by Vella Day
Once seated, Dolly delivered two glasses of water. “I take it you heard what happened last night?” she asked.
“Yes. Gavin came over to be with Rihanna, but he wasn’t able to tell us much. I think his mom might be trying to shield him from the horror.” Dolly nodded. “Have you heard anything?”
“Just that his wife is on her way up here. I imagine she wants to see him—for closure and all.”
“For sure.” I sipped my water. “Did Pearl mention the cause of death or if they had any suspects?”
“Not yet, but Steve is driving down now to help coordinate things with the Miami PD.”
“I’m surprised he’d take the trip before he learned if Daniel Sanchez had been murdered.”
Dolly leaned in. “I know, right? Something hinky is going on. What was a man like Daniel Sanchez doing renting a room at Mimi Prentiss’ house in the first place? I heard it’s not the cleanest.” She scrunched up her nose.
Gavin had been right. Something was off. “No speculation about who might be guilty then?” I asked.
A small smile came to Dolly’s lips. “Not yet, but at great personal sacrifice, I put my sister-in-law on the case. If you think I like to gossip, that woman—Nora—is the worst. If she didn’t live in Miami, and if she wasn’t in Sanchez’s social circle, I never would have asked her. She loves to hold it over my head that she is superior to me.”
“I’m sorry. But it’s fantastic that we have a connection to someone who might know what was going on in Daniel Sanchez’s life before he came here.”
A group of people piled into the diner. Really? I’d hoped it would remain empty.
“True.” Dolly looked over her shoulder at the newcomers. “I guess I need to take care of them. What would you guys like?”
“I’ll have a chocolate shake.” I needed the comfort food.
“Coffee, black,” Jaxson said.
Dolly smiled briefly and then went over to the new customers to seat them.
“Having an insider in Miami is good.” I always tried to find the proverbial silver lining.
“It is. I think we can do some research even without Nora though.”
“How?”
Jaxson leaned back in his seat. “Via Elissa Sanchez. At some point, she’ll become frustrated with the pace of the investigation and ask for our help. I wouldn’t be surprised if she has an idea who might have wanted to harm her ex-husband. Maybe not names, but whether it could be one of his co-workers or some disgruntled client. They must have talked periodically regarding Gavin’s internship and such.”
“True, but why ask for our help? Because we might care more about Daniel Sanchez—a man we’ve never met—than the sheriff?” I needed to answer my own question. “She’d never think that.”
“She might not, but somehow we always manage to find the one clue that unlocks a series of events that leads Steve and Nash to catch the killer. I realize Nash would do everything in his power to solve this, in part because he cares for Dr. Sanchez, but what if magic is involved?”
“Magic?” I whispered. “I will admit that many of the deaths we’ve investigated had some element of it, but how would some lawyer from Miami have anything to do with that?” I leaned closer. “You don’t think he could be a werewolf or a warlock, do you?”
“No, or rather not that I’ve heard mentioned.”
I raised my brows. “I can’t imagine Elissa Sanchez marrying him if he had been.”
“Probably not, even though her current beau breaks that rule, right?”
“You have a point.” So what if Nash Solano was a werewolf. Elissa Sanchez had come a long way since first arriving in our town. Learning about witchcraft and then werewolves had been difficult for the scientist. I was proud of her for being willing to bend her belief system and embrace new ideas.
A few minutes after Dolly seated this new group, she delivered our order, though I was no longer in the mood to indulge in the sugary delight. After seeing how angry, frustrated, and hurt Gavin had been, my heart kept breaking over and over again.
I pulled out my phone. “I’m sure my mom’s heard about what happened, but I want to ask her to contact us if Elissa lets her know anything about the cause of death.” I imagine the medical examiner doing the autopsy would keep her up-to-date on his findings.
My mom and dad ran the local mortuary, and as such, she and Elissa Sanchez had become friends, which served our agency very well.
“You’re not even considering that he could have died of natural causes?” Jaxson asked.
I shrugged. “I could go either way. Lawyers are under a lot of stress, which could lead to all sort of physical ailments. On the other hand, lawyers often have enemies. We should have asked Gavin what kind of law his father practiced. We don’t know if he even dealt with criminals. He could have been a civil lawyer.”
Jaxson sipped his coffee. “No matter the law, there is always a winner and a loser.”
“You’re right. I’ll text Rihanna since she’ll still be with him.” It was easier than doing a search on my phone. A moment later, she responded. “He’s a divorce attorney.”
“That almost guarantees someone will be upset with the outcome,” Jaxson said.
That was true. “Do you think Gavin’s dad mentioned anything about his purpose for being in Witch’s Cove to his landlady, Mrs. Prentiss?”
“I don’t see why he would, but there’s one way to find out.” He wiggled his eyebrows, clearly wanting to help lighten the mood.
My muscles relaxed knowing Jaxson was completely on board with solving the mystery of the man’s death. “The preliminary report on the autopsy probably won’t be finished until tomorrow if we’re lucky, so for now, interviewing the last person to have seen him alive—other than the possible killer—is our best bet. I’m quite certain Nash has already picked her brain, but from what I recall, Mrs. Prentiss might need some prompting to remember all of the details.”
“She’s not reliable?”
I shrugged. “She’s old, so I’ll let you be the judge.”
Once we paid, we hopped in Jaxson’s car and drove to Dr. Sanchez’s street. I’d delivered some funeral flowers to Mrs. Prentiss’ house after her husband had died, so I knew where she lived.
“Fingers crossed her memory is working today,” I said, mostly to myself.
At the front door I knocked, but it took her a minute to answer. “Yes?”
I tried not to let my disappointment show that she didn’t recognize me. That was a shame since she and her husband used to eat at the Tiki Hut Grill quite often. “Mrs. Prentiss?”
“Yes.”
“Hi, I’m Glinda Goodall, Fern Goodall’s niece?” I hoped that she remembered my aunt, at least.
“Ah, yes. You delivered those pretty flowers after Sam died.”
Okay, I was impressed that she remembered. It had been a few years since her husband had passed. “Yes. And this is my partner, Jaxson Harrison.”
She ran her gaze up and down his body, confirming she wasn’t dead yet. “How can I help you?”
“I was wondering if we could ask you a few questions about Daniel Sanchez.”
Her cheer disappeared. “Of course. Such a tragedy. Come in.”
The inside was dark and quite dingy, but all of the knick-knacks crammed onto the many shelves implied this was her comfort zone, and that was all that really mattered.
Jaxson and I sat on the sofa, while she sat across from us on a hard-backed chair. “I don’t know how I can help. I already told that nice deputy everything I know.” She looked to the side. “Though my memory isn’t what it used to be.”
I smiled. “That’s okay. Did Mr. Sanchez tell you why he was in town?”
“To see his former wife, I believe.”
I thought he would have come to visit his son, though Daniel Sanchez might not have wanted to tell Elissa’s neighbor the truth. “I guess he saw her a lot then since she lives so close.”
“I never saw them together, but
Mr. Sanchez would leave around eleven in the morning and not return until about five in the afternoon. I figured he was visiting her at the morgue.”
“Interesting.” If Dr. Sanchez was to be believed, he hadn’t visited her even once. So, what was he doing during that time? Visiting his parents at their downtown bookstore? Or was he checking up on a client whose spouse lived in Witch’s Cove? Ugh. We had too many options.
“Mrs. Prentiss,” Jaxson said. “How did Mr. Sanchez seem to you?”
“Seem?”
“Did he appear happy, concerned, troubled, excited, or what?”
She huffed out a breath. Her brows pinched, and her eyes seemed to lose focus for a moment. “I’d say more troubled than anything.”
“Why do you think that might have been?” Jaxson asked.
“I don’t know. Just an old lady’s spidey sense.” She waved a hand. “It’s not my place to pry into what is troubling a person. I just rent out the room.”
That was nice of her to be so considerate. “Did he say how long he planned to stay?”
“No, but he paid for three days in advance when he first showed up. I didn’t have anyone else booked for the remainder of the week, so I told him he could stay as long as he wished.”
“He paid in cash, I take it?”
“Oh, my yes. I don’t have any of those fancy computer things to help me with credit cards.”
“I understand. One more question. On the night he died, why was he outside?” He could have gone into the backyard to have a smoke, I suppose.
“He offered to carry the garbage can in from the curb and put it in back. He was such a nice man.”
“At two in the morning?” I had to assume the estimate for the time of death was fairly accurate.
“I don’t know the time. I’d gone to bed at around nine, and he said he would take care of it. When I knocked on his door the next morning to tell him I’d made breakfast, he didn’t answer. I only looked outside to make sure the trashcan was where it was supposed to be. That’s when I saw him and called the sheriff’s department.”
“How terrible for you to have found him like that.” I looked over at Jaxson. “That’s all the questions I have for now. Jaxson?”
“I’m good.” He stood. “Thank you, Mrs. Prentiss. We appreciate you taking the time to help us.”
“Anytime. Do you know how he died?” she asked.
“No. I wish we did.”
“I hope it wasn’t anything I gave him to eat. He might have been allergic to the peanut butter cookies I made.”
“I’m sure he would have smelled the peanut butter and not eaten them.” I hoped that was true.
“You might be right.”
We left and headed back to the office. “Was that a total waste of time?” I asked.
“Who knows? Sometimes even the tiniest detail can prove useful later on,” Jaxson said.
“Let’s hope.”
When we entered the office, I stopped short. A beautiful redhead was sitting across from Gavin and Rihanna. While I couldn’t be positive, I figured this might be Morgana Sanchez, Daniel’s second wife.
She turned around and dabbed her eyes. The woman stood. “I’m sorry to barge into your office, but my son said he was here.”
Her son? I didn’t get the sense that Gavin thought of her as a mother in any sense. I held out my hand. “I’m Glinda, Mrs. Sanchez, and this is Jaxson. I am so sorry for your loss.”
“Thank you.”
“Please sit down.” A cup of coffee with peach lipstick on the rim sat on the coffee table in front of her. Good for Rihanna for being such a good hostess.
I probably should head on home, but I didn’t want to miss the chance to pick her brain a little. Her sophisticated air gave off an odd vibe, but that might be because I was just a small-town girl.
To be thorough, I had to consider her a suspect. She could have realized she’d made a monumental mistake marrying him and felt she had to do him in.
Yes, I know I had to stop making up unfounded scenarios. A rampant imagination muddied the waters, which was never a good thing.
As Jaxson dragged over his office chair, I sat next to her. “Do you know why your husband was in Witch’s Cove?” I asked.
“No. He told me he was going to a conference in Tallahassee. I had no idea he was here until your sheriff called and told me the terrible news.”
At least her story was consistent with what she’d already told her stepson. “That must have come as a shock.” I turned to Gavin. “Did the medical examiner figure out the cause of death yet?” I assumed his mother would call him the moment she learned anything.
“No. He still has tests to run.”
I returned my focus to Morgana. “Did your husband have any medical issues?”
“His heart was giving him trouble.”
“Dad was sick?” Gavin asked, a rush of concern coloring his tone. “He never said anything.”
“He didn’t want to worry you.”
If anything, Gavin looked more upset than before. Poor kid. “By any chance, was your husband allergic to peanut butter?” I explained my reason for asking.
“No. He loved it.”
Mrs. Prentiss’ cookies had not been the cause of death then. I wanted to ask Mrs. Sanchez if she had any idea who might have wanted to harm her husband, but until we learned that Daniel Sanchez was murdered, there seemed to be no point in asking.
Not wanting to interfere with their time together, I stood. “I need to be heading on home, but feel free to stay as long as you need.”
When I motioned with my eyes that I thought we should give them some space, Jaxson stood. “Me, too.”
Iggy was somewhere about, but he’d either want to stay with Rihanna or head back when he could. If Mrs. Sanchez said anything interesting, Iggy would be the first to report it.
I was lucky to have such a sneaky little sleuth.
Chapter Three
As soon as we left the office, I waited until we’d reached the bottom of the steps before getting Jaxson’s opinion on Morgana Sanchez.
“She doesn’t seem all that broken up about her new husband’s death, despite the tears,” he said.
“I agree, but maybe she is in shock. Morgana might not believe he’s really gone until she sees the body tomorrow.” I shuddered to think of the day I had to view a loved one that way.
“You might be right. Mind if I stop over?” Jaxson asked. “We should work on how to help Gavin.”
I tossed him a brief smile. “I’d like nothing more.”
No sooner had we stepped into my apartment when my cell rang. “It’s Elissa Sanchez.” My pulse skipped a beat. She rarely called me. Had she learned the cause of death already?
“Put her on speaker.”
“Hey, Dr. Sanchez.” I plopped down onto the sofa, and Jaxson slid next to me.
“Gavin told me you heard what happened to Daniel.”
“Yes, my condolences.” That platitude just slipped out. The two hadn’t been together for a long time, and from what Rihanna had said, there hadn’t been much love between them the last few years of their marriage.
“Thank you. I…ah…have a problem that I’m hoping you can help me with—or rather help Dr. Alvarez, our visiting medical examiner.”
Jaxson’s wide eyes crinkled his forehead.
I was surprised at her request. “What can I do?”
“Do you think you can come over to the morgue now?”
“Did something happen?”
“Not exactly, but Dr. Alvarez can’t figure out Daniel’s cause of death—at least not before the tox screens come back—but he said he’s never seen anything like it before.”
That was intriguing. “Sure. I’m with Jaxson. Is it okay if he comes?”
“Of course, and bring your necklace.”
“My pink pendant?”
“Yes.”
“We’ll be right over.” I was pretty sure Jaxson would agree to accompany me.
; “Great. I’ll be waiting for you.”
I disconnected, and then Jaxson took my hand. “You don’t look happy,” he said.
“I’m good. It’s just I’m usually the one to beg Dr. Sanchez to let me do my pendant test on the corpse. Now that she’s asking me, I’m feeling the pressure.”
Jaxson tugged her into his embrace. “You’ll do great, but I thought she wasn’t supposed to have anything to do with the autopsy—orp wasn’t that her decision?”
“I don’t know, but whosever it was, it was a smart one. I guess there is nothing illegal in having her watch.”
“You’re probably right. Let’s go.”
I always wore my pink pendant, so there was nothing to grab, other than my jacket, phone, and keys. Once downstairs, we jumped in his car. While the morgue was close, it was chilly out, and I wasn’t in the mood to walk. Besides, Dr. Sanchez’s request sounded urgent.
As soon as we reached our destination, Jaxson parked, and we rushed up to the front door where Dr. Sanchez was waiting for us. “Come in,” she said.
Most of the lights in the main entrance were off, which seemed a bit strange, but I thought it best not to question her. When she led us into the autopsy room, I had to cover my nose, despite being rather accustomed to the smell of death.
“Where’s the other medical examiner?” I asked.
“I waited until he went home before calling you. Technically, I shouldn’t be with the body. I could be a suspect, and even if I weren’t, asking a witch to use a magic pendant would be out of his comfort zone.”
“I get it.” Just a few months ago, she was a skeptic, but I wasn’t about to bring that up either.
On the counter sat a container that she picked up and placed on the autopsy table. “I know you normally scan the whole body, but we’ve already narrowed Daniel’s death down to there being an issue with his heart.”
“His wife said he had heart problems.”
Dr. Sanchez stilled. “You spoke with Morgana?”