Lady on the Edge

by Ray Flynt

  Brad wondered what experience Westin had to know Dana was dead and not merely unconscious. He scribbled the details into his notebook. Jim Westin barely took a breath as he recounted the events; it sounded like he’d had a lot of practice telling the story.

  “Do you remember what time you found the body?” Brad asked.

  “Near as I can remember, it was about two-thirty in the afternoon.”

  “I just have one more question, Mr. Westin. Can you recall what position the body was in when you found it?”

  “I sure do,” Jim said, softening from the tone he had taken earlier. “He was layin’ on his side with his right arm tucked under his body, and the left arm stretched off to the side.” Westin demonstrated from his standing position. Both of his legs was bent at the knee, and the left leg was out front of the right one.”

  “Could you see the suicide note?” Brad asked.

  “I thought you said there wasn’t gonna be any more questions. I didn’t read no note,” he barked. “Now I got lots of work to do.”

  “Thanks for your help, Mr. Westin,” Brad said.

  As Brad backed his car down the driveway Jim Westin picked up hedge cutters and began poking at the shrubs in front of his house. But at least one of Westin’s eyes was focused on watching Brad’s exit, as he pantomimed with the clippers over shrubbery already immaculately trimmed.

  Chapter Seven

  Clearly Jim Westin was trying to protect his daughter, but the question he didn’t answer bothered Brad the most. Amanda had shown him the suicide note, but could there have been a second page? And if there was a second page, did it mention Kathy Ann? If so, Westin would have a motive for hiding that information these last four years.

  Most of what Brad had seen and heard still pointed to suicide, but Westin’s stonewalling bothered him.

  Brad located the Hilton Head sub-station of the Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office just before the entrance to Shelter Cove. The station was covered in beige stucco and a half-dozen patrol cars sat in the parking lot. The multi-faceted structure with its red hip roofs could have housed any number of small businesses.

  A shady spot under a live oak tree shielded his car from the mid-day sun.

  Brad offered his business card to a uniformed receptionist at the counter, who alerted Sergeant Miller to his presence by radio. “He’ll be right out,” the receptionist said, even though there was no response to the radio transmission. “He knew you were coming,” the receptionist added. In Pennsylvania, a sheriff is little more than a process server—an arm of the court—but in South Carolina the sheriff, his deputies and officers were the law.

  Five minutes later a tall, sandy haired man who looked to be in his late 20’s and wearing a tan uniform shirt and gray slacks approached from behind the counter. He stood about six feet tall, with a Roman nose, square jaw, and eyes shielded by tinted glasses. The receptionist passed him Brad’s business card which he glanced at casually and twirled between his fingers.

  “Y’all from Philadelphia?” he drawled.

  Brad nodded.

  “I’m Sergeant Josh Miller. Philadelphia? That’s up North, I reckon. Y’all must be a Yankee.”

  The receptionist flashed him a puzzled look.

  Brad’s lips curled into a smile, which he quickly covered with his hand.

  “It says here you’re a private detective. Ain’t South Carolina just a little bit out of your jurisdiction. What’cha’all doin’ down here anyway?”

  Brad laughed.

  Josh Miller dropped the accent and said, “It’s good to see you again Mr. Frame. I figured you’d recognize me, but I’m not sure you remember from where.”

  “You were in my seminar on Advanced Criminal Investigation hosted at the University of Maryland a few years ago,” Brad responded. “Got an A, if I remember correctly. But I thought you went by David Miller.”

  Brad had an excellent memory for names, a trait he inherited from his father.

  “That’s exactly right,” Josh said. “My full name is David Joshua Miller. I started using Josh when I moved down here. I always liked Josh. It was easier to break in a new name in these surroundings. My family still calls me David.”

  “Is there a place we could talk privately?”

  “Sure, right over here.”

  Josh led him to a glass fronted conference room. Once they were seated, Brad reviewed the reason for his visit, fully sharing Amanda’s suspicions of homicide in her son’s death.

  Josh leaned back in his seat and laced his fingers behind his head.

  “I remember the case very well. I was a rookie back then. In fact, I joined the department the summer after I took your seminar,” Josh explained. “The Carothers boy was the second death I investigated down here. The first was a traffic accident. I tried to put everything I’d learned in school into practice on that case. I took a statement from the man who discovered the body, and took custody of appropriate physical evidence. Most important, I protected the scene.”

  “Was there anything which made you suspicious it might not be suicide?” Brad asked.

  Josh squirmed in his seat and brought his hands to his side.

  “That was my first suicide investigation. I’ve only had a couple since—I mean that I’ve personally investigated. They’ve all been different. I was most surprised by the fact that the car doors were locked.”

  Brad was interested in this new detail. “Describe the sequence of events after you arrived at the scene.”

  “The neighbor met me at the top of the driveway, and said, ‘He’s dead.’ The guy, I can’t remember his name—”

  “Westin. Jim Westin,” Brad said.

  “Yeah, that’s right. Westin explained how he’d tried to break a window on the garage door and, when that didn’t work, how he went through the house to open the automatic garage door. He told me the car was locked, and I asked him to go in the house and see if he could find a spare key. While Westin was in the house, I examined the body and saw a piece of paper tucked in his pants pocket. It was the suicide note. I was looking at it when the neighbor came back out with the key to the car. I shoved the note in my pocket before I opened up the car and turned off the engine. After seeing the note, I discounted my initial suspicion about the car being locked.”

  “I heard that you ordered a blood sample taken at the funeral home.” Brad said.

  “Yes, the doctor gave me a rough time. He said it was clear it was suicide, and he didn’t need any more information to certify the death. I told him I was new at this business, and that’s what we had learned in school. I said I could get in trouble with my superiors if I didn’t get a blood sample. Then he consented.”

  “What were the results of the tests?”

  “Negative. No drugs, no alcohol.”

  That news surprised Brad. “Amanda said, and the funeral director verified, that you took charge of Dana’s clothing and personal effects and returned them to Mrs. Carothers a few days after her son’s death.”

  “That’s right. When I still thought there might be foul play, I figured I better hang on to the stuff.” The deputy elaborated. “I stuck the clothes in a bag and the personal items in another one and sealed ‘em with evidence stickers. After the drug tests came back negative, there was no need to keep them. Summerfield’s called me a day or two later saying Mrs. Carothers was asking about her son’s personal effects. They were a little messy, if you know what I mean. I washed the clothes first before I took them back.”

  Brad nodded.

  “I understand there were bruises on the body on the forehead and leg. Did you examine those bruises and form any opinions?”

  Josh stroked his chin as he thought. “Yeah, that’s right. You already know more about this case than I’ve forgotten. The bruises were another reason I was initially suspicious. But everything we found was consistent with the position of the body. There wasn’t any trauma that couldn’t be explained from his collapse to the concrete floor.”

  “So yo
u concluded the case was suicide?”

  “That’s right. There was really no other assumption to make.”

  “What about motivation?”

  “For the suicide, you mean?”

  Brad nodded.

  The officer shrugged. “Nothing definite. There were rumors he broke up with a girlfriend, but nothing specific.”

  “Any major unsolved crimes dating from the time of Dana’s suicide?” Brad inquired.

  Sergeant Miller squinted, and then shook his head. “I see what you’re getting at, but nothing I can recall. I’ll go back and look, and let you know.”

  “Thanks. Josh, I appreciate your time,” Brad said, wrapping up the discussion.

  They stood, exited the small conference room and returned to the receptionist’s desk where a uniformed man with graying hair stood looking at a clipboard.

  “Lieutenant DeWine, I’d like you to meet Brad Frame,” Josh said.

  Brad shook hands with the officer.

  “Mr. Frame taught a criminal investigation seminar I took in grad school,” Josh explained. “Maybe we could get him to do a training session for our department sometime?”

  The Lieutenant smiled noncommittally.

  “I learned so much from that seminar,” Josh continued eagerly. “For our final exam he set up a mock homicide scene in an apartment. The whole class had to comb the place for clues and determine who did it based on the physical evidence and profiles Brad supplied us on the most likely suspects. We had one chance at naming the murderer, and it was pass/fail. Fortunately for me, I passed.”

  Brad looked at the Lieutenant and winked. “Well, I never held the ‘bullet in the apple incident’ against him.”

  Josh laughed, a hearty rumbling belly laugh, which turned a few nearby heads. “I thought it would be funny to give an appropriate tribute to the teacher,” Josh explained to his Lieutenant. “So one day I shoved a spent .38 cartridge into an apple and left it on his desk.” Turning to Brad he asked, “How did you know I did it?”

  “I didn’t. You just admitted it,” Brad said, as Josh’s face flushed. “Watching your red-necked performance earlier suggested you were the joker responsible.”

  It was the Lieutenant’s turn to laugh.

  “It was good to see you again, Josh,” Brad said. “Good luck.”

  Chapter Eight

  Brad returned to Beth’s beach house by 1:45 p.m., but found no Beth and no note. The second golf cart was gone, so he figured she’d gone shopping. He sat in the great room and picked up his e-reader onto which he’d downloaded Anatomy of a Suicide, hoping to get a better sense of the psychology behind a person who decides to end their life—and especially in cases where there are no advance warning signs. After an hour of speed reading, he was no closer to explaining why Dana Carothers would have killed himself.

  He grabbed a beer from the refrigerator, his notebook, and an envelope with items he’d picked up from Amanda and Homer Summerfield and headed for the deck.

  The Carothers’ case gnawed at him: The plaintive look on Amanda’s face, the sadness that seemed to infuse every pore of Kathy Ann Westin, and his sense that Jim Westin wasn’t telling the whole truth about Dana Carothers’ death.

  Still he worked in a profession that relied on facts not emotions.

  Brad’s focus shifted toward plans for that evening, a romantic dinner after which he’d give Beth the engagement ring he’d had specially designed. It featured a two carat diamond to which the jeweler had added two oval-shaped sapphires that once graced his maternal grandmother’s engagement ring, ironically, a ring he’d inherited when his sister Lucy was brutally murdered.

  He watched as a tour boat chugged south on Calibogue Sound and decided he could get used to the sunshine and sea-scented air. Brad swigged his beer before studying the copy of Dana’s hand-written suicide note.

  I’m sorry for any pain I’ve caused you. I only hope that in time you’ll be able to forgive me.

  Love

  On re-reading it, it sounded like a tag line to a longer message, and Brad speculated anew that Jim Westin had purloined the first page of the suicide note in hopes of sparing his daughter.

  How could he find out the truth? Maybe if Kathy Ann hadn’t been in the vicinity, Jim would have been more forthcoming. Maybe another visit to Westin; or perhaps he could just share his theory with Amanda and let her coax the full story from Westin.

  Brad turned his attention to the property list Homer Summerfield had copied for him.

  BEAUFORT COUNTY SHERIFF’S DEPT.

  PERSONAL PROPERTY INVENTORY

  RECEIVED FROM: Summerfield’s Funeral Home - Bluffton, SC

  Dana Carothers’ belongings

  Clothing:

  1 Cotton T-shirt - blue

  1 trousers - denim

  1 belt - leather/brown

  Personal Property:

  1 handkerchief - Rt rear denim pocket

  1 wallet - w/$10 bill/ Lft rear pkt

  1 set keys - Lft front pkt

  1 piece paper (suicide note) Lft front pkt

  Cash: $4.68 - Lft front pkt

  1 comb - Rt front pkt

  (signed) Josh Miller

  Sergeant, Beaufort County Sherriff’s Office

  Finally he spotted what he was looking for—an out of place item—keys in Dana’s left front pocket.

  He felt a rush and reached for his cellphone. He dialed Sharon’s number, and when she answered, he said, “How soon can you be in South Carolina?”

  Chapter Nine

  Friday evening’s dinner could not have been more perfect.

  Bistro 17 was an impeccable choice. They had a seat next to the window, and as the sun set over the harbor, orange clouds streaked the horizon. The chef’s special of grilled tuna served on a bed of couscous with a medley of fresh vegetables was scrumptious. Beth loved the flowers he ordered for their table, and when the waiter served her a cappuccino and the pianist began to play All I Ask of You from Phantom of the Opera, Brad produced her engagement ring.

  Beth screamed, drawing the attention of nearby diners who saw the broad smile on her face, spotted the ring box and burst into applause; quickly followed by a symphony of forks clinking wine glasses until Brad stood and kissed her.

  He completely forgot about Dana Carothers.

  He also forgot to tell Beth that he’d invited Sharon to join him for the investigation—a tactical error.

  Brad was up early and dressed. He checked text messages and found one from Sharon confirming that she’d caught an early flight from Philadelphia to Atlanta, and would leave there on a regional jet bound for the Hilton Head Island Airport.

  Beth joined him for a breakfast of French toast that he prepared especially for her. She looked radiant, he thought, and her new diamond sparkled as she sat with her left hand poised over the right.

  As they finished breakfast, Beth was still gushing. “That was like a fairy tale last night,” she stared at him with dewy eyes. “You know, like you’d turned a pumpkin into a glass coach just for me.”

  Brad smiled, looked at his watch, and said innocently, “I’m not sure what your plans are for today, but I need to meet Sharon’s plane at 11:20.”

  Frost quickly formed on the pumpkin.

  “What?” Beth plopped her coffee mug on the kitchen table. “Diane at Re/Max is expecting us at 11:30… you know… to sign the paperwork for your offer on the house.”

  Brad shrugged. “I didn’t know.”

  “Yes you did,” she said sharply. “I mentioned it on the boat over to Hilton Head last night.”

  “I must have had other things on my mind.” Brad tried to laugh it off

  “And you never told me about Sharon?” Beth glanced at her watch, and in a softened tone said, “I’ll see if Diane can meet an hour later. I’ll go with you to the airport, and we can swing by her office after you drop Sharon at her hotel.”

  Brad sensed a mine field ahead.

  “Uh, I figured Sharon could stay here.”r />
  “Oh, Brad.” She stood and tossed her napkin on the plate. “It’s not your house yet.”

  She marched into the great room, and Brad called out, “Our house,” just as the door to the master suite slammed shut.

  Brad winced.

  At 10:20 a.m. Beth exited the bedroom, purse in hand, and announced. “We’d better get going or we’ll miss the ferry.”

  They sat in silence as Brad drove the golf cart to the ferry landing.

  While on the boat, Beth informed him that she’d rescheduled the appointment with the realtor for 12:30 p.m., and added, “Sharon will just have to wait for us.”

  Brad took that as her tacit, if not wholehearted, agreement that Sharon could stay at the beach house. His intent in inviting Sharon was to free up his time. Sharon could do at least half of the legwork, and with her staying at the beach house it would be easier to confer, thus giving him more time to spend with Beth.

  He only hoped Beth would see it that way, but wasn’t sure as they rode in chilly silence from the ferry dock to the airport.

  Unlike the Philadelphia airport, Brad didn’t have to walk a half-mile between the parking lot and the terminal. He found a recently vacated spot directly in front and he and Beth walked through the entry, turned toward the baggage claim area, and spotted Sharon walking toward them, her luggage in tow.

  Brad watched as Sharon shifted her gaze between him and Beth as she approached, and when she got close looked quizzically at them and asked, “What’s wrong?”

  Chapter Ten

  “I hope you’ll be comfortable in here, Sharon,” Beth said as she showed me a bedroom on the second floor of her Daufuskie Island beach home.

  The airy room had a queen-sized bed and a two-tiered bunk in the corner. Judging by the Iron Man posters on the wall, the last occupants of the bunk beds were thirteen-year-old boys.