Chapter 7 #2
“My cousins were coming down here last night,” Erik said, cocking an eyebrow at the boy. “I bet you noticed them, right?”
K perked up. “Couple of redheads, yeah? One of them was kinda …” He mimed a pair of large breasts in the air in front of himself. “Yo, did they say something about me? You can tell them they can hit me up, bruh. Give them my Insta.”
“Sure,” Erik said. “But did you see their mom with them, too?”
K gave Erik a dubious look. “Their mom? Yeah, she bought their tickets. Wait, did she say something about me? I dunno, man, some moms are hot, but she seemed a little … like, stuck-up or something.”
“Uh …” Erik, blushing deeply, looked to me and Ricky for help. We both shrugged and grimaced. I mouthed to him, Where did she go? How he got that information out of this cringeworthy conversation with K was going to have to be his problem.
He turned back to his friend, cocking his shoulders a bit in an effort to regain his cool-older-dude facade. “She paid for the tickets, huh? Yeah, uh, she has a lot of money, you know. Like, a lot.”
Some of the doubt passed from K’s face. “She’s really rich, huh?”
“Yeah,” Erik nodded. “Did you see her car? She has a new BMW. It’s sick.”
K nodded appreciatively. “Is it that green one? It was parked right there last night. I was checking that out all night. That thing is fire.”
Bingo! I had to admit I was impressed with how Erik had maneuvered this information out of K—or, at least, how he had stumbled onto the right tack.
Erik seemed pleased with himself, too. “So she didn’t leave after she bought the tickets?”
“Nah, man, she walked off somewhere and came back when the movie was over and they all left together.”
“Did you see where she went during the movie?”
K shrugged. “No, but, like, she probably went to the café. Everything else is closed at night.”
Erik nodded. “Yeah, I bet you’re right. Thanks, man.”
K’s face clouded over again. “Hey, look, you can tell your cousins I said hey, but I’m not sure about the mom. I mean, I’m not eighteen yet or anything; I don’t want to get her in trouble.”
“You’re probably right,” Erik said, blushing again.
“She’ll, um, be disappointed, but I’ll tell her you weren’t interested.
” With an attempted fist bump through the ticket slot, Erik left K and returned to us.
“Jeez, that got weird. But it sounds like Rachel stayed here and didn’t go back to the inn until after the movie, so I guess I cleared her, huh? ”
Ricky patted him on the shoulder. “Good job. But a journalist’s job is also to verify the facts.”
“What do you mean?” Erik was confused, and I was worried that Ricky’s imagination was going to run away with him again.
“I mean,” Ricky said, “that we should check at this café and see if she actually was there. What if she got a ride back to the inn, in an Uber or something, leaving her car here to establish an alibi?”
“I don’t think we have Uber here,” Erik said doubtfully.
“And that would be a little convoluted anyway,” I said, giving Ricky’s imagination an affectionate half smile.
I was briefly torn between thinking he was being silly, and wanting to play along, knowing that it would tickle him if I did.
Fake boyfriend duty called. I asked Erik, “Where is the café? I suppose we should check this alibi.”
“Okay,” Erik said with a shrug, leading the way down the street. Ricky gave me a triumphant smile, and I grinned in return as we followed.
The café was two doors down from the theater, on the corner.
A hand-painted sign in the shape of a coffee cup and saucer hung out over the sidewalk above the door, bearing the name RONNIE’S ROASTERY.
A bell over the door tinkled as we went in, and a short, wide-set, middle-aged woman bustled out from the back room and beamed at us over the counter.
“Well, hello, Erik,” she said warmly, then a tinge of worry entered her face and voice. “Your mom didn’t order more muffins, did she? I don’t think I have an order from her.”
“Hi, Mrs. Wise. No, no muffins. I was just, um, showing these guys around town.”
Her smile brightened again, and she turned it on Ricky and me. “New friends?”
“Well, we’re staying at the inn …” I started.
“He’s a travel writer,” Erik said. “Mr. Popp. And this is Mr. Warner, he’s a photographer.”
One of Mrs. Wise’s plump hands flew up to pat the gray-streaked bun on the back of her head.
“Mercy! A photographer! And a travel writer, too. Gosh, uh, what do I have for you? I’m kind of picked over from the lunch rush, but I think there’s some cake back here.
…” She whirled around to a refrigerator along the back wall, pulling a tall chocolate cake, a few slices missing, into view.
Ricky was quick with his camera, shooting me a wink as he pulled it from his shoulder.
“Hold it right there! That’s too perfect.
” Mrs. Wise beamed, holding the cake in front of her apron-clad bosom as if presenting it to the judges on a TV baking competition show.
He took a few more shots of only the cake after she set it down on the counter, and a few more as she slid a knife through it to cut off a generous slice.
“Compliments of the house,” she said, handing me the freshly plated cake and a fork.
“I can’t believe I’m going to be in a travel …
uh, what do you write for? A blog? Are you on social media?
Do you need to make a video of me dancing?
I know some of the TikTok dances.” She started to shimmy a little.
“It’s a magazine,” I said quickly. “Offbeat Traveler.”
“A magazine! How quaint.”
I carefully cut off a portion of the cake and passed it to Erik, who ate it with his fingers. I took a couple of bites of the remainder, then passed the fork and the plate with the rest of the cake to Ricky.
“That’s really delicious,” I said. “What are your other specialties?”
“Well,” Mrs. Wise said, bringing a tray with three glasses of milk to the table, “I started this place as mostly just a coffee shop, but there aren’t too many restaurants in town anymore, so I’m doing a good business these days in sandwiches and salads for lunch and dinner.
I get cheese from a local dairy farm, and bread from the bakery out on the highway, and I make my own pies and cakes and scones and muffins.
I usually run out of scones and muffins within an hour or two of opening,” she said proudly.
“And I supply some to Mary Alice for the inn sometimes.”
It was getting a little late for lunch, but was still far too early for dinner, and the café was empty of any other patrons. I wondered how busy her “good business” in sandwiches and salads made her. Would she remember if Rachel was there the night before?
Nothing to it but to ask. “How busy are you during a typical lunch or dinner hour? Like, for example, how busy were you last night?” Smooth, right?
She screwed up her face a little, thinking back. “Last night? Hmm, I’d say last night was kind of slow. I probably had seven or eight parties for dinner, and a few folks in for coffee later in the evening.”
“My mom’s cousin Rachel came into town last night,” Erik said, gulping down some milk. “Maybe she came in. Kind of tall, red hair?”
Mrs. Wise nodded. “I think she was here. Pretty lady, very elegant, but not too friendly?”
Erik nodded vigorously. “That sounds like her.”
“Yes, she was here for a little while, having an espresso. She was waiting by herself for a while, and then a man came and met her here, and they talked for a bit. Seemed like they were trying to keep their meeting very private.” She seemed to consider this for a moment, then said to Erik in a confidential tone, “It seemed like none of my business, and maybe that means it’s none of yours, too. Forget I said anything.”
We wouldn’t forget, but we didn’t need to know more. Rachel’s whereabouts around the time of Richard’s death seemed to be accounted for. We thanked Mrs. Wise profusely for the cake, and I took down her contact information, promising to let her know when the article went to print.
As she walked us to the door, she put one arm around me and the other around Ricky, standing between us and squeezing a little and saying to Erik, “These are good friends for you, Erik. You need to find more like them so you don’t get lonely when they’re gone.”
He lowered his eyes and mumbled a goodbye as we tumbled out onto the sidewalk. Apparently his closet door wasn’t closed as tightly as he might have been hoping, but it was nice to know that he had support waiting for him on the other side when he decided to really open it.
I looked around at the streetscape as we walked back toward Ricky’s car, scanning the narrow storefronts, many of them vacant, a few housing boutique shops and small business offices. A sign across the street caught my eye and stopped me in my tracks, a guilty thought flashing across my mind.
“Ricky,” I said, and he and Erik stopped and looked at me, then followed my finger as I pointed across the street at the sheriff’s office. “Should we tell the sheriff what we figured out? About the rug?”
“Maybe,” Ricky said, a little doubtfully. Working with law enforcement wasn’t really our usual style, inasmuch as we had one, but we also usually worked more on hunches and suspicion. Having an actual, tangible—or intangible, as the case may be—piece of evidence and not sharing it felt wrong.
“C’mon,” I said, stepping into the street. “Maybe we can get some information, too. Like what kind of injuries Richard died from.”
This seemed to appease Ricky, and he and Erik followed close behind as we crossed the street and entered the storefront office.
Behind the desk sat the deputy I recognized from last night, her long blond plait emerging from the back of her brimmed hat, winding over her shoulder, and ending with an incongruously frilly white bow.
I read her name badge. “Hello, Deputy Duncan,” I said. “I don’t know if you remember me. I’m Oliver Popp, and I’m staying at the Rose Beach Inn?”
She nodded crisply. “Yeah, I remember. The hot tub drop-in. What can I do you for?”
I hadn’t fully worked out my approach. “I wanted to check in and see how the investigation into Mr. Rose’s death was going. See if you needed anything else from us to help.”
She shrugged. “Not really. Not much to investigate. He fell, looks like by accident, and broke his back and neck when he hit the Jacuzzi on your balcony.”
Ricky rested an elbow on the desk. “Those were his only injuries?”
“I think so,” Deputy Duncan said, keying something into her computer.
After a pause, she said, “Yep, preliminary report from the medical examiner said the cause of death was consistent with how he fell and where he landed. Death was instantaneous,” she added.
I think she was trying to be reassuring, but it still sounded horrible.
“Okay, that’s good to know,” I said. “Erik, you said you had something to tell the deputy, right? What you saw when Rachel asked you to go into the room to get that … thing for her?”
“Huh? Oh, yeah,” Erik said. “Yeah, I didn’t notice it before. But it’s weird, and I thought maybe I should tell you. The rug was missing from their room.”
Deputy Duncan didn’t seem too interested. “The rug?”
“Yeah, from the sitting area,” Erik said.
“Are you sure there was a rug there?”
“All the rooms have rugs,” Erik said.
“He has to vacuum them every day,” Ricky piped up.
“Huh,” Deputy Duncan said. “I’ll make a note of it, but I don’t know if we’ll be able to do anything with that information. Maybe he moved it. Did you look in the closets and stuff?”
“Yes, we did, and we didn’t find it. Anyway, we thought you should know,” I said, feeling less guilt about withholding information, but a little new guilt that we seemed to be annoying the deputy.
“Okay,” she said. “Let me know if it turns up. Maybe that will give us something to work with. But by itself, I’m not sure if there’s anything to do.”
As we returned to the car, I had to satisfy myself that we’d done our due diligence.
We’d learned that Richard had almost certainly died from the fall, not earlier, in his room.
We’d checked out Rachel’s alibi and cleared her, which left …
only the rest of the Rose family as suspects.
We’d have to see if we could find out what the other family members had gotten up to after they’d left the lounge.
And as we rode back to the inn, Erik chattering happily again from the backseat, I had another thought, one that was worthy of Ricky’s wildest flight of fancy.
He had to be rubbing off on me, I told myself, as I resolved not to share this new wrinkle with him, lest he allow himself to really run with it.
It seemed so far-fetched, so silly, but I couldn’t stop turning it over in my mind: Rachel had sat alone at the café, waiting.
A man had joined her, and they had conferred privately.
Before we knew that she had gone to the café, Ricky had speculated that she had left her car conspicuously parked downtown as a cover; we now knew that wasn’t true, but what if her presence downtown was the cover?
Who was this man? An accomplice? A hired killer?
What did he tell her when he arrived? That the deed was done?
I looked sidelong at Ricky, who was driving and trying to patiently field Erik’s questions and chatter.
Maybe he had gotten too far under my skin, to the point that I was starting to think like him.
I chuckled darkly to myself, and wondered how I could find out, on my own, who the man was and what he and Rachel had done.