by K C Ames
Only Antonio’s pulpería at the very end of Ark Row stayed open late, but even he was closing up shop when Dana and Benny walked by.
“Hi Antonio,” Dana said. Antonio, the owner, was outside, rolling his small wooden fruit stand inside for the night.
“Hello. Nice night out.”
“It sure is. Did you get some of that extra business from those television people too?”
“I did. It was a good night, but they almost wiped me out clean of my beer supply that’s supposed to last me until the next delivery next week. I’m all out of Heineken and Imperial beer already. All I’ll have left until Monday is Pilsen beer. I won’t hear the end of it from the locals tomorrow.”
Dana chuckled. It took some getting used to for her, coming from the land of instant gratification back in the States to a small beach town off the beaten track where merchants were constantly running out of stuff.
No hay, Spanish for “we don’t have it,” was heard from the merchants in town as often as “should I ring it up for you?”
Dana and Benny said goodnight to Antonio, and they continued on their walk.
It was a short walk from the pulpería to the Qué Vista Restaurant, and from there they were just a few feet from the beach.
Dana was expecting some wild partying going on, but instead it was subdued. Qué Vista was winding down too.
She figured the drinking types had long moved down to the Giggling Dorado. Murray Theriot, an expat from Louisiana, owned the dive bar, and he would stay open as long as he had a crowd willing to spend money or until he ran out of booze. No hay.
They made it onto the beach and continued on their walk. It was too dark to see much, but they could hear the waves crashing lazily onto the shore, giving Dana goose bumps. The beauty of the Pacific Ocean never got old for her. Even in the darkness, she took in the beauty of it all.
She looked up to the night sky, and the stars were out in force. It was like nothing she could see living in San Francisco. Too much fog, smog, and city lights to get the light show you could get down in the tropics. You would have to go to the Morrison Planetarium in Golden Gate Park to get a star show like that in San Francisco.
They ran into Maria Rivera, who was walking from the beach back towards her restaurant.
“Hey, Maria, where are you coming from?”
Maria seemed taken aback at running into them.
“Oh, um, I was getting some fresh air before I close the restaurant. It was busy with all the people from the show back in town,” she said, sounding frazzled.
“I know what you mean. We got slammed at the cafe at about five. Stayed open an hour longer and still had to turn people away so we could close.”
Maria nodded in agreement as she looked behind her, seeming nervous.
“Did you hear anything about the investigation? When will the show resume shooting?” Dana asked her.
“No one has a clue. You know how Detective Picado is. I think he enjoys the power he has in putting people’s lives on hold for as long as he wants.”
Dana smiled. It seemed there was no love lost between Picado and just about everybody else in town.
“Any more drama like the last time we were at Qué Vista?”
“Nothing that bad, thank goodness.”
“Can you believe it? That loudmouth drunk we kicked out is dead. It’s so creepy. And I found the body,” Dana said, sending a shiver down her own spine.
“I should have been nicer, I suppose, you never know when someone’s number is up in this life,” Maria said, trembling.
“She was out-of-hand drunk, shouting, arguing with that boyfriend, breaking your glassware; you have nothing to feel bad about,” Benny said.
“How are you doing, finding the body and all?” Maria asked Dana.
“I had a hard time sleeping a couple nights after that. Had some whacky nightmares,” Dana replied.
Benny looked at her, surprised, since that was the first time she had shared that with him.
“Have you seen her boyfriend, Robbie Gibbons, around?” Dana asked.
“No. I haven’t seen him since that night. But the word around the campfire is that he’s devastated over Rose’s death,” Maria said.
Dana perked up. “Who told you that?”
“No one directly. It’s the good old spread of gossip around town. It’s on overdrive. And I overheard a couple of the cast members gossiping about it at my restaurant.”
“So what did you hear?” Dana asked.
“Well, I overheard one of the tables at the restaurant saying that Robbie took her death hard and then Detective Picado has him shaking in his Givenchy sandals about going to jail.”
“That’s Picado doing what he does best,” Dana said.
“Usually in these kinds of situations the boyfriend is the prime suspect,” Benny said.
Dana nodded in agreement, having watched a lot of true crime shows on the Investigation Discovery Channel.
After another few minutes of small talk not related to Rose Budd’s death, Dana and Benny continued down onto the beach so that Maria could close her restaurant and so they could finish their late-night stroll.
“Funny running into her out there,” Dana said.
“I guess she needed a break,” Benny replied.
They had walked hand in hand for just a couple minutes more when she suddenly heard what sounded like someone crying.
It was too dark to see anything, but they looked at each other, puzzled.
“You hear that?” Dana asked.
Benny nodded, then whispered, “I think someone is crying.”
“Sobbing,” Dana clarified.
They continued walking, heading towards the crying sound.
“Everything okay?” Benny said out to the dark night in the direction of the crying sounds, which immediately stopped as soon as Benny said that.
Then they could hear someone breathing hard through their nose in an attempt to swallow the fact that they had just been crying.
Dana and Benny could see the shape of a person sitting on the soft sand.
“Are you okay?” Dana asked to the shape.
“I’m fine,” the shape replied curtly.
Benny used his iPhone flashlight and pointed it towards the direction of the shape, and sitting there on the beach with his legs crossed was the man Dana knew as TJ from earlier that afternoon in her bookstore slash cafe.
It was the chubby, impatient man behind Dakota who, along with Mr. Twelve-Pack Abs, were hurrying Dakota up for chatting with Dana and holding up the line.
He was alone, just sitting there with four empty bottles of Imperial beer in the sand by his feet. There was one unopened bottle by the empties, and he held one bottle that still had beer in it lazily in his right hand.
He must be one of the customers that wiped out Antonio’s Imperial beer supply, Dana thought.
”Are you okay, man?” Benny asked, moving closer with his flashlight still shining.
“You mind getting that light out of my face?” TJ asked, sounding upset.
“Oh, yeah, I’m sorry,” Benny said, shutting it off. He then repeated the question, “Are you okay?”
“I’m just peachy. I’m in a strange country. I lost my soul mate, and I’ve just been fired,” he said, taking a long drink from the bottle.
“Your soul mate?” Dana asked.
“I came all the way down to this Third World country for this job and now they fire me. A ticket back to LAX is all I get,” he said, not answering Dana’s question about the soul mate. Instead, he took another huge gulp of beer, emptying the bottle, which he then dropped between his legs on the sand to join the other empty bottles littered in front of him. He immediately picked up the last bottle and, using the bottle opener in his pocketknife, he opened it and flicked the bottle cap onto the sand.
“Maybe you have had enough to drink, buddy,” Benny said.
“Forget you! You’re not the boss of me. I don’t even know you. But I know you,�
� he said, pointing a crooked finger at Dana. As if the score of empty bottles weren’t proof enough, he sounded very drunk.
“You were in my bookstore cafe this morning. You ordered a large dark roast coffee and three pineapple empanadas,” Dana said.
He lit up. “Oh yeah, I love those empanadas. Do you have any with you?” he asked seriously.
“Um, no, it’s the middle of the night and we’re just out for a walk.”
“Dang it,” he said. He took another sip of beer and scrunched his face. Dana figured the beer was getting warm.
“I could use one of those empanadas right about now,” he said, sighing loudly.
“So how did you lose your soul mate?” Dana asked.
“The most beautiful girl in the world. She was so talented. A star in the making. Rose Budd... and now... and now... she’s dead,” he said. He began to sob again. “I loved her so much.”
Dana felt a ping inside, for the pain he was feeling felt palpable to her.
“I thought she was with Robbie Gibbons,” Benny said, rather coldly.
He might as well have insulted TJ’s mother and kicked his puppy, the way TJ glared at Benny.
“She didn’t love that idiot pretty boy. She loved me,” he said, shoving his thumb onto his chest and spilling beer all over his T-shirt. “We just had to keep it on the down low because I was part of the crew and she was part of the cast. She was going to be the star of this season. But for appearances and ratings, it was best if everyone thought she was in love with that numbskull dolt Robbie Gibbons, but she loved me. And I loved her.”
Dana and Benny gave each other puzzled looks. It seemed genuine to Dana, but then again he was stinking drunk, so she shrugged.
“You don’t believe me either. No one does. Well, I don’t care. I know the truth, and now everyone knows, so they fired me. Well, I’ll show them. I’ll show Robbie. I’ll show you all,” TJ said as he lumbered up to his feet, out of balance. He stood there for a few seconds like a man on a wire, but he eventually could stand somewhat erect, and he stumbled away, holding on to the bottle of beer like it was a ring buoy and he was lost at sea.
“Should we go after him?” Dana asked.
“He’s two hundred and thirty pounds easy, and he’s drunk and belligerent. We couldn’t stop him if we wanted. He’ll be fine. He just needs to sleep it off,” Benny said.
“Look at this mess he left behind.”
Benny sighed. “Darn tourists always leaving trash behind,” he said as he kneeled down and began picking up the empty bottles TJ had left behind.
Dana joined in picking up empty bottles and their little tin caps. The bottles were sticky and caked in wet sand, and they smelled like warm leftover beer. So much for their quiet, romantic night stroll under the stars.
Eighteen
The next morning, Dana drove down to Ark Row. She parked and walked to the bookstore slash cafe. The Ark Row merchants parked at the far end of where Ark Row began to leave the parking spots right in front of the stores to customers.
As soon as she could see her shop, she saw TJ pacing out front.
It surprised her to see him up that early in the morning, considering how drunk he had been less than ten hours ago.
She sighed, not being too keen on dealing with him or anyone from the television show. The cast and crew were turning out to be an insufferable bunch.
But it wasn’t like he was giving her much of a choice, since he was loitering out front.
As soon as they made eye contact, he gave her a thin smile and a limp-wrist half wave. He was standing in front of the shop’s door, blocking the entrance with his hefty frame, and he didn’t move to give her access to her own store.
Is he waiting for me? Dana wondered.
“Hi, Dana. I’m TJ Summers,” he said, sounding nervous. Dana chuckled, she remembered him. Although she hadn’t known his last name until that moment. She was about to say that she knew who he was but he continued to speak, “I stopped by to talk to you, but Mindy said you don’t come in until later, so I thought I would wait for you.”
His appearance was a rumpled mess. He was in the same Iron Butterfly T-shirt and khaki cargo shorts that he had the previous night.
His clothing was dotted with stains from a night of heavy drinking on the beach and who knows where else. His disheveled hair and beard were all over the place. He looked like a street person off the streets of San Francisco. I shouldn’t be surprised, Dana thought, since he was so drunk the previous night. But beyond his messy appearance on that morning, he looked downright terrified about something.
“Well, come on inside, I’ll get you a cup of coffee on the house.”
“Um, no thank you. I’ve already had three cups. And two of those delicious egg and chorizo bagel breakfast sandwiches.” Thinking about Mindy’s breakfast sandwiches seemed to bring some joy to the man, then his face turned back to panic.
“I just need to talk to you for a minute. About last night,” he whispered the about last night part, and he looked around, making Dana look around too. Was someone watching them?
“Okay, shoot.”
TJ looked around more and he got closer to Dana. He smelled terrible—a mixture of sweaty sea air, stale booze, coffee, and sausage. Spit it out so you can go take an hour-long shower, Dana wanted to tell him, but she stood there, looking at him with a puzzled look.
“First, I’d like to apologize to you and your friend. As you could tell, I was very drunk. So I’m sorry. But, I beg of you, please don’t tell anyone about the stupid things I said last night.”
“I’m surprised you remember,” Dana said, smiling. TJ didn’t smile, he just looked horrified.
She figured he wasn’t in the mood to be teased about it. “Don’t worry, what happens on the beach late at night stays on the beach,” Dana said.
“Thank you. It’s very important that you and your friend don’t tell anyone about what I said about Rose Budd and me. You haven’t told anyone, have you?”
“Nope. You’re actually the first person I’ve seen this morning. So don’t worry, I won’t say anything.”
“None of what I told you about me and Rose was true. Like she would have been interested in a slob like me,” he said, looking down at his Birkenstocks.
“Don’t be so rough on yourself, but don’t worry. None of that is my or anyone else’s business, so I won’t say a word about it.”
That seemed to lighten up the thousands of pounds of stress he seemed to have been carrying on his shoulders that morning.
“Can you also ask your friend not to say anything?”
“Don’t worry, he won’t, but I’ll tell him. So how long is the production shut down for?”
“I don’t know. The producers are fighting with the Costa Rican officials about it right now. Every day we’re shut down, they’re losing a ton of money. And we have deadlines in order to shoot enough footage to cut into a show in time for the season premiere in the fall.”
“So you’ll be sticking around?”
“Why wouldn’t I?” he blurted, sounding defensive.
“You said they fired you last night.”
“Oh, sorry. No, that was just a misunderstanding. Hopefully, we can get back to work soon. Besides, the cops said none of us can leave until they give us the okay individually, so even if I wanted to go back home to LA, I can’t. I’ll be arrested at the airport.”
“I guess they’re conducting their investigation and they don’t want potential witnesses to leave,” Dana said.
“And suspects.”
“What do you mean?”
“You said potential witnesses. Well, the cops are trying to find out who killed Rose, and if I had a dollar to bet, I would bet that Detective Picado thinks it was one of us from the show.”
TJ seemed to hold back tears whenever he said Rose Budd’s name.
“So you have met Detective Picado?”
“Unfortunately, I have. He’s a tough son of a gun.”
Dan
a laughed. “I must agree with your assessment.”
TJ finally cracked a thin smile. “So you have met him too?”
“It’s a small town, most of us have at one time or the other met with him.” Dana didn’t want to get into her personal history with Picado, so she left it at that.
He once again begged her not to tell anyone about their conversation last night or about what they had just spoken that morning. Dana reassured him for what must have been the fifth time. TJ finally seemed satisfied that she would keep their encounter last night to themselves.
“Okay, thank you,” he said as he shuffled away down Main Street. Dana watched him for a moment, and he was heading towards the footpath. She figured he was staying at the resort like most of the cast and crew were doing.
Dana called Benny on her mobile phone. She was still standing out front, so she spoke quietly and told him about her encounter with TJ.
“It makes sense. No matter what the truth is about his relationship, he was talking out of school, which could jam him up with the police and his employer.”
“Especially with the police, since significant others are usually prime suspects,” Dana said.
“I’m sure Picado is on top of that if it’s true, so let’s not get involved further with TJ. The man could be dangerous.”
He seemed harmless to Dana. She didn’t see it as cut and dry as Benny usually saw things. She was not too worried about TJ, but it intrigued her. What was going on with him and on that show? Could he have really been dating Rose Budd? Seemed unlikely, but then again, Julia Roberts married Lyle Lovett.
Regardless, she had given him her word, and she would keep it even if she had a thought in the back of her mind niggling away at her. Maybe he was afraid and didn’t want anyone to know about what he said on the beach because he was an obsessed stalker or a spurned lover that was dumped for Robbie Gibbons.
It was hard to fathom such scenarios. Unfortunately, there had been many dead women at the hands of an obsessed or spurned man.
She was all about keeping his secret to save him embarrassment or being fired, but she would not be manipulated into helping cover up his malfeasance in the death of Rose Budd. So she needed to look into the matter further. She wasn’t about to throw him under the bus if what he had told her just now was the truth.