Claw Enforcement

by Sofie Ryan

  “Maybe he didn’t,” I said, picking a bit of cat fur off the front of my pants. “I didn’t actually see him talking to Healy at the bar. I only saw him walking away.”

  “No, he was lying,” Rose stated matter-of-factly. “He spun quite a tale about all the people he talked to instead of Mr. Healy.”

  Charlotte nodded. “I agree with Rose. As I told you before, Robbie always was one to take the easy way out. I was hoping he’d grow out of that.” She sighed softly.

  “I had dinner with Liam last night and I didn’t find out anything useful, either,” I said, “other than it looks like the lawsuit will continue even though Healy is dead.”

  “That’s not surprising,” Charlotte said.

  “I didn’t really get anywhere when I tried to talk to Liam about Joe Roswell. Liam just got . . . well, defensive. He doesn’t believe Roswell could have had anything to do with what happened.”

  “He’s very loyal,” Rose said. She put a hand on my arm. “Why don’t you let me talk to him instead?”

  “I think that’s a good idea,” I said. “What are you going to do about Robb Gorham?”

  “Talk to Stella as soon as she gets back,” Charlotte said. “They’re related somehow and you know whatever Stella has to say, she won’t sugarcoat it.”

  “What else can I do?” I asked. That was a change, I realized. In the past I’d tried not to get involved. Now I was looking for ways to help.

  “I think Alfred would like to see Elliot again,” Rose said.

  “I’d be happy to take him anytime.”

  Rose smiled. “Thank you. I appreciate that and I know Alfred does, too.”

  Mr. P. showed up just before lunch. He had a satisfied smile on his face. I was just coming back from the garage workshop and we walked in together.

  “You look like you had a productive morning,” I said.

  He nodded. “I did.”

  “Would I be butting in if I came and listened while you update Charlotte and Rose?”

  “Of course not,” he said, hiking his already high-water pants up a little more. “You’re part of the team.”

  We gathered in the Angels’ office, Charlotte in her flowered apron because she was about to start her shift and Rose with several pages she’d printed that seemed to be part of the Chamber of Commerce member directory. Mr. P. sat at his desk.

  “I had breakfast with Sammy this morning,” he began. Sam and Mr. P. had been friends for years despite their age difference. They were both well-read and insightful and I’d often thought I’d like to be a fly on the wall when they talked. “I learned quite a bit about Cassie the bartender. For one, her last name is Gibson.”

  I held up one hand. “Wait a minute, Gibson as in Gibson’s Point?”

  Mr. P. smiled approvingly. “Ironically, yes, although Cassie Gibson is a Gibson by marriage only. Her husband is a descendant of Oliver Gibson, a crewmember on a British ship that explored the New England coast back in the early 1600s. Several of the crew stayed behind. Oliver Gibson was one of them. Gibson’s Point belonged to that family a long, long time ago.”

  “So she was angry because Christopher Healy bought a piece of land that used to be in her husband’s family?” Charlotte asked.

  Mr. P. shook his head. “No. That property hasn’t been in the Gibson family for several generations.”

  “But Cassie Gibson did have a reason to dislike Mr. Healy,” Rose said.

  “Yes, she did.” Mr. P. looked over at me again. “You said that Vincent told you Cassie had been hoping to get hired with a crew to learn drywall and crack-filling on another one of Joe Roswell’s construction projects.”

  I nodded. “That’s right.”

  “Well, according to Sammy she had been hired, but then the project was put on hold—no paycheck and no health insurance.”

  I blew out a breath. “The inn project.”

  “Exactly,” Mr. P. said. “When Christopher Healy bought that piece of land, Cassie Gibson lost a salary and the health insurance her husband needs to get back on his feet. Sammy says she didn’t have a good word to say about young Mr. Healy.” A cloud seemed to pass over Mr. P.’s face.

  Rose gave his shoulder a squeeze.

  “It’s a long way from hating someone to killing them,” I said.

  Charlotte nodded. “Assuming she poisoned him—and we don’t know for sure that’s even how he died—what did she use and how did she obtain it? And how did she know Healy was going to crash the reception?”

  “All very good questions, Charlotte,” Mr. P. said. “I have a possible answer to one of them. Cassie Gibson’s sister works at the holistic health center in the building next to Legacy Place. One of the practitioners is a homeopath.”

  “You think Cassie could have stolen something from the health center and poisoned Christopher Healy,” Charlotte said.

  Mr. P. nudged his glasses up his nose. “It’s possible.”

  “Maybe all Cassie wanted to do was make Healy sick, not kill him,” I said.

  “The same thought occurred to me,” he said.

  Rose hadn’t said a word. She looked a little disconcerted.

  “Rose, is everything all right?” I asked.

  She nodded. “I talked to Mabel last night. To see if she’d heard anything. She knows what’s wrong with everyone.”

  I frowned. “Mabel?”

  “My next-door neighbor when I lived at Shady—I mean Legacy Place.” She shook her head. “You’d think a woman with so many ailments would be dead by now, but she’s still with us.”

  I stifled a smile.

  She waved one hand in the air. “Anyway, Mabel mentioned that there had been a break-in at the health center about a week or so ago.”

  We looked at one another.

  “That’s too coincidental to be a coincidence,” she said, quoting the New York Yankees late catcher Yogi Berra.

  Mr. P. adjusted his glasses. “So let’s find out if it is,” he said.

  Chapter 11

  Mr. P. turned to the internet to look for information about the break-in. Rose and Charlotte turned to their version of the information superhighway—town scuttlebutt, specifically all the gossip around town that their various friends and contacts were privy to. Since this wasn’t a task I had the skills for, I went out to the garage to do some work on my mantel.

  Mac had gotten the glass for what I had started calling the ice cream table and was working on attaching it to the top of the metal frame when Rose came across the parking lot. She stopped by the door and looked over the two pink garden benches. “Well. They would certainly get your attention,” she said. She smiled at Mac. “I just came to let you know that you’re having lunch on Monday.”

  He looked at her a little uncertainly. “I have lunch every day,” he said.

  “I know that,” Rose said with just a touch of irritation in her voice. “I mean you’re having lunch at Sam’s.”

  “I am?” Mac still looked clueless.

  Rose looked at me and gave her head the slightest of shakes.

  I pushed my dust mask off of my face. “What time does Cassie Gibson’s shift start?” I asked. I had a lot more experience than Mac did with the conversation veering off on a tangent.

  “Eleven thirty,” she said.

  “Are you sure I should be doing this?” he asked, twisting the screwdriver he was holding between his fingers.

  “Of course,” Rose said. “All you have to do is talk to her. I’ve never seen you have any trouble talking to women here in the shop.”

  Rose was right. Mac was personable and friendly without being smarmy.

  “You can do this,” I said.

  He blew out a breath. “Okay, I’ll take a shot at it.”

  “Splendid!” Rose said. “If you need any tips, just talk to Alfred.” She gave us a sly smil
e. “He’s got game.” She turned and made her way back to the shop.

  Mac was struggling not to laugh. “He’s got game?” he said once Rose was out of earshot.

  I sat back on my heels. “One Saturday morning I came back from a run to see Mr. P. getting the newspaper wearing Rose’s bathrobe and slippers and when he opened the door to her apartment I could hear her singing ‘Sweet Emotion.’”

  Mac shook his head. “That did not happen. “You’re making it up.”

  “It happened and I’m scarred for life,” I said. I wasn’t sure which had been more traumatizing: seeing Mr. P. in a pink ruffled bathrobe and quite possibly nothing else or hearing Rose sing “Cause the backstage boogie sets your pants on fire.”

  Mac couldn’t stop laughing. I pointed a finger at him. “Alfred Peterson’s got the computer skills of a teenager hacker, he quotes Shakespeare like an English professor, and he’s a pretty good dancer. I promise you, he’s got game.”

  * * *

  * * *

  Although Mr. P. and I both wanted to see the piece of property that Christopher Healy owned, getting there seemed to take as much planning as Hannibal crossing the Alps. We were both in agreement that the terrain might be a bit too much for Rose—although neither one of us would have dared say so to her. I was secretly concerned it might be too much for Mr. P., too. In the end, we enlisted Nick’s help and decided not to tell anyone else about our little field trip.

  Nick picked me up right after supper, Mr. P. riding shotgun in the SUV.

  “I feel a little guilty deceiving Rosie,” Mr. P. said as Nick backed out of the driveway.

  “I can stop at Mom’s and you can tell her what you’re doing and why you think she should stay home,” Nick offered. He was obviously enjoying someone else potentially being in the hot seat with Rose since it was often him getting the third degree.

  I smacked the back of his head. “Alfred said he feels a little guilty, not a little crazy,” I said.

  Nick just laughed.

  The sky was low, heavy with dark clouds and the water was rough and angry, crashing against the shore below when we reached Christopher Healy’s land. I could smell the salt in the air. The wind pulled at my hair. I pushed it back from my face and pulled the sleeves of my sock-monkey sweater down over my hands as I folded them across my chest.

  “It’s so beautiful,” I said to Nick. It was, even with the clouds and the wind and the rain not that far away. There were some patches of grass and low stunted bushes on the sand and rocks, but much of the area was bare.

  Nick picked up a smooth, flat rock and turned it over in his fingers. “Don’t tell Liam, but I hate the thought that this place could end up as some kind of a hotel. Do you remember when we used to sneak down there to swim?” He pointed at the shore below.

  I smiled and leaned against his arm for a moment. “I remember.” They were good memories. I looked around. “And I think Christopher Healy was right. This place should be left alone.”

  Mr. P. was standing between us, one hand on the top of his head to keep his hat from blowing away. He had made his way carefully across the windy, uneven terrain and I mentally chastised myself for wondering if he would be up to it. I should have known better than to underestimate him. “I agree,” he said. “There are some places that just need to be.”

  I nodded. There was a wildness to the stretch of land that made me think of huge sailing ships and adventures.

  “I understand why Healy was fighting so hard to protect this piece of land,” I said. I glanced down at my feet and then looked up again to see Nick watching me. “What?” I asked.

  “You’re thinking what I’m thinking, aren’t you?” he said, stuffing his hands in his jacket pockets. “This land is the reason Healy is dead.”

  I pushed my hair behind one ear, but the wind tugged it free again. “I can’t come up with any other reason.”

  Mr. P. nodded in agreement. “Neither can I.”

  “So what now?” Nick asked.

  “You know what Rosie would say.”

  “Time for a cup of tea?” I said.

  Mr. P. smiled. “She probably would say that, although that wasn’t exactly what I was thinking of.”

  Nick tossed the rock he’d been holding out over the water. “Rose would say follow the money.”

  “‘For the love of money is the root of evil,’” Mr. P. said softly. Most people misquoted the line as Money is the root of all evil—something Rose always gently corrected. Whether the line was stated exactly right or not, I knew she believed in the sentiment.

  “So where do we start?” Nick said.

  “McNamara’s,” I replied.

  He frowned. “What does Glenn have to do with any of this?”

  I pulled a strand of hair away from my face. “Nothing. But he does have hot chocolate. And if I’m going to follow the money, or the people with the money, or the people without the money I’m going to need a cup of hot chocolate. A big cup.”

  “Splendid idea, my dear,” Mr. P. said, patting my arm. He and Nick started back to Nick’s SUV. I took one last look around before I followed. Now that we understood Christopher Healy’s passion for this piece of land maybe we’d be able to figure out who killed him.

  * * *

  * * *

  Mac was helping a couple of his friends bring in their boats on Sunday. Jess was having brunch with Liam to continue the dating subterfuge. And Elvis had disappeared into the backyard. I called Michelle and invited her to lunch.

  “I’m sorry for the late notice.”

  “Don’t be,” she said. “Believe it or not, I was just about to call you and suggest the same thing.” She hesitated for a moment. “Can we declare a moratorium on talking about the Healy case? At least for today.”

  “Absolutely,” I said.

  We ended up going to McNamara’s. Most of the lunch crowd had cleared out so we lingered over our coffee and dessert—tiny chocolate lava cakes—regaling Glenn with stories about our not-exactly-misspent youth. I laughed until my stomach ached. I hugged Michelle when she dropped me off and we both agreed we needed to do it again soon.

  * * *

  * * *

  Rose was working Monday morning so we drove in together as usual. Mac had the coffee made and came down the stairs with a cup for me when we walked into the shop. Rose stopped, put her hands on her hips and eyed him. “You’re not wearing that shirt to Sam’s, are you?” she said. He was dressed in jeans and a green-and-blue-plaid shirt. He looked good to me. Then again, he always looked good to me.

  “I’m guessing the right answer is no?” he said, somewhat uncertainly.

  She pressed her lips together. “Well, it’s not that there’s anything wrong with your shirt.” Her tone of voice said there definitely was something wrong with the shirt. “It’s just that it doesn’t showcase your assets.” She thought for a moment. “Where’s that long-sleeved black T-shirt?”

  Mac held up a hand. “Wait a minute. What do you mean, ‘showcase my assets’? Why does what shirt I wear to lunch matter?”

  “Why does it matter?” Rose said, making a dismissive gesture with one hand. “If you were pounding in a nail, would you use the end of a screwdriver when you had a perfectly good hammer in your toolbox?” She didn’t wait for his answer. “Of course you wouldn’t. You’d use all the tools in your toolbox. That’s what we’re doing here.” She started for the stairs. “You don’t have to change until it’s time to leave.” She stopped on the second step from the bottom. “And put on your black jeans.” She disappeared up the stairs.

  Mac turned to me. “I’m already starting to regret this.”

  “I’m not,” I said. “It’ll work out. They know what they’re doing. Don’t panic. Rose won’t do anything stupid.” I counted off on my fingers all the things he’d said to me about the Angels’ other cases.

  He
gave me a sheepish smile. “Okay, I deserved that. Anything else you need to say?”

  I gave him the same kind of appraising look he’d gotten from Rose. “Nope. Just that she’s right about the black jeans.”

  * * *

  * * *

  Mac came downstairs about eleven thirty, trailed by Rose, who wore a self-congratulatory smile. He was wearing the long-sleeved T-shirt and black jeans and he looked great. I was waiting on a customer interested in Mac’s refurbished postal sorting table and it was hard not to get distracted—just to be absolutely certain he looked great from all sides. By the time the customer had decided that he wanted the table and I’d helped him wedge it in the back of his hybrid SUV, Mac had left in his old truck. Charlotte was just coming up the sidewalk. I waited for her and we walked inside together.

  “We’re going to have to wait a bit longer to talk to Stella,” she said. “She’s staying an extra day.”

  “I don’t think that’ll be a problem,” I said. “She’s a bit of a long shot anyway. I’m still not clear on how she and Robb Gorham are related.”

  “Second cousins once removed,” Charlotte said. She frowned. “Or maybe it was first cousins twice removed.”

  I laughed. “Let’s just say cousins and go with that.”

  “I saw Mac go by,” she said.

  “Are you sure this whole sending him to charm Cassie Gibson thing is a good idea?” I asked.

  “Well,” she hedged for a moment. “I won’t say it’s a good idea, but it’s not a terrible one, either.”

  I sighed. “That doesn’t exactly fill me with confidence.”

  Charlotte gave my arm a squeeze. “Mac will be fine. He’s a smart man and what’s the worst that can happen?”

  “Oh I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe she’ll hold Mac at knifepoint and I’ll have to rush her while Mr. P. hits her over the head with a mixing bowl.” I was referring to a previous case that had gone a little off the rails.

  She smiled. She had obviously caught the reference. “Well, lucky for Mac, if that happens, both you and Alfred have already had some practice.”