Chapter 20
The Coast Guard patrol boat pulled away as we left the saloon. A Mystic Bay Police boat was tied up to the yacht. Chief Brooks’s crew had rigged a tarp so we couldn’t see Patrick’s body. My knees trembled as we walked past. Chief Brooks used his body to shield Lorel from the RHI, murmuring to her, coaxing her. “It’s all right now. Just another step.” Henry hovered alongside, holding Lorel’s arm.
Eden stared at the team working in the RHI, her oversized T-shirt flapping in the wind. I lowered my eyes. How long had Patrick’s body been out there last night? How had I slept while just feet away his life bled out into the bottom of that boat?
My mind spun. Who wanted to kill Patrick Yardley?
Eden and Henry didn’t even know him.
On the other hand, I’d just had a very public blowout with him at New Salt. How many people had seen me rush out of his room after I’d confronted him about his other woman? Only half of Mystic Bay. My stomach churned.
Lorel had had a screaming fight with him on Kiddie Beach. How many people had seen that? There’d been people on the beach. The kids having the bonfire. Renters watching television at Fast Times.
Chief Brooks helped Lorel step from Stellene’s yacht into the police boat. An officer offered me a hand and I took it as I followed Lorel. The tide was going out and the wind had picked up, making the boat rock. My head throbbed and I was queasy after all the champagne and the terrible sight of Patrick’s body. I couldn’t bear to look back at Chief Brooks’s stricken expression.
Henry handed Eden into the police boat, then he jumped in. He misjudged the boat’s motion and fell to his knees. Eden sat next to Lorel and put an arm around her. Henry scrambled to his feet and stood by the rail. The wind stirred his blond hair around his forehead. He had a high hairline hidden by his mass of hair. From the side his nose was hooked, strong, like an eagle. The crew started the engine and the sharp tang of diesel fuel made my stomach twist again as we pulled away from the yacht.
In the darkness it had seemed that we were miles from Harmony Harbor, but we returned to the dock in just a few minutes. As the crew tied up I looked back at Model Sailor. From this distance, Stellene’s yacht was a white toy on the horizon, a dream just out of reach.
Eden joined me at the boat’s rail. “Last night was a million years ago,” she said.
At the end of the dock, Stellene stood tall, her mouth a stern straight line of plum-colored lipstick. Oversized round sunglasses hid her eyes. Even at this early hour, she looked chic in white trousers, a white linen sweater, and a beaded belt slung around her waist. Behind her, crews dismantled the tents and carnival rides she’d provided for her guests’ entertainment. Her crossed arms dared the police to further disturb her plans.
In the distance, a man hefted a bright yellow kayak from the beach and carried it into the boathouse.
Two golf carts rolled toward the pier and parked. Two officers in tan Mystic Bay uniforms approached Stellene, trailed by a woman in a maid’s uniform. Tara. She threw worried glances toward Lorel and me.
We stepped onto the dock.
“I left my duffel bag,” Henry said.
“We’ll get your things to you,” one of the officers said. “Later.”
Eden took Henry’s arm. Lorel held on to my arm but she stumbled on the rough planks of the dock. Her eyes were fixed straight ahead. “Allie, I just want to go home.”
“Soon.” I turned to the officer. “Can we go home?”
“We need to ask a few questions first.”
Another one of Stellene’s golf carts pulled up behind her and a man got out. Beige suit, striped tie, horn-rimmed glasses.
Lawyer. Stellene must have him on speed dial.
Another man got out, short, with long shaggy brown hair parted in the middle, dressed in plaid shorts and a plain black T-shirt.
“Lars!” Eden ran to him and they embraced. Henry’s eyes met mine, then he followed.
The other officer jutted his chin to the second golf cart. “This way, please.”
Lorel slumped into the cart, her body slack against mine. I wrapped my arms around her and held her tight.
The officer nodded at the driver and the cart moved forward.
“Can we go home?” Lorel whispered.
The officer looked about my age, with brown buzz-cut hair and sympathetic dark eyes. “Chief wants to have you answer some questions, then I can take you home. Sorry.”
“See, Lorel we can go home soon,” I said.
Lorel muttered, “Yes, Allie, we’ll stop at home right on my way to jail.”
“What are you talking about?” I whispered.
“Allie.” Lorel’s whisper was fierce. “Look. There we were on a yacht in the middle of nowhere. We’re the only two people who knew Patrick. I”—she choked—“had a relationship with him. Who do you think the cops are going to finger for killing him?”
“Lorel—”
The officer was sitting very straight in his seat. I was certain he and the driver were listening to every word. I lowered my voice and squeezed her shoulder. “Shh. You know darn well neither one of us kill— hurt Patrick.”
“Well, who did?”
“I don’t know. What do we know about Eden and Henry? Huh?” I said.
“That they were as drunk as we were last night.”
“Lorel, maybe somebody came over on that boat with him.”
Lorel’s voice was shrill. “And did what? Killed him and then swam back to shore?”
The police officer threw a look back at us. He was taking mental notes, I knew it.
“We’re not under arrest, are we?” I thought of the crime shows I watched. He’d given us no Miranda warning.
He shook his head.
My mind churned with thoughts of last night. When we rode over to the yacht on Stellene’s beautiful wooden powerboat. Eden singing. Drinking champagne. Then exploring Model Sailor. Laughing in the saloon. Henry firing the gun.
The gun.
Oh, my God.
The popping sounds I heard in the middle of the night. Fireworks, I’d assumed. Could I have heard the shots that killed Patrick Yardley?
The blur outside my window. Stellene’s crew had left all the security and running lights on. I was pretty sure I’d seen blond hair. Eden and Henry both had blond hair. If those popping noises had been the shots that killed Patrick I was sure Lorel was innocent. She’d been asleep beside me.
Could Eden have killed Patrick, a person she didn’t even know? She hadn’t batted an eyelash when I said Patrick’s name, and neither had Henry. If they knew Patrick and had killed him, they were the best actors I’d ever seen.
I felt like the earth was shifting under me.
What was Patrick doing on that boat? Why on earth was he in a rigid-hulled inflatable like some kind of commando when he and his brother owned Miranda, my dad’s old fishing boat? Why had he tied up to Model Sailor?
The cart rolled past the patio.
“Could you stop by the gate?” I said. “My aunt Gully’s coming over.”
The officer swung around. “Aunt Gully from the lobster shack?”
Lorel slumped against my shoulder. “Stop the cart!” I shouted.
The driver hit the brakes. The officer jumped from the cart and ran to Lorel’s side.
“She’s fainted!” I said.
The officer and I pulled Lorel from the cart, her body completely limp.
The police officer swung her into his arms and carried her to a chaise longue.
Why couldn’t Lorel go for a guy like this? The police officer was tall, dark, not bad looking, and law abiding. His uniform shirt barely contained his burly muscles. He gently set Lorel down on the chaise. I lifted her legs and sat next to her. The driver ran into the house. A short time later he hurried back out with a glass of water. Yasmin, one of the maids from the night before, followed with a towel.
The officer stepped away, keyed his mic. I heard the words “medical care.” When he f
inished, he pulled a notebook from his pocket and fanned Lorel.
Lorel’s face was so pale. Blue veins traced around her eyes and mouth. Her lips were gray. She looked awful, so small inside the too big sweats from Stellene’s yacht. Seeing my sister, usually so strong, like this shook me.
Movement by the doorway drew my eye. Tinsley peered around the door frame, hunched in a pink tunic with a gauzy matching scarf.
Yasmin wet the cloth and put it on Lorel’s head. The big police officer and driver hovered. A siren screamed in the distance.
Tinsley stepped close, dipping her chin and mouth behind her scarf. “What’s going on?”
“I wish I knew.” I squeezed Lorel’s hand.
Lorel murmured and held her other hand over her eyes. The officer pulled over an umbrella to shade her face.
“Can we talk?” Tinsley whispered.
“Yes,” I said. “But I have to talk to the police first.”
Tinsley nodded and stepped back.
Hector, Hilda, and Aunt Gully rushed around the corner onto the patio. I jumped to my feet.
“Who’s running the shack?” I said. “Bit Markey?”
“We’re closed until we know you’re both okay.” Aunt Gully wrapped me in her arms. I felt numb, exhaustion crowded out every emotion. “Lorel fainted.” I whispered in her ear, “I think the police officer’s in love with her.”
Hilda grabbed onto Aunt Gully and me. “Thank God, you’re okay. What a nightmare! How could this be real?”
Hector also wrapped into the group hug. “Aunt Gully said she’d drive over herself, but Hilda said that Gully shouldn’t drive when she was upset, and that she would drive, and I knew that would be no good, so I took them both.”
“How did you get past the gate?” I said.
Hector shrugged. “I tailgated the ambulance.”
EMTs wheeled a stretcher across the patio.
Tinsley kept her distance as the police officer fanned flies away from Lorel. Hmmm. Good thing Nurse Ratchet wasn’t around to see Tinsley. Where was Olga? I also wondered if Tinsley could answer the only question that mattered: What was Patrick Yardley doing at Model Sailor?
Everyone moved back to make room for the EMTs.
Lorel’s eyes fluttered open. “What are you doing? I’m fine. I’M FINE.” Lorel batted away the EMTs. One turned to Aunt Gully. “You family? We’ll take her to the hospital for a bit, just to keep an eye on her.”
The officer muttered into his mic again. “I’ll accompany Miss Larkin to the hospital.”
Aunt Gully and Hilda hovered as the EMTs helped Lorel onto the stretcher. “We’re going, too.”
A man in a beige suit and a buzz cut strode out the door onto the patio like a G-man from a fifties police drama, his shiny shoes clicking on the stone patio. He gestured to the police officer. They whispered together.
Tinsley stood still, arms folded, her chin tucked behind her scarf. No one seemed to notice her. She’d perfected the art of invisibility. Was she angry? Entertained?
How things had changed from last night.
The G-man walked up to me. “Detective Budwitz. If you’re all right, Miss Larkin, we have a few questions.”
“Yes.” I squeezed Aunt Gully’s arm. “I’ll talk with the detective, Aunt Gully. You go with Lorel. We’ll catch up at home.”
“Are you sure you’re okay, Allie?” Aunt Gully’s voice was strained.
“What a waste of time,” Lorel snapped as the EMTs rolled her away.
Lorel would be okay. “Yes. I’ll see you at home.”
Chapter 21
The G-man led me through the conservatory to another hallway and into a small study. Tinsley slipped in behind us.
In the study, dark-paneled bookshelves climbed to high ceilings. Leather-bound books lined the shelves. Though no one had probably read them in decades, not a bit of dust danced in the bands of light streaming in the window. Tinsley silently pulled a sheer curtain to shade us from the sun and stepped from the room. I wondered if the police detective realized that she wasn’t an employee.
Detective Budwitz asked me a lot of questions I could barely remember moments after he asked them. The only one that stood out: “What was your relationship to the deceased?”
My honest answer would’ve been that I hated him. He’d made my sister miserable since fifth grade. Instead I spoke the more dangerous truth: “He was my sister’s ex-boyfriend.”
“And your relationship to Stellene Lupo?”
I almost laughed. Mermaid? I cleared my throat. “I worked at the party last night.”
His small bright eyes blinked. He printed on a yellow legal pad, the letters dark and square. The words “pinpoint accuracy” came to mind.
“And then you were a guest on the yacht?” The tiniest bit of disbelief shaded his question.
It did seem weird. What were we doing on that yacht? It never should’ve happened. Stellene didn’t want Eden on the boat. She wanted her to stay in the mansion. Had all this happened because of a singer’s crazy whim?
“We, my sister and I, were on the yacht to cook breakfast.” Which we didn’t even do.
He looked up when I told him about the figure I’d seen passing the window and the sounds that I thought were fireworks.
“What time was that?” he said.
I squirmed. Why hadn’t I looked at a clock? “I’m not sure. After midnight? It was dark. I didn’t check.” And the champagne had muddled my mind.
A knock on the door. A young woman in a State Police polo came in carrying a small box.
Budwitz nodded at her.
“This is a swab test for gunshot residue,” she said.
I blinked. Those popping sounds must have been gunshots. “I didn’t—”
She gave me a reassuring look. “Just procedure.”
Heat rose in my face. “I mean, everyone else handled the gun except me.”
Lorel. Lorel had handled the gun.
“What gun?” Budwitz said.
“There was a gun. In the saloon.”
Budwitz jotted notes.
His eyes bored into mine “Did you fire the gun?”
“No,” I whispered.
The woman had me sign some forms I hardly looked at.
Budwitz’s cell rang. He excused himself and left the room.
“Have you washed your hands?” the young woman asked. She took a swab out of a vial and rubbed it along my palm and fingers. Then she repeated the process with my other hand.
“Um, not exactly,” I said. “My sister and I fell, uh, went in the water.”
Budwitz returned. “You went in the water? Swimming after you found the body?”
“Not exactly.” I explained, haltingly, what had happened.
Budwitz stared, his narrow lips slowly turning down as I spoke. The young woman threw him a look, packed up, and left.
Budwitz jotted more notes then stood.
He gave me his card. I glanced at it. State Police Major Crimes Unit.
“Can I go?”
He nodded, once. When I left the study, Tinsley was waiting outside. She pulled me into a little parlor and eased the door halfway closed.
A fancy china clock on the fireplace mantel read noon. How did it get so late? Detective Budwitz’s footsteps clicked down the hallway.
“Are you hungry? I had Tara bring snacks,” Tinsley said.
A silver tray was stacked with the same brownies from last night and a crystal carafe of lemonade. I realized I was starving. I picked up a brownie, gulped it, and took another.
“Mom’s guests are absolute frigging locusts, but Tara knows I like brownies so she put some aside for me,” Tinsley said. “When they heard the cops were coming all the guests cleared out. Now it’s just cops and lawyers. My mom. First thing she does, call the lawyers.”
Before I could say anything, voices came down the hallway. Tinsley and I went to the door and peeked around the frame. Three people approached: Eden, Lars, and a woman I recognized. My heart
skipped.
“I’m not under arrest, am I?” Eden’s voice rang off the high ceiling and marble floors.
“No.”
Eden and Lars passed, holding hands, trailing a trim brunette in a dark gray pantsuit with professional stud earrings. Her dark hair was pulled back in a bun so tight not a single strand dared to escape. That stride. That posture. So straight it was almost robotic. A brownie crumb lodged in my throat.
Detective Rosato. I’d met her a month earlier and had given her the nickname Robo Detective for her no-nonsense, expressionless demeanor. She was a perfect partner for the G-man, Budwitz.
What did I expect? Like many Connecticut towns, Mystic Bay was too small to have special units to investigate serious crimes like murder. The state wasn’t that big. How many major crimes units were there? Of course she’d show.
Thank goodness I got Detective Budwitz. Just the memory of Detective Rosato’s laser look made me want to confess to something, anything.
I swallowed hard. Tinsley and I stepped back out of sight.
“Please wait outside,” Detective Rosato said.
“You don’t understand, Officer.” Eden’s voice, beautifully modulated, was peremptory. “We’re a unit.”
The man with Eden spoke, his voice higher pitched and nasal. “My name is Lars. We are one. We make all our decisions together. We’re one being.”
There was silence. I knew exactly the expressionless look that Detective Rosato was giving Lars, regarding him like a particularly unimpressive specimen under a microscope. I’d laugh if I didn’t find her so terrifying.
After a few moments, the nasal voice said, “I’ll wait outside on the patio.” Footsteps squeaked down the hallway.
The door across the hall closed firmly.
Tinsley tugged my hand and looked both ways in the corridor. “Come with me. And whatever you do, don’t make a sound, okay?”
Tinsley slid off her shoes. I did the same. We tiptoed into the hallway, the marble cool under my feet. Just down the hallway past the study door was a black lacquered screen and some potted palm trees. We sidled behind them and Tinsley eased open a narrow wooden door. Low murmuring voices filled the room, as if a radio or television were on. Tinsley held a finger to her lips.
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