The High Tide Club

by Mary Kay Andrews

  “No. A couple of times, he let the mask slip. He yelled at the valet parking kid and threatened to have him fired. And then, when I called from my car to tell him I was leaving instead of spending the night at his house, he got in a really nasty dig about me running away. Of course, the next morning he showed up here with flowers and croissants and a lame apology. Still, it was an eye-opener.”

  “Never trust a man who hollers at the help,” Felicia said.

  “This whole time, he’s been angling to get his hands on Josephine’s money,” Brooke said. “That first time he met with her at Shellhaven? I think Josephine must have told Gabe her secrets. I think she told him that day that Gardiner was my mom’s father, and that’s why he was suddenly, passionately in love with me—he figured if he married me, he could eventually get his mitts on that money.”

  “Don’t be so hard on yourself,” Lizzie said. “We saw the way he looked at you. Like Dweezil when she sees a can of sardines.”

  “Is that supposed to make Brooke feel better about herself?” Felicia asked.

  “You know what I mean. It wasn’t only dollar signs he was seeing when he looked at Brooke. There was some real attraction there.”

  “I think the attraction was that I was vulnerable. I’ve been so isolated from family and old friends since I moved down here to St. Ann’s.” Brooke gave the women a sad smile. “Okay, maybe vulnerable and isolated is a nice way of saying I was horny. It’s been more than three years since I had a man in my life.”

  “Seven years for me, unless you count the drunken one-night stand I had at a wedding two years ago,” Lizzie said. She turned to Felicia. “You?”

  “Next question?” Felicia said.

  Brooke stared down into her coffee. “You know what else I think? I think Gabe killed Josephine.”

  67

  Both the women stared at Brooke in disbelief.

  “I thought the cops agreed that it was an accident,” Lizzie said. “We all saw her that night. Josephine was groggy from mixing the new pain meds with the wine. She tripped over the dogs, fell, and hit her head on the bathroom floor. Right?”

  Felicia chimed in. “Josephine was ninety-nine years old, and she had end-stage cancer. I mean, she would have been dead in a matter of days anyways. Why would Gabe risk murdering her?”

  “That’s what I was asking myself all night long,” Brooke said. “And then it came to me. Josephine was ready to sign a will that would have divided her estate between five people—the three of us, plus my mom and Varina. She also planned to leave pretty generous cash bequests to Shug and Louette. And she planned to deed back the property she owned at Oyster Bluff to the original landowners.”

  “Which would have all gone into effect if Gabe had gotten that will witnessed,” Felicia said.

  “But he didn’t get it witnessed when he easily could have. Which meant that when Josephine died, that will was invalid. She died intestate—so that meant her estate would be left to her closest blood relatives,” Brooke said.

  “Meaning your mom,” Lizzie said. “And if you’re right, Gabe Wynant was the only person who knew about that connection. And I’m not disagreeing with you, Brooke, but it’s still so hard for me to think of Gabe as a murderer.”

  “Why?” Felicia demanded. “Just because he was an apparently rich, classy-looking white dude?”

  “Well, yeah, now that you mention it,” Lizzie said.

  “I wouldn’t have believed it either, if I hadn’t seen him try to shoot C. D. at point-blank range. If you’d seen his face…” Brooke shuddered. “He meant to kill C. D. And I’m not sure he wouldn’t have killed me too…”

  She left the sentence unfinished, but her friends knew she was still dwelling on the way Brooke’s would-be suitor fell to his death. They sat sipping their coffee until Lizzie spoke up.

  “I get that Gabe had the perfect motive to kill Josephine, but so did C. D., if you look at it like that.”

  “Huh?” Felicia said.

  “We know C. D. is convinced he’s Josephine’s son, but the will she dictated didn’t include him, so he had just as much motive, maybe even more than Gabe, to kill Josephine. Like revenge. Because as far as he’s concerned, she dumped him like a cast-off shoe at an orphanage,” Lizzie said.

  “Maybe you’re right,” Felicia conceded. “I mean, what does anybody really know about C. D., besides the fact that he was raised in an orphanage? Don’t you think it’s an awfully big coincidence that he showed up at Talisa, looking for a job, only six months ago?”

  “Stop!” Brooke clutched her head with both hands. “I’m already dazed and disoriented. You two aren’t helping matters any.”

  “You’re the one who brought up the topic of murder,” Felicia said. “What do you want to do now? Do we just keep our mouths shut about our suspicions?”

  Brooke sighed. “Lizzie’s right. We don’t actually know if Josephine’s death was an accident or a homicide. I’m so mixed up right now. Gabe gave me my first job right after law school. He was my mentor and my friend. Something changed in him, and I never saw it. But I keep thinking about what my mom said. ‘The people we think we know the best are the ones with secrets we can’t even fathom.’”

  “Who doesn’t have secrets?” Lizzie said. “My grandma Ruth used to say there’s a little felon in the best of us.”

  68

  October 1941

  Millie peered into the steam-clouded bathroom mirror and gingerly touched the bruises on her neck and chest. Blackish-purple handprints bloomed on her breasts. His handprints.

  She’d lain awake all night, pondering her situation. Her bruises would fade as they had in the past, but what of her future with a man like Russell Strickland?

  Only one solution occurred to her. She found the packet of razor blades in the medicine cabinet, alongside the Pepsodent, the cotton balls, and the Pond’s Cold Cream, all so thoughtfully stocked by the Bettendorfs’ housekeeper in anticipation of any need a guest might encounter. With a fingernail, she slit the paper wrapper and held the shining blade up to the light. One deft swipe across her wrist would surely do the trick, wouldn’t it? But the mess. How inconsiderate. And who would find her? Josephine? Her own mother? Her grandmother? She could only imagine their horror at finding her in a pool of her own blood. She shook her head. No, it was just too ghastly.

  Millie’s hand closed on the bottle of sleeping pills she’d pilfered from her mother’s pocketbook. Almost a whole bottle. These would do the job nicely. She shook them into the palm of her hand. Tiny pink tablets, as sweet and promising as a first kiss. One swallow. Not nearly as messy. She would take the pills, then climb into the bathtub for a long, lovely nap. But what if the pills didn’t work? She could barely choke down baby aspirin. What if she vomited them back up? Or worse yet, what if she woke up, still engaged, still doomed to the life with Russell Strickland that had been so neatly planned for her? She could picture the shock and disappointment on her mother’s face.

  That wouldn’t do either. She frowned and dumped the pills into the sink, turning on the tap to wash them down the drain.

  Millie looked back in the mirror again. She was no longer the coed who’d met and flirted and become infatuated with Russell Strickland. That girl disappeared the first night he’d forced himself on her, months ago, in the backseat of his car, taken her in the same violent way he took anything he regarded as his property.

  The woman who’d emerged from that car was someone who had to stay hidden. But she was there, just beneath the innocent veneer Millie presented to the world. She turned away from the mirror quickly, having glimpsed the resolute, rage-fueled visage who came and went in the blink of a long, fluttery eyelash.

  She brushed her teeth and combed her hair and returned to her bedroom, where she dressed quickly in dark slacks because there was a chill in the air this morning.

  The house was eerily quiet as she tiptoed past the closed bedroom doors of her oldest, dearest friends, Josephine and Ruth. What would they th
ink if they saw this version of Millie? She crept down the stairs and into the big kitchen. Someone had put a pot of coffee on the stove, and she was tempted to pour herself a cup to soothe the throbbing in her temples, but time was of the essence. She must act before the sleeping household awakened.

  She slipped out the back door and made her way in the predawn darkness toward the garage. She would have her pick of the Bettendorfs’ vehicles. The Packard, the roadster, the truck. All the keys were kept in their ignitions, because who would steal a car on an island? She’d read about carbon monoxide poisoning. A length of garden hose inserted in a tailpipe and then wound into a nearly closed window. Just the trick. No fuss, no muss.

  A male voice cut abruptly through the morning stillness. “Millie? What are you doing out here?”

  Her stomach roiled at the sound of his voice. Her first instinct was to run and hide as far from here as she could get. But just how far could she get on an island?

  69

  Mary Balent was a presence in Carter County. According to her website, she was a fifth-generation native and had gone to undergrad and law school at the University of Georgia, which made her what faithful alum referred to as a “Double Dawg.” Her law office stood directly across the square from the county courthouse, and since moving to St. Ann’s, Brooke had watched her with envy as she skillfully navigated the local legal landscape.

  Now, a week after her harrowing experience at the lighthouse and Gabe Wynant’s demise, Brooke and Marie sat in Ms. Balent’s office, seeking representation as they attempted to untangle Josephine Bettendorf Warrick’s estate.

  Mary Balent had already read the wartime letters from Millie to Gardiner Bettendorf, which Brooke had dropped off a week earlier, and Marie had submitted a cheek swab for DNA testing to compare with Josephine’s hair sample.

  “We still don’t know the outcome of a DNA sample Gabe sent off, comparing Josephine’s DNA to a local man who believes he could be Josephine’s son,” Brooke explained.

  “Really?” Ms. Balent said, intrigued. “It was my understanding that Mrs. Warrick never had children.”

  “There is a chance that she could have had a son out of wedlock while she was living in Savannah in 1942 and given him up for adoption,” Brooke said. “My friends and I did some sleuthing. We found some anecdotal evidence that shows Josephine was interested in a boy who was raised at two different children’s homes there, but we didn’t find any concrete proof. As far as I know, Josephine never acknowledged having a child, and of course, we have no idea who the father might have been.”

  “But this man, C. D. Anthony, is convinced that he is Josephine’s son. He’s the man Gabe tried to kill last week,” Marie said. “Brooke saved his life.”

  “We’ll have to have this man retested,” Ms. Balent told her. “But in the meantime, I’d say your next-of-kin status to Mrs. Warrick is entirely provable. I can get the paperwork started to have myself appointed administrator of the estate this afternoon, and given the circumstances of the previous administrator’s death, that shouldn’t be a problem, but it’s probably going to take a while to get this mess straightened out. It could take months.”

  “We understand that,” Marie assured her. “My most immediate concern is going forward with my aunt’s burial. It’s been a month now. Josephine’s oldest living friend is ninety-one years old and is still heartbroken over her death. For her sake, at least, we’d like the closure a funeral could provide.”

  “Have you been in contact with the cousins you mentioned earlier? Do they have any objections to a burial?”

  “I called them,” Brooke said. “They were pretty shocked—and disappointed to discover that Gardiner Bettendorf had a daughter and that she was Josephine’s closest blood relative—but they indicated they don’t oppose a funeral.”

  “I’ll see what I can do to expedite that. We’ll have to get the body released. Have you talked to the sheriff?”

  “That’s my next appointment,” Brooke said.

  Marie spent the next ten minutes filling out legal documents as Mary Balent explained what each one meant.

  “You know,” she told Brooke, “I served on a couple of different bar association committees with Gabe Wynant over the years. I wouldn’t say we were friends, exactly, but I respected his expertise. I have to say, all these revelations coming out of Savannah are sending shock waves through the legal community, even all the way down here in little-bitty Carter County. I hear his former law firm has really taken a hit from this, which is a shame. You worked there, right?”

  “Yes. Gabe hired me right out of law school,” Brooke said, glancing at the clock. “Mom, while you finish up here, I’d better get over to the sheriff’s office.”

  Ms. Balent gave her an appraising look. “I know the sheriff pretty well. Is there anything I can help with?”

  “He says it’s just a few more routine questions so he can close out the death report on Gabe,” Brooke said. “But if it’s anything more than that, I might take you up on your offer.”

  * * *

  The Carter County courthouse was a looming brown brick Spanish revival–style two-story building from the early 1920s, but the courthouse annex where the sheriff’s office was located was a squat 1970s-era concrete bunker with leaky smoked plate glass windows.

  Howard Goolsby offered Brooke a seat in his cluttered office. “How’re you feeling? I heard you had a concussion.”

  “I’m much better, thanks,” she said, making an effort to sound and look composed. “You have some questions for me?”

  “Just a few,” he said, opening a file folder and leafing through the papers inside. “We took statements from those other two women, Elizabeth and Felicia, who witnessed Mr. Wynant’s fall. They both said Mr. Wynant struck you. And you feared for your life?”

  “Yes.” Brooke crossed and uncrossed her legs. “He’d already shot C. D. Gabe grabbed me and was dragging me toward the stairs, but I couldn’t leave C. D. there to bleed to death. When I resisted, grabbing for the handrail, he pointed the gun at me. I thought he would kill me. I kicked him, thinking he might drop the gun, but instead, he fell backward.”

  “I see,” the sheriff said, scribbling in a stenographer’s notebook. “Could you tell me again how you came to know Gabe Wynant?”

  “Again?”

  “Please.” The sheriff seemed amiable and relaxed.

  “He was my boss when I worked for his law firm in Savannah. As I said in our last interview, Josephine Warrick called me over a month ago and asked me to visit her on Talisa. She first said she wanted me to draft a new will for her, and then said she intended to make me and my mother, as well as three other women, her beneficiaries. I explained that I had no expertise in trusts and wills, plus, I had a conflict, since that will would potentially benefit me and my mother. That’s when I reached out to Gabe, because I knew he did a lot of estate planning work.”

  “So … the relationship was strictly professional?”

  Brooke felt the flush creeping up her neck. “At first, yes. But recently, Gabe let me know he wanted something more. We had a couple of dates.”

  “But nothing came of it? Was that your idea or his?”

  “Why are you asking me this?” Brooke asked, wishing now that she’d asked Mary Balent to accompany her to this interview.

  “Just doing my job. We found your name and number several times in Mr. Wynant’s phone log. He’d tried to call you several times the morning he was killed.”

  “My phone has lousy reception on Talisa.”

  “Mine too,” he said with a conspiratorial smile. “That’s when the old two-way radios come in handy, right?”

  “I suppose.” She looked at the sheriff. “Do you know how he figured out where we were?”

  “We think so. We found a fisherman who keeps a boat at the city dock. He said Wynant flagged him down and offered him twenty bucks for a ride over to Talisa. That little Geechee kid Lionel? Hangs around that dock all the time? He said a white-hair
ed fella asked him if he’d seen you and C. D., and Lionel obligingly said he’d seen the two of you riding a motorcycle in the opposite direction of the house.

  “Now, back to my questions. Remind me why Mr. Wynant would have tried to kill C. D. Anthony? Not once but twice, according to Mr. Anthony?”

  There was a rapping at the glass door.

  “Come in,” Goolsby barked.

  Mary Balent stepped into the office. “Sorry I’m late,” she said, nodding at Brooke. “Howard, Ms. Trappnell tells me she’s already told you everything she knows about this unfortunate matter. Now, what else do you need from my client?”

  Without waiting for an invitation, she dragged a chair from the corner of the room and sat beside Brooke, who found herself momentarily speechless.

  “Just tying up some loose ends,” Goolsby said. “She’s a lawyer, the dead guy’s a lawyer, I didn’t think we’d need to get any more lawyers involved.”

  “Just one more,” Mary said sweetly.

  “I was asking your client why Gabe Wynant seemed so intent on killing Mr. Anthony,” the sheriff repeated.

  “Did you ask Mr. Anthony that question?” Mary asked.

  “I did. This office has had some past dealings with Mr. Anthony, who isn’t always the most reliable witness. So now I’m asking her.”

  “Gabe told me C. D. had been hounding him for money, even trying to blackmail him over some financial irregularities C. D. uncovered. C. D. thought it was just a matter of some bad checks, but I think what he’d unwittingly uncovered was something much more serious—the fact that Gabe was in such bad financial straits he’d started stealing from his clients,” Brooke said. “Gabe must have known C. D. would tell me everything and that I’d figure out the rest. That’s why Gabe tried to kill C. D. He pretended it was to protect me from C. D., but that was a lie.”

  “Okay.” The sheriff scribbled some more notes. He reached into the top drawer of his desk and held out an envelope in a sealed plastic bag. “We found this in Mr. Wynant’s car, which was parked in the lot at the city marina.”