Cast Iron Alibi

by Victoria Hamilton

“Don’t touch me!” Brandi said, pulling her arm away.

  Gabriela, tears welling in her eyes, joined them. “Jaymie, I can’t believe you’ve gotten us involved in one of your murders.”

  “One of my murders?” Jaymie yelped. “What do you mean?”

  “We know you’re always getting mixed up in them and you’re used to it, but we’re not!”

  “That’s not fair, Gabriela,” Jaymie said, her voice shaking. “This has nothing to do with me.”

  “Calm down, everybody,” Melody said, her tone edgy. “Gabriela, shut up. Jaymie didn’t do anything, and you know it. She was good enough to invite us all here to stay at her family cottage at no cost. What have any of you done but gripe?”

  A chorus of protest broke out among them, and it devolved into a squabble, with tears, shaken fingers and trembling voices. It reminded Jaymie of the old days in ways she had not anticipated; there was one memorable fight in their school days that had resulted when Brandi stole some guy Gabriela was interested in. Melody had exacerbated it in that case by joking that you could steal a wallet and you could steal a sweater, but you could not steal a man.

  Jaymie retreated to the grove to sit and sniff back her indignant response. Melody hadn’t helped, all she had done was irritate everyone. She did that too often, occasionally with ill-timed humor and often with her impatience at the others’ emotional spats. Right now Jaymie was weary of the lot of them. An old adage about fish and houseguests and three-day limits came to mind. This was the third day.

  “A man is dead, you bunch of jerks! Not you, Court,” Brandi finally said, stalking away from them and joining Mel in the grove. She lit another cigarette. “I need a drink.”

  “It’s a little early,” Jaymie commented.

  “It’s noon somewhere.”

  Jaymie couldn’t sit still, she had to move. If she didn’t, she would either break down or berate her friends. She jumped up and retreated to the shady rock garden they had constructed on the hill that led to the Redmonds’ home above. She spent a few minutes pulling weeds, tossing them into a pile she was collecting that would have to be moved to the composter at some point.

  It didn’t make any sense to her that her cast iron pie iron had been stolen to murder some guy she barely knew. How random was that? And how would anyone know about the availability of the pie iron except for her friends?

  If it was her pie iron at the scene of the crime, it was unlikely the person who used it happened to wander through her property, stole it, and attacked the victim. She dusted her hands off and sat down on a rock, watching her friends from the shadows, trying to gather her thoughts. Melody sat in a lawn chair reading her book; she was observant most of the time, but oblivious to how her brisk manners sometimes hurt feelings. Courtney and Brandi sat together smoking and drinking coffee. Gabriela was inside, getting ready to go over to Queensville to visit with her husband and child. Tiffany, back from her walk, had apparently decided to go with her. They couldn’t do anything, though, until Detective Vestry had spoken with them all.

  She went back to the first evening, their dinner at the Ice House, and frowned. What stuck out to her was how efficiently Courtney headed off Mario as he walked toward Brandi. What did she say to the guy to put him off? That was the one single thread she could find that tied their group to Mario, but that was flimsy, more a wisp than a thread.

  Was there more she didn’t know?

  • • •

  Detective Vestry, a slim, serious-countenanced woman in her forties, arrived, glancing around at them all. She beckoned to Jaymie, who went with her to stand in the lane and explain.

  “So, the second murder in three years on Heartbreak Island and you’re mixed up in both of them?” she said, referring to the murder of Sammy Dobrinskie’s father, which Jaymie was instrumental in solving.

  Jaymie stiffened. “I’m not mixed up in this.”

  “You merely provided the murder weapon, is that it?”

  “So it is my pie iron?” She cleared her throat, trying to get past the tears. This was too much, and the detective hadn’t helped with her finger-pointing.

  “Pending positive ID, it’s a pretty good chance. We’ll be taking the other two to see if there are any prints on them.” She signaled to another officer, who nodded and headed to the pie irons. “How fortunate that you’ve given us such a good description of your missing one. How do you remember so much about it?”

  Ignoring the accusatory tone, Jaymie squinted at the sun that angled down into her eyes and said, “You know I specialize in vintage kitchen stuff. I could tell you perfect details about any of my kitchen stuff. I have a red Pyrex bowl that has one scratch in the finish and I’d know mine in a second if you lined up a dozen red Pyrex bowls in front of me. I can tell you about one of my graters, which is a WonderShredder. It has a patent number. Want to know what it is?” She smiled. “I could go on. And on.”

  Vestry’s eyes widened. “Beats me why anyone is interested in kitchen crap. I use whatever is handy.”

  “You’re not a collector, I’d assume. I know people who feel the same about their cat figurines, or Lionel train collection. My brother-in-law could tell you in detail about his Bakelite radio collection.”

  “It’s funny, I’d never heard of a pie iron before this,” Vestry mused, “and suddenly I’m knee-deep in them. Every islander Bernie canvassed seems to have one. Or more than one in most cases. Who needs more than one?”

  “Detective, let me guess: you’ve never camped before?”

  “What does that mean?”

  Jaymie bit her lip at the defensive tone. The detective, despite Jaymie’s best attempts, appeared to think her a troublemaker, and everything Jaymie said seemed to irritate her. She made a little progress occasionally, but then something like this happened and it felt like they were back to square one. “I meant that most campers are familiar with pie irons. But I get that not everyone is a camper. You do need more than one if you have multiple people, or you’re left waiting for one pie to cook before you can make another.”

  Melody approached and had heard most of the conversation. “Detective, why did Jaymie asking if you’d camped before irritate you?”

  Giving her a look, Jaymie attempted to stave off Melody’s feistiness, ill-timed as it would be at this moment.

  Vestry’s gaze swiveled to Melody and she opened her mouth to respond, but stopped and stared, then said, “You look familiar. Who are you?”

  “This is my friend, Melody Heath.”

  “Melody Heath.” The detective squinted. “The name doesn’t ring a bell. You look like someone else.”

  “Mindy Howe? Mercy Hall?” Melody said, giving her pseudonyms for contemporary and medieval romance novels. When Vestry shook her head in puzzlement, Melody twisted her mouth, glanced over at Jaymie, and then looked back to the detective. “How about Megan Hunter?”

  “Megan Hunter!” Vestry exclaimed. “You’re her?”

  Melody smiled. “I am.”

  Jaymie glanced back and forth between the two. “Who is Megan Hunter?”

  “You don’t know? She writes the Jade Torrence Private Dick series! I love those! Jade Torrence kicks butt; she’s awesome. Hey, when are those going to be made into a movie . . . or better yet, a TV series!” the detective babbled, gray eyes wide, cheeks flushing with pleasure. “I can see Cameron Diaz playing Jade. Your books would be ideal for Netflix or Amazon Prime; probably too much swearing and sex and violence for network TV.”

  Jaymie stared at Detective Vestry, who had turned into a fangirl in front of her eyes. Then she swiveled her gaze to stare at Melody. “A new pseudonym?”

  Mel colored faintly. She shrugged and waggled her hand. “Newish. I’ve written two so far, the first out last year and the second a few months ago. I keep the Megan Hunter books separate. Different website, different social media . . . everything separate. They’re action mystery, not romance. There’s more . . . mmm . . . blood and guts in them.”

  “And se
x,” Vestry said with a wink.

  “But . . . but you’re a romance author!” Jaymie wailed, staring at Mel.

  Melody rolled her eyes. “I’m an author, full stop.”

  “But I’m your friend, and you never told me. Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “Jaymie, can we talk about this later?” Melody said, her tone edgy.

  “Maybe we can talk later,” the detective said to the writer. “I have some great ideas for plots.”

  Melody’s eyes lit up. “I’d like that. Maybe we can grab a drink at the Ice House.”

  “You’re on.” She turned back to Jaymie, all business, but in a self-conscious trying-to-impress manner. “Now, you say you don’t know when the pie iron went missing. Maybe someone else noticed?”

  No one had. Vestry moved among the others, asking questions, following up on Bernie’s notes. Brandi seemed alarmed by the whole affair, while Courtney appeared ambivalent, though worried about Brandi. Tiffany and Gabriela, after being questioned briefly—neither knew anything—headed to the ferry to go to the Queensville Inn to visit with Gabriela’s husband and daughter. Jaymie sat in the shade and brooded. She watched her remaining friends, Melody reading her book as Brandi and Courtney sat together whispering.

  Brandi was upset about something, but when Jaymie had asked her what, she had shaken her head. Melody had conjectured that the first night, when Brandi disappeared, she had gone off for a tryst with a local guy. Why would she hide that? It was her personal life, and no one else’s business. However . . . maybe her friend feared the others would be judgmental, as Gabriela appeared ready to be. Brandi’s behavior, while her own business, worried Jaymie.

  Brandi knotted her burgundy dyed tresses into a bun and stretched a scrunchie around it. Jaymie watched and something occurred to her in that moment. Melody had conjectured that Brandi had hooked up with some local guy she had met online. Mario’s words haunted her, about a flame-haired love interest he was thinking of dating more seriously.

  Could that be Brandi? “Mel, Mel!” she said, scooting into the shadows and crouching down by her friend. “Listen to this.” She shared her hypothesis.

  “Makes sense. But don’t you think she’d be more upset by his death? I mean . . . if I sleep with a guy and he dies, I’m gonna be cut up.”

  Jaymie gave her a look. Her attempt at humor wasn’t appreciated. “But she is upset about something, and she won’t tell me what. I’d say she looks more nervous than sad. You’d think she’d be crushed, and we’ve all heard his name repeatedly today. Unless . . .” She frowned.

  “Unless what?”

  “Unless she’s upset about something else. Maybe she doesn’t connect Mario with the guy she was with. He probably didn’t use his real name on the dating app.” She plunked down on the ground and wrapped her arms around her knees. “Is that possible?”

  “Yeah, I guess. Maybe he used a screen name, like, oh, Hot Dude 27, or something like that.”

  Jaymie glanced at her, frowning; she remembered at the Ice House mistakenly picking up Brandi’s phone and seeing a message from someone with a screen name . . . what was it? It was 1BuffDude, or something like that. She explained what she had seen on the phone.

  Melody nodded. “So, she could have been with Mario and not know at this point that the guy is dead. How would we find out?”

  “It would be a heck of a coincidence.”

  “Maybe not. I know there’s a hookup app that tells you if someone who wants to hook up is close by, so if she checked in on that and Mario or whatever his screen name was came up? You already know the guy’s slept with lots of random women. Not so big of a coincidence, I’d say.”

  “You may be right about that.” Jaymie watched Brandi and Courtney. “I wish I knew what to do.”

  Melody’s eyes had narrowed. “There’s something else I’ve been wondering about, something that would make the explanation simpler. Jaymie, when Brandi told you that our campsite booking had been canceled, did you check with the site owners?”

  “No, why?” Mel raised her eyebrows and waited while Jaymie puzzled it out. She thought about what her friend was asking. “Are you suggesting that Brandi faked the booking being canceled so she could come here and meet up with a guy? I don’t know, Mel . . . if it was Mario, then she had met up with him before.” She told Mel about him bragging about the hot redhead he had met up with a few times. “Why would she need to cancel our camping trip and rearrange it to be here if she was seeing him whenever she wanted?”

  “I can think of a few reasons. She wanted to see him more often and the camping trip was going to get in the way. Or maybe she was planning to take it to the next level, like, become boyfriend/girlfriend, and she wanted time to make it happen.”

  Jaymie remembered what Mario had said, about kicking Hallie out and moving in his hot redheaded lover. “But she wouldn’t get serious like that without knowing his name, would she?”

  “You’d be surprised,” Melody said. “Even a screen name . . . I read about one case where a guy and gal who went beyond screen names used fake real names—if that makes sense—to text.”

  “Huh?”

  Melody shifted impatiently. “Okay, say a guy texted as Hot Dude and the encounter went beyond screen names. Maybe his name is really Frank, but he wants it to be more . . . romantic, sexier, so he calls himself Brick, or Stone, or some other stupid soap opera name.”

  “For a romance writer you’re impatient with people looking for romance.”

  “Romance. Huh. It ain’t romance guys like Mario are looking for.” Sighing, Melody nodded and shook her head awkwardly. She shrugged her shoulders, like she was trying to release tension. “Maybe you’re a little bit right. In the present moment I am having trouble summoning up the romantic feels, you know?”

  “I’m sorry, Mel. I hope you sort things out.”

  “Me too,” the writer said gloomily, then glanced at Jaymie. “You’re not really mad I didn’t tell you about the Megan Hunter books, are you? I didn’t think you’d be interested in them.”

  Jaymie thought for a moment. “I’m not mad, Mel. I’m hurt, I guess. I don’t only want to know about the writing I want to read. I want to know how your life is going. These books . . . were you excited about writing them?”

  “Yeah, I am. It feels fresh. That’s good.”

  “Then tell me about them. I’m interested in your life. We’re friends.”

  “Okay. I get it. We’ll talk. Now . . . back to Brandi and Mario, if any of our suppositions are true.”

  “I just don’t know. All I do know is, Mario was thinking of dumping Hallie for a hot-to-trot redhead. And we know one of those.” Jaymie watched Brandi. Should she ask her? Should she probe if her friend had been meeting up with Mario the first night? And if it was true, should she tell the detective?

  It wouldn’t have anything to do with Mario’s murder—it couldn’t have!—but . . . what if it did?

  Ten

  Hoppy perked up and barked, one happy yip of excitement. He danced in a joyful wobbly circle, then took off up the hill, zigzagging dizzily through the ankle-deep bed of dry pine needles, yapping in elation the whole way. Jaymie peered up through the shadowy trees to see Ruby Redmond, moving chairs around on the back patio of their rustic cottage. The couple was back from their sailing trip.

  She went to the bottom of the hill and shouted out, “Hey, neighbor! Don’t mind my doggie who is dashing up to see you; he’s been missing you.”

  “I have bickies for my favorite doggie friend,” Ruby called out. “Come up. I have something for you, too, Jaymie!”

  Jaymie climbed the hill along the obscure path; it wove between clumps of hostas and hydrangea and dogwood, along a path mulched for tidiness and with logs in strategic spots to act as steps. In the dark it was virtually impossible to find unless you knew how to scale it. She crested the hill and saw Hoppy waggling and wiggling around Ruby’s feet while she fished the doggie treats he loved out of her shorts pocket. “Come, sit
!” Ruby said, motioning to the Adirondack chairs that lined the back patio of their cottage. She squatted and ruffled Hoppy’s fur, caressed his ears and gave him a couple of crunchie doggie biscuits.

  “Are you talking to me or Hoppy?” Jaymie asked.

  “Both. Wait here; I’ve got something for you.” Ruby disappeared into the cottage.

  Jaymie sat down in one of the chairs and leaned back, closing her eyes. The questions she had about Brandi were worrying her; if her friend was mixed up with Mario, then how long before the police made the connection? The guy would have a cell phone and he and Brandi would have texted or spoken . . . surely the police would be wanting to speak with her again once they looked over his phone.

  Ruby returned and held out a paper bag to Jaymie, joy lighting up her visage. She had a sailor’s face, deeply tanned, angular and lined from time spent in the sun and the wind, with a shock of short white hair that stood straight up most of the time. “Got this up north. We did a bike trip on Mackinac Island. Enjoy!”

  Jaymie opened the bag and inside was a three-slice box of famous Mackinac Island fudge: Traverse City Cherry, German Chocolate, and Butter Pecan. “Oh, Ruby, thank you!” She teared up, which she thought was a strange reaction—it was just fudge, after all—but it meant a lot that her friends thought of her while they were away.

  But Ruby jumped up and put her arms around her. “Aw, honey, it’s okay.”

  “I don’t know why . . . I mean . . . tears!” She shook her head as her voice became clogged. “It’s all that awfulness this morning.”

  Ruby put her forehead to Jaymie’s, holding her face in her long-fingered hands for a moment, then she sat back down, staring at Jaymie earnestly. “I know you saw the fire this morning. We knew Mario; it’s terribly sad, especially with poor little Hallie expecting any day now!”

  “You know them?” Jaymie said, sniffling back her tears.

  “We had Mario and Kory do some work at the Ice House this spring, before Kory’s jail stint. I know he got out again a while ago.” Her deep-set eyes sad, she shook her head. “It’s a terrible thing. I worried at the time, you know . . . Hallie visited the job site from time to time, and I saw how Mario treated her.”