Jessie Delacroix and the Sanctum of Shadows (Whispering Pines Mystery Series Book 2)

by Constance Barker

  After an evening of tromping through mud and muck and fighting off pirates, the last thing I wanted to do was to go on another outing. I still wanted a full day in a warm tub with strawberries and champagne and Arthur licking my hand. Our shadow bodies didn’t really get tired, but I would have taken it a little easier if I’d know that all the stress and strain would catch up to me as soon as we got back home. Still, Savannah was my home for a few years, and I hadn’t been there for a couple of months…and we did have a murder to solve. There was no way the police were going to be able to crack this one without us three girls ending up in a crazy house when we tried to explain what was really going on.

  “Thanks, Olivia…Doctor. Sounds good, Cam.”

  “I don't want you going all vigilante on us now, Jessie,” Kyle said as he rubbed his chin and gave us a concerned look. “Zach isn’t sworn in yet, and you guys haven’t been through the screening and classes to be deputized.”

  “That's true,” I said, “but then again, Kyle, you guys don't have any jurisdiction in Savannah anyway. The Sheriff would have to bring in the Chatham County authorities to help out there, and those big city boys are likely to take over the whole investigation. Besides, it's my alma mater, and Cammy’s law firm represents both the University and the museum. She’s licensed to investigate anywhere in the state, and it sounded like Olivia and Dr. Bandersnatch just hired her to look into their friend and colleague’s murder – so…”

  “Okay, okay. I get it,” conceded Kyle. “ Just keep it on the up-and-up and the down-low. You don’t represent law enforcement, and don’t tell them you do. Keep the Sheriff and me in the loop, and don't go sticking your nose where it doesn't belong. Understand?”

  “Me? Why, don't be ridiculous, Kyle. Would I ever do such a thing?”

  Kyle rolled his eyes, and Cammy laughed out loud. Am really that nosey?

  “So, fill us in, Kyle.” Zach leaned in with his hands clasped in front of him and his elbows out wide, taking up half of the table. “What else have you found out? Are any of these treasure hunters in the suspect pool?”

  Kyle let out a frustrated sigh. “Everybody is a suspect at this point, Zach. We don’t know enough to rule anybody out.” He gestured to the next table with his head and lowered his voice. “These guys the Sheriff is talking to represent a treasure recovery outfit from Savannah that usually works in international waters. The tall one – Finch – knew Lawrence Pettigrew, Doctor Bandersnatch’s unfortunate colleague from the museum; and the Sheriff thinks that Pettigrew may have been feeding him some insider information he was able to steal or glean from Olivia and Phineas so they could beat them to the treasure.”

  “Why, that’s preposterous, Officer Carnigan,” Phineas blurted, a bit indignant. “Lawrence would never put himself before the interests of the museum. He was dedicated to public service and the common good. He provided several great finds to the museum too, including the Ketchikan skull dating back to the time of the Bering land bridge. He lost three toes to frostbite recovering it.”

  Kyle was not convinced. “It’s not exactly diamonds and gold, Dr. Bandersnatch. A museum would probably be the highest bidder for such an item.”

  “I’m not so sure either, Martin.” Olivia took the doctor’s arm. “There was always something that seemed a little bit shifty about that man. More than once I saw him looking at the screen on my laptop.”

  “And,” Kyle continued, “there were some drafts of emails on the deceased Mr. Pettigrew’s personal email account that seemed to indicate he was feeding information to someone.”

  “Drafts, you say?” Phineas gave a dubious look. “So they were never sent, then. Maybe somebody was trying to frame him.”

  “Drafts have become a common way for cohorts in crime to communicate, Doctor. They share a gmail account, often under a phony name, and then save a message as a draft without sending it. The other person will log into the account, read the draft of the saved message, and then delete it. That’s how the disgraced head of the CIA communicated with his secret lover until he was caught and their secret exposed.”

  “Well, Lawrence Pettigrew was a good man.”

  Yet he mysteriously ended up on the replica ship, hanging from the tallest mast.

  “Did anyone have access to Mr. Pettigrew’s private laptop, Phineas?” I was looking for a way to prove that his friend was not involved in any unethical behavior.

  “No, of course not. Only his most trusted staff, and perhaps those of us involved in the ship project, I should think. We all had our personal tablets and devices lying around the studio there.”

  People are way too trusting of others they assume to be their friends. I looked over toward the table of treasure hunters where Sheriff Muldoon was doing his best to get at the truth.

  I wonder if I can peer into the back of Mr. Finch’s head… I couldn’t really get a clear image of his thoughts, but I could tell that he didn’t like the Sheriff asking him so many questions. It seemed that he was hiding something…but what?

  “Jessie…Jessie… Jes!” Cammy finally brought me back from my side trip into Finch’s head.

  “Oh…sorry. Just daydreaming, I guess. I’m still so tired.”

  “Tired from what, Jessie?” Kyle asked.

  I looked at Zach. It seemed he hadn’t told anyone about our trip to the Sanctum of Shadows when he got left behind. That was good. “Oh, the girls and I – Cammy and Ginny – were out following some clues for the treasure last night. We must have walked a couple of miles through the woods.”

  “Yeah.” Cammy looked at Kyle and then Zach. “You guys should see the way Jessie can scamper through the woods and shinny up a tree, just like a squirrel. It’s really something.”

  She gave me her smart-ass face.

  “Yep, that’s me – a natural-born woodland creature.” I took a few seconds to think of a comeback. “But at least I didn’t get stuck in the swamp, up to my crotch in mud. Maybe the guys would like to hear about that part of the story, Cam.”

  “Ha!” she laughed, and shot me a death scowl. “It was so much fun. Too bad we have to get packed and have some lunch before our ride gets here.”

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  Chapter Fourteen

  Fortunately there was plenty of room on the Uber Doober van that came by for the return trip late Sunday afternoon. A lot of people were still coming in for the treasure hunting, plus more media people were converging on Whispering Pines too, now that the triple homicide and disappearing corpses had gotten people’s attention. But not so many people were taking the return trip yet. There was even room for Arthur.

  Zach had a condo not far from Hunter Army Airfield in Savannah, where he worked part time, so he got off at Oglethorpe Mall. His brother, Hector, lived and worked in Charleston, but Zach had come to Savannah after his stint in the military to pick up a degree in security and law enforcement.

  Cammy bought her own place in Midtown a few months ago, right in Chatham Crescent, so we got off at the Arts Academy and walked through Tiedeman Park to her house on Atlantic Avenue. I had dropped her off and picked her up a few times, but I’d never been inside her new place. She wanted to finish up her remodeling before she had guests, and she had everything the way she wanted it now. Arthur was ready to stretch his legs after the long ride, and it was a beautiful night with a warm coastal breeze.

  “It’s just a small place,” Cammy said as she unlocked the door to her cute little bungalow, “but it’s mine!”

  As soon as she flipped on the light, Arthur dashed into the open kitchen just beyond the living room. He seemed a little miffed not to find a bowl of food and water waiting there for him, but he quickly nestled into a cozy spot on the rug next to the warm motor of the gently vibrating refrigerator.

  “It was a two-bedroom, but I turned the smaller one into my en suite and closet. Come on…”

  I followed her into her beautifully decorated master suite, and we left ou
r bags by the king-sized bed.

  “In here…” She opened the door to the adjoining room. “…is my ‘Girl Cave.’” She showed me her vast walk-in closet and dressing room with a whole wall for shoes and a luxurious shower area with double sinks. She even had a skylight and a vanity with a lighted mirror, marble top, and red velvet throne. The centerpiece in the other half of the room was a large heart-shaped Jacuzzi tub right in the middle with a wet bar and wine refrigerator on one side and a massage table on the other.

  “Um…nice little room.”

  She unhooked the flexible gooseneck of the hand-held-shower head from the faucet and turned on the water in the whirlpool built for two. Then she poured in a few drops of foaming bath oil and gathered up the empty wineglass and a book from the end of the tub.

  “Get in. Beer, wine, or iced tea?” She pulled off her top and threw it by the hamper near her closet door, and her pants and bra followed.

  “Um…Chardonnay, if you have it.”

  “I do, but I want you to try this Beaujolais. You’ll like it.”

  She walked to her bar in just her panties, so I undressed and slipped under the rising bubbles in the tub. Each arch of the heart was made for one person to recline nicely, with easy access to the table area between the humps. The water was just over my hips so far, so I felt a little uncomfortable as I tried to relax.

  “So, you have a removable showerhead here so you can wash your hair in the tub, I guess.”

  Cammy Jo did a kind of double-take as she filled two glasses with the red wine and tried to hide her smirk.

  “Uh…sure. Yeah, that’s what it’s for.”

  Okay…I get it now. I’m an idiot. I feel like such a 12-year-old schoolgirl next to Cammy, and in a bathtub, I look like one too. She set the two glasses and a bowl of grapes by the tub. Then she slipped out of her undies and into the warm water with a pleasurable moan.

  “Ahhh…it’s good to be home.”

  I’m not a fan of red wine, but I took a sniff and a sip. I was pleasantly surprised. “Mmm! Fruity!”

  “I knew you’d like it. It’s not like that dry Cabernet that those snooty wine connoisseurs go for. This is sweet and delicious.”

  I took another sip – bigger this time. “So, what’s our plan for tomorrow?”

  “A short stop in the office, then Savannah State. From there we can take the Truman to the Diamond Causeway and across the bridge to the museum on Skidaway. Then we’ll meet Zach. He said he’ll have a boat waiting for us at the Delegal Creek Marina.”

  “Sounds good.”

  I knew my way around the main part of the city pretty well, but anything south of the University might as well be in Egypt. If it wasn’t on La Roche Avenue, I would get lost.

  Cammy’s bed was so comfortable, I didn’t want to get up. But the aroma of toaster waffles and coffee, with the help of some urgent insistence from Arthur, finally got me going.

  “Cammy, you’re bed is wonderful.” I sat down at her breakfast nook and caressed my hot cup of coffee. Black coffee always tasted the best when I was low on energy.

  “Really? I tried that memory foam mattress for a while, and I really liked it. But it wasn’t so good for…entertaining, so I switched back.”

  Her priorities were different from mine, but the girl knew how to live life to the fullest…that was for sure.

  “It would be nice to see some of the old gang at the law office, Cammy Jo, but…I really would rather not…”

  “…have to see your ex. Yeah, I don’t blame you.”

  Jason was one of the hotshot young lawyers at the firm who I made the mistake of dating for most of the year I was there.

  “I’ll just call and tell him I have some business to take care of for the museum. He’s well-aware of the murder and knows that Bandersnatch and I were both in Whispering Pines. I’ll be on the clock for the company, so he’ll be okay with it.”

  I brought some dry food for Arthur, but he seemed more interested in my waffle – which I wasn’t interested in at all. He scarfed it down in two seconds and was ready for more. Good thing I don’t have his appetite.

  Cammy went into the living room, which was open to the kitchen, and started speaking in hushed tones into her phone. That seemed a little odd to me, so I strained a bit to hear what she was saying. That was a mistake. Instead of just hearing her, I could see both her and Jason along with everything in their minds. This was new to me. Granny had told me that I could look behind people’s eyes to see what was in their head, but I always made a point not to invade their privacy – especially since Granny said that the guys would always be seeing me naked in their heads.

  All at once, I knew everything. Cammy had a one-time tryst with Jason recently after a Friday Happy Hour, but she immediately regretted it. She had always told me that Jason was a pig, and now I knew why – because he was hitting on her the whole time I was seeing him. Now he was trying to use that one mistake to control her, but he could never control Cammy Jo.

  I hadn’t really heard a single word either of them said, but I had just stepped inside of their common reality for a moment. I was really glad now that I had made the decision to leave and start running the Inn and the Tea Room. Really glad. She hung up the phone and came back into the kitchen.

  “Don’t let that jerk get you down, Cammy. And don’t worry about me – I don’t care what might have happened between the two of you.”

  She jerked her head toward me but said nothing.

  I shrugged. “I just got this feeling when you were on the phone.”

  “It was nothing – believe me.”

  I smiled.

  “And you’re a witch.” Cammy finished her coffee. “Let’s go.”

  “I am not a witch,” I retorted with a bit of a whine.

  “Really? You opened a lock with a simple command and turned me into a squirrel. How else do you explain that?”

  “Hey, that was in a different world. You probably could have done the same thing there. I mean, you saw the way that old woman floated up into the air in front of the pirates.”

  “You mean the ghost of your Granny?”

  “I was taken aback. “What?”

  “Just a guess, but judging from your response, I know I’m right.”

  “Uh…I thought you were a skeptic about things like that.”

  “I am. But I’m smart enough to accept things when I know they’re real, especially when I see them with my own eyes.”

  She really did have the deductive mind of a great private investigator. “Well, maybe the whole thing was just some kind of mind trick we all fell into, and that place didn’t really exist.”

  “Right.”

  We stepped into her attached garage and got into her 7-year-old Audi Cabriolet. Arthur got in the backseat, and she opened the garage door.

  “Okay, Jessie. Start the car.”

  “But…you have the keys.”

  She looked at me. “Start it.”

  I was curious to see what would happen if I tried too, but I was hesitant. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to know.

  “Sure,” I said. “Nothing’s going to happen. Should I wiggle my nose or blink my eyes or wave a magic wand or what?”

  “Just think it…say it. Whatever.”

  “Fine.” I waved my hand. “Start.”

  The empty key slot for the ignition turned and the engine started purring obediently. Cammy Jo slid the key in and put the car in reverse. I gasped in disbelief.

  “I never had a doubt,” she said. We backed out of the driveway and headed for the University.

  Was this a dream? I turned around and looked at Arthur, my eyes wide open, wondering how my life might change from this moment onward.

  My mind was adrift, but the vibrating buzz of my cell phone snapped me back into reality. It was a text from Olivia.

  “Cammy Jo…”

  “Yeah.” She turned down the radio a bit. “What is it?”

  “Olivia says that her co-chair and the Doctor’s
entire staff are at the boat launch site on Raccoon Key. Pettigrew’s family is there too. We should just go there.”

  “Roger that.” She put on her sunglasses, cranked up the radio, and took the ramp onto the Harry S Truman Parkway. “Tell Zach we’ll be early.”

  25 minutes later we were at the Delegal Creek Marina. It was almost 10:00 a.m., and Zach had arrived early to make the arrangements for a boat and was sitting at the bar enjoying a morning cocktail.

  “Good morning, ladies!” He was cheerful and in a pleasant mood.

  “I have a liquid lunch from time to time, Zach, but a liquid breakfast seems a bit…daring.” Cammy Jo sat down next to him and held up two fingers for the bartended. “OJ.”

  I stood between them, and Zach pulled the stool on his other side over for me.

  “Well,” he laughed, taking a sip of his Bloody Mary and chomping on the stick of celery that garnished it, “I was up with the roosters and already had a double order of chicken and waffles at the Waffle House. Can’t come home without a trip to my favorite restaurant.”

  “Your dates must be thrilled with your choice of dinner venues,” Cammy chided.

  “And this…” Zach held up his red beverage. “…is a Virgin Mary, alcohol free.”

  “Well,” Cammy leaned in toward Zach, “every man should have a virgin at least once in his life. Do we have a boat?”

  Zach gestured toward a middle-aged man in a white nautical cap drinking coffee at the other end of the bar. “Whenever you’re ready. Captain Jack just needs your company credit card, and he’s ours for as long as we need him – half-day minimum.”

  “A half day is plenty. I just better not lose the receipt so we can charge it back to the client, or else Jason will burst into flames.”

  That was true. The cheap little jerk could blow big money on sports betting and fancy dinners for clients, but if we bought two boxes of paper clips instead of one we’d better have a good reason.

  The bartender set down two glasses of orange juice, not much bigger than a shot glass. “Eleven dollars. Would you like to start a tab?”