by Louise Clark
“I take it this Laing fellow was lobbying the taskforce head?” Christy pitched her voice so it was cool and rather bored.
“No. Maybe. Probably.” Kelloway shook his head. “But when I saw them, they were just catching up. Chad and Norm were old friends. While Norm was solidly in Shane’s camp, whatever he did, he knew Chad wouldn’t be influenced in the same way and that he’d stick strictly to the facts.”
“Did Adam and Shane know that?” Sledge asked.
Kelloway frowned. “What do you mean?”
Sledge shrugged. “You said this Adam was on one side, Norm on the other. Adam was still with Shane when you left. Did Adam know that Chad wasn’t prepared to recommend the fish farm be given the go-ahead?”
Looking puzzled, Kelloway shrugged. “I don’t believe so. Adam thinks inland installations are the way to go and he was hot against a new open net system being set up in Loyal Scotsman’s Bay. When Chad left, he said he’d heard enough, but he didn’t indicate which way he was leaning. That’s why Norm chased after him. He wanted to press his point, I guess. Whatever Shane wanted, Norm wanted more. He was Shane’s shadow. I don’t know if Adam realized Norm was going to seek out Chad, though.”
“Was it just Shane and Adam there when you left?” Christy asked.
“No, Rhonda was still there.” Kelloway looked from her to Sledge. “What’s this about really?”
Sledge offered him a thin smile. “Clean government, an eco-friendly environment, and the kind of community I’m prepared to live in.” He shot Christy a look. She gave him a little nod back. “Thanks for your help, Mayor. I think we’ve heard enough.” He slipped off the desk and jerked his head toward the doorway. “Time to be off.”
Christy led the way. In the outer office, the secretary dove for her desk. She pulled a piece of heavy, good quality letterhead embossed with the mayor’s personal information out of a lower drawer. She shoved it and a pen at Sledge. “Can I have your autograph?”
He smiled back, putting all the kindness he could into the rock idol smile. He wrote a note, slashed his signature across the page and handed it back. She looked at it, sighed with pleasure, and clutched it to her breasts. “Thank you,” she said breathily, her eyes moist.
“My pleasure,” he said, then followed Christy from the room.
Out in the hallway, Sledge put his ball cap back on and said, “Who’s next? Rhonda Hicks, the councilor, since we’re here?”
“May as well,” Christy said. “We should have asked where her office was before we left the mayor’s office.”
Sledge snorted. “Not a good idea. Too much information. The last thing we want is to have the mayor and his secretary trailing us around the building just because they want to rub shoulders with a celebrity.”
Christy chuckled. “At first I thought the mayor was going to figure out we were the ones who caused the incident at the fish tank.”
The cat’s head popped out of the tote. No hope of that. He didn’t even know what SledgeHammer is.
“Everybody knows what SledgeHammer is,” Sledge said as he pushed open a door separating the inner hallway from the lobby of the building. There wasn’t a hint of a boast in the words; he was just stating a fact. Love the band or hate it, Canadians, and a good portion of the rest of the world, knew all about SledgeHammer.
In the lobby, they found a receptionist who told them where Rhonda Hicks’ office was. She eyed Sledge speculatively, which told Christy the mayor’s secretary had already put the word out that he was in the building. Sledge gifted the receptionist with his bone-melting rock star smile, which caused her jaw to drop and her eyes to widen, even as her gaze turned misty.
Christy poked him in the ribs and gave him a pointed look. He turned the bone-melting smile on her and she frowned. Which added amusement to his smile and made her frown deepen. “Task at hand,” she said, steel in her voice.
He laughed and said, “Yes, ma’am,” then followed her back into the bowels of the town hall.
They found Rhonda Hicks’ office without too much difficulty, but she wasn’t in. A secretary told them she was expected any time. Her hopeful tone of voice and the avid looks she was shooting at him, had Christy saying, “It’s too bad we missed her. We’ll try again.”
Disappointment clouded the woman’s eyes as she nodded.
Christy turned to go, but Sledge hesitated. “Do you have any paper?” he asked.
The woman nodded. “Of course.” She bent to pull some paper from a desk drawer, then shot him a speculative glance and changed drawers. She drew out good quality letterhead much like the paper used in the mayor’s office, except this had Rhonda Hicks’s contact information on it. She handed it to Sledge.
He smiled at her, reached for a pen from her desk and scrawled his name across the page. Then he asked her name, and above his signature wrote a small personal note. By the time he was finished, the woman was fanning herself. “OMG. OMG. It is you. I thought it was, but… I can’t believe I met you! Oh, wait till I tell my sister! She’ll be so jealous.”
He winked at her, picked up the second piece of paper and saluted her with it. “Nice to meet you,” he said cheerfully.
“Oh,” the woman said. “Oh.”
They left on that note, closing the office door behind them. “You are dreadful,” Christy said, shaking her head.
He laughed.
“What do you want with that second piece of paper?”
“You’ll see.”
They reached the lobby again and the receptionist offered up a blinding smile. “Did you find Ms. Hicks’s office?”
Sledge sauntered over to her desk. “Your instructions were excellent.” He smiled at her.
She grinned back in a loopy way. “Thanks!”
He put the paper on the desktop and said, “Do you have a pen I can use?”
The girl’s eyes fixed on the paper, then she looked up at Sledge, hopefully. He increased the wattage of his smile and held out his hand. She found a pen and gave it to him, her fingers lingering on his for just a moment. He asked her name and she stammered it out. As with the two secretaries, he wrote a personal comment, then slashed his name across the page.
He handed it to her. “Thank you for your help.”
“Oh.” The word was more of a sigh than a statement. “You’re so welcome. I love your music,” she added, blurting out the words as if they’d been torn from her very soul.
Sledge winked. “Awesome. It’s always great to meet a fan.” He turned away, then gave her a little wave as he pushed open the heavy front door and held it for Christy.
Out in the parking lot Christy said, “You realize there’s not a woman in that building who will get any more work done today.”
He laughed as he climbed into the van. “Causing a flutter is one of the perks of the job.”
Chapter 11
With Rhonda Hicks away from her office and not expected back, Sledge and Christy returned to the campground, then headed to the beach. The rest of the group were already there and they discovered that Roy, Ellen, and Trevor had been busy plotting while they were absent.
“Dinner out?” Christy asked, as she laid out her towel near Ellen’s chair—which was again beside Trevor’s, she noticed. Quinn and Tamara had Noelle down at the water and she could see them splashing around. It looked like they were having a great time.
Ellen nodded. “Trevor and I were talking about a restaurant we found when we went to lunch the other day. The setting was lovely, looking over a rocky section of the coast, the service was impeccable, and the food was delicious.”
“Really?” Sledge said. From his raised brows and incredulous tone, his skepticism was obvious.
And not surprising, since restaurants in the village that serviced the provincial park, and the cottages that surrounded it, tended to cater to the vacation and tourist trade, and were only a notch or two above fast food.
Trevor shot his son a disapproving look. “It’s located one town over.” Which was where the locals t
ended to live.
“We thought it would be fun for you young people to have a night out, together. We’ll be grandparents and babysit Noelle,” Roy said, clearly liking the idea.
“I’m not a grandparent,” Ellen said, sounding huffy. “I am the child’s aunt.”
Yeah, we know. A yawn followed the thought. The cat had made a beeline for his little shelter as soon as they got down to the beach. He apparently intended to nap and Frank was having a hard time staying awake for the conversation.
“We thought you could discuss the murder,” Roy continued, “without worrying that Noelle might overhear or get involved.”
“Nice idea,” Sledge said, stretching out on his towel and shifting his cap so the peak shaded his eyes from the afternoon sun, “but Tamara doesn’t like to play murder speculation.”
“She’ll learn,” Roy said, with supreme confidence.
Unfortunately, the evening didn’t work out quite how Ellen, Roy, and Trevor had imagined it would.
Christy knew the three members of the older generation meant well when they decided to give the young people a night out, a sort of double date where they could get to know each other better and talk about themselves, as well as the murder. The problem was that the murder was on everyone’s mind and not all of them felt the same way about investigating it.
Ellen and Trevor had done their best. The restaurant they’d found had an interesting menu, a decent wine list, and good ratings on the local restaurant guide site. Roy had made reservations for seven-thirty, a compromise time that had apparently caused something of an argument, since Ellen thought eight more sophisticated and Roy figured the restaurant would probably be closed by nine.
She and Tamara had both worn dresses for the evening. She’d chosen one with the handkerchief skirt, because she liked the way the flirty skirt flowed around her legs and she thought the mint green color looked good with her red-brown hair. Tamara wore a simple sleeveless sheath that was less dressy, but still looked good on her. The guys had drawn the line at suits and ties, but were both wearing slacks and front button shirts.
They’d arrived to find their table set in a corner, providing some privacy, and by the window, which looked out on a spectacular view ocean and the Gulf Islands. There was a linen tablecloth, a flower as a centerpiece, and heavy silver cutlery. The clientele was adult and dressed in upscale casual clothes. Though by no means as swanky as many a Vancouver restaurant, it was indeed high-end for the area.
Tamara looked pleased as the hostess seated them. She clearly liked the idea of being out for the evening. Christy wasn’t so sure. They were at a table for four and Tamara was opposite her with Quinn on her left and Sledge on her right. It was bittersweet, sitting with Quinn beside her, so close physically, yet so distant in reality. He was here with Tamara tonight. She’d best remember that.
They were very civilized as they went through the ritual of ordering pre dinner drinks and studying the menu. Tamara, who didn’t drink alcohol, encouraged the others to enjoy a bottle of wine, which they did. They talked about the menu items, and in the end chose a couple of appetizers for the table, while each of them picked something different for their entree. That gave them another topic of conversation that lasted until the appetizers came.
With the advent of the food and beverages some of the careful politeness eased. Sledge, who liked high-end cuisine and enjoyed a good bottle of wine, swirled the expensive merlot in his glass and said, “Hammer e-mailed me yesterday.”
Quinn cocked an eyebrow. “Is he still in China with Jahlina?
Hammer was the drummer in SledgeHammer and Sledge’s musical partner. After Vince, SledgeHammer’s longtime manager, had been killed, both Sledge and Hammer decided to take a break from music and touring. Hammer had gone to China with his girlfriend Jahlina Wong to search out her roots. Sledge had stayed in Vancouver and helped Christy and Quinn solve the mystery of who had killed Tamara’s birth father.
Sledge nodded. He looked gloomy. “Jahlina’s made contact with some cousins and the whole family seems to be delighted to meet their Canadian relative and her famous boyfriend.”
Christy laughed. “SledgeHammer is famous in the Far East too?”
At that Sledge grinned. “All over the world.” He drank some wine and speared a piece of crispy calamari. “The thing is, Hammer wants to put off making a decision about a new manager until next year. He’s having fun over in the East and he doesn’t want to think about business. I guess all the bad press about Vince’s death burned him out.”
No surprise there, Christy thought. Hammer’s brother had been the main suspect in Vince’s death. Hammer had been furious, his brother frightened he might never be cleared of involvement in the crime. In her opinion, Hammer needed time to heal, and so did Sledge, whose front lawn had been where Vince’s body had been found. “So you’re at loose ends.”
Sledge shot her one of his rock star grins. “I need a project.”
“Even though you’re on vacation?” Tamara asked. She looked interested, though in an impersonal way.
A very contained woman, Tamara kept her feelings hidden, so there was no telling what she was thinking. Christy wondered if it had been her years in captivity in North Africa that had taught her the behavior, or if she’d always been that way.
Sledge turned his grin on Tamara. “Holidays are planning times. Let your mind drift, open yourself up to new ideas.”
Quinn snorted. “You sound like my dad. Be one with the universe, go with the flow, let the muse take you.”
“No harm in any of those, man,” Sledge said affably.
Tamara smiled faintly. The smile wasn’t one of amusement, but more an acknowledgement of the two men’s banter. Again, Christy couldn’t get a sense of what she was feeling. Moments later, she wondered why she was even trying to understand the woman.
Then suddenly Tamara’s mask of indifference slipped. She leaned forward, twirling her water glass on the table nervously. “Before we came to ClanRanald, I spoke with a lawyer and the director of an international NGO about starting a non-profit that connects people in the first world who have skills needed in the third, with the people in developing countries who want to learn and change. The goal would be to help people become self-reliant, rather than to just provide money or assistance. It would be a way to change the cycle of war and violence that afflicts many developing nations.”
Quinn smiled at her in a way that was both affectionate and approving. “That’s a big project. Have you looked at the logistics?”
Christy kept her attention focused on Tamara, who was nodding. She didn’t want to look at Quinn, to see the bond growing between them. She and Quinn had split. She wasn’t going to act like a jealous stalker, obsessed with rekindling their relationship.
“There are grants available, both private and governmental, I could apply for,” Tamara was saying. “I’ll write a mission statement and goals, then develop a structure and a five-year plan with achievable benchmarks. It’s a big project, but I need focus and direction.” She looked down, then at Quinn, with a quick sideways glance at Sledge. “I was told that having someone with an international profile involved in the organization would be helpful in obtaining grants and setting up international networks.”
“Have you talked to Olivia?” Quinn asked.
“I have, yes. She seems interested in learning more.”
Olivia’s international reputation as a cyber security guru would be useful on a project like this. However, even though she was Tamara’s birth mother, she’d been willing to believe Tamara might have killed her birth father, Olivia’s lover and longtime friend. For Christy that would have been enough to blight the relationship forever, but Tamara seemed willing to overlook the flaw, proving she was a very different person from Christy.
Sledge buried his nose in his glass of wine, absenting himself from the conversation the moment being a sponsor or spokesperson for Tamara’s budding NGO came up. Christy sensed that he didn’t want to b
e cornered and suspected he’d had to deal with this kind of solicitation before.
Their entrees arrived, interrupting the discussion. They were at the coffee and desert stage, to which Sledge and Quinn had added snifters of brandy, when Quinn mentioned the murder. That surprised Christy, since she knew Tamara thought detecting was best left to the professionals.
“We’re striking out,” Quinn said after he’d inhaled the wine’s aroma and sampled its bouquet.
Sledge cradled his balloon glass between his fingers and swirled his brandy. He nodded. “Pretty much.”
Tamara pursed her lips, but didn’t say anything. Her disapproval was evident enough.
“I think Patterson is stalled too,” Christy said, deliberately ignoring Tamara’s frown.
“It all comes down to the fish farm,” Quinn said. Either he was ignoring Tamara too, or he hadn’t noticed her displeasure.
“Why would someone kill someone else over a fish farm?” Christy asked.
Quinn cocked his head. “Passionate about the environment? Worried how it would affect the local tourism industry?”
“Okay,” Christy said slowly. “Your dad was a crazy environmentalist. Would he have killed someone proposing an installation like this?”
Quinn’s mouth flicked up in a lopsided smile. “He got pretty angry at some of the demonstrations we attended.”
“Angry, yes. Angry enough to kill?”
Quinn’s smile became rueful. “No. It’s not in his nature. I take your point. Both of my suggestions lack real motivation.”
“There must be something more,” Christy said, nodding. “Another element we’re missing.”
“Money and sex,” Sledge said suddenly. “That’s what my dad says. Murder is all about money and sex.”
“So who’s sleeping with who?” Quinn said, raising his eyebrows.
“Honestly! This is ridiculous.” Tamara managed to look affronted and embarrassed at the same time. “You’re talking about people you don’t know and speculating about their private lives as if you do. I think we should discuss other things.”