Cast Iron Alibi

by Victoria Hamilton

  Brandi was in a thoughtful mood. What was she thinking behind her huge sunglasses, always perched on her nose? Jaymie wondered. Was she thinking about Mario? There was no telling, as she was being unusually circumspect. Of course, she had Courtney to talk to. Jaymie was actually glad of that. It felt like, as the years had passed, she and Brandi had less and less in common. Maybe their fun friendship of years past was based on an illusion, something Mel had intimated.

  “How did your conversation with Jocie and Jakob go this morning?” Mel asked, sliding a glance sideways at Jaymie.

  “So good.”

  “You cried, right?”

  Jaymie nodded.

  Brandi smiled. “I know how you feel. I miss my kiddos too.” Her smile died. “I trusted Terry to be looking after them, for God’s sake, and instead he shows up here. He needs to let it go.”

  “Maybe he’s back there now?”

  “I hope so.” But she didn’t look convinced, finally laying her sunglasses aside to reveal red-rimmed bloodshot eyes. “He hasn’t returned my text.”

  “But someone’s looking after the kids, right?”

  “Oh, yeah, if the babysitter poops out on us, his mom will take over. She’s great. Even my oldest likes her and calls her Grandma. His family is fine, he’s the one who screwed up.”

  “Screwed up?” Until this moment, despite numerous comments she now recognized as hints, she had assumed that Brandi got tired of being married. “What did he do, Bran?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” she said, her smile watery.

  The waiter arrived with their drinks.

  “This is what I need: vodka, and lots of it.” She took a long, thirsty drink, then called out to the departing waiter, “Hey, another of these, please!”

  He turned, nodded and headed back to the bar.

  Brandi fished in her purse and got out her phone, bringing up pictures. “Here’s some of the latest pics of my kids. I don’t share them online because you never know, right?”

  “That’s why I don’t share pictures of Jocie.” Jaymie took the phone and scrolled through the photo gallery of Brandi’s photos, most of her kids, but also many of her partying, a few of her and different guys and some of Courtney. There were, among them, older ones of Brandi looking happy with Terry. The best was one of Terry with Logan and Gabriela.

  “Aw, I love a couple of these pics of you, Brandi,” Jaymie said. She swallowed hard, glanced at Melody, then looked at her friend. “Do you mind if I send a couple to my phone?”

  “Which ones?”

  “Uh . . . this one of you at Mardi Gras in New Orleans, for one. And a couple of others. You have some of my wedding that I didn’t see.”

  “Sure, whatever,” she said, draining the glass and reaching out as the waiter brought another. “Just don’t post them, okay?”

  “I wouldn’t dream of it. In fact, I won’t leave them on my phone,” Jaymie said, sending the photos she had named, but also another of Terry, to her phone. “I’ll off-load them to my computer as soon as I get a chance.” She didn’t know how, but she was going to take the photo of Terry to Hallie to see if Brandi’s Terry was Mario’s Terry. It was going to bug her until she knew for sure. Mel was looking at her weirdly. Jaymie made a face and handed the phone back to Brandi.

  As they ate, Brandi talked about her kids. The oldest took music classes and was showing some remarkable talent. Said every parent everywhere, Jaymie thought with a smile. The child she was looking after finally slept through the night without waking up screaming, which was a big move forward.

  “And my little guy baby . . .” Brandi’s expression softened. “He’s my last. I got my tubes tied. You know, I think babies are the one thing men don’t make a mess of.”

  “I’m sorry your marriage didn’t work out, Brandi,” Jaymie said, reaching over and squeezing her friend’s hand. “What was it about him that broke the marriage up?”

  Courtney snorted. “What wasn’t there?”

  “Court, enough. He’s a good dad most of the time, but he won’t discipline the kids. It’s left all up to me. And . . .” She sighed. “He cheated on me.”

  “Figures,” Mel said darkly.

  “Right?” Courtney added.

  “I’m sorry,” Jaymie said. She paused, but then said, “But you’ve moved on, right? Like coming here to hook up with . . . with a guy.”

  Melody raised her brows. Jaymie belatedly realized her writer friend had not been in on the conversation about Brandi and Mario, but it was too late.

  Brandi sent her a narrow-eyed look. “I can do whatever I please. I’m a free woman, despite what you or Terry think.”

  “I’m sorry, Brandi, I didn’t mean it to sound—” At that moment her phone pinged and she picked it up to look at the text. “Val says she’ll meet us on our way back to the island, if we can stop at her house.” She looked up from her phone. “I have to go retrieve Hoppy at Mrs. Stubbs’s. Anyone want to go with me?”

  “I’ll go. And it’s my turn to pay for lunch. You’ve paid for enough, Jaymie,” Melody said, with a pointed look at the others. “Brandi, you can settle up with me for your Caesar drinks. I’m not supporting your booze habit.”

  Jaymie and Melody stopped at the cash desk to pay the bill, and then proceeded out to the hall and toward Mrs. Stubbs’s suite.

  “What was that about Brandi meeting a guy on the island? Not that I’m surprised.”

  Jaymie told her what she had figured out. “I shouldn’t have brought it up, though. I think I hurt her feelings. But listen to this,” she continued, and told her friend what she and Val had discovered about Mario’s son being named Terry.

  “So that’s why you were trying to find out more about Terry last night around the fire.”

  “You caught on enough to help,” Jaymie said. “Not that it did any good.”

  “Let me guess: one of the photos you sent to your phone is of Terry?”

  Jaymie nodded. “But I don’t know what to do next. I don’t want to accuse an innocent man.”

  “If he’s innocent, it’ll all be fine.”

  “But it feels like I’m crossing some kind of invisible friendship line, you know?” she murmured as they headed down the carpeted, dimly lit hallway. “Taking the photo without asking, and maybe showing it to Hallie . . . and the police?”

  “A man was murdered. Which is worth more: finding the killer or preserving Brandi’s feelings, such as they are?”

  “I don’t know. Here is Mrs. Stubbs’s place,” she said as they came to the door. “You don’t mind coming in to talk for a minute, do you? Mrs. Stubbs is an avid reader, and she’d love to talk to an author.”

  They entered to find Hoppy securely on Mrs. Stubbs’s lap as she read Elizabeth Is Missing by Emma Healey on her reading device, a gift from her sons. She liked it because her sight was fairly bad even with thick glasses; books that had not been available in large print she could now read, with the font sizing capability.

  “Mrs. Stubbs, this is Melody Heath, my writer friend.”

  “Ah, Jaymie has talked about you,” she said, closing the cover on her device. “She keeps trying to get me to read your books. I haven’t so far.”

  Mel laughed out loud, a hoot that echoed and startled Hoppy, who looked up, ears perked. “I respect that, Mrs. S. Not all books or all writers are for all readers.”

  Jaymie rolled her eyes. “That’s before I knew you wrote the Megan Hunter books,” she said to Melody. “Mrs. Stubbs reads mystery and suspense, not romance.”

  Melody’s eye lit up. “Hey, I’ll send the Jade Torrence series to your device.”

  “They’re Detective Vestry’s favorite books,” Jaymie said with a hint of acerbity.

  “That woman . . . ! I’d be interested in reading the books, young lady, to see if there is anything Jaymie’s least favorite police detective and I have in common.”

  They sat with Mrs. Stubbs for a few minutes and talked books. She and Melody had many favorite author
s in common, as it turned out, and both had a surprising penchant for true crime.

  “We’d better get going,” Jaymie said. “We’re keeping our friends waiting.”

  “Who are the two girls you were with? Not the tall one with the purpley hair, or the one dressed like her, but the neatly dressed one and the other . . . the chubby girl?”

  “That’s my friend Gabriela—the one you call chubby—and her sister-in-law, Tiffany.”

  “I saw them; thought they were guests here at the inn. But they’re part of your girls’ week?”

  “Gabriela is. Tiffany was an unexpected bonus,” Jaymie said.

  “The gift that keeps on giving,” Melody added.

  Mrs. Stubbs’s arthritic fingers moved restlessly, turning her reading device over and over in her hands. “There was something . . . wrong in their interaction.”

  Jaymie’s gaze sharpened. When Mrs. Stubbs talked, she listened. “What did you see?”

  “It wasn’t what I saw, it was what I overheard. There was something menacing. Something . . .” She sighed and frowned. “Do you know how someone talks to you when they know a secret, something they are holding over you?”

  “I’m not sure I know what you mean.”

  “I do,” Melody said. “It’s like gloating; it’s cruel, cold, calculating. There’s a certain tone of malicious enjoyment, like they know something, and they could tell the world, but they’d rather hold it back and torment you with the knowledge.”

  “Exactly!” the woman said, pointing one crooked finger at Mel.

  “Who was holding what over someone’s head?”

  “I first saw them walking along the grass; I was sitting on the terrace outside my window. It was a nice day, not too hot yet. I’m old, virtually invisible to some people. These two were deep in conversation, and the skinny one looked around and dragged the other off around the corner of the inn. But I hadn’t heard their voices, so I don’t know who was saying what.” She closed her eyes, thinking.

  Jaymie exchanged a look with Melody, who was totally enthralled in the old woman’s method.

  Mrs. Stubbs opened her eyes. “The conversation went like this: first woman said, Why are you torturing me like this? Second woman said, Because you deserve it, after what you did . . . and the first woman interrupted and said, It was an accident. I didn’t mean any harm. Then the second woman said, If you know what’s good for you, you’ll give up and let go, Gabby!”

  Fourteen

  Jaymie recalled the frightened look on Gabriela’s face when Tiffany showed up. “The first woman is Gabriela, the second is Tiffany. Tiffany is definitely holding something over Gabriela—I think you’re right—but what?”

  “Something that happened at home before Gabriela left. Or something that was discovered after Gabriela left Ohio,” Mel said.

  “What do you mean, something that was discovered after she left Ohio?” Jaymie asked her friend.

  “I can think of a lot of possibilities: something wrong with the car that she didn’t tell anyone about, or a dangerous situation with the house she ignored, maybe?”

  “I can see that,” Jaymie said. “Gabriela was never handy around the house. And she could be careless; she was notorious for leaving the door unlocked at night, if she was the last to come in.”

  “I remember cops coming around and warning us about that after a series of break-ins of student housing. And still . . . she kept forgetting to lock up.”

  “It sounds like Tiffany is threatening Gabriela, though . . . to say If you know what’s good for you, you’ll give up . . . what does that mean?”

  “They have a child with them, don’t they?” Mrs. Stubbs said.

  Jaymie nodded. “Logan, Gabriela’s husband, came to Queensville with their daughter, Fenix, and his sister Tiffany. Something happened at their house and they had to leave. We don’t know what it was. What could be so wrong that it would force them out?”

  “If that’s his daughter, he hasn’t been spending much time with her. I sit in the lobby often to people watch. I know for a fact from Edith’s phone calls,” she said, naming her son’s partner, who manned the combined reservation concierge desk, “that he’s had the Queensville Inn babysitting service on alert for the few days he’s been here. There’s a lovely girl; Allie or Ashlee . . . I can never remember her name. She’s been here on and off for days taking care of their daughter.”

  “Where is Logan going, I wonder, when he gets a babysitter for Fenix?” Jaymie said.

  Melody squinted, staring out the sliding doors and into the distance. “Maybe following Gabriela? What a bunch of weirdoes we married . . . all except you,” she said to Jaymie.

  “I do know the babysitter, if it’s the girl I think it is,” Jaymie said. “Her name is Ashlee, and she’s Sammy Dobrinskie’s girlfriend. Maybe she knows what Logan has been up to. I’ll find out.” She texted Sammy to ask for his girlfriend’s phone number then returned her phone to her purse.

  “But Logan?” Melody said. “Do you suspect him of doing in Mario? Why would he?”

  “I don’t know,” Jaymie said. “But something is going on among those three: Gabriela, Tiffany and Logan. I’ve got this feeling . . . is it possible that Tiffany is setting Gabriela up in some way?”

  “I don’t know how that would work out . . . they don’t have anything to do with Mario, as far as we know, none of them.”

  “You’re right. It doesn’t make sense. It’s time to find out, though, what is going on there. If they won’t tell me, I’ll have to be sneaky.” She stood and snapped Hoppy’s harness on him. “We have to go, Mrs. S. Dinner cruise tonight.” She kissed her friend goodbye, and Mel asked if she could come back sometime and hang out with Mrs. Stubbs, who said yes in a surprised voice.

  “I like her,” Melody said as they left and headed down the dim hall. “A lot. In fact, she might become a character in the Jade Torrence books. I need some balance, someone older, or someone different. The list of characters reads like a who’s who of a Midwest country club.”

  Jaymie laughed. “Is that how you decide a character’s identity? You have a quota system for diverse ages and ethnicities?”

  Mel gave her a look. “Of course not. In general I let the character tell me who they are but lately . . .” She shrugged. “Maybe it’s because I’m surrounded at home with such suburbanality.”

  “Is that a real word?”

  “Nope. Coined it. Or maybe I coined it . . . who knows? Maybe I heard it from someone or somewhere and stole it.” She grimaced. “There is nothing new under the sun. Isn’t that a saying? Is it from the Bible? I don’t know. I feel like I don’t know anything anymore.” She sighed. “I’ve been . . . off lately.” She flexed her shoulders, an uneasy expression on her plain face. “The writing is suffering. I end up creating the same character over and over again and they’re all miserable straight white people in horrible marriages.”

  Jaymie bit her lip, trying not to laugh at Melody’s predicament, since her friend was clearly in distress, but it sounded funny, the way she said it.

  “That doesn’t reflect real life, does it?” Mel said, glancing over at Jaymie, anxiety on her face. “I mean, all the people in my work in progress are alike. Or it feels that way to me. I don’t always do that, do I?”

  “No, of course not. You’re good at having a varied cast of characters.” They walked on down the hall toward the front of the inn. “I guess I don’t understand writing,” Jaymie said.

  Melody sighed. “I don’t mean to be a pain. But I usually am a pain when the writing isn’t flowing. Thank God for editors. Mine told me I needed a vacation, and he was right. I needed this.” She stopped dead and put her arm around Jaymie’s shoulders and gave her a side hug. “See, that’s why this vacation is good for me. You’re good for me. I needed to mix it up, to get out of my shell. I’m a natural born hermit, inclined to crawl into my dark cave and think too much. I needed time away from Andrew. Reconnecting with you and Rach and even Brandi and Gabrie
la has been good for me. And meeting Valetta, Heidi and Bernie . . . and Mrs. Stubbs . . . I love her! It’s the best. I appreciate it.”

  “I’m glad you’re enjoying it. I was afraid it was kind of a downer, you know?”

  “I don’t need perfect. Just being with old friends is good.”

  They continued on, emerged from the hallway, passed the reservation desk and threaded their way through the chairs in the lobby to the front doors, where Tiffany, Gabriela, Brandi and Courtney were waiting for them on a bench outside.

  Together they walked to Val’s place. She invited them in to visit and meet Denver, the “man in her life,” as Valetta said with a smirk. Hoppy was overjoyed to see his old frenemy again and bounced around the cat, who eyed him, unimpressed by such an obvious display of emotion. Mel sat on the floor, back against the sofa, and Denver, after leisurely sniffing everyone, climbed onto her lap. She smiled and stroked the cat as he curled up and fell asleep. “This is what I need in my life. If only Andrew wasn’t allergic.”

  “Ditch the husband and get a cat,” Brandi said.

  Mel laughed. “You’ve got something there, Bran.”

  After a cold drink they returned to the island.

  • • •

  Four hours and many acrimonious battles over the bathroom and mirror space later, attired in suitable summer dinner cruise wear, they made the forty-five-minute trip north, Jaymie, Val, Rachel and Melody in Val’s car, and Brandi, Courtney, Tiffany and Gabriela following in Brandi’s. They parked at Desmond Landing in Port Huron and got out of the vehicles, straightening dresses and shorts, facing the humid hot air and retrieving purses from the two cars.

  Jaymie, dressed in a cute tropical-patterned summer dress she found at an end-of-summer sale at Target, spotted someone she knew waiting by another car in the parking lot. She waved and yelled, “Chief Ledbetter!” Val, who also knew the former chief of police, followed her over to where he stood by an aging Buick, accompanied by a gray-haired portly woman, her curls damp with the August heat, fanning herself with a ticket for the dinner cruise.