Chapter 11
The next few days were chaos. Nothing like the Bloodshot Eyeball shootings had ever happened on Sea Smoke Island. The media got wind of the story and soon the island was crawling with reporters interviewing people who’d been at the café that day.
Sally McPhee got her fifteen minutes of fame when she gave an interview to a local TV morning show.
Wiping away tears, she said, “My daughter warned me not to call my coffee shop the Bloodshot Eyeball, and I shoulda listened. First someone torches my kitchen, and now another bozo shoots up my windows. We’re just a hardworking business trying to keep our fishermen going.
Now we gotta close again and when we open up, there’s gonna be a new name.
We’re running a contest, so just go to our website if you got some brilliant idea for me. ”
Trust Sally to ninja her second disaster into a marketing opportunity. It was hard to miss the big “donate” button next to the naming contest.
Reporters tried to find Tina too—everyone was calling her the hero of the day—but she stayed out of sight at the inn.
Jack had the Honeymoon Suite booked for the whole week, which must have cost him a fortune, but that wasn’t her problem.
He invited her to stay as long as she liked while he came and went from the Sunderland house.
Of course, she had her own room, but the suite had much more space and that bathtub was impossible to resist. Nothing else seemed to work as well on the residual aches and pains from that day at the Bloodshot Eyeball.
Not that she was hanging around playing with bath bubbles. The Coast Guard never spotted the Devil May Care, but there was a reason for that, which Tina had discovered when she went down to the marina herself the day after the shooting.
The Devil May Care was tied up in its slip as if it had never gone anywhere.
She’d called Luke right away, but didn’t wait for him to arrive to do a quick search. The shooter hadn’t left anything behind. Luke had suggested the Harbortown PD come out and dust for prints, but she’d told him there was no point; the gunman had worn gloves.
A couple of days later, she met Luke in the marina so they could compare notes on what they’d learned. His eyewitness interviews had been mostly a bust.
“Do you know you’re the only witness who’s been able to provide actual details?” he said, bemused.
“That’s because I made everyone hit the floor. Ruined my own investigation.”
“You saved lives,” he said firmly.
They sat on the cushioned bench in the open deck of the speedboat. She found it pleasant to be surrounded by light glancing off the flat calm water. If she only spent time in boats when they were tied up in harbors, maybe she’d grow to like them.
“I wish we had some clue about what this guy’s motivation was. Some kind of grudge against the Bloody Eyeball? Sally? It certainly wasn’t random.”
“Definitely not. I made a list of everyone who was there, and I’m methodically going through it to see if anyone jumps out as a target.”
“My first thought was Benny Clyde. He left pretty quickly.”
Luke cocked his head, contemplating. “A while ago, I would have said yes to that. But he’s calmed down a lot. As far as I know, there are no lobster wars going on right now.”
“Lobster wars?”
“Territory disputes. They can get ugly. But gunfire ugly? Nah. And no lobsterman would ever endanger a bystander. They cut trap lines, that sort of thing.”
“Could he be involved in something else?”
“Well, sure, of course. Think I should talk to him? I have a better chance than you. The Clydes don’t like outsiders.”
She nodded, although it seemed like a stretch. All the guy had done was leave the scene in an expeditious manner.
“Could this incident be related to the Sea Smoke Island Fund? That’s a big island controversy.”
The Carmichael family had committed to offering restitution to the families who had been dispossessed back in 1912. The other islanders weren’t all onboard with that concept.
“Maybe, but that’s been going on for a while now. Nothing’s changed recently.”
“Right.” Tina sighed. “Also, why would they target the café instead of the inn? The shooter was right here, grabbing the boat. I think we can eliminate that possibility.”
Luke made a note on his list. “Agreed. By the way, did you know that your friend Jack is Jack Finnegan, the actor?”
“Yes.” She felt heat in her face, for some reason. “Should I have mentioned that?”
“Maybe. He was the most famous person in the building that day. It’s possible he was the target. What’s he doing here? I haven’t been able to interview him yet.”
“I’ll set it up.” Tina gazed up at the inn, perched like a palace on the clifftops about a hundred yards up. “He should tell you himself.”
“Sounds cryptic. What do you think? Could he have been the target?”
Tina had already considered that possibility, and had been unable to rule it out.
“The shooting did start right after he arrived at the Bloodshot Eyeball. But why wait until he was inside? If they wanted to hit him, they could have fired when he was on the steps, or the deck. Spraying bullets into a crowded coffee shop isn’t the best way to assassinate someone. ”
“Maybe it was more about sending a message. I have to ask,” he gave her a delicate sidelong glance, “what’s your relationship with him?”
“Nothing. We don’t have a relationship. We’re just…I’m helping him with something. Rather, we’re helping each other. Our paths have converged.”
“Your paths have converged? Is that what they’re calling it now?” Luke’s deep blue eyes flashed with amusement.
“Step off, Carmichael, you’re out of line and way off base.”
“All due respect, no, I’m not. As far as I can tell, you and Jack Finnegan were the only two anomalies at the Bloodshot Eyeball that day. Everyone else is more or less a regular. Maybe you were the target, have you thought of that?”
She had; it was on her list of possibilities.
“In my professional opinion, it’s much more likely that one of the regulars was a target because they would be expected to be there.”
His expression shifted as he considered that point. “You have a point. Shit. Heather.”
That was another line of thought she’d been pursuing.
Heather had not only been there that day, but she was often at the Bloodshot Eyeball helping her mother—and recording her podcast. During the renovations, Sally had built a small soundproof studio for that purpose.
“Maybe her podcast ruffled some feathers.”
Luke pulled out his phone and punched a button. “Hi sweetheart. You’re on speaker phone with me and Officer Chen. Serious question for you, think carefully before you answer. Do you think any stories you’ve been working on recently could have pissed off someone enough for them to—”
“Shoot up my mom’s café?” Heather’s husky voice came through loud and clear. “I’ve been wondering that too. Gabby’s on her way back right now, maybe we should all meet and talk it through.”
“It’s a plan.” He clicked off the phone and looked at Tina somberly. “I don’t like this.”
“What’s to like? The one silver lining is that I do believe if they really wanted people dead, people would be dead. We have no dead people. Let’s keep it that way.”
Luke nodded, turning his phone over in his hands. “I like your theory about a warning message, but what point is a message that no one understands?”
Fair point. “We have to assume that someone understands.” Tina sighed again. “Maybe it’ll be more clear once we talk to Heather and Gabby.”
“And Jack,” Luke added. “He should come to this convo too.”
She nodded as she got to her feet, then staggered when a wavelet hit the Devil May Care. She grabbed onto the railing. “Watch your speed!” she yelled at the skiff rowing past them. The kid at the oars looked confused.
“If he went any slower he’d be going backwards,” said Luke dryly.
“Whatever. The concept of moving vehicles on water was a bad one from jump.” She carefully climbed off the boat onto the floating ramp.
A sense of tremendous relief filled her as she touched slightly more solid ground.
“Speaking of which, what kind of person would choose a boat to shoot from? Boats are always moving up and down on the waves. Would that make an accurate shot nearly impossible?”
Luke jumped off the boat in one fluid movement that made her hate him a little bit. “Interesting point. The boat made for a quick escape. I’m sure we would have caught him right away if he’d been on land.”
“But he could have opened fire on land and then jumped into the boat to escape. I think it’s one more data point to support the idea that he wasn’t aiming to kill anyone. He generally kept his fire high. I noticed at the time, but wasn’t sure what it meant. Anything on the ballistics yet?”
“The bullets came from a semi-automatic AR-15. Without the weapon itself, they can’t say much more than that. Out here, plenty of folks have hunting rifles or shotguns, but AR-15’s are not common. I’ve never actually seen one on the island.”
“That would point to it being an off-islander. But how would someone like that know about the marina, and the fact that the manager had the day off? I already spoke to Chad Gridley and he swears he had no marina-related contact with anyone.” She gazed up at the office at the head of the ramp, where Chad was currently chatting with a guest. That was where all the boat keys were kept, along with life jackets, water bottles and snacks.
“Any chance there’s a security camera down here? ”
“There will be from now on. But no, there’s never been a need.
This is the first time anything unauthorized has ever happened in this marina, aside from secret make-out sessions and drunken midnight boat rides.
But those were all in the family, with tacit approval from the man at the top. Dad didn’t care about that shit.”
“Interesting family.”
“Don’t get me started.”