Luna-Sea

by Jessica Sherry

  “Are they reliable gossips?” I tried.

  Raina shrugged. “I don’t know. Don’t listen to ‘em most of the time. Look, there’s you again.”

  I stepped into the lobby from the hallway, bothered by what I’d heard in the bathroom and the events unfolded as I remembered them: Clara and her gang cornered me; Delores Kenning moved from the bathroom, back to the lobby, and out the door; Valerie and Jason Kent engaged in their heated discussion; Hugh Huntley offered me a second drink; Jason Kent took a shot and drifted back into the crowd, leaving his angry wife alone at the bar; in the far right corner of the room, David Love confronted Lucius Kayne; then, Valerie Kent dashed through the lobby; David Love became more agitated, and the crowd shifted away from their confrontation; Hugh Huntley grabbed my hand and asked me if I was okay; Wake escorted Love out; then, me, sliding off my barstool, and giving Clara and her cohorts some parting thoughts; Lucius Kayne left the building; then, I dashed out of the ballroom, through the lobby (almost falling on my bottom); moments later, Delores re-entered the lobby, looking over her shoulder as if the demons had followed her inside.

  “Gosh, sorry I missed this party,” Raina lamented. “Wish we had audio.”

  “The next couple of minutes are very important,” I told her.

  “What are we lookin’ for exactly?”

  “We are looking for what, or rather who, we don’t see,” I explained.

  Raina gasped. “Well, I’ll be!”

  “What?”

  “Looky there,” she said, pointing to the very top of the bar frame. A smiling Lucy Monroe was edging her way into the hallway. “She’s givin’ somebody the come-and-get-me look.” I ogled the bubbly blond as she winked at someone across the room. She disappeared down the hallway, and Jason Kent followed her. The two waited until the coast was clear, and slipped into the room at the end of the hall.

  Raina and I gawked at each other.

  “I can’t believe it!” I spouted.

  “Honey, men cheat on their wives all the time,” Raina reported.

  “I know, but you didn’t see him, how upset he was when Valerie was robbed,” I tried to convince. “It was like his whole world had just been rocked off its foundation. Made me tear up to see a man that affected.”

  Raina shrugged. “The only thing ‘ffecting him at that party is Lucy Monroe.”

  “When I was out on the deck, a light flicked on and off in that room.”

  “Well, you know those two weren’t outside,” Raina reasoned.

  “Yes, but they could have seen something,” I replied, “and just couldn’t admit it. Now I know why Kent didn’t want anyone watching the footage. So, while I was encountering the woman, a few people were missing from the party. The Hulk, Ed Wakefield.”

  “And Ricky,” Raina pointed out. “He ain’t been there for awhile.”

  “Right, Ricky, the volcano,” I decided. “He has an anger problem. David Love. Valerie Kent. Lucius Kayne.”

  “And the love birds, but we know where they are,” Raina added. “Chances are that none of them had anything to do with your missin’ woman, though.”

  “That’s true, but anyone absent from the party before or during my run-in with the woman could have seen something.”

  “You’re gonna talk to all those people?”

  I shrugged. I didn’t want to. The mole crab hides and lets the information filter in. Seeking it out was a whole different ballgame. “I don’t know.”

  Back in the ballroom, Chris eyeballed his phone, slid his finger against the screen a few times. Rachel yammered on, gesticulating and laughing, while her group of busty friends grimaced near the fireplace. Clara and her group had just received a new round of drinks, and toasted, probably to the demise of Beach Read.

  Then, I appeared at the sliding glass doors. The party blinked out like a lightbulb. Hugh Huntley got to me first, followed quickly by Chris, Rachel, and Clara. Chris led the group to the back deck while Hugh Huntley went to the bar to call the police.

  Much of the crowd stayed behind, giving each other confused looks. I was led back into the ballroom by Hugh Huntley, followed by Chris, Clara and others who had gone outside. Lucius Kayne was with us and Jason Kent quickly joined, like he was just coming back from the bathroom. His mistress snuck out of the party through the lobby, bypassing the ballroom altogether.

  Wake showed up in the lobby several minutes later. He breezed passed the valets, and headed to the back hallway like a man on a mission.

  “His knuckles are dirty,” I observed. Raina and I watched as he pushed the button for the elevator. “Where is he going?”

  The police arrived. Detective Lewis looked smug and annoyed as he made his way to the complaining witness, and even moreso when he realized it was me.

  “Holy cow!” I belted out. I stopped the disc and set it back a few seconds. “Check that out!” I pointed to the elevator where Wake had just gotten inside. “Did you see that?”

  “See what?”

  I played it for her again. She shook her head. “I don’t see nothin’ but an elevator.”

  “Watch the floors change.”

  We eyeballed it again and watched as L flashed suddenly to 5. “The video skipped.”

  “You sure?” Raina asked. “Didn’t seem like it skipped.”

  “When I watched the elevator earlier, it showed each floor as it passed – L, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. I’m sure of it. Wake’s elevator went from L to 5,” I explained.

  Raina nodded. “Okay, well do the other cameras skip?”

  We repeated the footage over and over, painstakingly eyeing each screen for abrupt changes.

  “Ah, check out the lobby,” I instructed, backing the recording up once more. The grand clock over the front desk – a gorgeous gold, blue, and black peacock, of course – went instantly from 11:37 to 11:41.

  “So, there’s four minutes of video missin’ from the lobby and the hall,” Raina decided sitting back in her seat. “Can’t do much of anythin’ in four minutes.”

  “It’s long enough to hide something,” I replied.

  “Ain’t like they could slip that redhead in through the front door with all those people ‘round,” Raina pointed out.

  “You’re right. Seems improbable that someone would go to the trouble of erasing four minutes of recording in the lobby being that there are at least fifteen witnesses standing around there.”

  “Hallway, too, for that matter,” Raina added. “It’s not as crowded as the lobby but bein’ that the bathrooms are back there, there’s been a steady back and forth of people all night.”

  “The four minutes could just have been a technical glitch.”

  “Unless, they’re coverin’ up somethin’ that wouldn’t be obvious to people in the room,” Raina considered slowly, “but might be obvious durin’ a double-take.”

  I considered what she said, but sighed after a minute. “Fact is, this has only posed more questions, and hasn’t led to any concrete evidence that the woman was there at all.”

  Raina shrugged. “Least you know that it wasn’t no run-’a-the-mill party. You got weird stuff comin’ outta the woodwork. Anythin’ coulda happened and probably did.”

  Viewing the footage had only made this whole situation worse. I should’ve left it alone, should have just stopped pursuing it, but no. Once again my stupid curiosity had wasted my time, efforts, and energies, not to mention made me look like an idiot.

  But, still.

  Raina left for home not long after we finished watching, leaving me to pace the apartment. It was after 11:00. The streets were starting their eerie fade with only a few stragglers spilling out of bars or loitering outside of restaurants. A mountain of work awaited me at the store. Work could have been perfect therapy right now – a chore for my nervous energy.

  But, no. I didn’t pick up my computer to work on Frankenstein conversation starters. I didn’t start framing the creepy images I’d printed off the Internet of Shelley, her family, and gothic cemeteries
and old mansions. I didn’t even pick up the copy of the book to finish my re-read.

  No, not me. Not Delilah Duffy, expert mistake maker bordering on lunatic. I grabbed my keys and rushed to the Jeep.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Finders, Keepers

  An Ancient Roman law states that if an item is abandoned, it can be legally snatched up by a new owner, hence the expression “finders, keepers.” It’s also a nautical idiom, referring to shipwrecks and their lost (then found) treasure. Once recovered, the treasure belongs to the finder.

  The footage urged me to find more answers. It was after 11:00 when I pulled into the quiet lot of the Peacock. But, a hotel’s lobby is always open. I approached the front desk, mentally composing an excuse for snooping, when Hugh Huntley waved to me from the corner of the bar. Smiling, I headed to him instead.

  “Ms. Duffy, what a pleasant surprise,” he greeted. “I was just closing up, but I’d be glad to offer you a nightcap.”

  “Oh, no thank you, Mr. Huntley,” I replied.

  “What brings you out this evening?”

  “Curiosity. Can I take a look at the room on the corner?” I pointed toward the left of the building.

  Hugh Huntley pinched his bushy, gray eyebrows together. “Do you mean the study?”

  I nodded. Mr. Huntley smiled and tossed his cleaning towel on the counter.

  “Yes, let me escort you,” he said, coming around the bar. “I expect it’s vacant at this time of night.”

  “I know it’s strange,” I admitted as we walked toward the back hallway, “but I was just thinking about the party, and the woman, and all the possibilities.”

  “Ms. Duffy, strange is absent from our vocabulary here at the Peacock,” Hugh Huntley smiled, “as true hospitality is serving without questions or judgments.” He opened the closed door at the end of the hallway, and switched on the light. A Hemingway-style study, with bookcases that reached floor to ceiling, was a feast for my eyes. A dark leather couch and matching chairs occupied the middle of the room, mahogany tables filled in the spaces in between. The back corner of the room was all windows, braced by a window seat, and it afforded a wide-open view of the outside that was obstructed by the glare from the lights.

  “Indulge me, Mr. Huntley,” I said, flipping the light back off. I let the darkness settle, and then moved across the room to the window. I banged my leg against a side table, but bit my tongue so I wouldn’t cry out like a sissy girl. With the light off and the glare absent, I could see the deck that wrapped around the house, the stairs I had stumbled down, and out onto the backyard where patches of grass gave way to shrubbery, then thickets and trees.

  “Might I ask, what you are looking for?” Mr. Huntley said as we stood in the darkness.

  I sighed. “I am trying to determine if a very awkward conversation is in order. With the lights off, you can see quite clearly.”

  “Yes, but there shouldn’t have been anyone in this room during the party,” he replied. “Quite honestly, no one really uses this room. Mrs. Kayne wanted a quiet reading lounge for guests and designed it herself.”

  “It’s lovely.” I made my way back to the door and turned the light back on.

  “She enjoyed it,” he noted.

  “How long have you worked here?”

  “Ah, one loses count,” he replied with a soft chuckle, “twenty-two years.”

  “You must know the family very well,” I urged. Bruce Wayne’s loyal butler and secret-keeper, Alfred, came to mind.

  “As much as one could, I suppose, in my position,” he agreed.

  “The night of the party, I saw how Mr. Kayne snapped at you because of the wine,” I told him. “Is he usually so curt?”

  Mr. Huntley paused, and said, “Did Mr. Kayne behave curtly? I don’t recall.”

  I smiled. “And Chris? You’ve been here since before he was born. I bet you have fond memories of his childhood.”

  “Mr. Chris has always been a joy,” he said, almost too robotically. “He used to come behind the bar and perform experiments with the seltzer water.” While Mr. Huntley spoke about young, master Chris, I toured the room, picking up picture frames and knick knacks, eyeballing the books, taking it all in.

  “What about that guy Wake? He seems like an odd sort to work here.”

  Mr. Huntley nodded. “Quite.”

  “Has he been here as long as you?”

  “Not as long,” he explained, standing very upright at the door. He was so accommodating that I was pretty sure I could ask him to fetch me the paper and some cookies and he would, with a smile as if thankful to have a wish to grant. “I admit, the man isn’t very conversational, but he keeps the grounds and takes care of odds and ends for Mr. Kayne. I don’t think we’ve exchanged more than ten words over the last ten years.”

  A silver picture frame on a high shelf caught my eye. I had to reach up on my tiptoes to get it. Though it wasn’t very old, the picture was black and white.

  I chuckled. “This is really cute.” Two boys around the age of eight dressed in costumes. A young Chris Kayne wore a floppy suit and a scowling expression. He held a cane and hunched over like an old man. A glob of light clay had been slathered on his nose, making it stick out like a beak.

  The other boy also wore a suit, with a neatly tied bow tie and a pocket watch chain drooping across his midsection, but stood erect, holding a book and a test tube. He wore wire-rimmed glasses, completing his studious look.

  “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,” I breathed out, amused. “Chris wasn’t kidding when he said it was one of his favorite books.”

  “Mr. Chris enjoyed acting out scenes with his playmates,” Hugh Huntley returned. “Mrs. Kayne loved that picture, and insisted that it be here in the study as an encourager to read good books.”

  I smiled. “I like her style.” I returned the frame, and then plopped down on the couch, running my fingers along the leather admiringly. One day, maybe I could have nice things like this, I mused. I had better start investing in the lottery. My hand fell on soft fabric. I grabbed it, and pulled it from behind me. A tie, dark blue, silk.

  “Finders, keepers,” I told Mr. Huntley.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Losers, Weepers

  Finders, keepers, losers, weepers is also a children’s rhyme. The same concept used to claim sunken treasure and important archeological finds also settles playground disputes. And when delivered in a snarky, sing-song voice, it can be particularly upsetting to the victim who may have only set an object down for a second to have a smart aleck swoop in and claim it. The problem with the finders, keepers, losers, weepers law, both in adult and children’s worlds, is determining a fair explanation of abandonment. How long can something sit untouched before it’s up for grabs?

  After a short attempt at sleep that didn’t end well, I rose from bed, showered, dressed, and made it to the police station by 8:15, beating Jason Kent to work. I waited in the quiet lobby adjacent to the room of cubicles that looked too normal to be the hub of real police work. But, as Sam liked to say, real police work is done on the streets, not at a desk.

  I’d called Sam this morning, a couple of times yesterday, only to get his voicemail. I hadn’t heard back. In his type of work, situations didn’t always allow for breaks to call needy girlfriends. But, I hadn’t seen him or talked to him in over twenty-four hours, making me feel abandoned, just as I felt during our almost-night together.

  Though I’d succeeded at the finders, keepers part (Kent’s silk tie was in my purse, waiting for the big reveal), I felt more like I belonged to the losers, weepers group.

  I tried him again. No answer.

  The last twenty-four hours of my life hadn’t allowed for breaks either. In between turning Beach Read into a gothic shrine, I’d scoped out David Love’s shop, spied on a drug deal, watched security footage until I was bug-eyed, and snooped out the study at the Peacock. I’d had three solid hours of sleep in as many days, and I was about to confront the Chief of Police about h
is affair. What was I thinking?

  I stood up, shaking my head, and was about to race out of the precinct when I heard, “Ms. Duffy?”

  Jason Kent waved me toward him. He carried a stainless steel coffee mug, briefcase, and a stern, haven’t-had-time-to-drink-this-yet expression. I could relate.

  “You wanted to see me?” he questioned, bypassing all the chitchat and pleasantries I’d hoped for (mainly to calm my nerves).

  “Yes.”

  He cast me a questioning look, and then pointed down the rows of cubicles. “Let’s go to my office.”

  Jason Kent did, in fact, have a real office. At the end of cubicle row, he unlocked a door with his name on it, and led me inside. He motioned toward one of the chairs in front of his desk, identical to the one I’d just spent twenty minutes waiting in, and I plopped down, trying to recall what wise gem of my rambunctious thinking had steered me to do this in the first place.

  “Have you remembered something significant about my wife’s case?” he urged.

  “No, not really. How is she?”

  “Well, you know Val,” he breathed out, “always a fighter.”

  I didn’t know her, not well, but that fact was abundantly clear. I nodded, the tension in my heart rising. “She’s feeling better?”

  “The concussion’s better, gash is healing, but she also cracked a rib,” Kent listed. “That’s going to take the longest. The worst part for her is taking it easy. Sitting still just isn’t in her vocabulary. So, what can I do for you, Ms. Duffy?”

  Kent sat at his desk and eyed me as my mind flurried to figure out where to start. The plan I’d concocted (and that had sounded so good) on the way here vanished from memory. Confronting a man about his affair wasn’t as easy as my natural distaste made it out to be.

  I shifted in my seat, and then flubbed. “Have there been any cases of graffiti on the island recently?”

  “Um, no, not lately. Why?”

  “At the party, I noticed the Kayne’s mermaid fountain had been vandalized-”