Live and Let Fly

by Clover Tate

  “He’s already printed a small piece implying that I had something to do with Jasmine’s death. I’m afraid he’s going to run something larger next time.” I was too ashamed to give Rose the details. Worse, I was laying my troubles in front of her. She had enough to deal with already.

  “Oh. I get it. Don’t let it worry you. Jasmine had to put up with a lot of tabloid drama, and once she learned not to pay attention, it was fine. Who knows? Maybe it even helped her career.”

  I turned once again to the door. “Thanks, Rose. I should be the one comforting you, instead of the other way around.”

  “Don’t even think of it.”

  On impulse, I hugged her. “You’ll let me know if Sunny gets to be too much trouble, won’t you?”

  “Like I told you, she’s great.”

  Rose’s phone rang. She glanced at its screen, and her face tightened. “The funeral home.”

  • • •

  Stella’s home was only a ten-minute walk north from Rose’s. The quirky Victorian houses thinned, replaced by a handful of ranch-style structures that filled the old dairy pasture at the top of the hill. Stella’s house was one of these. It was built into the side of the hill, so that her garage—no longer home to the Corvette, I remembered with a pang—and the face of her studio were set below the house, but had full western sun.

  I climbed the stairs to her front door and felt under a planter of wild ginger for her spare key. There it was. I brushed the dirt from it and went inside. Madame Lucy sat next to her dish and let out a mournful howl.

  “I’m sorry, baby,” I told the cat as I looked through Stella’s lower cupboards for cat food. “Your mama is away for a few days. But I’m going to take care of you. I’ll come and visit every day until she’s home.”

  In reply, Madame Lucy moved to the cupboard next to the refrigerator and pointed her nose toward it. Yes, there was her bag of food. “Thank you, Madame.” I filled her dish and freshened her water before going in search of the litter box.

  It felt strange to be here without Stella. The house was so still, so quiet. Stella had left her bed turned down and a gorgeous old cotton nightgown lying on it. Its collar was embroidered in white thread. From the impression in its center, it seemed Madame Lucy had made it a napping spot.

  Stella had been intending to come home that night, like every night, even if this one would have been later than most, and go to bed. The turned-back blankets were too poignant a reminder for me. I pulled them up and straightened the quilt.

  I found Madame Lucy’s litter box in the corner of the bathroom. Stella had left the window open, and the afternoon air stirred the linen curtain. The cat, licking her whiskers, followed me downstairs as I checked to make sure the studio was secure. Upstairs again, I stacked Stella’s mail on the dining room table and looked out the plate-glass window to the ocean, rushing in and out, strips of white frosting each wave.

  A few more kites than usual bobbed in the wind. The kite festival was the day after tomorrow, and every vacation beach house and bed-and-breakfast in town was booked. Martino’s Pizza would be doing a brisk business, and each of the Tidal Basin’s tables would be filled by seven. Madame Lucy rubbed her head against my leg.

  Among the tourists and the residents was a murderer. Rose and Kyle had been ruled out. Caitlin was at the top of my list, but Marcus was still out there.

  I’ll find whoever did this to you, Stella, I thought. I will.

  • • •

  I was awful company for Avery and Sunny at dinner that night. Sunny kept trying to tell me about the advantages of the accounting software she’d chosen for me.

  “Wait until you see how easy it is. Even you could use it,” she said.

  “Uh-huh.” I pushed a cherry tomato across my plate.

  “And you should see the reports. Say you want to look at your utilities costs for the year. You know, see if it would pay to get a new furnace. You just push a button, and there it is.”

  Avery, bless her, actually seemed interested. “What did you say the name of this software is? I’m still keeping track of everything in a spreadsheet.”

  Sunny first looked horrified, then delighted. “Oh, Avery, let me set you up. You can email me the spreadsheet, and I’ll enter everything for you. You’re going to love it.”

  “I wouldn’t do that to you—”

  “Please.” Sunny drew the word out into three syllables.

  “If you’re sure—”

  “Ha-ha-ha,” Sunny sang. “Tomorrow. After I get home from Rose’s, I’ll do it.”

  Avery rose and folded her napkin on the table. “And you really don’t mind doing the dishes? I need to get ready to go out.”

  “Consider it my rent,” Sunny said. She really was turning out to be an okay roommate, after all. Today alone, she’d swept the porch, vacuumed, and, of course, taken Bear for a long walk at Clatsop Cliffs. And she hadn’t broken a thing.

  “Go out?” I asked.

  A hint of a smile crossed Avery’s face. “Dave and I have plans. There’s music down at the Tidal Basin. They’re booked up, but Dave got us in.”

  My lips formed “Oh,” and I smiled. “Wear that raspberry-pink dress. It looks great with your skin.”

  I had plans of my own that night. Once it was dark, I’d take my competition kite to the beach and give it a trial flight. I knew it was flight-worthy, I just wanted to be able to handle it with grace at the festival. Maybe Strings Attached’s future was in peril, but I still wanted to show the world that I could make a champion kite. I’d take the kite to the stretch of beach just south of Avery’s. After dark, it would be just me and the wind.

  An hour or so later, I had the kite carefully rolled and tucked under my arm. I slipped on a fleece cover-up—even August nights could be chilly, especially right at the surf—and called Bear to come with me. He sprang up from his bed and trotted to my side. Sunny had her head deep into a book called Richer than Croesus.

  The night was overcast, but the full moon illuminated the clouds with a pearl-gray glow that made it easy to find my way down the beach. The tide, tugged by that same moon, was on its way in, slowly creeping up the beach. I found an open spot with no washed-up tree trunks to stumble over. A few houses with lights still glowing dotted the bluff above the beach. I could just make out Jasmine’s house—now Caitlin’s—to the south. Superstition kept me from wandering that far down.

  While Bear inspected a clump of seaweed a few yards away, I unrolled my kite and hooked the line to its bridle. Tomorrow I’d be able to see it in its full glory: Father Wind, his cheeks puffed, chiffon-like ribbons of wind unfurling into the breeze. Tonight, the kite would be a dim shape. Even so, I felt the shimmer of excitement that I always did when testing a new design.

  I gave myself a few yards of line and lifted the kite. It was a large kite—better to wow the crowds with—and I braced myself to stay steady in the wind. Bear ran over, head up, to watch. Up, up, up went the kite, and I couldn’t help gasping at its beauty—and power. Chills ran through my body. After a few minutes of giving it line, bit by bit, the kite was calm in the sky, its cheeks puffed and eyes firmly ahead, with those long, dancing furls of wind pouring from Father Wind’s lips. I’d really outdone myself.

  Giving a short yap, Bear ran down the beach. “Bear!” I yelled. I couldn’t go after him, not with a kite of this size in the sky above me. I’d be pulled away. If I dropped the line, the kite could end up anywhere from dangling from a beach house’s chimney to washed out to sea.

  Squinting into the horizon, I saw a man’s shape coming closer. For a split second, I remembered the man in Jasmine’s window and the breath caught in my throat. Then I relaxed. It was Jack.

  He had a kite with him, too. Aha. All I made out was its color—orange—and the fact that it looked as large as mine. The contest was in two days. I didn’t want to give away my kite, but
at this point, thanks to the upcoming article in the National Bloodhound, maybe it didn’t matter.

  Bear danced around Jack’s feet as he came closer. “Emmy?”

  I switched my attention to reeling in my kite, but I was very aware of his presence. “Fancy seeing you here.”

  “How’s Stella? Is she conscious?”

  “Not yet.” I’d called every few hours through the day and gotten the same report over and over again. “They say she’s stable, but not yet awake. The sheriff told me her car was definitely sabotaged.” The wind chilled my arms. I wished I’d brought a jacket instead of just my fleece pullover.

  “I don’t believe it. Someone tried to kill her,” Jack said. “It’s sure now.”

  “I’m afraid so. She saw something or someone at the concert that clued her in on Jasmine’s death. Had to be.”

  “Could it have been Marcus? As far as I know, he hasn’t been found.”

  “Maybe.” I still had a hard time seeing Marcus as a killer. A grieving, confused man, yes, but not a murderer. “She’ll tell us. Although sometimes people lose their memory when they come out of a coma.” I refused to admit the possibility that Stella wouldn’t gain consciousness eventually.

  Jack looked down the beach toward town. “I suppose we’re safe here. He’ll stay clear of Rock Point.”

  “You mean Marcus.”

  He took his time responding. “It seems crazy, but who else could it be?”

  “Sheriff Koppen agrees with you.”

  “But you don’t?” Jack said.

  “I don’t know what to think anymore.” I’d eliminated every suspect from my list except Marcus and Caitlin. If only there were some way to get in touch with Marcus. I transferred my attention to my kite. Even at night, when I could barely make out its details, it was a showpiece. During the day, it would be stunning.

  “Why not Marcus?” Jack asked.

  I started to reel my kite in. “According to his sister-in-law, he was devastated when his wife died. They worried about him. It just seems like someone who could care that much couldn’t be a murderer.” Marcus’s wife was buried in the cemetery east of town. An idea took root in my mind.

  “Some people might say that’s why he’d kill,” Jack said.

  Bear ran up from the surf and sniffed at the bundle Jack held.

  “Is that your competition kite?” I asked. My kite was heavy with wind, so I was reeling it in slowly.

  “Is that yours?” As the Father Wind kite came closer, ever so slowly, Jack made a low sound of appreciation. “Not bad at all.”

  The tone of voice he used told me he was bowled over, and I couldn’t help but smile. “It was a last-minute choice. I’d spent hours—you have no idea how long—doing two appliqué kites of Rock Point, but Sunny wrecked them. Then I realized that I needed a blockbuster, not some contemplative piece. This is the first chance I’ve had to take it out.”

  “That’s clever.” He pointed to the ribbons of fabric waving from Father Wind’s mouth. “Instead of the tail following the kite, it almost looks like it leads the kite.” He knelt and rolled his kite out onto the sand. “Too bad this one is going to take top prize.”

  Jack’s kite was a strange collection of angles. I couldn’t quite make it out. He unbundled some graphite spars and slid them into place, again, at angles. By the time I had reeled my kite in, his was assembled. It was a five-foot-wide multisided star, with no tail. Clean and geometric, but not likely to be very fast.

  “This isn’t your usual style at all,” I said. I let my kite rest on the beach. It began to gently deflate. I wouldn’t say so to Jack, but I knew mine was the sure winner.

  “I’ve had some artistic influences lately.” He gave me a side glance as he attached the kite’s bridle.

  “Really?” I flattened my kite and carefully rolled it up, tucking its strands of wind into the body to protect them. “And what would that be?”

  “You hadn’t guessed?”

  Standing on the beach with the Pacific Ocean stretching thousands of miles toward China, we might have been at the edge of the world. Where we stood, civilization’s lights dropped off, and the heavy ocean churned and pulled with deceptive calm.

  He looped an arm around my waist and kissed me. When we separated, I murmured, “For a couple who just put things on hold, we sure get along well.”

  “You have a problem with that?”

  He pulled me close, and I rested my head on his chest. Through his T-shirt, I felt his heart beat against my ear. “No,” I said. I sighed. “And yes.”

  Jack was one of the best things to happen to me this summer. But there was too much going on now. What if I went broke, lost Strings Attached, and moved away? How would Jack feel about being with me then? I cringed to imagine him reading my story in the National Bloodhound and knowing I’d sold myself out. Yes, Jack was wonderful, but right now being with him was like pouring chocolate syrup on the rotting remains of last week’s dinner. I needed to straighten up my life first.

  Regretfully, I pulled myself away. “It’s not the right time. Not yet.”

  Jack’s gaze was full of questions, but to his credit, he didn’t argue. “Okay,” he said. That was all. He turned his back to me and lifted his kite. It caught the wind and spun before slowly rising.

  “I guess I should get back now. Come on, Bear.” I didn’t know when I’d ever said a more difficult good-bye. I didn’t want to leave, but it would be wrong to stay. I picked up my kite. “I’ll see you at the festival, Jack.”

  “Emmy . . .” He let one hand drop from his spindle of line long enough to touch my cheek. I felt each one of the next five seconds in every fiber of my being. “Never mind. Good-bye,” he said softly. He returned his attention to the kite.

  I walked up the beach toward home, Bear trotting ahead of me. My feelings were a tangle of desire and fear that clogged my throat. I turned around again. Jack’s kite rose and rose, its features dimming in the night.

  chapter twenty-seven

  It was a long shot. I knew that. But right now it was the only shot I had.

  Just after the sun rose, I drove to Rock Point’s only cemetery, beyond the Methodist church. I hadn’t had the chance to wander there yet. The morning was quiet, except for the sounds of birds. Conifers crowded the gravestones and nearly threatened to swallow the cemetery whole. The sound of my car door shutting disturbed a crow sharpening his beak on a cement obelisk and he flew away, cawing.

  The cemetery was old. The moss on the gravestones told me that much. Someone had clearly come up here from time to time to tend the ragged grass between the graves, though. Naomi Salek was buried here somewhere, but there was no caretaker’s office and no directory, so I’d have to search the cemetery row by row.

  I trudged through the dew-heavy grass to the bottom of the graveyard and started walking a zigzag pattern. The graves weren’t laid out regularly enough to sit in rows, so I had to double back sometimes to check names and dates.

  Most of the plots were easy “no”s. They were crumbling or covered with moss old enough to have turned brown and become part of the stone. I passed scores of memorials for men lost at sea. Men had a lot of hubris, thinking that their flimsy wooden boats stood a chance against the ocean’s massive power.

  Naomi had died five years ago. She’d have a modern headstone, or, more likely, a plaque set into the ground. I kept searching.

  Almost an hour later, I found the Salek family’s plot. The cloud cover was beginning to break up, and I slipped off my pullover and tied it around my waist. Rock Point had been thick with Saleks, it seemed, and judging by the dolphins and compasses carved into their gravestones, many of them had been fishermen.

  Here was Naomi Salek’s grave. Its marble plaque read simply, “Naomi Whiting Salek, Loving Wife and Mother,” and gave the dates of her birth and death. When she died, she’d been only a
few years older than I was now. A bare plot lay beside her, almost certainly reserved for Marcus. Bundled at the foot of the grave was a handful of fresh daisies and black-eyed Susans that could have been pulled from anyone’s garden.

  It told me that the grave had had a recent visitor, maybe even a visitor who would return today. I could only hope.

  “Rest in peace, Naomi,” I said. I wiped her marble plaque dry and placed an envelope upon it.

  • • •

  Despite the steady stream of customers through Strings Attached, the day dragged. Every time I heard steps on the shop’s porch, I raised my head, hoping to see Marcus. If Marcus was the man I thought he was, when he read my letter, he’d come. He hadn’t come.

  When the traffic of customers slowed for a moment, I called Salem Hospital. The nurse on duty recognized my voice from my many calls the day before, and she was almost as glad to report as I was to hear that Stella’s vital signs were improving, and that she was responding to stimuli.

  “Does that mean she’s awake?” I asked, clutching the phone.

  “She can’t talk, if that’s what you’re asking, but if we apply pressure to her skin, she flinches, and she responds to sound. Good signs.”

  “So, she’ll be back to normal soon.”

  “Can’t say that. It’s looking good that she’ll regain consciousness, but there are no guarantees. If her brain was damaged, she might not recall anything. She might not be the person you remember, either.”

  Despite the nurse’s warnings, I hung up with a huge feeling of relief. Stella was improving. That had to be good.

  Besides waiting for Marcus—if he showed up—I had one more thing I was anticipating. The new National Bloodhound came out today. I’d seen Nicky yesterday morning, and I assumed that he’d had plenty of time to file his story. I was just waiting for someone to show up waving a copy and asking why I had blabbed, what I had gotten from it, and what role I’d played in Jasmine Normand’s death. I didn’t leave the shop for lunch like I usually did, in part because I still hoped Marcus would come by, but also because I couldn’t face the crowd at the Brew House. Jeanette might have dropped a copy of the tabloid on the public reading pile, with the pages of particular articles folded down. I didn’t want to be there. I didn’t want to see it. I wanted to pretend, just for another day, that Strings Attached was happy and successful, and there was nothing to threaten its future. I didn’t regret trading my story for information that would find Stella’s attacker, but I didn’t have to like it.