1 Lowcountry Boil (19 page)

TWENTY-FIVE

I closed the door to the Escape, put the key into the ignition, and waited. Seconds later, Colleen joined me. “Hardware store,” she said.

“Look, my priority is finding out who killed Gram, and why. I’m reasonably certain that Troy, Adam, and Scott are the culprits, but to prove that, I’ve got work to do. You’ve got your assignments, I’ve got mine. I can’t just go chasing around with you all day.”

“All right, but you’ll be sorry you missed this.”

I rolled my eyes. “You’re the guardian spirit.”

She gave me that smug grin.

I backed out of my parents’ driveway. My iPhone automatically connects to the Sync system whenever I get into the car. Through the car’s stereo system, I heard Nate’s special ring. I pressed the button on the steering wheel to answer the call. “Hey. I thought you’d be in the air by now.”

“After they delayed the flight three times, they canceled it. I’m rebooked on another flight, but it doesn’t leave until four-forty-five.” Tension coiled in Nate’s voice.

I took a deep breath and tried to sound normal. “What time do you get in?”

“Not until around ten tonight. I’ve got a stop in Atlanta.”

“Do you want me to pick you up?”

“I’ll rent a car at the airport. What’s going on there?”

“Too much to get into over the phone, but nothing for you to worry about. I’ll catch you up tonight.”

“I’ll call you from Atlanta. Stay safe.”

“See you soon.” I pressed the button to end the call.

Five minutes later, I pulled into a parking space in front of Island Hardware. They weren’t open for business. It was only seven-thirty. “Now what?”

“We go inside.” Colleen did her pop-out-and-in-again trick and was standing in front of the door.

“Maybe you can walk through doors, but I can’t.”

The smart aleck grabbed the large brass door handle, pressed down on the thingamajig and pushed open the door. The door chimed. I took a step backward, but she just breezed right on in. She didn’t say a word. Just smirked.

I looked up and down the street, and then followed Colleen inside and shut the door behind us. The store appeared deserted. Colleen gave me the shhh sign and ducked behind the first row of power tools.

“I wonder where they are,” I whispered.

“Deanna’s taking the morning off. The jerk is out back talking to the insurance agent. Now be quiet.”

Sure enough, a few minutes later, the back door opened and Adam called out, “Thanks…bye.”

We crouched down and peered around the end of the aisle. Ten minutes later, my legs were cramping, and Adam was still in the back.

“Stay here.” Colleen mouthed in exaggerated lip movements. She stood and walked across the store and down the back hallway. Why didn’t she just talk out loud? No one could hear her but me.

I heard muffled noises, like somebody moving things around. I sat cross-legged on the floor about the time Colleen strolled back in.

“What’s he doing?” I mouthed.

She leaned down and whispered, right in my ear. “He’s tearing that office apart looking for the money.”

“Why are you whispering?”

“So you will, too. If I speak to you in a normal voice you’ll forget to whisper.”

Suddenly the front door opened, heralded by the electronic ding-dong, and then slammed shut.

Colleen crouched beside me, and we peeked around the corner.

Michael stood inside the door oozing fury. “Adam!”

Adam came down the hall and onto the sales floor with a curious look on his face. “Hey Michael, what’s up?”

The raging-bull look on Michael’s face must have registered with Adam. He stepped behind the counter, putting it between him and his brother.

“Why don’t you tell me what’s up, brother?” Michael’s voice was deceptively low and calm as he crossed the room to stand directly across the counter from Adam.

Adam glanced around the store. He looked torn between relief there were no customers around and alarmed. “What do you mean?” He laughed nervously.

“I found something of yours.” Michael flung a wallet down on the counter.

Adam picked it up and inspected it. “My wallet. Thanks. I thought I’d lost it. Been looking everywhere for it.”

Michael placed both hands on the counter and leaned in towards Adam. “Not. Quite. Everywhere.”

My blood temperature dropped to below freezing, and I wasn’t the one Michael was mad at.

“Where’d you find it?” Adam looked like a possum just before an eighteen-wheeler rolls over it: bewildered and transfixed.

“Under my bed.”
Michael ground out the words.

“How—”

“Oh, I think it’s pretty obvious how. Tell me something, brother
.
What were you thinking about when you were screwing
my
wife in
my
bed?
Did it make you feel big?
Isn’t one woman enough for such a big man?
Or did you just like taking something that was mine?”

“Now, Michael…” Adam held up his palms and took a step back.

“Don’t bother to deny it.”

Adam just stood there, staring at Michael. The corner of his mouth inched up in an odd little grin.

“I don’t know why I didn’t see it before.” Michael pounded his fist on the counter. “How long?”

Adam started to speak, hesitated.

“How long, Adam?”

“About a year.”

Michael pulled his fist back and drove it squarely into his brother’s left jaw.

Adam flew backward. He slammed into the shelves on the wall and slid to the floor with a loud thud.
Small plastic buckets of screws, nails, nuts and bolts rained down on his head and shoulders.

“
Well, guess what? You can have her.” Michael laughed harshly. “Hell, you could’ve had her a long time ago if I’d known you wanted her.
I hope you enjoy her now that you won’t be screwing her in my bed. Because I don’t sleep there anymore.”

I could not control the big grin spreading across my face. The Halleluiah Chorus played in my head.

Adam hadn’t bothered getting up.

Michael looked at him like something he’d stepped in and gotten on his shoe. “You and Marci deserve each other.”

Michael walked out and slammed the door behind him.

Colleen and I looked at each other.

After a minute, we heard Adam pick himself up off the floor. He stumbled back down the hall, cursing under his breath.

I jerked my head towards the door and Colleen nodded.

We hightailed it out of there.

TWENTY-SIX

Colleen faded out a block from the hardware store, leaving me to noodle over how my adulterous cousin figured into the epidemic of chaos infecting the island. There must be a connection, or why would Colleen have shared that particular piece of information? Why did she always disappear before I could think of the questions I wanted to ask her?

I hadn’t had much sleep the night before, and I needed caffeine. Not just coffee, but something with an extra shot or two of espresso. With all the pinballs banging off the corners of my brain just then, a chat with Moon Unit would have sent me into tilt.

The Book & Grind, a bookstore and coffee shop, had opened two years ago in the old drapery and upholstery shop between Phoebe’s Day Spa and the dry cleaners. I decided to give it a try. The rich aroma of espresso permeated the air and beckoned me to the counter. I ordered a triple mocha latte to go.  Lighthouse Park—the city park just south of Devlin’s Point—provided a quiet place to think. I parked the Escape and opened the moonroof.

Here’s what I knew: Gram suspected something was going on with the town council. Adam and Scott were working on a scheme to build a resort on the island. It would take four votes to change the zoning and allow oceanfront commercial development. It appeared Adam had hired a hit man—Troy—to kill another council member, but who? Who did Adam want on the council instead and where would the other votes come from?

The weirdest piece to the puzzle was Merry’s camp. It had to be connected. Adam somehow convinced the rest of his family to donate land for the youth camp on Devlin’s Point. I had no idea what he stood to gain from such a thing, but it was important enough to him that he had Troy and Kristen spying on Merry. Plus, Adam had been surreptitiously meeting with David Morehead outside The Pirates’ Den.

Maybe Adam figured Merry would get the ban on beachfront development lifted for her camp, then he could build his resort on Gram’s land, North Point. No way would Kate Devlin—or Michael—sit still for a resort on Devlin’s Point. But maybe the youth camp was the proverbial camel’s nose under the tent.

Gram must have figured out the resort scheme. Maybe they tried to buy the land first, and that had tipped her off. My gut said Adam hired Troy to kill Gram to get control of her land, her town council seat, or both. A plan I had complicated. If Merry hadn’t shanghaied me, and the seat had gone up for special election, who would have run?

The caffeine kicked in.

Adam was having an affair with Michael’s wife, Marci the Schemer. Marci thought she was going to inherit Gram’s house and land. Hell, she even tried to trade me Michael for the land. Adam evidently felt confident he controlled Marci, which meant she was involved in this mess right up to her perfectly arched eyebrows. But was she a co-conspirator, or was Marci the Schemer being manipulated?

Marci’s house was only four blocks away. She would be at work. If I snooped around, what evidence might I find that she was guilty?

My stomach felt like I’d eaten a bad fish as I stared at the Craftsman-style house Michael shared with Marci. Well, until that morning anyway. I wondered if she knew he wouldn’t be sleeping there that night. Marci had done all right for herself—although evidently she didn’t see it that way. What would possess any woman married to Michael to sleep with Adam? It had to be about money. Marci always thought the world owed her mink and caviar. We’d never been close, but I used to feel sorry for her. The landscape of her childhood was sown with bad seeds.

Marci’s mother, Daddy’s sister, Sharon, fell in love with a surfer who showed up in Stella Maris the summer she turned seventeen. Paul Miller was tall, tanned, toned and untroubled by any ambition higher than the waves of the Atlantic. He got a job mowing and mulching for Granddad to pay for surfboard wax and weed. Aunt Sharon knew if Granddad found out they were seeing each other he’d fire Paul—and possibly shoot him—so they kept it a secret.

When she turned up pregnant, they took off on an extended beach tour. Marci told me once some of her earliest memories were of a nudist colony near Daytona. They lived like coastal gypsies until Marci was school-aged, and then came home. Gram and Granddad did the best they could to help Paul and Sharon. But normal was more than Paul’s free spirit could bear. One day he just took off, and nobody had heard from him since. Aunt Sharon cuddled up to vodka, and Marci started sneaking swigs when she was twelve. I know, because she used to offer me a taste and tease me when I wouldn’t try it. Aunt Sharon drank more and more until her liver gave out. She died three months after Michael and Marci were married.

Marci might be family, but I’d stopped trying to be her friend when she sank her claws into Michael, something I’d never forgiven her for. She took Michael from me because she saw an opportunity to take something that was mine, and for no other reason. Finding out she was cheating on him—with his own brother—brought ambivalent feelings. On the one hand, I was giddy that she could be so stupid. Her infidelity would certainly be the end of her already unstable marriage, which meant Michael would soon be free. On the other hand, I was pissed she could hurt him that way.

With a resigned sigh, I opened the car door and got out. I glanced up and down the oak-lined street, crossed it, and approached the front door. I was reasonably sure Marci was at work. It was after nine on a Thursday. On the outside chance I was wrong I rang the bell.

The door opened to reveal the petite form of my cousin, dressed in jade-green silk lounge pajamas with a matching robe hanging casually open. Hell’s bells. What was she doing at home?

For a moment she just stood there, glaring at me with one eyebrow cocked, her full lips in their permanent pout. I looked evenly into the hardest eyes I’d ever seen. It was like we were playing some weird game of chicken right there on the front porch.

Finally, Marci the Schemer spoke. “Well, well. Look who’s come to call. Have you decided to take me up on my offer?”

Lord, my hand itched. I quelled the urge to smack her. Deep breath. “I was hoping we could talk for a few minutes.” That was the last thing I was hoping for.

Marci shrugged. “Why not?” She stepped back to let me in.

“I should have called, but—”

“But you were in the neighborhood?” Marci cut me off with a sardonic half-grin as she led me into the living room and waved me towards the sofa. She curled herself into an over-stuffed chair.

“Yes, actually. I was.” I felt queasy. I was inside the lair of the beast. But I was also in Michael’s home, surrounded by things he touched every day.

Marci gave me an
oh-please
look.

“I wanted to talk to you about Gram.”

“What is there to talk about? She’s dead. You have everything you want.”

I glared at her. Not quite everything. “Look, Marci, no one was more shocked by her will than me.”

“But you’re sure not sorry about it, are you?”

“It’s unfortunate you feel you didn’t get what was rightfully yours, but that really wasn’t what I wanted to talk about.”

“I shouldn’t imagine that it was. Exactly what
do
you want?”

“Have you seen this morning’s paper? Gram was murdered. I was hoping you might have a clue why.”

“That article is absurd.” Marci scowled. “Who would want to kill her? She was a little old lady, for heaven’s sake. She walked on the beach and puttered with her flowers. There was nothing remotely interesting
in her life, much less anything sinister enough to cause someone to kill her.” If Marci knew anything about Gram’s death, she had polished her acting skills.

“So it seems.” I was offended at her characterization of Gram, but I smothered the impulse to react. “Did you ever see her wearing a silver, heart-shaped locket?”

“Not that I recall, why?”

“I found one near where she was killed. There was a picture in it of a man. I wondered if you might know who it is.”

Marci looked surprised. “Where is the locket?”

“Blake has it.”

“Why?”

“I guess he thinks it’s evidence. It must have come off after she was hit over the head.”

“Hit over the head? I thought she fell down the steps.”

“I saw her heart necklace.” The voice came from the foyer.

We both turned to stare at Elvis Glendawn, who had appeared in the doorway.

“Elvis?
How did you get in?” Marci gaped at him.

“Well, Miss Marci, I was supposed to mow the yard this morning, like every Thursday. Michael, he’s usually in the kitchen, sometimes we have breakfast together. This morning, I knocked and knocked, but Michael never came and I guess you didn’t hear me.”

Marci looked at him like he was a palmetto bug.

Elvis shifted nervously from one foot to the other. “One time before Michael didn’t hear me cause he was in the den and he told me I shoulda come on in. So this morning, I came on in like he told me to, only I can’t find him.”

“That’s because he’s not here.” Icicles formed on Marci’s breath.

Elvis took a few steps backwards. “I didn’t mean to do anything wrong, Miss Marci.”

“Elvis,” I said. “Did you say you’d seen Miss Emma’s locket?”

“Oh for Pete’s sake, Liz. You can’t pay any attention to what he says.”

I cut her my top-of-scale withering glare. “On the contrary, I’m sure Elvis would never tell us anything that wasn’t true. Elvis, did you see Miss Emma’s necklace?”

Elvis glanced from me, to Marci, to the door, apparently trying to decide if he should make a run for it. His eyes met mine and he gulped. “She showed it to me one time. She said not to tell anyone. It was our secret, but since she’s gone now, I guess I can tell. I mean, if it might be important, I guess you should know about it.”

“Did she say who was in the picture?

“No, she just said it was a very nice man,” Elvis said.

“You didn’t recognize him?”

He shook his head slowly.

“Could he be the phantom you told Blake and me about yesterday?”

“Phantom?”
Marci said. “Of all the—”

“Hush up,” I said to her. I turned back to Elvis. “What do you think?”

He shrugged. “I never got close enough to the phantom to see his face. And I only saw the picture in the locket that one time. I can’t say.”

“Enough of this nonsense. Elvis, go mow the lawn. If my cousin wants to play Nancy Drew with you, she can do it on her own time.”

He turned and beat a hasty retreat.

“I should be going. If you think of anything that might be important, let me know.”

“Didn’t you say Blake was investigating this? Have you been deputized?”

“I’ll let myself out.” I strode out of the room and out the front door, leaving nearly as quickly as Elvis had only moments earlier.