by Dana Moss
Taffy borrowed Maria’s sneakers and a T-shirt. With her wet hair and smeared makeup, she looked like one of the campers. She got out of the car.
Malcolm had headed off in one direction to tell people not to leave the campground. Taffy went the other way, toward the remaining teens still packing up their stuff.
“Hey there,” Taffy called out.
A girl with black hair and a nose ring eyed her suspiciously. A guy wearing just one shoe was gathering up empty beer cans, coolers, and wine bottles. Two other kids climbed clumsily from the last standing tent.
“You want something?” the girl said.
Taffy ignored her tone and remained cheerful. “Looks like you had a bit of a crazy night.”
The girl shrugged. “We’re graduating soon.” She eyed Taffy up and down. “Looks like you had a bit of a rough night too.”
“Oh no, this is just—”
“Monica, I can’t find Jenny and Rex. Did they leave already?”
The girl—Monica—shrugged again. “I’m not their keeper, Wade. Pack up your stuff and put it in Dwight’s car.”
Taffy stepped forward. “Hey, did one of your friends go out canoeing last night?”
Wade stopped on his way to Dwight’s car. The other kids taking down the last tent paused to listen.
“No,” Monica said, “Not that it would be any of your business.”
This girl seemed to have some sort of chip on her shoulder.
Taffy crossed her arms. “You all seem in a big hurry to pack up.”
She waited for it…and there it was, another one of Monica’s shrugs, plus a roll of the eyes for greater emphasis. “Under age. Drinking. Cop car pulls up. You do the math, Blondie. Seems like a good idea to blow this popsicle stand.”
Did that sassy shrugger just call her “Blondie”?
“The police want everyone in the campsite to stay put for awhile. They need to ask some questions.”
“You a cop?” Monica’s second appraising look was more withering.
“No, but—”
“Didn’t think so. Dwight, toss me your keys.” He took a break from folding up the tent and dug around in his pocket. “Wade, put the empties in the trunk.”
A tired-looking girl carrying a toothbrush and a towel wandered into the campsite.
“Anyone seen Ty?” Her straight, dark-blonde hair was dip-dyed black at the tips and tied back in a ponytail. Taffy thought she looked a little like her friend Macy back home in New York.
“Everyone’s gone already,” Dwight said to the new girl. “We’re on our way, too.”
“I really think you should stay,” Taffy said.
“Try not to waste too many neurons, Blondie.”
What was wrong with teenagers these days?
They all piled into the car. The dip-dye girl got into the front seat. Dwight fired up the engine.
Taffy looked toward the beach, but Malcolm was still on the other side of the campground. There was nothing she could do to stop Monica and her posse from leaving. She made a mental note of the license plate as they drove slowly out of the campsite and toward the park gate.
It took another ten minutes for the rest of the police team to arrive. By then, Ethan and Maria were towing the canoe to shore.
CHAPTER FOUR
John Doe wasn’t nameless for long, but Taffy had to wait for the details until the next morning when she stopped by the police station on her way to work.
“Bradford,” Maria said. “Nathan Tyler Bradford. His father identified him last night.”
Taffy sat down next to Maria’s desk. She had her own office now, next to the chief’s, but the walls were glass, so it wasn’t very private. She kept her door open all the time.
“That must have been horrible. To have to identify your own child?”
“Not being a parent, I don’t know firsthand, but my mom keeps wringing her hands whenever I leave the house, and she thanks the Lord Almighty every night I come home. ‘I would crumble to pieces if anything ever happened to you,’ she tells me. ‘I’d kill you myself first,’ she says, which makes no sense at all. But I can surmise that losing your child is probably the worst hell on God’s green and dangerous earth.”
“Did he say anything about how his son could have ended up in that canoe?”
“I didn’t press with too many questions yesterday. Or details. He was devastated by the news of the death. I’m going over there this afternoon to finish the interview.”
“Can I come?”
Maria gave her a look. “Unless you enroll in the police academy and become a detective, I can’t treat you like a colleague on cases. You know that.”
“But I found the body.”
The look was now embellished with the raising of one eyebrow. “In some situations, that might make you an initial suspect.”
“You know what I mean, Maria. And I was helpful the last time. And what about those teenagers I told you about?”
“I’ll be interviewing them next, don’t worry. I’m going to the high school tomorrow. I’ll tell you what I can, but you know I’ve got to follow protocol.”
Taffy pouted, but Maria wasn’t a pushover.
Chief Green stepped from his office and approached Maria’s door. “Salinas!”
“Yes, Chief?”
“Just got off the phone with Mayor Gifford. He said he hopes this latest wrinkle gets cleared up quickly.”
“Does he know a kid died?”
The chief ran his fingers through the puff of curly white hair that started above his right ear and wound around to the left. “All he’s got on his mind is his latest tourism scheme. He doesn’t want a shadow cast over the town.”
“Death will do that,” Taffy said. “Especially murder.”
The chief gave her a look. “Just try to get it cleared up quickly. For all our sakes.”
“Got it.”
When he went back to his office, Maria turned to Taffy. “Why would we want to drag it out longer than necessary anyway?” She shook her head and started sorting her paperwork. Then she looked up at Taffy. “Don’t you have to be at the candy factory or something?”
“I guess so.”
Taffy stood up to go. Ellie had probably tried to call her, but her phone was still on the fritz. Taffy had to stop by the factory daily to check on things, deal with paperwork, and put out any fires, but Ellie was doing a decent job as manager. She only occasionally dropped certain balls that needed to be chased down and tossed back into the juggling rhythm that Taffy had come to realize was the nature of running a business, especially one crawling its way back from the brink of bankruptcy.
“You’ll fill me in on the details as they come up?”
“I’ll do what I can. Within my official limits.”
It was true they had bent a few rules on the last case, enough to risk Maria losing her job, but their joint efforts had brought a killer to justice, and that had been enough to earn Maria her promotion. But she was still in the early days of being a proper detective. Taffy knew she cared about fulfilling her role and doing Chief Green proud by his decision.
“There was something about that boy’s face…” Taffy mused. “And the way he was lying there in the boat? He didn’t look peaceful.”
“We’ll find out what happened to him. Don’t worry. I’ve asked them to speed up the autopsy results so we can start to rule things out.”
Taffy picked up her purse and grunted as she lifted it to her shoulder.
Maria watched her wrestle with it. “What’s weighing you down?”
Taffy pulled out a fairly large bag of rice. “Technology.”
~
Taffy left the police station. She tossed her purse and bag of rice onto the luxurious leather passenger seat of her black Bentley. Nana had shipped out her convertible GT a month ago. It was too much car for the little town of Abandon, but she had been happy to turn in her tiny Chevy Aveo. She’d missed driving a luxury convertible. She’d taken the top off in time for th
e long weekend, and the weather had been cooperating nicely. The sun shone on her face, and the wind lifted and twisted her long blond, freshly flat-ironed tresses as she sped up the bluff to the Sweet Abandon Candy Factory.
On the way, she passed the new sign for the Castle Rock State Park and Sanctuary. Something good had come out of solving that last case with Maria. The mayor and the Parks Commission had made a plea to acquire the sanctuary for the State Park Reserve, and in the last few months, they’d put in walking trails and picnic benches.
Turning into the factory parking lot, she pulled into her VIP spot next to Ellie’s spot marked “Manager” and noted yet another bobble-headed figurine on Ellie’s dash. Did that make more than twenty? Taffy didn’t bother to count.
She walked up to the main entrance and pushed through the candy-striped double doors.
“Miss Belair! How are you today?”
“Aubin, we’ve been over this a million times. I insist you call me Taffy.”
Aubin waggled her ring-clad fingers nervously in front of her rouged cheeks. “That was well and good when you were just a sugar elf, but you’re the boss now. You deserve to be addressed with respect as the authority figure you are.”
Taffy sighed. It was the same every morning. Why fight it?
“So is everything totally sweet and sour?” Taffy asked.
Aubin giggled. She’d made Taffy swap out words like shipshape, tickety-boo, and hunky-dory in favor of candy catchphrases.
“Enough to make your teeth ache and your lips pucker. I’m going to buzz Ellie and let her know you’ve arrived. She was asking about you.”
Taffy thanked Aubin and disappeared through the brown padded door made to look like a bar of chocolate.
Ellie met her halfway down the hallway.
“I’ve been trying to locate you, girlfriend. Why haven’t you answered my calls and texts?”
Taffy held up her bag of rice as they walked to her office. “Phone’s dead. And that’s not the only thing.”
Taffy told Ellie about the happenings at the campsite.
“That’s tragic.” Ellie looked close to tears, but she did tend to wear her heart on her sleeve. “And the police haven’t figured anything out yet?”
“Maria’s ordered the autopsy, and she’s starting questioning.”
“She thinks it’s murder?”
“You know Maria. She doesn’t make assumptions. She waits for results.”
“So, in other words, she’s not telling you anything?”
Taffy frowned. “It’s not that. She’s got to do things by the book. Who am I to interfere?”
“You think it’s murder though, don’t you?” Ellie’s eyes shone with a brilliance to match the factory’s gourmet jelly bean coating.
“I’m not sure what I think, but the police haven’t asked for my opinion.”
“They will. Maria’s your best friend, and Chief Green respects you, which is more than I can say for me.”
“He just thinks you got off easy last time, but eventually you’ll show him what a fine, upstanding citizen you can be.” Taffy paused before asking, “You actually purchased all those bobble-headed toys in your car, right?”
Ellie had managed to curb her kleptomania in the past six months, and Taffy trusted her implicitly, but every so often, she liked to double check.
“I picked out and purchased every last one of them,” Ellie said proudly. “Except for the ones Pete gave me for my birthday.”
Pete was a paramedic and he and Ellie had been dating for a few months. They were already talking about moving in together. Taffy and Ethan, on the other hand, had progressed at a snail’s pace. They’d solved a murder, renovated a house, and had their share of sleepovers and double dates with Finn and Maria, but they hadn’t moved to the “next stage.” Taffy couldn’t define what that was exactly. Moving in together? Getting engaged? Maybe it was too early for that. And was she ready for it anyway? They were pretty different from one another. Ethan was an outdoorsy park ranger with a penchant for bird-watching, and Taffy was a mostly reformed party princess with penchant for… what? Sticking her blemish-free nose into cases that didn’t concern her?
Taffy set her bag of rice on her desk. “I know I got in late, but I think I’ll have to leave early to buy a new phone today.”
Ellie perched on the corner of Taffy’s desk. Her curvy hip pressing against the glass desktop looked like it might bust the stitches of her navy pencil skirt. As manager, Ellie had decided to dress the part, though she still sported the pink-striped blazer that all the elves wore—“To keep up morale,” she’d said—and she’d replaced her usual concert T-shirts with blouses and traded in her hairnet for a sprinkle-encrusted headband.
“The reason I was calling is that I had a bubblegum brain-blast idea. You know how we need to boost business to recover financially and how we put my pet marshmallow idea into motion—that’s going to go gangbusters, I’m sure of it—well, I also thought of some other ways to stir up interest. Tours!”
Taffy gave her a blank look.
“Tours of the factory! Small groups. We show them how some things are made. At the end, we give them a sample bag and some coupons for friends and family. Clint has already volunteered to be a guide. Whadaya think?”
Ellie’s enthusiasm made her eyes sparkle and her cheeks go pink.
“What about liability, insurance, all that?”
“I’ve talked to that lawyer, Mr. Talbot, and he thinks he can find us an insurance underwriter. I’ve already talked to a few schools and organizations, just to gauge interest. And there’s lots!”
“That’s great, Ellie. I’m impressed. You see, Chief Green will be singing a different tune in no time.”
“So I’ve got your blessing?”
“Sure. So long as we keep up with our production schedule, I think it’s a great idea.”
~
Around lunchtime, Aubin put through a call to Taffy’s office. It was Maria.
“Cell phone still damaged?”
“I was about to head to the mall to buy a new one.”
“Maybe you can alter your plans slightly. Mr. Bradford asked you to come to our meeting this afternoon.”
“Me? Why?”
“He said he wanted to meet the person who found his dead son. Meet me at the station? We’ll drive over together.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Taffy drove with Maria to an exclusive subdivision adjacent to the Castle Rock Resort’s golf course.
“Noel Bradford owns the pro shop. He bought it a couple years ago when he moved from Eugene.”
Taffy nodded. “What are you going to ask him?”
“We need some more background on Nathan. Where he goes to school, who his friends are, whether or not he was having any trouble at home or school.”
“What do you think happened?”
“I can’t say yet. We’re waiting for the preliminaries on the autopsy report. He looked a little beat up, and his clothes were damp, but I’m not sure if it’s from dew or lake water.”
“I wonder if someone put him in the canoe and set it adrift. I didn’t see any oars.”
“We’ve got someone looking into who the canoe belongs to. There was water in the bottom. Could have been a leak. His clothes were wet when we found him. It’s a puzzle to piece together, but we don’t have many pieces yet. For now, I need to find out as much as I can about this kid.”
Taffy nodded. “What do you want me to do?”
“Just listen, be supportive to the victim’s family, notice anything unusual in behavior or the surroundings.”
Taffy smiled. “Are you quoting a manual?”
Maria frowned to suppress her own smile. “I’m still new to the investigative procedures. Cut me some slack.”
“I’m here to help. The teasing’s a bonus.”
Maria parked at the curb even though the house had a large, double-lane, empty driveway. When Taffy raised an eyebrow, Maria said, “Courtesy.”
Then she led the way up a boxwood shrub-lined pathway and rang the bell.
An unshaven man with bloodshot eyes—likely from crying—answered the door. His khakis were wrinkled and one side of his golf shirt collar was tucked under.
Maria said, “Mr. Bradford? Remember me?”
“Detective Salinas, of course. Come in.” His bloodshot gaze drifted to Taffy.
“This is Miss Belair. She was… first on the scene.”
“Call me Taffy.” She held out her hand.
Noel Bradford slowly, unenthusiastically lifted his hand to hers. His skin was dry, his grip weak, though he wasn’t an old man by any stretch of the imagination. Early fifties maybe? This was a man in shock and grief. Pleasantries were a low priority.
“Leave your shoes on,” Noel said absently.
“Is your wife home?” Maria said as she stepped across the threshold onto plush white carpeting.
“No. She’ll be home later. She’s been in San Diego. When I got ahold of her, she said she’d be on the first flight back.”
Taffy followed Maria into the foyer.
To Noel, Taffy said, “I’m so sorry for your loss.”
His gaze flickered. “You were the one who found him at the lake?”
Nodding, she said, “In the canoe.”
He looked at Maria. “Canoe? No one said anything about a canoe.”
Maria sighed. “We haven’t disclosed many of the details. The situation is under investigation, and—”
“Why would Tyler get into a canoe? He can’t even swim. Refused to learn.”
“Tyler?” Maria looked confused. “You mean Nathan?”
“Yes, Nathan. Nathan Tyler Bradford. He’d changed to his middle name a few months back, when he first got here. Wanted a fresh start with new friends. I’d just gotten used to calling him Tyler. And now…” He choked up.
Maria jotted something in her notebook.
“You say he got here a few months ago? Where was he before?”
“With his mother. In Eugene.”
Taffy said, “I thought she was in San Diego.”