“Sure, be my guest.” He opened the door to his apartment and walked in, then closed the door behind him.
Liz sat in his chair at the desk and signed on to her e-mail account. She opened the suspect list she’d made at the library and added what she’d learned from Mrs. Ingles. She printed out a copy for her father and herself, e-mailed a copy to Betty and Ryan, then reread what she’d written.
David Worth –—Husband of murder victim. Got stabbed in shoulder, need to find out if it was self-inflicted, but doubtful because he wasn’t arrested. Gets nothing from the will.
Iris Kimball—Needs money to help her mother. Captain Netherton was with her on night of the murder as an alibi. She went in and saw Regina first. Said Regina was choked with an Ace bandage. Had champagne bottle and two glasses in her room—Captain Netherton?
Captain Clyde B. Netherton—Had possible affair with Regina, Iris, and others. Bought Regina expensive perfume. Was with Iris at the time of the murder.
Francie Jenkins—Threw rock at the Worths’ Bentley. Lied about where she was during the murder? Vice president of the Barrier Island Historical Society. Trying to stop the demolition of Castlemara. Her parents were friends of Regina’s parents. Possible affair between Francie’s father and Regina’s mother.
Edward Goren—Former salvager and treasure hunter. Problems with his son, Nick. Alibi?
Brittany Poole—Known thief. Doesn’t pay her bills. Materialistic. Dating Nick Goren.
Nick Goren—Son of Edward Goren. Doesn’t get along with his father. Gave Brittany a piece of jewelry that was in the showcase in his father’s shop, Gold Coast by the Sea.
Someone outside the Indialantic—Knew Regina would be wearing the jewels to Vero Beach Treasure Coast Ball. A simple robbery?
Her father opened the door from his apartment and said, “Lunch is on the table.”
Liz shut down the laptop, pulled the papers from the printer, and went inside the apartment. On the table was a cream-cheese and green olive sandwich and a can of root beer. Her father’s cooking ability was a notch above Aunt Amelia’s. A wee notch.
She sat and said, “Thanks, Dad. I’m glad I got you alone. I wanted to go over some things concerning Regina Harrington-Worth’s murder.”
He raised his right eyebrow. “Why am I sure that I’m not going to like this?”
“Oh, you’ll be happy, because it wasn’t just me looking into things. Ryan and Betty are part of the team.”
“‘Team’?” He sat down across from her.
“We haven’t really narrowed it down to a single suspect. That’s why I want to bring you into the fold. And, of course, with your brilliant mind and close connection to Agent Pearson…I would value your input.”
“I like the way you worded that, but I can’t share anything having to do with the case that Charlotte has shared with me.”
“Okay, then just look at this and tell me if there’s anyone I should eliminate as a suspect?” She handed him the list.
“Eat your sandwich, young lady.”
Liz took a large bite and mumbled, “I have more notes at home that I can e-mail you.”
“Is Betty to blame for this?”
Liz smiled. “And you. Remember the case of Kate’s missing surfboard? You told us exactly what to do. After we set up our sting operation, you were there to intimidate the culprits and get back the surfboard.”
“There’s a big difference between a stolen surfboard and a murder. Plus, I’ve only defended murder suspects, not prosecuted them.”
They heard a knocking at the apartment’s inner door leading into the hotel. Her father got up from the table and answered it. Aunt Amelia, Iris, and Agent Pearson stood in the hallway. Iris’s usually stoic face was tearstained.
“What’s going on?” he asked as they stepped inside.
Before Agent Pearson could answer, Aunt Amelia said, “Iris needs a lawyer. She’s going to be arrested, and I assured her that you would take her case.”
Liz got up from the table. “Arrested for what?”
Agent Pearson ignored Liz’s question. “Fenton, are you going to take her case? I need to know. I have a deputy waiting outside.”
Aunt Amelia came to him and took both of her nephew’s hands in hers. “Everyone needs a good defense attorney, as you’ve told me yourself.”
“I didn’t kill anyone, if that’s what you’re thinking!” Iris shouted, breaking out of her stupor.
“Ms. Kimball, don’t say another word. I’ll meet you at the courthouse,” Fenton said.
“Thank you, Mr. Holt,” she said with tear-filled eyes.
At least he hadn’t said the word “jail.” The courthouse and jail were in the same building.
“And, Charlotte,” he added. “I don’t think you need to put her in handcuffs. Unless you’re charging her with a capital offense?”
“Not as yet, I’m not. Okay. No handcuffs. We’ll see you there.”
Liz saw that one of the pages from her suspect list had fallen to the floor. Unfortunately, so did Agent Pearson.
Before Liz could grab it, Agent Pearson swooped in and snatched it up. “What do we have here?” she asked, adding a tsk-tsk sound.
“That is private,” Fenton said.
She looked down at the paper. “I see Iris Kimball’s name on here.”
Iris shot them a dirty look.
Fenton snatched it from her hand. “Thank you, Charlotte. It’s simply a list of all the people who were around at the time of the murder.”
Agent Pearson didn’t look at him in anger. Instead, the detective seemed to view him as a worthy opponent—the game now afoot. She glanced at Liz, then back at Fenton with a smile. “Well, I hope you aren’t keeping anything from me?”
Liz broke into their moment. “Charlotte, we’ll be willing to go over everything we have learned, if you’ll let us in on a few things you’ve learned, as well.” In all fairness, when Agent Pearson and Liz had first met, she’d been introduced by her first name.
Agent Pearson’s lips turned slightly upward. “‘Us’? Well, I see one thing on your list for suspect number one I can clear up right now—nothing was self-inflicted. But I’m not at liberty to share anything more. And the two of you”—she gave Fenton a chastising nod—“must report anything you know about this matter, or you could be charged with interfering in our investigation.” She took a step closer to a now whimpering Iris. “Perhaps later, I might be willing to sit down with you and your father, but only if you’re forthright with me beforehand.”
Aunt Amelia moved to go with them, but Fenton held her back. Agent Pearson put her hand on Iris’s elbow and guided her into the hallway. Liz heard the squeaking of the housekeeper’s shoes as she scuffled away.
“Stay with Liz,” Fenton said to Amelia. “I want to be there when they bring Iris in. Why do you think she’s innocent, and what is she being charged with?”
Aunt Amelia sat on the sofa and fingered the iridescent beads around her neck. “They say she pawned one of Regina Harrington-Worth’s missing earrings. They have her signature at the pawnshop and even have camera footage of her coming in with an earring and a cat collar with diamonds on it. Iris said the earring was lying on the carpet next to the collar when she went into Regina’s bedroom and found her dead. Iris grabbed them both, knowing that whoever killed Regina would be blamed for the theft rather than her.”
“Did she say any of this in front of Charlotte?” Fenton asked.
Aunt Amelia rubbed her hands in worry. “Yes. Was that a bad thing?”
“Not a good thing, that’s for sure.” He walked into his office and grabbed his briefcase from the floor next to his desk. He turned back before going out the door. “Auntie, did Iris say anything else to Agent Pearson I should know about?”
“Yes. She swore she didn’t murder Mrs. Worth. She said she took the earring and collar t
o get enough money to help her mother get an operation. And I believe her.”
As strange as it seemed, Liz tended to believe Iris, too.
Chapter 33
On the way to the emporium, Liz saw Captain Netherton pull out of the Indialantic’s parking lot in his Ford Explorer, most likely heading to the police station where Agent Pearson had taken Iris. He was Iris’s alibi for the night of the murder and vice versa. Liz thought of Greta Kimball waiting for her daughter to come through with the money so she could have her operation and leave the Sundowner Retirement Home. She understood Iris’s in-the-moment temptation to grab the earring to help her destitute mother. However, Liz recalled when she’d pricked her finger on one the prongs on Venus’s collar and noticed a missing stone. Had Iris been the one who had pried off a stone to verify whether it was a real diamond? Then a vision of the champagne bottle and the two flutes she’d seen in Iris’s sitting room the day before the murder popped into her head. There was definitely someone else in Iris’s life. As soon as her father came back from the courthouse, Liz planned to ask him to call the security company for a copy of the footage for the night before Regina’s death, to see whether he could find Iris’s champagne-sharing guest. The feed on his laptop was only good for seventy-two hours. Liz would also share everything she’d written in her notes involving Iris. She didn’t know if the information would help or hurt Iris’s case, but as Iris’s attorney, he needed to know everything. As for David Worth, his wound wasn’t self-inflicted, sliding him down near the bottom of the list.
After parking the Caddy, Liz walked to the emporium and stepped inside. Kate sat on the bench by the window, whispering into a book. The tips of Bronte’s ears crowned from the basket next to her, and a huge shopping bag rested on the floor by Kate’s feet. As Liz stepped closer, she heard Kate say to How to Care for and Nurture Your New Kitten, “You give good instructions to the newbie owner, but I noticed you didn’t mention you must play with your kitten every day, so make sure Liz can read between your lines.”
Brittany Poole stood next to a mannequin near the half wall to Sirens by the Sea, accessorizing a flowing, tropical-print sundress with a strand of chunky lime-green glass beads. After she draped the beads around the mannequin’s neck, she glanced at Liz, then pointed to Kate. Brittany raised her right hand up to her ear, then extended her pointer finger and swirled it in the air in the universal “crazy” gesture. Clicking her tongue and shaking her head, Brittany turned and walked to the back of her shop. She stood behind the cash register and continued to watch them.
Liz agreed that Kate’s conversing with books was a little on the idiosyncratic side, but Kate had once explained to her that every book written held a certain energy, an aura of connection to the heart and soul of the author who’d written it. As an author herself, why should Liz argue? Kate never cared about anyone else’s opinion. Liz wished some of that confidence would rub off on her. She walked over to the basket, glanced inside, and saw her fluffy gray-and-white kitten nestled atop an apropos Hello Kitty flannel blanket.
“Yay. She didn’t run away and hide in the Bronte section of your bookshelves. That must be a good sign.”
“It’s kismet. You’re meant to be together,” Kate said, then sneezed.
“Bless you!” Something about the ferocity of her sneeze suddenly flipped a switch in Liz’s memory. “Hurry, let’s get out to the car. Chop chop!” She took the basket holding Bronte.
Kate stood and put the book in the bag that held Bronte’s things. “Boy, Liz, you’re sure anxious for a new companion.”
Liz prodded Kate toward the exit, noticing Brittany watching them with a strange look on her face. Liz hoped it had nothing to do with what Liz had just realized. When Brittany had made fun of Kate with her “crazy” gesture, there on her right hand was the same ring Regina Harrington-Worth had been wearing the night Liz had brought her husband’s suitcases up to the Oceana Suite.
Once outside, Kate said, “Okay, okay. What’s the rush?”
Liz kept her mouth shut about Regina’s ring. She knew Kate too well. If she told her, Kate would charge back inside and read Brittany the riot act. “I’m just anxious to get Bronte settled.” Then she told Kate about Iris Kimball’s arrest.
“Wow,” Kate said. “I never saw that one coming. I mean, she really is a sourpuss and all, and knowing about Iris’s mother’s situation, I guess it’s a possibility she even murdered Regina.”
“Aunt Amelia doesn’t believe it. She’s hired my father to be Iris’s lawyer.” Liz wanted to add, Now that I’ve seen Brittany with Regina’s ring, it will play to Iris’s advantage.
Kate opened the passenger door to the Caddy and put the bag of Bronte’s things on the floor. Liz placed the basket on the seat and said to Bronte, “We’ll be home in three minutes.” She adjusted the seat belt diagonally across the basket in case she had to stop short for a crab, turtle, or armadillo crossing the road. She shut the door, then hurried to the driver’s side and got in. Kate came over to the driver’s window and yelled through the glass, “Text me if you hear anything. I have to get back inside. Ryan’s stopping by to help me anchor my canoe to the wall.”
If Liz attempted to manually roll down the Caddy’s window, nine times out of ten, it would get stuck halfway. “Fun times,” she shouted back.
“You know it!” Kate said, completely missing Liz’s sarcasm.
When Liz returned home, she retrieved Bronte from the front seat. Cradling the basket in her arms, she walked up the steps onto the deck. She opened the French door and went inside. Glancing down at the tiny furball, she knew she’d done the right thing. Bronte hadn’t mewed once on the way to the beach house. Liz said, “I won’t let you down, little one. I promise.”
She placed the basket near the sofa and went out to the car for the rest of the kitten’s things. When she came inside, Bronte was perched on the cushioned window seat looking out at the ocean. Liz took a mental snapshot. Could there be a more tranquil, soothing picture than a kitten, a window seat, and the sea? Maybe Liz would become one of those spinsterlike Miss Marples, with a cat, a pair of knitting needles, and no man to complicate things. Liz had always toyed with the idea of penning a “cozy mystery,” as her editor called them. She would use a pseudonym like Betty had, and there’d be little violence and gore, a sprinkling of humor, and a puzzle that was neatly solved, resulting in a happy ending—except for that of the murder victims, of course.
The fact that Brittany had been wearing Regina’s ring meant she was somehow involved in the murder. But Liz’s next thought segued to the fact that not even Brittany would be stupid enough to wear the emerald and chunky gold ring in plain sight—although her boyfriend, Nick, might have been stupid enough to have given it to her after he murdered Regina Harrington-Worth.
Liz made sure Bronte was settled, then she texted Ryan and Betty: Meet me at the Indialantic’s dock in ten minutes. New developments. Liz. Ryan responded with OK, and Betty with a thumbs-up emoticon. Liz set out food, water, and a cat bed, then scattered a few catnip toys on the floor before leaving a sleeping Bronte on the window seat. She hated to leave her new housemate, but she had to share with Betty and Ryan about the ring she’d just seen on Brittany. Before leaving the beach house, she called her father and left a message on his voice mail, telling him about the ring on Brittany’s finger, knowing he would pass the information on to Charlotte.
Exactly ten minutes later, Liz was sitting in her father’s Chris-Craft, Serendipity. At one time, the Indialantic’s dock would have been considered more of a pier. Almost a hundred years later, following a plethora of hurricanes and storms, it had been shortened and rebuilt with enough room to moor ten yacht-sized vessels. Today, besides the Serendipity, only Queen of the Seas and Edward Goren’s skiff were in their slips. Overly kindhearted Aunt Amelia offered dock privileges to her hotel guests, as well as to her shopkeepers at the emporium.
It was perfe
ct weather for a boat ride on the Indian River Lagoon. However, Liz planned to stay dockside, away from suspicious eyes and ears, namely Aunt Amelia’s and Barnacle Bob’s. She didn’t want to go anywhere near the emporium and Brittany Poole. Her great-aunt had enough on her mind between Iris and Pierre. Liz and her father had convinced Aunt Amelia that Pierre needed to see a doctor. Liz’s heart broke when she saw the resignation about Pierre’s condition sink in and bury Aunt Amelia’s sunny resolve and her penchant for looking at the positive side of life.
Betty walked up the dock carrying an umbrella. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky. Betty called out, “You left this in my suite. Thought you might need it.” She wore a pair of white capris and a navy-and-white horizontal boatneck top with a red bandana tied around her neck. On her feet were navy boat shoes. She carried a large white tote bag with an embroidered emblem of an anchor on the front that Liz knew was handmade and purchased from Home Arts by the Sea.
“Thanks, Betty. I rushed out without sun protection.” Liz extended her hand and Betty hopped onto the deck with amazing agility. “You sure dressed for the occasion, but I wasn’t planning on taking us out. There are new developments.”
Betty sat on the stern’s teak-cushioned bench. “Can’t wait to hear them. You couldn’t ask for a more perfect day. You sure you don’t want to take a short cruise out to ‘our’ island?”
Betty was referring to a small uninhabited island south of the Sebastian Inlet. In the past, they would pack a picnic lunch, throw anchor, and wade toward shore. Then they would pretend to be stranded on the island, like in Robinson Crusoe, one of Liz’s favorite childhood reads. The island had shrunk in size over the years from hurricanes and changing water surges. She hoped it even still existed. Liz hadn’t driven a boat since she’d been back, but she was familiar with every nuance of the Serendipity, even down to the correct amount and type of wax to use on the vintage teak deck.
“I’d love to. But I don’t think we should leave port until we sort out all the latest developments.”
Death by the Sea Page 20