Brewed Awakening

by Cleo Coyle

  “No mention in the accident report. The cops obviously didn’t believe Mrs. Prescott.” Quinn shrugged. “That’s the whole story from this station.”

  “Not the whole story,” I said.

  “What do you mean?”

  I told Quinn about spotting Stevens in the parking lot. I shared as many details as I could remember about my tangle with him in the Parkview’s Gotham Suite, including the conversation I overheard between Madame and Annette’s sister, Victoria Holbrook. I also shared my suspicions—and fears—about why the hotel security chief was out here in the Hamptons, far from his limited jurisdiction.

  Quinn’s reaction was surprisingly subdued. He even made an effort to dial back my rising panic. “Calm down, Clare. From what you just told me, Annette’s sister—”

  “Victoria.”

  “—is running the hotel where Stevens works. You said this woman is desperate to find her sister. We know Annette and Harlan have a house out here, right?”

  I nodded. “That’s right.”

  “It makes more sense that Stevens is out here on Victoria’s behalf, looking for clues to Annette’s disappearance, and not necessarily for you.”

  “Or”—I gave Quinn my own version of the Spock eyebrow—“maybe he’s doing the same thing we’re doing, looking for Harlan’s killer.”

  “Maybe,” Quinn said. “Speaking of which, we have one more stop to make—”

  “Wait a second, flatfoot!” Matt cried. “Weren’t you listening? If this Stevens guy really did track our van from the hotel, then he’s going to show at my place in Water Mill.”

  “What’s your solution, Allegro?”

  “Drop me back at the house. Then you and Clare can take that rental car out of my driveway and to your next stop. I want no evidence that anyone is at home but me if this little piggy turns up on my doorstep with questions.”

  Quinn shot me that wink again. “Good team work, Allegro. Sounds like a plan.”

  SIXTY-SEVEN

  OUR next stop, after dropping off Matt, was the home of Flora Tanner, widow and mother of doomed Dana Tanner.

  “Sergeant Piper gave me her address,” Quinn said.

  Obviously, Quinn thought Mrs. Tanner was a suspect, although I was the one who had used the word vendetta back at Deerfield Farm. Clearly, the man’s detective mind was running on the same track.

  “Do you think Dana’s mother killed Harlan,” I asked, “or somehow engineered his death?”

  “We’re going to find out” was his reply.

  The Toyota hatchback was cramped compared to Matt’s luxury sports car, but it forced me to sit closer to Quinn, and I found the situation—to borrow his word—nice.

  We drove toward East Quogue but turned onto Lewis Road before reaching the town. Passing the entrance to the Westhampton Dwarf Pine Plains Preserve, we made a right onto a woodsy road lined with gated homes partially hidden behind shrubbery and ivy-covered stone walls.

  “That’s the place.”

  Quinn drove through open wooden gates, once whitewashed but now weathered and pockmarked by peeling paint. The house—a three-story Victorian at least a century old—suffered from the same sort of neglect. Even the paved driveway leading up to the house was cracked and pitted.

  As we climbed the creaky wooden steps to the front door, Quinn leaned close and whispered, “Let me do the talking . . . partner.”

  I flashed him the Spock eyebrow again.

  Quinn rang the doorbell three times before we heard the lock on the windowless door click. It opened slowly, to reveal a frail, middle-aged woman gripping an aluminum walker. She wore a housecoat, no makeup, and her dark hair was a tangled nest.

  “Forgive my rudeness,” she said, her words garbled by a partially paralyzed tongue. “My brother’s not here to answer the door, and it’s difficult for me to get around.”

  “No apologies necessary,” Quinn replied. “Are you Flora Tanner?”

  The woman tried to focus on Quinn’s face. It was clear from her sagging features that she’d suffered a stroke and was still recovering. Finally, she drew a pair of thick-lensed horn-rimmed glasses from her pocket, put them on, and looked up again.

  “Yes, I’m Flora Tanner. And you are?”

  “Detective Michael Quinn, New York City Police Department.” Quinn displayed his badge. “And this is my partner, Detective Clark. We’re here to talk about your daughter’s case.”

  The woman scoffed. “What case? You people didn’t find enough evidence, remember?”

  “We may reopen the investigation,” Quinn said.

  “Why? The bastard’s dead.”

  “You’re talking about Harlan Brewster?” I asked.

  The woman stared at me for a moment. Then she turned on her walker. “Come in, sit down,” she called over her shoulder.

  The house had a faint musty smell, and with the curtains drawn against the waning late-afternoon sun, the interior was shrouded in shadow. Flora Tanner led us to a large living room with an ancient stone fireplace, cluttered antique cabinets, a worn couch, and a threadbare lounge chair, which she immediately occupied.

  After an uncomfortable moment, Quinn and I sat on the couch.

  “Why did you two detectives come here?”

  Quinn cleared his throat. “New evidence has surfaced, Mrs. Tanner. Another case involving memory loss similar to your daughter’s. This incident is also connected to the Parkview Palace.”

  Flora Tanner sighed heavily. “What do you need from me?”

  “Please tell us what you remember about the events surrounding Dana Tanner’s alleged assault.”

  She objected to the word alleged and said so. Then, for the next fifteen minutes, Flora Tanner related her daughter’s story. There was nothing in her version we hadn’t heard from Gwen Prescott back at Deerfield Farm. But Dana Tanner’s amnesia after she’d gone missing and the regression to memories of a time years before were both eerily familiar.

  With some bitterness, Flora Tanner related her frustration with the district attorney’s office, which ultimately refused to pursue a case against Harlan Brewster.

  “I knew he was responsible. Ask around. That man had a bad reputation. I may not have proof, but as a mother I know Brewster is the reason my daughter is dead.”

  SIXTY-EIGHT

  FLORA Tanner brushed away a tear.

  “What more can I tell you?” she asked, her voice breaking.

  This woman obviously hated Harlan Brewster, and likely celebrated his death, as her sister hinted. But it was also obvious that Flora Tanner was physically incapable of harming the man—unless she hadn’t been impaired at the time of Harlan’s death, this past June.

  I cleared my throat. “Ma’am, if you don’t mind my asking, is your illness serious? Have you had the condition long?”

  “I had a stroke, Detective Clark, in the spring of this year. It was my second stroke because I stopped taking my medications. I spent the entire summer in a rehab facility. The doctors say I should be fine, if I stay on my medication. And my brother is seeing to that.”

  I glanced at Quinn, who nodded his encouragement at my questioning. Was he thinking the same thing I was? If Mrs. Tanner had been in rehab the entire summer, she wasn’t in a position to cause Harlan’s accident, but she could have engineered it with someone else’s help. Her brother? Another relative or friend? A direct question like that would certainly get us thrown out of the house. Fortunately, I thought of a less volatile line of pursuit, and jumped in.

  “Again, if you don’t mind,” I asked gently. “I’d like to go over what happened to your daughter after the incident. Your sister mentioned a specialist and an upstate mental health facility?”

  “Yes. The facility belonged to Dr. Dominic Lorca.”

  Lorca? The name sent a chill through me. I noticed Quinn visibly tense.

 
“I didn’t trust that celebrity doctor,” Flora continued. “But I didn’t have a choice.”

  “I don’t understand,” I said.

  “No, I guess you wouldn’t.”

  “Please explain it to us, then.”

  “Well, Detectives, the people who maintain summer homes out here tend to be very rich. But many of us who’ve lived in this region all our lives are not. I didn’t have medical insurance for myself or my daughter. And I couldn’t afford treatment for her, not unless I sold this home and the land it’s been on since my great-grandfather bought it. I wasn’t going to do that, so I considered begging a loan from my sister or taking a mortgage from the bank. I was weighing my financial options when Lorca came to me, offering to treat Dana without a fee. I jumped at the chance.”

  She sighed again. “But you get what you pay for, as they say. I’m certain that quack did more harm than good.”

  Quinn leaned forward. “You say Dr. Lorca came to you?”

  “The doctor knocked on my door a few weeks after the assault. I thought my prayers had been answered. Three months later, I buried my Dana beside her father in Southampton Cemetery.”

  “Did you ever see or speak with Harlan Brewster after the incident with your daughter?”

  Her laugh was bitter. “We didn’t travel in the same social circles, Detective Quinn.”

  “But Gwen Prescott told us your daughter met Mr. Brewster at a beach party,” I countered.

  “That beach party was hosted by Harlan Brewster. I’m told a lot of pretty young girls got invited to his parties. Pretty girls get invited to a lot of parties out here. That’s how my sister, Gwen, married so well.”

  Flora Tanner hung her head, as if she were suddenly too exhausted to support it.

  “I had my first stroke last fall, a few months after I lost Dana, so I don’t socialize much these days—though I’m told the lights are still blazing at Harlan’s house.”

  I blinked. “Excuse me?”

  “Harlan’s house is open,” she insisted.

  “How do you know?” Quinn asked.

  “My friend Mary works for a service that delivers my groceries. For the past three weeks, she’s been delivering groceries to the Brewster house.”

  “But Harlan’s dead and Annette Brewster’s missing,” I said. “Who would be staying there?”

  “I only know what I heard” was Flora Tanner’s mumbled reply.

  After that, she seemed more fatigued than ever. So tired that she could hardly keep her eyes open.

  Quinn and I exchanged glances.

  “Thank you for your help, Mrs. Tanner.” Quinn rose. “If there’s any change in the status of your daughter’s case, I’ll be sure to let you know.”

  She bade us goodbye, and we showed ourselves to the door.

  “Dana Tanner’s case sounds a lot like what happened to me,” I said as we stepped off the porch, “including the timely arrival of Dr. Dominic Lorca.”

  Quinn nodded. “Lorca muscled in on the Tanner case the same way he did on yours. He could simply be an opportunist, looking for another research subject or bestseller topic. Or . . .”

  “Or? What do you suspect?”

  “I don’t know. But my gut tells me there’s something more here than coincidence.”

  “Me too, but how can we possibly investigate Lorca?”

  “Very carefully. Believe me, I know from experience. The celebrity doctor has powerful friends.”

  I was about to open the door to Quinn’s rental car when a dirty green pickup truck rumbled through the gates and pulled up beside the Toyota—so close I was forced to press myself against the car to avoid getting smacked.

  Ernest Landscaping was painted on the truck’s door, along with a phone number. The vehicle’s bay was packed with tools, a pile of tin signs with the Ernest logo, and a pair of lawn mowers.

  “What are you doing here?” The voice was male and very annoyed.

  I heard a door slam and a big man in grass-stained overalls came around the truck. His long, dark hair was wrapped in a bandanna like a Barbary pirate’s. His angry eyes were focused on me, but Detective Quinn quickly intercepted him before he got in my face.

  “Are you Ernest?”

  “Who’s asking?”

  The detective flashed the badge and introduced himself. The bandanna man’s attitude adjusted appropriately.

  “Yeah,” he said, scratching the back of his neck. “I’m Ernest . . . Ernest Belling. Flora’s brother.”

  Quinn nodded amicably. “Yes, Flora told us how you’re taking care of her. You’re doing a good thing, Ernest.”

  The man’s face softened. “All she’s got left is me.”

  “Well, you sure are doing your best, while maintaining your career at the same time. I suspect you do a lot of work for the summer crowd. Are you still busy in the fall?”

  “Planting and pruning is nearly year-round, Detective Quinn—”

  “But not many of the summer people are out here now, right?”

  “Not many, no.”

  “Flora mentioned the Brewster house is open,” I said, jumping in. “She said someone is staying there.”

  Ernest grunted. “Flora says a lot of stuff about Harlan Brewster. Sometimes she curses him out as if he were standing in front of her. Sometimes she thinks he’s still alive. I don’t want her thinking about that man anymore. It upsets her too much. Anyway, Flora is in no position to know. She hasn’t been out of that house in weeks, except for trips to the doctor. I wouldn’t put much stock in her crazy talk.”

  I was about to counter that Flora had heard about the Brewster house through a local gossip, but a glance from Quinn silenced me.

  “I don’t think you came here to ask me about my business,” Ernest said, his anger flaring again.

  “No, we didn’t,” Quinn said. “We came to inform your sister that new evidence has emerged, and the NYPD might reopen her daughter’s investigation.”

  “Oh.” Calmer now, he nodded. “That’s good, I guess.”

  The groundskeeper’s gaze traveled to the front door, then back to Detective Quinn.

  “I’ve got to check on Flora. It’s time for her medicine.”

  “We won’t hold you back then, Ernest,” Quinn replied. “Thanks for your help.”

  SIXTY-NINE

  “I thought Ernest was going to tear my head off when he got out of that truck.”

  “I handled him,” Quinn replied, gaze on the road.

  “Bandanna Man claims Flora is touched in the head, but I don’t buy it. Flora’s body was frail, but her mind was just as sharp as yours or mine—well, maybe not mine, but you get what I mean. I heard no ‘crazy talk’ from her.”

  “We’ll know soon enough.”

  “How so?”

  “You and I are going to the Brewster estate. If it’s occupied, as Flora claimed, they’re likely members of the domestic staff. If we’re lucky, one of them was around on the night Harlan took his last ride. We can find out if he was alone, where he was going, his state of mind—”

  “Didn’t the local police already investigate that?”

  Quinn shook his head. “They treated Harlan’s death like a routine traffic accident.”

  “Maybe it was routine,” I said. “On the other hand, Galloping Gwen’s flashlight story certainly seemed credible.”

  “I agree,” Quinn replied, “though there was no blood or anything to indicate someone was sitting next to Harlan during the crash.”

  “What about the backseat?”

  “The backseat.” Quinn fell silent a moment. “That’s a thought.”

  “Care to share it?”

  “I saw something once as a rookie. There was a high-speed chase along the FDR Drive that ended at a road construction site where the perps slammed into a concrete abutment. The car w
as totaled and the pair in the front seat died instantly. But a girlfriend cowering on the floor in the back walked away. Someone from the Traffic Division told me her position in the car saved her.”

  “You’re saying someone might have been crouched in the backseat?”

  “I’m saying it’s possible.”

  Quinn fell silent after that, and I gazed out the window. The sun had set, clouds were moving in off the ocean, and the rural roads were becoming as dark and scary as the night I arrived. Things didn’t get any better on the drive to the Brewsters’ estate.

  Quinn saw the address in the police report, but even with GPS we made two wrong turns on the narrow two-lane blacktop and wasted twenty minutes before we finally saw the brush-covered stone sign that read Sandcastle.

  The wrought iron gates were closed and locked. Had we come in daylight, we might have assumed the place was empty. But it was night, and we could clearly see the glowing windows through the trees.

  “I can’t wait to find out who’s at home,” I said.

  “Yeah, you’re still Clare,” Quinn replied with barely suppressed amusement.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Never mind. Just don’t set your expectations too high. It could be some hired house sitter who never met Harlan and doesn’t have a clue how to answer our questions.”

  But for once Detective Quinn was wrong. When he pressed the intercom button, a familiar male voice answered.

  “May I help you?” Despite the electronic distortion, I knew I’d heard this man’s inflection before—and recently.

  “Is this the Brewster residence?” Quinn asked.

  “It is.”

  “To whom am I speaking?”

  “Owen Wimmer. I’m the Brewsters’ attorney. And you are?”

  “Detective Quinn, New York Police Department, and my partner—”

  I frantically shook my head and waved my hands. Then I dived under the dashboard (no mean feat in a compact car).

  “—isn’t with me now. I’d like to speak with you, Mr. Wimmer.”