Chapter 13
After the meeting had dispersed, Tina confronted Jack in the pale sunshine outside the constable’s office.
“I should have told you about the watercolor,” Jack said before she could scold him. His gray eyes held hers. “It slipped my mind when the bullets started flying.”
“I want to see this watercolor and exactly where you found it.”
He jerked his head toward his truck. “Come on, then.”
“That’s okay. I’ll follow you. I borrowed a golf cart from the inn.” She was finding it difficult to concentrate while she was around him. The admiring way he’d been looking at her inside the constable’s office unnerved her. She needed to keep some distance.
“Fine, but first tell me how you’re feeling. Is your head okay? How about your arm?”
“All better. Never to be spoken of again.”
He shrugged and slid into his truck. She chugged along after him in the golf cart, cursing her own stubbornness.
The thing only went about ten miles per hour, and she wouldn’t be surprised if it ran out of gas soon.
He quickly outpaced her and disappeared down the road.
As a silver lining, she had time to enjoy the beauty of the turning birch leaves and flaming red sumac bushes, and to think.
Sea Smoke Island was so beautiful, in a haunting, moody way.
Had it been difficult for Naomi Martin to leave?
Did her fear of a little gossip really explain her departure?
Gossip usually died away when there was nothing to feed it.
If they’d stayed on, and no further evidence surfaced to implicate Naomi, surely it would have all blown over.
She was still thinking about that question as Jack pointed out the spot under his fridge where he’d found the watercolor. That was how her mind worked. Things lodged in there and refused to quiet down until she resolved them.
She studied Jessie’s watercolor, with its lovely washes of blue sky and tawny sand.
In the watercolor, two children kneeled on the sand, with a whimsical sand structure rising between them, not so much a castle as a conglomeration of towers still holding the shapes of plastic pails.
A seagull perched on the sand, gazing out to sea.
Its profile echoed the shape of the rock formation at the far end of the beach, the one Luke had recognized.
The piece had a timeless quality that pulled you in and invited you to pull up a beach chair and let the sun warm your face.
How could anyone have allowed it to end up under a refrigerator?
“It looks idyllic, doesn’t it? Like a child’s dream,” she murmured.
“Jessie is extremely talented.” Jack smiled as he gazed down at his sister’s work.
In his open-collared white shirt and jeans, he looked almost like a normal person, only about ten times more attractive.
But of all his appealing qualities, the way he talked about his sister topped the list for Tina.
“Did she mention this watercolor to you?”
“No, she said she was working on something about ghosts.”
“Well, that’s cryptic.” She squinted at the watercolor. “Maybe these two children are the ghosts, in some kind of metaphorical way. Lost innocence or something.”
He shot her a surprised glance. “You might be right. I like that. It…well, that would be a familiar theme for Jessie.”
“Why?”
When he hesitated, she drilled him with a stern gaze. “This is for her, remember? So we can find her?”
“Okay.” He threw up his hands. “Jessie was abused by a friend of our family. It happened after I joined the Army, and she didn’t tell anyone until later. I’d say most of her art is about processing that trauma.”
“Okay. Okay. Thank you for telling me. I promise I’ll respect her privacy.” She touched his arm, sensing his discomfort. “But this could be helpful.”
“How?”
“It’s another possible connection. Marigold mentioned that Adam has some kind of expertise in dealing with emotional trauma, like what Jessie experienced, and what Naomi Martin did, at the time of the murder and possibly before.”
He wrinkled his forehead. “Sorry, but that sounds like a real stretch. Is trauma that unusual?”
“No. But here’s something else.” She lifted the watercolor so he could fully take it in.
“This artwork is channeling pure nostalgic love, like the happiest time in someone’s life.
If these two kids are in fact the Martin children, and Seth Baker is actually Lloyd Martin, telling Jessie stories about his old life here, why were they so quick to leave? ”
“Didn’t Heather say it was because they were afraid of the gossip?”
“Does that reasoning hold up? What’s your take, Hollywood?”
Jack made a little face. “No one gossips about me. But one of my costars got caught up in a scandal. The paparazzi caught her having dinner with a married A-list star, looking a little too intimate. They camped outside her house. She got swarmed on social media. She had to check into a hotel and disguise herself as a DoorDash driver to get to work. She would have done anything to make it stop. Being the target of gossip sucks.”
“Did she move?”
“No, it blew over and everyone moved onto the next scandal.” He shook his head at the memory and opened the fridge door. “But it sure was hell while it was happening. Want a soda?”
“Exactly my point.” She accepted a can from him, realizing that he was right. They were starting to grow on her. “That’s why I’m not buying that explanation. I think they had another reason to leave.”
“Like what, murder?”
“I’m not saying that. I’m saying I want to talk to her. To Kate Mansfield, as she’s called now.”
“I’m coming,” he said instantly.
Oh shit. She should have known he’d say that. “Not necessary. It’ll be a quick day trip.”
“You’re still recovering from a head injury. I’m coming. Besides, if this sandcastle kid is the guy we’re looking for, there’s no way I’m missing out on this.”
With a sigh, she gave in to the inevitable. If she really hadn’t wanted him to come, she shouldn’t have mentioned it. She took a long swig from the can, making a face as the bubbles hit her nostrils. “I’ll have to figure out a way to question her without setting off any alarms.”
“Now you’re talking my language. Acting.” He paced across the linoleum floor to the window. “She works at a craft shop, right? The obvious thing would be to play a couple on vacation who wants to make a scrapbook of our trip.”
She gave him points for remembering Kate Mansfield ran a craft shop. But she took all those points away for suggesting something so cliché. “Nope. It won’t work. You’re more famous than you think. She might be a fan.”
He tossed back his soda. “Or a hater. You’d be surprised how many people hate Denver Black.”
“What?” The very thought outraged her. “I can’t even comprehend that level of idiocy. Denver Black is the best character—” She broke off under his amused gaze. “We can’t be a couple. You be you, and I’ll be your…assistant.”
He let out a laugh as he tossed his can into a blue recycle bin. “Why would I need an assistant?”
“You don’t have an assistant?” She was genuinely surprised. Didn’t most actors have one?
“Nope. I guess that means the position’s open.
Problem is, I’m not sure you’re right for it.
” With a teasing grin, he settled into a kitchen chair and stretched his legs out, crossing them at the ankles.
“Tell me why you’d make a good assistant, because from where I’m sitting, you’re too much of a boss to make that work. ”
“I’m not a boss. I have a police chief, a chain of command. I’m used to following orders.”
“I bet you hate every second of it.”
She narrowed her eyes at him, irritated that he’d read her so well.
“I don’t mind orders as long as they make sense.
It’s the bad ones that—” She shook herself out of that line of thought.
“We’re getting off track. I’m not applying for a job here.
I can fake being your assistant for an afternoon.
Can you fake being a person who keeps their mouth shut while I do my thing? ”
“Now you’re just being unkind. I might have to call HR on you.” His eyes glinted at her, full of teasing good humor. Although her jaw had automatically tightened, now she felt herself relax.
“You’re an idiot.”
“There you go again. Do I have to put you on probation?”
That did it. She felt laughter swell inside her like a helium balloon.
It came out in a gale of giggles. She knew it was undignified to laugh like this, and not usually her style, but she just couldn’t help it.
His eyes kept twinkling at her, and that grin split his rugged face, and something about his utter comfort with his own goofiness made her relax all the way down to her bones. Her funny bone.
“I ought to rescind your invitation,” she gasped when she finally caught her breath. “I have a bad feeling about this.”
“No, you don’t. You have a good feeling. Look at you, all shiny and happy. It’ll be great. I can give you some acting tips on our way there.”
“I might surprise you. I worked as an office temp before I got my criminal justice degree. I can play the nerdy Asian girl so well it could double as a stripper act.”
He was still laughing at that when his phone rang. He looked at the screen, then signaled that he had to take the call.
She used the opportunity to wander around the first floor of the house to see if he’d missing anything. It seemed unlikely, since he knew the house much better than she did, and he’d been poking around for days.
Part of her was hoping to spot some photos from Jack’s childhood, but she saw none, likely because the house had been rented to someone else for the past few years.
She did find some pencil marks on a post that tracked what heights Jack and Jessie had reached over the years.
That was pretty cute. Wholesome. The kind of thing her Chinese immigrant parents hadn’t done because they were renters who took immaculate care of their apartments until Tina had bought them a house.
Another reminder of how differently she and Jack had grown up.
He came into the living room and saw her looking at that record of his growth spurts. “As you can see, I was a late bloomer. Last one in my class to get tall. That kind of thing can scar a guy.”
“You don’t seem scarred.” Then she reconsidered. “But maybe you are. Is that why you gave Denver Black a literal scar?”
He lifted an eyebrow at her. “They told me chicks love scars. Did they lie?”
“Oh, I get it.” She folded her arms across her chest and gave him an up-and-down scan. “You don’t like to take yourself seriously.”
Something flickered in his eyes, then he held up his phone. “That was my FBI buddy. I received a call here the other night and I was sure it was from Jessie. He traced it for me. Guess where it originated?”
“Don’t make me guess, I fucking hate that. Just tell me.”
His lips quirked. “Here. Sea Smoke Island. If it was Jessie, she’s on the island somewhere.”
“He couldn’t pinpoint it better than that?”
“No.”
She sorted through their options. Should this new information change their plans? “How did you know it was her on the phone?”
“I don’t. I just got that feeling. Jessie and I are really close. But I can’t say for sure. It could have been wishful thinking.”
She knew better than to doubt a brother’s intuition. But she couldn’t consider it actual fact either. “When was this call?”
“The day you got here. It came in after you left that first time.”
“So even if she was on the island then, she might not be now.” She hated to pour cold water on this news, but it had to be said. “I think I should still go to Vermont. But if you want to stay here in case she appears, or if you want to do a door-to-door search—”
“No.” He gave a regretful shake of his head. “It’s not enough to go on. I can’t really trust my instincts at the moment because I’m so worried about her.”
All the teasing humor disappeared from his face, so she could see just how anxious he was feeling. Her heart went out to him, even though she normally tried to operate on a non-emotional level when she was pursuing a case.
“Hey,” she said gently. “Chin up. We’re making progress.”
“Are we? I don’t know. I might need a hug. Is that part of a fake assistant’s job?” One corner of his mouth ticked up in a smile. She could practically see him pull himself out of despair in order to tease her.
She laughed. “Idiot.”