Last Licks

by Donally, Claire

“All I can ask is that you try.” Luke snapped his case together and picked it up.

  “I have one more thing to ask you,” Sunny said, “something that came out of the stuff you talked about with Will yesterday.”

  “What?” Luke’s brown eyes got a little wary.

  “You said somebody gave you the heads-up that Reese was going after people for reports. Where did the warning come from?”

  Luke looked a little relieved. “Rafe Warner. He’s a pretty decent guy.”

  And a pretty busy one, Sunny added silently. She thanked Luke again for the lotion, and made sure the bottle was tightly capped before putting it in her pocket. He said good-bye and headed off to the front door.

  Sunny glanced to the nurses’ station, where Camille was beckoning her over, holding up a gauze pad and a roll of tape.

  If only a few drops of magic lotion could take care of everything, Sunny wistfully thought as she went to get bandaged.

  *

  Mike Coolidge almost dropped his remote when Sunny came home, joined him on the couch, and told him about Luke’s upcoming gig.

  “O’Dowd’s?” Sunny’s father said in disbelief. “What was the kid thinking?”

  “I think he was just happy to find a place where he could play.”

  Mike frowned. “The crowd down there will eat him alive.”

  “Maybe not, if some friendly faces turn up,” Sunny said hopefully. “Would you mind coming? Maybe you could ask Mrs. Martinson, too.”

  “Helena? In O’Dowd’s?”

  Sunny tried to imagine the fastidious Mrs. Martinson in a rowdy joint like O’Dowd’s, but the picture just wouldn’t come. “All right,” she said, shrugging in defeat, “that probably won’t work. But you’ll show up for Luke, won’t you?”

  Now it was Mike’s turn to shrug. “I wouldn’t mind hearing him do something besides ‘You Are My Sunshine.’ Just remember, I’m not as good at barroom brawls as I used to be.”

  “Thanks, Dad.” Sunny got up and went to the kitchen, where she found Shadow back in his usual spot on top of the refrigerator. She went up on tiptoe and he leaned down ’til they were nose to nose. She heard him sniff and his eyes widened, but he stayed where he was.

  Sunny zipped up the stairs for a quick shower. That should remove any temptation, she thought. But just to be sure, she unloaded her pockets and sent her T-shirt and pants down the chute to the laundry. Then, in a fresh shirt and shorts, she went downstairs to see what Mike had gotten off the shopping list.

  After checking the fridge, she stuck her head around the entryway to the living room. “I see you got some tomatoes and cold cuts. We still have romaine. How does salad and a sandwich sound?”

  Mike thought that sounded pretty good, so Sunny went to the kitchen and got to work. While she was slicing the tomatoes, she looked down at her scratched hand. Luke’s lotion had washed off in the shower, and she was getting prickles of pain again. When she finished her preparations, she went back upstairs, applied a little more of the viscous yellow stuff, and taped a new gauze pad over it. She descended the staircase and stepped into the living room again. “Dinner’s ready.”

  Mike got the glasses and poured seltzer for both of them—raspberry flavored this time. Meanwhile, Sunny set out a meal for Shadow.

  As they ate, Sunny and her dad made small talk about the events of the day. “I’ve been hiding in the air-conditioning all day,” Mike complained. “Even when I went out this morning to the mall, it was sticky.”

  “Sticky or stinky?” Sunny said. “Didn’t you say it was supposed to break this afternoon? I left the umbrella in the Wrangler—”

  Even as she spoke, a thunderclap detonated over the house like a small bomb. The whole place shook, and Shadow abandoned his supper and dashed over to Sunny’s feet. But he wasn’t cowering. His head and tail were both up, one scanning the area for trouble to be dealt with, the other lashing around in agitation.

  “It’s okay.” Sunny leaned down and petted his bristling fur. “Nothing to get upset about. It’s only thunder.”

  “Yeah,” Mike said. “I’m told that it’s lightning you have to watch out for.”

  The sound and light show lasted only about twenty minutes, but the heavy rain that followed stayed on. Sunny and her dad finished their meals and the dishes. While he went back to the living room to see if the storm had done anything to their cable service, Sunny stayed in the kitchen by the phone, trying to think of anyone else she could call to go to Luke’s show tomorrow evening.

  This is when you realize how much your life has shrunk, she realized. Most of her friends from the old days had, like her, left Kittery Harbor and gone off into the wide world. The ones who remained were all married and didn’t have that much in common with her anymore. Finally she punched in the number for her old high school classmate, current vet Jane Rigsdale, who thought a guitarist in O’Dowd’s sounded like a hoot. “The problem is, Tobe’s got tickets for an outdoor concert in Portsmouth tomorrow night—that is, if the Piscataqua doesn’t break its banks and sweep everything away.”

  Desperate to boost the friendly audience count, Sunny went into the living room. “I tried asking Jane to O’Dowd’s, but she has a date for tomorrow. Do you think any of your friends might want to come?”

  “I don’t think Zach Judson’s been in that dump since he was your age,” Mike said. “And Ken Howell swore years ago never to mention O’Dowd’s in the Courier. Every time he’d mention a fight or a drug bust there, it only advertised the place to other lowlives. So he stays away. If he actually saw something there, he’d feel he’d have to write about it.”

  He gave her a sly smile. “I did talk to one person while you were off phumphing around in the kitchen, and he agreed to come.”

  “Really? Who?” Sunny asked.

  “Will Price.” Mike raised his hands to cut her off. “Before you start in, he didn’t mention that you’d called him. Besides, he’d be a good man to have at our table.”

  Sunny gave him an unwilling nod. Quite a number of the creepy types in O’Dowd’s knew that Will was a cop. If he showed up out of uniform, they’d probably behave themselves, thinking he was there undercover. “I was, um, waiting,” she said, realizing how lame that sounded.

  “You mean you weren’t going to call him because you didn’t want Will to know you were going to see another fellow—even if you were only watching him make music.” Mike sighed, looking more dadlike than he usually did. “Maybe you don’t talk much about it, but I know it bothers you that Will hasn’t been a bit more serious.”

  “I haven’t asked for anything more.” Sunny winced at the defensive tone that crept into her voice. “I’m just glad there’s someone around to go out with every once in a while.”

  Mike nodded. “Look at it this way. He agreed to go out with you when you’re going to watch this new guy in town play guitar. That’s got to mean something.”

  “Right,” Sunny said. “Because all us girls just love a guitarist.”

  She decided it was time to find a new conversation topic. “Have you heard anything about Alfred Scatterwell?”

  “I asked among my friends,” Mike replied. “Seems he’s not very political . . . not much of anything really. All he seems to do is sit in his house, counting his money and waiting to inherit the rest. Helena suggested you stop over tomorrow morning. She might have something more for you.”

  “Okay, thanks.” Sunny sat and watched the news with her dad, at least until the weather report.

  “Looks like that storm cleared the air.” Mike tuned off the air conditioner and opened the window. They heard the sound of a breeze, but no rain.

  “Good,” Sunny said. She watched a little more TV with her dad, then excused herself to go upstairs and call Will.

  “So,” he said when he answered, “I understand we’re going to watch Luke Daconto perform. That se
ems awfully chummy, considering he’s a possible suspect.”

  “You never know, he might decide to confess onstage as an encore,” Sunny responded, thinking, Thanks a lot, Dad.

  “Speaking of which, how was your day of interviews? Did you learn anything from Elsa Hogue?”

  “Well, she doesn’t like Alfred Scatterwell,” Sunny said.

  “You don’t have to like someone to take their money.”

  “But would you trust them if you thought they had a cruel streak?” Sunny asked. “That’s how Elsa described him. Either cruel or very self-absorbed.”

  Will made a noncommittal noise over the phone. “Anything else?”

  “She got a warning about Reese and his demands for paperwork, just like Luke. And, in fact, it came from the same person. Even though the therapists are independent contractors, the union warned them—specifically, Rafe Warner.”

  “What do you think?” Will asked. “Workers of the world, unite?”

  Sunny hesitated for a moment. “There’s something I didn’t check with Luke. According to Elsa, she went to the nurses’ station to bum some caffeine and found Luke there doing the same thing.”

  “That puts them both pretty close to the ever-popular Room 114.” Will’s voice got quiet. “But only Elsa Hogue admitted it.”

  “How about you? Did those lists that Rafe gave you lead to anything?”

  “Only to getting my friends pretty ticked off at me,” Will admitted. “It was a lot of stuff for them to be checking out. They could have gotten caught.”

  He sighed. “No one seems to have a criminal record, and they haven’t been buying any new cars or boats.”

  “Huh?” Sunny said, then, “Oh. Spending their ill-gotten gains.”

  “Right. However, my friend in Boston did find a car service that had a Maine run. The driver was supposed to pick up a passenger on a flight from Hartsdale Airport down in Atlanta, arriving around half-past twelve. But the flight was delayed by almost an hour and a half.”

  “Factor in another hour and change for the trip up to Bridgewater, given the traffic . . . that would tie in with Gavrik’s arrival.”

  “That’s the good news,” Will said. “Unfortunately, it also gives the doctor an alibi, assuming Ollie’s right about the killer being in the room with Scatterwell. Gavrik would have been on the plane.”

  “I still wouldn’t mind asking her what she was doing out of town,” Sunny said. “Or even better, you can ask. Something’s going on there.”

  They agreed to tackle Gavrik the next day—and to have another chat with Rafe about the good doctor.

  “Then after Daconto is flushed with success from his O’Dowd’s debut, we can ask him about his bad memory on the night that Scatterwell died.” Will laughed.

  “You don’t have to sound so happy about it,” Sunny snapped.

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean it to sound that way,” Will apologized. “All I want is for something to let us get a fingernail into this case.”

  They chatted a moment more, then Sunny said good-bye, hung up the phone, and went back downstairs.

  “I think I’m going to hit the hay,” she told her dad.

  She climbed the stairs, glancing back to find Shadow at her heels. “No AC tonight,” she told him. “I really hope we’re back to normal.” Sunny opened the window, closed the blinds, and changed into shortie pajamas. As she was taking off her watch, she saw the gauze pad.

  “Let’s give it a try,” she muttered, going through the stuff from her pockets. There was the miniature bottle. She undid the top and poured a small dollop onto the scratches.

  “Well, it feels better.” She peered at the scratches, holding her hand under the bedside light. Was it her imagination, or did they not look so pink? She could only hope so.

  But she wasn’t the only one who wanted to inspect the wounds. Shadow successfully dodged the left hand trying to keep him away, bringing his nose to her right. He made a sad noise at the sight of the scratches, sniffed at them three times, then pulled back and sneezed with a vigorous shake.

  “Whatever it’s made with, the stuff is potent.” Sunny laughed and hopped into bed. Shadow followed, snuggling under the sheet and a thin blanket.

  Soon enough, they were both asleep.

  11

  The next morning, Sunny sat at the kitchen table, enjoying a cup of coffee, while Mike prepared to head off to the old school and his daily three-mile trek. She’d awakened to find a clear sky outside her window and a cool breeze drifting in. Except for the smell of damp earth, no trace remained of last night’s storm—and even better, the heat and humidity of the last two days were gone as well. The weatherman on the radio said as much.

  I guess he looked out his window, too, Sunny couldn’t help thinking.

  “Sure you don’t want to come along?” Mike asked.

  “I’ve got calls to make this morning, and then some visits,” she told him.

  Mike grinned. “And a date tonight.”

  “Right,” Sunny said sarcastically. “Provided we get through the day.” She waved good-bye to her dad as Shadow came into the room, looked around, and finally settled at her feet. When she finished and got up, he moved to a patch of light from the kitchen window while Sunny went upstairs to shower.

  As she washed herself, she couldn’t help stealing glances at the back of her right hand. It was incredible: instead of pink scratches, a set of silvery lines barely showed up against her skin.

  “For a hippy-dippy chippie, Luke’s mother sure knew her stuff,” Sunny said.

  She came out of the bathroom wrapped in a terry cloth robe and went to her room to pick out the outfit of the day. This wasn’t easy. She wanted to look nice for her visit with Mrs. Martinson, but tough enough to deal with the temperamental Dr. Gavrik. In the end, Sunny went with flats, a pair of charcoal gray slacks, and an off-white top.

  “When I get home, I’ll change into something more suitable for O’Dowd’s,” she muttered. “Something that can stand up to splinters and won’t show beer spills.”

  She’d just finished wrestling with her hair and putting on some makeup when the phone rang. It was Will Price, calling to tell her he’d secured them a lunch appointment with Dr. Gavrik for twelve thirty. “Should I pick you up around noon?”

  “Sure, but I’ll be over at Mrs. Martinson’s house, so pick me up there,” Sunny told him. “See you then.”

  She hung up and went downstairs.

  Shadow perked up and ambled over when he saw Sunny leaving some supplies for him. She gently massaged his fur, then washed her hands and was on her way.

  It was a pleasure to be outdoors today, now that the soggy, enervating weather had moved on. As she walked the few blocks, Sunny saw a number of people coming out to take care of deferred garden business, like mowing grass. Mike put his own gardening efforts into cultivating the rosebushes Sunny’s mom had planted years ago, but tended to neglect the lawn. As she arrived at the Martinson house, Sunny saw that Mrs. M.’s butterfly bushes were in bloom, bringing blue blossoms and a sweet scent to the air.

  She rang the doorbell and heard excited barking inside.

  When Helena Martinson answered the door, she had one hand on Toby’s collar. “Come on inside, dear,” Mike’s lady friend said. “Is the kitchen all right?”

  “It’s fine.” Sunny stepped carefully as Toby romped around her feet. “No lack of energy in the little guy, is there?”

  Helena got Sunny established at a little table right beside the kitchen window and set out two mugs of coffee and, of course, two pieces of her famous coffee cake.

  Toby went to his water bowl and began noisily drinking.

  “We just got back from emptying him, and here he is, loading up again.” The older woman gave Sunny a wry smile. “There are a lot of things about owning a dog that they don’t tell you.”

 
; “You’re not regretting your adoption, are you?” Sunny asked.

  “Of course not. You’re good company, aren’t you, Toby?”

  Toby came over to rest his muzzle on Helena’s knee—and leave a wet spot on her tan trousers.

  Sunny raised a forkful of cake to her mouth and followed it with a sip of coffee. “Delicious, as usual.” She looked at Helena expectantly. “So, tell me—what did you find out about Alfred Scatterwell?”

  “As you know, I wasn’t very fond of Gardner because of what he tried to do to me—in this very kitchen, as a matter of fact.” Helena’s eyes seemed to skitter around her spotless kitchen. Sunny had never seen her so reluctant to share gossip; she tried to encourage her with a little humor.

  “I know Gardner was a bit of a dog,” Sunny said. “Dad started to remember that, when the surprise and the initial reunion feeling began to wear off. First he remembered the good times. After all, it was thanks to that band he had with Gardner that Dad met my mother.” She laughed. “Of course, the band broke up after Gardner tried to get between my dad and mom, but that only hit Dad later. Speaking of hitting, did I mention that Dad punched Gardner in the nose?”

  “Yes,” Helena replied, but it seemed as though she wasn’t really following what Sunny was saying. Her expression was distant, as if she were resolving something in her mind.

  “So what’s the problem? Did Alfred turn out to be a dog, too? Like uncle, like nephew?”

  “No.” Mrs. Martinson looked closely at Sunny. “What did you think of Gardner? How did he treat you?”

  “At first, I thought he was funny and charming—a real life of the party. But the longer I stayed around him, the more I saw of his less nice side.”

  Helena nodded. “But how did he treat you?”

  “He was very buddy-buddy,” Sunny replied. “Complimentary. He wanted me to push his wheelchair—said it was the only way to get pretty girls around him.”

  “Only Gardner would try to turn a disability into a come-on,” Mrs. M. said sourly. She looked carefully at Sunny. “But there was nothing else?”