by Kendel Lynn
“We argued,” Tucker said, seeming to ignore them. Or perhaps didn’t even hear them. “Last week. Daph wasn’t going to crash the wedding. I mean, at first, that was Jona’s idea. She said it was okay because Juliette first cheated on Daphne with me, why not the other way? But Daphne was torn, you know, with the friendship. Juliette just wanted more and more from Daphne, and the wedding was looming.”
“What about Down the Isle? Did Daphne agree to do another season?”
“Daphne told me she was going to do it with Jona. Take the money and the new show, be the Eligible. Leave us all behind. But then she backed out. She said she’d rather leave the island. Get far away and start over by herself. And I wanted her to leave with me. You know, settle down somewhere, just us. We argued. She couldn’t live with the guilt. Wanted a clean slate without me. I thought she loved me.”
“She was going to tell Juliette?”
“I don’t know. But she didn’t care if she found out. It was all too much. Our fight got ugly. I got mad. I pushed her. Just once. She fell in the parking lot. Her head bounced on the asphalt. And that was it. She was gone. One push. One angry shove and my entire life ended. Right there in a random office parking lot.”
“You called Sam,” I said. “And he helped.”
“He helped.”
The low whoop of sirens grew steadily louder.
Tucker raised his gun. He pointed it at me and I raised my hands.
The sirens stopped. The gun never wavered. Tucker didn’t blink.
The front door slammed, almost like a crash. Footsteps pounded against the floors. The floorboards creaking under the weight.
I sat statue still, not wanting to startle Tucker. I knew he’d heard them, too.
“Tucker,” I said gently. “They’re here to help with Daphne.”
He kept the gun raised. Didn’t say a word.
A half-dozen snaps and scuffs. The sounds of guns unholstering.
Voices shouted for him to put the gun down.
I leaned to my right, ready to bolt.
Tucker moved the gun. He didn’t aim it at my head. He aimed it at his own. And pulled the trigger.
“No!” I screamed and closed my eyes.
The shot was beyond loud. Like saying a hurricane was breezy or a ghost pepper had a little kick. I covered my ears, but it was milliseconds after the insane explosion.
Someone put their hands on my arms. Held me tight. A strong grip on each side.
“You’re okay,” Ransom whispered, barely audible. “You’re okay. You’re okay.” His volume rose ever so slightly. I realized he wasn’t whispering. He lifted me out of the chair and I finally opened my eyes. He blocked nearly everything around me, holding me close to his chest, gently walking me into the house.
We passed Parker and Sheriff Hill and at least a dozen uniformed officers. I felt tears on my cheeks. My legs wobbled, but Ransom kept us moving, bearing most of my weight.
He eased me onto the front porch swing. He slowly rocked. His arm firmly around me, my head still buried in his chest. “You’re okay,” he repeated. “You’re just fine. I’m right here. You’re okay.”
I cried. For Daphne, for Juliette, for Millie Poppy, for Sam. Even for me. I’d battled killers this past year. Terrible people who did terrible things. But Tucker battled himself, and somehow this loss ran the deepest.
Once spent, my sobs smoothed into heavy breaths, then deep meditative breathing. I lifted my face to Ransom’s. He kissed my forehead. I turned and watched the line of police and rescue vehicles in the drive and down the street. An officer directed residential traffic, another cleared a space. One, I knew, that would be used for Dr. Harry Fleet, the medical examiner.
“Is Millie Poppy at the hospital?” Ransom asked.
“Yes,” I said. “I should go tell her. And Juliette and the search teams. Oh my God, Zanna and her family.”
“We’ll take care of them,” Ransom said.
Parker stepped onto the porch, leaned against the railing in front of us. “Can you tell us what happened?”
I nodded, wiped my face, took another deep breath. Eight counts in, eight counts out. I told them what I’d surmised after leaving Millie Poppy at the hospital. Staring out the guest room window. Sam and the flower bed. Tucker appearing in the garden. His confession. The sirens. The gunshot.
“That’s enough for now,” Ransom said. “We’ll talk again later, Parker.”
“I should let you two go,” I said.
“We need your clothes,” she said. She held what looked like a large Ziploc stuffed with pale blue fabric.
My body shook as if she stuck me with a charged electrode. “Is it on my face? In my hair?” My voice trembled with each syllable. Panic bubbled as I stared at Ransom.
“No, honey, no,” he said. “He shot away from you. You’re clean. You’re fine. It’s just your clothes. Soil. Residue. It’s procedure. You know that.”
“You swear?” I asked.
“On all things hand-sanitized.”
Parker helped me in the half-bath just inside the foyer. I checked my face and patted my hair. Ran cool water over my wrists and hands and lightly blotted my face with a paper guest towel. My shaking hands made it difficult to remove my pants, even with the elastic waistband. I donned the scrubs and tied the drawstring tight.
Parker hugged me quick. “He’s right. You’ll be okay. Call if you need me.”
I rejoined Ransom on the porch. “If you don’t need me here, I’m going home,” I said. “It’ll be quiet there. Especially with everyone still at the BBQ. I could really use the peace.”
Ransom wrapped me in a bear hug. “Text me as soon as you get home. I’ll come by tonight with dinner and a bottle of wine.”
“I may need two,” I said.
Driving down Cabana, I tried to keep my mind focused on the positive things. All the people I love. The Ballantynes. Colonel Mustard and Mrs. White. Ransom. Sid. But my mind wouldn’t stay still. It didn’t seem right to let someone else, a stranger in a uniform, tell Millie Poppy that her husband buried Daphne Fischer in their garden. That her granddaughter’s fiancé killed himself in her backyard. My peace would have to wait another hour.
I parked in Island Memorial Hospital’s parking lot and used the automatic swishing doors to the main entrance. The volunteer at the visitor’s desk handed me a guest access sticker and directed me to the third floor. I gripped my compact bottle of hand-sani as I waited for the elevator. It wasn’t much comfort, but it kept my trembly hands busy.
Sam Turnbull lay partially reclined in a standard hospital bed in the intensive care unit. Tubes ran out of his both arms, his nose, and his mouth. Surgical tape held a ventilator apparatus across his face.
Millie Poppy sat near him. Her chair was against the wall, beneath a window. Not at his bedside. She looked distraught, distant. Mad as hell.
“You know about Sam,” I said. “And Tucker.”
“He called me,” she said. “He explained what happened. He’d already called Juliette. Told her over the phone. Sonofabitch. Tess was with her, thank the good Lord. I called the police.”
“That explains how they arrived so quickly,” I said. “The island is small, but the entire emergency crew arrived pretty quickly. For which I’ll be forever grateful.”
“He explained the partial message about the rose garden,” she said. “I guess Sam had also written me a letter.”
I eased into a chair at the foot of the bed kittycorner to Millie Poppy.
“He’d put it in my desk drawer,” she continued. “But Tucker found it this morning. Guess he decided the jig was up. Well, it’s definitely up for him. For them both.”
The ventilator hissed and thumped. Another machine beeped periodically. The only sounds in the quiet room.
“Tucker killed himself,” I said.
&nb
sp; She stared at me for a moment. “My husband…” Her voice choked on the word and tears fell down her face. “He knew. Tucker knew. Juliette cried herself to sleep every night. We spent hours and hours, days, searching the marsh land, anguishing. Where could she be? This whole time, they knew. My God, he killed that girl. It’s sickening. And Sam. How could he sleep next to me? He buried that girl in our garden. I thought I knew this man.”
“I’m sorry, Millie Poppy,” I said. “I’m sorry this happened to you and your family. That you had to find out this way. Alone. That I couldn’t figure it out sooner. Or figure it out at all. It was always just right out of my reach.”
“Oh, sweetie, those two hid it good. That’s the scariest part. How well they pulled it together. They killed that poor girl and smiled at me the very next morning. It makes my stomach turn and my blood boil at the same time. It’s horrifying me.”
“You going to be okay here? Want me to drive you somewhere? I’m sorry, but your house, well, it’s inaccessible for a while.”
“It’s inaccessible forever,” she said. “I’ll never set foot in there again. The girls are picking me up in a bit. I have some paperwork to sign first, then I’m never looking back.” Tears fell down her cheeks in salty streams of anger, devastation, exhaustion.
“But…” I started, though I didn’t know what to say.
“My husband buried a girl in my yard. One doesn’t get over that.”
Two doctors in white coats entered the room and a man wearing a suit walked directly behind them. The older doctor, his hair fully grayed, half-moon glasses perched on his nose, spoke first. “Mrs. Turnbull? You requested DNR papers for your husband?”
“Yes,” Millie Poppy said. “I’ll sign whenever they’re ready. Today if possible.”
“Well, we’d like to speak to you about that,” he said.
The man in the suit stepped forward. “I’m an attorney with Island Memorial. Your husband’s been implicated in the death Daphne Fischer.”
“I’m aware of that,” she said. “But he’s in a coma. One, I’ve been told, he won’t recover from. It’s his right to request a DNR designation.”
“Do you have documentation of this request?” the lawyer asked.
“We hadn’t yet created our living wills,” she said. “But I’ll declare it under oath. That was his intention.”
“You can see how this looks, Mrs. Turnbull,” the lawyer said.
“It’s Pete,” she said. “Millie Poppy Pete. Always has been.”
The doctors looked uncomfortable, but remained silent.
“Okay, then, Ms. Pete,” the lawyer said. “Your husband’s an accessory in the murder of your granddaughter’s friend. His own grandson, now deceased, is also accused. The police notified us moments ago.”
“What are you saying, exactly?” I asked.
“And you are?” he said.
“Elliott Lisbon with the Ballantyne Foundation,” I said. “A close family friend.”
“Perhaps we should discuss this in private,” he said to Millie Poppy.
“Are you implying I want to pull the plug on my husband because he buried a girl in my roses or because I’m the only person left to inherit and I don’t want to wait for him to die on his own?”
“I’m not imply—” the lawyer said.
“How long can he live like this?” Millie Poppy said.
The older doctor cleared his throat. “We can’t be sure. He has minimal brain function.”
“Can he survive without the ventilator?” she asked.
“No, ma’am,” the doctor said. “It’s unlikely.”
“My inheritance is no matter,” Millie Poppy said. “Most of the money is mine, anyway. He’s my husband and I have rights. You cannot simply let him languish because he might also be a criminal.”
“Excuse us a moment.” The three men stepped into the hall to confer.
“Are you doing this for the right reasons?” I whispered to Millie Poppy. “Let the system work. You can’t rush his death.”
“Oh, yes I can,” she said.
The men returned with the older doctor taking lead. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Turnbull, we’ll need to refer this to a judge. You should retain legal counsel.”
“Again, my inheritance is no matter, gentlemen,” she said. “I’m not removing him from life support for personal gain. He’s DNR. You’re the ones with financial motive. How much does it cost to leave him here hooked up?”
“That’s a discussion for another time,” the lawyer said.
“Minimum care, right? Doesn’t cost but a small amount of IV bag changing, take his vitals every so often. Yet, I bet you’ll charge about fifty thousand dollars a day to keep him alive. Against his wishes. Pretty good racket. You’ll make millions. Sounds like you have more motive to keep him alive than I do to sign the DNR.”
“Like I said, you’ll likely want to get yourself an attorney.” The older doctor led the other two out of the room. The door softly swished closed.
“Let him rot,” Millie Poppy said. She grabbed her handbag and walked to the door.
True to her word, she didn’t look back.
EPILOGUE
(Day #23: Sunday Morning)
The sun glittered in the brilliant blue sky above me as I rested on a thin quilt. It covered a ten by ten square of freshly cut grass on the Big House’s back lawn. I was enjoying a bit of afternoon pug therapy. Colonel Mustard and Mrs. White scurried and hopped, almost like bunnies, as I tossed them their toys. The Colonel preferred a sweet little lamb with a gentle squeaker while Mrs. White pounced and dragged a bright red parrot bigger than she was.
Carla, Chef, and Jane were in the kitchen preparing a Sunday brunch. Fried chicken and waffle bites, citrus French toast, egg white frittatas, roasted potatoes. The Ballantynes would soon join us poolside from their residence.
The entire group had treated me as fragile for the past two weeks. I was using Jane as my gauge. Once her caustic demeaner returned, normalcy would follow.
Ransom walked over to the blanket, then sat close to me. He’d no sooner waved two bully sticks when the puppies abandoned their furry playmates and raced to his side. They quickly settled into their cigars. Paws holding them steady while they gnawed their way to euphoria.
“I heard Sam Turnbull passed away on Friday,” he said.
“A relief for all, I’m sure,” I said. “Millie Poppy took Juliette to a cousin’s in Minnesota. Or maybe Kansas? Idaho? Somewhere the crisp, cool fall weather could soothe their souls.”
“Should make the transition easier for them with Sam departing on his own. No courts, no legal issues.”
“Probably too easy for Millie Poppy’s liking,” I said. “Not that I blame her.”
“Sid selling her house?”
“Not personally. Her office is handling both the commercial side for the Cake & Shake and the residential side for the house.”
“We’ll release it as a crime scene tomorrow,” Ransom said. “We were about finished anyway.”
I continued to gaze at the sky. Two fluffy clouds slowly crossed my field of vision. An airplane flew through them. “I’ll call the Spiritual Center. They volunteered a team to smudge the house and the garden. Sid’s office has a team that’ll remodel the backyard.”
“They really think it’ll sell?”
“Rip out the roses, brick the patio, add a big kitchen, some blooming hydrangeas,” I said. “It’s one of the few homes in that neighborhood with direct gate access to the sand. We’ll leave the smudge team’s info. May take more than one cleansing.”
“Sheriff Hill called me on my way over,” he said. “The council is revoking Jona Jerome’s permit. No more Isle House.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Carla said something about a new show in Las Vegas called Lucky in Love. Not sure how they’ll spin it. I know all pres
s is supposed to be good press, but it’s been non-stop bad press. At least it’s their bad press and not ours. For once. Tate Keating’s doing a full-page next week on the Ballantyne’s new homeless shelter.”
“I know you don’t realize it, but you did good on this,” he said.
“I didn’t, though,” I said. “I didn’t solve my case or even help anyone solve it. It solved itself.”
“Don’t underestimate the power of pressure. Your pursuit never relented. You kept pushing for answers. You didn’t let up for a minute. Tucker Turnbull didn’t have the strength to withstand your pressure. You absolutely helped bring Daphne home.”
“Thank you for saying that,” I said. “I think I’m ready to move on. To wash off the melancholy that’s clung to me since I first arrived at Millie Poppy’s three weeks ago.”
He held my hand, gently tugged me to sit up. “Move on?”
“My next case,” I said. “Jane Doe, the girl with the Queen of Swords tattoo. She’s yet to be identified. It doesn’t feel right to abandon her. Not after we found her.”
He stood, then pulled me to my feet. Colonel Mustard and Mrs. White sawed on their bullies without a blink in our direction. “Agreed. But perhaps it can wait until after we return.”
“Oh?”
“I’ve booked us a trip,” Ransom said. “I think you’ll love it. Fresh air, sea breezes, go at our own pace.”
“Barcelona? No wait, Monterey?” I smiled at his smile. “We’re driving down the coast?”
“Yes, we are. And the end will be even better than the beginning. It’s time you got your happy back.”
“Happy? Like the Happiest Place on Earth?”
“A week in the Adventureland Suite,” he said. “We leave next Saturday.”
“What about your case? You can’t possibly be finished with it.”
He placed his hands on my face. His thumbs stroking my cheeks. “It’ll continue without me while I’m gone and be here when I return.” He leaned down and I closed my eyes. He smelled of sandalwood and spice and dreams that come true. He kissed me.