Dead Man's Carve (A Tickled to Death Mystery Book 1)

by Kym Roberts

  Life was about to get really hard for him — of that I was sure.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Officer Martin was the third officer to arrive. I was pretty sure one of the others called him to the scene because of his previous dealings with the crazy broad in the center of everything. Namely me. But for now, he stood in front of Lucky Drugs Pharmacy interviewing Brendan, who’d handled the whole situation much better than I had.

  Betty and I sat on the porch swing of my store (that I’d felt compelled to sterilize first just in case someone had used it for a motel room last night) and stared at the yellow plastic blanket in the middle of the road, waiting for Officer Martin to finish getting the scoop. I found it ironic that just a couple of days earlier I’d signed a violation against the victim for trespass, and now he was dead. A few detectives arrived and there was some pointing and head bobs this way and that way. I finally got tired of it all and turned to ask Betty the question I was dying to know the answer to.

  “What were you doing here tonight?”

  “Wh — what? Did you ask what I was doing here tonight?” She fidgeted with her hands, in a way that made me even more curious. The woman feared no one.

  “Yes.” I wasn’t in any mood for games. I just wanted her to answer my question.

  “She was here to see me.” My dad’s voice broke the ice forming between us as he exited the front door of my shop.

  “Dad!” I jumped up to hug him like I did when I was nine and my pet rabbit died. “I’m so glad you here.” His flannel shirt felt as soft against my cheek as it did when I was a kid and I found myself not wanting to let go.

  “I would have come the first time you found a body if you’d have called me. You would think by the time the second one rolled around you would have learned how to dial your phone. Betty’s taking better care of you than you do yourself; she called me.” His voice was stern, but by the way he clung to me, I knew he was just as scared as I was.

  I pulled away as tears began to fill my eyes. I did not want to cry over a man I didn’t like. Tommy, however, was a different story.

  “What do you mean, Betty’s here to see you? Are you giving her a carving lesson?”

  Looking over the top of his glasses, dad’s eyebrows raised. I looked at Betty wondering why he wouldn’t answer the question, but Betty only had eyes for my Dad.

  I realized I was about as dense as a fifty-foot Alder tree.

  Dad was dating Betty on the not-so-sly, but I’d been too wrapped up in my own problems to see it. “Oh.” I managed to spit out.

  The two seemed to get along very well, despite Betty’s brash humor and my father’s conservative demeanor, but I’d never thought of them dating. By the way they looked into each other’s eyes now, though, I could tell they were ready to let the world know the truth.

  Officer Martin approached me, along with a female detective wearing a navy jacket, white blouse and hip hugging khaki pants adorned with a silver badge at the waist. From the bulge on her right hip, I had no doubt there was a firearm concealed underneath her jacket. Her gait was confident, not masculine, yet lacking the sway held by most women.

  “Ms. Dust, I’d like to introduce you to Detective Maury from the Homicide Unit. She wants to get a statement from you.”

  Officer Martin stepped back as the detective moved forward and offered me her hand. She met my eyes and gave a firm handshake, two notches to her credit. “Ms. Dust, if you could come with me, I’d like to get some information.” It wasn’t a request, but rather a pleasantly delivered command.

  “Of course.” I walked beside her toward an unmarked White Ford Crown Victoria and met Tommy’s gaze across the street as he sat in another unmarked police vehicle. A cleft formed on his otherwise smooth brow. He actually looked as though I’d hurt his feelings.

  As if sensing the turmoil between us, Detective Maury turned sideways in the car, effectively blocking my view of the vehicle across the street — and Tommy. She went through the usual questions — my name, date of birth, address and social security number — before asking what had happened that evening.

  After I went through the whole story for the second time, I told her about the watch. “The watch on the victim’s wrist. I’ve seen it before. On Ryan Hart, my customer who was hit by the train last week.”

  She nodded and wrote something down on her notepad. “What makes you think it’s the same watch?”

  “Because when I saw it, it reminded me of the Tag Hauer I bought my … my fiancé the Christmas before he died.” I twisted the wedding ring on my finger, surprised I’d acknowledged my lack of vows. Maybe it was because I was giving an official statement. Or maybe I’d actually moved—

  “And you’re sure it’s the same watch?”

  “I can’t say definitively, but the letter ‘R’ was engraved on Ryan’s watch. Just like the one on Carl’s wrist. I’m sure Ryan’s fiancé could identify it.” Missy and I had a lot in common. If she didn’t give Ryan the watch, then she knew exactly where he got it. There was no way she wouldn’t know the watch that had been worn by the man she loved with all her heart.

  Detective Maury nodded her head still writing information down. Then she asked, “Did you see Tommy Keyes driving the truck?”

  “No. I was focused on the victim in the middle of the street.”

  “Did you see him strike the victim?” She pushed.

  I was beginning to get concerned, but I was forced to answer, “No,” a second time.

  “Did you see Mr. Keyes get out of the truck?”

  Again, I had to answer with a resounding, “No, but maybe Brendan —”

  Her mouth turned down at the corners as she shook her head. Brendan hadn’t seen any of it. “Mr. Keyes says he ran to help you from the bar, but didn’t know his truck had been stolen until you pointed it out to him.” Detective Maury watched for my reaction.

  It was a bold-faced lie, wasn’t it? But how could I prove it? All of the images I’d been watching for the last couple days came back to me. “Bob’s Books has video of everything in town!” I practically screamed.

  “Excuse me?” Detective Maury was beginning to look at me like I was nuts, so I quickly explained the video set up and the news feed to the Portland television station. Her bored brown eyes twinkled, even though her demeanor remained aloof.

  After a few more questions, Detective Maury stepped out of the vehicle and met her partner and Officer Martin in the middle of the street with the coroner, the very man who’d ruled Ryan’s death accidental. They obviously discussed the possibility of video, then Detective Maury approached the news crew standing at the end of the street while her partner and Martin located the cameras on Bob’s store and looked up and down the street to see the angle the cameras captured.

  I couldn’t help but check on Tommy sitting across the street — head back against the headrest with his eyes closed, he looked defeated. I hoped he stayed that way.

  Maybe. I wasn’t sure. The guy I liked was still inside there, somewhere. A few minutes later the Detective Maury converged with her partner before they headed back to their respective patrol cars. Neither one looked very happy. I didn’t think I was going to be either.

  She sat down and again turned sideways in the car. “There’s no video.”

  “What do you mean? He’s got cameras pointed at everything.” I argued.

  “The lines have been cut.” She replied, her twinkle decidedly fatigued.

  “But St...” I stopped. Afraid I’d implicate Stone for a crime he didn’t commit because of the crime he did commit — for me. Had he cut all of the camera feeds?

  “Have you ever seen the victim with a large knife?” Det. Maury asked.

  “A knife?”

  “Yeah. Have you ever seen him carry one?”

  “No, but I didn’t really know him. I met him once at Woody’s. Someone said his name was Carl.” That was an introduction I wanted to forget, hopefully sooner rather than later. “But then I found him passed out
in my garage yesterday and I thought he was dead. He had a different name there, but I don’t remember what it was.”

  Detective Maury looked up from her notebook. “Officer Martin told me about it. But you never saw him wearing a knife?”

  I shook my head.

  “The coroner found a large knife in his coat pocket that probably caused his death.”

  “Wh — what? It wasn’t the car accident?”

  “Oh, it was the hit and run that caused it, but the knife probably delivered the decisive injury from inside his coat. We won’t know for sure until the autopsy is conducted, but considering what happened in your garage, and the circumstances surrounding his death, this doesn’t appear to be accidental.”

  Movement, over the detectives shoulder, caught my attention before I could even absorb what she was saying. Tommy exited the police car and walked toward Woody’s. Brandy Kay stood at the yellow tape waiting anxiously for her man.

  “You’re letting him go?” The pitch of my voice could break glass. “He killed a man!”

  I watched Officer Martin lifted the crime scene tape for Tommy to hunch underneath, then he reached out to put his arm around Brandy Kay’s shoulder. The two dodged the reporters and headed toward Woody’s.

  “Ms. Dust, no one saw him in the truck, he was at work and he has an alibi.”

  “That’s impossible!” I was starting to sound hysterical even to myself. “What about Bob’s phone?”

  “It wasn’t in the truck before it was stolen. Thank you for your help Ms. Dust. We’ll be in touch.” Detective Maury’s voice sounded just as irritated as mine sounded outraged.

  “You need to catch this killer, detective.”

  She smiled, a flicker in her eyes told me she would see this case through to the end.

  So would I.

  Chapter Thirty

  It’d been a long night. At five A.M. I decided the shop would remain closed for the day. I still had hours and hours of video to search through and I needed the link between Tommy and Carl. Or Tommy and Ryan. Or Tommy and Max. Something that would connect Tommy to the assault on Mayor Bob.

  Stone hadn’t answered my twenty phone calls, so I turned toward the internet to learn as much about Max Gomez’ life and death as possible. Of course the date he died wasn’t one of the dated DVD’s, so I’d been sorting through all the unmarked discs for hours.

  Sleep deprived, the images turned double, my neck screamed, and sharp pains shot down into my stiffened back. Finally, I admitted temporary defeat and put a sign on the shop door saying I’d be closed until Friday. Then everything ceased to exist except for my down-feathered pillow and the warm dog next to me.

  It seemed only seconds later that a pounding on my back door had me jumping out of the bed like an alarm was blaring throughout the house. Then I realized there was an alarm sounding; it was Bogart barking louder than I would have imagined possible. The shock left me wondering not only what day it was, but what year it was as well.

  We both flew to the steps, Bogart in the lead until my socks slipped on the smooth wooden planks and sent me bouncing down the steps on my rear end, somehow slipping underneath Bogart and then finally landing on the bottom step, my backside aching with certain bruises. I sat there wondering if I’d ever walk again when, in rare graceful form, Bogart launched off my stomach and disappeared from my sight. His barking stopped and his toenails clicked on the floor as he returned in an excited tap dance.

  “Are you in the habit of sleeping on your floor?”

  Dazed, I looked up at the man standing over me, Bogart dancing at his side. “Stone. Where have you been?”

  “I had some personal business to take care of. What happened to you?” As his strong arms reached down to help me up, I caught his fresh scent and realized I hadn’t brushed my teeth or hair in almost twenty-four hours.

  The pain on my backside, however, made me expel morning breath into mid-afternoon before answering, “I spent the night reviewing video, I still haven’t found anything worth looking at.”

  “I saw the town made the news again last night. You weren’t involved in it, were you?” His eyes actually showed concern, but I ignored the thumping of my heart and trudged across the floor to the couch like a woman three times my age.

  Once situated, I told Stone about Carl and Tommy, and how Brandy Kay was putting everything on the line for a man guilty of murder. Then I got up the nerve to ask about the one thing that bothered me the most — Stone’s rendezvous with the stripper.

  “Did you ... did you ...” The one simple question was turning out to be more difficult than I expected. When he just stared at me, waiting for me to ask the question most people wouldn’t, I forged forward. “Did you pay Brandy Kay for sex?”

  “Do I look like the type of man who would pay for it?” His voice held no inflection, no emotion and his face was — well, expressionless — stone.

  But I got the awful impression that I’d just insulted him to his core. “Well ... no,” geez, I had screwed up, “but what does a man who pays for it look like? Because really, women like me don’t have a clue.”

  His mouth quirked, and I could see I’d humored him.

  “Why don’t you take a shower, and I’ll make us something to eat.”

  Bogart barked in agreement, and I self-consciously ran my hand over my hair. Which was a bad thing. I smiled my acquiescence and did my slow granny scoot toward the stairs.

  “Need me to give you a massage?”

  When I glanced back his eyes were sparkling with mischief. “Funny.”

  “I wasn’t trying to be funny.”

  I ignored his remark, since I wasn’t sure I could handle Stone being serious at the moment, and made my way upstairs. Thirty minutes later I felt fresher, and my butt didn’t hurt as badly. My hair hung down wet across my shoulders, but I’d applied a little makeup and brushed my teeth. The aroma of eggs and bacon filled the cabin, and I found Stone on the couch reviewing video footage. I sat down next to him and grabbed the plate off the coffee table.

  “This smells delicious,” I said as I leaned in to view the footage of my parking lot from February the previous year.

  Stone took a deep breath, his nose skimming the surface of my hair. “I have to agree.”

  The bacon stopped at my lips as I realized the intimacy I’d created. Stone leaned back, and brought the conversation around to where I was more comfortable.

  “I found the video of the night Max died, he just walked into the bar.”

  “Really?” The thumping of my heart wasn’t just from Stone, this was the key to everything.

  We watched and watched, and watched some more. Each time someone went in or out we tried to identify them. Tommy stood at the front door. The toothless drunk walked into the bar. A couple guys who looked like loggers at the end of their shift ambled in. A car dealer from Portland, glanced around the lot before entering the bar. I guessed that his wife, who shared the screen in his cheesy television commercials, wouldn’t approve. Even Brendan, our pharmacist, liked to frequent the club. It seemed like everyone I knew had gone into Woody’s at one time or another.

  Then the back door of the bar flew open. Slammed against the wall with a man and a woman plastered against it. The woman was kissing the man while wrapping a bare leg around his waist. Her skirt hiked up so far, her rear would have been hanging out if the quality of the picture had been better.

  Tommy turned away from the front door and headed in the direction of the commotion.

  “Is that Max?” I whispered like I was interrupting the couple’s intimacy.

  Stone whispered back. “I can’t tell.”

  Tommy arrived at the scene and yanked the blond away from the man she was mauling, effectively exposing the man’s grainy face, but hiding the woman’s in the shadows.

  “That’s Max.” Stone leaned in, intent on watching the last images of the man who was responsible for him being alive.

  Words were exchanged between Max and Tommy before
the blond slapped Tommy across the face, his shock evident in the way he drew back. Tommy stood there looking at the woman, totally stunned. It was at that moment that I recognized her, but it wasn’t Brandy. It was Dara, my friend and hairdresser. I’d never known she was dating anyone, but at the time this video occurred I was chin-deep in mourning.

  This could well have been the first and only time Dara and Max were together. But again, it amazed me that someone else from town, especially a woman, had gone into Woody’s and I hadn’t heard a word about it.

  Dara stormed off toward the street and although Max tried to stop her, Dara left on her own. Max then got in Tommy’s face before taking off for the woods. Alone. Tommy watched him go, then headed back to his post at the front door.

  The last recorded images of Max revealed him alone, stumbling down the path to the footbridge where I’d met Stone. It was sad and depressing, and broke my heart for the man suffering from PTSD. But mostly I felt for the man sharing my couch, who couldn’t take his eyes off the screen.

  “I’m sorry.” I put my hand on Stone’s arm and leaned against his shoulder. But he didn’t move. His eyes glued forward, he continued to stare at the screen, refusing to believe there wasn’t more. He watched for thirty minutes, pausing and rewinding. Studying every person who exited the bar and which way they went. Some headed for the parking lot. Others headed for their cars on the street. None of them ever turned toward my shop to take the path to follow Max.

  And with each passing minute, a little of Stone’s resolve chipped away.

  But then the muscles in Stone’s arm clenched. He stopped the tape as a familiar old man exited the bar and spoke to Tommy longer than I would have expected. I sat up and watched the silent conversation, knowing as much as Stone did that something important was about to happen.

  When Carl walked away, he didn’t have the drunken sway I’d seen; in fact his actions and movements were very calm and methodical as he left Tommy and headed toward the back parking lot. Just before the tape ended, we watched Carl pull something long and shiny from his dingy coat pocket and jaunt to the right to take the path toward the Tickle Creek Bridge.