Original Secrets: A Whispering Pines Mystery, Book 3

by Shawn McGuire

  “Just make sure to pad out your gasoline budget,” I suggested.

  “What have we got this time?”

  I led him into the cottage and over to the ladder, explaining that the body was upstairs, and offering what information I had gathered.

  “Climb a ladder. Great.” He put his hand to his lower back and groaned. “Can I ask you to look away? You laughing at me would be a real blow to my ego.”

  “I need to interview a few more people while you’re doing your thing anyway. Your ego is safe.”

  Inside the smaller of the two cabins, I found the other eight people quietly gathered in the living area. I pulled them outside one-by-one and asked them the same questions I asked Lori, Rochelle, and Blake. Their reports closely echoed what the first three had told me. Marissa, my second to last interviewee, corroborated Rochelle’s claim that the two of them were together and that the guys had been driving her crazy.

  Five foot one, pug nose, medium-brown skin, straightened dark-brown hair half twisted in a bun, half hanging past her shoulders.

  “I never once said I was interested in either of them,” Marissa insisted. “Barry was a nice guy, successful, fun to be around, but he wouldn’t leave me alone. It was like an obsession of some kind. Angel can be super-sweet, but he also has a temper. The two of them kept poking at each other.” She let out an exhausted exhale. “We were all super sick of the competition thing going on between them. Guess we won’t have to worry about that anymore.”

  I purposely saved Angel for last. I stuck my head in to the cabin and called him outside.

  Five foot four, bodybuilder physique, hair shaved to about a quarter inch, olive complexion, black-brown eyes.

  “Tell me your full name and give me your contact information, please,” I started.

  “Angel Delgado.” He gave me his address and phone number, but before I could ask anything else, he asked, “So, he’s really dead?”

  “Would that be a good thing or a bad thing if he is?”

  This took him by surprise. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I heard from your friends that you and Barry had issues with each other. Care to comment on that?”

  “Guess that’s a nice way to put it. He knew how much I wanted to go out with Marissa. He kept asking her out anyway, didn’t matter how much I told him I liked her or how many other women he could have.”

  This supported what Lori, Rochelle, and Blake told me. “Barry was a ladies’ man?”

  “I guess. You saw him. He’s like Mr. Perfect. Stinking rich, good looking, party guy. Every girl he ever talked to wanted to go out with him.”

  “Except for Marissa. She told me she wasn’t interested.”

  Angel smiled at that comment but didn’t respond verbally.

  “How long had you and Barry known each other?”

  “We were roommates in college.”

  My turn to be surprised. “You guys were roommates even though you seemed to hate each other?”

  “Didn’t hate each other then. We only roomed together for two years. I dropped out after that. Not because of him. I got an opportunity to open a gym and jumped at it. Barry went on to get a degree in finance or whatever. Ended up making a ton of money in the stock market. Anyway, stuff started between us during our freshman year.”

  “What kind of stuff?”

  “Like, he’d jump ahead of me in the cafeteria line and take the last piece of peanut butter pie even though he hated that pie and knew how much I liked it. Or he’d turn on a football game in our room, but never the teams I liked. And even though he hated football, he’d insist on watching the game just so I couldn’t watch my team. Stupid stuff like that, you know?”

  I got the feeling that Angel told this story to anyone who would listen. Probably even a few who weren’t listening. Right now, he was making my job easy. All I had to do was stand there and take notes. Still, I couldn’t help but ask, “That was just the first year?”

  “Yeah.”

  “And you roomed with him again after all that?”

  “I figured it was easier to deal with what I knew than to figure out someone else. I stopped telling him about what I liked. That way he didn’t know what to go after. Then I screwed up.”

  “How did you screw up?”

  Angel shook his head as though reliving whatever had happened. “There was this girl on the floor beneath us. Damn, she was hot. Really nice too. She and I had lunch together every day for like two weeks. One night I told Barry I was gonna ask her out. The next day she tells me that she’s going to the movies with him that weekend.”

  It sounded like sibling scuffles, like Rosalyn accidentally deleting the television shows I recorded. Once was an accident. Five times? No.

  “Sounds like you have a lot of anger toward Barry.”

  Angel shrugged a muscular shoulder. “I guess.”

  “Barry told me that he got off-track during the swimming race this morning. That race was your idea, right?”

  His expression shifted from annoyed sibling to one I’d seen on determined athletes. Jaw set, arms stiff at his side, hands clenched.

  “It was my idea.”

  “Why? You’re the better athlete, right?”

  “I’m way better, and he knew it.”

  “Then why challenge him?”

  Angel looked off into the pine trees. “Because he was going after Marissa again. He wouldn’t leave her alone.”

  “You wanted to take him down a notch. Best him at something before Mr. Perfect got his way again.”

  He considered this. “I guess.”

  “Did you know he’d swum too far?”

  He laughed, a derisive little snort. “We were just supposed to go to the point and back. It was like, what, fifty yards? Maybe seventy-five. Wasn’t my job to tell him to turn back. Not my fault if he can’t follow directions.”

  “Nobody went to look for him? None of you were concerned when he didn’t return with you and the other guy?”

  “Look,” Angel defended, “it hadn’t been that long. We were getting ready to pull up anchor and go to look for him when Lori saw you coming.”

  “Angel, did you do something to Barry?”

  It took a second for my full meaning to hit him. “He got stuck in those weeds. How could I make that happen?”

  “I mean after you got back here.”

  “After we got back here?” His forehead wrinkled with confusion. “I wasn’t anywhere near him. I wanted to stay out on the pontoon, but he wanted to come back and take a nap like a little baby. Dude shoulda worked out more, focused on his stamina. Everyone else felt bad for him, so we ditched the pontoon. He took a nap, I went for a walk to blow off steam.”

  His voice trailed off, as though the reality of everything was finally hitting him. Since I had no proof anything had been done to Barry, and I got no indication from Angel that he was lying, I ended the interview.

  “How much longer do you expect to be here?” I asked.

  “I don’t know. We’ve got the cottages for another week or whatever, but no one’s gonna want to stay in that one. Not after a dead body’s been in there. Everyone’s probably gonna want to just leave now.”

  “I’ve got your contact information. I’ll call if I have more questions.”

  Angel wandered into the woods, and I found Dr. Bundy waiting for me outside Barry’s cottage.

  “I don’t have anything preliminary to report,” he said. “I’m not going to make any guesses about what could’ve happened to him because I’ve got nothing to go on at this point.”

  “What about the white stuff around his nose and mouth and the blue tint to his skin?” I asked in a hushed tone.

  “I’ll analyze the white substance and figure out the cause of the blueness, but like I said, I don’t want to speculate.”

  We widened the gap between us a few feet as the EMTs came out of the cottage with Barry’s body on a stretcher. I watched somberly as they steered him to the waiting ambulan
ce.

  “Just so you know,” Dr. Bundy informed, “I’m backed up right now. It might be a day or two before I get to the autopsy.”

  “Why so busy?” I asked.

  “Partly staffing issues due to budget cuts and summer vacations. Partly people being foolish. Car accidents, drownings, head injuries because people won’t wear helmets when they mountain bike. If they saw what I saw . . .”

  “Speaking of drowning,” I said, “it’s been a few weeks since I ordered my grandmother’s autopsy report. Any chance you could check on that for me?”

  “A few weeks?” He put a hand to his belly and laughed. “You make that sound like a long time. I’ll look into it, see if I can put a rush on it for you.”

  Chapter 5

  We left the rental cottage area and were about halfway to the station when it occurred to me that I was driving the van. As in, I wasn’t driving the Cherokee because I kayaked into work this morning and now it was well past dark. It was only a few hundred yards across the bay from the marina to my house, but there was no way I would do that in the dark. If I had a bigger boat? Sure, no problem. The creatures that lived in the lake couldn’t tip a bigger boat. At least that’s what my twelve-year-old brain told me. Twelve-year-old Jayne believed that there was a Loch Ness type monster living in the lake that would attack small vessels and swallow the passengers.

  I paused at the station and grabbed my laptop—there was paperwork to do for Barry’s case and I could do that at home—and then debated about grabbing some dinner from Grapes, Grains, and Grub. The village pub served amazing bar food, which sounded really good right then, but I was too tired to eat at the pub tonight, and takeout would be cold by the time I got it home. Hopefully Tripp made something for dinner. The guests who stayed at Pine Time B&B were never going to want to leave. Not after indulging in one of Tripp’s breakfasts. He was an amazing cook.

  I continued west for a short distance along the two-lane highway that bisected the village—the shopping and business district, so to speak, was south of the highway near the lake, and the residential district was north—and took a left at the campground. At the end of the quarter-mile-long driveway, I spotted Tripp sitting outside his popup trailer in the front yard, his portable gas fire pit lighting up his space next to the tree line. The fire had to be for ambiance because he couldn’t possibly need heat. It was still 80-some degrees and humid.

  I pulled to a stop in front of the detached garage and the second I open the driver’s door, Meeka launched herself out of the smelly van and darted to the backyard to chase fireflies and yap at shadows.

  “What are you doing over there?” I called out to Tripp. Our normal routine had been to meet for dinner on the boathouse sundeck and then hang out and talk and take in nature—the lake, the loons, the pine trees. It had been a week . . . no, two weeks since we’d last done that.

  “Wasn’t sure you were coming home tonight,” Tripp called back.

  Sometimes, Tripp got a little pouty when I had to work late. His vision of us running the bed-and-breakfast was exactly that, us running the B&B with nothing else taking time away from it. That had been the plan, then the village council offered me the sheriff position. Those responsibilities would ease at the end of the busy summer tourist season, and I’d be here with him much more often. Hiring a deputy would help. Then again, when it was no longer the busy summer tourist season, we wouldn’t have many visitors at the B&B. We had to come up with an incentive during the winter months to lure people up to Wisconsin’s Northwoods, or we’d be sitting here looking at each other.

  I crossed the yard to Tripp. “What do you think of staging dinner-theater murder mysteries?”

  “In general or . . . ?”

  I laughed as I dropped onto his second lawn chair. My tired body instantly slumped. “I was thinking of ways to get people up north in the winter. We could get a couple snowmobiles and rent those out. There’s also cross-country skis and snowshoes. People love winter sports on a frozen lake. Oh, ice fishing, of course.”

  Not that I would ever sit out on a frozen lake. Hours of watching a bobber in a hole? No thanks.

  “There could be something there. We’ll add it to the list.” He ruffled Meeka’s ears when she stopped to greet him, and then she was off again. “Were there problems in the village today? Is that why you’re home so late?”

  “Not in the village exactly.” I told him about coming across Barry this morning and what had happened to him a number of hours later.

  “Don’t tell me there’s been another murder.” Tripp let his head drop back and stared at the sky as though scolding the universe.

  “I’m not sure what happened. I don’t have reason to believe it was murder, but he seemed okay when I left him this morning. There are a few more people in the village I can speak with, our resident bicycling nun to start with, but otherwise, there’s not much I can do until Dr. Bundy gets back to me with the autopsy results.”

  “You interviewed all of the people he was here with?” My detective skills were wearing off on him. Tripp knew the process almost as well as I did.

  “I interviewed them all, and other than one guy, I don’t think any of them are guilty of anything. Even the one guy is iffy.”

  “This is going to bother you now, isn’t it?”

  “Of course it is. A person I rescued this morning has died, and I want to know why. What if I missed a sign? He almost drowned; maybe I should have insisted that he get checked out at the healing center.” I tugged my uniform shirt free of my cargo shorts. “Right now, I’m starving. Do you know if there’s anything in the refrigerator?”

  “No leftovers. I just hung it up for the day not too long ago so didn’t make anything. I had a sub sandwich. Would you like one?”

  “That sounds fast, which translates to perfect.”

  “I’ll make one for you.”

  I could make myself a sandwich, but his always seemed better. “Thanks. I’m going to run up and change clothes. Meet you in the house?”

  “Roger Wilco.” He stood and gave a crisp salute.

  I wandered across the backyard to the boathouse built on the edge of the lake. A small sliver of the building was on land, but most of the boathouse was over the water. The area above the boat garage was a cozy little apartment I shared with Meeka. It was the perfect size for us with a sleeping area facing the backyard, a small kitchenette and bathroom in the center, and a living area overlooking the lake. I pulled off my uniform shirt and shorts and pulled on a pair of sweatpants cut off at the knee and an oversized T-shirt. I looked like a complete slob but couldn’t have been more comfortable and that’s all I cared about at that moment.

  I had just placed my Glock into its case in my nightstand when I heard Meeka’s claws clacking on the hardwood floor.

  “Ready for dinner?”

  She wagged her tail, turned in a circle, and crossed the floor to stand by her dishes. After putting a scoop of kibble in one bowl and filling the other with fresh water, I stepped out onto the sundeck.

  “I’m going to the house to eat.”

  I said this like the little white dog understood every word. She gave a soft ruff and dropped her face into her dish.

  I left one of the house’s patio doors open a crack, so Meeka could come in if she wanted, and found Tripp in the kitchen. He was just placing my sandwich on a plate along with some baby carrots.

  “Ham, turkey, and roast beef on a 9-grain sub bun.” He presented the plate like a gift to a queen—resting on his outstretched hands, head bowed—then set it on the counter in my usual spot. “A swipe of seedy mustard, Muenster, tomato, lettuce, and pickles.”

  “You say the nicest things to me.” I filled a glass from a pitcher of lemonade in the refrigerator and climbed onto my barstool. Before stuffing the sandwich into my mouth, I asked, “How was your day?”

  “We got a lot done today.” He looked proud of this fact. Getting the B&B up and running was almost a bigger goal for him than it was for me
. “I’m happy to report that the main level is completely done, with the exception of re-staining the floors and filling it with furniture.”

  “Now that is something to celebrate. I should have grabbed a beer instead of lemonade.”

  Tripp opened one of the kitchen cupboards, pulled out a small bottle of vodka, added a generous shot to my lemonade, and then prepared one for himself. He sat on the stool next to me and held out his glass to clink against mine.

  “Here’s to progress being made,” I said.

  He gave me that look. The one that told me that the “progress” he was thinking about had nothing to do with the house. Over the last two months, Tripp and I had become very close. He didn’t hesitate to let me know that he wanted to take our relationship further. My problem was that I had ended a seven-year relationship with Jonah, my ex-fiancé, shortly before coming to Whispering Pines. While the pain of that breakup had dulled to the point that I was pretty much over it, I wasn’t quite ready to step back in to another relationship. I cared too much about Tripp to rush things between us. If I was being honest, and I couldn’t say it out loud yet, I wanted the same thing he did. Just the thought filled me with terror, though. I wanted Tripp to be in my life for a very long time and was scared that if we took things to the next level, something bad would happen and he’d leave.

  “To progress,” he said with a husky voice and a wink.

  Without realizing I’d done it, I had chugged down half my glass of vodka lemonade. To absorb a little of that, I took another huge bite of my sandwich.

  “This is really good,” I mumbled around my mouthful.

  He gave a nod that said he knew I wanted to take the conversation in a different direction. “Would you like to see what we did today?”

  “Absolutely.”

  Leaving my drink on the breakfast bar, I followed Tripp around the main level with my plate in hand, munching my sandwich and baby carrots as we wandered. The dining room was the first room we completed. We had painted every other room on the main level a light blue that perfectly coordinated with the lake, but for the dining room walls we chose a light blue-gray with just a touch of green.