by Lee Hollis
Still, Hayley sensed Aaron was being distant on the phone.
And she knew it had to do with Lex.
As for Lex, Hayley continued to deliver home-cooked meals to him while he was on the mend, dropping them off at his apartment above the drugstore on Main Street. Lex had been discharged from the hospital and was told to finish recuperating at home. Hayley made sure just to set the food down on his dining-room table and beat a hasty exit to ensure no one got the wrong idea. She just didn’t want Lex chowing down on Milky Way bars and drinking Budweiser while he was unable to shop for any food of nutritional value.
When Hayley arrived at Drinks Like A Fish, Randy was tending bar and chatting with Sabrina, who was propped up on Liddy’s usual stool and sipping a dirty martini. Hayley walked over and sat down on the stool next to her. She immediately spotted some smeared mascara on her face and knew Sabrina had been crying.
Randy looked at his sister solemnly. “The usual Jack and Coke, sis?”
Hayley nodded and Randy left them to go make her drink.
“Sabrina, what is it? What’s wrong?”
Sabrina pulled a tissue out of her purse and dabbed her eyes. “It’s just been a little tough for me lately. A lot of pressure at work and . . .” Her voice trailed off.
“I know things haven’t been so great between us these past few months, Sabrina, but you can tell me what’s bothering you. Maybe I can help.”
“I never like to talk about my personal life and my marriage to Jerry. . . .”
Ever since they had reconnected, all Sabrina did was talk about her personal life and her complaints about her marriage to her artist husband, Jerry.
But now was not the time to remind her of that.
“He says I nag him all the time about not having a real job. How can he say that? I am fully supportive of those ridiculously expensive artist retreats he goes on, and I barely say a word when I’m out the door at seven A.M. and he sleeps until noon and then quote-unquote paints all day—even though when I get home, the canvas looks exactly the same as when I left it that morning.”
Hayley found it hard to believe that Sabrina said barely a word to her layabout husband. However, she just nodded and gently patted Sabrina on the back. “When one spouse is the sole breadwinner, it’s bound to cause some friction.”
“It’s not just that. We’ve grown apart. I worked until midnight last night, conducting an autopsy, and when I got home, Jerry didn’t even bother waiting up for me or leaving me any dinner. I had to microwave a Lean Cuisine. And this morning he went skiing with his buddies, without even saying a word.”
The autopsy.
Garth Rawlings.
Hayley couldn’t ask about it.
That’s not why Sabrina invited her here.
But she was dying to know.
“Somehow it was okay when I was enjoying my job, but lately I’ve been feeling unfulfilled and underappreciated and part of me just wants to open my own private practice and forget about working for the county. I’ll make more money. I’ll have more freedom.”
“You have to do what makes you happy, Sabrina. Life’s too short,” Hayley said.
Randy delivered Hayley’s drink, and sensing the private moment between them, scooted to the other end of the bar to pour some tap beers for a couple of fishermen.
“But the idea of leaving Jerry and suddenly being alone, and also overhauling my entire career at the same time, would be just too daunting.”
“That’s why they call it a ‘fresh start.’”
“Do you think I should leave Jerry? This would be my second failed marriage.”
“Matt cheated on you. How is that your fault?”
“Matt said I was too career driven and I wasn’t home enough, so he found comfort in the arms of his yoga instructor.”
“And his sales rep. And his chiropractor.”
“And Jerry doesn’t seem to want me around at all. He says I disrupt the flow of his creativity.”
“Maybe the problem is your choices in men. You jumped from Matt to Jerry in a matter of months. Maybe you need to take some time alone to figure out what kind of relationship you really want.”
Sabrina turned to face Hayley.
Hayley feared she had insulted Sabrina and braced for a lecture about her blatant insensitivity. But instead Sabrina simply raised her martini glass and clinked Hayley’s glass with the Jack and Coke.
“You’re right. It’s them, not me.”
Not quite what she meant.
But why not go with it to keep the peace?
“Thanks for listening, Hayley.”
“That’s what friends are for.”
Normally, Hayley would choke on those words. She had a hard time letting go of Sabrina’s treatment of her in the past. Plus she was never really a big Dionne Warwick fan. But right now, in this moment, she felt sorry for Sabrina and what she was going through.
“Now I suppose you want to hear about the autopsy?” Sabrina said, signaling Randy at the other end of the bar for another round.
“Sabrina, that is not why I came here tonight. I know your work is confidential and you can’t talk about it.”
“Please. Those bastards I work for leak details to the press all the time. Why shouldn’t I be loose-lipped, especially when the details are so tantalizing?”
“They are?” Hayley asked casually, pretending not to be on the edge of her seat, but salivating with curiosity.
Randy set another dirty martini down in front of Sabrina, which thrilled Hayley, because she knew the more the county coroner drank, the more likely it was that she would eventually spill all of the juicy details.
Fortunately, she didn’t have to wait too long.
One sip and Sabrina was off and running. “I noticed severe trauma and bruising on Garth Rawlings’s body. Something hit him really, really hard. His internal injuries were so bad, they were more in line with a car crash victim or someone found under a heavy fallen object.”
“That’s surprising. There was nothing around the kitchen that suggested he was hit or anything fell on him.”
“Well, he had a broken rib and a hole in the left atrium of his heart. Oh, not to mention a blow to the chest that was so severe he would have bled out in about thirty seconds.”
Hayley gulped her drink down. This was not just surprising. It was shocking. Especially since she initially agreed with Sergio.
Natural causes.
Garth just had a heart attack.
“What does all this mean, Sabrina?”
“It means I’m ruling his death a homicide.”
Chapter 14
After Hayley said good night to Sabrina, she ran to her car and called Sergio on her cell phone to tell him the news, but he had already read Sabrina’s official autopsy report.
“It doesn’t make sense,” Sergio said. “The physical evidence just doesn’t add up.”
“Unless Garth was beaten to death somewhere else and the killer returned to the warehouse with the body and carefully placed it on the floor,” Hayley offered, trying to be helpful.
“But the door was locked. He had food cooking in the oven. His dog was there. Everything points to him being in the warehouse alone at the moment he died.”
“Someone might have had a key and let himself or herself inside and then killed him. But if some sort of violent struggle took place in the warehouse kitchen, why would he be dead on the floor with a lit pipe in his hand? And wouldn’t Lex’s crew next door have heard the commotion?”
“Maybe. Maybe not. They were drinking beers and listening to music at the time, which might have drowned out the sounds of a fight. They all stated that they didn’t hear anything until the fire trucks arrived.”
“So, where do we go from here?”
“First thing I need to do is find out who else had access to the warehouse, which means talking to Rawlings’s widow.”
Tiffany Rawlings.
“Sergio, Tiffany Rawlings and I have done a few bake sale
s and bike rides to raise money for breast cancer awareness. We have a pretty good relationship, so I thought maybe . . .”
“Yes, Hayley. If you really think she will be more comfortable answering my questions with you there, then by all means come with me.”
Actually, Hayley wasn’t 100 percent certain Tiffany would feel more comfortable. But at the very least she could offer her condolences and be there if she needed a shoulder to cry on, since Sergio had a tendency to ignore the feelings of a victim’s loved ones and focus entirely on the interrogation at hand.
Sergio picked Hayley up at her house late Sunday morning and they drove over to the Rawlings residence, just outside of town in Otter Creek, a large two story frame house located a few hundred feet off the main road in a woodsy area. Tiffany had made it clear she would not miss church services and would only accept visitors after the noon hour. When she greeted Hayley and Sergio at the door, she was dressed in a black dress, with white pearls hanging around her neck. She wore her normally wavy long brown hair in a severe tight bun. She was clearly in mourning, as this was not the Tiffany whom Hayley knew from the bake sales and bike rides. She was usually much more provocatively dressed and a free spirit.
Hayley instantly felt pity for the grieving widow.
Tiffany led them into her living room, where she had set out some tea and freshly baked scones.
“Thank you for seeing us, Tiffany. I know this is an extremely difficult time,” Hayley said.
Tiffany nodded and motioned for them to take a seat on the couch. She sat down opposite them in a floral-print upholstered chair.
“I just have a few questions I would like to ask,” Sergio said, barreling ahead in his “bull in a china shop” kind of way.
Hayley kicked his foot with her own and he slightly winced.
Tiffany didn’t notice. She was staring at the mantel above the fireplace, gazing at a framed wedding photo of her and Garth on a beach in Hawaii. “I can’t believe we were married fifteen years. It seems like yesterday when we took the plunge in Maui. We still had so many plans. . . .”
Hayley sensed Sergio was about to speak, so she kicked his foot again. Sergio turned to Hayley, who glared at him, silently ordering him to give the poor widow a few moments to remember her husband before so callously diving in with his questions.
“We were going to expand the business. Maybe open a restaurant next summer. We were drawing up plans to build a new house in Seal Harbor. And, of course, we wanted to travel more and see the world. Just last month Garth received an invitation to teach a course at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris. Can you believe that? I’ve never been to France.”
“That’s such an honor,” Hayley said. “You must have been so proud of him.”
“I begged him to take better care of himself—to give up tobacco, exercise more—but he was so stubborn. I go to the gym five times a week. Him? Never. I always feared his smoking and those rich, heart-clogging sauces would finally catch up to him.”
Tiffany lifted the silver teapot to pour them some tea.
Hayley and Sergio exchanged a quick look.
Sergio cleared his throat. “Mrs. Rawlings, I’m afraid your husband did not die of a heart attack, as we originally believed. His death has been ruled a homicide.”
Tiffany dropped the teapot and it crashed into the half-full teacup, knocking it over and spilling tea all over the service tray. “What?”
“We just received the coroner’s report last night.”
“It can’t be,” Tiffany said, eyes welling up with tears. “Who would want to hurt Garth? He was a loving husband. A decent man. He had no enemies, to speak of. The coroner is wrong. That’s the only thing that makes sense. We all know she’s been wrong before.”
“I read the report,” Sergio said. “Based on her findings, the evidence unequally suggests—”
“‘Unequivocally,’” Hayley said.
“Unequivocally suggests someone killed him,” Sergio said, rolling his eyes at Hayley. “And at this point, I’m inclined to believe her. We’re just having a hard time figuring out how it happened.”
“But everybody in town loved Garth!” Tiffany wailed.
That was a tough sell. Anyone with a passing familiarity with Garth Rawlings’s personality would wholeheartedly disagree with his distraught widow.
“There must have been someone, Tiffany, maybe from Garth’s past who might not have believed he was a swell guy at some point,” Hayley said.
“Well, yes, of course. I mean, when you’re as successful as Garth, you don’t get there without stepping on a few toes. But that’s all in the past now. All was forgiven.”
“Who are we talking about?” Sergio asked, leaning forward.
“Ken Massey.”
A local businessman. Very successful. Owns a few restaurants and t-shirt shops frequented by the summer tourists.
“Garth and Ken had a falling-out?”
“When Garth was starting out, he didn’t have the capital to get the business going, so he brought in Ken as a silent partner. Ken paid the initial investment. When the catering business started making money, Ken tried to take control and dictate everything, and it got ugly for a while. Garth felt like Ken was keeping him in a straightjacket, but that was years ago. Ken went on to start a number of other successful businesses, and he finally agreed to let Garth buy him out.”
“Was there any bad blood between them after the buyout?” Sergio asked.
“No, not at all. They have long buried the hatchet, and Garth and I had dinner with Ken at the Town Hill Bistro just a few months ago, before they closed for the season.”
“One more question, Mrs. Rawlings, and then I promise we will stop bothering you. Were your husband and Ken still partners when he rented the warehouse space?”
“No. Why?”
“So he wouldn’t have had a key to get inside?”
“No, absolutely not. My husband had a few faults and one of them was paranoia. He was always terrified that someone would steal his recipes and his trade secrets, so he never gave anyone a key to that warehouse. He kept the master key in a safe here at home. I don’t even know the combination. Trust me, it could not have been Ken.”
Ken Massey didn’t have the best reputation in town. He’d been called a “snake,” a “cheat,” and much worse by the people he plowed over to make his fortune.
Sergio didn’t look as convinced as Tiffany Rawlings that Ken was a completely innocent party.
And, frankly, Hayley wasn’t inclined to believe it either.
Ken was a smart, driven, can-do guy.
If he wanted to gain access to Garth Rawlings’s warehouse kitchen, he would most likely have found a way.
Chapter 15
After they left Tiffany’s house, Hayley drove over to the local True Value hardware store, where a Christmas tree farm had been set up behind the building by a local Boy Scout troop for locals to shop for the perfect tree to take home and decorate for the holidays. They also sold homemade ornaments, festive colored lights, wreaths, swag, and garland. It was like one-stop shopping.
Hayley was in need of a new Christmas tree skirt. While she had been making eggnog in the kitchen, Blueberry had eaten some strands of tinsel and had thrown up all over her old skirt. The stain came out easily enough, but Hayley didn’t want to have to think about placing her wrapped presents on top of something that used to smell of kitty vomit.
She parked her car across the street and headed over to the lot, where about a half-dozen people were perusing the various trees in all shapes and sizes. Paul Applewood, the rosy-cheeked, pudgy, balding manager of the hardware store, greeted Hayley with a smile. “I thought I already sold you a tree this year, Hayley. Something wrong with it?”
“Oh, no, Paul, I just need a new skirt for the base. You have any nice ones left?”
“Got a real pretty one with a reindeer print the wife just finished last night. It’s around back, underneath the big pine tree next to my truck.”
&nbs
p; “Thanks, Paul,” Hayley said, smiling, before walking through the tree nursery to the back of the hardware store.
She heard a man’s frantic, hushed voice as she rounded the corner.
“I don’t know what the police chief wants, but he called my cell and left a voice mail asking me to come by the station to talk to him!” the man said.
Hayley recognized the deep, scratchy, manly-man voice immediately.
It was Ken Massey, Garth’s former business partner.
“I heard on the car radio this morning that the coroner ruled Garth’s death a homicide! What the hell am I going to do if Chief Alvares thinks I had something to do with it? He’ll never leave me alone!”
Hayley followed the sound of his voice through a thicket of trees. She finally spotted Ken—a tall, distinguished-looking man, with graying temples, in a black waffle-knit ski jacket. He paced back and forth, with his Android phone jammed to his ear.
Hayley sidled up next to a very thick spruce tree, which hid her from his view. She crouched down and continued to eavesdrop on his conversation.
“You’re my lawyer! I was hoping you’d tell me what to do!” Ken wailed before catching himself and lowering his voice. “We both know I can’t be implicated in this. It would ruin me!”
Hayley leaned forward into the spruce tree, moving some branches aside to get a closer look at Ken on the other side. He was rubbing his eyes and shaking his head.
“This is bad, Ted. Really, really bad,” Ken moaned.
“Hayley, did you hear a word I said? The Christmas skirts are all the way around back. You’re not even warm over here.”
The voice startled Hayley and she lost her balance, falling into the tree, which tipped over and crashed to the ground just inches from Ken Massey, who spun around, alarmed.
“What the hell!” Ken cried.
The sight of Hayley lying in front of him on top of a fallen spruce tree suddenly clicked in Ken’s mind and his face soured. “Ted, I’m going to have to call you back. Bar Harbor’s very own ‘Miss Marbles’ just showed up on the scene.”