by Blythe Baker
“Does Texas have a mafia? You always hear about the mafia in New York and Los Angeles, but the mafia is everywhere, right?”
“He’s not in the mafia, Page! Get a grip.”
“You are usually the one with theories and suspicions, Piper! Why not now? Why are you defending him?”
The truth was, the more I thought about Jude and his actions over the past few days, certain things did stand out. However, my relationship with Page had always been about balance, and now that she was diving off the deep end, it was my job to stand on the edge and secure her harness so she didn’t tumble into the void. I couldn’t follow her or we’d both be lost in a sea of unprovable theories and accusations. One of us had to remain on dry land, and in this moment, that person was me.
I sat my hand on Page’s knee and squeezed. “I’m not defending that jerk,” I said, looking her square in the face so she could see how serious I was. “I just think we need to wait until we have all of the facts. I’m sure we will see him tomorrow and he’ll be able to explain everything. And if he can’t, I’ll kick him in the crotch.”
Page released a choked laugh, and I saw the panic leave her eyes. She looked like herself again, rational and steady, like a flag pole rather than the flag.
We sat up until late in the night, talking, and though Page never admitted it, I knew it was because she was waiting for Jude to show up. I couldn’t blame her. I’d been stood up on a blind date once, and I spent the next several days staring into the eyes of every man I passed wondering whether it was him. Love can make you crazy, and Blaire and Page were great examples of that. It was almost laughable to think that I’d been despairing over my relationship with Mason. My love life was a breeze compared to theirs. Perhaps I should have forced Mason to come over to the house and hang out. That way he could have had a front row seat to the chaos, and left feeling much more confident in our relationship.
When Page went to sleep, I broke our policy and unlocked Jude’s door, ignoring the ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign hanging on the door. I didn’t go all the way in, but I poked my head around the door and saw his duffel bag sitting neatly at the foot of the bed, which was enough for me. Unless he planned to leave all of his clothes behind, he’d be back. And when he showed up, I’d have a few choice words for him.
Page was jumpy all of the next morning. She woke up before me and started breakfast, despite having no idea what was on the menu. When I got down to the kitchen, she had started making everything in the pantry—muffins, bagels, toast, pancakes, eggs, biscuits and gravy. The counters were strewn with every baking dish, pan, and utensil we owned, and I immediately knew I’d be running to the General Store to stock up on everything in the next day or two. We didn’t have another bulk shipment coming for three days, and Page had used up almost all of our eggs. Swallowing my annoyance, I took a deep breath and kept my mouth shut.
“You’ve been busy,” I said, making myself a cup of coffee. If I was going to keep up with Page, I was going to need at least two cups.
She jumped and turned to me, wide-eyed. Upon realizing it was me, she settled. “I couldn’t sleep, and you’ve done breakfast all of this week. It was my turn.”
“I do breakfast every day,” I corrected her. Sure, Page usually helped, but I was the cook. Page had been married for sixteen years, but she’d never been the stereotypical homemaker. They’d lived on boxed meals and the recipes from a cookbook I’d bought her called ‘Three-Ingredient Recipes for the Busy Mom.’
“Well, I’m doing it today,” she snapped. And then, taking a deep breath, “I’m sorry. I didn’t sleep much last night.”
“So you said.” I downed half off my mug, feeling the coffee scald the roof of my mouth, and refilled it. “Any sign of Jude?”
She shrugged. “I haven’t checked.”
We both knew she was lying, but I didn’t want to be the one to point it out. She’d been up so early waiting for him. I knew it, she knew it. I bet Mrs. Harris knew it, even though she hadn’t left the attic in a few days.
“Screw him,” I said.
Page smiled, and we finished breakfast in a companionable silence.
Taking the plates out to the dining room was a different story. Page went through the door just before me—a serving tray of scrambled eggs in one hand, a stack of pancakes in the other—but she came to a dead stop as soon as the door opened. She stopped so suddenly I nearly plowed into her, only a miracle saving the toast, biscuits, and bowl of gravy I was carrying.
“Wha—” I started, but then I saw him.
Jude was sitting at the head of the table, in the same spot he’d occupied the last few mornings, as if nothing had changed.
“That son of a—”
“Good morning, everyone,” Page said, a smile in her voice. She sounded like a cartoon princess, happy and sing-songy. Whereas I was still standing halfway between the kitchen and the dining room, fuming.
When Jude saw Page waltzing around the room, his face dropped into a mask of concern, but Page didn’t even look at him. She delivered the plates to the table and then wiggled past me to go into the kitchen for more plates. I dropped back into the kitchen after her.
“What are you going to do?” I whispered.
“About what?” she asked.
“Jude!” I nearly shouted, and then lowered my voice. “About Jude.”
Page’s face remained neutral. “Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
Page nodded, loaded up her arms with more plates, and walked back through the swinging door and disappeared into the dining room
Compared to last night, this Page was a Buddhist monk. She was totally zen. I shrugged my shoulders and followed her.
Though Page didn’t even glance in Jude’s direction, his eyes followed her around the room, and I could tell he was begging her to look his direction. Finally, after Page refused to see him, he looked at me. I was caught off guard and glanced away quickly, but it was too late. His eyes had asked me to understand, to give him a chance to explain, and I’d seen it. I’d been prepared to walk into the room and hate him. To kick him in the crotch like I’d promised Page, but now I knew I’d have to hear him out. I moved towards his end of the table to deliver my plates, and Jude took his opportunity.
“My phone died,” he whispered to me, grabbing a slice of toast from the plate I set in front of him. “I had to go back to the mainland for some business and I thought I’d be back in time, but I got held up, and my phone died, and I didn’t have Page’s number memorized.”
Dang it. He had a good excuse.
“Do you think she’ll talk to me?” he asked. “Can I fix it?”
I looked at Page. She was focused on Mrs. Smith, talking about the new jet skis they’d just purchased on a whim the day before. I made a mental note to find out what kind of business they’d been in before retirement. Whatever it was, it had been lucrative.
I shrugged. “I’ll see what I can do.”
When we got back to the kitchen, Page turned on me the moment the door closed.
“Why were you talking to him?” she fumed, her eyes red-rimmed. “You weren’t supposed to talk to him!”
I was taken aback, surprised. The last time we’d been alone in the kitchen, Page had seemed fine, if a little tense. Now, though, she was unhinged.
“First of all, he’s a guest. Am I supposed to not speak with our guests? Second of all, you never said I couldn’t talk to him.”
“It was implied, Piper,” Page said, her annoyance making her look remarkably like Blaire. “What did he say?”
I relayed the conversation to her, and then waited.
Finally, Page shook her head. “He could have called the bed and breakfast number. That’s searchable on the internet, and one of us would have answered. He could have left a message.”
I hadn’t thought of that. Though, that also meant that perhaps Jude hadn’t thought of it, either. I voiced this possibility to Page, but she didn’t seem eager to hear it or forgive him.
“If it helps, he looked longingly at you the entire time he was talking,” I said.
“Of course, he did,” Page said, flipping her dark hair over her shoulder. “I’m a catch.”
I laughed, and Page did, too. Then she rolled her eyes. “Is it bad that I really want to go back out there and talk to him?”
“It’s only bad if you think it’s bad,” I said. “I can’t tell you what to do.”
“But what would you do?” she asked.
Page rarely asked my opinion on anything. I’d always been the one going to her for advice, so this was a new experience, and I didn’t want to screw up.
“Well, not to be blunt, but you don’t have a lot of other dating options,” I said, ignoring the dirty look she shot me. “You might as well see this relationship through to its fiery end. And who knows? Maybe this was just a huge mix-up and things will be great and Blaire will have a stepdad.”
Page scrunched up her nose and was preparing to respond when the doorbell rang and interrupted her train of thought.
“I’ll get it,” she said.
She darted out of the kitchen, but curiosity got the better of me and I followed her to the door. The sun was just beginning to burn away the early morning dew, and pockets of fog still hung heavily on the horizon. It was too early for anyone we knew to be coming by, and we didn’t have any new guests checking in for two days.
Page pulled the door open, and revealed Shep standing on the porch, his hand resting dangerously close to the gun holstered on his hip. He never carried a gun. Every time I’d ever seen him, the holster was empty.
“Good morning, Shep,” Page said, smiling and then standing aside to invite him in.
Shep shook his head, and I suddenly realized how tense he was. He looked like Blaire at her sixth-grade spelling bee right before she threw up all over the stage.
“What’s going on?” I asked, moving into the entryway. Something felt off, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. Perhaps it was about my phone call to Shep the night before. Maybe he felt like he had to make a house call to come and put me in my place, remind me that he was the sheriff and I was a citizen. That I had no right to call him and interfere with his investigation. If that was the case, I was prepared to remind him that he’d begged me, not once, but twice to assist him with the investigation and that offered me every right to tell him when he was barking up the wrong tree.
I heard someone tumbling down the stairs and I turned to see Blaire standing there, her eyes nearly swollen shut, still in her pajamas.
“Is it about Matthew?” she asked. “Is he still in custody?”
Shep shook his head. “We released him this morning.”
I sighed. So that’s why he’d come. To apologize. To thank me for sending him along to Katie who probably offered up a clue that led him down a different path.
“Thanks for letting us know,” I said. “You could have just called.”
Shep’s face fell into an unknowable expression, his mouth tense.
“Page Lane,” he said. “I’m going to need you to come down to the station with me. I have a few questions.”
“Okay?” Page said, her voice a question.
“No, wait,” I said, feeling the tension in the air. “What’s this about?”
Shep looked more professional than usual and he was repeating lines from cop shows.
“It’s fine, Piper. He just wants to ask me some questions,” Page said, smiling apologetically at Shep.
Shep looked at me and then lowered his eyes to the ground and I knew. He didn’t even need to say it.
“No, Page,” I said, shaking my head, keeping my voice low. Several of the guests had finished breakfast and were now in the entryway, dressed in swim trunks and cover ups and sun hats, on their way to the beach. “You’re a suspect.”
The words felt silly coming out of my mouth. I had to be wrong. There was no way Shep suspected Page of anything. But I also knew they were true. Shep’s formal behavior and stopping by the house first thing in the morning? It didn’t make sense otherwise. He’d moved away from Matthew, but somehow, he’d stumbled into another absurd theory.
“No, I’m not. That’s ridiculous,” Page said, laughing. But when she looked up at Shep, she seemed to notice for the first time that he wasn’t smiling back. “Isn’t it?”
Shep shook his head slowly. “We have reason to believe that you may be involved—”
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Blaire shouted, running down the rest of the stairs, her pink plaid pajama pants making her look younger than she was.
I grabbed her as she ran for the door, afraid she may lunge at Shep. She hated him enough for suspecting her boyfriend, so I could only imagine how much she despised him now that he suspected her mom.
Just then Jude walked into the room, drawn by the commotion, and I saw Page’s eyes flit to him and then refocus on Blaire.
“This will all be sorted, honey. Don’t worry. I’ll be back in a bit,” she said.
Remembering the promise I’d made to Page after we first visited Shep to tell him everything we knew about the dead man, never suspecting I’d actually have to follow through with it, I caught her eye and winked. “I’ll help. I’ll solve it.”
Page gave me a soft smile, and then, with an audience composed of her sister, her daughter, her romantic interest, and her bed and breakfast guests, Page held her chin high, walked briskly across the porch and down the stairs, and ducked into the backseat of Shep’s outdated patrol car.
CHAPTER 12
Mason assured me for the hundredth time that he had everything handled at the bed and breakfast.
“I’ve answered phones and made beds before,” he said, squeezing my shoulder. “I swear, I can handle this.”
“I feel so bad,” I said, my head tipping forward. I felt exhausted. Since Page had been driven away in the patrol car that morning, it felt like I hadn’t stopped moving. I only ate lunch because Mason shoved a General Store sandwich in my hands and followed me around the house until I’d eaten at least half of it.
“Why? Don’t! This is what I’m here for,” he said.
I shook my head. “You have the mural to work on. The deadline is coming up soon, right?”
“No,” he said, holding a finger in the air, quieting me. “Do not even begin to put my mural on the same level as your sister’s freedom. This is more important. Besides, I’m ahead of schedule.”
I knew I would never get anywhere with him, I would never convince him to leave and go back home. And selfishly, I was glad. I needed Mason there. Blaire was trying to help, but her anger was threatening to shatter into a million pieces at any moment. I needed balance, stability, and Mason provided that.
“Do you know where you’re going to start?” Mason asked.
Trying to pick up the case when it was already moving full speed ahead was tough. I had to go back to the beginning and play catch up, following up on the leads Shep had already explored, try to find anything he could have missed.
“I think so,” I said, shrugging, “but the problem is that I still don’t know why Shep thinks Page may have been involved, aside from the fact that she argued with the man earlier that day. So, I may be following up on something that isn’t even pertinent to the case.”
Mason pulled me into a quick hug and kissed my forehead reassuringly. “You’ll figure it out.”
I smiled up at him, the corner of my mouth feeling heavier than normal. “I sure hope so.”
Matthew was back working the front desk of the Marina, and he straightened up as I walked in, hiding his phone under the desk.
“Don’t hide your phone on my account,” I said.
His narrow face turned upwards in an awkward smile. “Sorry. My parents are cracking down pretty hard since my brush with the law. Blaire isn’t here, by the way.”
“I know,” I said. “I’m actually here to talk about your ‘brush with the law.’”
His face fell. “I don’t kno
w what you heard, but it wasn’t a big deal. I didn’t do what Shep—”
I held up a hand to silence him. “I’m not here to bust you or lecture you. Page is in trouble, and I just need to know if you have the dead guy’s wallet.”
“No,” Matthew said before I’d even finished the question. “I told Shep the same thing. It’s the truth. I’ve never stolen anything from a person’s body. I simply abide by the schoolyard rule of Finders Keepers. Everything I had was only what I’ve found lying on the ground.”
“That’s still stealing,” I said.
“And believe me,” Matthew said, ignoring me, “there is no shortage of thieves on the island. The amount of people who come around looking for purses and wallets and backpacks they ‘lost’ on the ferry is astounding. But wait, what is going on with Page?”
“Have you not talked with Blaire?” I asked. After the way Blaire had cried the night before, I assumed she’d have called Matthew the moment he was released by the police. Though, her mother being arrested may have slightly rearranged her priorities.
“Not since yesterday,” he said, checking his phone and then setting it face down on the desk.
I quickly filled him in on the situation, his face growing redder every second.
“That idiot wouldn’t know how to solve a case if his life depended on it. There is a murderer on the loose, but he had me in his office half the night because of a few lost wallets.”
“Did he reveal any details about the case? Do you know anything that isn’t public knowledge?” I asked.
Matthew shook his head. “Sorry, I did all of the talking. Shep’s interrogation techniques involved asking me the same question over and over. Did you steal the wallet? It wasn’t exactly sophisticated. He didn’t reveal anything.”
Crap. I hadn’t wanted to admit it to myself, but Matthew was my only lead. I’d been depending on him to point me towards the next clue. Without him, I was back to square one, and I couldn’t afford that. Page was in trouble.
“Thanks anyway,” I sighed.
Matthew gave me an apologetic smile and I turned to leave. As I did, though, I saw an elderly couple pass by the window. Mr. and Mrs. Smith. I wasn’t exactly in the mood to make small talk, so I hung back, hoping they’d keep walking and not see me. Instead, they stopped just beyond the large picture window and hunched together, their heads nearly touching. Unable to keep my curiosity in check, I took a few steps nearer the window and peered around the frame. Mrs. Smith was digging in her small, but bulging purse. I almost assumed Mr. Smith was merely helping his wife find something in her purse and turned away, but then she removed a roll of cash.