“Sorry.” I shrugged.
“Everyone put on a lifejacket and belt yourselves into a seat.”
We did as Adam instructed as he removed the ropes from the pier and turned on the engine, slowly moving the boat away from the dock.
“Can’t you please hurry?” I begged.
“Not unless you want me to go aground. We won’t do much if we’re stuck on a sandbar.”
“Or worse yet, caught on rocks that will rip apart the boat,” Martha said. “Be glad that the boat has a partial roof to keep us out of the elements.”
“Even if it’s insane to go out in weather like this,” Adam said.
“I’m sure a dinghy can’t go too far out, or I hope not, anyway.” I grimaced. “All you’ll have to do is follow the sheriff department’s boats and the Coast Guard.”
“Remind me why we’re out here if the cops are already giving chase?” Adam asked.
“Because we know what the dinghy looks like,” I said.
“Okay, but you better bail me out of jail if I get arrested.”
Adam opened up the engine once we were out in open waters. The lights of the sheriff’s boats were looming in the distance, but I scanned across the bay and pointed away from where they were heading.
“I think I see something over there,” I pointed out. “Something yellow like the dinghy.”
“Or another boater in trouble,” Adam said.
The boat clipped through the whitecaps as I tried to call Sheriff Peterson, but to no avail. “Can you contact the sheriff and tell him he’s going the wrong way?” I asked.
Adam nodded as he radioed ahead and relayed the information to the sheriff, just as we were boring down on the dinghy.
“Watch out, Adam!”
Adam swung the wheel to the right, barely missing the dinghy, but as he came around the sheriff had joined us. A spotlight was cast on the small boat and Tom and Damon were shaking something fierce. The men were brought aboard the sheriff’s boat and I swelled in pride to see my son Stuart there with Peterson.
“It’s a good thing I came out here,” I shouted to my son.
“You better hope you can get back in.”
Adam attached the dinghy to his boat and headed back in just as a torrential downpour began. I huddled next to Eleanor and we smiled, although we weren’t able to control the chattering of our teeth.
“Thank you, Adam,” I said.
“You’re welcome. Wait in the car while I ready the boat to withstand the storm.”
We were drenched to our skin when Martha dropped us off home and Eleanor and I wearily walked inside, me using the cane so I’d be able to keep my balance.
“What happened to you two?” Andrew asked.
“Adam took us for a ride in his boat,” I said innocently.
“In the rain?”
“Well, we were pursuing a couple of murderers,” Eleanor said with a grin.
“You weren’t supposed to tell him that part,” I said with a sigh. “Once I get warm, I’m heading to the sheriff’s department so I can question those men.”
“You’re not going anywhere near the sheriff’s department. Let them handle their own investigation,” Andrew exclaimed.
“Since that so isn’t going to happen, be nice and drive us there.”
“After we come out of the shower, that is,” Eleanor said.
Fortunately, Eleanor kept some of her spare clothing at my house and she had some of mine at her house, too. We just never knew where we’d end up at the end of the day.
Chapter Seventeen
“OH, NO, YOU DON’T,” Sheriff Peterson said, as we walked toward his office.
“Don’t what?”
“You’re not about to speak with the suspects before I even get the chance.”
“If it wasn’t for us, you’d never have found them. You were going in the wrong direction.”
“We’d have figured it out.”
“Perhaps like in the morning.”
Sheriff Peterson sighed. “Fine, I’ll let you ladies go in first, but I highly doubt you’ll be able to soften them up. Not when you had them on the run.”
“I had them on the swim.”
Eleanor and I walked into the interview room. The sheriff never even made a reference about why I wasn’t in a wheelchair, but I’d tell him all about that tomorrow. Today, Eleanor and I had to get down to business.
“Hello again, gentlemen,” I greeted.
“These two men are the gutsiest suspects yet,” Eleanor said. “Who knew Damon would act so dumb one minute and the next would jump in a dinghy and take off into the bay. If you hadn’t jumped in, Tom, you’d have been left to face the music.”
Tom glared at Damon momentarily. “You could have given me a heads up before you jumped ship.”
“I didn’t have time to do much of anything. I wasn’t about to let them pin a murder on me.”
“What about me? You think I did it?” Tom asked Damon.
“Well, we were the only ones at the Butler Mansion before the body was found, but if you remember, you kept me busy taking up the suitcases.”
“You can’t blame me. It was you!” Tom insisted.
“I didn’t even know Laith,” Damon countered.
“I thought you two knew everyone who was supposed to be at the mansion?” I asked.
“No, we just wanted to come to Sara’s party.”
“So, neither of you knew Laith? He was a producer, you know,” Eleanor said.
“Now I know, but only because that’s what they said on the news,” Tom insisted.
“So who besides Roman and Sara did you know who was staying at the mansion?” I asked.
“I already told you who.”
“Okay, so what about Sara’s publisher Julian?”
“To be honest, I didn’t even read Sara’s book and I certainly wouldn’t know who her publisher was.”
“Something isn’t adding up,” I said. “If you didn’t know Laith, why did you kill him?”
“We’ve never met the man,” Damon said. “We don’t run in the same circles as them, which is why we hoped to worm our way in at the party.”
“What about the lies you told us?” I asked. “You never ran out of gas the night of Sara’s party.”
“Yes, we did,” Damon said.
“Then why did you tell us you called a wrecker, when it’s obvious you didn’t because we checked.”
“Because it sounded better than to say we wandered around and got lost in the dark,” Tom said.
“Then how did you finally get gas in your car and when?”
“A farmer happened by in the morning and gave us enough gas to get back into town.”
“So you didn’t wander far, then.”
“Nope, they slept in their car,” Eleanor said with a grin. “Of course we never know if you’re lying again or not, since you lied to us before.”
“What does it matter? From what I understand, the man wasn’t murdered until the day after the party,” Tom said.
“When you put yourselves near the scene of the crime.”
The door swung open and Sheriff Peterson motioned a deputy to take the men to the holding cell. “We’ll deal with them later. Come along, ladies. The coroner is heading this way with his report.”
We cheerfully entered the break room, which offered more space than Peterson’s office. Peterson made us each a chai tea that we inhaled while we waited for the coroner.
“Well, hello ladies.” Elway Wilson, the coroner, greeted us. “I don’t see you two enough. Sheriff Peterson must have chased you away from the crime scene before I arrived. It’s so entertaining to listen to you two banter back and forth about which of you is the most clever.”
“And that from a man who wears a Colombo style jacket everywhere he goes,” I said.
“I bet he has a sandwich in his pocket, too,” Eleanor added shrewdly.
“Not tonight, I’m afraid. I only eat when I do an autopsy.” He grinned.
“You have an odd sense of humor for a coroner, or perhaps you don’t, now that I think about it.”
“Well, there must be some after effects from hanging out with corpses,” Peterson said.
“Now you’re on their team? Shameful sheriff.”
“I can’t let them get in all the jokes now, can I?”
“I suppose not,” Elway said, as he sat down and pulled out a piece of paper from an envelope.
“In regards to the death of Laith Ahmed, Laith died of a brain aneurism.”
“What?” I shouted. “But that can’t be. He had a wound to the back of his head.”
“With a brain aneurism, a person will possibly injure themselves when they go unconscious. Many of my colleagues agree that a person who passes out due to the aneurism resembles a person having a stroke.”
“I don’t understand. Peterson said there weren’t any traces of blood in Julian’s room.”
“Not all wounds bleed, as is evident with Laith’s injury.
“I wonder if Laith and Julian were really involved and nobody wanted to tell us.”
“You mean like intimately?” Peterson asked.
“I don’t know how we’d prove it, not that it matters now. Otherwise, I don’t understand why Laith was in Julian’s room.”
“It doesn’t matter now.”
I leaned back in my chair. “I suppose you’ll have to cut Tom and Damon loose. I just don’t understand why they took off like they did after we asked them a few questions.”
“Questions or accusations?” Peterson asked with a chuckle.
“Fine, you win.”
“Why don’t we ask them? It should be amusing to hear what they come up with.”
We waited for Tom and Damon to be led into the room. They nervously stood there as we stared at them.
“Why did you take off like that, Damon?” I asked.
“I’m not going to have a murder pinned on me, especially when I didn’t do it.”
“I suppose, but you do realize that made you look quite guilty.”
“I hope you didn’t think I killed anyone?” Tom asked Damon.
“Well, you thought I did it.”
“I didn’t mean it, really. I was just trying to understand why they thought either of us killed a man we never even met.”
“That’s how it works,” I said. “I’m sorry but we made a mistake,” I said. “Laith Ahmed wasn’t murdered.”
“Then how did he die?” Tom asked.
“I’m not at liberty to discuss that with you, but you’re free to leave,” Peterson said.
“Why did you leave the mansion if you wanted to stay there so bad?” I asked.
“Because we didn’t want to be dragged into a murder investigation, for the hundredth time,” Tom exclaimed.
“How did you learn about that?” I asked.
Tom shuffled his feet. “I’d rather not say. I don’t want to get anyone into trouble.”
“Not a cop, I hope,” Peterson said.
“Oh, no, nothing like that. Sara Knoxville’s assistant told us.”
“Cindy?” I asked.
“You know her? Oh, I suppose you would.”
“When did she tell you that?”
“The day the body was found.”
“That’s strange, since she was staying at the Days Inn and never showed her face at the mansion,” Eleanor said.
“She lied to us about Tom and Damon, unless she didn’t really know where you two were.”
“Cindy suggested we stay there.”
“Well, I can’t wait to hear what she has to say,” Eleanor said.
“It will have to wait, Mother,” Stuart said as he walked into the room. “We have a situation on Charity Island.”
“What kind of situation?” Peterson asked, as he stepped forward, glancing at Tom and Damon. “You two can leave, unless you want to go back to the holding cell.”
Once the men exited the room, Stuart said, “The Coast Guard picked up a transmission from Charity Island. It appears a search and rescue is in progress.”
“Do you have any specifics?”
“No, but I thought you might want to get out there to help.”
“Come on, Stuart,” Sheriff Peterson said. “I might need help.”
“Carry on,” I said. “I don’t have the energy to come along.”
“Good, because you weren’t asked to come along,” Peterson said, as he left with Stuart.
I SIGHED AS I SANK into my favorite chair and listened to the news. “Sara Knoxville has been reported missing by her agent,” said Anita, one of the newscasters.
“It’s about time they declared Sara was missing,” Eleanor said.
“Didn’t you girls find her yet?” Mr. Wilson asked from his position on the sofa.
“Oh, no, we’ve been too busy trying to find a murderer,” Eleanor said. “Only to find out the victim wasn’t murdered.”
“Case solved.” Wilson laughed. “Hey, where are those fellas who were following you girls around town?”
“Apparently they decided not to do it. I did ask them to quit filming us.”
“Wait,” Eleanor pointed to the television. “Turn the TV up.”
I did as she asked.
“Four people have been rescued from Charity Island after their boat ran out of gas,” Anita said.
“They’ve been reported to have been stranded on the island for possibly three or four days. If the Coast Guard hadn’t been out on the bay, the S.O.S wouldn’t have been heard.”
Andrew answered the phone and he nodded as he said, “I’ll tell her.”
“What?” I asked.
“Sara Knoxville, Woody Wentworth, and Roman and Coco Douglas were the ones who were rescued from Charity Island.”
“We should go.”
“They’re at the hospital getting checked out. It might be better if you wait to see Sara until she’s back at the mansion.”
“Not a chance, mister.”
“I’LL TAKE YOU TO SARA’S room,” Sophia said, as she joined us. “She’s been asking about you since she arrived.”
I beamed in pride as we entered Sara’s room. She was laying on the bed with the telephone in one hand, her cell phone in the other. Now that’s multitasking.
Sara hung up the phone when she glanced over to me.
“How are you, Agnes?”
“You’re the one on the hospital bed, not me.”
“Doctor Thomas’ orders.”
“How did you wind up on Charity Island?”
“Woody suggested we go for a boat ride out to Charity Island. Apparently, he didn’t make sure the boat was fueled up first because we ran out of gas! We had to use the paddles to make it to shore. Roman said it reminded him of a Jaws’ movie.”
“Why didn’t you ask for help?”
“Nobody was there.”
“What about the lighthouse?”
“It’s been closed for renovations and the family who owns a house there had the place closed up until they get back from their Mexican vacation.”
“Didn’t your cell phones work at least?”
“No, we couldn’t get a connection. We kept shutting our phones off and turning them back on periodically to try and make a call, but until tonight, we weren’t able to get through to anyone.” She laid back against her pillows. “It’s been an agonizing time, waiting for someone to rescue us.”
“Eleanor and I have been looking for you, but the sheriff wouldn’t file a missing person’s report for you.”
“I can understand that since I’m an adult, at least most of the time.”
“I’m so sorry about your book,” Eleanor said.
“Well, that missing page hasn’t hurt the sales, from what my agent tells me.”
“You’ll have to thank the reporters and readers for that. Bad word travels fast.”
“I planned to contact my publisher to fix the error, but I have a feeling that readers don’t mind that there’s a page missing.”
> “Believe me, that wasn’t the case here in Tawas. We had picketers to contend with,” I offered.
“If it hadn’t been for Nash Rivers meeting them, they’d still be angry,” Eleanor added.
“Can’t say I blame them for that. I’ll have to thank Nash for lending a hand.” She frowned. “The sheriff told me about Laith’s death. I still can’t believe he’s gone, and at such a young age. He’s younger than I am.”
“At least now I know for certain that Julian didn’t have anything to do with Laith’s death.”
“Well, it sounds like you two have been quite busy. Roman feels bad that he wasn’t able to send a couple of people out to film you.”
“What?” I asked. “Are you sure about that?”
“That’s what he told me.”
“I hope Roman is still here, we really need to ask him a few questions.”
“Take it easy and get some rest,” Eleanor said, as we left the room.
Chapter Eighteen
WE WALKED INTO ROMAN’S room and he sat up in bed with a huge smile, “Hello, ladies. The sheriff told us all about how you’ve both been worried about where we were.”
“Yes. I didn’t think I needed to search Charity Island. I’m sorry that you had to rough it.”
“I am, too.” He laughed. “It’s certainly given me inspiration for my next movie, though. I’ll have to get my writers on it when I get back to California.”
“Do you know a Benny and Wallace?” I asked. “They claimed you sent them to film our activities as we were working on the disappearance of Sara’s case.”
Roman’s eyes widened. “Benny and Wallace sound like comedians, but no, I never got the chance to send anyone to film you at work.”
I pulled out my cell phone and showed Roman their pictures.
“I’ve never seen those men before.”
“If he didn’t send them, Agnes,” Eleanor began, “then who did?”
“Or why, is the question.”
“We should hunt them down, Agnes.”
“If only we knew where they were staying.”
“You’re right about that, but it wouldn’t hurt to ask Cindy a few questions while we’re at it. Why did she tell Tom and Damon that Laith was found dead at the mansion before it was even reported anywhere?”
Scandal in Tawas Page 14