to squinch it shut, but the harder I tried to close my eye, the more it felt like someone was pulling the dang thing open.

  Wait. Someone was pulling the dang thing open.

  “Ahh, welcome back to the land of the living.” Dr. Jo let go of the skin around my eyes and clicked off the penlight she was holding. “Never got to say that to any of my former patients. Sorry. Morgue humor. How do you feel?”

  “Did I fall or … ?”

  “You good ol’ fashioned fainted.” She adjusted a cool washcloth that lay across my forehead and handed me a bottle of blue sports drink. “Here. Drink up. You overexerted yourself in that heat, and you’re dehydrated to boot. Silas carried you aboard. Thought it would be faster than finding a local doctor. And—not to toot my own horn—he knew you’d get better care from me.”

  “Did they arrest him?”

  “Who, Silas?”

  “Preston Bosley.”

  “They’re probably doing that right now. They found an airline ticket to Bolivia in his bag right as Silas was leaving. Apparently, he bought it online as soon as he found out where we were docking.”

  Preston couldn’t spin his escape as sightseeing or confusion now. He’d been caught red-handed trying to run away. This was huge. This proved Tammi wasn’t guilty. I let out an audible sigh of relief and tried to push myself up from the cot.

  “Nope.” Dr. Jo held out one bossy finger to me. “Not so fast. Which part of rest do you not understand?”

  “But I need to talk to Silas.” Why did saying his name make me want to giggle?

  “You need to sit here and recuperate for at least another hour. Period. Besides, Silas had to go to town to file the police report.”

  “But—”

  “Nope.” Dr. Jo silenced my protests. She was right. There was nothing I could do nor anything I really needed to do at this point. Preston was in custody. Tammi could wait for her freedom a bit longer. It wasn’t like they were holding her in a dank, dark dungeon.

  Dr. Jo lowered the lights and covered me with a butter-soft sheet. It smelled like tropical flowers, still warm from the dryer. I yawned.

  She wouldn’t let me leave for another hour anyway. I pulled the freshly laundered sheet under my chin. Mmm. Might as well do as she said and get a little nap.

  I awoke with a start. The scent of iodine and disinfectant tickled my nose, and I remembered where I was. With no sunlight, it was impossible to tell if I’d been asleep five minutes or five hours.

  Dr. Jo had left a note that said, “Went to grab you a lunch plate.”

  My stomach let out a gurgling chorus of agreement to that plan, but she didn’t need to go to that trouble. I slipped out of bed, slightly dizzy. But it was the familiar head rush from lying still for too long, not the sickening lurch of fainting. I danced my toes around on the floor seeking my shoes before I remembered that I had kicked them off on the island. Dr. Jo had thoughtfully laid out a pair of disposable foam spa slippers by the end of the cot, though. I pulled them on and headed to the dining room.

  A few straggling passengers sat around, sipping their drinks. The buffet looked yummy although picked over. The doctor was scooping some sunflower seeds for a salad as I came up next to her. She scowled.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” she chided. “I was grabbing you a plate before they put the food away.”

  “Thanks,” I said, taking the plate from her. “But I’d rather eat here. I was getting claustrophobic down there.”

  “Try working in a morgue,” she said, but she didn’t argue as I sat at one of the empty tables. She made herself a quick sandwich and plopped next to me. We sat and chatted about Atlanta and what she missed and didn’t miss about the city. It was the most pleasant meal I’d had since coming aboard.

  “Some people get a little stir crazy at sea, but not me. If Karl would learn to make a proper glass of sweet tea,” she called in a voice that was clearly meant to carry behind the bar counter, “then I’d never need to leave this boat at all.”

  I was sticking to water until I was fully rehydrated, and I was pleased to see ripples bounce across the top of my full glass as the ship’s engines came to life again.

  Cappy’s voice sounded over the all-call.

  “Ahoy, me hearties, we apologize for the delay. We’ll be departing for home momentarily and will arrive first thing in the morning.”

  A brief cheer arose from the few other guests in the dining room. So I wasn’t the only one feeling it, the sense of relief and an emotional release at the prospect of landing on familiar soil. That also meant that Silas was back on board, and I couldn’t wait to hear what had transpired after I’d lost consciousness.

  But wait I must. At the movement of the engines and the captain’s announcement, Dr. Jo pushed herself up from her seat next to me.

  “Are you still feeling puny?” she asked.

  “Nope. I feel fine now. Just like my mom always prescribed. Rest, fluids, and if all else fails, eat something spicy.” I chomped down on a Sriracha-crusted shrimp for good measure.

  “Then I’m going to go finish my meds inventory. If you start feeling bad, you get your butt over to the infirmary.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” I saluted.

  I finished lunch and, even though I was stuffed to the gills, I felt a bit empty. For the past several days, I’d had a huge task in front of me—catch Bebe’s killer. Now her killer had been caught, which meant I had to get back to reality. My jobless, homeless, and (thank the good Lord above) Lanceless reality.

  Addie’s chiding words echoed in my mind, about my inability to relax. Well, I would show her. I had a full day left on this ship and some complimentary drink passes. I would relax harder than any other passenger here.

  An hour later, I was sprawled in a deck chair enjoying—yes, enjoying!—my last afternoon on the cruise. Maybe it was my heroic role in busting Preston … maybe it was God rewarding me for taking the high road and helping Tammi even after she had sack-of-trashed me so horribly … or maybe it was just Karl’s thoroughly well-crafted mojito that made me savor the warm sea breeze of the finally–moving ship.

  This, I would miss.

  Perhaps I’d even come home with a tiny bit of tan waiting for me underneath the coating of orange, which thanks to Jenna’s expert help was no longer getting me worried glances from fellow passengers. But as I shifted my head, the sun was blocked out. I peered around to see what had caused it. Peg stood at my feet holding her clipboard. Mimsy skittered in front of me, growling.

  “So happy to find you here, Miss Monroe.” If she was happy, I was a freaking mermaid.

  Her smile wasn’t so much strained as forced through a razor-clawed filter. Her normally taut and perfect bun was disheveled. Flyaway hairs wisped across her face, and she kept darting the tip of her tongue out to keep the hair off her mouth. Overall, it gave the general effect of an irate salamander.

  “Hi,” I said uncertainly. I was a little surprised to see her there, period. If she was the Bosley family attorney, shouldn’t she have stayed behind in the Bahamas to help Preston with his defense? Or maybe she could help him better from home, so she had stayed on.

  “I’m afraid I have one more form for you to sign,” she said.

  “For me to sign?”

  “Yes. Just saying that you won’t sue the Bosley family for damages after this morning’s little incident.”

  I rolled my eyes and took the clipboard from her to sign the document. If anyone had been damaged in this morning’s incident, I’d say it was Preston. Besides, even if I was the suing kind, which I wasn’t, Peg was the last person I’d want to tangle with in court. She didn’t even bother to double-check my signature, though. She blinked in rapid succession, holding back tears.

  “Are you okay?” I asked. Maybe she’d cared more about Preston than I thou
ght.

  “Hmm?” It was as if she’d forgotten I was there. “Oh. It’s nothing. It’s fine. I’m … I’m fine.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes, of course I’m fine. There’s nothing to—oh.” She crumpled onto the deck chair next to me. “I suppose it will come out in the news outlets any moment now. Preston Bosley has swindled every last cent out of the Bosley Corporation.”

  “What?”

  “That was the main reason the elder Mr. Bosley—Winston—had settled his estate as he had. He was well aware of his grandson’s gambling vice. Didn’t approve of it, for good reason, and he didn’t trust Preston. Winston wanted to protect the bulk of his wealth from the clutches of bookies and casinos, so he and I drew up the trust to provide for his widow and his grandson—enough to live comfortably, but not enough to squander.”

  “But Preston got desperate?” I pictured that man in the background of the photos I’d seen online last night, the type that was more than happy to break a few fingers—or worse—to get what was owed him.

  “The accountants and auditors at the Bosley Corporation have been scrambling all day to unravel his actions. Apparently, he’s been stealing small, unnoticeable amounts with false receipts and the like for quite some time. Something triggered him to accelerate his theft, though. While on this trip, he’s embezzled millions from multiple accounts and had the money wired to the Caymans.”

  “I wonder why.”

  “The police’s theory is that Bebe discovered the theft and was extorting money out of him. She was more clever than she let on.” It was clear from Peggy’s pinched mouth that it pained her to admit as much.

  It all made sense. Preston had been the one to insinuate that Bebe was a blackmailer in the first place. Apparently, he’d learned that firsthand.

  “So he ripped off Bosley’s Potties to pay Bebe off, but she got greedy for more?”