Ravenwood Cove Cozy Mysteries Books 1-3

by Carolyn L. Dean

  “You left! You refused me! What do you think you’re doing?”

  The words were loud and bitter and completely focused at Meg. The man’s face was a florid mask of unbridled rage, his fists clenching and unclenching at his sides. As frightening as he was, Amanda grabbed her friend’s hand and stepped in, ready to try to stop Anderson in any way she could.

  “You’re a psycho nutcase and you’ve been stalking me! Now leave me alone!” Meg shouted, her voice wavering a bit. People in the neighboring booths were starting to take notice, hearing the raised voices and seeing the anxious movements of the women. Owen Winters had just circled back by to check on whether his wreaths had sold or not, and as soon as he heard the volume of the voices he instantly pushed his way through the gathering crowd of people toward the furious stranger, grabbing Anderson’s arm as he raised his hand. Amanda saw Anderson’s posture shift, his hand going up like he was going to punch Meg, and she threw herself into his left side with all her might, just as Owen tried to pull it down. The force of both of them shifted Anderson off balance and he fell backward onto the asphalt, taking Amanda and Owen with him. Amanda landed sprawled across Anderson, and Owen was momentarily stunned but was still hanging onto the younger man’s arm, just as George Ortiz came running up.

  Anderson seemed blind with rage and was scrambling to his feet, ignoring his two attackers, as Meg backed into her chair and fell, trying to escape his fury. Just as Anderson reached out to grab her by the hair, the burly police chief expertly grabbed his hand and twisted Anderson’s arm high on his back, making the man squeal in high-pitched pain.

  “I don’t believe we’ve met.” The words weren’t meant to be polite, and at their note of authority, Anderson turned his attention entirely toward George.

  “This is a private matter, between me and my girlfriend,” he sputtered, but George was having none of it.

  “Seems like she’d disagree with that and sounds like we need to have a chat.” As George was reciting the Miranda rights to a squirming Anderson, Amanda shakily pulled herself to her feet and hugged her trembling friend, who seemed on the verge of tears. People were milling around, trying to see what all the excitement was about, and Mrs. Granger was standing by her walker holding Mrs. Bitterman’s hand.

  “What a jackass,” she pronounced. “Are you okay, dear?” Her granddaughter nodded and hugged her. They watched as George handcuffed Anderson and called into the police station, letting them know that he was bringing in a prisoner.

  “Can both you ladies come down and make a statement?”

  “Hey, what about me? I was minding my own business and that broad attacked me!” Anderson jerked his chin toward Amanda. “I think she hurt my back. I should sue. I’m the victim here.”

  George ignored him, his years of police experience evident as he expertly guided Anderson through the crowd. Meg promised that they’d be following close behind, once they got Mrs. Granger to the car, which took a bit of time, and the police chief smiled as if frog-marching a complaining suspect through a farmers market was the most normal thing in the world.

  While she waited for Meg to bring her car around, Amanda gathered their things together and made sure Mrs. Bitterman had a ride home. By the time Meg had arrived the two younger women were feeling the after effects of their confrontation with Anderson. Amanda’s knees were actually shaking as she put Meg’s purchases in the trunk. Mrs. Granger looked them both over and seemed to come to her own conclusion, pushing her walker to the driver’s door and trying to open the handle.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” Meg knew her grandmother’s eccentricities and she already had a very good idea of what the old lady was up to.

  “You’re both shaken up, so I’m going to drive.” She held out her hand for the keys, patiently waiting.

  “You can’t drive. You haven’t driven in years.”

  “Well, that doesn’t mean I can’t drive now.”

  “Yes, it does, Gram. Remember what happened last time? You put your Cadillac all the way through the back wall of your garage and we had to take your keys away to protect you.”

  “The brakes didn’t work properly.”

  “The mechanic said otherwise.”

  Apparently, Mrs. Granger was hoping that Meg wasn’t going to bring up the unfortunate garage incident, and she pouted just a bit.

  “Fine, you drive. Just because I’m not driving today doesn’t mean I can’t drive any time I want in the future, though.”

  Meg rolled her eyes as she opened the back door for her grandmother. “Fine. When you turn a hundred we’ll take a road trip and you’ll drive, okay?”

  Mrs. Granger grinned like a maniac, deliberately ignoring the note of sarcasm in her granddaughter’s voice.

  “Deal. We’ll rent a convertible and you can ride shotgun.”

  Chapter 3

  Amanda loved going down to the beach first thing on a crisp fall morning. On a rare, clear day like today, with the autumn wind pushing her from behind, she didn’t even mind the chill of being out so early. She had the beach all to herself and the morning sun was just starting to crest over the dunes, making the cold sand stretching in front of her glitter with golden flecks.

  Almost all the guests had left on Sunday afternoon, heading back to bigger towns and paycheck jobs, and the sole remaining guest, Richard Loomis, had said he wouldn’t be needing breakfast at the Inn. Amanda had tried to make small talk about the funeral and even though Loomis had listened patiently and politely explained that Mr. Peetman had been a friend of his family’s so he’d decided to pay his respects, Amanda still felt a bit uneasy around him. The fact that her cat Oscar had decided that Mr. Loomis was unwelcome, made plainly obvious by his walking by with his furry nose in the air and his fat tail jerking in irritation whenever Mr. Loomis came in the room, definitely colored Amanda’s opinion, too. If Oscar didn’t like him there was probably a very good reason why.

  She was nearly alone on the beach. The only other people out so early in the morning were a lone couple walking hand-in-hand and talking quietly to each other. Amanda smiled and nodded as she went by them, but they were so wrapped up in their conversation they didn’t even acknowledge her as they strolled by. She turned her head a bit to watch them pass, surprised at how their lack of eye contact made her feel. Even with the good friends she’d made at Ravenwood Cove, sometimes she felt really alone. She’d been so busy running her business, starting the farmers market, and trying to get her life back on track that she hadn’t had much time for other things. It wasn’t that she missed men, because she certainly didn’t miss her last boyfriend, Kevin. It was just that she hadn’t had a chance to relax at all and be able to slow down a bit. Her idea of a fun time was a good book and a quiet night at home, recuperating from all the renovating and housework she was doing. Maybe it was time to do something about that.

  If I ever get the time, she thought, I’ll see what I can do to make more of an effort to connect with people. Maybe I’ll take some classes.

  One of the benefits of early morning walks was that it gave her a chance to clear her mind and do some thinking. It had been two days since the scuffle at the farmers market and she was just now feeling like she’d recovered. She’d gotten some bruises and strains when she’d fallen on Anderson Bowles, but there was more to it than that. The memory of the confrontation and her fear over having to go into the police station and give her side of the story had definitely brought back memories of when her landscapers had found a dead body in her garden and she’d had to deal with the police. She still had occasional nightmares from the experience.

  It wasn’t that she minded dealing with the police. Well, especially the local sheriff’s office. Her new friend, Detective James Landon, was tall and smart and easy on the eyes, and she enjoyed his dry sense of humor. More than once she’d burst out laughing at some passing comment he’d made, the laugh lines around his sea-green eyes crinkling even as he tried to keep a straight face. After everything that h
ad happened when she first moved to Ravenwood Cove she had really needed a friend like him, who could give her some advice when the murder investigation bogged down or who could explain the terms in an autopsy report. The fact that he was a tall, good-looking man with a head of crisp dark hair and who looked great in a pair of Wranglers and cowboy boots had nothing to do with it.

  Well, almost.

  Amanda scanned the beach, pulling a bag out of her coat pocket. Tomorrow she’d be back on the beach, keeping up her weekly routine of secretly digging holes and hiding seashells and glass floats for the kids to discover later. The treasures she buried had helped put the little town back on the map again, with an influx of new visitors hoping to find their own discoveries in the sand. A local glass artist, thrilled to have more business, had started blowing multi-colored glass spheres, charging only for the cost of materials. The city council was happy to pay, knowing that every time a news story was printed that told about the fun discoveries people were finding in their little town, there was a surge of business for the mom and pop shops that made up Ravenwood Cove.

  On days when Amanda wasn’t digging holes and hiding goodies, she’d started carrying a bag for collecting litter. After seeing Mrs. Granger using a tool that was a long tube with a handle on one end and a set of gripping pincers on the other, she’d bought one for herself and used it for picking up trash. She appreciated not having to stoop over to get it, and sometimes not even having to slow down from her morning walk. It was amazing how much trash could wash up overnight, and she was happy to do this small task to make her new hometown more beautiful.

  The cove was quieter than the open shore, protected by a curved peninsula of huge, dark rocks that held the pale sand in place, and several tall dunes that helped muffle the wind. Even when waves were crashing on the side toward the ocean, the lapping water on the bayside would be calmer, and today was a perfect illustration of that. The only evidence that anyone had been up before her was just one boat tied to the main pier. The rest of the fishing enthusiasts knew that getting out early on a nice fall day gave them the best chance at a big catch, and plenty of time to set out crab pots.

  Amanda kept scanning the sand, finding bits of yellow rope and a beer bottle that she tucked into her trash bag. She enjoyed the long walk and took her normal route, from the edge of the cove by the main pier all the way around the bay and toward the small dock. It wasn’t used anymore because it had been left to rot years ago. The new pier made it much easier to get gear and fish in and out of the boats, and certainly much safer.

  It wasn’t until her small bag was nearly full and she walked past the front edge of the old dock that something caught her eye. Bobbing in the water on the far side of the wooden walkway was a small fishing boat, rubbing against the pilings. It was unusual to see anyone using that dock because Amanda knew that George, the police chief, had personally strung up the warning signs about not playing on the structure and that he’d asked the city council for funds to have the dock removed since it was no longer a necessity and he considered it a public hazard. As Amanda walked closer she could see the painted boat’s rope dockline hanging over the side and dragging in the water. No one had tied the rope to the cleats or the pilings, and it looked like the boat was just floating there.

  That was definitely unusual. No boat owner would ever leave a boat untied like that, knowing that tides and currents could push a vessel away from the shore easily. Amanda tried to think of reasons it wouldn’t be secured to the dock but couldn’t come up with a single one, unless the high tide had carried it into the cove on its own.

  Deciding to check it out, she set her trash bag and pincer tool down, using a nearby rock to hold the lightweight bag in place against the wind. The dock was long and straight, or as straight as such old, weathered wood could be, and Amanda had to take a few extra moments to figure out how to climb up the rickety stairs without putting her foot through the rotting boards. Watching her step, she carefully skirted obviously worn areas and headed toward the bobbing boat.

  She was about twenty feet away when she was just close enough to see inside the back part of the open dory.

  There was a naked foot, and a naked leg, lying in the bottom.

  Amanda’s heart hammered in her chest. There was a person lying in the boat, apparently face down. As Amanda took the last few steps forward to see the full interior, she silently prayed that she’d stumbled across some drunk sleeping off the effects of a really fun evening with a big bottle of booze, but as soon as she was able to see everything, she knew something was terribly, evilly wrong.

  There was a man lying in the boat. He was face down, and he was stark naked. His skin was so pale that it almost looked like he’d been carved from wax, and there were purple marks near anywhere his body touched the wooden bottom of the boat. One of his arms was thrown up over his head, nearly touching the one piece of clothing that he had, a sweatshirt that had been wadded up like a turban and stuck on his head like a horrible party hat.

  Amanda gulped in the clean sea air and mustered every bit of courage she had. She leaned over as far as possible and could just catch the dripping wet rope tied to the front of the boat, pulling it hand over hand until she had enough out of the water that she could tie it securely to the dock. The moving waves made it a bit tricky to time when to get in the rocking boat, but Amanda waited until she could ease herself across the bow. She had to check and see if the man was alive or dead, and she knew that if he needed immediate help she shouldn’t wait on an ambulance or the police to do that. His outstretched arm was only a few feet from the front of the boat. The instant Amanda touched the cold, still wrist, searching for a pulse, she knew she wasn’t going to be able to do anything for the man at her feet.

  Backing out of the boat and pulling herself onto the splintered edge of the dock, Amanda unzipped the pocket in her windbreaker and pulled out her phone. Her fingers were trembling when she punched in the phone number.

  “Nine one one. What’s your emergency?”

  She took a deep, shaky breath. “My name’s Amanda Graham, and I think I just found a dead body down at the Cove.”

  Chapter 4

  An hour before, the entire beach at the cove had been deserted. Amanda looked in dismay at the huge number of people who were now swarming around the end of the old dock, all trying to catch a glimpse of the dead body within it. A single phone call to the local emergency dispatcher had brought the ambulance and police, as well as local residents who liked to scan the emergency radio channels to hear what was going on in their small town. The morning fishing fleet, just returning from their early trips out of the cove, were obviously confused by the gathering crowd milling around their normally-quiet beach but they stayed to watch the excitement.

  Truman had been one of the first people to arrive, his small dog Benny panting as he raced alongside Truman’s bike. At Amanda’s quiet request Truman stationed himself at the end of the dock, calmly talking to anyone who wanted to walk closer for a look-see at the boat, and telling them that until the cops arrived and said what they wanted done the dock was off-limits.

  Amanda saw several people she knew in the crowd, including her neighbors the Hendersons and her guest Richard Loomis, but she stayed where she was on the pier, knowing that she would almost certainly be questioned about her discovery. Lisa came jogging across the sand with her camera in hand, obviously in full reporter mode, but as soon as she saw Amanda she skidded to a stop. She talked quickly to Truman and apparently didn’t like his statement that she’d have to stay back with the others, but finally stepped back toward the gathering crowd, her face reflecting her disgruntlement.

  The paramedics were the first officials to arrive, but once they had decided there was nothing more they could do for the dead man they quickly scrambled out of the boat and waited for the local cops to show up, one of them heading over to help Truman control the crowd. Amanda didn’t know any of them very well, but she’d gratefully accepted the folded up blanket o
ne of them had provided for her to sit on. The old pier was full of rusty nails and long splinters, and it was nice to have a safe place to sit.

  Well, as safe as it could be, considering that a dead man was still lying face down just a few feet away from her. She’d known George Ortiz and his police officers would show up, but she was surprised at how little time it took for James Landon, her friend and a detective with the local sheriff’s department, to drive across the sand in his unmarked patrol car. He was there within ten minutes of the call over the radio, leaping out of his car with impatience and heading right for the still-docked boat. He gave a couple quick instructions to George’s officers, probably requesting they move the crowd back so no one could hear the conversations on the dock or see in the untouched boat, because the police officers began stringing a line of crime scene tape between their cars and ushering people back toward the dunes.

  James nodded in curt greeting to Amanda as he strode by but his focus was entirely on the possible crime scene. A few seconds of quiet conversation with George Ortiz and he left the police chief standing by the boat, heading back toward Amanda.

  “How come whenever there’s a dead body in town, you seem to be nearby?” He couldn’t keep the smile out of his voice.

  “Yeah, like that’s my plan. I’m just trying to be part of the action in this town, don’t ya know.”

  James plopped down next to her. “I thought you were just making sure you’d get a chance to see me.” His grin was infectious and Amanda hesitated, trying to assess if he was just teasing her or actually flirting.