The Tell Tail Heart

by Cate Conte

  I cleared my throat. “Jeez. You need to give people more warning,” I said.

  “Why? It’s still my house.” He took off his hat and placed it on the counter with his wallet and keys, one keen eye on the lot of us. “So whaddya have to tell me?”

  But I wasn’t ready to go there yet. And I had a question for him. “Where have you been?” I asked, nodding at his outfit. He was in all black. His PI outfit. “You look like Super Spy or something.” My tone was teasing, but I really wanted to hear what he might say to that.

  But he was still good at sharing as little as possible. “Out,” was all he said.

  Yeah. I figured on that being the response. I tried not to wear my feelings all over my face.

  He wandered over to the table and selected a piece of sushi from the tray, dipped it in my soy sauce. Eyed me. “Still waiting for what you had to tell me.”

  Everyone else remained dead silent, obviously hoping that he’d forget about them. Even at his age, Chief Leopold Mancini still commanded the same attention as in his heyday. And no one wanted to mess with him.

  I sighed. Always the one doing the dirty work. “Grandpa. I’m only telling you this because I know you’ll hear about it from one of your friends. You know, in the department.” I was totally stalling, buying time, trying to figure out what to say about tonight’s adventures.

  Grandpa’s hand stilled on the way to his mouth but, after a short pause, finished its route.

  “Val and I … humored Ava-Rose tonight and went with her to stake out the yacht club.”

  Val’s mouth dropped open. I could feel her glaring at me out of the corner of my eye.

  Grandpa frowned. “Staking out the yacht club? For what reason? And what do you mean, staking out? Have you gone through official police training and forgotten to mention it to me?”

  I ignored the last part of the question. “Ava-Rose is convinced someone is stealing things. And she said she’d seen that vet, Dr. Drake, with Jason Holt the night he was killed.” The words gushed out of my mouth, so desperate was I to not mention the beach, the trailer, the crazy woman piece of the evening.

  Grandpa looked around the table. Val’s eyes dropped to her plate again. Ethan was frozen, only his eyes moving between us. When Grandpa’s gaze returned to mine, his cop face was on. “You two should know better than that,” he said. “Playing detective is no joke if you stumble upon the wrong person or situation.”

  He wasn’t kidding.

  “I know,” I said, trying my best to sound apologetic. “But Ava-Rose has been so upset. Right, Val?” I was babbling now. I’d forgotten how nervous Grandpa could make you if you were lying.

  “Right. It was my fault, Grandpa,” Val cut in. “Ava-Rose is really worried about some things at the yacht club, and she asked for my help. I dragged Maddie along.”

  “If Ava-Rose has a problem, she should call the police,” Grandpa said. “Not involve my granddaughters. Not to mention, she could get herself hurt. Or killed,” he added grimly. “I’ll speak with her.”

  “No, Grandpa, don’t do that!” Val sent a panicked look my way. “Like I said, it was my fault. I wanted to humor her. But I’m really enjoying working for her and if you talk to her that would be, well, bad.”

  “Yeah, Grandpa, it’s all good,” I said. “We could have easily talked her out of it, but like I said, I was curious. And it all worked out. Craig showed up.”

  Grandpa’s bushy eyebrows rose. “Did he? That was convenient.”

  “It was,” I agreed. “And he brought them both to the station to try to figure out what’s going on. So maybe he got some answers.”

  Grandpa watched us, his eyes narrowed. I could tell he knew there was more to this story but wasn’t going to pursue it in front of the guys. After a minute, he turned to Ethan. “Can’t you at least go along and try to keep an eye on them when they get these harebrained ideas?” he demanded, but there was a teasing tone in his voice.

  “No way,” Ethan said immediately. “I know better than to encourage them.”

  “Well, they take after their grandmother,” Grandpa Leo said. “Now, where’s the dessert?”

  “I made cupcakes.” Ethan jumped up and went to the counter, where his prized cupcake tower stood in the corner. He took off the lid and presented it with a flourish. Grandpa’s face immediately lit up, and for the moment Jason Holt and Ava-Rose were forgotten. I could feel Val’s eyes boring into mine, wanting to know why I’d chickened out and didn’t mention Leopard Man. I avoided her gaze. Finally, she gave up and went for the cupcakes.

  And blessedly, my phone rang while the rest of the group clustered around the counter. Becky. I used it as an excuse to flee the scene and hurried into the living room to answer.

  “There’s a press conference first thing tomorrow,” she said without preamble. “About the Holt case.”

  “Really? Why? What’d they find out? Did they arrest someone?” I held my breath. Leopard Man? Thea Coleman? Dr. Drake? The possibilities were endless.

  “Not sure yet. The police said they’ve found ‘significant evidence’ in the case. I thought you’d want to know.”

  “Thanks,” I murmured, wondering where this was going to lead. Significant evidence against whom? Did it have something to do with Thea Coleman? I felt a stab of guilt. She was on the run and I knew where she was. So did Grandpa. Unless they’d found her. Maybe they’d found her and arrested her. Or maybe Grandpa’s presence at the beach house was a setup. Maybe he had Leopard Man lure her there so they could arrest her. I tapped the phone against the palm of my other hand, deep in thought. I wondered if Craig’s interrogation of Drake and Ava-Rose had led to some kind of revelation.

  The door to the kitchen flew open and I spun around. Grandpa stood there, looking at me quizzically, a half-eaten cupcake in one hand. “You’re not having a cupcake? I’ll tell you what, these are pretty darn good.”

  “Oh, I definitely am,” I said. “Right now. I was just … that was Becky.”

  “Ah. And what did Becky have to say?”

  “There’s a press conference tomorrow. About the Holt incident.” I stuck my phone in my pocket. “Do you know anything about that?”

  “A press conference?” Grandpa dipped his finger into the generous frosting still left on his cupcake and licked it off. “No. I don’t. Why would I?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “You still have friends in the PD, don’t you?”

  “I do, but they don’t send me reports anymore,” Grandpa said.

  I frowned. “Did you get my message earlier? About the notebook from the other day?”

  Grandpa nodded. “I remember putting it in the bin. I don’t know where it went from there.”

  We stared at each other for a moment. I couldn’t help but feel like he knew more than what he was telling me. And also that I’d been there, at the beach house. He probably did. Grandpa knew everything. I wondered when he’d say something.

  “You know, Maddie,” he said, around a mouthful of cupcake, “there are some things that don’t need to be broadcast to the entire world.”

  I frowned. “You mean the press conference? I don’t think it is. I think it’s going to be broadcast to the island.”

  “Don’t be a wise guy,” he warned. “I’m serious, Maddie.”

  “Grandpa, I know that. But I’m not sure what you’re talking about,” I said. “Is there something you need to tell me?”

  “Is there something you need to tell me?” he countered.

  I swallowed. “No,” I said, keeping my voice decidedly cheery. “I don’t think so. But I’m going to grab a cupcake now. Before Val eats them all.” I slipped past him into the kitchen, letting the door shut behind me. Grandpa didn’t follow.

  Chapter 43

  Becky declined to give me a fake press pass for the press conference, which was being held in the community room at the police department, so I had to settle for going to Bean for coffee and watching it on my phone with JJ. Val was still mad a
t me for throwing Ava-Rose under the bus. I knew that Grandpa and I both knew we had bigger things to talk about than Ava-Rose and that he really wasn’t that concerned about her attempts at detective work, but I hadn’t bothered explaining that to my sister. She got kind of wrapped up in her own stuff and tended not to see anything beyond it.

  Aside from Val, Becky was busy doing newspaper things, Ethan was baking, and of course Lucas was still stuck at his conference on the mainland. We’d talked last night. He was hoping to get back on tomorrow’s afternoon ferry, but they still weren’t committing to running it. The storm hadn’t let up overnight. If anything, the winds had picked up even more. I wondered if the tapering off they’d predicted today was really going to happen.

  But I’d braved the weather to get out of the house for a bit, and here I was sipping a mocha with an extra shot of espresso, eating an egg sandwich, and feeding pieces of smoked salmon to JJ, who sat under my chair, and tuning in to the local news station’s Facebook page waiting for the update. Impatient, I called Becky.

  “I have some questions if your police reporter needs them,” I said when she answered.

  “Really,” she said.

  “Yeah. Like, if they haven’t arrested Thea Coleman, did they track her down for questioning about the whole hotel room debacle? Did they find any link between Drake and Holt?”

  “Thanks, but I’m pretty sure my reporters can figure out what to ask on their own,” Becky said, sounding amused. “If not, I’m going to send them back to J-school. And if Drake hasn’t been identified as anything yet and if they’re still looking for the killer, we don’t want to tip off the rest of the reporters.”

  “Good point,” I said.

  “Yeah, well, that’s why I get paid the big bucks. I’ll call you later. It’s about to start.”

  I jacked up the volume at the notification that the Daybreak Harbor PD was now live. Social media was pretty fabulous, if you asked me. I navigated to the page as Gil Smith, the first selectman of Daybreak Harbor, stepped up to the podium, which was flanked by the cop in charge of press, a guy named Lowman, on one side and Sergeant Ellory on the other. This was a Very Serious Matter here in town.

  “Thank you all for coming,” Gil began, a somber look on his face. “As you all know, a visitor to our island died recently of unnatural causes. Lieutenant Lowman, our spokesman, and Sergeant Ellory, our lead on this case, are here to talk about some new developments.” He stepped back and Lowman took his place.

  Lowman cleared his throat and glanced at his notes. “We have some new information on the Jason Holt case.” He paused for a moment as the buzz began making its way through the crowd, the air of impatience palpable even though the reporters were offscreen.

  “We’ve determined that Mr. Holt, the author, was the victim of a hit-and-run. The autopsy determined that the force of the impact, though it did kill Mr. Holt, was not enough to propel his body the distance into the canal. Which meant he was moved there, in a likely attempt to cover up the death.” Another pause, possibly for dramatic effect.

  “A rental car registered to Jason Holt was found abandoned in Fisherman’s Cove, with marks on it consistent with an impact of this nature,” Lowman continued. My eyes widened at this news. Fisherman’s Cove. Where we’d followed Thea Coleman last night. It was the farthest town from Daybreak Harbor, way out on the other side of the island. It was the least touristy of all five towns and the smallest populated. A lot of the local fishermen lived out there.

  I almost knocked over my coffee cup trying to raise the volume. Someone had run the guy over with his own rental car? Who would’ve had access to it? Had he left the keys in it for his clandestine meeting with Drake and someone had jumped in and decided to kill him? Or had someone just tried to steal the car and he got in the way?

  Was it related to Drake? Maybe he’d had someone on standby in case their meeting didn’t go right. But how would Drake know that the keys were in the car—if they were in the car?

  I resisted the urge to text Becky and tell her to have her guy ask if the keys were in the car.

  The reporters clamored at Lowman, anxiously awaiting their chance to ask questions.

  But he ended it there. He didn’t refer to is as a murder, and he didn’t not refer to it as a murder. Which meant they probably still didn’t have a definite suspect in mind. Or maybe they did, but it was too early to tip their hand. “Sergeant Ellory, who’s in charge of the investigation, and I will take questions now,” Lowman announced.

  Hands all over the room shot up as the reporters in the audience vied for first shot. Lowman pointed to one of them. I pressed the earbud farther into my ear so I could hear the question, which wasn’t very easy. I heard a mumble and something about what changed and murder.

  “Whether or not this was an accident, the fact that the body was moved suggests there was a conscious attempt to cover up the death of Mr. Holt. Therefore, the charges would be different than manslaughter,” Lowman said.

  “Do you have any suspects?” someone else with a louder voice shouted.

  Ellory stepped up to the podium. “At this point, we have a person of interest we’re looking into,” he said. “Obviously, we won’t rest until we find the person responsible for this. We don’t stand for murder on our island.” It was his turn for a dramatic pause. “And we are committed to Daybreak Island being a safe place for residents and visitors alike.”

  I rolled my eyes. If it was going to be a safe place for all residents—including the feline ones—they also needed to get rid of Thea Coleman, who I sincerely hoped was their person of interest. Sure, it was a little self-serving, but if we could solve two problems for the price of one, who could object to that?

  The reporters tried to ask who the person was but got a “no comment” for their troubles. I wasn’t surprised. There were a couple of questions about the car and about motive, but the cops were basically done answering questions except for making the stale comments about the investigation being ongoing and that they’d be continually reporting any updates. No questions about the keys. I closed Facebook and drained the rest of my coffee while I thought about my next move. Which was supposed to be going to the market to get organic ingredients for some new recipes Ethan wanted to try.

  It seemed like such a normal thing to do.

  A shadow fell across my table. I glanced up to find Damian Shaw standing in front of me, holding two coffees and smiling.

  “I saw you sitting here and you looked so engrossed in what you were doing I figured you could use more sustenance,” he said, sliding into the chair across from me and setting one of the cups down. “Hey, JJ,” he said, peering under the table. JJ squeaked back.

  “Thank you,” I said. “It’s much needed, actually. How are you doing? How’s the Lobstah Shack?”

  Damian shrugged. “It’s not bad, actually. People still want seafood takeout. And the soups are flying out of the Crock-Pot for sure.”

  “It’s that time of year.” I took a sip of my new coffee. I was probably on my way to an ulcer, but at least getting there would be tasty.

  “So what are you up to?” Damian asked, leaning back in his chair. “Did you watch the press conference?”

  “I did,” I said.

  Damian nodded. “I listened to it on the radio on the way over. Crazy, right? You think they have anything to go on?”

  “I hope so. I would think they have to at this point,” I said. “But it really is so weird. I wonder what the real story is with that guy, if someone did this on purpose or if it truly was an accident and someone panicked.”

  “We’re all wondering that, honey,” the woman at the table next to us remarked.

  We both turned to look at her. I recognized her from the group of friends Grandpa Leo and Grandma used to play cards with years ago. Helen, maybe? I gritted my teeth trying to remember. I hated looking rude in front of Grandpa’s friends.

  “Hattie, honey.” The woman smiled at me. “It’s okay. It’s been years s
ince I’ve seen ya. How’s your grandpa, anyway? He stopped coming around for card games lately. He’s probably chomping at the bit to get this dead guy sorted out, isn’t he,” she said, answering her own question before I could open my mouth. “I get it. Usually it’s the locals causing a ruckus amongst themselves this time a year, though you don’t see that many actual murders when everyone is drinking themselves into drunken stupors to pass the days. This guy had to have done something to make someone mad to get dumped in the channel that way. Poor sucker.” She shook her head somewhat unsympathetically. “People think this island is all fun and games, but winter brings out the beasts round here. And that storm’s coming—things like this always happen when somethin’s in the air, you know?”

  I exchanged a glance with Damian. “So you think someone did this on purpose?” I asked Hattie. “That it wasn’t an accident and a cover-up?”

  Hattie shrugged. “I think people have secrets. And men like that writer—the power of the pen and all that—make people awfully nervous if they don’t want those secrets coming out.” She rubbed her hands together a little too gleefully. “It’s like our very own season of Scandal.”

  Chapter 44

  Damian and I left the coffee shop together a few minutes later, but I barely noticed him walking next to me until he repeated my name.

  “Are you okay?” he asked, when I finally registered that he was speaking to me.

  “I’m fine. Sorry. I was just thinking about what Hattie said.”

  “About the writer? And Scandal?”

  “Yes. Well, no,” I said, a little more sharply than I’d intended. “This isn’t a TV show. And if people like the ones on that show are on our island, we’re all in big trouble.”

  “True story,” Damian said. “I wonder if she actually watched it?”

  I sighed. “I have no idea. But I’ve been thinking. About secrets. Jason Holt came here to write. He’s been here a few times, I’ve heard. But usually over the summer. So why was he sticking around for the winter? I keep asking myself that question, but I can’t figure out the answer. I mean, I assumed he was here to work, but why did he have to work here? Did he really like it here that much?”