Murder on Edisto (The Edisto Island Mysteries) (19 page)

Chapter 15

IN SPITE OF THE early hour, locals, tourists, and renters jammed Whaley’s lot from Neptune to Billow Street and all along Myrtle. The only tables open were tall bistros in the middle of the floor. Half the patrons and all the staff knew Mason.

“Hey, Maple Leaf!”

“Mason, I’m ready to party!”

“What you importing for us this week?”

“I’ll be there, dude.”

He acknowledged them all, women and men, with a wink and a grin before a chivalrous act of sliding out Callie’s chair.

“You’re popular,” she said.

“Free alcohol and food tends to do that. But I have no family, so why not enjoy life with people wherever I go?”

Especially on the beach where parties carried status. She hadn’t eaten at Whaley’s in a couple of years. Their shrimp platter could talk Northerners into loving grits, so she ordered the dish to remind her of what she’d missed living in New England. Yankee seafood was so different than Lowcountry cuisine.

“Flounder for me,” Mason said to the waitress. “Bring us the boiled peanuts appetizer. Vodka tonic for me and a grape soda for the lady.”

Unique choice of drink, but Callie could enjoy something creative since swearing off gin. Voices ran loud. Kids talked the loudest. She’d forgotten the ambience of this place with its dated photographs hung amongst mounted fish. She settled, elbows on the tall table. “So what else have you heard, rumor man?”

“Something about break-ins,” Mason replied, scooting his chair closer to be heard. “And that the acting chief of police has a new trainee.” He grinned wide. “Some interfering woman from up north.”

Her nerves relaxed; she enjoyed being back in commission. “If a rumor’s not juicy enough, people feel the need to embellish. Truth is, I’m helping Seabrook since he’s short of boots on the ground, but I haven’t helped much. He’s catching some sleep after we spoke late last night.” She sniffed. “And I’m a far cry from a trainee.”

Mason crinkled his mouth. “Last night? I’m intrigued.”

“Sure you are.”

The waitress served their drinks, leaving Mason with a wink.

Callie waited for the girl to leave before she leaned in. “Another break-in at the Beechum place. Seabrook was there all night after leaving my house.” She took a swig of her drink.
Chew that one over, Mason
.

Mason cocked his head. “Your house?”

“Yes.” She sniffed her drink and took another sip. “Thought this was grape soda.” She grabbed the menu. “
Grape vodka, Sprite, and cranberry juice
. Not funny, Mr. Howard. I was trying to abstain.”

He pulled the glass away from her. “Don’t drink it then.”

She retrieved it. “Just one,” she said. “Almost reminds me of third grade.”

He smiled. “How many break-ins are you up to?”

She removed her own house from the count, embarrassed to have been caught off guard, but she also didn’t want the world to consider her vulnerable. The rest of the break-ins were rampant island news anyway. “Three if you count Sophie, plus the murder.” She took a moment to enjoy the grape flavor, recalling recess on swings, pumping her legs, pretending her eight-year-old feet walked on clouds.

The waitress brought the appetizer, and Callie dove into the boiled peanuts, complimenting Mason for being Canadian and still enjoying Southern food, and kidding him for having no accent to go with it. Fifteen minutes later, she noticed he’d eaten only a few of the soggy legumes, like a person who hadn’t grown up on them. Apparently, he’d ordered them for her. Nice touch. Seabrook
did
warn the man was smooth.

The din of the place amplified as customers crammed into extra chairs around tables, at the bar, squeezing into seats in corners. Callie accepted one more grape soda, which seemed to last a long time until she realized Mason had bought her a third. She learned about the Canadian restaurant business, but he evaded chitchat about himself. He could talk details about the bartender, the fifty-something lady at the bar, and the couple snuggled in the corner, more than the normal transient beachcomber should be able to. He knew more about her than was comfortable.

The conversation always came back to
her
, a couple times catching her unawares as she spoke of Boston and briefly about John. Mason took it all in with a sensitive attentiveness.

She had to admit she’d missed the flirtatious bob and weave and the occasional glance from a man observing her body.

“How well do you know Don Raysor?” she asked, returning to business. Raysor seemed over-the-top disgruntled about her presence, and maybe Mason knew why.

“Stereotypical southern bubba throwing that tub belly around,” he said. “Few like him around here.”

“He sure doesn’t like me.”

“You’re a woman cop,” he said.

“Any secrets on him?” she asked, sipping her drink.

Mason shook his head. “Nobody’s told me anything. I think he used to be married, but not sure what happened with that.”

“Guess you’ll have to work harder on your intel.”

Mason knew little about the red-faced man from up the road other than as a member of Colleton County Sheriff’s Department. Raysor came from Walterboro, an hour away, distant enough to protect his lifestyle, past, and whatever he did on the side.

“Who’s the guy repairing your steps?” Mason asked, adjusting his voice to barroom level. “Sure gets loud in here, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah,” she yelled. “Jack Peters. He starts in the morning. Ever use him?”

He shrugged. “I’m in someone else’s rental, remember? But from what I hear, I don’t trust him.”

“Seabrook thinks he’s safe enough.”

Mason grimaced. “I’m not a big
Seabrook
fan, either.”

The sour response interrupted the casualness between them. The best course of action would be to give him credence for it. “Well, since you’re so into the underground, what’s wrong with Peters? And then tell me what irritates you about our acting chief.”

He leaned on his hand, two fingers up the side of his cheek, coolly watching her. “Peters is too loose for my taste. These people give him too much liberty, and I don’t understand why. He showers and eats in a lot of their homes. Like the community uncle.”

Mason’s concerns had merit per her personal and professional canons. “Everyone does seem to trust him.”

“Too much.” Mason swirled his drink.

Then he smiled, and she liked the softened facial lines. No stranger to the sun, his dark brows were bleached a shade lighter, his hair streaked. An outdoorsy individual whose financial means afforded him latitude to enjoy beaches, mountains, wherever he felt the urge to roam. She bet all his travails had a Mother Nature flavor versus urban glass and steel.

She wondered what Stan would make of this guy.

“Mike,” Mason started, “isn’t a bad guy as a whole, but he’s damaged. I see him as a perpetual bachelor after what happened to his wife. Too wounded.”

“He didn’t really kill his wife, did he?” She’d said it too low to be heard over the noise, but Mason seemed to read her lips.

“No, home invasion,” he said. “Murdered while he was at the hospital. In Charleston, I believe.”

Her eyes widened at the sharp pain of empathy. How could she have been around Mike and not felt the connection? She understood the deep, empty hole in his life and now the lack of pictures on his desk.

Dragging her glass closer, she cradled it, remembering the guilt at not saving John. Routine had separated her just far enough from him for life to go crazy, just like with Mike . . . er . . . Seabrook.

“Did they catch the killer?” she asked.

“No. And he blamed himself for not being there.” He reached across the table and stroked the back of her hand with a finger. “Heard he went almost nuts trying to solve the case. They let him go from his position, or he quit, I don’t know, but he became a cop to hunt for the guy. He still has his mission, from what I hear. For obvious reasons, Charleston wouldn’t hire him, so he came here.”

Seabrook ran toward law enforcement, and she ran away from it, after similar circumstances. “Poor guy. How long ago?”

Mason’s smile changed to dismay. “How insanely stupid of me, Callie.”

His embarrassment pulled her back to the present. After wiping her damp fingers on a napkin, she placed them in her lap. He didn’t have to tell her what he was embarrassed about. “It’s okay, Mason.”

“I didn’t think. You asked about Seabrook, and I answered with no consideration of his privacy or your similar past.” He clasped her hand between his damp, warm palms. “My deepest apology.”

Clever or sincere? She wasn’t sure.

“Well,” she said and drew back to recover. She lifted the menu. “You can make up for it with dessert.”

“Let me.” Taking the menu, he held up a finger to catch the waitress’s eye.

“Ticket?” the young girl asked.

He flashed that bright smile, which drew out one from the girl. “Not yet,” he said. “Bring us a big slice of your Bananas Foster cheesecake and two forks.”

Twenty minutes later, Callie scraped the last smear of caramel rum sauce off the plate. She asked what Mason did in his spare time, apart from jogging, and he diverted to trivia about residents. She tried to enter into a story-swapping routine, and Mason soon laughed at one of her Southern redneck tales, with none of his own.

She was about to try interrogating him again when a noisy brawny guy entered to a dozen “Hey, Fred” greetings. A car pulled into the parking lot and parked with headlights blazing into the front door, causing her to squint. They shut off, but her breath caught. The disappearing sun had turned the day to dusk.

“What’s wrong?” Mason asked, searching the place for what had suddenly incapacitated her.

“I have to get home.” She jumped from her seat, fingers gliding along the edge of the round table for balance. “I don’t stay out after dark.” But she wasn’t sure how she’d face going home, either. That long approach, turning the corner, praying not to see that glow.

Mason threw some bills on the table and placed her purse on her shoulder. “If you weren’t so frightened, I’d kid you about turning into a pumpkin, but you’re ten shades of pale, Callie.”

“Just get me home.”

Outside, the thick salty night air had cooled the evening. Staring at her shoes, she settled in the Jag. Mason came around to the driver’s side after retrieving an item from the trunk. “Here,” he said, setting a lightweight blanket in her lap.

He touched Classical on his satellite radio, and Brahms floated around the interior. “Think about a bubble bath, candles, white roses. Smell the roses?”

“I shouldn’t have come,” she mumbled into the cotton pressed against her hot face as the car’s tires spit gravel.

As the Jag made its way to Chelsea Morning
,
the Canadian talked to her, transporting her someplace else full of soft towels and violins. He painted descriptions of flowers on a counter and deep, deep carpet. Chocolate in a bone china bowl. Wine on the edge of the tub. Her brain was scrambled, yet he laid stepping stones before her, guiding her home to safety.

Soon, with instructions on where to place her feet, she recognized her own porch, gave Mason the keys, then relaxed as he lifted the blanket away inside her foyer.

“What time is it?” she asked.

“Nine thirty,” he said, folding the blanket.

She blew out long, releasing pressure. “Thanks so very much, Mason.”

Pain crossed his face. “Not earned, I’m afraid. I didn’t take you seriously about the dark.”

“My problem. It was a lovely date nonetheless.”

His pleasant smile rested on her. He set the blanket on her credenza, and without any misgivings, leaned over and placed both hands on her cheeks. The kiss was tender, assuring, and quickly done.

“I had a wonderful time,” he said. “Sure you won’t come to my Friday gathering?”

She nodded toward the door, his eyes following.

He grinned in acknowledgement. “Oh, the evening issue,” he said. “I could put a tasteful scarf on your head coming and going. Even carry you to your door, m’lady.”

The drinks weighed on her, the kiss still lingering on her lips. The date was sweet, but . . . “I’ll let you know. I’m not much of a party girl.”

“Hopefully I can entice you to accept before summer’s end. Good night, my dear.”

She smiled, enjoying the word
dear
for the first time in her life. “Good night.”

After securing the door, she leaned against it and exhaled. Gracious, she’d been a fool falling apart like that. But the dinner had been fun.

She flopped on the bed, grinning, anxious to tell Stan she’d finally been wined and dined. Tonight her nightmares just might be sweetened by the evening.

JOLTING OUT OF bed, Callie poised in the middle of her blue braided bedroom rug, her Glock tight in shaky hands. She waited rock-still, listening for the next shot.

Another crack, then another.

“Mom?” Jeb yelled from his bedroom. “What’s going on?”

“Get in the closet until I tell you to come out.”

“But—”

“Just do it, Jeb!”

Heart pounding, she moved deftly to the front door.

Then she quietly cursed. Peters hammered nails into her porch steps with an effort that belied his laissez-faire appearance.

Her forearm muscles went lax and lowered the weapon she’d snatched from under her pillow. “It’s okay. He’s a contractor I hired to repair and paint the stairs. Go back to bed.”