It Had to Be You

by Delynn Royer

  Trixie’s initial reaction was shock at finding Nell here and then dismay upon noting that, even dressed in men’s trousers, a healing scratch on one cheek, and with her sleek dark hair tied back in a pony tail, Nell still managed to look like she was dining at the Waldorf-Astoria.

  And then Trixie was annoyed. Sean didn’t appear nearly as surprised as she was to find his old flame lounging aboard a rum-runner in the middle of the Atlantic. Had some part of him expected to find her here?

  “A little early in the day for a drink, isn’t it?” Sean asked Nell. To his credit, he didn’t look particularly happy to see her.

  “Not with the week I’ve had,” Nell said breezily. “So, what took you so long, Sean? When you asked me about the Fíorghra yesterday, I expected you to beat it out here by sundown.”

  “I had some other business to attend to first. What the hell are you doing here, Nell? I thought I left you with a babysitter.”

  “Cute fella, but he was very young. And maybe not too smart. He had a weakness for pretty faces.”

  Egan Murphy eyed Trixie with interest as he knocked a cigarette ash off into an ashtray. “Who’s the skirt?”

  Before Sean could reply, Nell cut in dismissively. “She’s just a tab reporter, but the way she’s been following him around lately, I’m starting to think she’s his biographer.”

  “Trixie Frank.” Trixie gifted Nell with what she hoped was a quelling look before extending a hand toward Egan Murphy. “New York Morning Examiner.”

  Egan looked amused as he stood and took Trixie’s hand. “Pull up a stool. I’m Egan Murphy.”

  As Sean went to get Trixie a stool, Nell piped up airily. “Shouldn’t you be back in New York sharpening your pencils?”

  “Shouldn’t you be sharpening your claws?” Even as the riposte crossed her lips, Trixie chided herself for letting Nell get a rise out of her. The satisfied smile Nell gave her in response only clinched it.

  A paraffin stove burned in one corner of the charthouse, warming the small room and lending an absurdly cozy atmosphere to their gathering. Trixie took off her coat and draped it over her lap as she sat. Sean did likewise so that the four of them circled the table like conspirators. Egan offered Sean the half-empty bottle of whiskey. “Want a snort?”

  “No, thanks.” He got down to business. “Now I know how you made it to Johnny’s funeral so fast. You weren’t in London or Boston, were you? You were out here all along.”

  “For about the last month,” Egan allowed.

  “I hear Johnny paid you a visit the day he died.”

  “He did.”

  “Why?”

  Egan shrugged, took a swig from his glass. “Business. He came to take the cash from the safe every week or so.”

  “Did he bring anything with him?” Sean asked.

  “Like what?”

  “Like whatever it is his killers seem to be looking for. Ledgers, bank records, papers? They say Johnny was always good at keeping the books.”

  Egan took a last drag from his cigarette, ground it out in a dirty ashtray, then pushed it away with a flick of his hand. “What do you care? From what I hear, you got more to worry about than who killed Johnny.”

  Sean leaned over the table. “Damn right, Egan, but whoever killed your brother also killed a cop and set me up to take a trip to Sing Sing for it. I’d say that makes this personal for the both of us. Wouldn’t you?”

  Egan eyed Sean, seeming to consider his response. “Johnny didn’t bring anything out here with him that day. He took something with him when he left.”

  Nell sat straighter in her chair. “What?”

  “A ledger book and some files he was keeping in the ship’s safe,” Egan said.

  “That doesn’t sound like Johnny,” Nell cut in. “He always kept his records locked up in his apartment. He wanted them close by and safe in case he needed to get his hands on them.”

  Egan cast her a disgruntled look. “They was close by, Nell, and they was safe enough. They was with me.” Egan looked back at Sean. “Johnny brought a strongbox full of stuff out here as soon as we dropped anchor. Said there was an investigation going on and he didn’t want to take no chances with his place being tossed.”

  “Always one step ahead,” Nell said under her breath, “that was our Johnny.”

  “You take a look at what was in the box?” Sean asked Egan.

  “Nah, what do I care? Johnny says keep it safe, I keep it safe.”

  Sean turned to Nell. “And so what about you? Is your name in there? Just how deep are you in this?”

  Egan laughed. “How deep? Go on and tell him, doll. The island natives still calling you Queen of the Bootleggers?”

  O Nell scowled. “Oh, shut up, Egan.” When she looked back at Sean, she softened her tone. “It doesn’t matter if my name’s in Johnny’s books or not. After we separated, I did some traveling. A pal in London asked me if I’d act as a distiller’s agent. All I had to do was go to Nassau and oversee the sale of one shipment to the rum runners headed north. It was easy, there was money in it, and it was all legal. I told Johnny about it and introduced him to my British pal.”

  “So what is it you’ve been up to since then?” Sean asked. “Buying or selling or both?”

  Nell sat back in her chair, looking pleased with herself. “Oh, a little of both. As it turned out, Johnny was our best customer. It’s only right that I got a cut from both sides. And it’s all legal, Sean. All this.” She waved a hand to indicate the Fíorghra. “Perfectly legal as long as we’re sailing under the British flag.”

  Trixie sat quietly absorbing the information being revealed around the table. No wonder Nell was leaving Johnny messages and dropping by at all hours of the night. Not only were the two of them most likely still sleeping together, they were in business together as well.

  Lenore had hated Nell for good reason.

  “And so what now?” Sean pressed Nell. “Transfer ownership of the Fíorghra and continue with business as usual?”

  Nell shrugged, looked at Egan. “We haven’t decided yet.”

  Egan’s expression when he met Nell’s gaze was guarded. Trixie got the distinct feeling that he didn’t quite trust his sister-in-law. “There ain’t no rush to decide,” Egan said finally. “We’re set to pull up anchor tomorrow anyhow.”

  “We?” Sean asked Nell. “You going along?”

  “No, not me. When I dust out, it’ll be by steamer with my passport, but maybe you should think about signing on. You see the papers this morning?”

  “I saw enough.”

  Nell leaned in closer to Sean. Her earlier air of smugness had vanished. “Then you know what’s waiting for you if you go back. I tried to tell you before to let this case alone and you wouldn’t listen. Listen to me now. Just get out. Go with Egan. We know people in London. They can’t touch you there. If you stay in New York, they’ll kill you.”

  “Who’s they?”

  Nell said nothing for several seconds, during which time Trixie didn’t realize she was holding her breath, until Nell finally sat back, breaking the tension. “It doesn’t matter who they are. They killed Johnny and that cop too, and they have enough pull in your department to set you up to take the fall. Isn’t that enough?”

  The quiet anger that flashed across Sean’s face was unmistakable. “Sure, Nell. It’s enough to make damn sure I’m not going anywhere until I find out who’s behind all this and why.”

  Nell let out a disgusted sigh and looked at Trixie, who, for once, agreed with her. “Maybe you can talk some sense into him, sister. If he goes back now, they’ll give him the electric cure. Do you remember what they did to Becker?”

  Nell spoke the truth. Trixie had been only a child when the Becker case exploded in the press, but every journalist knew the story.

  Li
eutenant Charles Becker was allegedly a corrupt cop, but his guilt in the murder of a gambler called “Beansie” Rosenthal was questioned by some. Guilt or innocence, though, mattered little at Becker’s trial. Not when he was the perfect scapegoat for a hostile press and other defendants eager to turn state’s evidence. Charles Becker had died in the electric chair back in 1915.

  Something clenched in the pit of Trixie’s stomach at the thought of that happening to Sean. She clasped his arm. “Maybe you should listen to her. Get away from here for a while. I can talk to Julius. The Examiner’s readership is over a hundred thousand. We can use that leverage to break this thing open. We can put pressure on the department to find who really killed Owen Carter.”

  Sean looked at Trixie. “And what about you? Remember what we talked about last night. You think they’re going to just let you go about your business, exposing their operation to the public and messing up all their plans?”

  “Well, no, but—”

  “There ain’t no buts about it, kid. If I thought I could trust these two, I’d tie your behind to that chair right now and send you off to merry old England to wait this thing out. In fact, the more I think about it, the better that idea sounds.”

  Trixie was half-convinced he meant it. She shut her mouth and, for a tense moment, the only sound in the room was the incessant creak and groan of the Fíorghra as it rolled gently in the water. Damn if she would give him an excuse to get rid of her now.

  “Yeah. That’s what I thought.” Sean turned back to Egan. He reached into his jacket and pulled out John Murphy’s wallet.

  At the sight of it, both Nell and Egan registered recognition, but Egan was the first to speak. “Say, where’d—?”

  “It doesn’t matter.” Sean extracted a small silver key from the billfold. “You recognize this? Johnny had it when he died.”

  “It looks like the key to the strongbox,” Egan said.

  “The one Johnny took back with him on Thursday?”

  “Yeah. He knew we were due to set sail soon. He wanted his stuff safe but not on the other side of the Atlantic.”

  “You sure that’s all there was to it? Rumor had it he was getting ready to sing to the feds in exchange for immunity.”

  For the first time, Egan looked angry. He pulled a cigarette from a pack of Lucky Strikes and reached for a match. “Why the hell would he do that? We had a good business going. He was getting set to build a fancy hotel and gambling joint in Montauk. All he needed was the right partners and they would’ve made a bundle. If he started singing to the feds, that all would’ve gone down the toilet. He’d have been a dead man.”

  “He is a dead man,” Sean said.

  Egan struck a match, lit his cigarette, and shook out the match righteously. “Well, it ain’t true. Whoever killed him, it wasn’t for that.”

  “Maybe you’re right,” Sean said. “Where do you think Johnny stashed the strongbox after he left?”

  Apparently mollified by Sean’s allowance that his little brother might not have been a stool pigeon, Egan’s tone grew more subdued. “I figured he took it back to the city.”

  “I don’t think so,” Sean said, casting a look at Nell, who remained silent but attentive. “Some pretty serious people have been looking there for it and don’t appear to have found anything yet.”

  He returned his attention to Egan. “How about all his liquor purchases? He was supplying the whole syndicate with booze. All those cases couldn’t be smuggled into the city at once without drawing too much attention. Do you know where he stashed it in the meantime?”

  Egan took a drag off his cigarette, looked at his sister-in-law indecisively, then back at Sean. “I don’t know for sure.”

  “The Shinnecock Inn?” Sean posed.

  Of course. Trixie spoke before she could stop herself. “Mary Patterson.”

  “That’s the woman you brought to Johnny’s funeral.” Nell stared hard at Egan. “Johnny never mentioned her to me. Who is she?”

  “Johnny didn’t tell anyone everything,” Egan said irritably. “You know that. She’s just the wife of a friend.”

  “Wife of a friend.” Nell sounded calm, but to Trixie, she looked like a kettle set to boil. “I’ll just bet. Does her husband spend a lot of time out at sea? Does the poor girl get lonely?”

  Egan avoided Nell’s penetrating gaze. “Ah, Nell, let it go. Johnny’s dead for cryin’ out loud.”

  Nell sat back, folded her arms and said nothing more, but Trixie could see she was not able to let it go, and for the first time, she felt some empathy for this woman that she couldn’t otherwise abide. Trixie knew well how it felt to be betrayed by a man. It was like having a piece of your heart cut out, a piece that you could never quite get back again after that. How would it feel to be damaged like that not just once, but over and over again?

  “He wasn’t worth it, sister,” Trixie said softly.

  Nell cast Trixie a resentful look, but for once made no effort to retort. The silence in the charthouse weighed heavy until Sean finally broke the impasse by rising to his feet. “I guess we’re headed back to The Shinnecock Inn.”

  * * *

  Trixie suspected that if she hadn’t so recklessly blurted out Mary Patterson’s name, Nell might have stayed behind on the Fíorghra to finish her negotiations with her brother-in-law. As it turned out, she chose instead to return to the island with Sean and Trixie aboard the Maighdean Chuain.

  The way Scotty MacPherson had happily greeted Nell by name when she’d climbed down the monkey ladder made Trixie wonder if the jolly old Scotsman wasn’t personally responsible for half the illegal bootlegging traffic along Block Island Sound.

  The ride back to Montauk was colder than the ride out as the sun was by then tipping toward the west. Nell spoke little along the way. That suited Trixie just fine. As long as Nell remained preoccupied with her dead husband’s infidelities, she appeared to have little energy to devote to beguiling Sean. It was all Trixie could do, however, to keep her own lips zipped. She was curious about whether Sean had suspected he would find Nell aboard the Fíorghra.

  “Did you have any idea she would be on that boat?” she asked him when they arrived on shore and Nell finally walked away for a few minutes to smoke a cigarette.

  Sean didn’t answer right away as he counted out the second half of Scotty MacPherson’s fee and placed the bills into the old man’s waiting hand.

  “’Tis a playsure doin’ business wi’ ya,” the Scotsman said to Sean, then tipped his old black cap at Trixie and winked. “And fare ye weel, bonny lassie.”

  Trixie gave the old man a smile before she and Sean headed back up the dock. Already, the sun was beginning to set and the last of the fishing boats had finished their workday. “Well?” she prodded.

  “No,” Sean said. “I didn’t know she’d be there. I figured Egan would be, but it’s no surprise if you think about it. She owns that boat now that Johnny’s dead.”

  “Yeah, well, it sure does seem like every time we turn around, there she is. Popping up at Bickford’s when she had no business being there was just the start of it. For Pete’s sake, we left her back in the city, and we still can’t go ten feet without tripping over her. She’s even out in the middle of the frittering ocean. It’s just so—so—”

  “So what?”

  “Annoying.”

  “We are investigating the death of her husband,” Sean pointed out. “It stands to reason that she’s going to be involved somehow or another.”

  He sounded more condescending than helpful, and her ire rose at the thought that his first instinct seemed to be to defend Nell. “Oh, she’s involved for sure.” Trixie lowered her voice as they neared where Nell stood staring pensively out at Fort Pond Bay. “I just haven’t quite put my finger on how yet.”

  Sean laughed dryly. “All right, kid. Yo
u be sure to let me know when you do.”

  * * *

  As if it hadn’t been enough that Trixie had been forced to share her seat on the tiny Maighdean Chuain with Nell, this was the limit.

  Inside the darkened interior of the Buick, Trixie looked to her left to study Sean’s profile as he switched on the headlights and steered them along the narrow dirt road toward The Shinnecock Inn, and then to her right to glare at Nell, who sat so close that their knees bumped every time the car hit a rut in the road. Huddled inside her coat and with her hands jammed down deep in her pockets, Trixie felt like the unlucky slab of meat in a bratwurst sandwich—but she’d be darned if she would let Nell sit next to Sean.

  Before Trixie could face front again, Nell looked at her and gave her a cool smile. “Comfortable?”

  “Cozy,” Trixie said. “How long do you plan to stay in Montauk?”

  Nell looked self-satisfied. “Oh, I don’t know. How long are you staying?”

  “Why? Want to room together?”

  “Sure, and then maybe I’ll slam my fingers in the car door to make it the perfect day.”

  Trixie set her teeth together and focused on the narrow dirt road ahead. Sean downshifted and she glanced at him in time to catch a look of concern as his gaze flicked away from the rear view mirror.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  “Nothing.” He said it too quickly.

  Trixie sat up straighter to look in the mirror for herself. It’s nothing, all right. The narrow road behind them appeared dark and empty. So, what’s the problem?

  She looked back at him only to see that a tiny muscle in his jaw had tightened. “Nothing my patootie.”

  He gave her an annoyed glance.

  “What?” she pressed.

  “It’s nothing. A while back I saw headlights, but now they’re gone.”

  This time, Trixie turned around to peer directly through the back window. Again, she saw nothing but empty road, though not much of it. Dusk was falling rapidly, limiting how far back she could see. “There’s nothing there.”