Shroud of Fog: (A Cape Trouble Romantic Suspense Novel)

by Johnson, Janice Kay

  Had anyone checked to find out where the father actually was when his wife supposedly committed suicide? This was, after all, a man who remarried a woman he had to have met during those maybe-not-so-idyllic summer weekends in Cape Trouble.

  And if not him – after five summers spent in town, the mother had to have made friends, maybe enemies. Maybe she was having an affair.

  With a married man? Could she have threatened his marriage?

  Yeah, there were all sorts of possibilities.

  One of which, Daniel recognized, was that Sophie didn’t remember events the way they’d actually happened. Maybe she never had run out to the dunes and heard those voices distorted by fog. Maybe the morning wasn’t even foggy. She’d have had dreams, told herself stories. Even adult eyewitnesses were prone to reshaping what they’d seen, an effect amplified by the passing of time. Sophie had had – what? – maybe twenty years to recast her memories.

  But damned if he wasn’t going to pull what information he could find on her mother’s death, even if there wasn’t a thing he could do if the investigation had been incompetent.

  Abbott Grissom, it occurred to Daniel, might even have been the responding officer.

  A hand set down a cup of coffee in front of him and he was jolted to realize he had neither seen nor heard Sophie’s approach.

  Very calmly, as though the conversation hadn’t been emotional at all, she said, “You have questions about Doreen.”

  Did he? He stared at her blankly for a minute.

  Then he pulled himself together. “Yeah. Tell me what you know about her relationships. Friends, people she despised, people who despised her. To your knowledge, did she date? Have a lover? Used to have a lover?”

  She said nothing for a minute, only searched his face with those extraordinary eyes. “Why would the killer have searched the stuff in storage if she was killed for personal reasons?”

  “To make us think exactly what we have been thinking.” He didn’t have to look far for reasons. “Rage, because the auction meant so much to her and it was a way of lashing out. Greed, because, hey, maybe he’d find something valuable.”

  Her lashes fluttered a few times, but otherwise she didn’t react. After a moment, she nodded. “You’re right. Although, the longer he hung around, the greater the risk of getting caught.”

  “That’s true, but somebody not used to killing who’d just done something like that wouldn’t have been real clear-headed at that moment.”

  “No, that’s true.” Her forehead crinkled. “You said ‘he’.”

  “Convenience. I still think a woman is just as likely.”

  “Oh.” This was said very softly. “I’ll tell you what I know, but it’s not that much. You have to understand, I’ve only come over here a couple of times a year, usually not for more than a long weekend. Doreen would talk about her latest enthusiasm, whatever that was, more than personalities.”

  A smile twitched at Daniel’s mouth. He’d heard Doreen once she got started on the nerve of the road workers who sprayed poison on roadside weeds or the negligence of the city council because they didn’t have the guts to pass a measure that might conceivably offend some constituents. Doreen had been more interested in her causes than she was in gossip, that was for sure.

  He took a sip of coffee and said, “Let’s start with the auction committee members.”

  *****

  After Daniel left, Sophie made herself turn on her laptop and go online, first to check email then to start searching for descriptions and values for the items she’d brought home from the storage unit. As distracted as she was, concentrating was a challenge, but she didn’t want to think anymore about that long-ago morning or the chill of the fog. She wasn’t crazy about the idea of reflecting on who among Doreen’s acquaintances might have hated her enough to murder her, either.

  Oh, and picturing Doreen as Sophie had found her wasn’t so good. Especially not on top of remembering her own mother’s death.

  Yes, researching Depression era pressed glass was a whole lot safer.

  But turning off her thoughts once she lay in bed was a whole lot harder. It was incredibly frustrating to be so tired and yet not be sleepy.

  There’d been something unreadable in Daniel’s voice when he asked if Doreen might have had a lover. Was he only conscious of the possibility that Sophie would be uncomfortable talking about anything like that? At least, as related to a woman she’d admitted had been a mother figure to her?

  Maybe, but— Did he know something she didn’t? Or had heard gossip?

  It had never crossed her mind that Doreen might have a romantic relationship at all, and certainly not a lover. Sophie examined why that was so, and decided it was partly Doreen, so brisk and no-nonsense, so lacking in vanity, but it was partly Sophie’s own view of a woman who’d given her security by being so unchanging. Always there. Her enthusiasms came and went, but she remained essentially the same. Sophie could drive over the mountains to the ocean and find Doreen no different than the last time she was here.

  I never will again, she thought, with grief that struck like a knife blade – or heavy cut glass.

  No. Think about her alive, not dead.

  All right. Had Doreen ever talked about a man in a way that might suggest he’d shared her bed, or that she had unrequited feelings for him, or—?

  If so, Sophie couldn’t recall. Doreen was both exasperated with most people she knew and yet tolerant at the same time. She understood and sympathized with people’s foibles, but grew irked they couldn’t overcome them.

  Still. Doreen had been sixty-three years old. She’d surely once dreamed of love and sex if not marriage. Sophie wished she’d thought to ask. Would her aunt have told her?

  Tomorrow, she resolved, she would call her stepmother. She had, of course, let her know about Doreen’s death, but they hadn’t talked long. Maybe she could get Julie reminiscing. She’d know if her sister had ever been engaged or anything like that, surely. No, they hadn’t been close in recent years, but they’d both lived in the same small town until Julie married Sophie’s father. They were family.

  Sophie’s thoughts veered to wondering why Daniel was turning his attention to possibilities unrelated to the auction. Because he was thorough? Or had he hit brick walls where it came to auction volunteers? There were those videos at the storage facility, too; maybe he or Officer Grissom had recognized some people coming or going.

  Well, of course they had, Sophie thought practically. They’d probably recognized everyone they saw on the video. This really wasn’t a very big town.

  Was Daniel competent to conduct a murder investigation? She hadn’t thought to ask. His easy air of command had made her assume he hadn’t only been a patrol officer before he took the job of police chief, but he might have been risen through the ranks without ever being a detective. Or if he was one, he could have been investigating fraud or something like that.

  She worried at that for a few minutes, but finally concluded that he acted like someone who knew what he was doing. She would ask, though. She didn’t think she could bear it if no arrest was ever made. If she had to be haunted by another person she loved dying violently for no reason she could ever understand.

  Afraid that she would have nightmares, she pictured Daniel Colburn as sleep began to blur her thoughts. That strong face, eyes such a dark blue she had tried to peer closely over the dinner table to see if really they were muddied by brown only to determine that no, they weren’t. Those lines carved in his forehead that spoke of weariness or pain. The sharp delight she felt when he smiled.

  His was the face she carried with her into sleep.

  *****

  Reluctantly, Daniel met Kurt Gillespie, mayor and therefore his boss, for breakfast at The Waves, a restaurant attached to the town’s largest hotel, the Surfside. The menu was pretty conventional, which was fine for breakfast. Kurt seemed to like the food, or maybe just the well-padded booths. Daniel had eaten here more often than he’d like, beca
use it was almost always Kurt’s choice.

  Daniel thought wistfully of the thick slabs of delicately spiced French toast at the Sea Watch Café, Naomi Kendrick’s place. Maybe next time he’d dig in his heels and demand they eat there instead.

  Gillespie was okay, but aside from the one open-and-shut killing that had been followed by a quick arrest, this was the first really significant crime that had happened in Cape Trouble since Daniel took the job here. There’d been the usual loud domestic disturbances, a brawl or two, a few locals charged with driving under the influence, a runaway teenager, car accidents including a couple of ugly ones out on Highway 101. Mostly, though, complainants were tourists, and tourists were arrested, too. This was different. Daniel tried to brace himself for an elected official determined to stick his nose into an investigation.

  Predictably, Kurt had no sooner heaved his bulk onto the padded bench on his side of the booth when he said, “Well? You getting anywhere on this thing?”

  Thing? Mildly offended, Daniel couldn’t help wondering how Kurt Gillespie and Doreen Stedmann had felt about each other. Plus, he was in the right age range to conceivably be the mysterious lover. Married, too, to a wispy nonentity. Could be Gillespie occasionally craved a little spunk in a woman.

  Yeah, but he hadn’t been springing over any fences, that was for sure.

  He explained to the mayor why closing this investigation wasn’t going to be easy. Whoever committed the crime had likely taken out the camera that would have given investigators the best view of anyone coming or going at the storage facility. The sheer quantity of fingerprints on every surface in the unit where Doreen was killed.

  “There’s hardly a citizen in town who hasn’t stepped foot in there, donated something, handled something a neighbor or acquaintance donated.” He shrugged.

  Kurt grunted. “Wife donated a few things. Me, I’m a believer in economic expansion. We’d all be more prosperous if some major development arrived.”

  Daniel had considered exactly that as a motivation for the murder, but had trouble believing in it. The Campaign to Save Misty Beach had, from what he’d learned, brought in some substantial donations already. Yeah, Doreen had launched it and was its driving force, but there hadn’t been any guarantee that eliminating her would grind it to a halt, allowing the land to go to developers. And who was crazy enough to crush the skull of a nice woman in hopes of higher daily receipts from your coffee shop or boutique?

  A nut. There were some out there, he couldn’t dispute that. But the town had been surprisingly united in the desire to see the land on the other side of the river preserved in its natural state.

  He disliked the notion of someone killing Doreen to stop the campaign for another reason, too: Sophie had now become the driving force. It scared the shit out of him, imagining someone plotting to murder her.

  Over the course of a meal that ran to pancakes heavy enough to form a sea stack, Daniel managed to calm Mayor Gillespie. Gillespie wanted real bad to believe a transient had somehow stolen into the storage facility and come on Doreen and been unbearably tempted by all the riches within her cavern. Daniel didn’t work as hard as he could have to divert him from his dream world. He’d have liked to believe in that dream world, too.

  Back at the police station, he greeted Ellie then went into his office and closed the door. His last glimpse was her surprised face. He tended not to shut himself in unless he had a visitor, but he didn’t want anyone else to know he was looking into the death of Sophie’s mother. Much as he liked Ellie, he doubted he could depend on her to keep her mouth shut. He’d rather not have to explain why he was indulging his curiosity.

  He hadn’t even explained it to his own satisfaction.

  It only took him a minute to find the basics in the computer. Unfortunately, no police reports had been appended, no lab results if any had been done, no interviews. About all he learned was what year Michelle Thomsen had supposedly killed herself, and therefore how old Sophie was now. He also had a case number that should allow him to locate the binder or box stored in the evidence room down in the basement.

  “I’ll be downstairs,” he told Ellie as he passed her desk.

  She half rose. “I’ll be glad to find anything you need.”

  “I’d rather have you on the phones. I’m just going to poke around. Had an idea that probably won’t go anywhere.”

  She didn’t look happy, maybe because he’d disturbed her sense of how things ought to be. Or was the filing system so inadequate he wouldn’t be able to find anything without her help?

  No, not with Ellie around. That was a woman who knew how to organize. She’d never put up with sloppy filing. Doreen should have tapped her for help.

  Except, Daniel remembered as he descended the steep stairs with a crude handrail, Ellie’s husband took tourists on whale-watching cruises from spring into fall. His was one of the businesses that would boom if a couple of new resort hotels were built on Misty Beach.

  Mulling that over, Daniel pulled out his keys to let himself into the room that held the older records. This was the first time he’d had occasion to want anything out of here, but he found that tall steel shelving units held ranks of white cardboard boxes clearly marked with case numbers and dates in thick black marker.

  He found the one he wanted right away and, surprised by how light it was, took it off a top shelf and set it on the table by the door. For some reason he hesitated before removing the lid. This felt like opening Pandora’s box.

  Irritated with himself, he shook off the melodramatic thought. This was a twenty-year-old…no, not even a crime. A tragedy, sure, but he really was checking it out only because of his curiosity about Sophie.

  The box was damn close to empty, he saw with a surge of disappointment as he set aside the lid. Anger, too, which might not be justified depending on what those couple of manila folders held.

  He sat on a metal folding chair and started reading. The responding officer’s name wasn’t familiar to him. Officer Justin Stroh had called for his chief right away. Daniel had heard Randy Marsh’s name before, even though he’d resigned or retired ten years or so ago. The further notes were his. No, he’d never requested assistance from the county because he’d convinced himself he didn’t need any.

  The second folder held photos. As many bodies as Daniel had seen, as many crime scene photos, this one shook him because he knew ten-year-old Sophie had come upon exactly this scene. Her mother had been blonde like her daughter, slim. Pretty, he guessed, but you couldn’t see that, not with her head having been blown apart. The single shot had entered her temple and done one hell of a lot of damage. She’d fallen awkwardly, as people tended to do who were dead long before they hit the ground. The handgun looked as if it had fallen about a foot away from her right hand, which lay flopped palm up.

  He recognized a Colt .38 revolver. The chief’s notes confirmed his impression. It was a model with a two inch barrel and a six-shot cylinder, a standard detective special for many years. A good backup weapon that could be easily concealed. Not too big for a woman to use.

  But nowhere in the too scanty notes did he see any evidence that the weapon had been traced or even fingerprinted. There was mention of the child who had found her mother. Had to be sedated, said a note. And, Claims to have heard voices, possibly a man’s as well as a woman’s. Could have been other people on beach, or even someone speaking back at the cabins. Hard to tell with fog.

  The father had been called immediately and had left work and driven straight over to Cape Trouble. The chief had had to go through several people in Mike Thomsen’s office to reach him. No question but that he had been in Portland, which was something.

  Just as Sophie’s belief that she’d heard Mommy talking was disregarded, so was Mike Thomsen’s insistence that his wife never removed the white gold chain with a heart pendant that had been his first gift to her. He wanted to know where it was.

  Admitted they had had some marital discord in recent past but denies w
ife was depressed, Chief Marsh wrote. Necklace not found at cabin. Husband sure she was wearing it previous weekend. Claims she wore it even in shower. In a different ink, a note had been added: Search of scene didn’t turn it up. Rescue personnel could have trampled it into the sand. Don’t like to think of sticky fingers, but you never know.

  Final conclusion: No reason to doubt that Michelle Thomsen did take her own life.

  Daniel found nothing to indicate what had happened to the handgun. It could have ended up melted down, as sometimes happened, or returned to Sophie’s father if in fact it had belonged to him or his wife. God, Daniel thought, do I ask her?

  He went back through every scrap of paper, hoping he’d missed something. No such luck. Chief Randy Marsh had wanted to accept Michelle Thomsen’s death as suicide. There was no suggestion he’d given even passing thought to the possibility that it could have been murder. That would have shaken up townsfolk. Marsh would have had to bring in outsiders to conduct an investigation he was incompetent to handle. Nope, call it a tragedy. Explain away any anomalies. Lucky these were summer people. Father and daughter would pack up and leave, and Cape Trouble could go back to being a peaceful small town.

  Daniel read again that last note. No reason to doubt that Michelle Thomsen did take her own life.

  “Bullshit,” he said aloud, his anger rising to a boil even as he knew he wouldn’t be able to reopen the investigation. Without DNA, without the weapon, with no witness but a ten-year-old child, there wasn’t a damn thing he could do now, twenty years too late.

  Sophie had mostly accepted Chief Marsh’s conclusion. Would she be any better off to know that Daniel suspected her mother had been murdered?

  If it were him, he knew what he’d prefer. Brooding, disliking his choices, he restored the mostly empty box to its place on the shelf.

  CHAPTER SIX

  “Corn chowder,” Sophie decided without any hesitation. It was one of the specials today at the Sea Watch Café, and came with cornbread and honey-butter.