Treasure Built of Sand (Palmyrton Estate Sale Mystery Series Book 6)

by S. W. Hubbard

  Croft whistles. “Why did they all want his juice?”

  “Tall, thin, blue eyes, 1600 SAT scores, Princeton grad.”

  “Ah—designer babies. So I guess an overweight, brown-eyed, graduate of the police academy wouldn’t be in such demand, eh.” He shakes his head. “But I gotta tell ya, I’ve produced two pretty spectacular kids.”

  “I’m sure you have. And I bet neither one of them is a murderer.”

  “So you think these kids turned and killed their own half-brother?”

  “The group was arguing about what they wanted from Gregory. They all wanted to meet one another and meet him. But some wanted him to claim them as his children, while others were ashamed of how they were born and wanted to keep it quiet. Brielle never told her husband that he wasn’t Austin’s biological father.”

  Croft scratches his head. “And I bet Jeanine never told her first husband that he wasn’t Trevor’s biological father. Or if she did, neither one told old man Finlayson. The grandfather’s all about blood ties, and the Finlayson family name being carried down through the generations.”

  “Sophia told me that Trevor kept going to parties with a group of kids from Bumford-Stanley that he didn’t even like. She said he was afraid of them, but he wouldn’t stop going out with them, and she was never included.” I gaze over at the Peterman’s dark house. I’m glad Sophia is off in Maine on her college visit, but I’m curious about how much she knows and what she told Croft. “At the time, I thought she might just be jealous of Trevor and mad that she was excluded from the cool kids’ group. I take it she didn’t tell you about the half-siblings?”

  Croft gives an almost imperceptible shake of his head. Although I can see he’s grateful for all the information I’m giving him, his natural impulse is to not share anything in return.

  “Half-siblings and sperm donation were not part of our conversation,” he says. But he looks perplexed, as if something Sophia told him doesn’t jibe with what he’s learning now.

  Croft’s reticence doesn’t deter me from sharing my theories. “Well, now I think those so-called parties Sophia wasn’t invited to were actually Trevor meeting with the half-siblings. And I suspect he got on the wrong side of their plans.”

  “So they killed him. Or one of them did.” Croft shifts his large body and looks toward Brielle’s house where we can just make out Austin sitting alone on the steps. “It doesn’t matter that Austin won’t talk to us. With a group of kids this large, you can bet one of them will crack and start ratting on the others.”

  We both look at Sienna earnestly talking to two other cops.

  “Yep, we’ll have the Finlayson murder case wrapped up by tomorrow.”

  Chapter 36

  As it happens, Detective Croft’s prediction was overly optimistic.

  By Monday, all the kids, with the exception of Sienna, have lawyered up.

  And when six rich families hire six different high-profile lawyers, even getting a straight answer to, “What color is the sky?” becomes problematic.

  “Everything is a negotiation,” Sean reports to me on Monday evening after touching base with Detective Croft at the end of his work day. My husband has recovered remarkably well from the news of my antics last night, especially since he knows Anthony is locked up in the Ocean County jail with no likelihood of bail.

  We’re prepping a dinner of grilled mahi-mahi and roasted broccoli which Sean has pulled together effortlessly. After a very stressful weekend apart, and a Monday spent catching up at our respective offices, we’re relieved and grateful to be together at home.

  “So far, they’ve only pieced together a few details about Trevor’s last days from what you and Sienna told them,” Sean says as he pours me a glass of Sauvignon Blanc. “Apparently, the kids persuaded—he makes air quotes around the word— “Gregory to come back to the house with them after his matinee performance at Monmouth University. When you saw Austin and Mason at the miniature golf course, they must’ve been making their plan. Croft thinks the boys probably jumped Gregory and dragged him into their car, which would be kidnapping, or at least unlawful restraint, but Gregory insists he went willingly, so no charges there.”

  “Gregory can’t deny that Mason punched him.” I toss Ethel a cracker smeared with brie as I set the table.

  “No, but he refuses to press charges against his son. I once socked my brother Terry in the jaw and knocked his tooth out. No one arrested me.”

  Sean goes out on the deck to tend the fish on the grill. I watch him through the kitchen window as he adjusts the heat and sprinkles the seasonings. Whatever he does, he does with total concentration.

  My heart swells with love.

  Did Donna used to feel this way about Anthony? Where did their love go so horribly wrong? How did Anthony change from warm and affectionate to jealous and possessive? Did Donna see it coming, or did it just creep up on her?

  At the office this morning, I told her what Anthony did last night. Not surprisingly, she collapsed in a heap of tears and apologies. But when I told her not to worry because Anthony had been arrested and was being held without bail at the Ocean County Jail, she cried even harder.

  Love doesn’t die easily.

  Sean looks up from his grilling and smiles at me through the window. I remember I’m supposed to be watching the broccoli in the oven, and snap to attention.

  Once we get our food arranged on the table, I return to the topic of what Detective Croft has learned from Sienna. “What does Sienna say about the night Trevor died?”

  Sean spears a broccoli floret and uses it as a pointer. “She admits the siblings had a meeting that night. Unfortunately, she couldn’t go because she had to be at her great aunt’s wake.”

  “And there are multiple witnesses to alibi her,” I interrupt before he can confirm the fact. “But didn’t any of the others tell her what happened that night? Six kids can’t be that good at keeping a secret.”

  “Sienna says Ava told her the kids met at Brielle’s house and argued about planning an encounter with Gregory, and Trevor ran off. And that’s the last they saw of him. Later, when his grandfather found the note and raised the alarm, all the kids believed Trevor had killed himself.”

  “What about that note? Are the police positive Trevor wrote it?

  “The paper had his fingerprints and his grandfather’s prints. A handwriting expert confirmed it’s Trevor’s writing.”

  “But that’s just an expert opinion, not confirmed fact. Could the old man have forged it, or forced Trevor to write it?”

  “You still think the old man was involved in the murder?” Sean asks. “But if the news came out that Trevor wasn’t a biological Finlayson, the old man might’ve had a better shot at preventing the trust fund from going to Roxie—she really isn’t Trevor’s half-sister.”

  “Hmmm. Maybe that ambiguous note is just an incredibly lucky break for the killer. It helped everyone believe Trevor committed suicide.”

  “Until the body washed up and the police said it was murder.” Ethel has been circling the table for the past five minutes, and I finally slip her a singed edge of fish when Sean isn’t looking. “What does Sienna say was the kids’ reaction to that news?”

  “According to Croft, Sienna says that’s when the group started splintering. She said it was all too much drama for her, and she refused to talk to some of them. But Ava persuaded her to come to one last meeting.”

  “Which turned out to be Sunday night.” I swirl the wine in my glass. “Does Croft think Sienna is lying to protect the others?”

  “He says no. Sienna’s parents have been totally cooperative. They’ve always been honest with her about how she was conceived. She never wanted to hurt them by going public, and she didn’t really care about connecting with Gregory.”

  “I believe that. She was the least confrontational of the kids that night. So why did she go to the meetings at all?”

  “Sienna’s an only child.” Sean strokes my hand as it rests on the table
. “She told Croft that she was intrigued by the idea that she had siblings.”

  “Wow—I totally get that. When I was trying to find out what happened to my mother, there was a short period of time that I thought she might have run off because she was pregnant, and that I might have a sibling. I hafta say, letting go of that fantasy was tough.”

  Sean frowns. “Well, Sienna’s Walton’s fantasy of a big, happy family has imploded. One of her siblings is a murderer.”

  “One of her brothers, surely. A girl wouldn’t be strong enough to strangle Trevor, would she?”

  “Trevor wasn’t a big kid, but it’s unlikely a girl could pull the murder off single-handedly. It takes time to kill someone that way—a good seven minutes of sustained pressure.”

  My delicious dinner churns in my gut as I picture Mason or Clark or Austin crouching over Trevor. “How could anyone squeeze a person’s throat for that long and watch him struggle and turn blue? They all seem like normal teenagers, not psychos.”

  Sean makes a face as he knocks back the last of his wine. “A person doesn’t have to be a psycho to commit murder, Audrey. You know that. He or she just needs to want something desperately.”

  “But strangling someone is so personal.” I push my plate away, all appetite extinguished. “With a gun, it’s one squeeze of the finger and a life has ended.”

  “Yep. That’s why having a gun in the house is dangerous for everyone in the family. Too easy to pop off a shot when you’re mad. But Trevor’s killer didn’t necessarily kill him with his bare hands. He could have caught him from behind and strangled him with a belt or a rope. Given the condition of the body, the medical examiner couldn’t tell if a ligature had been used.”

  “Ugh.” I lean back in my chair and stare at the ceiling. “Where does the investigation stand now?”

  “The long and short of it is Sienna has told the police all she knows.” Sean stands up and clears my plate. “But it’s not enough to make an arrest. The kids maintain the last they saw of Trevor, he was alive. And Croft has no way to prove he wasn’t.”

  Chapter 37

  Tuesday morning finds Donna, Ty, and me all together at the office with, mercifully, no drama whatsoever.

  Ty and Donna have fallen back into their old relaxed banter, and Donna has come to terms with Anthony’s arrest and confinement.

  “Uncle Nunzio is furious with Anthony,” Donna tells us as she pursues cobwebs with her DustBuster. “He says if Anthony had stayed put in South Carolina, none of this would’ve happened. And when my mother heard that Anthony threatened you with a gun, Audrey, she finally agreed that there’s no hope for our marriage and we hafta get divorced. So I’m moving forward with the filing.” She guns the DustBuster at some dry leaves Ty has tracked in. “No more procrastination.”

  “Good. Now all three of us can work on the Freidrich sale this weekend.” Ty lifts his feet for Donna’s vacuum. “The power company finally got the lights back on in that neighborhood last night. Imma go over there later and see if there’s branches on the walk and driveway that need to be cleared away.”

  “I already updated our website, Facebook, and Twitter with the new sale dates and sent out an email to all our regulars,” Donna reports.

  “Great work, guys.” There’s no doubt my staff is on top of this sale. Still, I have a powerful urge to go over to the Freidrich house myself just to double-check that everything’s been done correctly.

  But that would be insulting.

  Wouldn’t it?

  When I was preoccupied with the much bigger Gardner sale, I was willing to let this smaller sale slide a bit. But now that I’m done with the Gardners, the Friedrich sale is back on my front burner.

  “Last week, I told Mr. Gardner I’d take the check with the proceeds of the sale to Brielle’s store as soon as I finished the accounting. I’ve got it all done, so I think I’ll swing by there now. You’ll hold down the office until I get back?”

  “Yeah.” Ty frowns at a big vase of Brielle’s that I sold via photograph to a customer in upstate New York. “I gotta figure out how to ship this. Gonna take a crap ton of bubble wrap.”

  Great. I’ll take the check to Brielle’s store, then slip over to the Friedrich house for a quick look. No one will be the wiser.

  On the quick drive to Elle’s Choices, I speculate on whether I’ll find Brielle there or not.

  I’m hoping she’ll be too preoccupied with Austin’s issues to manage her retail hobby because I can’t quite imagine how we’ll deal with talking about what went down at her house on Sunday. The check in my tote bag represents a fraction of the value of all the lovely items she carefully selected for her home, all now dispersed to other houses across New Jersey and New York.

  Now I understand that she never really wanted to get rid of her possessions; she did it to protect her son and her marriage. Worse yet, her elaborately planned ruse was all for naught. The arrival of the police at the Gardners’ home means that her husband now knows the truth about his son’s parentage.

  But maybe emptying the house wasn’t pointless.

  If Trevor’s murder really did happen at the Gardners’ house, the police will have a hell of a time finding any forensic evidence to prove it.

  Regardless, it’s hard to imagine Brielle will be in the mood for polite chit-chat. Will she find some way to blame me for what her son did? It sure isn’t my fault that Austin planned one final meeting of the siblings with their biological father, but if my presence there hadn’t attracted Anthony, Austin might’ve gotten away with his plan to rip up the floorboards.

  And if I hadn’t eavesdropped on the confrontation between the kids and Gregory, no outsiders would have known about their true relationship.

  I’m not sure why I hadn’t thought this through before, but now I’m really nervous about encountering Brielle.

  However, Everett Gardner seemed pretty adamant about having the check today, and it’s not like the Gardners’ mood is likely to improve any time soon.

  I may as well suck it up, so I can put the whole crazy incident behind me, the sooner, the better.

  I find a parking spot on the pretty side street where Elle’s Choices nestles in the middle of the block. On this side street, signs of the destruction wrought by the weekend storm are everywhere. A branch hangs limply from a curbside tree and the storm drains are blocked with heaps of leaves, twigs, and flotsam. I pass a store that sells mother-of-the bride dresses and formal wear for ladies who travel the charity fundraiser circuit, and a small wool shop where women sit around a table, knitting. Across the way, an indie bookshop promotes book signings by authors I’ve never heard of and a Friday night poetry slam.

  Seems like no one here is hellbent on crass commercialism.

  I pause in front of Brielle’s display window before I enter the shop. No surprise—it’s arranged invitingly, with artful placements of pottery and candles and table linens and three droll little sandpiper statuettes. A semi-sheer scarf in shades of aquamarine and sea foam floats above it all.

  Ah, Brielle—what an eye!

  I take a deep breath and push open the door. A little bell announces my arrival, and a lovely scent of lavender and citrus envelops me.

  The shop appears empty. I creep around like a home-invader looking for priceless gems. I spot an item I’ve seen before: a tall, narrow, green ceramic vase. Did I sell it at the sale?

  No. Now I remember. Jane Peterman has that vase in her kitchen. It looks different here because at Jane’s house, it was filled with dead flowers.

  I continue browsing. There’s nothing in this shop that anyone needs—not the polished driftwood candelabra, not the delicate blue and gold glass salad plates—but everything is so pretty, it’s hard not to feel like I want it all.

  Maybe that’s the secret to Brielle’s success: imbuing customers with envy.

  Acquire my stuff and you’ll acquire my life.

  Luckily, I know enough not to want her life.

  I tune my ear to a l
ow voice coming from the back room. “Yes....yes. I told you, I’m fine.... I don’t know. Nothing’s been decided yet.... Look, I have to go. There’s a customer in the shop. Have a safe trip.”

  Brielle emerges from the back room with a customer-greeting smile affixed to her face. It disappears when she sees me.

  I hold up the envelope. “I brought you the check for the proceeds of the sale. There’s a detailed accounting included.”

  She stands frozen. I think reaching out for the envelope would cause her to shatter as surely as an icicle falling from the eaves of a house.

  I place the envelope on the elegant table holding the modified iPad Brielle uses to accept credit card payments. Nothing so gauche as a cash register here. Maybe I can just back out of the store...and her life...and never see her again.

  Brielle regards the envelope like a roach that’s crawled out of the woodwork. Her eyes narrow. “So, you spied on my son. I hope you’re satisfied with what you learned.”

  Should I attempt to explain that I was simply in the right place at the wrong time for Austin? Brielle is an influential person in Palmyrton. Still, no amount of rationalizing from me is likely to make her give Another Man’s Treasure a glowing recommendation.

  Should I offer one of those “sorry, not sorry” apologies? I’m sorry if my actions revealed the web of lies you’ve been living for two decades. I’m sorry if my employee’s deranged husband upset the plans of your unhinged son. I’m sorry if I disrupted your scheme to perfectly control the police, your husband, and your son.

  I settle on, “I’m sorry for the unfortunate...er...confluence of events.”

  “Ha, ha, ha!” Brielle’s laugh threatens to careen into hysteria. “A Series of Unfortunate Events—my son used to read those books when he was a child. He loved trying to figure out the crazy plot twists. Austin is relentlessly curious. I suppose he gets that from Gregory. I won’t say ‘his father.’ Everett is Austin’s father. He’s devastated by all this. Devastated.”