Coached to Death

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Coached to Death Page 23

by Victoria Laurie


  Shepherd looked surprised. “That’s kind of brilliant,” he said.

  I smiled. “Thank you.”

  He tilted his beer at me. “Those qualities would make you a good detective too.”

  “They come in handy when I’m trying to read what motivates a person.”

  Tilting his chin slightly, Shepherd said, “What do you think motivates me?”

  I chuckled. “You don’t want to know what I think about what motivates you, Detective.”

  He smiled—almost overconfidently. “Sure I do. Come on, tell me, oh brilliant marketing whiz, what motivates me in life?”

  I took another sip of beer. “Well,” I said, “for starters, I think you have a giant chip on your shoulder.”

  Shepherd rolled his eyes, like he understood that was obvious.

  “But I don’t think that came from your childhood. I think that chip formed when you decided to become a police detective in your hometown.”

  “How would that form a chip on my shoulder?” he asked, and I could see the doubt in his eyes.

  “Because no one in East Hampton takes you nearly as seriously as you take yourself,” I said. “And you interpret that as a lack of respect. So you’re hard on people in every way you can be because you’re constantly trying to prove to them that you’re good at what you do, and that they should respect you.”

  Shepherd’s eyes widened, and for a moment, he was totally speechless.

  I continued. “So what motivates you is a desire to get a little recognition for doing a good job in a town where respect and recognition are hard to come by for anyone without a trust fund.”

  “Huh,” Shepherd said. And I knew in that moment that I’d nailed him.

  I smiled slyly. “See? I would make a good detective.”

  “Yeah,” he said, his face reddening. “I could’ve used your input on a few cases I’ve worked on.”

  “Speaking of which,” I said, “do you think I was being followed tonight by the assassin?”

  “Hard to say, but someone was interested in where you were going and what you were up to.”

  “Why would the assassin be interested in me, though?”

  “You saw her up close,” he said. “And I’ll bet anything she waited around to see what you’d do after she left the church.”

  “So she would’ve seen me get in my car, make a call, and wait; then when you showed up, she would’ve seen us talking.”

  “Yeah. A lot of ifs, but still plausible. She also would’ve known with your public arrest and bond hearing, that you were my number-one suspect.”

  “So . . . what? She’s keeping tabs on me to make sure you’re still interested in pointing to me as Heather’s killer?”

  “Maybe,” he said.

  And then I had another thought, a very unsettling one. “You don’t think she wants to kill me too, do you?”

  He shook his head. “If that was her behind you and if she did want you dead, trust me, you’d be dead.”

  I gulped. “Comforting.”

  Moe arrived at that moment to drop off some rolls. Shepherd took up the basket, unfolded the cloth napkin covering the rolls, and offered me one.

  “No thank you,” I said. Bread goes right to my hips.

  He frowned. “You’re not one of those are you?”

  “One of those?”

  “Yeah. One of those people who denies themselves the pleasure of a dinner roll because you’re worried about the carbs or that the gluten is some kind of poison.”

  I took a roll from the basket. “Nope.”

  Tearing a small bit of the warm pastry off the end, I popped it into my mouth, and my taste buds lit up. The roll was soft, buttery, and deliciously sour. I nearly moaned. Shepherd bounced his eyebrows and bit into his own roll.

  We chatted then about other things: my sons, his family, life in East Hampton. Our food did eventually arrive, and the restaurant started to fill up too. More staff arrived in the form of two high school girls who waited on tables and brought food out.

  Pushing my plate away after I’d eaten more than I should’ve of the delicious dinner, I said, “This is an odd little place, isn’t it?”

  “Moe’s?” he said.

  I nodded.

  “Yeah, I guess. The service is slow, but the food is the best. I hang out here a lot. Moe takes good care of me.”

  “You two kind of look alike,” I said, teasing him.

  “He’s my granduncle—the youngest of my grandfather’s brothers—so that’s not surprising.”

  “He is?” I said. “I meant that as a joke.”

  Shepherd chuckled. “Joke’s on you then. You ready?” he asked next.

  I nodded. Shepherd motioned for me to gather up my things, which I did, and while I was doing that, I noticed that he took out a hundred-dollar bill and left it tucked under his dinner plate. He then got up and walked with me over to where Moe was standing, talking to two men who were also eating ribs.

  Shepherd draped his arm over Moe’s shoulder, leaned down, and said softly, “Gotta go, Uncle Moe. Can you spot me dinner?”

  “Don’t I always?” Moe said, turning to hug the younger man. Moe then stepped back and held his grandnephew at arm’s length, considering him with a worried frown. “You doin’ okay, squirt?”

  “I’m doin’ great,” Shepherd assured him. “Thanks for dinner.”

  “You betcha!” Moe said. “Stay outta trouble, you hear?”

  Shepherd gave him a cool two-finger salute before motioning me to walk in front of him out the door.

  “He calls you squirt?” I asked as we passed through the doorway.

  “I was a late bloomer,” Shepherd said. “I was the shortest kid in class until I was about seventeen, when I finally got a good growth spurt.”

  “I know all about being the littlest kid in class,” I said.

  He eyed me sideways. “You turned out just fine.”

  I felt myself blush. “Why, Detective, was that a compliment?”

  Shepherd ignored the question and instead cleared his throat and pointed to his car. “I’ll follow you to your house to make sure you’re safe.”

  “Okay,” I said. We got into our respective vehicles, and I pulled out of the lot first. As I drove home, I kept glancing in the mirror, where I could see Shepherd’s lights a respectful distance behind me.

  It was comforting that he had my back. It was also comforting to simply have him nearby, and that wasn’t something I wanted to analyze overmuch.

  Finally, I pulled into my drive, and Shepherd did too. I waited for the garage door to go up and eased inside; and that’s when Shepherd appeared at my door and pointed to the house, as if asking if he could enter. I then noticed that he had his free hand on his holstered weapon, and I gripped the steering wheel tightly as I realized he wanted to go in and check to make sure the assassin wasn’t lurking in the shadows.

  Sebastian wasn’t yet wired to the house, so it was a source of vulnerability for me. Still, there was an alarm, and I rolled down the window. “The code is 0710,” I said, pointing to the alarm panel. It was the twins’ birthday.

  “Got it,” Shepherd said. “Sit tight.”

  I watched as he moved to the panel, punched in the code, then entered through the door. A light flipped on inside and I waited in anxious silence for what seemed like eternity. At last, Shepherd reappeared, and approached my window. “All clear,” he said.

  I let out a breath of relief. “Thank you.”

  “Set the alarm tonight,” he said, moving away toward his own car.

  I got out and stood for a moment by my car door. “Goodnight,” I called.

  He waved over his shoulder without looking back. I moved to the door and punched the button to close up the garage again. Shepherd was by now in his car, but he hadn’t backed away yet. There was a moment where I stood there in the beams of his lights and had the strangest urge to call him back and invite him inside. For what I didn’t quite know, and the thought was truly jus
t a momentary flash of . . . I don’t know. Maybe just loneliness.

  It’d been nice to spend an evening with him. Even though it hadn’t been a date, it’d still been nice.

  At least I didn’t think it was a date.

  Had it been a date?

  Shepherd’s car began to back up as the door to the garage got to about knee level. I moved inside but paused in the back hallway leading to the family room. “Nah,” I said, laughing at myself. “Definitely not a date.” And then I stopped again. “But what if it had been?” I considered that for a lengthy moment. “Oh, my,” I said. “Oh, my . . .”

  Chapter 13

  I found Gilley sipping coffee at the kitchen table in Chez Kitty, still looking sleepy.

  “Good morning,” I sang as I breezed into the cottage.

  He looked up. “Coffee’s hot,” he said.

  I moved to the counter and took a mug from the cupboard. Pouring myself a cup from the French press, I loaded in some cream and sugar and brought it to the table to sit down next to Gil. “No breakfast this morning?”

  Gilley frowned, and his lower lip quivered. “I Skyped last night with Michel,” he began. “It didn’t go well. We got into an argument, and he . . . he . . . he threw the F-bomb at me!”

  I gasped. Knowing Michel, that was nearly unfathomable to me. “He called you . . . ?”

  “Fat!” Gilley wailed. “He actually called me fat, Cat!”

  “Wait, a fat cat, or just fat?”

  “Just fat. Not a cat. You’re the cat, Cat.”

  “Got it.” Placing my hand over his, I said, “You’re not fat, Gilley.”

  “Tell that to Michel.”

  “What were the exact circumstances surrounding his . . .”

  “Calling me fat?”

  “Yes.”

  Gilley’s lower lip trembled again, and I squeezed his hand in comfort. It took him a moment before he could speak. “I wanted to do something nice for him, so I thought a little strip tease would be appropriate, you know, because he’s in London, and I’m all the way over here, and it’s been forever since we’ve seen each other, if you get my drift.”

  “I do,” I said, hoping he wouldn’t go into detail.

  “So, anyway, I was doing my sexy dance, which is part Brit-Brit, part Bey, part Madge—”

  “Britney, Beyoncé, Madonna,” I said.

  “Mmm hmm,” Gilley said. “And I was full on vogueing it up like all the single ladies in a ‘Slave 4 U’ tribute when I heard Michel . . .” Gilley paused to lower his chin and emit a tiny sob.

  “You heard Michel what?” I asked.

  Gilley looked up at me, his expression so pained. “I heard Michel . . . giggle.”

  “Oh, no,” I said. “Oh, Gilley . . .”

  “Can you believe that?”

  “Well, maybe Michel wasn’t laughing at you. Maybe he was laughing with you. Maybe it was simply a case of him thinking you were joking, only to discover that you were serious.”

  But Gil shook his head. “No,” he insisted. “No. He laughed at me, Cat. At!”

  “I’m assuming you told him you were offended?”

  “Oh, I did, sister. I did!” Gil said. “I let him have it. Unfortunately, I was shirtless while I was yelling at him, and at the end of my yelling he pointed to me and said that it was hard to take me seriously when I’d gotten so fat!”

  “So he was merely being defensive,” I said. Michel was typically so even-keeled; it was hard to imagine him losing patience with Gilley enough to resort to that kind of an insult. “He simply uttered it during an argument. I’m sure there’s no truth to it, Gil. You’re fine!”

  Gilley stood and pulled up his shirt. A roll of blubber had settled nicely around his waistline. “Still think I’m fine, Cat?”

  It took all of my willpower, and I do mean all of it, not to laugh at the ridiculous image of Gilley with his shirt pulled up, the roll of blubber splooging around his middle, and the pained and furious expression on his face.

  Still, I managed to hold it together. “We all have a little extra junk somewhere on us, Gil. It doesn’t make us fat,” I said gently.

  Gilley lowered his shirt and slumped back into the chair. “No,” he said. “He’s right. I’ve been snacking on far too many carbs lately.”

  “What can I do?” I asked him. I hated seeing Gilley so upset.

  “I don’t know. Distract me from the thought of food.”

  I got up from the table and headed to the fridge. I took out some eggs, some blueberries, and some strawberries. “What’re you doing?” he demanded.

  “You’re going to eat a sensible breakfast of eggs and fruit, Gilley,” I told him. “Starving yourself isn’t the way to keep yourself healthy. You need to fuel your body properly with good foods, add in a little exercise, and you’ll be trim again in no time.”

  Half an hour later Gilley pushed his plate away. “Thanks, Cat.”

  “Of course,” I said. “You’re always taking good care of me. It’s nice to take care of you for a change.”

  “So how was your night last night with the boys?” he asked.

  I shook my head. “It never happened.”

  “What never happened?”

  “Dinner with Matt and Mike.”

  “Don’t tell me they blew you off?”

  “No, no. Nothing like that. On the drive to the city, I was followed.”

  Gilley leaned forward. “Followed? By who?”

  “Whom, and I don’t know.”

  “Do you think it might’ve been Shepherd?”

  “No. Definitely not him.”

  “How do you know if you don’t know?”

  “Because I called Shepherd and told him I was being followed, and he sent me to the Patchogue police station, where I waited for him to come and escort me back.”

  “Wow,” Gil said. “That was nice of him.”

  “It was. And he even bought me dinner.”

  Gilley leaned forward again. “You guys went on a date?”

  “No,” I said firmly, having decided sometime between two and four a.m. that we had most definitely not been on a date.

  At least I thought so.

  “So who did he think was following you?”

  “He didn’t know either. We’re both hoping it wasn’t the assassin.”

  “Do you think it was the assassin?”

  “Maybe,” I said. “And that’s terrifying me.”

  Gilley gulped. “You know, the crazy thing is, Cat, whoever this woman is, she could basically walk right up to your house, knock on your door in plain clothes, and you’d never know it was her. She could shoot you before you even had a chance to process who she could be!”

  I felt the color drain from my face, and I gripped my coffee mug tightly. “Gee, Gil, thanks for that absolutely terrifying thought.”

  Gil’s expression turned regretful. “Sorry. I’m sure that won’t happen, though. I mean, now that I think about it, it’s a pretty far-fetched scenario.”

  Suddenly, the doorbell rang.

  Gilley and I both looked at each other in alarm.

  “Who the hell is that?” I whispered.

  “How should I know?”

  “Well, go look through the peephole!”

  “It’s your guest house! You go look through the peephole!”

  I shook my head.

  Gilley shook his.

  We both glared hard at each other.

  The doorbell chimed again.

  Slipping out of the chair and pulling Gilley with me toward the kitchen, we ducked down behind the counter, and I called out, “Who is it?”

  “It’s UPS, ma’am,” came the faint reply. “I have a package here that requires a signature.”

  “Oh! My new drone!” Gilley sang happily, and he bounded out from behind the counter and skipped over to the door.

  “Gilley!” I said in a harsh whisper. “Look through the peephole first!”

  Gilley paused in front of the door and tilted forward on t
iptoes. “It’s really him,” he said with a relieved sigh. After opening the door and signing for the package, he came back to the table and began to pry open the box.

  It was about then that he realized I was still ducked down behind the counter. “What’re you still doing over there?” he asked. “It was only the UPS guy.”

  “This time,” I said. I stood up slowly and rubbed my shoulders as a cold shudder went through me. “I can’t live like this, Gilley.”

  He frowned and set aside the box to focus on me. “What do you think we should do?”

  “I think we have to find Heather’s murderer. I was up most of last night mulling this whole thing over and over, and the more I think about it, the more I think that maybe Carmen really did kill Heather. And that’s why she was fleeing the scene at the church. I think she might’ve confessed to Father Stephan that she killed Heather, and, nervous that he’d break the oath of confession and talk to the cops, she killed him. I’m also thinking that the getaway car she hopped into was driven by someone she trusted. Maybe a relative.”

  “Sasha,” Gilley said. “She lives in West Hempstead. That’s a little bit of a hike from here, but drivable in a little less than two hours.”

  “Yes. We need to find where Sasha lives and see if Carmen is a relative of hers, and if so, if she’s taken refuge with her.”

  Gilley shrugged. “I’m game. Give me ten minutes to make myself presentable, and we’re off.”

  True to his word, Gilley was ready exactly ten minutes later, and we set off toward West Hempstead.

  Still feeling a little wary about being followed the night before, I drove my sedan to a storage facility on the west side of town, making sure to double-check my rearview mirror every few seconds along the way.

  “What’s here?” Gilley asked me as I entered my security code.

  “Another mode of transportation,” I said.

  Gilley furrowed his brow, but I waited to show him when we got to a set of garage doors. Using the remote I’d brought along, I opened the doors and put the car in park.

  “Ohmigod!” Gilley squealed. “We’re taking the Ferrari?”

 

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