Knot on Your Life

by Betty Hechtman

  I had my arms folded and was almost tapping my foot as I waited for her explanation. “I was expecting a little more action at night than Vista Del Mar offers. Everybody kind of disappeared and there was nothing much to do. I’d forgotten to bring toothpaste so I used Aileen’s SUV to go to the drugstore. I saw you getting out of your car when I was on the way there. When I saw your Mini Cooper was still parked there on the way back, I wondered what you were up to since this place is obviously closed.” She glanced around the empty dining room.

  “Oh,” I said, unfolding my arms.

  “And after what your friend said about you being some kind of detective and that you’d be checking out the investigation of the accident, well, I thought it might be related to that.”

  I laughed thinking what she must have imagined. “Come with me and I’ll show you what I’m doing.” She’d told me that she ran a food service that provided lunch and snacks for offices and I thought she’d be able to relate.

  She followed me into the kitchen and I pointed to the butter, eggs and sugar on the counter. “I make the desserts for the restaurants and bake muffins for the coffee spots in town.”

  “Really,” she said, surprised, as she took a look around the kitchen. “Then we’re kindred spirits. Though my customers are down on sugar. I brought samples of a cookie recipe and they weren’t even interested. But they loved the samples of the snack item PJ made, well, except for the vegans and nondairy people.” She asked me for details of how I worked and it turned out we both operated in similar old-fashioned ways.

  “I could use an app to handle my business, but I prefer to deal in person.”

  “Well, now that you’ve seen what I’m doing—” I left it hanging, hoping she’d take the hint and leave but she didn’t make a move.

  “So then you didn’t find out anything more about the accident?” she asked.

  I checked her expression. She seemed interested, but not overly concerned. “Bad news. The victim died,” I said.

  Deani was pale to begin with but whatever color she had drained from her face as she took in what I said. “That’s terrible.” She leaned against the counter for a moment, before saying that she had to go. Her reaction caught me off guard and I followed behind her trying to think of something to say to her. She mumbled a good night before she went out. She seemed so upset and I wondered if I’d been too blunt or she was just one of those sensitive types. Either way I didn’t think it was a good time to remind her that Fifi should spend the night in the guesthouse.

  As soon as she was gone I resumed making the cakes, trying to move faster since I was now behind. I was almost back on schedule as I poured the batter into three tube pans and put them in the oven. It only took a few minutes for the air to smell of buttery vanilla sweetness.

  I realized I’d never turned on the radio and just as I went into the other room there was a knock at the door. No mystery this time—Dane was standing with his face close to the glass. He made it a habit to stop by when he worked the night shift. He came in carrying a holder with two cups of coffee and a bag with grease marks.

  A midnight blue canvas jacket covered his uniform of the same color. He leaned in and gave me an affectionate kiss before looking around to see if there were any witnesses. “No worries, it looks like no Cadburians saw that.” He had a serious expression but his tone was joking. “I have to worry about my rep. Can’t be caught kissing while on duty.” He sniffed the air. “No cinnamon.” He sniffed again. “But I smell vanilla. Pound cake?”

  “Good detective work,” I teased and his mouth curved into a grin.

  “That’s me, the cake detective.” He let out a sigh. “Better than the call I had a little while ago. Tonight’s big event was someone getting trapped in the bathroom at the wine bar.” He put up his hands to demonstrate his solution : “All it took was a good shove to the door.”

  He followed me into the kitchen. “What else are you making?” he asked.

  “Rustic cherry pie,” I said. He chuckled and shook his head.

  “I still can’t believe that someone who makes such fabulous desserts relies on frozen food.” He put down the coffee and took out two submarine sandwiches wrapped in paper.

  My eyes lit up at the food and he feigned a grumble. “And here I thought you were excited to see me.”

  “Sorry. Of course I’m glad of your company. But I’m famished. With everything that happened I never got around to eating.” I gave him a hug. “I’d starve if it weren’t for you. You bring me sandwiches and you leave pasta for me a couple nights a week when you cook for the karate kids.” The truth was Dane was a whiz at dinner food. The tomato sauce he made from scratch was so delicious that I was tempted to lick the plate.

  “You look a lot better than when I saw you earlier. Too bad they couldn’t save him.” As he said that the thought that had been lurking in the back of my mind finally came to the front. How had I not thought about it before?

  “Someone else was there,” I blurted out.

  “Someone else was where?” Dane said, sounding confused.

  “Someone had to have seen what happened and called for help. I can’t believe that Lieutenant Borgnine didn’t figure that out.”

  “He assumed that you called,” Dane said. He was looking at the sandwiches. “Where should we eat these.”

  I forgot about my ravenous hunger for the moment. “I couldn’t have called. There’s no cell signal there. I can’t believe he doesn’t know that.” I was pacing in the kitchen now. “There’s something more. I’m sure he was lying on his back when I found him, but there was blood all over his face. Sammy said you’d think the blood would be on the ground around him.”

  “Okay, what’s your point?” he asked.

  My shoulders slumped. “I don’t know. Maybe somebody hit him in the head with a rock. You should tell Lieutenant Borgnine.”

  “I’m sure he’ll figure it out,” Dane said, waving the sandwich under my nose. The smell of garlic and Italian dressing made my mouth start to water, but I took one last shot.

  “So, you aren’t going to say anything?”

  “Don’t poke the bear,” he said.

  “But you’d think he’d be happy to get the help,” I said and Dane rolled his eyes.

  “Don’t worry about it. From what I’ve heard, it sounds like a simple accident. There’s a reason for all those warning signs. And it’s not like you’re involved with the group the victim was with,” he said. He peeked out of the kitchen. “Let’s take our food out on the sunporch. Though I suppose now it’s a moon porch.” He picked a table near the window and I moved the place settings out of the way.

  “As long as we put everything back just the way it was. We don’t want Tag to throw a fit.” The smell of the meat and cheese and condiments was swirling around my senses, overriding all other thoughts, and I felt drunk with hunger.

  He watched as I practically inhaled the sandwich and downed the coffee.

  “What would you have done if I hadn’t come by?” he asked.

  I shrugged. “Who knows? Passed out—eaten one of the pound cakes? I’m just glad you did.”

  “I’d like to take that to mean you were glad to see me, but I get it. It really is all about the food, isn’t it?” He faked a hurt expression.

  “I’m glad to see you, too,” I said, looking in the bag to see if there was anything else. He rolled his eyes and handed me the rest of his sandwich. “You need this more than I do.” A moment later there was nothing left but crumbs. Now that I wasn’t consumed by hunger I remembered to tell him I’d offered to let Fifi stay in my guesthouse. “So if you see someone going in or coming out, don’t call out the cavalry,” I said. I was about to tell him about Deani’s strange visit when his radio began to crackle and I heard something about trouble on Lover’s Beach.

  “Got to go,” he said. He went to pick up the wrappings of the meal, but I said I’d take care of it. “Probably kids drinking beer.” He got up from the table and then loo
ked around before he smiled at me. “Looks like the coast is clear.” He held out his arms and what started out as a mutual hug finished as a hot kiss that neither of us was in a hurry to end. It was just lucky we both’d had garlic. And then he was off into the night.

  I knew that Dane wouldn’t arrest the kids. He’d just give them a talking to and then get them to join his karate classes. His motto was keep them busy and keep them out of trouble.

  I cleared up the table and reset it, making sure everything was perfectly aligned before going back to the kitchen. I made the crust and poured on the cherry filling. All the red brought to mind Tim’s head again. Maybe Dane didn’t want to poke the bear, but I had no problem doing it.

  Chapter 13

  As soon as Dane left, I looked at my watch. It was late by Cadbury time, but not by cop time, and I had Lieutenant Borgnine’s cell number. Surely he wouldn’t mind a call. After all, I was only trying to help.

  I heard it begin to ring and was collecting my thoughts on how to tell him what I’d noticed without putting him on the defensive. I snapped to attention when a woman said hello. It wasn’t just a greeting, there was an edge to it, and I considered hanging up. But there was no longer any anonymous hanging up, my number would show on the phone.

  “Hello,” I answered back with a tentative tone.

  “Who is this?” she demanded.

  “I was trying to reach Lieutenant Borgnine,” I said. “It’s official business.”

  “I just bet it is. Listen, I know all about you badge bunnies who see cops as these romantic heroes. Teddy is taken.” There was a finality to her tone and I was afraid she was going to hang up. It was hard for me to keep from laughing. Her husband had a bulldog face and a body shaped like a fireplug. His manner was gruff and impatient and certainly didn’t inspire thoughts of romance in me.

  “I’m calling about something that happened today. A man died on the rocks by Vista Del Mar. I was almost a witness.”

  I could tell by her breathing that she was evaluating what I’d said. “Then give me your name,” she said finally.

  “Casey Feldstein.”

  She took a moment to process. “The muffin girl,” she said.

  I wanted to correct her and say muffin woman, though I wasn’t exactly sure at what age muffin girl changed to muffin woman. I was in my mid-thirties, but then my retreat bunch referred to themselves as the birthday girls.

  “I want to thank you for getting Teddy off the doughnuts, but do you suppose you could cut the sugar out of your muffins? His sweet tooth needs taming.”

  “Actually, tonight I’m making what I call biscuit muffins. Barely any sugar. The sweetness comes from raisins.”

  She uttered a noise that sounded like approval before making a tsk sound. “I assume you aren’t calling with an update on your baking. What is it then?”

  “It’s police business,” I said.

  She made a disapproving sound. “But aren’t you the one he complains about interfering with his investigations?”

  “I wouldn’t say interfere. I am really about helping him.”

  “I don’t know that he sees it that way. But if you hold on, I’ll get him. He’s just coming out of the shower.”

  “Borgnine,” he barked in the phone a moment later. It was too soon for him to have had time to don more than a towel. Not an image I wanted stuck in my brain. “Who’s this?” he demanded.

  “C’mon, your wife and I just had a long conversation. She told you who’s calling.”

  “Maybe she did. So what’s so important?”

  I considered how to phrase what I was going to say. I was calling to give him necessary information that he missed, not show off that I knew something he didn’t. “I happened to run into Dr. Sammy Glickner,” I began, but he cut me off.

  “The magician? Don’t tell me he got in trouble because of one of those magic shows of his. I’m telling you he should stick to straight illusions and lose that comedy stuff. I’m assuming it was planned, or did you just screw up and he did what he could to cover it up.”

  “How do you know about his magic act?” I asked, surprised.

  “Number one, this is a small town, and number two, I’m a top cop, which means I know about everything. And I might have happened into a show he did for the group of doctors at one of the Pebble Beach resorts.”

  “I’ll keep that under advisement,” I said. “But my mentioning Dr. Glickner had nothing to do with his magic skills, more his doctor skills.” I took a momentary pause to let it sink in before I continued. I explained telling Sammy about the incident on the beach and offered the detail that it appeared that the victim fell backward onto the rocks. “Somewhere in all of it, I brought up seeing blood on his forehead and how it had gotten on me. Dr. Glickner said that it seemed inconsistent with a backward fall.” Rather than tell the lieutenant what I thought it meant, I left it hanging, hoping he’d come up with the same conclusion I did.

  “Funny that Glickner would be commenting on the head of the victim since he’s a urologist and his specialty is the other end.”

  I let out a sigh wishing he’d stop fixating on Sammy and pay attention to what I’d said. “This isn’t about Dr. Glickner’s specialty,” I said.

  “So then, what is the point of what you said?” Borgnine asked with a touch of impatience. I took a deep breath and hoped for the best. I was going to have to spell it out for him.

  “I was just thinking that maybe the victim was hit on the head with something, like a rock. As in someone picked it up and did it,” I said and waited for his response.

  He surprised me by being silent for a few moments. “Maybe you’re wrong about the way he was laying when you found him.”

  “About that,” I said. “Someone else was there first. The person who called nine-one-one.”

  “But I thought that was you.”

  “There’s no cell service at the beach,” I said. “Someone had to go somewhere else to call.”

  “And you’re sure that wasn’t you,” he said in his interrogation tone.

  “Like I said, no. I barely had time to check for a pulse before the first responders arrived.”

  “Hmm,” he muttered in an unhappy tone. “But back to the blood on his head. He might have hit his head and then rolled onto his back before you got there. Or maybe you’re just wrong about how he was lying.”

  “I don’t think so,” I said.

  “You saw him just for a few minutes. How can you be sure?” I could tell Lieutenant Borgnine was getting annoyed.

  “I did only see him for a short time, but I know what I saw. He was flat on his back and I think he fell that way and that the blood on his head came from his being hit on his head.”

  “I’ll talk to the first responders,” he said. I knew he was trying to dismiss me.

  “They just wanted to get Tim out of there before the tide washed him away. I don’t think they focused on how he was arranged on the rocks,” I offered.

  “I’m sure the medical examiner will study his wounds.”

  “And when will that be?” I asked. There was silence on the other end. The doctor who served as medical examiner had a full practice since he wasn’t often called on for medical examiner duties.

  “I don’t have to tell you that,” he said.

  “No problem,” I said. “I’ll check it out myself.”

  “What do you mean, you’ll check it out yourself?” I was afraid my comment had made him snap to attention and I wondered if he’d lost the towel in the process.

  “I’ll check for blood residue.”

  “There’s no way to tell where exactly he was lying and the tide came in and washed everything away.”

  “Even if the tide washed most everything away, I bet there’s something left. And I have some luminol. Don’t worry, I’ll let you know what I find out,” I said.

  “Luminol? What are you doing with luminol?” the cop sputtered. Luminol was a substance that reacted with even the slightest trace of
blood by making it glow in the dark. Sammy had gotten some thinking he could use it in an illusion. It had never panned out, but the bottle was in the storage area of my guesthouse along with the rest of his magic gear.

  “Well, you can’t spray all of those rocks.”

  “Don’t need to. I can go exactly to the spot,” I said in a confident tone.

  “Don’t do anything rash,” he commanded. “You must have baking to finish. Those rocks are dangerous. You should leave it to the professionals. We should talk about this in person. Don’t leave before I get there.”

  • • •

  I barely had time to mix the biscuit muffins and put them in the oven before there was an insistent knock on the glass portion of the door.

  “Good. You’re still here,” Lieutenant Borgnine said. The light reflected on his bristly salt-and-pepper hair and it was obviously still wet. There was no rumpled herringbone jacket this time. He was dressed for action in a navy blue tracksuit and white sneakers. He didn’t wait to be invited before coming in and shutting the door behind him. “It’s better if no one knows I’m here,” he said, glancing out the window to the deserted street. I wasn’t sure who he was worried about and I didn’t bother asking. I’d riled him up enough already.

  “You got the luminol?” he demanded.

  “No. I don’t carry it on me,” I said, trying not to chuckle at the absurdity that I went around with luminol in my purse. “It’s at my place.” Just then the timer went off and I went toward the kitchen with him almost on my heels.

  He sniffed the air and I had to admit it did smell wonderful. “The wife said you were making some sugar-free items.”

  I pulled the trays of biscuits out of the oven and he stepped closer to get a better view. “Are those them?” he asked. “So what are they, biscuits or muffins?”

  “I’m not sure what the definition of either of those is. They’re kind of biscuits shaped like muffins.”

  “If this is a first-time thing, you really ought to let me taste-test them.”