Death With An Ocean View (A Kate Kennedy Mystery Book 1) (15 page)

Twenty-Nine

In the blazing
midday sun, Kate watched as Marlene staggered, almost tumbling into the pool, then ran over to talk to some strange man on the beach. Kate squinted. He seemed vaguely familiar. Putting on her prescription sunglasses, she took a closer look. Timmy! He’d cleaned up some, and had on new clothes, and the baseball cap covered most of his sun-bleached hair, but that was Timmy.

Ugly, unconnected theories whirled through her mind and vied for her attention. Timmy and Marlene were standing under a palm tree, their heads together. Marlene doing most of the talking. Kate felt sick. Why
had
the newsboy called Marlene from Del Ray Beach? And why had he shown up this morning at Stella’s memorial? Kate glanced around, expecting to find all eyes on the odd couple. But no one else seemed to have noticed them. While the mourners waited for the reception to start, Joe, embracing Stella’s urn and flanked by Mary Frances and the mayor, was the center of attention.

When Kate looked again, Timmy was gone.

“So will you join us?” Joe was speaking to her. She steeled herself, trying to focus. Obviously he’d just asked her a question, but she’d been concentrating on Marlene, who seemed to be sleepwalking her way back to the pool area.

“Join you…where?”

“On the sailboat.” Joe sounded annoyed or puzzled. What was he talking about? “After the reception, I’d like you ladies to be part of Stella’s final voyage.”

“We’ll need to wear deck shoes and change our clothes,” Mary Frances said. “And I want to get out of this black dress. I don’t think we should go sailing looking like we’re at a funeral.”

Marlene stepped back into the group. “Of course, Joe, we all want to say a last goodbye to Stella.”

The mayor said, “I’m so sorry I can’t come. I’m heading back to Town Hall now.”

Kate thought Brenda Walters didn’t look quite as attractive in the bright sunlight, but then who did? Every pore showed. And makeup that flattered indoors often turned garish in the cruel light of day. The mayor had tiny white lines around her temples. Face-lift scars. Unlike old soldiers, those scars fade but they never go away.

“However, I’d like all of you to be my guests tonight at the Broward County Main Library. It’s the kickoff cocktail party for the Book Bash. Dave Barry will be there. And the governor.” She paused, then patted Joe’s arm. “This is such a sad day, but I believe Stella would want you to join me tonight.”

Now that was one event Kate didn’t want to miss. But first, she wanted to get her hands on the elusive yearbook and ask her sister-in-law a few questions.

The recreation room’s glass door slid open and the large square-jawed caterer announced, “Soup’s on!” Stella’s mourners formed a double line and moved back inside.

The table that had held the old photographs and the yearbook now boasted a Lazy Susan filled with crudités and various salad dressings.

Don’t panic, she told herself, then did. Yet…the caterers or the undertakers had to have stashed the photos and the yearbook somewhere nearby, right? She sought out Samuel Adams, who was directing traffic to and from the kitchen.

“Where’s Stella’s yearbook?” Kate could hear her high-pitched anxiety. She pointed. “It was on the table over there.”

Adams kept moving. “I carefully packed away those photographs myself. They’re in a box to the right of the lobby door. I didn’t see the yearbook. Mr. Sajak must have it.”

“He only has the urn,” Kate said, her voice catching.

“Well, maybe someone is holding the yearbook for him.” Adams picked up speed, indicating he thought this conversation was over.

An upset Joe Sajak assured Kate he hadn’t assigned the yearbook’s safekeeping to anyone else, then angrily ordered the caterers to go through every box and to empty every trash bag.

And where the devil had Marlene gone?

Apparently, she hadn’t come back inside for the reception.

An hour later when Mary Frances, Joe, and Kate left the reception to change their clothes and get ready to head down to the marina, no one had found the yearbook.

Kate, who’d been helping Joe search, finally accepted that her sister-in-law, like the yearbook, had vanished.

They arrived at the marina minus Marlene. She’d called Joe Sajak from God knows where, explaining that something had come up and she was sorry to have missed the reception, but she would arrive by one fifteen, their estimated time of departure.

So now they were three, Joe in the lead, clutching the urn.

The Fort Lauderdale marina wore its age well. Motor yachts, sloops, trawlers, cigarette boats, and houseboats were among the many crafts berthed at its docks. Under a brilliant blue sky and enough breeze to temper the sunshine, the Atlantic Ocean fore and the Intercoastal aft, the setting was beyond beautiful.

Joe looked at his watch. “One fifteen. Let’s board.”

Mary Frances untied the lines.

At Kate’s look of surprise, she said, “I took a Coast Guard course just as soon as I moved to South Florida.” Her green eyes, twinkling in the sunshine, locked onto Joe’s. “You never know when you’ll meet a sailor, do you?”

Kate came aboard, and Joe hoisted the main as Mary Frances was casting off the last rope.

“Ahoy! I’m here.” Marlene had arrived.

Sailing out to sea, they passed some of the most expensive real estate in the world: mansion after mansion with green lawns and elaborate docks housing sleek white yachts. Joe was a good captain and the thirty-foot Catalina seemed easy to handle. Marlene, still dressed in the caftan that she’d worn to the memorial, was barefoot, her sandals stowed under a seat in the cabin. Kate sat across the deck from Marlene, holding the Persian urn. She hoped it would be a smooth voyage.

With Mary Frances at the wheel and Joe busy with the sails, Kate said, “Where were you, Marlene? I saw you with Timmy, then you disappeared.”

“Lower your voice,” Marlene snapped. “You sound like I’ve committed a crime.”

Kate thought, Well, have you?

“For your information, I was with Detective Carbone. I’d told Timmy to meet me at my car. I didn’t want him going to the police alone.”

Stunned, Kate asked, “What happened?”

“Timmy ran away because he was frightened and felt guilty. He’d delivered a note to Stella, then she was murdered. He figured there had to be a connection. Yesterday afternoon, he’d tried to contact me to ask what he should do. When he couldn’t reach me, he called Oberon, who lived in Del Ray, and who showed up at the phone booth while Timmy was waiting for me to return his call. When he saw you and Mary Frances, he panicked and ran away again. Then today he read that Oberon had committed suicide and he came looking for me.”

“Panic can make us do strange things,” Kate said. “Does Timmy think Oberon was working alone?”

Marlene shook her head. “Wyndam Oberon had been talking to someone on his cell phone when Timmy met
him
Tuesday on the pier. And he overheard Oberon say, ‘Timmy’s here now.’”

The ocean was choppier than Kate had hoped. She’d sailed aboard a good number of boats, but had never been part of a burial at sea. When Joe dropped anchor, she clutched the urn with both hands. Joe gently took it from her and they all stood starboard, the wind to their backs. He opened the urn and held it at arm’s length over the rail, then turned it upside down. “Goodbye, Stella Maris, my star of the sea.” The ashes didn’t really scatter, but rather drifted over the water, like sand in the wind.

As they sailed back in silence, Kate felt compelled to break it. She had to know. “Joe, how did Martin Baum commit suicide?”

Sajak looked angry. Because she’d broken the silence? Or because she’d asked that question? “He shot himself through the head.” Joe sounded flat. His baritone dulled.

“Did anyone ever think it might not have been suicide?”

Joe stared at her. “Only Stella. At first she talked about ‘her theory’ a lot, but then she seemed to forget all about it.” He sighed. “The man killed himself, Kate. You should forget about it too.”

Thirty

One of the
reasons Kate had acquiesced to living in South Florida was the best library in the United States, award-winning Broward County Main Library. Located just off Broward Boulevard in downtown Fort Lauderdale, the library was big, beautiful, modern, and user friendly.

As Kate rode the escalator up to the second-floor cocktail party, she admired its clean lines and cool architecture. Maybe she’d volunteer to spend some time here…if Jeff Stein didn’t offer her a position at the
Palmetto Beach Gazette.
God, what was she thinking?

At least that thought took her mind off murder, albeit temporarily.

Marlene poked her. “We’re here. Stop daydreaming and step off.”

The wide-open space was packed with literary types, their readers, and their wealthy benefactors—the latter two not necessarily being mutually exclusive. Some of South Florida’s millionaires enjoyed having a reading room or a center with their name on a bronze plaque above the door, even if that plaque would be the only item they’d ever read.

The mayor, wearing a narrow black jersey dress and looking as modern and beautiful as the library’s design, greeted Kate and Marlene like old friends.

Kate in a blue silk pantsuit, one of Charlie’s favorites, suddenly felt frumpy. Marlene wore an orange and yellow print that Kate had considered relatively subdued, but now seemed flashy.

Joe and Mary Frances, who’d been talking nonstop since they left Ocean Vista in Marlene’s convertible, joined them. As the mayor took Joe’s right hand in both of hers, she said, “I’m so pleased you came. Let me get you a drink.”

“I can’t get over how much you remind me of someone,” Joe said, “an actress or—”

“Oh, Joe, you flatterer, I’m only Brenda Walters.”

At that instant, Kate’s lost memory hidden behind a senior moment broke out, coming through loud and clear.

“Excuse me,” she said, “there’s something I have to do.” She left the quartet debating what they wanted to drink, and headed around the corner and up the stairs to a bank of computers.

Within a few minutes, she’d brought up BEDFORD FALLS HIGH SCHOOL, clicked on the correct year, and scrolled down to YEARBOOK. She entered SCIENCE HONORS,
and up popped the page with the photograph of Martin Baum and his four honor students.

She zeroed in on the girl with the bumpy nose. Yes! The same eyes, the same heart-shaped face, but in addition to a face-lift, the mayor had also had a nose job. Just as the Pekinese Samantha had become Serendipity, Bea Wernoski had become Brenda Walters and, like so many other name changers, had kept the same initials.

Reveling in her recently restored memory, Kate pictured Stella starting to introduce the mayor as “Bea,” stumbling for a second, then quickly switching to Brenda.

“Kate.” The well-modulated voice caught her off guard. She looked up from the heart-shaped face in the old photograph into the heart-shaped face of Mayor Brenda Walters.

“I’m so sorry, Ballou, we’re going out right now.”

Still dressed in her blue pantsuit, Kate struggled to get the leash on an indignant, yelping, overexcited Ballou. With today’s jam-packed schedule focused on mourning, murder, and the mayor, her poor dog hadn’t been walked since this morning. How could she have been so cruel to the animal she loved?

She’d take Ballou out, talk over her theory with Marlene—who’d agreed to meet her on the beach—then call Carbone. But what if she was dead wrong? After all, her case against the mayor was circumstantial at best. Not a shred of proof other than Stella having almost said “Bea” instead of Brenda, and the mayor having the same heart-shaped face and the same initials as the teenage Bea Wernoski.

The mayor had been both charming and chatty when Kate had looked up from the computer and into her smiling heart-shaped face. If Brenda Walters had caught a glimpse of the Science Club photograph, she certainly gave no indication of anger, or fear, or even concern. She’d only asked what Kate would like to drink. No wonder Kate was questioning her own thought processes. Still…Charlie’s heaven-sent clue and her own now crystal-clear memory of Stella’s slip of the tongue seemed to confirm her theory. And Wyndam Oberon’s “suicide” seemed to be a copycat of Martin Baum’s.

Of course, she hadn’t been able to discuss a word of this turmoil with Marlene because Mary Frances and Joe had been in tow.

“Come on, Ballou, let’s go confer with Auntie Marlene.”

Though it was only eight o’clock, the beach was deserted and dark. Since she usually walked Ballou earlier, Kate hadn’t realized how much darker these early November evenings had become. And with the moon and the stars almost hidden behind clouds in an overcast sky, there appeared to be eerie shadows stalking her in the sand.

Where
was
Marlene? Kate had no choice; Ballou had to go. Now. With her pooper-scooper at the ready, they headed north toward the pier. Maybe Marlene was on the phone with Detective Carbone, making sure Timmy faced no charges. She’d show up. Soon, Kate hoped.

A fog horn sounded in the distance. A boat heading to Port Everglades. Had Stella’s ashes settled into the sea? Into a watery grave. Were the dead lonely? Kate decided that she’d go to the cemetery tomorrow and visit Charlie.

A sharp blow to her head, followed by a powerful shove into the ocean, brought Kate to her knees. As she fought to stand, a wave knocked her down, and she tasted saltwater mixed with blood. She could hear Ballou barking. Strange, he sounded so sad. Then two hands were on her shoulders, pushing her under. She landed face first on the ocean bottom. With sand in her teeth and terror in her heart, she regained her footing and thrust herself upward, gasping for air, only to be struck a second time. Her head pounding, Kate slipped under again, certain she was drowning. Ballou’s barking had faded away.