The Widows of Sea Trail (The Widows of Sea Trail Trilogy)

by Jacqueline DeGroot

  One topic led to another until just as the neutralizer was being squeezed over the tightly-clamped rollers covering my mom’s head, she happened to mention her father who had recently died in North Carolina. My ears perked as I really had been mostly reading a magazine and just umhmming when I thought it necessary.

  “Where in North Carolina?” “You’ve probably never even heard of it, but it’s a little beach called Sunset Beach.”

  “Sunset Beach? Why, that’s where I live!”

  “You’re joshin’!”

  “No, really. I live on the mainland in a retirement community called Sea Trail Plantation.”

  I watched as every speck of color leached from her face; honestly, even her eyelids under a heavy coating of lilac shadow went ashen.

  Her mouth tensed and she became silent. She was stuck in an odd position with her hand wavering in the air. Finally I asked, “Did I say something wrong?”

  “That’s where he was killed. Somebody killed him and put his body in a dumpster.”

  “Oh . . . my . . .God. That was your father they found?”

  “Yes,” she whispered, “it was my dad someone strangled and discarded as if he was just so much rubbish.”

  “Have they any idea who could have done such a thing?” I asked, shocked that this far away I could have accidentally come across the daughter of the man who had been killed on my little plantation a little more than a week ago.

  “No. No one knows a thing. The police chief says they hope to get some information they can use from the coroner, but so far nothing.”

  My instincts kicked in and I started probing for answers. “Do you know why he was vacationing there by himself? Had he ever been there before?”

  “He wasn’t vacationing, he was trying to figure out whether he wanted to sell his lot or build a house on it.”

  “I heard he owned a lot at Sea Trail.” I wasn’t about to tell her about my finding his wallet.

  “Yes, he and my mother bought it about four years ago.”

  “I suppose Chief Massey knows his?” I knew unequivocally that she did.

  “I haven’t actually spoken with her, my brother went down and made arrangements for his body to be shipped back. He said he spoke with the police chief and she assured him that everything was being done, that it would just take time. I know that they had a special team come in and go through everything in the dumpster and his car. That’s about all I know.”

  “Where is his lot?”

  “I’m not sure, I’ve never been there. But it’s next door to a really cranky old man.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “When Mom and Dad first bought the lot, they planned on building right away. They had some plans done up and the lot staked out and then all hell broke lose with the man next door. Something about set backs and blocking his view of the golf course. There was a big brouhaha between him and my dad about it but the builder submitted the plans anyway. They got held up with the Architectural Review Committee for five months. During the reviewing process, Mom got cancer and they halted the whole thing. Mom said she didn’t want to live next door to that old buzzard anyway. She died four months later from pancreatic cancer, so I guess she didn’t have to.”

  “Did the plans ever get approved?” I asked.

  “That’s a funny thing, they finally did. Dad got a call from the builder who asked if Dad was still planning on building, he said if he wasn’t planning on building now that he might have a buyer for the lot. But we told Dad to take his time and not be rushed into anything. He was devastated when Mom died. We all needed time to sort things out, and the last thing I needed right then was for my dad to move away.”

  Debbie had finished squirting all the liquid from the squeeze bottle, with a final sputter it ran dry and she tossed it with an arc into the trashcan on the other side of the chair. With a resigned air, she muttered, “I guess in retrospect, I should have encouraged him to sell, then he wouldn’t have had a reason to go down there again and he’d still be with us.” Tears filled her eyes and I could see she felt guilty for having advised him to wait.

  “You couldn’t have known, no one could have.”

  “So do you think it was a workman as my brother’s been saying?”

  “Hard to say. Do you suppose he was looking at that house because he was considering building again?”

  “I know he was. He was probably just going through different houses to get ideas.”

  “Was he planning on using the same builder?”

  “No. I think he would have, but the guy’s developed a heart condition and has decided to retire.”

  “So he might have been looking at the workmanship so he could pick a new builder?”

  “Sure, I suppose that’s possible.”

  I remembered talking to Tom Coyte at one of the full moon parties, he had told me that although it is illegal, trespassing in fact, people often walked in and around the houses that were under construction. Sometimes they wanted to check things out so they could decide on a builder, but usually they were just curious how their neighbors were spending their money. Tom had added that he didn’t mind people checking out his work, that he had nothing to be ashamed of in any of his houses. I knew he was always winning awards and that his homeowners were always speaking very highly of him so I didn’t doubt his sincerity. Had Debbie’s father decided to build on his lot after all, and had he decided to check out the area’s premier builders?

  “Well, when I get back to Sunset Beach, I’ll go see the police chief and make sure she knows he might have been looking to build on his property, that would certainly be helpful to know.”

  “Thanks. We just need to know why someone killed him, you know?”

  “Yeah, I’m sure it’s hard not knowing what happened to your dad.”

  Mom was still holding her head over the sink and we could hear the echo of her voice against the basin as she called up to us, “If you two are done yakking would you mind letting me up, my back is killing me!”

  Debbie went back to paying attention to Mom and her sopping rods and papers and I went back to my magazine. But I didn’t read a single world. I was amazed at the way people were connected, the coincidences like this one that just blew you away. I remembered Diane, a friend who lived in Ocean Ridge Plantation telling me about two of her neighbors. Both men had worked for the same company based out of Virginia for thirty years, in the very same department, in view of each others desks, yet neither knew the other had bought a lot and built a retirement home in the same community, on the same street, just one lot apart until they moved into their houses during the same month. It just boggles your mind sometimes I thought as I fanned the pages without seeing a single thing. Thoughts of Matt had managed to slip back into my mind— in between the ones concerning Debbie’s father.

  When Mom was ready and it was time to leave, Debbie went through the kitchen area and into the house and brought out a large framed picture. “I thought you’d like to see a picture of my mom and dad, it was taken during their last Christmas together.”

  I took the picture from her and looked down at the smiling couple and then had to grapple with the picture frame to keep from dropping it. The man in the picture was the same old man I had seen in the theater that day. Suddenly I knew exactly where his lot was and who his neighbor would have been had he built the house he wanted.

  I was becoming engulfed in the fog all these coincidences were creating. There was so much more here than had first appeared. I didn’t think of Matt again until we were almost home.

  Afew days later I went home to pick up the pieces of my life once again. I was miserable, I felt cheated, but I was determined that I was not going to let that two-timing jerk keep me from enjoying my plantation. I had an intriguing series of events to check out and it bolstered me to think that I might have something useful to contribute.

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Showdown Unfortunately, over the next several days I did not enjoy my pla
ntation. I did anything but. I forced myself to get up early and went for a walk around the plantation. I had a few stops in mind. Driving back from Virginia, a plausible scenario had come to mind and it was time to check it out.

  First I walked to the lot I suspected had been Mr. Clay Harmon’s. It was at the end of King’s Corner. His neighbors, if the directory was right, were none other than Alvin and Janetta Japonika, the couple that had been seated right in front of me in the theater not so long ago.

  I walked around the lot, pacing it off with my feet as if I was measuring until Alvin came out of his house and off his deck to find out what I was doing there. I was ready for him. I knew Janetta but I’d only met Alvin a handful of times.

  “Hi Al! I heard this lot was going to be for sale soon so I thought I’d check it out. My brother and his wife are looking for a place to build a house and as they have eight kids, they need a rather large one. If I’m counting this off right, this lot is large enough for a large two-story. If it’s set all the way back, it should give them the square footage they need, which is close to five thousand I’m guessing. I read that the further the set back, the higher you can build so, if the front of the house is here . . .” I walked briskly to the back corner of the lot, “then the back sunroom or family room can end up right about here.” I looked over at his house and from the way I had lined everything up, his lateral view of the golf course would be shot to hell. I watched as his face went beet red.

  “I’m tired of people trying to ruin my view! When I lived in Maryland they built a mall behind my house even though the builder said the woods behind me were part of a preserve. Then I moved down here to Eastport. I had a lovely view of the golf course. Then they up and decided they were going to abandon the golf course and build more houses. For years the homeowners wrangled with them, but we lost and the course went fallow and I had no view again. Then I moved here and now everybody who wants to build on this lot wants to ruin my view! I’m fed up with it. Tell your brother to buy one of the lots over on Crooked Gulley and leave me the hell alone!”

  The squat, angry-faced man with the single wisp of gray hair whipping in the breeze stomped off through the underbrush to his yard. At the out of bounds marker he turned to sneer back at me. “It’s not for sale no how. The man who owed it died, it’ll likely be in probate for years.”

  If my plan was going to work, I had to smooth this over before we parted.

  “Oh, well than this isn’t the lot for them, they need to start building right away. Tell me where those lots are you mentioned, if you don’t mind.”

  He trudged back, and reluctantly rattled off the locations of six lots he thought were big enough for a large house. I thanked him profusely and continued my walk.

  Then I went to see Chief Massey. I told her I thought I had an idea about the murder but wasn’t sure. I asked if they had come up with anything forensic from the body, anything like fingerprints or DNA that would tie a suspect to the victim. She told me there were marks about the throat that were likely indentations from fingernails and that they had three very good fingerprints, a thumb among them, from the leather belt the victim had been wearing.

  “It looks like he was lifted by the belt. If your suspect matches those prints, well, we’re home free. They’ve been run and they don’t match any on file,” Lisa said.

  “If I get you a set of prints, can you run them?”

  “Sure. Why don’t you just tell me what you’ve got and we’ll check it out.”

  “If I can’t get you a good set in a few days, I’ll let you handle it. But for now, this just a hunch I’d like to play out. Here, I sealed his name in here, ‘cause I know you’d never let me out of here without giving you something. But don’t open it until the day after tomorrow. I could be so sooo wrong about this and I’d hate for anyone to have those kinds of hard feelings toward me. I promise I’ll get the prints, if they don’t match, I just look stupid to you, no one else.”

  “Fair enough, I’ll look for you in a day or two.”

  I knew I wouldn’t make it to my car without that envelope being opened, but I was fairly confident she’d give me at least a day to do this on the sly. She knew I was an old hand at investigating crimes of all kinds and that I had even nailed a couple of serial arsonists during my career.

  Then I went home to shower and eat, and to be miserable again. Whenever thoughts of Matt came to mind, I felt as if a dark deep pit was swallowing me whole. I was fighting to get back to where I’d been before, but nothing was helping. I was going through the motions of trying to be happy, but I was really about as unhappy as I’d ever been.

  As I sat on my deck sunning I thought about a trip Matt and I had discussed, it would have been our first trip together. Well that sure wasn’t going to happen now.

  He had wanted to take me to Florida to visit some friends. I had tried to back out by saying I just couldn’t possibly kennel Gimlet. She had never been in a kennel and I didn’t think at this stage in her life that it was such a good idea. He had said I wouldn’t need to kennel her that she could fly with us. I told him I was afraid of the airline losing her, or of her being too hot in the cargo hold. That’s when he told me that we wouldn’t be flying on a commercial jet as he had his own. I had stared slack-jawed at him

  “You have your own jet?” I asked and he laughed at me, and tweaked my nose.

  “Don’t look so shocked, my company pays for it.”

  “But it’s your company!”

  He had grabbed me around the waist and pulled me onto his lap. “Yeah, so it is. You a member of the mile-high club yet?”

  “No, Stephen and I rarely flew and when we did, we just read magazines. I guess you could say we were a pretty dull couple.”

  “Well, we must indoctrinate you. You must have sex at thirty-thousand feet.”

  “And why must I?” I remember I was being naughty by taking a swatch of my long hair and painting his chin with it.

  “Because I say so.” He grabbed at it with his mouth and caught my thumb and nipped it.

  “Owww! And what you say goes?”

  “Absolutely. In fact, I think we should practice right now.” With that, he had deftly popped open the button on my jeans and inched my zipper down.

  I remembered how wet I was by the time he had finally tugged my jeans off. And he’d known it. I had been lifted, spun, entered, and was straddling him with his hands on my hips directing me before I could take a breath.

  Damn! Why was my mind constantly reverting back to the times when everything had been so perfect? When my whole world had seemed so promising, so right?

  When I recalled the afternoon we’d been stranded under the gazebo in the garden behind the Carolina Conference Center, I had to blink hard to keep from swooning at the memory. Using his body to shield me from anyone who might have been looking out the adjacent doors, he’d lifted my shirt and suckled me. I hadn’t cared about the rain as it drummed down in torrents. I had only cared about that moment and how wonderful he was making me feel.

  Now I just couldn’t believe it was all gone. All those wonderful feelings, all those times when he’d held me so close. Could it truly be over? What kind of God would let me walk into that kind of trap?

  And how was it that with all the time he’d spent with me, his wife hadn’t become suspicious? I mean for cryin’ out loud, he’d spent whole nights with me! Could she be so naïve as to have thought him on business trips all that time? Maybe she did know, maybe she didn’t care, and maybe they had one of those marriages that involved an “understanding” of extramarital sex? That would make sense if they couldn’t have sex anymore. But if that were the case, why wouldn’t he have told me, explained that he just couldn’t abide a sexless marriage?

  Mrs. Hunter was certainly very pretty; maybe she had her own paramour. I discounted that idea almost as soon as it came to mind. Matt did not appear to be the kind of man who shared anything, certainly not something as personal as a wife. For the first time, things
were beginning to seem a little odd to me, things weren’t jiving, lining up the way they should in my exhausted little brain. Nothing was adding up anymore. A niggling thought was beginning to pervade and bounce around in my head. Had I been too hasty in my judgment of Matt?

  I had to go inside, my tears were smearing my sunscreen and my eyes were starting to burn from it seeping under the lids. I needed to go in anyway, it was time to get ready for Gourmet Club. This time it would be at the Ashley’s residence on Osprey Court, I always loved being around Rita, she was so positive and happy and energetic. It would do my heart good to get out and get back in circulation.

  My contribution was the first course, a rich French onion soup made with Burgundy wine. As this was a couples thing, Pat Gambarelli had arranged for me to pair up with one of the other singles in the group. Tonight my “date” would be Gene, a nice man who had lost his wife to cancer a few years ago.

  I went inside and started cutting up the onion and grating the cheese. I was crying again when the phone started ringing. It was Viv and time for a wardrobe chat.

  “You need to wear that saucy little number we got at Belk’s the other day.” I could barely make her out through the crunch of either an apple or a carrot.

  “This is just gourmet, and it’s Gene. He’s not looking to replace his wife. I’d be wasting the time it would take to iron it.”

  “Trust me, you have to wear that dress tonight.”

  “Why? Just tell me why.”

  “Not tellin’.”

  “What do you know? You know something!”

  “Just wear the damned dress!” I heard a click on the phone.”

  “Viv?Viv? Viv!” I dialed her number but it was busy. By now tears were running down my chin from the onion so I hung up the phone and reached for a paper towel. By the time I got the soup assembled and ironed the dress, I didn’t have a free minute to call her back.