A Spirited Gift

by Joyce Lavene

  “It was so dark out here when I came out to turn on the generator,” Kevin said. “I never even noticed the garden shed was down.”

  “I guess the ME should be able to tell what happened if they do an autopsy, right?” I asked him.

  “Yes. Scott said her husband is on his way here. Do you want to tell him what you know about what happened?”

  “But not about her affair with her assistant, right? Because I’m not telling Sandi’s husband that his dead wife was cheating on him—even though he probably knows already.”

  “I only asked because you know them. And maybe that would motivate him to demand an autopsy. With everything that happened last night, it would be easy to overlook evidence. I’m sure the medical examiner’s office will have their hands full anyway.”

  I really didn’t want to be the one to tell a grieving husband that his wife was dead, possibly murdered by her lover. I wished someone else could get that job. But Kevin was right. Gramps always said bad news was best gotten from friends instead of law enforcement.

  Kevin and I went inside to take a look at the damage the storm had done to the inn. Scott’s police car was gone from the front, but Barker and David were still holding on to Matthew. The two mayors weren’t so drunk that they didn’t hurriedly hide the scotch bottles they’d emptied during the night when they saw Kevin.

  “I’m surprised you’re still here,” I said to them. “Weren’t you worried about your homes and families?”

  Both the older men shrugged. “Not so much,” David said. “My wife is in Florida with the grandkids this week.”

  “And my wife is busy working on the divorce papers with her lawyer in Raleigh,” Barker explained with a sigh. “If the storm wrecked the house, maybe Loraine won’t want it. I hate living in hotel rooms.”

  Matthew stood up. “I’m getting out of here. You have no right to hold me. I don’t know where Sandi is, but she’s not my responsibility either.”

  “Kevin, this is Sandi’s assistant,” I explained. “Probably the last person to see her alive.”

  “Alive?” Matthew stared at me. “What are you saying? You finally found her?”

  “Yes,” Kevin answered. “EMS took her a few minutes ago. Her husband is on his way. He doesn’t know she’s dead yet. I think you should stay.”

  “No way! He’s not the forgiving type. Sandi said so. And don’t try to make it sound like I had anything to do with killing Sandi.”

  “Who said anyone killed her?” I asked him.

  “I assumed you wouldn’t try to keep me here if you thought it was an accident.”

  “We can all talk about that when Chief Michaels gets here,” I said. “Until then, I think you should stay here as a guest.”

  “You can’t make me,” Matthew charged.

  “Yes she can,” Nancy reminded him as she walked by. “I told you, in the absence of the police chief, the mayor can assume his authority. If she says you stay, you stay. Anyone want some iced tea?”

  Matthew sat down again. He stared out of the window in the bar. He seemed to finally realize that this wasn’t something that would go away quickly.

  I wondered, looking at him, if he was the kind of person who could’ve killed Sandi and tried to cover it up by putting her body in the shed. There was no way to know for sure, but he didn’t seem the type to me.

  Of course my mind jumped ahead to other questions. Why didn’t he walk the extra few hundred yards to the edge of the ocean and dump her in? That was always an easy way to explain any mysterious deaths that happened this close to the water.

  But there had to be other variables too—she looked awfully heavy for his meager frame to carry very far. Maybe he got as far as he could. Maybe he was scared to get that close to the ocean during the storm. I felt sure there was no way anyone could have known that shed would collapse over her.

  I knew from years of listening to Gramps talk when he was sheriff that these things didn’t always make sense—until all the pieces fit together. It would probably be the same way with Sandi’s death. We wouldn’t know for sure what had happened—but we’d find out eventually.

  “You think he’s okay there with the mayors?” Kevin asked me as we walked into the kitchen. “Otherwise, I can lock him up in the root cellar out back.”

  “He’s been there all night. I think Barker and David can handle him.” I was glad to see the kitchen was in order—though lacking most of the fresh food that had been there when Kevin left.

  From there, we headed to the flooded ballroom. The look on Kevin’s face when we walked in was heartbreaking. Knowing how hard he’d worked on the old inn made me feel even worse. I watched him slog through the water and debris to stare out of the big, broken window.

  “What a mess,” he said. “I’m glad I have good insurance.”

  I took a deep breath, not realizing until that moment that I had been worried he might not want to clean up and start over. Not everyone did. Some people came to live in Duck and didn’t make it past the first storm. Kevin had staying power. He was a keeper. That made me smile despite everything that had happened.

  I helped him put boards across some of the windows upstairs. There weren’t any pieces of wood big enough to put across the window in the ballroom. We put a few tarps over it until repairs could be made. At least the damage wouldn’t get any worse.

  I really didn’t want to be at the inn when Sandi’s husband got there. But I felt like I owed it to her. I was the one who noticed she was gone—and had found her body. I hoped that obligation didn’t include telling him about Matthew. It seemed like too much for a person to hear at one time.

  By lunchtime, the inn was cleaned up and all the holes were patched, at least temporarily. With no supplies coming from the mainland, we were going to have to make do for a few days. I knew from past experience that it would be a rough time for everyone, but we’d get through. We always did.

  Some of the mayors came back to the inn, since they couldn’t make it through to their homes and there was nowhere else to go. Motels were full up with refugees. We’d heard stories about houses with roofs missing, cars upside down in the middle of Duck Road and electric poles down across the island.

  The Blue Whale had become a refuge for stranded travelers and local residents whose homes were badly damaged. They kept coming and Kevin found places for them. At lunch, we put together a meal for over two hundred people, many of them strangers. It was one of Duck’s finest hours.

  We were joking around in the kitchen when Shawn Foxx arrived with his two little girls. I knew him right away even though it had been a few years since I’d last seen him.

  “I heard my wife is missing,” he said. “I hope you have some news for me.”

  Chapter 9

  Althea, who was used to dealing with small children at the library, took the two little girls into the next room, promising them ice cream. Everyone else cleared out of the kitchen, leaving Kevin and me to talk to Sandi’s husband.

  I wanted to tell Kevin that he could leave too. This wasn’t his responsibility. But I knew when he pulled up a chair for Shawn and then sat down opposite him that he wasn’t leaving. I was glad to have him there. I’d been mayor of Duck for two years, but I’d never had to tell anyone that their wife was dead. I wouldn’t be involved now except for that feeling inside that I should be the one to break the news.

  “I don’t know if you remember me, Shawn,” I began. “I’m Dae O’Donnell. Sandi and I went to a few conferences together.”

  “Sure. I remember you. What’s this all about, Dae?”

  There was no easy way to tell the story. I told him that I’d noticed Sandi was missing during the night and that we’d found her this morning. “I’m so sorry.”

  He took it well. The only sign that he was upset was a tightening around his eyes and mouth. Of course he’d been a marine for many years. He probably wouldn’t break down and cry in front of us.

  “What happened?” he asked, glancing at Kevin. “
What was she doing outside during the storm anyway?”

  Kevin introduced himself and shook Shawn’s hand. “We’re trying to figure that out. Everyone else was in the lobby, since we felt that was the safest place. We don’t know how she got outside.”

  Shawn’s gaze flickered over us. “What are you saying? You mean someone might’ve taken her outside? What aren’t you telling me? Exactly how did my wife die?”

  At this point I thought it was a good idea to be a public official. “We don’t really know yet. EMS took her to the hospital. I’m sure they’ll do a full autopsy. All we know right now is that Sandi died during the night and we found her outside in a shed. Again, I’m so sorry. If there’s anything we can do—”

  “Can I see her?” he asked.

  “I’m sure you can, but they moved her to the hospital. I’m sorry.”

  “What about her assistant?” Shawn asked. “She didn’t come here alone. Maybe her assistant knows something about what happened. Where is she?”

  I didn’t know what to say. Sandi must’ve told him her assistant was a woman. This was going to get awkward very quickly. “Her assistant is in the bar, actually. We thought it would be best if he waited here until travel was better.”

  “He?” Shawn’s blue eyes narrowed into slits. “What’s his name?”

  “Matthew Wright,” I said, hoping that didn’t mean anything to him.

  Shawn brought his beefy fist down on the tabletop. “I knew it! I told her—I warned her—to stay away from him. I warned him too.” He got to his feet and his chair tipped over. “Where is he? That skinny little runt has a lesson to learn.”

  Kevin stood up too. He wasn’t as big as Shawn Foxx. I hoped there wasn’t going to be a problem between them. “Not here, Foxx. Not now. You’ve got two little girls in there who just lost their mommy. You can rip Wright a new one later.”

  Shawn’s eyes lost that killer look, and he picked up the chair. “Sorry. I knew something was going on between them. She told me it was over. Not like this was the first time for Sandi. I don’t know what it was—she was never happy just being with me and the girls. Wright just happened to be the one this time.”

  I took a deep breath and was glad I didn’t have to tell him that his dead wife had been unfaithful. It was bad enough telling him he had a dead wife.

  “You and the girls are welcome to stay,” Kevin said. “You must’ve had a hard time getting here from Manteo. I know the roads are a mess.”

  They started talking about the storm, and it turned out both of them were volunteer firefighters. I got up and got them both a cup of coffee, glad the tension had eased.

  Marissa was peeking around the corner as I walked by. “Is everything okay? I hope that big guy isn’t going to hurt Kevin.”

  “I think it’s fine now. It was just a shock.”

  “I guess it would be a shock to find out the person you loved was cheating on you.”

  I didn’t say anything, refusing to add to the local grapevine. There were bound to be rumors and speculation about everything that had gone on before and after the storm. The best thing was to leave them alone and not add to the problem. Gossip wouldn’t help find out what had happened to Sandi.

  I looked in the bar after that—Matthew was still there, his head resting against Barker’s shoulder while both men took a nap. I left them alone and looked for other things to do.

  I had just started helping Althea with Sandi’s daughters in the lobby when the front door opened and Mrs. Euly Stanley bounded into the inn. She was an older lady with a shock of curly gray hair that almost overwhelmed her fragile face. Mrs. Stanley was a great patron of the Duck Historical Museum.

  “Dae, we need help at the museum next door. There’s been some damage, and I think we better get it taken care of in case it rains again. Mildred and I are the only ones over there. Thank God we live close by. Think you could spare a few men for us?”

  Althea seemed to have everything in hand with the two little girls. Marissa waved me on when I told her I was going to the museum for a few minutes. I was glad for the chance to get out of the Blue Whale for a while—even if it was on cleanup detail.

  The Duck Historical Museum was right next door to the Blue Whale Inn. It held all the treasures of our sometimes checkered past, from pirates to the present day. Before leaving, I rounded up some volunteers from among the hotel guests who were looking for anything to pass the time. A few bored mayors’ assistants came with us, along with a few Duck residents who’d been put out of their homes by the storm.

  The museum was one of my favorite places. Not that it mattered much in this case. I just wanted to get away from what had become an impossible atmosphere next door. Something ached inside of me when I thought of Sandi dying alone out in the storm.

  Maybe we hadn’t been the closest of friends, but no one should have to die that way. Looking into the faces of her two little girls, I felt heartsick. What a terrible thing for them. At least I’d been an adult when my mother died.

  It would be simpler—safer—to think that the strong winds had collapsed the shed on her. And maybe that was exactly what had happened—once she got outside.

  But Sandi hadn’t lost her ring outside. She’d lost it while she was still in the ballroom. The fear I’d felt from the ring—Sandi had experienced that fear—while she was inside, relatively safe from the storm.

  Maybe I was too emotional about it, I thought as I walked around the museum with Mrs. Stanley, surveying the damage. Maybe I wasn’t seeing clearly. The whole evening had been strange, even for me.

  But why had Sandi been outside in the shed while the storm was raging over Duck? Sandi wasn’t exactly a back-to-nature kind of person. I didn’t have to know her well to know that about her. She’d probably been terrified out there.

  Rationally, I supposed she could’ve run out of the back door after being with Matthew upstairs. Maybe she was looking for a place to be by herself. It was possible she got outside before she’d realized how bad the storm was. Maybe she’d gone into the shed to get away from wind and rain. People had died from collapsed housing many times. There was no real mystery to it.

  I closed my eyes and rested my forehead against the bronze bust of one of our Duck forefathers. I was exhausted. The events of the previous night kept whirling around my head, like the storm had never left. I knew there was no point in going over it again and again. If Sandi was killed by Matthew, the medical examiner would pick up on it. We’d know soon enough.

  In the meantime, I helped scoop water out of one of the rooms that housed a collection of clothes worn by generations of Duck families. There were dresses and suits—even baby clothes, some laid out on chairs and others on mannequins. I swept sand that had come in from a broken window on the ground floor. A few of the men were hammering wood slats—from pallets or whatever else they could find—over the broken windows to keep the weather out.

  The museum was housed in one of the oldest buildings in Duck—the home of Wild Johnny Simpson. It had been donated for the purpose of holding the ever-growing collection of artifacts that was the museum. People of Duck loved their history, and they were proud of it.

  I walked through the rooms filled with paintings, photos, pirate maps, and old letters, seeing all those things I had heard stories about growing up here. I loved the tales of the old Bankers, the pirates and the scallywags. I mourned the hundreds of ships that had gone down in the Graveyard of the Atlantic. They were all a part of me.

  I had that strange, fluttering feeling again as I walked by an old mirror. It was a little corroded on the sides, but the gilt edging was still beautiful. The tag said it had once belonged to Bridget Patrick, a Banker woman who raised twenty-three children here after her husband’s death.

  Floating along the edge of my vision was that strange pinpoint of light again. Seeing it raised the hairs on the back of my neck, and I thought about the strange voice I’d heard when I found Sandi’s body.

  I hastened to remind my
self that the voice must have come from the wild, crashing Atlantic and the call of the misplaced seagulls. But only part of me believed that.

  I needed to see Shayla and talk to her about the things I’d seen. I wasn’t sure exactly what spirit balls were, but one seemed to have followed me from the séance. And I had a feeling it wasn’t my mother.

  Chapter 10

  I said my good-byes to Mrs. Stanley quickly so I could get back out into the sunlight and fresh air. Usually the stale air of the museum suited me perfectly—but not today. I had my gifts and they had nothing to do with seeing ghosts or spirit balls. True, I had invited my mother’s spirit to be with me. That didn’t mean I wanted some strange spectral presence to come by for tea.

  I couldn’t say why I didn’t think the pinpoint of light was my mother—just a feeling. If that strange voice at the shed was any indication, it most definitely was not my mother or anyone else I knew.

  As I walked out of the museum, I passed one of the treasures we’d managed to find through the years—a portrait of the pirate Rafe Masterson.

  He was the last pirate hanged in Duck. He was said to have cursed the area after being tricked into the custody of the local people he’d pillaged and raided. Three hundred years later, people who were born here still saw his malevolent designs in any unfortunate occurrences. Fires that seemed to start on their own, sometimes even storms, were blamed on him and his curse.

  I’d seen this portrait dozens of times, but I never really noticed how lifelike his dark eyes were. They seemed to be looking out at the world around him. His pencil-thin mustache above full lips had obviously been added for drama. He wore a black tricorn hat and a red coat, with heavy black boots on his feet. The cutlass at his side looked deadly.

  It was said he was one of the most evil pirates to sail in the area—killing people for sport, stripping merchant ships bare and lighting them on fire—sometimes with the travelers still aboard.