Chapter 12
Gwendolyn’s glare was on my back until I reached the end of the road and, in a burst of nervousness, turned left instead of right, still speeding along like she was suddenly going to leap at me from a quarter mile away and take me down.
My brisk walk took me to the tiny slice of nature on Clarendon Road, sandwiched between two Cape style homes, one gray and white and the other white and gray.
Amais Lester Memorial Park was smaller than Mariner’s Rest, where I usually ended up on walks with Muffin.
Lester Memorial was barely larger than a standard driveway, just enough room for some blowsy native flowers valiantly hanging on despite the cooler weather, and carefully trimmed privet hedges.
In the center was a birdbath that had been turned into a sort of tiny garden, most likely unintentionally since the contents leaned heavily on mossy and wet rather than sculpted and intentional.
Few people came here, thinking it was some extension of one of the yards on either side of the park.
Really, though, it had a hidden feature that Ben had showed me a few weeks after I moved to Witte House.
Amais Lester. He’s the hidden feature. At the far end of the park (well, far being subjective) where the wrought iron fence buts up against the low stone wall demarcating the start of the slope towards the shore, Amais Lester’s grave was hidden under heavy plants and overhanging willow limbs.
Twice a year, a citizen’s group came out to clean it off, but the rest of the time, Mr. Lester remained hidden from the world in his little corner.
The rest of his family was in the Old Burial Grounds, down the slope a bit further and fenced off with more serious hardware than heavy shrubs and nosy neighbors.
For the moment, though, I was grateful for whatever had occurred that led him to be buried in what had become the Historic District of Lester Cove rather than the cemetery because it gave me a place to hide for a little bit
“Excuse me! Hello? Excuse me! Sir!”
A very little bit.
I turned towards the shrill voice to find a man wearing a gardening apron and brandishing a rake striding towards me from the gray and white Cape. “Hi! Lovely weather today!”
He narrowed his eyes. “It’s about to rain!”
“Well. Yeah. Rain’s nice. Isn’t it? Objectively speaking, I mean.
” And I hadn’t brought a raincoat. Or umbrella.
Because, well, I’d been in SoCal for years and I couldn’t remember the last time I seriously needed any rain protection before coming to Lester Cove.
A tiny voice in my ear whispered I’d need to get myself something since I’d moved to Maine now, but that made me feel all kinds of uncomfortable.
I hadn’t moved to Maine. I was just... visiting.
For a bit. I still had my apartment in LA.
I still paid rent on it and the utilities were still being taken out of my account.
So totally no need for a raincoat.
“—and I don’t appreciate you skulking about here, Mr. Murphy! I don’t know what you think you can get away with just because you’re famous but I know all about your sort!”
I blinked, shaking myself mentally. I’d missed the first half of the rant but my context clue skills were excellent.
“You think I’m famous enough to get away with murder?
” I asked, pressing my hand against my chest and giving him my best I’d like to think the academy smiles. “That’s so nice! Thank you!”
He blinked and took a step back from the gap in the hedges. “I know your sort,” he repeated. “And you’re all only good for one thing and that’s nothing!”
“That might hurt my feelings later,” I admitted. “But right now I’m just trying to enjoy a nice, uh, cloudy afternoon walk and spend some time in this lovely park.”
He wiggled his way through the gap, still clutching his rake as if he’d need to defend himself from me at any moment. “This was a quiet town until you got here,” he spat. “A quiet town! Now there’s murder! And tabloids! And actors!”
“Oh god forbid,” I muttered, but I felt bad because I got it. Everything that’d happened since the summer, I got it.
“Sir, I’m just trying to enjoy my day,” I lied.
“Enjoy it back in La La Land!” He shook the rake at me then, backing away. “Murderer! If I’m found dead in my bed, the world will know it was you! I called my wife before I came over here! She knows you’ve seen me!”
“Oh my god.”
“I’m telling everyone on My Good Neighbor that you’re lurking around!”
Dear lord. That My Good Neighbor app was like an HOA run amuck. Which, given the state of HOAs according to my parents and Aunt Nina, was really saying something. “Well, do what you feel is best,” I said, since he was lingering, apparently hoping for some response.
He jerked his chin up defiantly. “I’m calling the police!”
“Tell Heath I said hi.” I wiggled my fingers in a wave before shoving my not-casted hand in my pocket and heading for the park exit.
So much for gathering my thoughts. I don’t know what Good Neighbor was telling Cherry at the station but it was high-pitched and frantic, his tone carrying over the sound of the growing breeze and rustling trees.
The entire encounter had thrown me off my game and I was neck deep in sorting through everything when Heath pulled up beside me at the corner of Clarendon and Shore, about two blocks from Witte House.
“Mr. Grubbins said you were threatening him,” Heath called through the open window of his cruiser. “And you were skulking menacingly.”
I kept walking. “Mr. Grubbins wanted to hit me with a rake so he can take his menacing skulking, fold it into five corners, and shove it—”
“He’s a busybody,” Heath cut in. “He’s harmless. These rumors and the fires, Tubbs’ remains... It really gets to people like him and oh my god, would you stop walking for a minute? This is a pain in the neck trying to drive and talk to you at the same time.”
“I have to walk the dogs and flush after the cat.”
“You what?”
I ignored him. “Besides, Ben’s leaving this afternoon and I need to ask if I can borrow his car instead of the Beetle since his car’s automatic.”
Heath looked a tiny bit put out by this. “I can give you a ride while your arm heals,” he said, a trace of petulance in his tone. “You’re seeing the orthopedist in Malm’s Corner? I can take you.”
“Not while you’re on duty,” I pointed out.
“My appointment’s tomorrow at ten. You’re working, remember?
I have an appointment to give you my statement at three.
” That had been a pain in the rump, on top of everything else.
Ben had insisted on me having representation ready to go just in case things went even more pear shaped, so coordinating with his friend Mario and with Heath had taken most of my morning before heading out.
“Well, I’m not always on duty.”
I felt like I was missing something important but couldn’t put my finger on it. Glancing at Heath as I jogged across the intersection to get on Buttermilk Road, I asked, “If I wanted to report a missing person, do I have to know them?”
“How do you know they’re missing if you don’t know them? Maybe they’re just avoiding you, specifically.”
Rude. Who would want to avoid me? I’m a delight.
“Any news on who’s stalking me? Those pap pics aren’t taking themselves and I checked—taking a picture of me inside Witte House is kind of illegal.
” I’d been pretty sure it was but a quick internet search on Maine’s laws regarding that sort of thing proved me right.
“What about finding whoever pushed me into the water? I’d think that’s pretty important.
I mean, to me it is but I don’t know about to you. ”
“Damien...”
I stopped on the corner, Witte House in sight.
A few people were coming and going from their houses, the faint sound of cheering wafting on the breeze from the marina as the regatta spooled out on its last day.
It should’ve been an idyllic early autumn afternoon but I couldn’t enjoy it, not while everything in my head felt like I was on the edge of a cliff, waiting for it to crumble under my feet.
“Am I a laughingstock to you, Heath? To the entire department?”
His sigh was audible and dramatic.
“It’s a serious question. Because you’ve brushed off every concern I’ve had this week.
And those pap pics? They’re scaring me, okay?
And, not to sound like too much of a dick here, they’re tanking what little cred I have left.
I’ll be lucky if I can get a job selling sketchy kitchen appliances on informercials when this is all done. ”
Heath’s expression scrunched up in thought. “They still make infomercials?”
I threw up my hands. “Maybe they’ll bring them back because of how pathetic my career is!”
“Get in the car, Damien. Let me drive you back to the house.”
I looked from him to the very visible bulk of Witte House and back again. “It’s less than two hundred yards away.”
“Damien. Let me do this.”
He was so insistent, his cheeks pinking, so I sighed and caved. “Alright. Save me some steps I guess.”
Heath waited until I was buckled in and looking at him expectantly before shifting the car into drive again. “I was actually on my way to the house to talk to you when Cherry called about Grubbins losing his cool.”
Crap. “Oh? Missed me that much? I was sure you wouldn’t want to talk to me any time soon unless it was in an official capacity.”