FLORA, FAUNA, & FOUL PLAY: A Ravenwood Cove Mystery (book 12)
By Carolyn L. Dean
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FLORA, FAUNA, & FOUL PLAY: A Ravenwood Cove Mystery (book 12) is copyright 2020 by Carolyn L. Dean. All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author or publisher, except for the use of brief quotations in critical articles or reviews.
Dedicated to my new friends and neighbors in Texas, and those I still love on the West Coast
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
THANK YOU...
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chapter 1
“Oh, for heaven’s sake, Buster! Put on some pants!”
James Landon leaned back in the seat of his unmarked patrol car, closed his eyes, and tried to block the horrible image he’d just seen out of his memory. Being on stakeout at a suspect’s house was never his favorite part of working as a detective for the sheriff’s department. It was even worse when he could see one of the bad guy’s rotund brothers stroll nonchalantly naked through the decrepit cottage he was watching, uncaring about the blinds being open as he vigorously scratched his armpit with one hand and carried an open beer in the other.
So much for lunch, he thought. I don’t think I can eat after seeing that.
He’d been after Monty Dundee for two weeks, and the tip he’d gotten about Monty finally showing up at his childhood home was proving to be a dud so far. His brother, Buster Dundee, was an unemployed loser with an unimpressive rap sheet and apparently no personal shame, but there were no current warrants out for his arrest, so James had no reason to take him in.
I’m gonna have to bleach my eyeballs to get that picture out of my head, James thought, just as his phone vibrated in his jacket pocket. Digging it out, he tapped the screen and put it up to his ear.
“Hey, Mom. What’s up?”
“Oh, hi, honey,” Flora Landon answered, and James could instantly hear the note of tension in her voice. “I hope I didn’t catch you in the middle of things. Um, have you heard anything from Amanda this afternoon?”
James sat up in his seat, surprised, the stakeout suddenly forgotten.
“No, I haven’t. Mom, what’s the matter? Amanda’s supposed to have picked up Katie already.”
“Well, that’s just the problem. She hasn’t shown up yet, and she doesn’t answer her phone. It’s not like her to be late to pick up the baby, so I’ve been trying to reach her, but I haven’t had any luck so far.”
Alarm bells started going off in James Landon’s well-trained brain. He’d been in law enforcement long enough to know a whole list of horrible things that could happen to people, and the thought of his wife being in any of those scenarios was enough to make his heart pound.
“Mom, I’ll swing by the inn and see if she’s there. Maybe there’s just some sort of problem with one of the guests at the bed and breakfast, and she got so involved with it she’s running late.”
Even as he hung up the phone and started his car, James had the metallic taste of fear in his mouth. His headstrong wife’s life revolved around the people she loved, and he knew their beautiful nine-month-old daughter was the center of her universe. It was rare that she had her mother-in-law care for Katie, unless it was date night and James and Amanda wanted to go out to a movie or dinner, but Flora had asked for some time with the baby and Amanda had looked at her busy schedule and agreed.
As he sped toward their bed and breakfast, the Ravenwood Inn, he used voice commands to dial Amanda’s phone.
It rang several times, then went to voicemail.
Amanda wasn’t there to answer.
Chapter 2
The drive to the Inn seemed to take forever, as James wound his patrol car through the twisting streets of Ravenwood Cove. The old coastal town was built on several levels, from the sea-level sandy beach at the bay up to the main part of town, and then further up the coastal cliffs to the bluff the Ravenwood Inn was built on. As James crested the hill his eyes were locked on the circular driveway in front of the imposing structure. Ever since Amanda had started remodeling the sprawling building, she’d been in the habit of parking close to the massive front doors, in case she needed to hop in her car to run errands downtown.
Her SUV wasn’t there.
Two rental cars and a Goldwing motorcycle, belonging to this week’s guests, were parked in the gravel-covered lot at the side of the Inn, along with Mrs. Bitterman’s blue Prius, but Amanda’s car was nowhere to be seen.
James blew out a deep breath as he pulled to a screeching stop in front of the wide porch steps. Maybe he’d just missed her and something had happened to her phone. Maybe she was already on her way to pick up little Katie.
Or maybe she was missing.
As he pushed open the heavy front door to the inn, he instantly heard an ancient voice coming from the kitchen.
“Where’s my great-grandbaby? Where’s our baby Katie?” the hopeful voice intoned, and James steeled himself a bit as he walked across the foyer and into the Inn’s massive kitchen. Katherine Granger, ninety-plus-years-old and one of James’ favorite people, r had taken such a liking to Amanda she’d virtually adopted her as her own granddaughter, and when baby Katie was born and named after her, she’d fallen completely in love with the precious little girl.
Sitting on her favorite stool at the marble-covered kitchen island, Mrs. Granger fixed an accusatory stare at James and then turned to her friend, Mrs. Bitterman, who was openly smiling at him.
“That’s not baby Katie,” she said, and Mrs. Bitterman, always so cheerful and energetic, gave a sound of disgust.
“Obviously. Hi, James! How was—” she started to say, but Mrs. Granger put a claw-like hand on her arm and interrupted her.
“What is it, James? What’s wrong?”
The tall detective ran a hand distractedly through his dark hair and gave a huff of frustration. “I’m not sure anything’s really wrong, Mrs. Granger, but I can’t get ahold of Amanda, and she’s not answering her phone. My mother says she hasn’t picked up the baby yet. Have you heard anything from her?”
Mrs. Granger shook her head, her eyes wide. “No, not a word.”
“Were you here when Amanda left to get the baby?” James asked, but again Mrs. Granger shook her head.
“I’m sorry, sweetie, but we just got here,” the old lady said. Her birdlike eyes, normally so full of mischief, suddenly looked worried. “Have you talked to anyone else about this?”
As James opened his mouth to answer the little old lady’s question, the back door to the kitchen opened with a sudden bang.
“Whew! That wind today will cut right through you. I’m lucky I was bundled up enough to get the last of the asparagus.”
Elizabeth Porter, the Inn’s cook and Amanda’s devoted assistant, set her wicker basket on the counter and untied the silk scarf she’d tied over her hair. “Hey, James,” she said in brief greeti
ng, but as she walked over to the deep cast iron sink to wash her hands Mrs. Granger slid off her stool, specially fitted with arms so she could be more secure when she came to visit. The old lady grabbed her wheeled walker, and almost hopped in her hurry to intercept Elizabeth.
“Lizzie, James says he can’t find Amanda. Do you have any idea where she could be?”
Elizabeth’s mouth opened in a soundless O of surprise, then she clapped it shut. “I... I don’t know. She left about two hours ago. Said she had to take care of some errands before she got Katie and then she’d be back in time to make the quiche for tomorrow’s breakfast.”
James crossed his arms. It seemed to be the only way he could keep himself together, as if the possibility of his wife actually being missing would somehow make all the parts of himself, of his body and his mind, fly apart. Years of training as a law enforcement officer came in handy in a lot of different circumstances, but his headstrong, sweet, loving wife being gone was definitely not one of them.
“What errands did she say she was going to do?” he asked.
Elizabeth sighed and tried to think back. “Um, well, she was going to meet with the mayor about the opening weekend of the farmers’ market, and I asked her to stop by the store because I need some Meyer lemons for the tart I’m making tonight. She normally does things like that before she picks up Katie, and I think she was meeting someone, too.”
“Meeting someone?” James strode over to Elizabeth, his well-worn cowboy boots loud on the wooden floor. “Who was she meeting?”
“I... I don’t know,” Elizabeth said, suddenly seeming startled. She’d been around James many times since she’d come to work at the Inn, but this was the first time she’d seen such a blazing intensity in his focus. “She got a phone call about ten minutes before she left, and it seemed to kind of upset her. When I asked her about it, she said it was no big deal but she had to go see someone. Then she grabbed her coat and hurried out of here.” She shrugged defensively. “She didn’t seem to want to talk about it. That’s all I know, honest!”
“Think, Elizabeth, think!” James commanded, grabbing both her shoulders and trying to restrain himself from shaking the young woman. “What was her tone when she was talking on the phone? Did she say anything else? Did you see her take anything unusual with her when she drove off?”
“Just her purse and her keys, that’s it. Nothing out of the ordinary.”
James clenched his teeth, even as he let go of Elizabeth. She staggered back a step and put a hand on her shoulder, as if to ease away the feeling of his grip.
“Well, there was one more thing that was kind of odd,” she said. Elizabeth locked eyes with James.
“When she said she had to make a stop to meet someone, she mentioned it was to fix something that should’ve been fixed a long time ago.”
Mrs. Granger’s eyes were wide as she watched the scene in front of her. “Fix something? Fix what?” she asked.
“I don’t know, and she left before I could ask her,” Elizabeth said. “All I remember is she had this sort of determined look on her face.”
“Determined?” James asked, and Elizabeth quickly nodded.
“Yeah, determined. We’ve all seen that look before,” she said. Suddenly, Elizabeth looked worried.
“Like she meant business.”
Chapter 3
As soon as Elizabeth told James about the last comment his wife had made on her way out the door, something inside his head clicked. In an instant, he pushed the fact that he was Amanda’s husband to the back of his thoughts and shifted into putting together a gameplan on how to discover what had happened to her. Years of law enforcement experience had shown him both the best and the worst of what could happen to a missing person, and if something had happened to Amanda he needed to be as clear-headed as possible as he chased down every lead.
After extracting a promise from Mrs. Granger to stay at the Inn with Elizabeth and call him if Amanda returned or there was any news, James jogged to his car, his fingers already dialing the sheriff’s office. Two hours was long enough to give a bad guy a head start, but James’ network of friends and fellow law enforcement officers were his best resource to see if someone could find his wife. Her car was missing, and so was she, apparently.
His first destination was the Ravenwood Cove police station, and he tried not to speed through town as he raced toward it. His friend, George Ortiz, was the well-respected police chief, and they’d had more than one adventure together. Somehow, Amanda seemed to be a magnet for trouble, and her curiosity and ability to put clues together had gotten her into hot water more than once. When she’d moved to Ravenwood she hadn’t fallen in love with it right away, but maybe the fact that a body was found in her overgrown garden may have had something to do with it. Since then, she’d changed the derelict inn into a thriving business and a favorite place for parties and teas, with even a couple of weddings taking place in the elaborate pergola on the extensive grounds.
Driving down Main Street toward the town square, anyone would’ve thought all was right with the world, and Ravenwood Cove was its normal quiet, happy little village. Mrs. Mason was wearing her signature pink apron as she poured fresh water into the dog bowl in front of Bake Me Happy, and she paused just long enough to straighten up and wave at James. He could see Brian Petrie, the owner of the hardware store, talking and laughing with Heinrich in front of the town’s lone pizza parlor. The unmistakable aroma of baking dough and roasting garlic filtered through the air vents in James’ car. The newly hired ticket taker at the Liberty Theater was up on a tall ladder, adding letters to the marquee to let people know Wizard of Oz would be its classic movie for the week. Grace TwoHorses, owner of the town’s toy store, was sitting in the large front window as she changed the display, wearing a colorful felt hat that made her look like a big bug, complete with antennae and googly eyes.
It all looked so peaceful and normal.
Except Amanda was missing, so the world was upside down.
James tried her phone one last time as he pulled into the parking space in front of the police station, and jogged up the stone steps. By the time he’d pulled open the heavy front door, he could hear a heated discussion going on inside, and recognized George’s voice, full of authority.
“I don’t care if she said your dog looks like a pig with mange, Mr. Crabbe. You cannot just go into her yard and cut down her prize rose bush.”
“But she had it coming!” Henry Crabbe retorted, his complexion mottled with anger and frustration. “I think she hurt Princess’ feelings. My dog won’t even play with her ball anymore. Now she just mopes around the—”
“George, I’ve got to talk to you, stat,” James interrupted, and the fervor in his eyes was enough to make George drop his conversation immediately. He followed James’ retreating back as he strode toward the police chief’s office, ignoring Mr. Crabbe and his neighbor issues.
“What is it?” George asked as he shut the door behind him. “What’s going on?”
James blew out a shaky breath and looked at the floor. “I can’t get ahold of Amanda, and no one’s heard from her since she left the Inn over two hours ago. She’s not answering her phone, and she never went to pick up the baby from my Mom’s.”
There was a moment of silence between them. Both were family men, both devoted to their wives, so no words needed to be spoken to explain how James was feeling.
Finally, George nodded in understanding. “I’ll give you all the help I can, buddy. Where do you want me to start?”
A look of relief passed over James’ face. “Thanks, George. I knew I could count on you. Can you get in touch with some of the surrounding police agencies to have them keep an eye out for anything on the roads? I’m going to see if I can get the location of her phone, and I’ll get the sheriff’s office on it, too. Who’s on duty here right now?”
“Let me see...” George hit a button on his computer and tapped the keyboard a couple of times, finally bringing up a large
calendar. “Looks like Rollins is on patrol. You have any place you’d like him to start? Any thoughts on where she might be?”
Something in James’ chest started to hurt. “No, not really. Elizabeth Porter told me Amanda got a phone call that upset her, then told her she had to make a stop before she picked up Katie. She said something about taking care of something that should’ve been fixed a long time ago.”
“No clue what the means?” George asked, picking up the police radio handset on his desk.
James sighed and shook his head. “‘Fraid not. Things had been really calm and peaceful since Katie was born, and we had just gotten into a routine with running the Inn and taking care of the baby. Just normal stuff. Nothing out of the ordinary at all.”
“Oh, it’s probably nothing, James,” George said. “Maybe she met an old friend and her phone’s not working. She’ll turn up just fine, but we’ll do some legwork just in case, okay?”
“George, even if her phone wasn’t working she still would’ve picked up Katie.”
The possibilities of what could’ve happened to Amanda were unspoken but on both of their minds.
James put his hand on the doorknob. “Thanks for the help, George. I’m going to contact our phone provider to see if they can help me with phone records and location. I think there’s an app that I might be able to use, but I’m not sure which one it is. Let me know if Rollins finds anything.”
“The moment I know something, I’ll call you,” George promised. “We’ll find her.”
“Sure, George. Talk to you soon,” James said as he walked out, already pulling out his phone to call for help.
As much as his friend was on his side and willing to do whatever he could to help, James still had a hollow feeling in his chest, as if something had gone terribly, terribly wrong.
Chapter 4
Flora, Fauna, and Foul Play Page 1