Murder on Edisto (The Edisto Island Mysteries) (13 page)

She bit the inside of her mouth. Heart aching at what amounted to Jeb’s long-brewing frustration, she realized anything she said would sound like an excuse, or a discount of his concerns. So she suffered his rebuke.

“I’m sorry,” she finally said. “I’ll try to do better.”

“Oh, Mom.” He pivoted to leave then spun back. “You don’t even see what you’ve turned into. Someone told me you puked on the beach this morning. Then I see you drinking again tonight.”

“I didn’t overindulge,” she said.

He shook his head. “People feel sorry for me. Do you know what that feels like?”

Dish towel wound tight in her grasp, she searched for the right words. What would John think of this?

This wasn’t teenage angst or selfishness. Jeb’s lecture wasn’t about what people thought. It was anger infused with love, Jeb clashing with himself over an inability to define what the hell was wrong so he could heal his family. He had no father. She had no husband. Fixing all that was impossible, and they both still struggled with the reality.

She wiped an already clean counter with the towel. “I said I’m sorry.” Rushing to him might only make him refuse her embrace, so she held herself in check. “We’ll get past this,” she finally said.

“Goddamn it, Mom. It’s what you always say.”

What else could she say? Those words had supported her for over two years now. What other words were there? She blinked as she studied the towel, struggling for an answer she hadn’t used before.

Jeb blew out an exaggerated breath, then retreated to his room. Soon muted words traveled through the door, hopefully a call to her father,
please
not to her mother, and please not to his new friends from the beach.

Robotically she returned to her dishes.

What other option was there than simply rising each day to see if she could weather it better than the day before? Jeb’s college, however, would remove him from the tension of watching his mother stuck in some bizarre dimension. School could be his opportunity to cut loose from her and her demons.

She made a new gin and tonic without realizing it. Her fourth in the same number of hours. However, she had eaten, so the effect should be minimal.

Slipping outside to her screened porch, she nestled in the dark, in the same Adirondack chair as the night before. Crap. The record player. This felt like a
Serenade
album night from Neil. Leaving the drink on the wicker table, she hoisted herself up to stand and froze.

A light was on at Papa Beach’s house.

Chapter 11

AT THE SIGHT of lights in Papa’s house, Callie slipped back into her living room, flipped the switch off to avoid being backlit, and peered under a blind, cell phone in hand. She paused before remembering which speed dial number was Seabrook’s. “There’s a light on over there,” she whispered when he answered, staring out in hopes to glimpse the intruder.

“Moving or stationary?” Seabrook asked.

“Stationary,” she said. “I’m headed over there. Wanted someone to know.”

“Hell no, you’re not,” he said. “Give me five minutes. I’ll park two doors down on Jungle Shores. Go out your back door and wait for me at the base of your stairs.”

So he lived that close. Backup did make her feel easier.

After changing into sneakers, she slipped the Glock holster on her waistband. She made her way outside, down the steps, and crouched in the shrubbery to avoid the streetlights.
What had she been thinking?
God, she knew better than to go over there by herself. She didn’t think she’d had that much gin. Soon her phone shimmied, a text saying:
Coming up behind you
.

Seabrook was good for his word. He hugged the shadows and gave two short flashes with a mini-flashlight before joining her. Dark T-shirt and jeans. Deck shoes, she noticed.

“You can see better from my porch,” she whispered as he reached her. “But up there, toward the west corner near the street, you’ll see a hint of the light. No movement.”

“I see it,” he said low, then sniffed. “Is that gin?”

“I’m fine. One drink,” she lied and held up a key. “I can get us in the back door.”

He held up his own key. “We changed the locks.”

They crossed the moonlit yard to Papa’s house and climbed silently to the landing. Seabrook eased open the screen door and placed an ear to the wooden one. They readied their weapons. He gently opened the door. As he pushed it, he turned on a rail-mounted flashlight on his pistol.

Soft forties music filled the air, a slow big band instrumental. Seabrook eased across the kitchen with Callie on his heels. Her gaze briefly rested on the spot where Papa’s body had lain. She quickly refocused as she braced against a shudder.

Someone had wiped up the stain after the coroner released the scene, but the pernicious smell of death lingered, having settled into the fabric of the place. Seabrook and Callie crept on into the living room. He swept right, she left.

A lone lamp shone next to the old recliner, situated in front of the window as if placed to be seen by only Callie. The dated radio serenaded them from its new position on the coffee table, the cord draped across the braided rug from the same outlet as the lamp. The forty-year-old radio seemed centered to entertain the recliner’s occupant.

Callie pushed hair out of her eyes and gripped her weapon, holding her breaths quiet.

They detoured down the hallway, entered each of the three tiny bedrooms, the bath, and checked the linen closet.

“All clear.” Seabrook holstered his gun, shut off the flashlight, and put it in his jeans pocket. He flipped on the nearest overhead switch. “Well, that’s weird as hell.”

Callie walked back up the hallway and halted in the lamp-lit den, scanning the placement of every ashtray, picture, book, and coaster.

Seabrook spoke over her shoulder. “What do you see?”

“Hold on.” Her eyes skimmed the furniture, knickknacks, all the familiar items she’d known for years.

A dozen or more of Papa’s possessions had been rearranged. An ashtray in a new spot. A doily on the sofa instead of the coffee table. Naval histories stacked on an old desk instead of alphabetized in their bookcase. She’d been in the house only a month ago, apart from the murder. Wherever Papa B’s wife had positioned something before her passing, Papa felt it should remain. Someone had chosen to alter that.

The wrecked items from the previous break-in were no more. Pictures on the wall leveled, the broken frames picked up and set on an end table like they awaited mending. Furniture righted.

“You have anybody come in here to straighten up?” she asked.

“Nope,” Seabrook said. “Tape’s still on the front door. Locks changed.”

Like tape stopped anybody. Like a key couldn’t be copied. Like a locksmith wouldn’t saunter right in at the request of someone he trusted to have the proper authority. Or, like the proper authority wouldn’t consider having some fun of his own.

“He straightened up, then moved things around, as if to claim this place as his own,” she said.

Seabrook scratched his head. “But who?”

Callie scouted the room one more time. “Papa’s son is in Florida. Maybe Peters? Any of your people? A greedy real estate agent? Somebody who could enter your office and give a good excuse you’d believe for the key. Or your receptionist.”

“Are you always so suspicious of everyone?”

If he only knew. “It can save lives, believe me,” she mumbled, scanning harder.

What
was
the damn situation here? Callie reminded herself to call Stan in the morning, to see what he found out about Henry Beechum’s past. This extension of the original break-in reeked personal. But personal against Papa, or personal against her? Who else would have seen that light and reacted?

Or did someone love Papa and sneak in to relive his memories?

“Who came to see him when he was alive?” she asked. “A lady friend? Another child, um, person like me?”

Seabrook shook his head. “Nobody I know of. Henry either went out to see somebody or stayed home alone. Thought you’d know that.”

But I always came to see him
, she thought.
We met in his house because my parents were always in mine.

“I’ll call it in to the county,” Seabrook said. “Forensics will wait until tomorrow. If they think I need to stay here until they arrive, I will.”

Would it be so selfish to hope he stood vigil? Something threatened to unravel inside her, and she didn’t like it. Not over a stupid lamp and old music.

They entered the kitchen, Seabrook punching in a number on his cell.

“Shit,” Callie whispered, then, “Shit!”
out loud.

Seabrook stiffened and broke the call. “What?”

Two coffee cups sat on the dinette. She touched the back of her hand to the cup nearest her. “Still warm. Check the coffeepot.”

Seabrook shook his head as he felt the cold machine. “Coffee smell would’ve hit us when we walked in.”

“Wait.” She eyed the cups closer. Oh no. “This one’s tea.”

Seabrook stared into the second cup. “This isn’t tea.”

“No, it wouldn’t be. We visited Chelsea Morning in the cooler months, because Daddy rented it in the summer. Papa always fixed me hot chocolate.” On the kitchen counter, the box of hot chocolate and box of tea bags still remained in place, just as they’d been the day she found Papa’s body. Sweet Jesus. This had to be the same guy. And he’d connected the dots about her friendship with her old friend. Her pulse quickened as she stared at the ceramic white mug, the café’s logo in black on its side, above the words
The Original Italian Caffe
. “And that cup is mine.”

“Maybe you left it here?” he said. “Let’s not stretch our imaginations too far.”

“No,” Callie said, recalling the Cioccolato Caldo she drank in it, the hot chocolate actually reminding her of Papa Beach when she ordered it.

She pressed her back against the refrigerator.
Someone had entered her house
. Had they hidden in a closet? Watched her undress? She slid down the appliance into a crouch. “I brought that cup with me from Boston. John bought it on our ninth wedding anniversary as a memento from Vittoria Caffe in the North End.”

Her chest tightened, pants going shallow. As she opened her eyes, Seabrook stooped in front of her. “Let’s slow down and think about this.”

She searched his green eyes. “I found my front door unlocked today. When I got home from talking to you.”

Concern etched his features.

“I’d just unpacked that cup. Someone’s been in my house,” she repeated. “Jeb didn’t forget to lock the door. Someone got in. This is all about me.”

“No,” he said, placing both hands over hers and lowering them from under her chin. “We don’t know that. It could be a joke because someone knows you’re an ex-cop. Maybe . . .” He hunted the room for ideas.

The aroma of gunpowder came back to her. Papa distorted, broken. The waiting cups for their one-on-one. “Who else besides me would know about tea and hot chocolate,” she said, her voice soft, “except someone who’d seen Papa’s murder crime scene?”

Seabrook drew back. “You think his murderer put this show on for you?”

“Or a cop,” she added, trying to recall the faces of the uniforms. There weren’t that many.

“Maybe it’s an asshole with a bad sense of humor. Still, change all your locks tomorrow, okay?”

“Don’t patronize me,” she said. “I’m a pro at watching my back. My biggest flaw is listening to people ordering me to chill, telling me
not
to look over my shoulder so much. That’s exactly when they make their move.” She jerked away from Seabrook. “Nobody around here would understand—” Blood rushed from her face. She jumped up. “This is a diversion. Jeb!”

She flew outside and ran home, kicking up shells and sand, her Glock drawn, Seabrook’s footsteps keeping up behind her.

Goddamn it!
The oldest trick in the universe. Distract, then snatch. Or kill.

As she fumbled with her key, she kicked the back door. “Jeb! Answer me! Jeb!”

The door flew open . . . and slammed into an obstacle. “Jeb—”

Her son hobbled about on one leg, frowning. “Mom! You ran the door over my foot!”

“Have you heard anything? Seen an intruder?” she asked.

“No. I’ve been in my room. What’s happened?”

“Don’t go outside.”

Seabrook waited in the doorway.

Callie pointed at him, shaking her finger with emphasis on each word. “Shut that door. And lock it!”

The cop obeyed as told. Jeb moved toward Seabrook, glancing at him then back at his mother, waiting for someone to explain. In the meantime, Callie hurried room to room and anchored every opening to Chelsea Morning.

With nothing else to secure, her mouth so dry her tongue stuck to her teeth, she burst back into the kitchen. She opened cabinets, making sure the mug was gone, as if she needed assurance. Her glances darting around her home, she didn’t know what else to do. Someone
had
violated her place, and she wondered what else was gone, or what he’d seen. Eyes seemed to peer at her from every corner, shadow, and crevice.

Someone picked her lock. If she did change them, when would she know to change them again? A riding sense of futility filled her chest like indigestion.

“Someone stole a cup from here and planted it at Beechum’s house to freak out your mother,” Seabrook said.

Jeb sat on a barstool next to a standing Callie. “What the hell, Mom?”